spective seats. But Thersites alone, immediate in words, was wrangling; who to wit, knew in his mind expressions both unseemly and numerous, so as idly, and not according to discipline, to wrangle with the princes, but [to blurt out] whatever seemed to him to be matter of laughter to the Greeks. And he was the ugliest man who came to Ilium. He was bandy-legged,[1] and lame of one foot; his shoulders were crooked, and contracted toward his breast; and his head was peaked[2] toward the top, and thin woolly hair was scatteced over it. To Achilles and Ulysses he was particularly hostile, for these two he used to revile. But on this occasion, shouting out shrilly, he uttered bitter taunts against noble Agamemnon; but the Greeks were greatly irritated against him, and were indignant in their minds. But vociferating aloud, he reviled Agamemnon with words:
"Son of Atreus, of what dost thou now complain, or what dost thou want? Thy tents are full of brass, and many chosen women are in thy tents, whom we Greeks bestow on thee the first of all, whenever we capture a city. Dost thou still require gold, which some one of the horse-taming Trojans shall bring from Troy, as a ransom for his son, whom I, or some other of the Greeks, having bound, may lead away? Or a young maid, that thou mayest be mingled in dalliance, and whom thou for thyself mayest retain apart[3] [from the rest]? Indeed it becomes not a man who is chief in command, to lead the sons of Greeks into evil. O ye soft ones, vile disgraces, Grecian dames, no longer Grecian men,[4] let us return home, home![5] with our ships, and let us leave him here to digest his honors at Troy, that he may know whether we really aid him in any thing or not. He, who but just now has dishonored Achilles, a man much more valiant than himself; for, taking away, he retains his prize, he himself having seized it. But assuredly there is not much anger in the heart of Achilles; but he is forbearing; for truly, were it not so, O son of Atreus, thou wouldest have insulted now for the last time."
- ↑ See Buttm. Lexil. p. 540, § 8.
- ↑ See Buttm. p. 537, who derives ϕοξὺς from ϕώγειν, to dry, as if ϕοξός, warped by heat.
- ↑ Not being compelled to restore her, like the daughter of Chryses.
- ↑ Virg. Æn. ix. 617: "O vero Plirygiæ, neque enim Phryges!"
- ↑ This is Niigelsbach's spirited rendering of οἴκαδε περ.
