Æschylos Tragedies and Fragments. Aeschylus

174 to utmost bounds of earth;

      And, should he gainsay, that the fiery bolt

      Of Zeus should come and sweep away his race.

      And he, by Loxias' oracles induced,

      Thrust me, against his will, against mine too,

      And drove me from my home; but spite of all,

      The curb of Zeus constrained him this to do.

      And then forthwith my face and mind were changed;

      And hornèd, as ye see me, stung to the quick

      By biting gadfly, I with maddened leap

      Rushed to Kerchneia's fair and limpid stream,

      And fount of Lerna.175 And a giant herdsman,

      Argos, full rough of temper, followed me,

      With many an eye beholding, on my track:

      And him a sudden and unlooked-for doom

      Deprived of life. And I, by gadfly stung,

      By scourge from Heaven am driven from land to land.

      What has been done thou hearest. And if thou

      Can'st tell what yet remains of woe, declare it;

      Nor in thy pity soothe me with false words;

      For hollow words, I deem, are worst of ills.

      Chor. Away, away, let be:

      Ne'er thought I that such tales

      Would ever, ever come unto mine ears;

      Nor that such terrors, woes and outrages,

      Hard to look on, hard to bear,

      Would chill my soul with sharp goad, double-edged.

      Ah fate! Ah fate!

      I shudder, seeing Io's fortune strange.

      Prom. Thou art too quick in groaning, full of fear:

      Wait thou a while until thou hear the rest.

      Chor. Speak thou and tell. Unto the sick 'tis sweet

      Clearly to know what yet remains of pain.

      Prom. Your former wish ye gained full easily.

      Your first desire was to learn of her

      The tale she tells of her own sufferings;

      Now therefore hear the woes that yet remain

      For this poor maid to bear at Hera's hands.

      And thou, O child of Inachos! take heed

      To these my words, that thou may'st hear the goal

      Of all thy wanderings. First then, turning hence

      Towards the sunrise, tread the untilled plains,

      And thou shalt reach the Skythian nomads, those176

      Who on smooth-rolling waggons dwell aloft

      In wicker houses, with far-darting bows

      Duly equipped. Approach thou not to these,

      But trending round the coasts on which the surf

      Beats with loud murmurs,177 traverse thou that clime.

      On the left hand there dwell the Chalybes,178

      Who work in iron. Of these do thou beware,

      For fierce are they and most inhospitable;

      And thou wilt reach the river fierce and strong,

      True to its name.179 This seek not thou to cross,

      For it is hard to ford, until thou come

      To Caucasos itself, of all high hills

      The highest, where a river pours its strength

      From the high peaks themselves. And thou must cross

      Those summits near the stars, must onward go

      Towards the south, where thou shalt find the host

      Of the Amâzons, hating men, whose home

      Shall one day be around Thermôdon's bank,

      By Themiskyra,180 where the ravenous jaws

      Of Salmydessos ope upon the sea,

      Treacherous to sailors, stepdame stern to ships.181

      And they with right good-will shall be thy guides;

      And thou, hard by a broad pool's narrow gates,

      Wilt pass to the Kimmerian isthmus. Leaving

      This boldly, thou must cross Mæotic channel;182

      And there shall be great fame 'mong mortal men

      Of this thy journey, and the Bosporos183

      Shall take its name from thee. And Europe's plain

      Then quitting, thou shalt gain the Asian coast.

      Doth not the all-ruling monarch of the Gods

      Seem all ways cruel? For, although a God,

      He, seeking to embrace this mortal maid,

      Imposed these wanderings on her. Thou hast found,

      O maiden! bitter suitor for thy hand;

      For great as are the ills thou now hast heard,

      Know that as yet not e'en the prelude's known.

      Io. Ah woe! woe! woe!

      Prom. Again thou groan'st and criest. What wilt do

      When thou shall learn the evils yet to come?

      Chor. What! are there troubles still to come for her?

      Prom. Yea, stormy sea of woe most lamentable.

      Io. What gain is it to live? Why cast I not

      Myself at once from this high precipice,

      And, dashed to earth, be free from all my woes?

      Far better were it once for all to die

      Than all one's days to suffer pain and grief.

      Prom. My struggles then full hardly thou would'st bear,

      For whom there is no destiny of death;

      For that might bring a respite from my woes:

      But now there is no limit to my pangs

      Till Zeus be hurled out from his sovereignty.

      Io. What! shall Zeus e'er be hurled from his high state?

      Prom. Thou would'st rejoice, I trow, to see that fall.

      Io. How should I not, when Zeus so foully wrongs me?

      Prom. That this is so thou now may'st hear from me.

      Io. Who then shall rob him of his sceptred sway?

      Prom. Himself shall do it by his own rash plans.

      Io. But how? Tell this, unless it bringeth harm.

      Prom. He shall wed one for whom one day he'll grieve.

      Io. Heaven-born or mortal? Tell, if tell thou may'st.

      Prom. Why ask'st thou who? I may not

175

Lerna was the lake near the mouth of the Inachos, close to the sea. Kerchneia may perhaps be identified with the Kenchreæ, the haven of Korinth in later geographies.

176

The wicker huts used by Skythian or Thrakian nomads (the Calmucks of modern geographers) are described by Herodotos (iv. 46) and are still in use.

177

Sc., the N.E. boundary of the Euxine, where spurs of the Caucasos ridge approach the sea.

178

The Chalybes are placed by geographers to the south of Colchis. The description of the text indicates a locality farther to the north.

179

Probably the Araxes, which the Greeks would connect with a word conveying the idea of a torrent dashing on the rocks. The description seems to imply a river flowing into the Euxine from the Caucasos, and the condition is fulfilled by the Hypanis or Kouban.

180

When the Amazons appear in contact with Greek history, they are found in Thrace. But they had come from the coast of Pontos, and near the mouth of the Thermodon (Thermeh). The words of Prometheus point to yet earlier migrations from the East.

181

Here, as in Soph. Antig. (970) the name Salmydessos represents the rockbound, havenless coast from the promontory of Thynias to the entrance of the Bosporos, which had given to the Black Sea its earlier name of Axenos, the “inhospitable.”

182

The track is here in some confusion. From the Amazons south of the Caucasos, Io is to find her way to the Tauric Chersonese (the Crimea) and the Kimmerian Bosporos, which flows into the Sea of Azov, and so to return to Asia.

183

Here, as in a hundred other instances, a false etymology has become the parent of a myth. The name Bosporos is probably Asiatic not Greek, and has an entirely different signification.