Ancient, Classical & Medieval Books

ARGUMENT. Apollo, enraged at the insult offered to his priest, Chryses, sends a pestilence upon the Greeks. A council is called, and Agamemnon, being compelled to restore the daughter of Chryses, whom he had taken from him, in revenge deprives Achilles of Hippodameia. Achilles resigns her, but refuses to aid the Greeks in battle, and at his request, his mother, Thetis, petitions Jove to honour her... more...

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THE FIRST BOOK   I, WHO erewhile the happy Garden sung  By one man's disobedience lost, now sing  Recovered Paradise to all mankind,  By one man's firm obedience fully tried  Through all temptation, and the Tempter foiled  In all his wiles, defeated and repulsed,  And Eden raised in the waste Wilderness.    Thou Spirit, who led'st this glorious Eremite  Into the... more...

HOMER'S ODYSSEY.   BOOK FIRST—INTRODUCTION. The Odyssey starts by organizing itself; it maps out its own structure in what may be called a General Introduction. Herein lies a significant difference between it and the Iliad, which has simply an Invocation to the Muse, and then leaps into the thick of the action. The Iliad, accordingly, does not formulate its own organization, which fact has been... more...

Homer's "Iliad" begins towards the close of the last of the ten years of the Trojan War: its incidents extend over some fifty days only, and it ends with the burial of Hector. The things which came before and after were told by other bards, who between them narrated the whole "cycle" of the events of the war, and so were called the Cyclic Poets. Of their works none have survived;... more...

INTRODUCTION The impersonal character of the Homeric poems has left us entirely in the dark as to the birthplace, the history, and the date, of their author. So complete is the darkness which surrounds the name of Homer that his very existence has been disputed, and his works have been declared to be an ingenious compilation, drawn from the productions of a multitude of singers. It is not my intention... more...

FOREWORD Most societies seem to have epic heroes and events that define them as they like to see themselves: Even a young society such as Australia has Ned Kelly, Eureka Stockade, and ANZAC. Others have their Robin Hood, Siegfried, Roland, or Davy Crockett. Lacplesis (Bearslayer) is such a work. Bearslayer is patriotic, brave, strong, tough, loyal, wise, fair, and virtuous, and he loves nature. He... more...

FIRST SESTIAD On Hellespont, guilty of true-love's blood,In view and opposite two cities stood,Sea-borderers, disjoined by Neptune's might;The one Abydos, the other Sestos hight.At Sestos Hero dwelt; Hero the fair,Whom young Apollo courted for her hair,And offered as a dower his burning throne,Where she should sit for men to gaze upon.The outside of her garments were of lawn,The lining purple... more...

BOOK I Arms, and the man I sing, who, forc'd by fate,And haughty Juno's unrelenting hate,Expell'd and exil'd, left the Trojan shore.Long labors, both by sea and land, he bore,And in the doubtful war, before he wonThe Latian realm, and built the destin'd town;His banish'd gods restor'd to rites divine,And settled sure succession in his line,From whence the race of... more...

BOOK FIRST THE COMING OF AENEAS TO CARTHAGE I sing of arms and the man who of old from the coasts of Troy came, an exile of fate, to Italy and the shore of Lavinium; hard driven on land and on the deep by the violence of heaven, for cruel Juno's unforgetful anger, and hard bestead in war also, ere he might found a city and carry his gods into Latium; from whom is the Latin race, the lords of Alba,... more...