Homer · a new plain-English translation from the Greek
Meanwhile godlike Odysseus made his bed in the entryway. He laid out an undressed ox-hide, and over it heaped many fleeces of the sheep the Achaeans had been slaughtering, and when he had lain down Eurynome threw a cloak over him. There Odysseus lay, awake, plotting evil for the suitors in his heart. And now the women who slept with the suitors came out from the hall, laughing and full of gaiety with one another as they had always done before. His spirit rose in fury inside him, and he turned over many plans in his mind and heart,
whether to leap up and kill each of them, or let them lie with the arrogant suitors this one last time, though his heart barked within him at the thought. As a bitch standing over her weak, helpless pups growls and strains to fight when she does not know the man approaching, so his heart growled inside him, outraged at their shameful deeds. He struck his chest and rebuked his own heart, saying: "Bear up, heart. You endured worse than this once before, on the day the Cyclops, raging and unstoppable, devoured my brave companions. You endured that too, until your cunning
got you out of that cave, though you thought you would die there." So he spoke, holding down the fury in his breast, and his heart stayed obedient, enduring without flinching, though he himself tossed from side to side. As a man before a great blazing fire turns a stomach stuffed with fat and blood, shifting it this way and that, eager to have it roasted through, so Odysseus tossed from side to side, turning over in his mind how he, alone, could lay his hands on the shameless suitors, so many against one. Then Athena came near him,
descending from the sky, and she took the shape of a woman. She stood over his head and spoke to him: "Why are you lying awake again, unluckiest of all men? This is your house, this is your wife within it, and you have a son such as any man would wish to call his own." Resourceful Odysseus answered her: "Yes, goddess, all that you say is exactly right. But this is what troubles my heart, this thought that keeps turning over in my mind, how I, alone, can lay my hands on the shameless suitors, when they are always gathered here together in force.
And there is a still bigger problem turning over in my mind besides. Even if I should kill them, by your will and by Zeus's, where could I escape to afterward? I ask you to think about that." Grey-eyed Athena answered him: "Stubborn man, other men trust even a lesser comrade, one who is mortal and does not have so much cunning in him — but I am a god, and I watch over you from beginning to end in every trial. I will tell you plainly: even if fifty companies of mortal men stood
around the two of us, eager to kill us in battle, still you would drive off their cattle and their fat flocks. Now let sleep take you. It is wearing to stay awake keeping watch the whole night through — you will soon come up out of your troubles." So she spoke, and poured sleep down over his eyelids, and then the shining goddess went back to Olympus. As sleep took hold of him, loosening the cares of his heart and slackening his limbs, his faithful wife woke, and sat up weeping on her soft bed. When she had wept her fill and satisfied her heart, radiant among women, she prayed first of all to Artemis:
"Artemis, mistress, daughter of Zeus, if only you would strike an arrow into my breast right now and take my life, or else a storm-wind would snatch me up and carry me away down the misty paths and drop me where the backward-flowing stream of Ocean pours in — as the storm-winds once carried off the daughters of Pandareus. The gods destroyed their parents, and the girls were left orphans in the house, but bright Aphrodite nursed them on cheese and sweet honey and pleasant wine, and Hera gave them, beyond all women,
beauty and good sense, and holy Artemis gave them stature, and Athena taught them to work fine handicrafts. But while Aphrodite was making her way up to great Olympus, to ask Zeus who delights in thunder — for he knows all things, the good and the ill fortune of mortal men — to grant the girls a ripe and happy marriage, in that time the storm-spirits snatched the girls away and gave them over to the hateful Furies to serve. So too may the gods who hold Olympus wipe me away, or may fair-haired Artemis strike me down, so that with Odysseus
still in my sight I might go down even beneath the hateful earth, rather than ever gladden the heart of a lesser man. But even so, grief has this one thing bearable in it: a person can weep all day long, heart heavy with sorrow, and yet have sleep at night — for sleep makes one forget everything, the good and the bad alike, once it has closed over the eyes. But for me even my dreams are wicked, sent by some cruel power. For this very night one lay beside me who seemed just like him,
exactly as he was when he went with the army, and my heart rejoiced, since I did not think it was a dream but that it was real at last." So she spoke, and at once golden-throned Dawn came. Godlike Odysseus heard the sound of her weeping, and pondered it, and it seemed to his heart that she already stood beside his head, knowing him. He gathered up the cloak and the fleeces on which he had slept and laid them on a chair in the hall, and carried the ox-hide out and set it outside, and lifted his hands and prayed to Zeus: "Father Zeus, if you gods willingly led me over dry land and sea to my own country, after treating me so harshly, let someone among the people waking up now
speak a word of omen for me inside the house, and let some other sign from Zeus appear outside as well." So he prayed, and Zeus the counselor heard him, and at once thundered from bright Olympus, out of the clouds on high, and godlike Odysseus rejoiced. And a woman grinding grain sent out a word of omen from within the house nearby, where the shepherd of the people kept his mills. There twelve women in all worked at them, grinding out barley meal and wheat flour, the marrow of men. The others were asleep, having finished grinding their share of grain, but one alone had not yet stopped, the weakest of them all.
She now stopped her mill and spoke a word — an omen for her master: "Father Zeus, who rules over gods and men, you have thundered greatly from the starry sky, though there is no cloud anywhere — this must be a sign you are showing to someone. Then grant even to wretched me the wish I am about to speak: let this be the last and final day the suitors take their sweet feast in the halls of Odysseus, the men who have loosened my knees with heartbreaking toil as I grind their barley meal — let this be their last supper." So she spoke, and godlike Odysseus rejoiced at the word of omen
together with Zeus's thunder, for he believed he would punish the guilty. And the rest of the household slave-women gathered in the fine halls of Odysseus and kindled a tireless fire on the hearth. Telemachus rose from his bed, a man like a god, put on his clothes, slung his sharp sword over his shoulder, bound fine sandals under his smooth feet, and took up his strong spear tipped with sharp bronze. He went and stood on the threshold and said to Eurycleia: "Dear nurse, did you all treat the stranger well in our house, with a bed and food, or does he lie there neglected?
That is just like my mother — sensible as she is in other things, she still shows favor thoughtlessly, sometimes honoring a lesser man and sending away a better one without respect." Wise Eurycleia answered him: "You should not blame her now, child, when she is not at fault. He sat and drank wine as much as he wished, and said he was no longer hungry for food, since she asked him. But when he thought of going to bed and sleeping, she told the slave-women to spread bedding for him, but he, like a man who has known nothing but misery and misfortune all his life,
refused to sleep on a bed and in blankets, but slept instead in the entryway on an undressed ox-hide and sheep fleeces, and we threw a cloak over him ourselves." So she spoke, and Telemachus went out through the hall carrying his spear, and two sleek dogs went with him. He set off to the assembly to join the well-armored Achaeans. And Eurycleia, daughter of Ops son of Peisenor, called to the slave-women, radiant among women: "Come, some of you sweep the hall and sprinkle it, and lay the purple coverings
over the well-made chairs; others of you wipe down all the tables with sponges and clean the mixing bowls and the well-made double-handled cups. And you others, go to the spring for water and bring it back quickly. The suitors will not be away from the hall for long — they will come back early, since today is a feast day for everyone." So she spoke, and they listened closely and obeyed. Twenty of them went to the dark-watered spring, and the rest worked skillfully about the house. Then the men who served the Achaeans arrived, and they
split the firewood well and skillfully, and the women came back from the spring, and after them came the swineherd, driving three fat pigs, the finest of the whole herd. He let them graze about the fine enclosure, and himself went over to Odysseus and spoke gently: "Stranger, are the Achaeans looking on you any more kindly now, or do they still treat you with contempt around the hall, as before?" Resourceful Odysseus answered him: "If only the gods would punish the outrage, Eumaeus, that these men recklessly plot
in another man's house, without a shred of shame." While they were saying such things to each other, Melanthius the goatherd came up close, driving the goats that were the pick of all his herds, meant for the suitors' dinner, with two herdsmen following him. He tied the goats under the echoing colonnade and then spoke mockingly to Odysseus: "Stranger, are you still going to be a nuisance here in the house, begging from the men, and not go out the door? I don't think the two of us are going to settle this
until you have had a taste of my fists, since you go begging in a way that is not decent — there are other feasts the Achaeans hold too." So he spoke, but resourceful Odysseus said nothing back to him, only shook his head in silence, brooding evil in his heart. After him came a third man, Philoetius, leader of men, bringing a barren cow and fat goats for the suitors. Ferrymen had brought them across, the same men who carry over anyone else who comes to them. He tied his animals carefully under the echoing colonnade, and then went and stood by the swineherd and questioned him closely:
"Who is this stranger who has just come to our house, swineherd? What men does he claim descent from? Where is his family, his native land? Poor man — he does have the build of a lord and king. But the gods bring hardship on men who wander far, even when they weave misfortune for kings." So saying he came up and clasped Odysseus's hand in welcome, and spoke to him with winged words: "Greetings, stranger and father — may good fortune come to you in time to come, though right now you are caught in so much misery.
Father Zeus, no other god is crueler than you — you show no pity to men, even though you yourself have given them life, and yet you let them fall into hardship and grinding pain. I felt the sweat break out on me, and my eyes filled with tears, when I remembered Odysseus, since I think he too, if he is still alive and looks on the light of the sun, must be wandering among men clothed in rags just like this. But if he is already dead and in the house of Hades, then how I grieve for blameless Odysseus, who set me over his cattle while I was still just a boy, in the land of the Cephallenians.
Now those cattle have grown beyond counting — no other man's herd of broad-browed cattle could put out shoots and multiply the way his has — but other men order me to bring the cattle in for them to eat, and they care nothing at all for his son in the house, nor do they fear the anger of the gods, for they are eager already to divide up the property of their long-absent lord. My heart keeps turning this over endlessly in my chest: it would be a wicked thing, while his son still lives, to go off to another people, taking the cattle with me, to live among strangers — but it would be even more bitter to stay here,
sitting among cattle that are no longer mine, and suffer this pain. Long ago I would have fled to some other of the mighty kings, since things have become unbearable, but I keep hoping that unlucky man may still come, somehow, from somewhere, and scatter the suitors through his own halls." Resourceful Odysseus answered him: "Herdsman, since you seem neither a bad man nor a foolish one, and I can see for myself that good sense has reached your mind, I will tell you this, and I will swear a great oath on it. Let Zeus first among the gods be my witness, and this hospitable table,
and the hearth of blameless Odysseus, to which I have come: while you are still here, Odysseus will come home, and with your own eyes, if you wish, you will see the suitors who now lord it here being killed." The man who tended the cattle answered him: "If only, stranger, the son of Cronos would bring that word to pass — you would see what strength I have, and what my hands can do." And Eumaeus, just the same, prayed to all the gods that wise Odysseus would come home again to his own house. While they were saying such things to each other,
the suitors, for their part, were plotting death and doom for Telemachus. But then a bird flew up on their left, a high-soaring eagle gripping a trembling dove. And Amphinomus stood up among them and spoke: "Friends, this plan of ours will not succeed for us — the murder of Telemachus. Instead, let us turn our thoughts to the feast." So Amphinomus spoke, and his words pleased them. So they went into the halls of godlike Odysseus, laid their cloaks down on the couches and chairs, and set about sacrificing great sheep and fat goats,
and fat pigs too, and a cow from the herd. They roasted the entrails and passed them around, and mixed wine in the bowls, and the swineherd handed out the cups. Philoetius, leader of men, distributed bread to them in fine baskets, and Melanthius poured the wine. And they reached out their hands to the good things laid ready before them. Telemachus, with a shrewd plan in mind, seated Odysseus inside the sturdy hall, near the stone threshold, setting out for him a shabby stool and a small table, and set before him a portion of the entrails, and poured wine
into a golden cup, and said to him: "Sit here now among the men and drink your wine. I myself will hold off the mockery and the blows of all the suitors, since this house is not a public house but belongs to Odysseus, and he won it for me. And you, suitors, restrain your hearts from insult and from violence, so that no quarrel or fight breaks out." So he spoke, and all of them bit their lips and marveled at Telemachus, that he spoke so boldly. Then Antinous, son of Eupeithes, spoke among them:
"Hard as this word is, Achaeans, let us accept it from Telemachus — he speaks to us with real threats. Zeus, son of Cronos, did not allow it, or we would have stopped him in the hall by now, clear speaker though he is." So spoke Antinous, but Telemachus paid no attention to his words. Meanwhile the heralds led the sacred hecatomb for the gods through the city, and the long-haired Achaeans gathered in the shaded grove of Apollo, the god who strikes from afar. When they had roasted the outer meats and drawn them off the spits,
they divided the portions and feasted on the glorious meal. Those who served him set before Odysseus a portion equal to their own, for so Telemachus, the dear son of godlike Odysseus, had commanded. Yet Athena did not allow the overbearing suitors to hold back entirely from painful insult, so that the pain might sink even deeper into the heart of Odysseus, son of Laertes. Among the suitors was a man who knew no decency, Ctesippus by name, who lived in Same. Trusting in his own vast wealth,
he had been courting the wife of Odysseus, long gone from home, and now he spoke among the arrogant suitors: "Listen to me, proud suitors, while I say something. The stranger has had his fair share for some time now, as is right — it is not good, nor just, to slight the guests of Telemachus, whoever comes to this house. But come, let me give him a guest-gift too, so that he in turn may give some reward either to the bath-woman or to some other slave who works about the house of godlike Odysseus." So saying he snatched up an ox's foot in his strong hand
from the basket where it lay, and hurled it — but Odysseus dodged aside, tilting his head just a little, and smiled in his heart a grim, sardonic smile, while the ox-foot struck the well-built wall.
Then Telemachus rebuked Ctesippus: "Ctesippus, it turned out much better for you this way — you missed the stranger, since he dodged your throw himself. Otherwise I would have run you through the middle with my sharp spear, and instead of a wedding your father would have been busy here with a funeral. So let no one show me any more outrages in this house. I take notice now, and I understand each thing, the good and the bad alike — before this I was still a child.
Even so, we put up with watching all this, the sheep slaughtered, the wine drunk, the bread eaten — for it is hard for one man to hold back many. But come, do me no more harm out of spite. And if you are now bent on killing me myself with the bronze, I would choose even that — it would be far better to die than to keep watching these disgraceful deeds forever, guests knocked about and slave-women dragged shamefully through the beautiful house."
So he spoke, and all of them fell silent and still. At last Agelaus, son of Damastor, spoke among them: "Friends, when a thing has been said justly, no one should take offense and answer back with hostile words. Do not strike this stranger, nor any of the slaves in the house of godlike Odysseus. But to Telemachus and his mother I would say a gentle word, if it might please the hearts of them both. As long as your spirits still held out hope that wise Odysseus would come home to his own house, no one could blame you for waiting and holding off
the suitors in the halls — that was the better course, if Odysseus had returned and come back to his home. But now it is plain at last that he is never coming back. So go, sit beside your mother and tell her this: let her marry whichever man is the best, and offers the most. Then you can enjoy all your father's property in peace, eating and drinking, while she keeps another man's house."
Sensible Telemachus answered him: "No, Agelaus — by Zeus, and by the sufferings of my father, who far from Ithaca has either perished or still wanders — I am not delaying my mother's marriage at all. I tell her to marry whomever she wishes, and I offer countless gifts besides. But I am ashamed to drive her out of the house against her will with a word of compulsion. May the god never bring that to pass."
So spoke Telemachus. And among the suitors Pallas Athena stirred up unquenchable laughter, and set their wits astray. Now they were laughing with jaws that seemed not their own, and the meat they were eating was spattered with blood, and their eyes filled with tears, and their hearts felt like wailing. Then godlike Theoclymenus spoke among them:
"Wretched men, what is this evil that has come over you? Your heads and your faces and your knees below are shrouded in night. Wailing has blazed up, your cheeks are wet with tears, the walls and the fine crossbeams are spattered with blood. The porch is full of ghosts, and the courtyard is full of them too, hurrying down to Erebus, into the dark. The sun has perished out of the sky, and an evil mist has come rushing over everything."
So he spoke, and they all laughed merrily at him. Eurymachus, son of Polybus, began to speak to them: "The stranger newly come from elsewhere is out of his mind. Quick, young men, take him out of the house and send him off to the assembly, since he finds it as dark as night in here."
Godlike Theoclymenus answered him: "Eurymachus, I ask for no escorts from you. I have eyes and ears and both my feet, and a mind in my breast that is put together well enough. With these I will go out the door, for I see evil coming upon you which not one of you will escape or avoid — you suitors, who in the house of godlike Odysseus commit outrages against men and plot reckless deeds." With that he went out of the well-appointed house, and came to Peiraeus, who received him gladly.
But the suitors all looked at one another and tried to provoke Telemachus by laughing at his guests, and one of the arrogant young men would say: "Telemachus, no man has worse luck with guests than you. Here is one you keep, this filthy vagrant, hungry for bread and wine, good for no work and no fighting, nothing but a dead weight on the earth. And now this other one has stood up to play the prophet. If you would take my advice, it would be far better: let us throw these strangers into a many-oared ship and send them off to the Sicilians, where they would fetch you a decent price."
So the suitors talked, but he paid no attention to their words. In silence he watched his father, waiting always for the moment when he would lay his hands on the shameless suitors. And the daughter of Icarius, wise Penelope, had set her beautiful chair opposite them, and heard the words of each man in the hall. For they had prepared their midday meal amid laughter, a sweet meal to their liking, since they had slaughtered so much. But no supper could ever be more joyless than the one a goddess and a strong man were soon to set before them — for they had been the first to plot disgraceful deeds.