LP0015 - Myrmidons - Ovid's Metamorphoses -

Legendary Passages #0015 - Myrmidons - Ovid's Metamorphoses -

Last time we heard of Medea and Aegeus, and how Minos asked King Aeacus of Aegina for an alliance, but was refused. We shall continue the passage with King Aeacus welcoming an embassy from Athens.

The Athenian ship docs at Aegina. Cephalus asks why they have so many young men, but few elders. Aeacus explains that there was a terrible plague recently.

King Aeacus prayed for help from Jupiter. That night he dreamed. Ants began to grow in stature and to take the form of men. His son Telamon awakens him, telling him that his dream has came true! Many men have landed on the isle, and all pledge themselves to him. That is the reason the men of Aegina are called Myrmidons, because the word literally means 'ant-people'.

Next time, the passage continues with the story of Cephelus and his magic javelin.

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Myrmidons,
a Legendary Passage,
from Ovid's Metamorphoses,
translated by Brookes More.

Book 7 [490] - [661]

Before the ships of Crete had disappeared, before the mist and blue of waves concealed their fading outlines from the anxious throng which gathered on Oenopian shores, a ship of Athens covered with wide sails appeared, and anchored safely by their friendly shore; and, presently, the mighty Cephalus, well known through all that nation for his deeds, addressed them as he landed, and declared the good will of his people.

Him the sons of Aeacus remembered well, although they had not seen him for some untold years. They led him to their father's welcome home; and with him, also, his two comrades went, Clytus and Butes.

Center of all eyes, the hero still retained his charm, the customary greetings were exchanged, the graceful hero, bearing in his hands a branch of olive from his native soil, delivered the Athenian message, which requested aid and offered for their thought the treaty and the ancestral league between their nations. And he added, Minos sought not only conquest of the Athenian state but sovereignty of all the states of Greece.

And when this eloquence had shown his cause; with left hand on his gleaming sceptre's hilt, King Aeacus exclaimed: "Ask not our aid, but take it, Athens; and count boldly yours all of the force this island holds, and all things which the state of my affairs supplies. My strength for this war is not light, and I have many soldiers for myself and for my enemy. Thanks to the Gods! the times are happy, giving no excuse for my refusal."

"May it prove so," Cephalus replied, "and may your city multiply in men: just now as I was landing, I rejoiced to meet youths, fair and matched in age. And yet I miss among them many whom I saw before when last I visited your city."

Aeacus then groaned and with sad voice replied: "With weeping we began, but better fortune followed. Would that I could tell the last of it, and not the first! Giving my heart command that simple words and briefly spoken may not long detain. Those happy youths who waited at your need, who smiled upon you and for whom you ask, because their absence grieves your noble mind, they've perished! and their bleaching bones or scattered ashes, only may remain, sad remnants, impotent, of vanished power, so recently my hope and my resource.

Because this island bears a rival's name, a deadly pestilence was visited on my confiding people, through the rage of jealous Juno flaming for revenge. This great calamity at first appeared a natural disease- but soon its power baffled our utmost efforts. Medicines availing not, a reign of terror swept from shore to shore and fearful havoc raged. Thick darkness, gathered from descending skies, enveloped our devoted land with heat and languid sickness, for the space of full four moons.

Four times the Moon increased her size. Hot south winds blew with pestilential breath upon us. At the same time the diseased infection reached our needed springs and pools, thousands of serpents crawling over our deserted fields, defiled our rivers with their poison. The swift power of the disease at first was limited to death of dogs and birds and cattle, or among wild beasts. The luckless plowman marvels when he sees his strong bulls fall while at their task and sink down in the furrow. Woolly flocks bleat feebly while their wool falls off without a cause, and while their bodies pine away. The prized horse of high courage, and of great renown when on the race-course, has now lost victorious spirit, and forgetting his remembered glory groans in his shut stall, doomed for inglorious death. The boar forgets to rage, the stag to trust his speed; and even the famished bear to fight the stronger herd.

"Death seizes on the vitals of all life; and in the woods, and in the fields and roads the loathsome bodies of the dead corrupt the heavy-hanging air. Even the dogs, the vultures and the wolves refuse to touch the putrid flesh, there in the sultry sun rotting upon the earth; emitting steams, and exhalations, with a baneful sweep increasing the dread contagion's wide extent.

So spreading, with renewed destruction gained from its own poison, the fierce pestilence appeared to leap from moulding carcases of all the brute creation, till it struck the wretched tillers of the soil, and then extended its dominion over all this mighty city.

Always it began as if the patient's bowels were scorched with flames; red blotches on the body next appeared, and sharp pains in the lungs prevented breath. The swollen tongue would presently loll out, rough and discolored from the gaping mouth, wide-gasping to inhale the noxious air- and show red throbbing veins.

The softest bed. And richest covering gave to none relief; but rather, the diseased would bare himself to cool his burning breast upon the ground, only to heat the earth- and no relief returned. And no physician could be found; for those who ministered among the sick were first to suffer from the dread  disease- the cruel malady broke out upon the very ones who offered remedies. The hallowed art of medicine became a deadly snare to those who knew it best.

The only safety was in flight; and those who were the nearest to the stricken ones, and who most faithfully observed their wants, were always first to suffer as their wards. And many, certain of approaching death, indulged their wicked passions- recklessly abandoned and without the sense of shame, promiscuously huddled by the wells, and rivers and cool fountains; but their thirst no water could assuage, and death alone was able to extinguish their desire. Too weak to rise, they die in water they pollute, while others drink its death.

A madness seizing on them made their beds become most irksome to their tortured nerves. Demented they could not endure the pain, and leaped insanely forth. Or if too weak, the wretches rolled their bodies on the ground, insistent to escape from hated homes- imagined sources of calamity; for, since the cause was hidden and unknown, the horrible locality was blamed. Suspicion seizes on each frail presence as proof of what can never be resolved. And many half-dead wretches staggered out on sultry roads as long as they could stand; and others weeping, stretched out on the ground, died in convulsions, as their rolling eyes gazed upwards at the overhanging clouds; under the sad stars they breathed out their souls.

"And oh, the deep despair that seized on me, the sovereign of that wretched people! I was tortured with a passionate desire to die the same death- And I hated life. No matter where my shrinking eyes were turned, I saw a multitude of gruesome forms in ghastly attitudes bestrew the ground, scattered as rotten apples that have dropped from moving branches, or as acorns thick around a gnarled oak.

Lift up your eyes! Behold that holy temple! unto Jove long dedicated!- What availed the prayers of frightened multitudes, or incense burned on those devoted altars?- In the midst of his most fervent supplications, the husband as he pled for his dear wife, or the fond father for his stricken son, would suddenly, before a word prevailed, die clutching at the altars of his Gods, while holding in his stiffened hand, a spray of frankincense still waiting for the fire.

How often sacrificial bulls have been brought to those temples, and while white-robed priest was pouring offered wine between their horns, have fallen without waiting for the stroke. While I prepared a sacrifice to Jove, for my behalf, my country and three sons, the victim, ever moaning dismal sounds, before a blow was struck, fell suddenly beside the altar; and his scanty blood ran thinly from the knives that slaughtered him. His entrails, wanting all the marks of truth were so diseased, the warnings of the Gods could not be read- the baneful malady had penetrated to the heart of life.

And I have seen the carcases of men lie rotting at the sacred temple gates, or by the very altars, where  they fell, making death odious to the living Gods. And often I have seen some desperate man end life by his own halter, and so cheat by voluntary death his fear of death, in mad haste to outrun approaching fate.

The bodies of the dead, indecently were cast forth, lacking sacred funeral rites as hitherto the custom. All the gates were crowded with processions of the dead. Unburied, they might lie upon the ground, or else, deserted, on their lofty pyres with no one to lament their dismal end, dissolve in their dishonored ashes. All restraint forgotten, a mad rabble fought and took possession of the burning pyres, and even the dead were ravished of their rest.- And who should mourn them wanting, all the souls of sons and husbands, and of old and young, must wander unlamented: and the land sufficed not for the crowded sepulchers: and the dense forest was denuded of all trees.

"Heart-broken at the sight of this great woe, I wailed, `O Jupiter! if truth were told of your sweet comfort in Aegina's arms, if you were not ashamed of me, your son, restore my people, or entomb my corpse, that I may suffer as the ones I love.'

Great lightning flashed around me, and the sound of thunder proved that my complaint was heard. Accepting it, I cried, `Let these, Great Jove, the happy signs of your assent, be shown good omens given as a sacred pledge.'

"Near by, a sacred oak tree grown from seed brought thither from Dodona, spread abroad its branches thinly covered with green leaves; and creeping as an army, on the tree we saw a train of ants that carried grain, half-hidden in the deep and wrinkled bark. And while I wondered at the endless line I said, `Good father, give me citizens of equal number for my empty walls.'

Soon as I said those words, though not a wind was moving nor a breeze,- the lofty tree began to tremble, and I heard a sound of motion in its branches. Wonder not that sudden fear possessed me; and my hair began to rise; and I could hardly stand for so my weak knees tottered!- As I made obeisance to the soil and sacred tree, perhaps I cherished in my heart a thought, that, not acknowledged, cheered me with some hope.

At night I lay exhausted by such thoughts, a deep sleep seized my body, but the tree seemed always present- to my gaze distinct with all its branches- I could even see the birds among its leaves; and from its boughs, that trembled in the still air, moving ants were scattered to the ground in troops below; and ever, as they touched the soil, they grew larger and larger.- As they raised themselves, they stood with upright bodies, and put off their lean shapes; and absorbed their many feet: and even as their dark brown color changed, their rounded forms took on a human shape.

"When my strange dream departed, I awoke, the vision vanished, I complained to Heaven against the idle comfort of such dreams; but as I voiced my own lament, I heard a mighty murmur echoing through the halls of my deserted palace, and a multitude of voices in confusion; where the sound of scarce an echo had disturbed the still deserted chambers for so many days.

All this I thought the fancy of my dream, until my brave son Telamon, in haste threw open the closed doorway, as he called, `Come quickly father, and behold a sight beyond the utmost of your fondest dreams!'

I did go out, and there I saw such men each in his turn, as I had seen transformed in that weird vision of the moving ants.

They all advanced, and hailed me as their king. So soon as I had offered vows to Jove, I subdivided the deserted farms, and dwellings in the cities to these men miraculously raised- which now are called my Myrmidons,- the living evidence of my strange vision. You have seen these men; and since that day, their name has been declared, `Decisive evidence.'

They have retained the well-known customs of the days before their transformation. Patiently they toil; they store the profits of their labor; which they guard with valiant skill. They'll follow you to any war, well matched in years and courage, and I do promise, when this east wind turns, this wind that favored you and brought you here, and when a south wind favors our design, then my brave Myrmidons will go with you."

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