previous next
if any other man of the Achaeans had told us of this dream we should have declared it false, and would have had nothing to do with it. But he who has seen it is the foremost man among us; we must therefore set about getting the people under arms." With this he led the way from the assembly,

and the other sceptered kings rose with him in obedience to the word of Agamemnon; but the people pressed forward to hear. They swarmed like bees that sally from some hollow cave and flit in countless throng among the spring flowers,

bunched in knots and clusters; even so did the mighty multitude pour from ships and tents to the assembly, and range themselves upon the wide-watered shore, while among them ran Wildfire Rumor, messenger of Zeus, urging them ever to the fore.

Thus they gathered in a pell-mell of mad confusion, and the earth groaned under the tramp of men as the people sought their places. Nine heralds went crying about among them to stay their tumult and bid them listen to the kings, till at last they were got into their several places and ceased their clamor.

Then King Agamemnon rose, holding his scepter. This was the work of Hephaistos, who gave it to Zeus the son of Kronos. Zeus gave it to Hermes, slayer of Argos, guide and guardian. King Hermes gave it to Pelops, the mighty charioteer, and

Pelops to Atreus, shepherd of his people. Atreus, when he died, left it to Thyestes, rich in flocks, and Thyestes in his turn left it to be borne by Agamemnon, that he might be lord of all Argos and of the isles. Leaning, then, on his scepter, he addressed the Argives.

"My friends," he said, "heroes, squires [therapontes] of Ares, Zeus the son of Kronos has tied me down with atê. Cruel, he gave me his solemn promise that I should sack the city of Priam before returning, but he has played me false, and is now bidding me

go ingloriously back to Argos with the loss of many people. Such is the will of Zeus, who has laid many a proud city in the dust, as he will yet lay others, for his power is above all. It will be a sorry tale hereafter that an

Homer. The Iliad of Homer. Rendered into English prose for the use of those who cannot read the original. Samuel Butler. Longmans, Green and Co. 39 Paternoster Row, London. New York and Bombay. 1898 (?).

Creative Commons License
This work is licensed under a Creative Commons Attribution-ShareAlike 3.0 United States License.

An XML version of this text is available for download, with the additional restriction that you offer Perseus any modifications you make. Perseus provides credit for all accepted changes, storing new additions in a versioning system.

hide Places (automatically extracted)

View a map of the most frequently mentioned places in this document.

Sort places alphabetically, as they appear on the page, by frequency
Click on a place to search for it in this document.
Argos (Greece) (3)

Download Pleiades ancient places geospacial dataset for this text.

hide References (19 total)
  • Commentary references to this page (9):
    • Thomas W. Allen, E. E. Sikes, Commentary on the Homeric Hymns, HYMN TO DEMETER
    • W. Walter Merry, James Riddell, D. B. Monro, Commentary on the Odyssey (1886), 4.335
    • Walter Leaf, Commentary on the Iliad (1900), 14.95
    • Walter Leaf, Commentary on the Iliad (1900), 16.481
    • Walter Leaf, Commentary on the Iliad (1900), 18.316
    • Walter Leaf, Commentary on the Iliad (1900), 4.75
    • Walter Leaf, Commentary on the Iliad (1900), 5.685
    • George W. Mooney, Commentary on Apollonius: Argonautica, 1.879
    • Thomas D. Seymour, Commentary on Homer's Iliad, Books I-III, 1.47
  • Cross-references to this page (3):
    • Raphael Kühner, Bernhard Gerth, Ausführliche Grammatik der griechischen Sprache, KG 1.pos=2.2
    • Raphael Kühner, Bernhard Gerth, Ausführliche Grammatik der griechischen Sprache, KG 3.1.5
    • William Watson Goodwin, Syntax of the Moods and Tenses of the Greek Verb, Chapter II
  • Cross-references in general dictionaries to this page (5):
  • Cross-references in text-specific dictionaries to this page (2):
hide Display Preferences
Greek Display:
Arabic Display:
View by Default:
Browse Bar: