- Source
- Pausanias. Pausaniae Graeciae descriptio, Volumes 1-3. Spiro, Friedrich, editor. Leipzig: Teubner, 1903.
- Translation
- AI-generated (gemini-3.5-flash) — machine translation; may contain errors
- Languages
- 日本語 · English · 简体中文 · 한국어
- CTS URN
- urn:cts:greekLit:tlg0525.tlg001.humanitext-grc2:4.20.6-4.20.10
- Generated
- Humanitext Reader · reader.humanitext.ai · 2026-10-26
A Spartan slave herdsman, who was having an affair with the wife of a Messenian living outside the wall, learns that the guard on the acropolis has been abandoned due to heavy rain and deserts to the Spartan camp to deliver this crucial intelligence.
οὗτος ὁ βουκόλος ἔνεμεν οὐ πόρρω τῆς Νέδας. ἀνδρὸς οὖν τῶν Μεσσηνίων τῶν οὐκ ἐντὸς τείχους ἐχόντων οἴκησιν γυναῖκα εἶδεν1 ἐφʼ ὕδωρ ἐλθοῦσαν· ἐρασθεὶς δὲ διαλεχθῆναί τε ἐτόλμησε καὶ δοὺς δῶρα συγγίνεται. καὶ ἀπὸ τούτου τὸν ἄνδρα παρεφύλασσεν αὐτῆς, ὁπότε ἀποχωρήσειεν ἐς τὴν φρουράν. ἀνὰ μέρος δὲ τοῖς Μεσσηνίοις τῆς ἀκροπόλεως ἐπήγετο ἡ φυλακή· ταύτῃ γὰρ τοὺς πολεμίους μάλιστα ἐδεδοίκεσαν μὴ ὑπερβῶσιν αὐτοῖς ἐς τὴν πόλιν. ὁπότε οὖν οὗτος ἀποχωρήσειε, τηνικαῦτα ὁ βουκόλος ἐφοίτα παρὰ τὴν γυναῖκα.
This herdsman was pasturing not far from the Neda. So he saw the wife of one of the Messenians who did not have their dwelling within the wall coming for water; having fallen in love, he dared to speak to her and, having given gifts, associated with her. And from then on, he watched her husband, whenever he went off to the guard-duty. Now the guard-duty of the acropolis was conducted by the Messenians in turns; for they were most afraid of the enemies scaling it into the city. Whenever, therefore, this man went off, at that time the herdsman would visit the woman.
καί ποτε ἔτυχε σὺν ἄλλοις ἐς ἐκεῖνον περιήκουσα ἐν τῇ νυκτὶ ἡ φυλακή, ἔτυχε δὲ καὶ ὕειν πολλῷ τὸν θεόν,2 καὶ ἐκλείπουσιν οἱ Μεσσήνιοι τὴν φρουράν· τὸ γὰρ ὕδωρ ἐβιάζετο σφᾶς ἀθρόον ἐκ τοῦ οὐρανοῦ καταχεόμενον, οὔτε ἐπάλξεων ἐνῳκοδομημένων οὔτε πύργων ὑπὸ σπουδῆς τοῦ τειχισμοῦ, καὶ ἅμα οὐδὲ κινήσεσθαι τοὺς Λακεδαιμονίους ἤλπιζον ἐν ἀσελήνῳ νυκτὶ καὶ οὕτω χειμερίῳ.
And once it happened that the guard-duty in the night came round to him with others, and it also happened that the god was raining heavily, and the Messenians abandoned the post; for the water, pouring down in a mass from heaven, forced them away, as neither battlements had been built nor towers because of the haste in walling, and at the same time they did not expect the Lacedaemonians to make a move on a moonless and so stormy a night.
Ἀριστομένης δὲ οὐ πολλαῖς πρότερον ἡμέραις Κεφαλλῆνα ἔμπορον, ἑαυτῷ ξένον καὶ ἐσάγοντα ἐς τὴν Εἶραν ὁπόσων ἐδέοντο, ἑαλωκότα ὑπὸ Λακεδαιμονίων καὶ τοξοτῶν Ἀπτεραίων ὧν ἦρχεν Εὐρύαλος Σπαρτιάτης, τοῦτον τὸν Κεφαλλῆνα ἀφαιρούμενος3 ἐκεῖνον μὲν καὶ τὰ χρήματα ὁπόσα ἦγεν ἀπέσωσεν, αὐτὸς δὲ ἐτέτρωτο καὶ οὐκ ἐδύνατο ἐπιφοιτᾶν τοῖς φυλάσσουσι καθάπερ εἰώθει. τοῦτο μάλιστα αἴτιον ἐγένετο ἐκλειφθῆναι τὴν ἀκρόπολιν·
But Aristomenes, not many days before, when a Cephallenian merchant, his guest-friend who imported into Eira as much as they needed, had been captured by the Lacedaemonians and the Apteraean archers whom the Spartan Euryalos commanded, rescued this Cephallenian and saved both him and all the goods he was bringing; but he himself had been wounded and was unable to visit the guards as he was accustomed to do. This was the chief cause of the acropolis being abandoned.
τῶν τε δὴ ἄλλων ἕκαστος ἀνεχώρησεν ἀπὸ τῆς φρουρᾶς καὶ τῆς ὑπὸ τοῦ βουκόλου μοιχευομένης ὁ ἀνήρ. ἡ δὲ τηνικαῦτα ἔνδον εἶχε τὸν βουκόλον, αἰσθάνεταί τε τοῦ ἀνδρὸς ἐπιόντος καὶ αὐτίκα ὡς τάχους εἶχεν4 ἀποκρύπτει τὸν ἄνθρωπον. ἐσελθόντα δὲ τὸν ἄνδρα ἐφιλοφρονεῖτο ὡς οὔπω πρότερον καὶ ἠρώτα καθʼ ἥν τινα αἰτίαν ἥκοι. ὁ δὲ οὔτε μεμοιχευμένην εἰδὼς οὔτε ἔνδον ὄντα τὸν βουκόλον ἐχρῆτο τῷ ἀληθεῖ λόγῳ, καὶ αὐτός τε διὰ τοῦ ὄμβρου τὸ βίαιον καὶ τῶν ἄλλων ἕκαστον ἔφασκεν ἀπολελοιπέναι τὴν φρουράν.
So each of the others departed from the guard-duty, and so did the husband of the woman who was committing adultery with the herdsman. At that time, she had the herdsman inside, and she perceived her husband coming and immediately hid the man as fast as possible. When her husband entered, she welcomed him as never before and asked him for what reason he had come. He, knowing neither that she had committed adultery nor that the herdsman was inside, told the true story, and said that both he himself because of the violence of the rain and each of the others had left the post.
ἐπηκροᾶτο δὲ λέγοντος ὁ βουκόλος, καὶ ὡς ἀκριβῶς ἐπύθετο ἕκαστα, αὖθις ἐκ τῶν Μεσσηνίων ἐς τοὺς Λακεδαιμονίους ἀφίκετο αὐτόμολος. Λακεδαιμονίοις δὲ οἱ μὲν βασιλεῖς ἀπὸ στρατοπέδου τηνικαῦτα ἀπῆσαν, πολεμαρχῶν δὲ τότε Ἐμπέραμος ὁ τοῦ βουκόλου δεσπότης προσεκάθητο τῇ Εἴρᾳ. ἀφικόμενος οὖν ἐς τοῦτον πρῶτα μὲν τὸ ἐπὶ τῷ δρασμῷ παρῃτεῖτο ἁμάρτημα, δεύτερα δὲ ἀνεδίδασκεν ὡς τὴν Εἶραν ἐν τῷ παρόντι μάλιστα αἱρήσουσιν, αὐτὰ ἕκαστα ὁπόσα ᾔσθετο τοῦ Μεσσηνίου διηγούμενος.
And the herdsman listened to him speaking, and when he had learned each detail accurately, he again went back from the Messenians to the Lacedaemonians as a deserter. Now, the kings of the Lacedaemonians were absent from the camp at that time, but Emperamos, the master of the herdsman, was then commanding as polemarch and besieging Eira. Having come to him, then, first he begged off his offense for his escape, and secondly he explained that they would most easily capture Eira at the present moment, narrating each of the details which he had perceived from the Messenian.
- 4.20.6ἀνδρὸς οὖν τῶν Μεσσηνίων τῶν οὐκ ἐντὸς τείχους ἐχόντων οἴκησιν γυναῖκα εἶδεν
The genitive noun ἀνδρὸς directly modifies γυναῖκα ('the wife of a man'), and is itself modified by the extended genitive phrase τῶν Μεσσηνίων τῶν οὐκ ἐντὸς τείχους ἐχόντων οἴκησιν ('of the Messenians who did not have their dwelling inside the wall').
- 4.20.7ἔτυχε δὲ καὶ ὕειν πολλῷ τὸν θεόν
The impersonal verb ἔτυχε ('it happened that') governs the infinitive ὕειν. τὸν θεόν (the god, i.e., Zeus as the bringer of rain) serves as the subject accusative of the infinitive, while πολλῷ is a dative of degree/measure used adverbially to denote the heaviness of the rain.
- 4.20.8Ἀριστομένης δὲ οὐ πολλαῖς πρότερον ἡμέραις... τοῦτον τὸν Κεφαλλῆνα ἀφαιρούμενος...
A highly complex hyperbaton separates the subject Ἀριστομένης at the beginning of the sentence from its main verb ἀπέσωσεν. The present middle participle ἀφαιρούμενος ('rescuing/taking back for himself') governs the direct object τοῦτον τὸν Κεφαλλῆνα in the accusative.
- 4.20.9ὡς τάχους εἶχεν
An idiomatic expression consisting of ὡς, the imperfect of ἔχω (here third-person singular εἶχεν referring to the woman), and the partitive genitive of quantity/degree τάχους (literally 'as she had of speed'), meaning 'as fast as possible' or 'with all possible speed'.