The Iliad by Homer (book club recommendations txt) 📕

And as when water-fowl of many tribes⁠—
Geese, cranes, and long-necked swans⁠—disport themselves
In Asia’s fields beside Cayster’s streams,
And to and fro they fly with screams, and light,
Flock after flock, and all the fields resound;
So poured, from ships and tents, the swarming tribes
Into Scamander’s plain, where fearful’y
Earth echoed to the tramp of steeds and men;
And there they mustered on the river’s side,
Numberless as the flowers and leaves of spring,
And as when flies in swarming myriads haunt
The herdsman’s stalls in spring-time, when new milk
Has filled the pails⁠—in such vast multitudes
Mustered the long-haired Greeks upon the plain,
Impatient to destroy the Trojan race.

Then, as the goatherds, when their mingled flocks
Are in the pastures, know and set apart
Each his own scattered charge, so did the chiefs,
Moving among them, marshal each his men.
There walked King Agamemnon, like to Jove
In eye and forehead, with the loins of Mars,
And ample chest like him who rules the sea.
And as a bull amid the horned herd
Stands eminent and nobler than the rest,
So Jove to Agamemnon on that day
Gave to surpass the chiefs in port and mien.

O Muses, goddesses who dwell on high,
Tell me⁠—for all things ye behold and know,
While we know nothing and may only hear
The random tales of rumor⁠—tell me who
Were chiefs and princes of the Greeks; for I
Should fail to number and to name them all⁠—
Had I ten tongues, ten throats, a voice unapt
To weary, uttered from a heart of brass⁠—
Unless the Muses aided me. I now
Will sing of the commanders and the ships.

Peneleus, Prothoenor, Leitus,
And Clonius, and Arcesilaus led
The warriors of Boeotia, all who dwelt
In Hyria and in rocky Aulis, all
From Schoenus and from Scolus and the hill
Of Eteonus and Thespeia’s fields,
And Graia and the Mycalesian plain,
All who from Herma and Ilesius came,
And Erythrae, and those who had their homes
In Eleon, Hyla, and Ocalea,
And Peteona, and the stately streets
Of Medeon, Copae, Thisbè full of doves,
And those whose dwelling-place was Eutresis,
And Coronaea, and the grassy lawns
Of Haliartus, all the men who held
Plataea, or in Glissa tilled the soil,
Or dwelt in Hypothebae nobly built,
Or in Onchestus with its temple-walls
Sacred to Neptune, or inhabited
Arnè with fruitful vineyards, Midea
And Nyssa the divine, and Anthedon
The distant⁠—fifty were their barques, and each
Held sixscore youths of the Boeotian race.

Next, over those who came from Aspledon
And from Orchomenus in Minyas
Ascalaphus ruled with his brother chief
Ialmenus⁠—two sons of mighty Mars.
These, in the halls of Actor, Azis’ son,
Astyoche bore to the god of war,
Who met by stealth the bashful maid, as once
She sought the upper palace-rooms. Their ships
Were thirty, ranged in order on the shore.

Then Schedius and Epistrophus, two chiefs
Born to Iphitus, son of Naubolus
The large of soul, led the Phocean host,
Those who in Cyparissus had their homes,
In Panopè and Crissa the divine
And Daulis, or about Hyampolis
Anemoreia, and upon the banks of broad
Cephissus, and with them the race
Who held Lilaea by Cephissus’ springs.
With these came forty ships. Their leaders went
Among them, ranging them in due array
And close to the Boeotians on the left.

Ajax the swift of foot, Oileus’ son,
Was leader of the Locrians⁠—less in limb
And stature than the other Ajax⁠—nay,
Much smaller than that son of Telamon,
Wearing a linen corselet; but to wield
The spear he far excelled all other men
Of Hellas and Achaia. Those who dwelt
In Cynus, Opus, Bessa, and the fields
Of Scarpha and Calliarus and green
Augeia, Tarpha, and the meadows where
Boagrius waters Thronium, followed him
With forty dark-hulled Locrian barques, that came
From coasts beyond Eubrea’s sacred isle.

The Euboeans breathing valor, they who held
Chalcis, Eretria, and the vineyard slopes
Of Histiaea, and the lofty walls
Of Dium and Cerinthus by the sea,
And Styra, and Earystus; these obeyed
Elphenor of the line of Mars, and son
Of the large-souled Chalcodon ruler o’er
The Abantes. Him with loosely flowing locks
The Abantes followed, swift of foot and fierce
In combat, and expert to break the mail
Upon the enemies’ breasts with ashen spears;
With forty dark-hulled barques they followed him.

Next they who came from Athens nobly built,
The city of Erechtheus, great of soul,
Son of the teeming Earth, whom Pallas reared,
That daughter of the Highest, and within
Her sumptuous temple placed him, where the sons
Of Athens, with the circling year’s return,
Paid worship at her altars, bringing bulls
And lambs to lay upon them; these obeyed
Menestheus, son of Peteus, whom no chief
On earth could equal in the art to place
Squadrons of men and horse in due array
For battle. Nestor only sought to share
This praise, but Nestor was the elder chief.
Fifty dark galleys with Menestheus came.

Ajax had brought twelve ships from Salamis,
And these he stationed near the Athenian host.

But they who dwelt in Argos, or within
The strong-walled Tiryns, or Hermione
And Asine with their deep, sheltering bays,
Troezenè and Eïonae, and hills
Of Epidaurus planted o’er with vines,
And they who tilled Aeigina and the coast
Of Mases⁠—Grecian warriors⁠—over these
Brave Diomed bore sway, with Sthenelus,
Beloved son of far-famed Campaneus,
And, third in rule, Euryalus, who seemed
Like to a god, Mecisteus’ royal son
Who sprung from Talaus; yet the chief command
Was given to Diomed, the great in war.
A fleet of eighty galleys came with them.

The dwellers of Mycenae nobly built,
Of Corinth famed for riches, and the town
Of beautiful Cleonae, they who tilled
Orneia, Araethyrea’s pleasant land,
And Sicyon, where of yore Adrastus reigned,
And Hyperesia and the airy heights
Of Gonoessa, and Pellene’s fields,
And they who came from Aegium and the shores
Around it, and broad lands of Helicè⁠—
These had a hundred barques, and over them
Atrides Agamemnon bore command;
And with him came the largest train of troops
And bravest. He was cased in gleaming mail,
And his heart gloried when he thought how high
He stood among the heroes⁠—mightier far
In power, and leader of a mightier host.

Then they who dwelt within the hollow vale
Of queenly Lacedsemon, they who held
Phare and Sparta, Messa full of doves,
Bryseiae, and Augeia’s rich domain,
Amyclae and the town of Helos, built
Close to the sea, and those who had their homes
In Laäs and the fields of Oetylus;
All these obeyed the brother of the king,
The valiant Menelaus. Sixty ships
They brought, but these he ranged apart from those
Of Agamemnon. Through the ranks he went,
And, trusting in his valor, quickened theirs
For battle; for his heart within him burned
To avenge the wrongs