Kuga na Ajgini in Mirmidonci

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Kuga na Ajgini in Mirmidonci

Yet Aegeus—for no pleasure is ever pure, and some anxiety always intrudes upon joy— could not rejoice untroubled in his son’s return. Minos was preparing war. Strong though he was in soldiers, strong in ships, his greatest strength was a father’s anger, and he took up righteous arms to avenge Androgeus’ death. First, however, he gathered allies to strengthen him for war, and ranged the seas with his swift fleet, the source of his renown.

He won Anaphe to his side, and the kingdom of Astypalaea: Anaphe by promises, Astypalaea by war; then low-lying Myconos and the chalky fields of Cimolos, Cythnos flowering with thyme, little Seriphos, marble-rich Paros, and the island that impious Arne, the Sithonian woman, betrayed. Having received the gold she greedily demanded, she was changed into a bird that still delights in gold, the jackdaw, black of foot and clad in black feathers.

But Oliaros, Didymae, Tenos, Andros, Gyaros, and Peparethos, rich in shining olives, gave no help to the Cretan ships. Turning to the left, Minos made for Oenopia, the kingdom of Aeacus. Oenopia was its ancient name, but Aeacus himself had called it Aegina after his mother. A crowd rushed out, eager to see a man of such renown. Telamon came to meet him, with Peleus, younger than Telamon, and the third son, Phocus.

Aeacus himself came out as well, moving slowly under the burden of old age, and asked what brought him there. Reminded of his grief as a father, the ruler of a hundred peoples sighed and answered: “Help me, I beg you, in the war I have undertaken for my son; share in this righteous campaign. I ask solace for his tomb.” The grandson of Asopus replied, “Your request is vain: my city cannot grant it. No land is bound more closely to the people of Athens than this one: such is our treaty.”

Minos departed in anger. “Your treaty will cost you dear,” he said, thinking it wiser to threaten war than to wage it and waste his strength there beforehand. The Cretan fleet could still be seen from Oenopia’s walls when an Attic ship, speeding under full sail, arrived and entered the friendly harbour, bearing Cephalus and a message from his country. Though they had not seen him for many years, Aeacus’ young sons recognized Cephalus, clasped his hand, and led him to their father’s house. The distinguished hero, still bearing traces of his former beauty, entered with a branch of his country’s olive in his hand,

flanked on either side by two younger men, Clytus and Butes, sons of Pallas. When the first words of greeting had been exchanged, Cephalus delivered the Athenians’ message and asked for help, recalling their treaty and their fathers’ bonds, and adding that all Greece’s sovereignty was at stake. When his eloquence had thus supported the cause entrusted to him, Aeacus, his left hand resting on the sceptre’s hilt, said, “Athens, do not ask for help: take it.

Count without hesitation all this island’s strength your own. It has all you need—such is my kingdom’s condition. Strength is not lacking: I have soldiers enough for my enemy and to spare. Thanks be to the gods, these are happy times, leaving no excuse to refuse.” “May it indeed be so,” said Cephalus. “May your city grow in citizens! Only now, as I arrived, I rejoiced to see such handsome young men, so alike in age, coming out to meet me. Yet I miss many among them whom I saw when your city welcomed me before.”

Aeacus groaned and answered in a sorrowful voice: “A happier fortune followed a beginning steeped in tears. If only I could tell you of the one without the other! Now I shall recount it all in order. To spare you a long preamble: those whom you remember and ask after lie as bones and ashes. And how small a part they were of all I lost! A dreadful plague fell upon my people through cruel Juno’s anger: she hated this land because it bore her rival’s name.

While the sickness seemed a natural one, and the deadly cause of such destruction remained hidden, we fought it with the physician’s art. Death overwhelmed our remedies, which lay defeated. First, the sky pressed down upon the earth in a thick haze, trapping a stifling heat beneath the clouds; and while the moon four times joined her horns into a circle and four times waned, unweaving her full orb, hot south winds breathed their deadly blasts.

It is certain, too, that the springs and pools were poisoned, and many thousands of snakes wandered through the untilled fields, tainting the rivers with their venom. The sudden sickness first revealed its power in the slaughter of dogs, birds, sheep, and cattle, and among the wild beasts. The wretched ploughman watched in wonder as his sturdy oxen collapsed at their work and sank down halfway through the furrow; the woolly flocks gave feeble bleats, their fleeces fell away unbidden, and their bodies wasted.

The horse, once spirited and famous on the dusty course, betrayed his victories; forgetful of his former honours, he groaned beside his manger, doomed to an inglorious death. The boar forgot his fury, the hind her trust in speed, and bears no longer charged the sturdy herds. Weakness possessed them all. In woods and fields and roads foul carcasses lay, corrupting the air with their stench.

Strange to tell, no dogs or hungry birds, no grey wolves touched them. They dissolved into putrid slime, their reek spreading harm and carrying infection far and wide. The plague reached the wretched farmers with yet heavier losses, and ruled within the walls of the great city. First the inward organs burned; a flush betrayed the hidden fire, and breath came deep and laboured.

The tongue grew rough and swollen; parched mouths gaped in the warm winds, gasping for the oppressive air. They could bear neither bedding nor any covering, but laid their chests against the hard earth. Their bodies were not cooled by the ground: the ground grew hot from them. No one could check it. The savage scourge broke out against the healers themselves; their art brought them harm.

The nearer anyone came, the more faithfully he served the sick, the sooner he shared their death. When hope of recovery was gone, and they saw that only death could end the sickness, they indulged their desires, caring nothing for what might help: nothing could help. Everywhere, abandoning shame, they clung to springs and rivers and deep wells, and drinking quenched their lives before it quenched their thirst.

Many, too weak to rise, died there in the water itself; yet others drank that water too. So unbearable to the sufferers was the hateful bed that they sprang from it, or, if too weak to stand, rolled their bodies to the ground. Each fled his own home, each thought his own house fatal, and, since the cause was hidden, blamed the narrowness of the place. You might have seen them wandering half-dead through the streets, while they could stand; others wept, or lay upon the ground, turning their weary eyes in one last movement.

They stretched their arms towards the stars of the overarching sky, breathing out their lives here and there, wherever death overtook them. What were my feelings then? What should they have been, but to loathe life and long to share my people’s fate? Wherever I turned my gaze, there lay my people, like rotten apples falling from shaken branches, or acorns from a jolted oak.

You see the temple opposite, raised high on its long flight of steps: it belongs to Jupiter. Who did not offer fruitless incense on those altars? How often, while husband prayed for wife, or father for his son, did the suppliant breathe his last upon the unrelenting altar, with a portion of unburnt incense still found in his hand! How often, when bulls were brought to the temple, while the priest formed his prayer and poured pure wine between their horns, did they fall before the blow could strike!

I myself was sacrificing to Jupiter for me, my country, and my three sons, when the victim gave a dreadful bellow and suddenly collapsed without a stroke, staining the knives beneath it with a scant flow of blood. Even the diseased entrails had lost the signs of truth and the gods’ warnings: the cruel sickness pierced to their very depths. I saw corpses cast before the sacred doors, even before the altars, as though to make death more hateful still.

Some ended their lives with a noose, escaping the fear of death through death, and willingly summoned their approaching fate. The bodies of the dead were no longer carried out with customary rites: the gates could not hold so many funeral trains. Some lay upon the earth unburied; others were given to towering pyres without their funeral gifts. All reverence was gone: people fought over pyres, and burned upon another’s fire.

There were none left to mourn. Unwept, the souls of mothers, brides, young men, and old wandered abroad; there was no room for graves, no wood enough for fires. Stunned by this terrible whirlwind of disaster, I cried, ‘O Jupiter, if the story is not false that you lay in the arms of Aegina, daughter of Asopus, and if, great father, you are not ashamed to be my parent, either restore my people to me, or bury me as well.’ He gave a sign with lightning and a favourable peal of thunder.

‘I accept it,’ I said. ‘Let these be happy signs, I pray, of your purpose. I claim the omen you have given me.’ Nearby there happened to stand an oak with widely spreading branches, sacred to Jupiter, sprung from Dodona’s stock. There I saw grain-gathering ants in a long procession, carrying great burdens in their tiny mouths, keeping to their pathway over the rugged bark.

Marvelling at their numbers, I said, ‘Most gracious father, give me as many citizens, and fill my empty city.’ The tall oak trembled, and its branches rustled though no wind stirred them. My limbs shuddered with fear, and my hair stood on end. Yet I kissed the earth and the oak, and would not admit to hope; still I hoped, and cherished my prayer within my heart. Night came, and sleep took hold of my body, worn out with cares. Before my eyes the same oak seemed to stand, bearing as many branches, and on those branches as many creatures as before. It trembled with the same motion, scattering the grain-bearing column over the fields below.

Suddenly they seemed to grow, becoming larger and larger, rising from the ground and standing with their bodies upright, shedding their leanness, their many legs, their black colour, and clothing their limbs in human shape. Sleep left me. Awake, I condemned my vision and complained that there was no help in heaven. Yet a great murmur filled the house, and I seemed to hear human voices, a sound now strange to me. While I suspected these too were part of my dream, Telamon hurried in, threw open the doors, and cried, ‘Father, you will see something beyond hope or belief. Come out!’ I went out, and there, just as I had seemed to see them in my dream, stood men

in ordered ranks. I looked and knew them. They approached and hailed me king. I paid my vows to Jupiter, and shared among my new people the city and the fields their former farmers had left empty. I called them Myrmidons, giving their name its rightful origin. You have seen their bodies; the habits they had before they still retain: they are thrifty, enduring in toil, tenacious of what they gain, and careful to preserve it.

These men, alike in age and courage, will follow you to war as soon as the east wind that brought you safely here” —for an east wind had brought him—“has changed to a southerly.”