The Odes of Pindar (Penguin ed.)

by Cecil Bowra

  That riches like that and such great glory

  [60] Were ever yet surpassed by the older Hellenes,

  The fond fool struggles in vain.

  I will climb to the flowery bows

  And make noise of your greatness.

  Youth asks for courage in the terrors of war:

  And thence you won

  Your infinite renown.

  [65] Fighting now in the charging cavalry,

  Now with the men on foot.

  Your riper age’s wisdom

  Gives me a theme, where without peril I sound

  The whole gamut of praise.

  Good-bye. This song

  I am sending, like a Phoenician merchant, over the grey sea.

  And on the Kastoreion’s Aeolian mood, so please you,

  Look: turn to it, if ever

  [70] You liked my seven-stringed harp.

  O find, and be, yourself! ‘O that

  Lovely ape!’ cry the children, ‘O how

  IV

  Lovely!’ But Rhadamanthys has found bliss,

  Because his judgement bore him fruit without cavil,

  And his heart in him has no pleasure in lies,

  [75] The constant retinue of crafty whispering men.

  – Whom you cannot fight, and they spoil two lives,

  Sly hinters of slander,

  Their minds exceedingly like foxes’ minds.

  Yet Lady Vixen was not so cunning for once –

  Let the rest of the tackle toil in the sea’s depth, I

  [80] Am the cork that rides the surge. I’ll get no ducking!

  He cannot throw his word like a man

  In honest company, your twisting knave –

  He fawns upon all, weaving fine threads of mischief.

  My boldness is not his. Let me love my friend,

  But if I must fight my foe, I’ll be wolf and make for his legs,

  [85] I’ll be here and there, and twist and turn!

  And yet, whoever governs, way is made

  For the straight-spoken man;

  Where one is king, or when a city is overwatched

  By the brute multitude, or by the wise.

  No man must fight with God,

  Who exalts now those, then to others anon

  He will give great splendour. But that

  [90] Is little comfort for envious minds.

  They strain at a course they cannot stay,

  And the sharp wound is in their heart, or ever

  Their careful schemes come right.

  Let them take the yoke on their neck

  And bear it lightly: it were best.

  [95] To kick against the goads is the way

  To come sprawling. – May I have the regard

  Of the noble, and be with them.

  Pythian II, like Pythian III and Isthmian II, is not a true Epinician but a poetical letter, sent probably in 468 B.C. to Hieron who has just won the chariot-race at Olympia and asked not Pindar but Bacchylides to celebrate it. Pindar attributes this rebuff to slanderers at Hieron’s Court and, while protesting his admiration and affection for Hieron, lets himself go in denouncing these sycophants.

  3 Pindar writes the poem in Thebes and sends it to Syracuse.

  4–8 To win the chariot-race at Olympia was regarded as the highest possible success.

  9 The ‘archeress maiden’ is Artemis.

  12 The ‘Trident-lifter’ is Poseidon.

  15 Kinyras is mentioned as an example of a man whom the Gods love. He was a priest-king at Paphos in Kypros and loved alike by Apollo and Aphrodite.

  18–20 Hieron has recently saved Western Lokris from Kroton.

  31–2 Ixion killed his father-in-law, Eioneus, but was forgiven by the Gods.

  21–48 Myth of Ixion, on the theme of ingratitude. Pindar seems to indicate with what horror he regards it and so disclaims being guilty of it. We may also detect a latent hint that Hieron is more likely to be guilty of ingratitude than Pindar.

  33–4 Ixion assaults Hera, but a cloud takes her place, from which (42 ff.) a monstrous being, Kentauros, is born. From this and the mares on Pelion are born the Centaurs. Kentauros is Pindar’s own invention, intended to soften the violence of the Centaurs’ origin.

  53 ff. Pindar does not wish to be accused of having a sharp tongue, and quotes the sad precedent of Archilochos, a poet of the early seventh century, who was renowned for his savage quarrels.

  68 The song sent by Pindar ‘like a Phoenician merchant’ comes, as it were, on approval, to remind Hieron of what kind of poet Pindar is.

  69 Pindar asks Hieron to look at some earlier song that he has written for him.

  72 Hieron must be his true self on the lines of the Delphic motto ‘Know thyself’.

  72 The sudden break in the tone and sequence indicates the degree of Pindar’s resentment. The ancient commentators say that the ape is Bacchylides, who wrote his Ode V for this occasion and certainly imitates Pindar in what might be thought an ape-like way.

  73 Against the slanderers Pindar sets Rhadamanthys, judge of the dead, as the ideal of fairness and honesty.

  78 The slanderers do themselves no good, and Pindar is untouched by them.

  86 Pindar will speak his mind freely, no matter what the form of government is.

  90 The slanderers again. It is not quite clear in what pursuit they hurt themselves, and the point of the words is that in Greek ‘strain’ and ‘wound’ echo the same sound.

  Olympian IX

  For Epharmostos of Opous, winner in the wrestling

  I

  Archilochos’ tune that rang at Olympia,

  The threefold, loud song of victory,

  Was enough to guide to Kronos’ Hill

  Epharmostos in triumph with his own companions;

  [5] But now from the long-range Muses’ bow

  Sweep with arrows like these

  Zeus of the scarlet thunderbolt

  And Elis’ holy peak,

  Which of old the Lydian hero, Pelops,

  [10] Won as Hippodameia’s most beautiful dowry,

  And shoot a sweet feathered arrow at Pytho.

  The words you handle

  Will not fall to the ground,

  When you make the harp strings tremble

  For a man’s wrestling, who comes

  From glorious Opous. Praise herself and her son;

  [15] She belongs to Right

  And her daughter great in glory,

  Saviour Lawfulness.

  She flowers in acts of prowess

  By your stream, Kastalia, and by Alpheos.

  Thence the pick of all garlands exalts in glory

  [20] The Lokrians’ mother among her shining trees.

  On that dear city

  I kindle light with flaming songs,

  [25] And faster than thoroughbred horse or ship on the wing

  I shall send this news to every quarter,

  If by fate’s device I dwell

  In a choice garden of the Graces.

  They give delightful things, but ’tis their destinies

  That makes men noble and wise.

  II

  For how could Herakles

  [30] Have brandished a club in his hands against the trident,

  When Poseidon stood over Pylos and drove on him,

  And Phoibos drove, shaking his silver bow?

  Nor did Death keep the rod unshaken

  With which he brings down

  [35] The bodies of men to the hollow street of the dying?

  Fling this tale away, my lips!

  For to revile the Gods is an odious art,

  And to boast beyond measure

  Is a tune for the song of madness.

  [40] Babble not now of such things. Put aside

  Every battle and war of Immortals.

  Lend your tongue to Protogeneia’s town,

  Where Zeus of the flashing thunderbolt decreed

  That Pyrrha and Deukalion

  Should come down fro
m Parnassos

  And set their first home. Without wedlock

  [45] They made a single race

  Of a generation of stones:

  They were called People.

  Awake for them the liquid path of words;

  Praise an old wine, but the blossoms of songs

  That are new. They say that the power

  [50] Of waters flooded the black earth,

  But Zeus planned that an ebb

  Should suddenly check the tide. From them

  Were your brazen-shielded ancestors

  Begotten in the beginning, children

  [55] Of the daughters of Iapetos’ stock

  And Kronos’ mighty sons,

  Kings in the land for ever,

  III

  Until the prince of Olympos

  Plucked Opous’ daughter from the Epeians’ land

  And slept with her secretly

  In the Mainalian Hills

  And brought her to Lokros,

  [60] Lest the years overtake him

  With the doom of a childless breed.

  But his bride held the mightiest seed, and the hero

  Was pleased when he saw the son she brought him,

  And named him after his mother’s father,

  [65] A man surpassing in beauty and action.

  He gave him the people and city to govern.

  To him came strangers

  From Argos and Thebes, Arkadians and Pisatans also,

  But above all newcomers he honoured

  Menoitios, Aktor’s child and Aigina’s,

  [70] Whose son went with the Atreidai to Teuthras’ plain

  And stood with Achilles

  Alone, when Telephos routed the strong Danaoi

  And fell on the sea-going prows.

  He taught wise men to learn

  [75] Of Patroklos’ valiant heart.

  Then Thetis’ son begged him

  Never in murderous war

  To take a post far away

  From his own man-conquering spear.

  [80] May I find words to lead others

  And be fit to ride in the Muses’ chariot.

  May daring and power follow me in abundance.

  By his prowess and office I come

  To champion Lampromachos’ crowns at the Isthmos,

  Since both are conquerors

  IV

  [85] In their task on a single day.

  Twice again was the joy of victory theirs

  In the gates of Korinth,

  And for Epharmostos in Nemea’s valley.

  At Argos he won fame among men,

  And as a boy at Athens;

  And what a fight he put up at Marathon,

  [90] When dragged away from the striplings,

  With older men for the silver cups.

  In his fast crafty twists

  He slipped not but beat down his rivals,

  But to what cheers he went round the ring,

  Being young and beautiful,

  And most beautiful what he had done.

  [95] Then to the Parrhasian people

  His marvels were made known

  At the feast of Zeus Lykaios.

  At Pellana he won the warm remedy against cold winds.

  Iolaos’ tomb is witness,

  And Eleusis by the sea, to his glory.

  [100] What nature gives is in every way best, but many

  Have tried to win renown

  By taking lessons in prowess.

  If a God is not there, nothing

  Is worse for being kept in silence, for some roads

  [105] Go farther than others. No single training

  Will look after all of us.

  All skills are steep, but bring this prize

  And boldly roar aloud

  [110] That by divine will this man has been born

  Strong of hand, lithe of limb,

  With valour in his eyes,

  And by his victory, Aias Ileus’ son,

  In your feast he has crowned our altar.

  Olympian IX was written in 466 B.C. and sung at the victor’s home in Opous, two years after his Olympian victory.

  1–4 At the actual time of victory at Olympia Epharmostos had to be content with the simple victory-song attributed to Archilochos in which the main feature was the three times repeated refrain.

  9–10 The story touched upon is told in Olympian I.

  11–12 Epharmostos won the wrestling at the Pythian Games in 466 B.C. and this would be fresh news when the poem was composed.

  29–40 Pindar rejects stories that Herakles fought against the Gods.

  41–79 The myth falls into two parts, (i) the flood which destroyed the first race of men, except for Deukalion and Pyrrha, who created a new race; (ii) the origins of Patroklos, the friend of Achilles.

  41 Protogeneia is the daughter of Deukalion and Pyrrha and the ancestress of the new race of men.

  46 Pindar plays on the words las, ‘stone’, and laos, ‘people’.

  53 The ancestors of Epharmostos were kings of Lokris, and descended from Zeus and Kambysa (58).

  58 The daughter of Opous is Kambysa, or a second Protogeneia.

  70 The son of Menoitios is Patroklos.

  71 Teuthras and Telephos (72) were kings of Mysia.

  84 Epharmostos’ brother won in the Isthmian Games on the same day as Epharmostos in the Olympian.

  85–99 A list of Epharmostos’ victories.

  89 At Marathon he seems to have been taken forcibly from the boys and made to compete with the mature men.

  97 The ‘warm remedy’ was a woollen garment.

  100 Pindar states his usual belief in breeding.

  112 The ceremony takes place at the altar of the younger Aias.

  Nemean VII

  For Sogenes of Aigina, winner in the boys’ five events

  I

  Eleithyia, seated at the side

  Of the deep-thoughted Fates,

  Daughter of strong and mighty Hera, listen,

  Bringer of children to birth.

  Without you we see not the day or the black night,

  Nor find your sister, bright-limbed Youth.

  [5] But not for like ends do we all draw breath;

  As many as men are the different destinies

  That yoke each to his doom and hold him.

  By your help Thearion’s son,

  Sogenes, has been proved in valour,

  And song proclaims him victorious

  Among winners of the Five Events.

  – He dwells in the song-loving city

  [10] Of the Aiakidai, the spear-strikers.

  They are glad to look after

  A heart well trained in the struggle.

  If any man’s actions prosper, he strikes

  A honey-hearted well of the Muses’ streams.

  Even high deeds of bravery

  Have a great darkness if they lack song;

  We can hold a mirror to fine doings

  In one way only,

  [15] If with the help of Memory in her glittering crown

  Recompense is found for labour

  In echoing words of song.

  Wise sailors have learned

  Of the wind that conies on the third day,

  And lust for profit brings them to no harm.

  The rich man and poor man together

  [20] Come to death’s boundary.

  But I hold that the name of Odysseus

  Is more than his sufferings

  Because of Homer’s sweet singing;

  II

  For on his untruths and winged cunning

  A majesty lies.

  Art beguiles and cheats with its tales,

  And often the heart of the human herd is blind.

  [25] If it could have seen the truth,

  Aias would not, in wrath about armour,

  Have driven a smooth sword through his breast.

  After Achilles he was the strongest in battle

  Of all who
were sent in fast ships

  To fetch his wife for brown-haired Menelaos

  By the speeding breath of the straight West Wind

  [30] To Ilos’ city. To all comes

  The wave of death and falls unforeseen

  Even on him who foresees it.

  But honour grows for the dead

  Whose tender repute a God fosters.

  One came, a Champion,

  To the great navel of broad-bosomed earth,

  – In the floor of Pytho he lies –

  [35] Neoptolemos. He sacked Troy’s city,

  Where the Danaoi also toiled.

  He sailed away and missed Skyros;

  In their wanderings they came to Ephyra.

  For a little time he was king in Molossia,

  [40] And his race always holds this honour.

  He went to the God with wealth from the loot of Troy,

  And there he fell in a fight

  Over a victim’s flesh,

  And a man struck him with his sword.

  III

  His Delphian hosts were exceedingly grieved at it,

  But he paid what was foreordained.

  It was doomed that one of the royal Aiakidai

  [45] Should stay for ever within the ancient place

  By the God’s well-walled house;

  He should remain and see right conduct

  Of the heroes’ processions and multitudinous sacrifices.

  For honour and justice three words shall suffice:

  No lying witness, Aigina,

  [50] Watches over the doings

  Of sons sprung from you and Zeus.

  I make bold to say this –

  For shining successes

  The royal road of words begins at home.

  Yet in every task a pause is sweet;

  Even honey cloys,

  And Aphrodita’s delicious flowers.

  Each of us differs in blood

  And has a separate life;

  [55] One man has this, and one that.

  No man can have the luck to win good fortune entire.

  I cannot tell

  To whom Fate has given this end for certain.

  But to you, Thearion, she grants

  A right moment of happiness:

  In you who have found daring to do well

  [60] She spoils not the mind’s understanding.

  I am a guest. I keep black reproach away.

  I shall bring true glory like running water

  To the man that I love, and praise him.

  This reward is right for the noble.