Philosopher Pindar: The Complete Odes #7/71

The charm of poetry, often set to the sound of the sweet-toned lyre

and the many-voiced pipe, gives vigour to life,

and looks kindly now on one and now on another.

And so to the accompaniment of both these instruments

I have come ashore with Diagoras, singing of Rhodes,*his island home,

child of Aphrodite and bride of Helios,

to praise this giant of a man, a straight fighter,

who has won a crown for boxing by Alpheus’ river and at Castalia,*

and also to celebrate his father Damagetus, friend of justice.

Their home is an island of three cities,*close to a cape of broad Asia,

set among Argive spear-fighters.

My hope is to make known a true account, starting from Tlapolemus,

of their shared origin with the powerful race of Heracles.

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On Tlapolemus’ side they claim descent from Zeus,*

and on their mother’s from Amyntor, father of Astydameia. Over men’s minds hang countless errors:

it is impossible to discover what best can happen to man,

both now and at the end. To illustrate:

Tlapolemus, this land’s founder, once at Tiryns

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struck Alcmene’s*bastard brother Licymnius with a staff of hard olive

as he left Midea’s*chamber, and killed him in a fit of anger.

Even a wise man can be led astray by derangement of the mind.

So Tlapolemus went to consult the god,

and the *golden-haired one spoke from his fragrant shrine,

telling him to sail from Lerna’s*shore straight to an island pasture,*

where once the great king of the gods

had sent down a shower of golden snow on to a city,

when by Hephaestus’ art and a stroke of his bronze-forged axe

Athene sprang from the top of her father’s head, yelling her monstrous war-cry,

and Heaven shuddered at her, and mother Earth.

Then it was that Hyperion’s son, who brings light to mortals,

instructed his dear sons to be sure to fulfil a future obligation:

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to be the first to erect a prominent altar to the goddess Athene,

to institute a sacrifice and so to warm the heart

of the virgin spear-thunderer and of her father.

Reverence, child of forethought, shoots excellence and joy into men’s hearts;

but for all that an unexpected cloud of forgetfulness comes over them

and drags their minds away from the straight path of action.

And so it was they went up, but did not take with them the seeds of bright flame,

but established on the acropolis a sacred grove with fireless offerings.

Zeus called up a tawny-coloured cloud and rained abundant gold on them,

and the grey-eyed goddess*herself gave them every kind of craft,

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so that they surpassed all mortals in the ingenuity of their hands. In their streets stood statues like living and moving beings,

and their fame spread far abroad; for in an expert craftsman

skill flourishes when it is without artifice.

Ancient tales of men relate that when Zeus and the immortal gods

were giving out portions of the earth,

Rhodes had not yet appeared in the open sea but lay hidden in its salty depths.

In his absence no one had allotted the sun-god Helios a share,

and so they left him, a revered god, without a portion of land.

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He complained of this to Zeus, who set about recasting the lots,

but Helios stopped him; he saw, he said,

a land rising from the depths of the grey sea,

a land fruitful for men, and bountiful to their flocks.

At once Helios ordered Lachesis*of the golden headband

to raise her hands and to observe the gods’ great oath,

and to undertake with Cronus’ son that where the land had risen

to the bright upper air it should for all time be his prize and possession.

And so it fell out: the chief words of his speech were fulfilled,

and an island sprang up from the watery sea,

and Helios, father of the sun’s piercing rays,

lord of fire-breathing horses, now holds it as his own.

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Later he coupled with the nymph Rhodos and had by her seven sons,

who inherited from him the wisest minds among men of former times.

One sired Camirus, and Ialysus his first-born, and Lindus;

these shared out their ancestral land in three ways,

and each held his apportioned city apart, which now bear their names.

Here was established for Tlapolemus, lord of the men of Tiryns,

sweet requital for his miserable ill-fortune, as if he were a god:*a procession, reeking with the smoke of sacrificed beasts,

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and games*where men are judged for prizes.