The Odyssey - Book 3 Reading

Deodacy of Homer, book 3, telemocus with Nestor. Leaving the waters of the splendid east, the sun leapt up into the brazen firmament to bring light to the immortals, and to mortal men on the fruitful earth. The travellers now came to Pylos, the stately citadel of Nalios, where they found the people on the seashore sacrificing jet black bulls to preside in, Lord of the Earthquake, God of the Sable locks. There were nine companies seated there, with 500 men in each, and every company had nine bulls to sacrifice. They had just tasted the victim's entrails, and were burning the thigh bones in the God's honour, as the travellers brought their trim ship to land. The crew brailed up and filled the sail, more their vessel, and disembarked with the Athena leading the way. Telemocus was the last to leave. The goddess with the flashing eyes turned to him now, and said, "Telemocus, you must forget your diffidence, there is no occasion for it here at all. Why have you crossed the seas if not to find out where your father's bones lie buried and how he met his end?" Go straight up then to Nestor, the Tamer of Horses, where you're here to learn the wisdom hidden in his heart. But you yourself must appeal to him to tell you the honest truth, though a man as wise as he is will not lie. But mentor, the thoughtful telemocus asked, "How am I to go up to him? How shall I greet him? I have had no practice in making speeches. It is embarrassing for a young man to question one so much his senior." Telemocus replied bright out of theina, "Where your own intelligence fails, a God will inspire you." But I think the gods have blessed both your birth and your progress to manhood. With this palisothena led off quickly, and telemocus followed in the steps of the goddess, till they reached the place where the people of Pylos were assembled. They are sat Nestor with his sons. Their followers around them were piercing meat with skewers or roasting it in preparation for the banquet. But as soon as they caught sight at the strangers, they all made a move in their direction, took them by the hand and invited them to join them. Nestor's son, Pysastratus, who was the first to reach them, took them both by the hand and gave them places at the banquet on Downey Fleeces, spread over the sandy beach, near his brother Thrasimedes and his father. Then he helped them to the victims in their parts, filled the golden cup with wine, and welcomed palisothena, daughter of Zeus who bears the Aegis, with these words. Pray to the God, my friend, this feast that you find us holding is in the Lord Poseidon's honor. When you have made your drink offering and your prayer as a right dictate, pass on the cup of maloed wine to your companion here, so that he may do the same. For he too must be a worshiper of the immortal gods of whom all men stand in need, but since he is the younger, in fact a man of my own age, I hand this golden beaker to you first. And he placed the cup of sweet wine in Athena's hands. The goddess was delighted at the good manners which the young man had shown in giving her the golden beaker first, and at once began an earnest prayer to the Lord Poseidon. Hear me, Poseidon, sustainer of earth, and do not grudge us, your suppliance, the fulfillment of your wishes. First of all, grant glory to Nestor and his sons, consider next these others, and recompense all in pilots for their sumptuous offerings. Grant lastly that telemicus and I may successfully accomplish the task that brings us here in a swift black ship and afterwards reach home safely. So the goddess prayed, and as each petition left her lips, she herself made its fulfillment sure. Then she passed the fine two handled beaker to telemicus, and Odysseus' son repeated her prayers. The art of flesh from the victims was now roasted and drawn off the spits. Portions were carved for all, and they began this sumptuous feast. When they had satisfied their appetite and thirst, Nestor, the greenian charioteer said, "Now that our visitors have eaten well, it is the right moment to put some questions to them and inquire who they are. Who are you friends? From what port have you sailed over the highways of the sea? Is yours a trading venture? Or are you sailing the seas recklessly like roving pirates who risk their lives to ruin other people?" Telemicus inspired by Athena, who was anxious for him to question the king about his father's disappearance, and so win a good name among men. Now plucked up the courage to make him a spirited reply. Nestor, son of Nallios, great glory of the Greeks, you ask where we come from. I will tell you. We are from Ethica, which lies at the foot of Mount Nile. We have come on private, not on public business. I am searching through the length and breadth of the land for news of my noble father, the long-suffering Odysseus, who, it is said, fought by your side years ago at the sack of Troy. We can account for all the others who took part in the war. We know where each man met his pitiful death, but Zeus has wrapped even the death of Odysseus in utter mystery, and no one can tell us for certain when he died, whether he was the victim of some hostile tribe on land, or whether he was lost at sea in Amphithriti's waves. So I have come here to plead with you in the hope that you will tell me the truth about my father's unhappy end, if by any chance you witnessed it yourself or heard the story from some wanderer like him. Or if ever a man was born to suffer, it was he. Do not soften your account out of pity or concern for my feelings, but faithfully describe the scene that met your eyes. I beseech you, if ever my good father Odysseus in the hard years of war at Troy gave you his word and kept it, remember what he did, and tell me all you know. "Ah, my friend," exclaimed Nestor, the Gerenian chariot here, "What memory is the name of Troy brings back?" The miseries we fierce our canes endured there, raid after raid across the misty seas and search of plunder, wherever Achilles led, fight after fight around the very walls of royal primes town. There are best men fell, there war like Ajax lies, there lies Achilles, their patrickless, wise and council as the gods. My two antelokas, my own dear son, as strong as he was handsome, a fast runner and what a fight it to. Nor is that the full sum of what the nobler canes endured at Troy. There is no man on earth who could unfold to you the whole disastrous tale. Not though you sat and questioned him for half a dozen years, by which time you would have grown weary and gone home. In nine years we struggled to bring them down by every stratagem we could devise, but Zeus made it very difficult for us to achieve victory. And all the time there was not a man that dared to match his wits against the admirable Odysseus, who in every kind of strategy proved himself supreme. Your father, if you really are, his son. Indeed, I cannot help looking at you in awe, you talk exactly as he did, and I should have sworn no young man could so resemble him in speech. In all those years, whether at the General Assembly or in the Council of the Kings, not once did Odysseus and I find ourselves speaking on opposite sides. We seem to share a single mind, so well that we agree when, with our good sense in judgment, we advise the archives on the best policies. After we had destroyed Primes towering city, we left in our ships, but then the gods scattered the fleet. Zeus planned disaster for our home with journey, because we had not all behaved sensibly and honestly, and many came to grief through the fatal anger of the bright-eyed daughter of that mighty sire. It happened like this. She began by making the two sons of Atreus quarrel, acting on the spur of the moment, and with no regard for procedure, they summoned the whole Achaian army to assemble its sonset, so that the troops arrived to drunk and told them the reason for the assembly. Menleus put it to them all that their first concern should be to get to their distant homes across the seas, but this was not all to agamemnon's liking. He was for keeping them there and making ceremonial offerings to Athena, in the hope of appeasing her terrible wrath, not realizing in his folly how implacable she would prove, for it is not so easy to divert their mortal gods from their purpose. Well the pair of them stood there exchanging hard words till the soldiers, themselves divided in opinion, broke up the assembly in indescribable uproar. That night we rested, nursing vindictive feelings against our comrades in arms. For Zeus was making really just strike us the fatal blow. In the morning half of us ran our ships down into the tranquil sea, and stowed in them our spoils and the captive women in their low girdled dresses. Then though the rest still held back and stayed where they were with agamemnon, the commander and chief, our party embarked and set out. Our ships sailed fast, for a god had leveled the deep swell of the sea. We soon reached tenidos, and there eager to be home we sacrificed to the gods. But Zeus had no intention of letting us reach home so soon, and he mercilessly stirred dissension among us once more. As a result, one squadron swung the curved brows of their vessels round and turned back towards Troy. These were the followers of Odysseus that wise and subtle king, falling in once more with the wishes of Agamemnon, son of Atrius. But I, well aware of the gods' sinister designs, fled with the massed ships that formed my company. Warlike Diomedis did the same, bringing his party with him, and later on, Orbenhaed Menleus followed too. He caught us up at Lesbos, where we were pondering over the long sea journey, whether to sail north of the rugged coast of Chios and by way of Cyria, keeping that island on our left, or to sail south of Chios past the windy heights of Meemus. We prayed for a sign, and the god made it clear that we should cut straight across the open sea to your boya to get out of harm's way as quickly as possible. A whistling wind blew up, and our ships made splendid running down the teeming seaways, reaching Geristers during the night, and many a bull's thigh we laid on Poseidon's altar after spanning that weary stretch of water. It was on the fourth day that the company of Diomedis, son of Titus, the tamer of horses, brought their fine craft to anchor in Argos. But I held on for Pylos, and the breeze never dropped from the moment when the god made it blow. Consequently, dear child, I got back without any news of the man we had left behind, and have no idea who escaped or who was lost. But all the news that has come to me as I sit here at home, you shall have, as is only right, and I'll keep nothing back. In the first place, they tell me that the Mermedon Spermen reached home in safety under the greater Killy's noble sun, and that poya's sun, the bright Philoktiti's, fared equally well. Again, Edmeneus brought all his men to Crete, all that is who had survived the war. The sea got none from him. As for Agamemnon, though you live far away, you must have heard how he had no sooner got back than he fell a wretched victim to a gistless plot, and a grim reckoning there was for a gistless, which shows what a good thing it is when a man dies for a son to survive him, as a resty survived to take revenge on the treacherous a gistless who had killed his noble father. So you, my friend, and what a tall and splendid young man you have become, be brave as a resty's, and future generations will sing your praises. The thoughtful Tlemachus replied, "King Nestor, son of Nallios, great glory of the Ocayons, that was revenge indeed. A resty's fame will travel throughout Ocayon lands and live in song for generations. Ah, if the gods would only give me strength like his to exact revenge for the suitors vicious crimes, their willful disregard of what is right and the way they have humiliated me. But they have no such happiness in store for me, nor for my father. I must just endure." "My friend," said Nestor, "the greenian chariot here. Now that your own remarks have put me in mind of it, they do say a whole crowd of your mother's suitors are wreaking havoc in your house as uninvited guests. Tell me, do you tamely submit to this, or have the people of Ethica been listening to some rumour inspired by a god that has turned their hearts against you? Who knows whether someday Odysseus may not come back, alone perhaps, or with all his followers, and pay these suitors out for their violence? I only wish that bright eyeed Athena could show towards you some of the loving care she devoted to your illustrious father, in the course of our hard campaigns at drawing. For never in my life have I seen the gods display such open affection as Palace Athena showed in her championship of Odysseus. If only she would love and care for you like that, some of these gentlemen would soon have all thoughts of courtship knocked out of their heads forever." "Venerable lords," said the thoughtful telemicus, "I see no hope whatever of your words proving true. You speak of the impossible. You amaze me, for all my hopes that will never happen, even if the gods were to will it." The telemicus, the goddess of the flashing eyes exclaimed, "What are you saying? A god who wills it can bring anyone safely home, however far away he may be. And for myself I would rather live through untold hardships to reach home in the end and see that happy day, then come straight back and die at my own heart, as Agamemnon died by the wiles of his wife and a gistess. But it is our common lot to die, and the gods themselves cannot rescue even one they love, when death that stretches all men out lays its dread hand upon him." Mentor, the thoughtful telemicus replied, "Let us not discuss these painful matters anymore. We can no longer count on my father's return. The gods who never die have already set his feet on the dark path that leads to death. But there is something else I would like to ask Nestor, whose knowledge of men's ways and thoughts is unrivaled. They tell me he has been king through three generations, and when I look at him I seem to gaze on immortality itself. Nestor, son of Nalyus, tell me what really happened. How did Imperial Agamemnon son of Atreus meet his end? Where was Manalayus, and by what cunning snare did that treacherous a gistess can thrive to kill a man far braver in himself? Was Manalayus away from a K.N. Argos and wandering abroad? Is that why a gistess plucked up the courage to strike? My child nestled the greenian charioteer answered, "I will tell you the whole story. You can imagine for yourself what would have happened had Agamemnon's brother, Orbenhaird Manalayus, come back from Troy and caught a gistess in the house alive. No mound would have honoured his remains. Flung on the plain outside the city walls he'd have made meat for the dogs and birds of prey, and there's no woman in that cave who would have shed a tear of him. His was indeed no petty cry. While we who were besieging Troy, toiled at heroic tasks, he spent his leisure days right in the heart of Argos with the horse's grace, busy charming Agamemnon's wife with his seductive talk. At first, Queen Glightonestra turned a deaf ear to his dishonourable schemes. She was a sensible woman, and besides, she had a minstrel with her, to whom Agamemnon, when he left for Troy, had given orders to watch over his queen. But when the fatal day came appointed by the gods for her to yield, Agamemnon a gistess took this minstrel to a desert aisle, left him there as carrion for the birds of prey, and carried Glightonestra off to his own house, fond lover, willing lady. After this great achievement, he heaped the holy altars of the gods with thigh bones and hung the temple walls with fine fabrics and gold, holding offerings for a success beyond his wildest dreams. Meanwhile, we were sailing together over the sea from Troy, Menalayas and I, the best of friends. But when we were abreast of the sacred cape of Sunium, where Atticate juts out into the sea, Phoebus Apollo shot one of his painless arrows at Menalayas' helmsman and killed him, with the tiller of the running ship still in his hands. This man, frontus son of Onator, had been the world's best steersman in a gale, and Menalayas, though anxious to journey on, was kept at Sunium till he could bury his comrade with the proper rights. But when he too had got away over the wine-dark sea in those great ships of his, and had run as far as the steep headland of Malaya, far seeing Zeus brought disaster on their journey and sent them a howling gale with giant waves. Then in there, he split the fleet in two. He drove one group towards Crete and the Cedonian settlements on the River Edanus. Now, where the lands of Gorton end, out in the misty sea, there is a precipitous cliff that falls abruptly to the water, and the south-westernly gales drive the great rollers against a headland to the west, in towards Feistus, with nothing but this puny reef to keep their violence in check. When one party reached the spot, the crews by a hair's bread escaped destruction, though their ships were splintered on the rocks by the fury of the seas. Meanwhile, Menalayas, with the five remaining vessels of his blue-proud fleet, was driven on by Windenwave to Egypt, and so it was that he was cruising in those foreign lands, amassing a fortune in goods in gold, while I guess the scheme this wickedness at home. After he had killed Agamemnon, the Yusurba reigned in Golden my senior and kept the people in Subjection for so long. seven years. But the eighth brought him disaster in the shape of a Ristis. For that brave youth returning from Athens killed their Gistis, his noble father's murderer, and so the slayer was slain. When a Ristis had done the deed, he invited his friends to a funeral banquet for his hateful mother and the cowardly a Gistis. And on the self-same day, he was joined by menalers of the loud war cry, bringing in all the treasures that had filled his holes. "Be warned yourself, my friend, don't stray too long or too far from home, nor leave your wealth unguarded with such a set of arrogant broods in the place, unless you want them to share it out, to eat up all you have, so making your journey futile." I do urge you, however, to pay menalers a visit, for he has only just returned home from a region so remote that one might well give up all hope of return once the winds had blown one astray into that wide expanse of sea, which is so vast and perilous that even the birds cannot cross it in a year. So set off now with your ship and crew, or if you prefer to go by land, I have a chariot and horses at your disposal. And my sons are at your service too, to escort you to lovely Lackadamon where Orbenhaird menalers live. Appeal to him in person if you want the truth from his lips, though as wise a man as he is will not lie. As Nestor came to an end, the sun went down and darkness fell. It was the bride I had got a sithena who spoke next. "Venerable Lord, your tale was well told, but come, cut up the victim's tongues and mix the wine so that we can pour out offerings to Poseidon and the other immortals before we think of sleeping. It is time for bed, now that the light has faded into dusk. It is not right to remain any longer at this feast of the gods. We should return home." It was the daughter of Zeus who had spoken, her words did not fall on deaf ears. The squires sprinkled their hands with water while the young attendants filled the mixing bowls to the brim and then, after pouring a few drops first in each man's cup, they served them all with wine. The tongues were thrown into the flames, the company rose and sprinkled libations on them, and when they had made their offerings and drunk their fill, Athena and Prince Telemachus both made a move to return to their hollow ship, but Nestor stopped them protesting loudly. "May Zeus and the other immortal gods forbid that you should go to your ship and turn aside from my house, as though it belonged to some destitute porpo who hasn't enough blankets and rugs for himself and his guests to sleep between and comfort. Indeed, I have good bedding for all, and I swear that the son of my friend Odysseus shall not lie down to sleep on his ship's deck, so long as I am alive, or son survive me here to entertain all visitors that come to my door." "Well said, my Lord," replied the goddess of the flashing eyes, "and it is right for Telemachus to accept your invitation. He will go with you now and sleep in your palace, while I return to the black ship to reassure the men and tell them everything, for I am the only senior in the party. All the rest are young men of much the same age as the great-hearted Telemachus and follow him out of companionship. I intend to sleep there by the black ship's whole tonight and in the morning to set out on a visit to the great-hearted Calconians, who owe me a longstanding debt, not a small one either. But since Telemachus has become your guest, send him on in a chariot with one of your sons and give him the fastest and strongest horses in your stable. As she finished, bright-eyed Athena took the form of a vulture and flew off. They were all amazed. The old king marveled at the sight. "Telemachus, my dear boy," he exclaimed, seizing him by the hand. "There is no chance you will ever be a coward or weakling when, young as you are, you already have your guardian gods at your side. For of all that live on Olympus, this was no other than the daughter of Zeus, the august lady of Triton, who honoured your noble father to among the Arguives. "God, as be gracious and grant fame to me into my sons and to my honoured wife. In return, you shall have a yelling heifer, broad in the brow, whom no one yet has broken in and led beneath the yoke. She shall be sacrificed to you with gilded horns." This was his prayer and palace Athena heard him, and now the greenian charioteer nest or led the way towards his stately home, followed by his sons and his sons in law. When they came to the royal palace, they took their places on the seats and chairs, and the old man prepared a bowl of mellow wine for his guests, from a jar that had stood for ten years until the moment when the maid undid the cap and opened it. When the old king had mixed a bowl of this vintage, he poured a little out, with earnest prayers to Athena, daughter of Zeus, who holds the ages. They made their libations and quenched their thirst, after which the rest went to their homes for the night. But nest or the greenian charioteer arranged for the noble Odysseus' son, telemicus, to sleep at the palace itself on a wooden bedstead in the echoing portico, with the sperm and pysastritis, that leader of men, next to him. He was the only unmarried son left at home. The king himself retired to rest in his room at the back of the high building, where the queen his wife prepared his bed. When dawn came, fresh and rosy-fink it, nest or the greenian charioteer caught up from his bed, went out and ceded himself on a smooth white bench, which stood gleaming and polished in front of his lofty doors. Here his father Nalius used to sit and give counsel as wise as the gods, but he had long since died and gone to Hades Halls. So now nest or of Gerenia sat there in his turn, scepter in hand, a warden of the Achaean race. His sons all came from their rooms and gathered round him, echafron and stratias, persias and aritus, and the noble throsimides. The heroic pysastritis came last and made the sixth. The godlike telemicus was ushered to a seat at their side, and nestled the greenian charioteer now made his wishes known. Quick, my dear sons, do what I want so that I can pay my devotions to Athena, who of all the gods has first claimed upon them, since it was she who came in person to me at the gods sumptuous banquet. One of you go to the meadow for a heifer to be brought here as quickly as the cowhurt can drive her, and one go down to great-hearted telemicus's black ship and bring all his crew here except two, another summon the goldsmith leokies to guild the heifer's horns. The rest of you stay with me here and tell the servants indoors to prepare a feast in the palace and to fetch seeds and firewood in fresh water. They all busily sit about their tasks. The heifer came from the meadows, bold telemicus's crew came from his good ship. The smith came, equipped with the bronze tools of his trade, Anvil, Hammer and the strong tongs he used for working gold. Athena also came to accept the sacrifice. Then nestled the old charioteer gave out the gold, with which the smith gilded the heifers horns by way of embellishment to please the goddess's eye. Next stratias and echifron led the heifer forward by the horns. A raiders came from the storeroom carrying in his right hand a flowered bowl of lustril water and in the other a basket with the barley meal. The storeroot trussimities, gripping a sharp axe, stood by to strike the victim down and perseus held the dish to catch its blood. The old charioteer nested and now started the ritual with the lustril water and the scattered grain and offered up his earnest prayers to Athena as he began the sacrifice by throwing a tuft of hair from its head on the fire. When they had prayed and sprinkled the barley meal, nestled sun the high spirited trussimities stepped up and struck. The axe cut through the tendons of the heifers neck and it collapsed. At this the women raised their celebratory cry, nestled daughters and his daughters in law and his honoured wife Euredice climb in his eldest daughter. The men lifted the heifers head from the trodden earth and held it up while that leader of men pice stratus cut its throat. When the dark blood had gushed out and life had left the heifers body, they swiftly dismembered the cuckers, cut out the thigh bones in the usual way, wrapped them in folds of fat and laid raw meat above them. The venerable king burned these on the firewood, sprinkling red wine over the flames while the young men gathered round with five pronged forks in their hands. When the thighs were burnt up and they had tasted the inner parts, they carved the rest into small pieces, pierced them with skewers and held the sharp ends to the fire till all was roasted. The beautiful polycastee, King Nestor's youngest daughter, now bathed to telemigus. When she had bathed him and rubbed him with olive oil, she gave him a tunic and arranged a fine cloak round his shoulders so that he stepped from the bath looking like an immortal god. He then went and sat down by Nestor the shepherd of the people. When they had roasted the out of flesh and taken it off the skewers, they sat down to dime, with squires to wait on them and fill the golden cubs with wine. After they had satisfied their appetite and thirst, nestled the greenian chariot here set. Now my sons, fetched Telemachus a pair of long main horses and harness them to a chariot so that he can be on his way. They obeyed him promptly and soon had a pair of fast horses harnessed to a chariot, in which the housekeeper had packed bread and wine, together with delicacies of the kind that the favourites of the gods eat. He just took his place in the handsome chariot, and nestled his son, that leader of men pieced his stratus, got him beside him, took the reins in his hands and flicked the horses with the whip to urge them forward. The willing pair flew off towards the plains, putting the high city of Pylos behind them, and all day long the yolk rose and fell on the necks. The sun went down and all the ways grew dark. They reached Ferry where they drove up to the house of Diocletes, son of Autolocus, whose father was Alfas. There they spent the night and received the gifts that hospitality dictates. As soon as dawn appeared fresh and rosy-fingered, they harnessed their horses once again and mounted the burnished chariot. Out past the echoing portico and through the gates they drove, a flick of the whip to speed them on and the pair flew on with the will. They came to the wheat plains and hastened on to their journey's end with all the speed of their thoroughbred horses. The sun went down and all the ways grew dark.