BOOK XXVII

The twenty-seventh deals with the array in which Cronion musters the dwellers in Olympos for battle to help Dionysos. Now warbreeding Dawn had just shaken off the wing of carefree sleep and opened the gates of sunrise, leaving the lightbringing couch of Cephalos. Dark Ganges was whitened as he met the touches of Phaéthon, and the cone? of gloom newly cleft apart fled away torn by his beams; the crops were bathed in the spring morning by the drops of dew from his car. of the everflowing years, checked the course of his firebred steeds, when he heard the sound of flashhelm Ares rattling close by, and summoned the host to spearthrust, shooting a rosy ray with witnessing torch : Rainy Zeus poured down from heaven a rain of blood,® a strange shower which foretold bloodshed for the Indians. The thirsty back of black dust on the Indian ground was reddened with those gory drops of battle-shower ; the sheen of newburnished steel glittered against the beams of Helios.

Deriades the presumptuous made them arm for battle, and encouraged his soldiers as he uttered this victory! The bold hornbearing son of Thyone, as they call him, you must make the lackey of Deriades, who also bears horns on his head! Kill me those Pans also with devastating steel. Or if they are gods, and it is not permitted to pierce the body of unwounded Pan with cutting steel, then I make prey of the mountainranging Pans, and they shall tend herds of elephants in the wilderness. There are plenty of wild beasts here also, with which I will join the wildbeast Centaurs and Pans of hillranging Dionysos ; or I will make them a swarm of attendants for my daughter, and waiters upon the festal table face Bacchos will bathe his body in the streams of the Indian river, and call Hydaspes home instead of Sangarios; many a soldier who has come from Alybe with Dionysos shall here be a serf—let him forget the water of his silvern “ river and drink of the spear of Deriades! We have a vast sea here also ; then let ours also receive you, after the Arabian waves! Ours is a wider deep which spouts its wild waters, enough to swallow Satyrs and Bacchants and ranks of Bassarids. Here no friendly Nereus, no Indian Thetis will receive you and save you, like those hospitable waves, when you flee a second time; for our Thetis dreads the deep rumbling Hydaspes of my of an attendant on her. Hephaistos.

home. But you will say: ‘I have in me Cronion’s Olympian blood.’ But Earth produced the sky dotted with its troop of stars: you have your birth from heaven, but my Earth shall cover you up. Cronos himself, who banqueted on his own young children in cannibal wise, was covered up in Earth’s bosom, son of Heaven though he was. I am chief of a spearbold army; I am stronger than Lycurgos, who drove you away and your unwarlike Bacchant women. Your divine birth does not trouble me, for I have heard of the firestruck nuptials of your illfated Semele. Speak not of the lightning which attended upon the bed of Zeus, boast not of Cronion’s head or his manly thigh. The childbed of Zeus in labour does not trouble me; I have often seen my own wife in labour. Let your father help you, if he likes, your father Zeus self-delivered. by arming female Athena, whom they call? Victory, to help you the male: only that I may break off cliffs, and make the head of Pallas bloody with a cutflesh rock or a daring spear, and hit with an arrow from my bow of horn the thigh of threatening Dionysos, while he leads his horned Satyrs; and when he is wounded may fasten disgrace upon Zeus and Bromios and Pallas! Andif the Hobbler? shall arm to support them both, Hephaistos the artist is the one I want, to make all sorts of armour in his smithy for Deriades also.© I fear not the female chieftain: if she brandishes her father’s lightning, I have my father’s Lyaios as they say, offspring of heavenly Zeus, I will smash and send to Hades, the Zeus of the underworld ; Zeus will not fly through the air and carry him off. Indeed I hear that many sons of Zeus have been struck down in the past. Dardanos? was sprung from Zeus, and he perished; Minos died, and the bullfaced marriage of Zeus did not save him if Aiacos does become a judge among the dead??

If he likes, let him be king of the corpses and monarch of the pit! Do not kill the Earthborn Cyclopeans who touch Olympos with their long limbs, do not transfix them with a spearpoint in belly or neck, let the heavy stroke of bronze pierce their one round eye.—No, kill not the Cyclopeans of the earth, for I want them too: they shall sit in an Indian smithy ! Brontes shall make me a heavyrumbling trumpet to mock the thunder’s roar, that I may be an earthly Zeus ; Steropes shall make here on earth a new rival lightning : I will try it in fighting against Satyrs,° that Cronides may be jealous, and tear his heart yet more to see Deriades thundering and lightening—he shall fear the Indian chieftain hurling a newmade hand with the fiery whirlwind? My mother’s father, governor of the flaming stars, Phaéthon, is himself a potentate all of fire; and if on my father’s side I have the blood of a river, I will fight even with watery missiles and make watery war upon Dionysos, drowning the heads of my enemy Bacchants in river floods. Go and cut down the Telchines of the deep Nonnos is more than usually puzzle-headed or his text is with devastating steel, bury their bodies in the neighbouring sea and let Poseidon their father look after them, and bring to Deriades, as trophies of victory from the sea, the blue harness of their finewrought car and all their seafaring horses! Burn with your blazing torch the burgher heavychained of the city of maiden Athena, the offspring of fiery Hephaistos whom they call Erechtheus ; for he too has the blood of that illustrious Erechtheus, whom unmothered Pallas once nursed at her breast, she the virgin enemy of wedlock, secretly guarding him by the wakeful light of a lamp: let him remain hidden in a shining Indian box, and enclosed in an empty cell of her darksome maiden chamber.?

captive; let Lemnian Cabeiro ° unveiled lament the death of her two sons ; let sooty Hephaistos throw down his tongs, and see the destroyer of his race sitting in the car of the Cabeiroi, see Deriades driving the bronzefoot horses ! Morrheus to conquer Aristaios, that son of Phoibos who hunts the hare and scatters the poor pugnacious bees.? Go you and slay the battalions of soft Bassarids with your sickles and twoedged swords ;_ but the highhorned son of Zeus shall fall to the horned son of ariver. Let no one shrink when he sees him riding a lioness, or mounted like a champion on the loins of a wild bear, let none shrink from the grim may have (the ashes of) his descendant sent to her in another. jaws of wild beasts under the yoke : for who will run before leopard or lion with armed elephants on his went to battle, some on the backs of steelclad elephants, some upon stormfoot horses beside them. Close behind came an infinite host of footmen, armed with pikes or shields or capped quiver: one man carried a sickle of beaten bronze like a harvester of war, another marched lifting a buckler and quick bow and windswift arrows.

the fray near the mouth of the Indus. But from the trees of the forest Dionysos, thyrsus in hand, armed his warriors with shields and swords and invincible leafage. He divided his army of Bacchants into four parts, and posted them facing the dawn in the direction of the four winds. The first was among the thick trees by the feet of the circling Bear, where the skyfallen water of many scattered rivers comes pouring down from the Caucasos ὅ mountains, in that very place where heavyrumbling Hydaspes brings his flood eddying in his endless course. The second battalion he placed where twimouth Indus bends his flood, curving through the mountains towards the western district of the land between,’ and surrounds Patalene with his waters. The third he drew up where in the southern gulf the southern sea ° rolls with ruddy waves. The fourth mailed army the king posted towards the land of sunrise, whence Ganges moves watering the reedbeds with his fragrant waves. The host thus divided and under arms, he appointed four helmeted leaders, and addressed a rousing oration to them all : barbarian tribes of your enemies, match thyrsus against spear, against sword also; let my harp become a trumpet which stirs war for the Satyrs, instead of its familiar banqueting-table. May the green leafy vintage strike down the steel, may it conquer the sharpened spear! Instead of the nightly dancings of Dionysos, let my pipes take another tune and sing the battle-hymn—let them leave the suppertune of mindcharming Bromios.

to me, and never again arm his rebellious flood against the Bacchoi, I will treat him kindly ; I will change all his glorious water into Euian wine with streams from the winepress, making his waters strong, I will crown the peaks of his wild forest with my leaves and make it all vine: but if ever again he shall help with his protecting flood the falling Indians and his son Deriades, taking the horned rivershape in a man’s body, then make a dam over the presumptuous river, and cross the thirsty water as on a highroad with unwetted feet, and let the hoof of fine horses tread on a dry Hydaspes with bare sand and scrape the dust there. sprung from Phaéthon’s heavenly race, and if Phaéthon should set up fiery war against me to honour his daughter’s horned offspring, I will arm once more my Cronion’s brother ¢ against Phaéthon’s attack, a quencher for his fire from the watery sea. I will go to the island of Thrinacia,” where are the sheep and oxen of the fireflashing heavenly Charioteer, and drag the sun’s daughter Lampetié under the yoke of slavery, to bow the knee like a girl captured by the spear. Then let Astris wander away to the mountains, to bewail her son Deriades a slave in heavy chains : let her go, if she likes, to settle in the Celtic land, that she also may turn into a tree with the Heliads and weep often in floods of sorrowful blackskin faces of the captive Indians with the initiate’s chalk®; and bring me the bold king?

swathed in clusters of vine ; throw a fawnskin about Deriades in his coat of mail. Let the Indian king bend a slave’s knee to Bromios after my victory, and throw his corselet to the winds, covering his body in a better corselet of fur. Let him press his foot into purple buskins, and leave his silver greaves to the breezes. After his deadly arrows and the deeds of battle which he knows, let him learn the nightdancing rites of Dionysos, and shake his curls of barbarian hair over the winepress. Bring enemy heads as trophies of victory to breezy Tmolos, pierced with the witnessing thyrsus. Many long lines of Indians I will bring away from the war alive after fighting is done, and 1 will fix on a Lydian gatehouse the horns of mad Deriades.”’ Bacchant women made haste, the Seilenoi shouted the tune of the battle-hymn, the Satyrs opened their throats and shouted in accord; the sound of the beating drum rang out, beating time with its terrifying boom, the rattling women clanged their double strokes with alternate hands ; the shepherd’s syrinx piped out its Phrygian notes to summon the host.

Mygdonian torch shone leaping through the air, proclaiming the fiery birth of Bacchos. The horned brow of old Seilenos sparkled with light; snakes were twined in the unplaited hair of the hillranging Bacchant women. The Satyrs also fought; they were whitened with mystic chalk,? and on their cheeks hung the terrifying false mask of a sham voiceless face. One lashing a maddened tiger against his foes scattered the cars of linked elephants. Hoary Maron was armed with a clustering shoot, and pierced the bodies of fighting Indians with a branch of gardenwith Zeus in his godwelcoming hall, gathered in full company on golden thrones. As they feasted, fairhair Ganymedes drew delicious nectar from the mixing-bowl and carried it round. For then there was no noise of Achaian war for the Trojans as once there was, that Hebe with her lovely hair might again mix the cups, and the Trojan cupbearer might be kept apart from the immortals, so as not to hear the fate of his country. Now Zeus Allwise addressed the assembly, and spoke to Apollo and Hephaistos Pytho, Prince of Archery, lightbringer, brother of Bacchos, remember Parnassos and your Dionysos !

You did not fail to see Ampelos who lived but a day ; you know also the double mystic torch of the double peaks. Come now, fight for Lyaios your brother ! Bend your Olympian bow to help the Bassarids. Glorify the cliff of your Parnassos common to both, where the Bacchant woman holding revel has raised her voice in song to you and sleepless Dionysos, and kindled one common Delphian flame for both. Remember your lionslaying Cyrene,’ illustrious Archer ! Be gracious to Agreus and Dionysos both: as the Herdsman, fight for the generation of Satyr herdsmen. Repel the heavyhearted jealousy of Hera, that the stepmother of Apollo may not laugh to see Dionysos run! She always cherishes jealousy and resentment for my loves, and attacks my children. I will not remind you of your mother’s tribulation in childbirth,“ when Leto carried her twin burden and had to wander over the world, tormented with the pangs of childbirth ; when the stream of Peneios fled from her, when Dirce refused your mother, when Asopos himself made off dragging his lame leg behind him—until Delos gave help to her labour, until the old palmtree played the midwife for Leto with her Zeus was father and mother both, help your brother, the ornament of your country! Save your people who are following Dionysos, do not look on while the sons of your Marathon perish! Glorify the growth of your Athenian olive, which gave you a city. Grant this grace to old Icarios,? for one day Dionysos will give his rich bunches of fruit to him also. Remember Triptolemos and the good plowman Celeos, and do not having it was to settle the matter by single combat between their leader, Xanthos, and the Athenian champion Melanthios. As were about to begin, Melanthios saw a clad in a ae behind his opponent, and to having to ht two at once, arc turned round to look, and insult the fruitful baskets of Metaneira. For Zeus your fruitful father bore the birthpangs of the helper, your Bacchos of the vine, in his pregnant thigh, and you, the girl-child, in his head. Come now, raise the lance born along with you, shake your goatcape the aegis, the governor of war, be helper to my Satyrs, because they also wear hairy skins of the mountain goats; the god of countrymen himself, lord of the shepherd’s pipes, goatfoot Pan, needs your aegis-cape.

He once helped to defend my inviolable sceptre and fought against the Titans, he once was mountainranging shepherd of the goat Amaltheia my nurse, who gave me milk; save him, for he in the aftertime shall help the Athenian battle, he shall slay the Medes and save shaken Marathon. Shake your aegis-cape and protect Lyaios, your brother in his black goatskin-cape, who shall drive out the Boiotian captain and save your country? ; then the citizen of Eleutho shall sing a hymn of salvation, calling Euoi for Apaturios the faithful son of Thyone, if Athens shall celebrate together in Phrygian tune, after her Limnaian Bacchos, Dionysos of Eleusis. here is a great marvel! Hera of Argos stands by Goatskin. See, for some modern criticism of this curious Iacchos, an obscure Eleusinian god, was identified with Dionysos (Bacchos) at a fairly early date in Athens; he is the the historical celebrations under Athenian patronage of the Eleusinian Mysteries. The Apaturia, which Dionysos has really nothing to do with, was a festival at which children were enrolled in their fathers’ clans. Limnaios was a local Athenian title of Dionysos, from the position of his temple in the Limnai, or Marshes, a piece of low-lying ground of Deriades the foreigner ; Athena of Attica renounces the warriors of Cecrops; my own Ares of Thrace true to his mother deserts my son Bacchos, and the Thracian host which follows Dionysos, and saves an Indian horde! But I alone fight for Dionysos with my blazing fire, one against all, until Bacchos shall destroy the black nation root and branch. And you Hephaistos, lover of the Maiden, bridegroom of creative Earth,’ do you sit still and care nothing for Marathon, where the wedding torch ὃ of the unwedded goddess is shining? I will not remind you of the mystical sparks of your everburning light. Remember the casket in that childcherishing maiden chamber, in which was the son of Earth, in which the Girl nursed your selfbegotten offspring with her manly breast. Lift up your axe that played the midwife,° to save the people of your Athena with your delivering hatchet! Do you sit still, Hephaistos, and will not you save your children? Lift your accustomed torch to defend the Cabeiroi; turn your eye and see your ancient bride, your Cabeiro, reproaching you in love for her sons. Valiant Alcimacheia 4 of Lemnos needs your valour ! ”’ Olympos departed in haste. Athenaia and Apollo united together as helpers, and fiery Hephaistos went along with Tritogeneia. Hera joined herself to the other party of immortals, leading Ares by the hand, and wideflowing Hydaspes, to help the enemy with equal ardour. Rout and Terror went in their which torches were used to commemorate Athena’s marriage company, and with them cornbearing Deo, the rival of Bacchos, being jealous of lifegiving Dionysos who loved the grapes because he had discovered the beverage of wine ; and this dimmed the pride of ancient Zagreus, the god who first of all had the name of Dionysos.