by Theocritus
The Complete Works of
THEOCRITUS
(fl. c. 270 BC)
Contents
The Translations
THE IDYLLS OF THEOCRITUS
C. S. CALVERLEY VERSE TRANSLATION, 1869
ANDREW LANG PROSE TRANSLATION, 1889
J. M. EDMONDS, LOEB TRANSLATION, 1912
The Greek Text
CONTENTS OF THE GREEK TEXT
The Dual Text
DUAL GREEK AND ENGLISH TEXT
The Biographies
THE LIFE OF THEOCRITUS by J. M. Edmonds
THEOCRITUS AND HIS AGE by Andrew Lang
THEOCRITUS by Albert Curtis Clark
The Delphi Classics Catalogue
© Delphi Classics 2016
Version 1
The Complete Works of
THEOCRITUS
By Delphi Classics, 2016
COPYRIGHT
Complete Works of Theocritus
First published in the United Kingdom in 2016 by Delphi Classics.
© Delphi Classics, 2016.
All rights reserved. No part of this publication may be reproduced, stored in a retrieval system, or transmitted, in any form or by any means, without the prior permission in writing of the publisher, nor be otherwise circulated in any form other than that in which it is published.
ISBN: 978 1 78656 378 1
Delphi Classics
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The Translations
Ortygia island, Syracuse — Theocritus’ birthplace
Ancient ruins at Syracuse — The Temple of Apollo
THE IDYLLS OF THEOCRITUS
Little is known of Theocritus, the creator of ancient bucolic poetry who flourished in the 3rd century BC, except what can be learned from his writings. It is clear that from an early date two collections were made of the Sicilian poet’s work: one consisting of poems whose authorship was doubtful, yet formed a corpus of bucolic poetry, the other a strict collection of those works, considered to have been composed by Theocritus himself. Artemidorus of Tarsus, a grammarian, who lived in the time of Sulla, is believed to have been the first editor of these poems. He writes, “Bucolic muses, once were ye scattered, but now one byre, one herd is yours.” An annoymous epigram tells us: “The Chian is another. I, Theocritus, who wrote these songs, am of Syracuse, a man of the people, the son of Praxagoras and famed Philina. I never sought after a strange muse.” The last line may mean that he wrote nothing but bucolic poems, or that he only wrote in Doric. The assertion that he was from Syracuse appears to be upheld by several allusions in the Idylls.
A bucolic poem is set within a pastoral, rural setting, whilst a mime is set against the backdrop of a town. Theocritus’most famous Bucolics are 1, 6, 7 and 11. In Idyll 1 Thyrsis sings to a goatherd about how Daphnis, the mythical herdsman, having defied the power of Aphrodite, dies rather than yielding to a passion the goddess has inflicted on him. A series of divine figures from classical mythology, including Hermes, Priapus, and Aphrodite herself, interrogate the shepherd about his lovesickness. The poem deals with the classical belief of the folly of mortals that challenge the gods.
Idyll 11 concerns Polyphemus, the Cyclops, who is depicted in love with the sea-nymph Galatea and finds solace in his song. In Idyll 6, Polyphemus is cured of his passion and naively relates how he repulses the overtures now made to him by Galatea. Idyll 7 describes a Harvest Feast and is generally considered one of the most important extant bucolic poems. The scene is set on the isle of Kos. The poet speaks in the first person and is called Simichidas by his friends. Other poets are introduced under feigned names. Ancient critics have identified the character Sicelidas of Samos with Asclepiades of Samos, and the character Lycidas, “the goatherd of Cydonia,” with the poet Astacides, whom Callimachus calls “the Cretan, the goatherd.” Theocritus speaks of himself as having already gained fame and boasts that his songs have been brought by report even unto the throne of Zeus. He praises Philitas, the veteran poet of Kos, and criticises “the fledgelings of the Muse that cackle against the Chian bard and find their labour lost.” Other persons mentioned are Nicias, a physician of Miletus, whose name occurs in other poems, and Aratus, whom the scholiasts identify with the author of the Phenomena.
Several of the other bucolic poems consist of singing-matches, conducted according to the rules of amoebaean poetry, in which the second singer takes the subject chosen by the first and contributes a variation on the same theme. Suspicion has been cast upon the authenticity of Idylls 8 and 9 on various grounds. However, both poems were in Virgil’s Theocritus, suggesting that they passed the scrutiny of the editor that formed the short collection of Theocritean Bucolics.
There are three mimes: 2, 14, and 15. In 2 Simaetha, deserted by Delphis, tells the story of her love to the moon; in 14 Aeschines narrates his quarrel with his sweetheart, and is advised to go to Egypt and enlist in the army of Ptolemy Philadelphus; in 15 Gorgo and Praxinoë go to the festival of Adonis. It may be noticed that in the best manuscript 2 comes immediately before 14, an arrangement which is obviously right, since it places the three mimes together. The second place in the manuscripts is occupied by Idyll 7, the “Harvest Feast.”
Amphora painting of Odysseus and his men blinding Polyphemus (Eleusis museum) — Theocritus describes the Sicilian Polyphemus as being his fellow countryman
Sculpture of Pan teaching Daphnis to play the pipes, found in Pompeii; c. 100 BC
Falconet’s 1763 sculpture of Galatea, a key figure of Idyll XI
Fragment of Theocritus' Idyll 13, P. Oxy. 694, 2nd century AD
C. S. CALVERLEY VERSE TRANSLATION, 1869
Translated by C. S. Calverley
CONTENTS
PREFACE.
Idylls.
IDYLL I. The Death of Daphnis.
IDYLL II. The Sorceress.
IDYLL III. The Serenade.
IDYLL IV. The Herdsmen.
IDYLL V. The Battle of the Bards.
IDYLL VI. The Drawn Battle.
IDYLL VII. Harvest-Home.
IDYLL VIII. The Triumph of Daphnis.
IDYLL IX. Pastorals.
IDYLL X. The Two Workmen.
IDYLL XI. The Giant’s Wooing
IDYLL XII. The Comrades
IDYLL XIII. Hylas.
IDYLL XIV. The Love of Æschines.
IDYLL XV. The Festival of Adonis.
IDYLL XVI. The Value of Song.
IDYLL XVII. The Praise of Ptolemy.
IDYLL XVIII. The Bridal of Helen.
IDYLL XIX. Love Stealing Honey.
IDYLL XX. Town and Country
IDYLL XXI. The Fishermen.
IDYLL XXII. The Sons of Leda
IDYLL XXIII. Love Avenged
IDYLL XXIV. The Infant Heracles.
IDYLL XXV. Heracles the Lion Slayer.
IDYLL XXVI. The Bacchanals.
IDYLL XXVII. A Countryman’s Wooing.
IDYLL XXVIII. The Distaff.
IDYLL XXIX. Loves.
IDYLL XXX. The Death of Adonis.
IDYLL XXXI. Loves.
Epigrams and Epitaphs.
I.
II.
III.
IV.
V.
VI.
VII. For a Statue of Æsculapius.
VIII. Ortho’s Epitaph.
IX. Epitaph of Cleonicus.
X. For a Statue of the Muses.
XI. Epitaph of Eusthenes.
XII. For a Tripod Erected by Damoteles to Bacchus.
XIII. For a Statue of A
nacreon.
XIV. Epitaph of Eurymedon.
XV. Another.
XVI. For a Statue of the Heavenly Aphrodite.
XVII. To Epicharmus.
XVIII. Epitaph of Cleita, Nurse of Medeius.
XIX. To Archilochus.
XX. Under a statue of Peisander, who wrote the labours of Heracles.
XXI. Epitaph of Hipponax.
XXII. On his own Book.
PREFACE.
I had intended translating all or nearly all these Idylls into blank verse, as the natural equivalent of Greek or of Latin hexameters; only deviating into rhyme where occasion seemed to demand it. But I found that other metres had their special advantages: the fourteen-syllable line in particular has that, among others, of containing about the same number of syllables as an ordinary line of Theocritus. And there is also no doubt something gained by variety.
Several recent writers on the subject have laid down that every translation of Greek poetry, especially bucolic poetry, must be in rhyme of some sort. But they have seldom stated, and it is hard to see, why. There is no rhyme in the original, and primâ facie should be none in the translation. Professor Blackie has, it is true, pointed out the “assonances, alliterations, and rhymes,” which are found in more or less abundance in Ionic Greek.[A] These may of course be purely accidental, like the hexameters in Livy or the blank-verse lines in Mr. Dickens’s prose: but accidental or not (it may be said) they are there, and ought to be recognised. May we not then recognise them by introducing similar assonances, etc., here and there into the English version? or by availing ourselves of what Professor Blackie again calls attention to, the “compensating powers”[B] of English? I think with him that it was hard to speak of our language as one which “transforms boos megaloio boeién into ‘great ox’s hide.’” Such phrases as ‘The Lord is a man of war,’ ‘The trumpet spake not to the armed throng,’ are to my ear quite as grand as Homer: and it would be equally fair to ask what we are to make of a language which transforms Milton’s line into [Greek: ê shalpigx ohy proshephê ton hôplismhenon hochlon.][C] But be this as it may, these phenomena are surely too rare and too arbitrary to be adequately represented by any regularly recurring rhyme: and the question remains, what is there in the unrhymed original to which rhyme answers?
To me its effect is to divide the verse into couplets, triplets, or (if the word may include them all) stanzas of some kind. Without rhyme we have no apparent means of conveying the effect of stanzas. There are of course devices such as repeating a line or part of a line at stated intervals, as is done in ‘Tears, idle tears’ and elsewhere: but clearly none of these would be available to a translator. Where therefore he has to express stanzas, it is easy to see that rhyme may be admissible and even necessary. Pope’s couplet may (or may not) stand for elegiacs, and the In Memoriam stanza for some one of Horace’s metres. Where the heroes of Virgil’s Eclogues sing alternately four lines each, Gray’s quatrain seems to suggest itself: and where a similar case occurs in these Idylls (as for instance in the ninth) I thought it might be met by taking whatever received English stanza was nearest the required length. Pope’s couplet again may possibly best convey the pomposity of some Idylls and the point of others. And there may be divers considerations of this kind. But, speaking generally, where the translator has not to intimate stanzas — where he has on the contrary to intimate that there are none — rhyme seems at first sight an intrusion and a suggestio falsi.
No doubt (as has been observed) what ‘Pastorals’ we have are mostly written in what is called the heroic measure. But the reason is, I suppose, not far to seek. Dryden and Pope wrote ‘heroics,’ not from any sense of their fitness for bucolic poetry, but from a sense of their universal fitness: and their followers copied them. But probably no scholar would affirm that any poem, original or translated, by Pope or Dryden or any of their school, really resembles in any degree the bucolic poetry of the Greeks. Mr. Morris, whose poems appear to me to resemble it more almost than anything I have ever seen, of course writes what is technically Pope’s metre, and equally of course is not of Pope’s school. Whether or no Pope and Dryden intended to resemble the old bucolic poets in style is, to say the least, immaterial. If they did not, there is no reason whatever why any of us who do should adopt their metre: if they did and failed, there is every reason why we should select a different one.
Professor Conington has adduced one cogent argument against blank verse: that is, that hardly any of us can write it.[D] But if this is so — if the ‘blank verse’ which we write is virtually prose in disguise — the addition of rhyme would only make it rhymed prose, and we should be as far as ever from “verse really deserving the name.”[E] Unless (which I can hardly imagine) the mere incident of ‘terminal consonance’ can constitute that verse which would not be verse independently, this argument is equally good against attempting verse of any kind: we should still be writing disguised, and had better write undisguised, prose. Prose translations are of course tenable, and are (I am told) advocated by another very eminent critic. These considerations against them occur to one: that, among the characteristics of his original which the translator is bound to preserve, one is that he wrote metrically; and that the prattle which passes muster, and sounds perhaps rather pretty than otherwise, in metre, would in plain prose be insufferable. Very likely some exceptional sort of prose may be meant, which would dispose of all such difficulties: but this would be harder for an ordinary writer to evolve out of his own brain, than to construct any species of verse for which he has at least a model and a precedent.
These remarks are made to shew that my metres were not selected, as it might appear, at hap-hazard. Metre is not so unimportant as to justify that. For the rest, I have used Briggs’s edition[F] (Poetæ Bucolici Græci), and have never, that I am aware of, taken refuge in any various reading where I could make any sense at all of the text as given by him. Sometimes I have been content to put down what I felt was a wrong rendering rather than omit; but only in cases where the original was plainly corrupt, and all suggested emendations seemed to me hopelessly wide of the mark. What, for instance, may be the true meaning of [Greek: bolbhost tist kochlhiast] in the fourteenth Idyll I have no idea. It is not very important. And no doubt the sense of the last two lines of the “Death of Adonis” is very unlikely to be what I have made it. But no suggestion that I met with seemed to me satisfactory or even plausible: and in this and a few similar cases I have put down what suited the context. Occasionally also, as in the Idyll here printed last — the one lately discovered by Bergk, which I elucidated by the light of Fritzsche’s conjectures — I have availed myself of an opinion which Professor Conington somewhere expresses, to the effect that, where two interpretations are tenable, it is lawful to accept for the purposes of translation the one you might reject as a commentator. [Greek: tetootaiost] has I dare say nothing whatever to do with ‘quartan fever.’
On one point, rather a minor one, I have ventured to dissent from Professor Blackie and others: namely, in retaining the Greek, instead of adopting the Roman, nomenclature. Professor Blackie says[G] that there are some men by whom “it is esteemed a grave offence to call Jupiter Jupiter,” which begs the question: and that Jove “is much more musical” than Zeus, which begs another. Granting (what might be questioned) that Zeus, Aphrodite, and Eros are as absolutely the same individuals with Jupiter, Venus, and Cupid as Odysseus undoubtedly is with Ulysses — still I cannot see why, in making a version of (say) Theocritus, one should not use by way of preference those names by which he invariably called them, and which are characteristic of him: why, in turning a Greek author into English, we should begin by turning all the proper names into Latin. Professor Blackie’s authoritative statement[H] that “there are whole idylls in Theocritus which would sound ridiculous in any other language than that of Tam o’ Shanter” I accept of course unhesitatingly, and should like to see it acted upon by himself or any competent person. But a translator is bound to interpret all as best he may: an
d an attempt to write Tam o’ Shanter’s language by one who was not Tam o’ Shanter’s countryman would, I fear, result in something more ridiculous still.
C.S.C.
Idylls.
IDYLL I. The Death of Daphnis.
THYRSIS. A GOATHERD.
THYRSIS.
Sweet are the whispers of yon pine that makes
Low music o’er the spring, and, Goatherd, sweet
Thy piping; second thou to Pan alone.
Is his the horned ram? then thine the goat.
Is his the goat? to thee shall fall the kid;
And toothsome is the flesh of unmilked kids.
GOATHERD.
Shepherd, thy lay is as the noise of streams
Falling and falling aye from yon tall crag.
If for their meed the Muses claim the ewe,
Be thine the stall-fed lamb; or if they choose
The lamb, take thou the scarce less-valued ewe.
THYRSIS.
Pray, by the Nymphs, pray, Goatherd, seat thee here
Against this hill-slope in the tamarisk shade,
And pipe me somewhat, while I guard thy goats.
GOATHERD.
I durst not, Shepherd, O I durst not pipe
At noontide; fearing Pan, who at that hour
Rests from the toils of hunting. Harsh is he;
Wrath at his nostrils aye sits sentinel.
But, Thyrsis, thou canst sing of Daphnis’ woes;
High is thy name for woodland minstrelsy:
Then rest we in the shadow of the elm
Fronting Priapus and the Fountain-nymphs.
There, where the oaks are and the Shepherd’s seat,
Sing as thou sang’st erewhile, when matched with him
