§3.319Hectoris Andromachen? Pyrrhin’ conubia servas?
Hector's Andromache?
§3.320Deiecit vultum et demissa voce locuta est: §3.321O felix una ante alias Priameïa virgo, §3.322hostilem ad tumulum Troiae sub moenibus altis §3.323iussa mori, quae sortitus non pertulit ullos, §3.324nec victoris eri tetigit captiva cubile!
Do you preserve your marriage with Pyrrhus?" She cast down her look and spoke with a low voice: "O happy alone before others, daughter of Priam, ordered to die at the enemy's tomb under the high walls of Troy, who did not endure any lot, nor as a captive touched the bed of a victorious master!
§3.325nos, patria incensa, diversa per aequora vectae, §3.326stirpis Achilleae fastus iuvenemque superbum, §3.327servitio enixae, tulimus: qui deinde, secutus §3.328Ledaeam Hermionen Lacedaemoniosque hymenaeos, §3.329me famulo famulamque Heleno transmisit habendam.
We, our homeland burnt, carried across diverse seas, endured the arrogance of Achilles' offspring and the proud youth, bearing children in slavery; who then, pursuing Leda's Hermione and Lacedaemonian marriage, handed me over, a slave to a slave, to be held by Helenus.
§3.330Ast illum, ereptae magno inflammatus amore §3.331coniugis et scelerum Furiis agitatus, Orestes §3.332excipit incautum patriasque obtruncat ad aras.
But Orestes, inflamed by a great love for his snatched wife and driven by the Furies of his crimes, catches him off guard and slays him at his ancestral altars.
§3.333Morte Neoptolemi regnorum reddita cessit §3.334pars Heleno, qui Chaonios cognomine campos §3.335Chaoniamque omnem Troiano a Chaone dixit, §3.336Pergamaque Iliacamque iugis hanc addidit arcem.
At the death of Neoptolemus a part of the kingdoms yielded, restored to Helenus, who called the plains Chaonian by name and the whole of Chaonia from Trojan Chaon, and added Pergama and this Trojan citadel to the ridges.
§3.337Sed tibi qui cursum venti, quae fata dedere?
But what winds, what fates gave you your course?
§3.338Aut quisnam ignarum nostris deus adpulit oris?
Or what god drove you, unknowing, to our shores?
§3.339Quid puer Ascanius? superatne et vescitur aura,
What of the boy Ascanius?
Does he survive and feed on air, whom to you now Troy— Yet does the boy have any care for his lost parent?
§3.342Ecquid in antiquam virtutem animosque virilis §3.343et pater Aeneas et avunculus excitat Hector? §3.344Talia fundebat lacrimans longosque ciebat §3.345incassum fletus, cum sese a moenibus heros §3.346Priamides multis Helenus comitantibus adfert, §3.347adgnoscitque suos, laetusque ad limina ducit, §3.348et multum lacrimas verba inter singula fundit.
Does both his father Aeneas and his uncle Hector excite him into ancient virtue and manly spirits?" She was pouring forth such words weeping, and was raising long weeping in vain, when from the walls the hero Helenus, son of Priam, brings himself with many accompanying, and recognizes his own, and joyfully leads them to the thresholds, and pours forth many tears between single words.
§3.349Procedo, et parvam Troiam simulataque magnis §3.350Pergama, et arentem Xanthi cognomine rivum §3.351adgnosco, Scaeaeque amplector limina portae.
I advance, and recognize a small Troy, and Pergama simulated to the great, and a dry stream named after Xanthus, and embrace the thresholds of the Scaean gate.
§3.352Nec non et Teucri socia simul urbe fruuntur: §3.353illos porticibus rex accipiebat in amplis; §3.354aulaï medio libabant pocula Bacchi, §3.355impositis auro dapibus, paterasque tenebant.
And no less the Trojans enjoy the allied city together: the king received them in his ample porticoes; in the middle of the hall they libated cups of Bacchus, the feasts being served on gold, and they held the bowls.
§3.356Iamque dies alterque dies processit, et aurae §3.357vela vocant tumidoque inflatur carbasus austro.
And now day after day has passed, and the breezes call the sails and the canvas is inflated by the swelling south wind.
§3.358His vatem adgredior dictis ac talia quaeso: §3.359Troiugena, interpres divom, qui numina Phoebi, §3.360qui tripodas, Clarii laurus, qui sidera sentis, §3.361et volucrum linguas et praepetis omina pennae, §3.362fare age—namque omnem cursum mihi prospera dixit §3.363religio, et cuncti suaserunt numine divi §3.364Italiam petere et terras temptare repostas: §3.365sola novum dictuque nefas Harpyia Celaeno §3.366prodigium canit, et tristis denuntiat iras, §3.367obscenamque famem—quae prima pericula vito? §3.368Quidve sequens tantos possim superare labores?
With these words I address the prophet and ask such things: "Trojan-born, interpreter of the gods, who perceive the divinities of Phoebus, the tripods, the laurels of Clarus, the stars, and the tongues of birds and the omens of the swift wing, come, speak—for a prosperous sign told me my whole course, and all the gods by their divinity persuaded me to seek Italy and to try remote lands: only the Harpy Celaeno sings a strange portent, abominable to speak, and denounces sad wraths and filthy hunger—what dangers do I avoid first?
§3.369Hic Helenus, caesis primum de more iuvencis, §3.370exorat pacem divom, vittasque resolvit §3.371sacrati capitis, meque ad tua limina, Phoebe, §3.372ipse manu multo suspensum numine ducit, §3.373atque haec deinde canit divino ex ore sacerdos: §3.374Nate dea,—nam te maioribus ire per altum §3.375auspiciis manifesta fides: sic fata deum rex §3.376sortitur, volvitque vices; is vertitur ordo— §3.377pauca tibi e multis, quo tutior hospita lustres §3.378aequora et Ausonio possis considere portu, §3.379expediam dictis; prohibent nam cetera Parcae §3.380scire Helenum farique vetat Saturnia Iuno.
Or following what, could I overcome such great labors?" Here Helenus, first having slain bullocks according to custom, entreats the peace of the gods, and unbinds the fillets of his sacred head, and to your thresholds, Phoebus, he himself leads me by the hand, suspended by much divinity, and then the priest sings these things from his divine mouth: "O goddess-born,—for that you go through the deep with greater auspices is manifest faith: thus the king of the gods allotts the fates and rolls the changes; this order is turned— a few things of many, that you may more safely traverse hospitable seas and be able to settle in the Ausonian harbor, I will unfold in words; for the Parcae forbid Helenus to know the rest, and Saturnian Juno forbids him to speak.
§3.381Principio Italiam, quam tu iam rere propinquam §3.382vicinosque, ignare, paras invadere portus, §3.383longa procul longis via dividit invia terris.
First, Italy, which you now think is near, and whose neighboring harbors you prepare, ignorant one, to invade, a long, pathless way separates far off by long lands.
§3.384Ante et Trinacria lentandus remus in unda, §3.385et salis Ausonii lustrandum navibus aequor, §3.386infernique lacus, Aeaeaeque insula Circae, §3.387quam tuta possis urbem componere terra: §3.388signa tibi dicam, tu condita mente teneto: §3.389cum tibi sollicito secreti ad fluminis undam §3.390litoreis ingens inventa sub ilicibus sus §3.391triginta capitum fetus enixa iacebit. §3.392alba, solo recubans, albi circum ubera nati, §3.393is locus urbis erit, requies ea certa laborum.
First also the oar must be bent in the Trinacrian wave, and the sea of the Ausonian salt must be traversed by your ships, and the infernal lakes, and the island of Aeaean Circe, before you can establish a city on a safe land: I will tell you the signs, do you keep them stored in your mind: when by you, anxious, at the wave of a secret river, a huge sow, found under the holm-oaks of the shore, shall lie, having brought forth a litter of thirty heads, white, reclining on the ground, with white young around her teats, that shall be the place of the city, that the certain rest of your labors.
Nor do you dread the future bitings of your tables: the fates will find a way, and Apollo, being invoked, will be present.
§3.396Has autem terras, Italique hanc litoris oram, §3.397proxuma quae nostri perfunditur aequoris aestu, §3.398effuge; cuncta malis habitantur moenia Grais.
But these lands, and this shore of the Italian coast, which, nearest, is washed by the tide of our sea, avoid; all these walled cities are inhabited by hostile Greeks."