Prevod

While these things unfolded on earth under fate’s decree, and the cradle of twice-born Bacchus stood secure, Jupiter, they say, mellowed by nectar, happened to lay aside his weighty cares and, free of concern, joked playfully with Juno. “Surely your pleasure,” he said, “is greater than the pleasure men enjoy.” She denied it. They agreed to seek the judgment of wise Tiresias: he had known love as both sexes.

For once, in a green wood, he had struck with his staff the bodies of two great serpents as they mated; changed from a man into a woman—marvelous to tell— he had lived for seven autumns. In the eighth he saw them again. “If striking you has such power,” he said, “that it changes the striker’s lot to its opposite, I shall strike you again.” He struck those same snakes, and his former shape returned, his inborn form restored.

Chosen, then, to judge this playful quarrel, he upheld Jupiter’s claim. Saturn’s daughter, they say, took this harder than was just, or the matter warranted, and condemned her judge’s eyes to everlasting night. But the almighty father—for no god may undo another god’s deed—gave him, in return for his lost sight, the power to know the future, easing punishment with honor.