Metamorphoses 8

Iam nitidum retegente diem noctisque fugante
tempora Lucifero cadit Eurus, et umida surgunt
nubila: dant placidi cursum redeuntibus Austri
Aeacidis Cephaloque; quibus feliciter acti
ante exspectatum portus tenuere petitos

Now when retrieving shining day and chasing away the night, the East wind fell and the dank clouds rose: the still south winds granted a course to the Aecades and Cephalus; by which having been driven they arrived at their desired shores sooner than they had expected

interea Minos Lelegeia litora vastat
praetemptatque sui vires Mavortis in urbe
Alcathoi, quam Nisus habet, cui splendidus ostro
inter honoratos medioque in vertice canos
crinis inhaerebat, magni fiducia regni.      

Meanwhile, King Minos spoiled the coasts of Megara and was vying his military strength against the city of Alcathous, which Nisus ruled, on whom was stuck among his dignified grey locks and in the middle of his head a splendid purple luck, on which rested the greatness of his kingdoms

Sexta resurgebant orientis cornua lunae,
et pendebat adhuc belli fortuna, diuque
inter utrumque volat dubiis Victoria pennis.
regia turris erat vocalibus addita muris,
in quibus auratam proles Letoia fertur               15
deposuisse lyram: saxo sonus eius inhaesit.

Six times had the horns of the risen moon resurfaced and still the outcome of the war hung in the balance, and for a long time Victoria wavered on doubtful wings between the two. The royal turret was built on the singing walls on which Latona’s son is said to have layed down his golden lyre: his sound sticks in the stone

saepe illuc solita est ascendere filia Nisi
et petere exiguo resonantia saxa lapillo,
tum cum pax esset; bello quoque saepe solebat
spectare ex illa rigidi certamina Martis,               20
iamque mora belli procerum quoque nomina norat
armaque equosque habitusque Cydoneasque pharetras.

Often there the daughter of Nisus was accused to climb and to cause the resounding of the rocks with a small stone, when there was peace; during the war also she was often accustomed to look upon those combats of the rough war. And now as the war trundled on she knew the names of h=the chieftains and their arms and their horses and their dress and their Cretan quivers

noverat ante alios faciem ducis Europaei,
plus etiam, quam nosse sat est: hac iudice Minos,
seu caput abdiderat cristata casside pennis,               25
in galea formosus erat; seu sumpserat aere
fulgentem clipeum, clipeum sumpsisse decebat;
torserat adductis hastilia lenta lacertis:

And she had got to know before all others the face of the leader, the son of Europa, and more that she should have known him: By her judgment Minos, when he hid his head in a helmet, was handsome in a helmet. Whether he picked up his shield shining with bronze, picking up his shield was a handsome sight; if he threw his tough spear with contracted muscles

laudabat virgo iunctam cum viribus artem;
inposito calamo patulos sinuaverat arcus:               30
sic Phoebum sumptis iurabat stare sagittis;
cum vero faciem dempto nudaverat aere
purpureusque albi stratis insignia pictis
terga premebat equi spumantiaque ora regebat,

The young girl praised his skill and also his strength; if he bent the wide bows with arrows put in place; then she would swear that Phoebus stood holding arrows; and when he laid bare his face having taken off his helmet, and when in purple hr rode on the back of his white horse notable for the decorations which covered it and ruled its foaming bit

vix sua, vix sanae virgo Niseia compos               35
mentis erat: felix iaculum, quod tangeret ille,
quaeque manu premeret, felicia frena vocabat.
impetus est illi, liceat modo, ferre per agmen
virgineos hostile gradus, est impetus illi
turribus e summis in Cnosia mittere corpus               40
castra vel aeratas hosti recludere portas

Then scarcely herself, scarcely did the young daughter of posses sane mind: happy the javelin, which he touched, and happy the reins which he pressed against his hand, she thought. It was her desire, if it were allowed, to carry her virgin steps through the hostile battle line, it was her desire to send her body from the high towers into the Cretan camp or to open the bronze gates to the enemy

vel siquid Minos aliud velit. utque sedebat
candida Dictaei spectans tentoria regis,
'laeter,' ait 'doleamne geri lacrimabile bellum,
in dubio est; doleo, quod Minos hostis amanti est.               45
sed nisi bella forent, numquam mihi cognitus esset!
me tamen accepta poterat deponere bellum
obside:

Or anything else which Minos wished. And as she sat looking at the white tents of the Cretan king, ‘Whether I rejoice or grieve and the waging of this tearful war, is in doubt, because Minos is the enemy of his lover. But unless the war occurred, never would I have known him! Nevertheless if I was his hostage, he would be able to stop the war

me comitem, me pacis pignus haberet.
si quae te peperit, talis, pulcherrime regum,
qualis es ipse, fuit, merito deus arsit in illa.               50
o ego ter felix, si pennis lapsa per auras
Cnosiaci possem castris insistere regis
fassaque me flammasque meas, qua dote, rogarem,
vellet emi, tantum patrias ne posceret arces!

He would have me as his companion, he whould have me as his offer for peace. If If she who gave birth to you, such a great, most beautiful of ruler, was as such a kind as you are, deservedly a god burned for her. O I would be three times lucky, if I glided with wings through the air and I was able to stand within the camps of the Cretan king and having confessed myself and my flames, by what price, I would ask, he wished to by me, only let not seek the citadels of my fatherland

nam pereant potius sperata cubilia, quam sim               55
proditione potens!—quamvis saepe utile vinci
victoris placidi fecit clementia multis.
iusta gerit certe pro nato bella perempto:
et causaque valet causamque tuentibus armis.
at, puto, vincemur;

For may all my hopes of marriage perish rather than I obtain it by treachery, Although often the mercy of a placated conquered has made it is more useful to be defeated. Certainly he wages a just war on behalf of his murdered son and he is strong in his cause and the arms protecting his cause. But, I think, we will be conquered

qui si manet exitus urbem,               60
cur suus haec illi reseret mea moenia Mavors
et non noster amor? melius sine caede moraque
inpensaque sui poterit superare cruoris.
non metuam certe, ne quis tua pectora, Minos,
vulneret inprudens:

If this fate awaits the city, why should his warlike spirit open these my walls to him and not my love? Better without slaughter and delays and expense of his of his own blood to be able to conquered. Certainly I do not fear, lest anyone ignorantly wounds your breast, Minos

quis enim tam durus, ut in te               65
derigere inmitem non inscius audeat hastam?
coepta placent, et stat sententia tradere mecum
dotalem patriam finemque inponere bello;
verum velle parum est! aditus custodia servat,
claustraque portarum genitor tenet:

For who is so hard that not unknowing he would dare to throw his harsh spear at you? These ruminations please me and the thought is firm to trade myself for my country as my dowry and to bring an end to the war: but it is too little to wish it! A watch guards the entrance, and my father holds the key to the gates:

hunc ego solum               70
infelix timeo, solus mea vota moratur.
di facerent, sine patre forem! sibi quisque profecto
est deus: ignavis precibus Fortuna repugnat.
altera iamdudum succensa cupidine tanto
perdere gauderet, quodcumque obstaret amori.  

Him I alonee fear, unlucky, alone he delays my wishes. I only the gods had made me without a father! But indeed each is a god to himself: Fortune fights against cowardly prayers. Another girl long ago burned with such great desire would have rejoiced to destory whatever obstructed her love

et cur ulla foret me fortior? ire per ignes
et gladios ausim; nec in hoc tamen ignibus ullis
aut gladiis opus est, opus est mihi crine paterno.
illa mihi est auro pretiosior, illa beatam
purpura me votique mei factura potentem.'  

And why should any other girl be braver than me? I would dare to go through fires and swords; nor neverletthels is there need in this for any fires or for any swords, I need my father’s lock. That lock is to me more valuable than gold, that purple lock will make me blessed and give me my desire

Talia dicenti curarum maxima nutrix
nox intervenit, tenebrisque audacia crevit.
prima quies aderat, qua curis fessa diurnis
pectora somnus habet:

While saying these things night arrived, the greatest nurse of our troubles, and her boldness grew in the darkness. The first silence had come, when sleep hold hearts weary with daily cares

thalamos taciturna paternos
intrat et (heu facinus!) fatali nata parentem               85
crine suum spoliat praedaque potita nefanda
per medios hostes (meriti fiducia tanta est)               88
pervenit ad regem;

The daughter enters silently into her father’s chambers (oh what a crime!) she strips her father of his fateful lock of hair and with her cruel prize obtained she arrives to the king through the middle of the enemies (so greatly confident of their gratefulness)

89-95

And she addressed him thus shaken by her prescence: ‘love encouraged me to this deed; I the royal child of Nisus, Scylla, hand over my country and my household gods to you. Nor do I seek any prize except you; take as pledge of my love the purple lock and trust now that I do not just give you a lock but my father’s life to you’ and she stretched out the gift to him in her criminal right hand

95-96

Minos recoiled from her outstretched arm and disturbed by the image of such a disformed deed responded

97-100

May the gods banish you, o cruelty of our age, from their earth and may both the earth and the sea be denied to you. I certainly will not suffer such a great monster to set foot in the Jove’s childhood cradle, Crete, which is my world.’

100-109

He spoke and when this most just author had imposed laws on his conquered foes, he ordered the mooring ropes of the fleet to be loosened and for the rowers to drive the bronze ships. Scylla after she saw that the ships were launched and sailed in the sea and that the king rejected the reward of her crime, having prayed as much as she could she was moved to violent anger and stretching her hands madly passionate and with streaming hair she screamed ‘to where are you fleeing? The author of your triumph is abandoned, o you who I preferred to my country, to my father?

110-118

To where do you feel harsh one, whose victory is both my sin and my worth? Did the gift I gave you not move you does not my love, nor all hope of my founded on you alone? For to whom do I turn now deserted? To my country? It lies conquered. But imagine it stood: It would be shut to me on account of my betrayal. To the presence of my father? Him whom I gave as spoil to you. The citizens hate me deserving of hatred, the neighbouring countries fear my example. We are shut off from the whole world, so that only Crete might be open to me.

119-121

And if you forbid us Crete as well, ungrateful one, you abandon me, Europa is not your mother but the inhospitable Syrtis, the Armenian tigress and Charbydis agitated by the winds

122-133

You are no son of Jove nor was your mother led astray by the image of a bull (that story of your conception is false); it was a real bull who birthed you [both wild and captured by the love of no heifer]. Complete my punishment, o my father Nisus! Rejoice in my misfortunes my wall that I have now betrayed! For, I confess, I deserve and am worthy of death. But nevertheless let one of those whom I wicked have injured kill me. Why should you punish my sin who has triumphed by my sin? Let this crime to my country and to my father be a service to you. She is truly a worthy wife for you, who adulterer deceived the savage bull with wood and carried a clashing offspring in her womb.

133-139

Do my words reach your ears? Or do the same winds that bear away my vain words bear your ships, you ungrateful man? [Now, now it does not seem remarkable that Pasiphae preferred a bull to you; you were more savage a beast] Oh poor me! He orders his men to hurry and the waves sound torn by the oars and and my land and me recede from him.

140-144

What you wage is fruitless; o you have forgotten what I deserve in vain; I will follow you unwilling and having clasped your curved stern I will be dragged through the log stretches of the sea.’ She had just spoken, when she leapt into the waves and chased after the ship her passion giving strength and hated companion she clung to the Cretan boat.

145-149

When her father saw her (for now he was hovering in the air, just now having been made into a sea-bird (osprey) with tawny wings), he came towards her so that he might wound her clinging with his hooked beak. That girl released the stern in fear and the light air appeared to catch her falling, and did not let her touch the sea

150-158

Her hands produced feathers and having been changed into a bird she is called Ciris, having taken the name from the cut lock. Minos payed his vows to Jove in hundred carcasses of bulls, when he disembarked from his ships and touched the Cretan earth and his palace was decorated with hung spoils.Grown was the disgrace of his family and the foul adultery of his mother laid open by the the strangeness of her hybrid monster child. Minos decided to remove this shame of a marriage bed and to hide it in a kaleidoscopic home and secret roofs.

159-168

Daedalus, misted celebrated for his skill of a craftsman’s art, organised the work and he disturbed what was known and lead the eye to wander with a turning maze of varied paths. Not unlike how Menander plays in the Phygrian watery plains and flows backwards and forwards in doubtful course and running into itself looks back at its own approaching waves and now to its source, now having turned to the open sea it sends its uncertain waters, thus Daedalus flooded the countless paths with confusion and scarcely himself was able to return to the beginning; so great was the trickery of the house

169-179

After he had shut the twin figure of bull and young man in this place and twice fed him with Athenian blood but when the third lot, a lot that came about every ninth year, brought the creatures overthrow. And when by the virgin’s aid the difficult gate which no previous traveller had reached back to was found by rewinding the thread, immediately the son of Aegeus seizing the daughter of Minos set sail for Dia and abandoned his companion cruelly on the shore. To her deserted and lamenting much Liber gave embrace and brought aid, and so that she would be famed by an eternal star, he took the crown from her brow and sent it to the heavens

179-182

It flew through the thin air and while it flue its gems were transformed into shining fires and the settled in a place , retaining the appearance of a crown, which was is in the middle of the Kneeler and serpent holder

183-192

Meanwhile Daedalus disgusted of Crete and his long exile and touched by longing of his native soil was shut in by the sea. ‘He is able to obstruct me over land and water, but certainly the sky is open; we will go that way!Minos possesses everything, but he does not possess the air.’ He spoke and devoted his mind to unknown arts and changes the commands of nature. For he placed feathers in order, [beginning with the smallest, following a short one with a long] so that you would think they had grown in a slope; thus once the rustic panpipes gradually rise with their different sized reeds.

193-200

Then he fixed the feathers together with thread in the middles and wax at the bottoms and thus having been arranged he bent them with a small curve so they looked like real bird wings. The boy Icarus was standing at his side and ignorant that he touched his own danger, with shining face he would now play catch with the feathers which a wandering breeze had moved, now soften the pale wax with his thumb and impeded the wonderous work of his father with his game.

201-208

After his hand had placed the final touches on the work that had been born, the workman himself balanced his body on twin wings and hung in the beaten air. And he instructed his son ‘I warn you Icarus to drive the middle course, lest if you go too low, the waters may make heavy your wings, if you go to high, the fire may burn them’. Fly between each, I order you not to look at Bootes or Helice or the drawn sword of Orion; take the way which I lead.’

208-215

While he gives these warnings of fligh, he fits the strange wings onto Icarus’ shoulders. Between working and warning the old man’s cheeks wetter and his fatherly hands tremble. He gave a kiss to his son not again repeated and rising on his wings he flew before and feared for his companion, just as a bird who has led out her tender fledgings in do the air from the sheltered nest, he encourages him to follow and teaches him the fatal art.

216-225

And himself moves his wings and looks back to his son. Now some fisherman while fishing with his quivering rod or a shepherd leaning on his stick, or a ploughman on his plough handle sees them and are amazed, each trust that they are gods if they are able to fly through the air. And now on the left was Juno’s sacred Samos (they had passed by Delos and Paros), and on the right was Calymne, rich in honey, when the boy began to rejoice in his bold flight and deserted the leader and having been dragged by desire of the sky he drove his course higher.

225-235

The proximity of the scorching sun soften the odorous was, the binding of the feathers. The wax melted; he shook his bare arms and without an oar he could not grasp any air, and his lips to the end called the name of his father from the dark blue sea, which took its name from him. But the unhappy father, no longer father ‘Icarus’ he called ‘Icarus’ he called, ‘where are you? In what region should I seek you?’ ‘Icarus’ he was calling: he saw the wings on the waves and he cursed his arts and buried the body in a tomb; and the land is called by the name of the buried boy.

235-240

This man as he was placing the body of his pitiful son in the tomb, a chattering partridge looked out at him from a muddy ditch and applauded with her wings and witnessed proceedings with a joyful song. She was then a unique bird not seen before these times and recently made into a bird, a eternal scold to you, Daedalus

240-246

For his sister ignorant of the fates gave her son to him to be taught , a boy of teachable mind, who had now past his twelfth birthday. He, also, having seen the backbone of a fish took it as a model and cut with sharp iron a rows of teeth and thus discovered the use of the saw

247-253

He was also first to bind two arms of iron into one at a joint so that with the arms staying an equal distance apart, one part would remain still, while the other part drew a circle. Daedalus envied him and from the sacred citadel of Minerva sent him headlong lying that he had slipped; but Palls who favours the intelligent caught him up and gave him back a bird and dressed him with feathers in mid air.

254-259

But the liveliness of his quick intelligence left into his wings and feet; the name, which he had before, remains. Not nevertheless does the bird lift its body in flight nor does it make its nest in the branches and high rocks. It flies near to the ground and places its eggs in the hedgegrows and fears high places mindful of that previous fall.

260-266

Now the land of Aetna took in the exhausted Daedalus and having taken up arms in defence of the suppliant was thought kindly, now also Athens, by the aid of Theseus, had ceased to pay her lamentable tribute. The temples were garlanded and they called on warring Minerva with Jove and the rest of the gods, whom they honoured with sacrificial blood and with offered gifts and burning incense.

267-277

Wandering fame had spread Theuseus’ name through the the cities of Greece, and the people of rich Achaia implored his aid with the great troubles that harassed them*. Calydon, although suppliant, sought his help with anxious prayers, although she had Meleager. The cause of seeking was a boar, servant and vindicator of hostile Diana. For they say that Oeneus in thanks of a plentiful harvest paid the first crop to Ceres, his wine to Bacchus, Pallas’ oil to golden haired Minerva. Having begun with the rural deities the honour they sought was given to all the higher powers;

277-

They say that only Diana’s altars were left without incense completely passed by*. The anger also touche the gods; ‘but I will not bear this without revenge, and unhonoured, we will not bear called unavenged’ she spoke and the scorned godess send a bull of vengeance over the fields of