by Nonnus
The Works of
NONNUS
(fl. late 4th century)
Contents
The Translation
THE DIONYSIACA
The Greek Text
CONTENTS OF THE GREEK TEXT
The Dual Text
DUAL GREEK AND ENGLISH TEXT
The Biography
INTRODUCTION TO NONNUS by W. H. D. Rouse
© Delphi Classics 2015
Version 1
The Works of
NONNUS
By Delphi Classics, 2015
COPYRIGHT
The Works of Nonnus
First published in the United Kingdom in 2015 by Delphi Classics.
© Delphi Classics, 2015.
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.
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The Translation
Ruins at Panopolis, modern day Akhmim, a city in Upper Egypt — Nonnus’ birthplace
THE DIONYSIACA
Translated by W. H. D. Rouse
Composed in 48 books, The Dionysiaca is the longest surviving epic poem from antiquity, comprising 20,426 lines and written in Homeric dialect and dactylic hexameters. Recounting the life of Dionysus, including his fabled expedition to India and his triumphant return to the west, the poem is thought to have been written in the late fourth or early fifth century. The Dionysiaca appears to be incomplete, with some scholars believing that a 49th book was being planned when Nonnus stopped work on the poem, though others suggest that the number of 48 books is the same as the 48 books of the Iliad and Odyssey combined. It has also been argued by scholars that a possible conversion to Christianity or death caused Nonnus to abandon the poem after some revisions. They have identified various inconsistencies and difficulties in Book 39, appearing to be a disjointed series of descriptions, as evidence of the poem’s lack of revision. Others have attributed these problems to copyists or later editors, though most scholars now agree that the work is incomplete.
The primary models for The Dionysiaca are Homer and the Cyclic poets, as demonstrated by Nonnus’ Homeric language, metrics, episodes and the descriptive canons that abound in the poem. The influence of Euripides’ Bacchae is also significant. Though Nonnus’ debt to fragmentary and lost works is hard to appreciate, he alludes to earlier poets’ treatments of the life of Dionysus, such as the lost poems by Euphorion, Peisander of Laranda’s elaborate encyclopaedic mythological poem, Dionysius, and Soteirichus. Hesiod’s poetry (especially the Catalogue of Women), Pindar’s odes and the works of Callimachus have also had a hand in inspiring Nonnus’ great work.
The epic is notably varied in its organisation, as it is not arranged in a linear chronology, but instead in episodes, arranged by a loose chronological and themed order, similar to Ovid’s Metamorphoses. The poem states as its guiding principle poikilia, diversity in narrative, form and organisation. The appearance of Proteus, a shape shifting god, in the proem is presented as a metaphor for Nonnus’ varied style. Nonnus employs the style of the epyllion for many of his narrative sections, such as his treatment of Ampelus in 10–11, Nicaea in 15–16, and Beroe in 41–43. These epyllia are inserted into the general narrative framework and provide many of the epic’s highlights. Nonnus also employs synkrisis, comparison, throughout his poem, most notably in the comparison of Dionysus and other heroes in Book 25. The complex organisation and the richness of the language have caused the style of the poem to be termed Nonnian “Baroque.”
The Dionysiaca is noted for its careful handling of dactylic hexameter and Nonnus’ innovation in metre. Whereas Homer employs 32 varieties of hexameter lines, Nonnus only employs nine variations, avoiding elision, while adopting mostly weak caesurae, following a variety of euphonic and syllabic rules in word placement. It is especially significant that Nonnus was so precise with meter as the quantitative meter of classical poetry was giving way to stressed meter during his era. These metrical restraints encouraged the creation of new compounds, adjectives and fabricated words, and Nonnus’ epic reveals some of the greatest variety of coinages in any surviving Greek text.
Nonnus seems to have been an important influence to the poets of Late Antiquity, especially Musaeus, Colluthus, Christodorus and Dracontius. Although it is difficult to determine whether Claudian influenced Nonnus or Nonnus influenced Claudian, the two poets reveal striking similarities in their treatments of the Persephone myth. Nonnus remained continuously important in the Byzantine world and his influence can be found in Genesius and Planudes. In the Renaissance, Poliziano popularised The Dionysiaca to the West and Goethe is recorded as admiring Nonnus’ work in the eighteenth century.
Detail of a papyrus codex showing Book 15 of ‘The Dionysiaca’, P.Berol. inv. 10567, 6th or 7th century
CONTENTS
VOLUME I.
SUMMARY OF THE BOOKS OF THE POEM
BOOK I
BOOK II
BOOK III
BOOK IV
BOOK V
BOOK VI
BOOK VII
BOOK VIII
BOOK IX
BOOK X
BOOK XI
BOOK XII
BOOK XIII
BOOK XIV
BOOK XV
VOLUME II.
SUMMARY OF THE BOOKS OF THE POEM
BOOK XVI
BOOK XVII
BOOK XVIII
BOOK XIX
BOOK XX
BOOK XXI
BOOK XXII
BOOK XXIII
BOOK XXIV
BOOK XXV
BOOK XXVI
BOOK XXVII
BOOK XXVIII
BOOK XXIX
BOOK XXX
BOOK XXXI
BOOK XXXII
BOOK XXXIII
BOOK XXXIV
BOOK XXXV
VOLUME III.
PREFACE
SUMMARY OF THE BOOKS OF THE POEM
BOOK XXXVI
BOOK XXXVII
BOOK XXXVIII
BOOK XXXIX
BOOK XL
BOOK XLI
BOOK XLII
BOOK XLIII
BOOK XLIV
BOOK XLV
BOOK XLVI
BOOK XLVII
BOOK XLVIII
Bacchus in his panther-drawn chariot, as depicted in a third century mosaic from Seville
Lycurgus attacking the nymph Ambrosia
VOLUME I.
SUMMARY OF THE BOOKS OF THE POEM
HEADINGS OF THE FIRST FIFTEEN BOOKS OF THE DIONYSIACA
(1) The first contains Cronion, light-bearing ravisher of the nymph, and the starry heaven battered by Typhon’s hands.
(2) The second has Typhon’s battle ranging through the stars, and lightning, and the struggles of Zeus, and the triumph of Olympos.
(3) In the third, look for the much-wandering ship of Cadmos, the palace of Electra and the hospitality of her table.
(4) Tracking the fourth over the deep, you will see Harmonia sailing together with her agemate Cadmos.
(5) Look into the fifth next, and you will see Actaion also, whom no pricket brought forth, torn by dogs as a fleeing fawn.
(6) Look for marvels in the sixth, where in honouring Zagreus, all the settlements on the earth were drowned by Rainy Zeus.
(7) The seventh sings of the hoary supplication of Time, and Semele
, and the love of Zeus, and the furtive bed.
(8) The eight has a changeful tale, the fierce jealousy of Hera, and Semele’s fiery nuptials, and Zeus the slayer.
(9) Look into the ninth, and you will see the son of Maia, and the daughters of Lamos, and Mystis, and the flight of Ino.
(10) In the tenth also, you will see the madness of Athamas and Ino’s flight, how she fled into the swell of the sea with newborn Melicertes.
(11) See the eleventh, and you will find lovely Ampelos carried off by the manslaying robber bull.
(12) With the twelfth, delight your heart, where Ampelos has shot up his own shape, a new flower of love, into the fruit of the vine.
(13) In the thirteenth, I will tell of a host innumerable, and champion heroes gathering for Dionysos.
(14) Turn your mind to the fourteenth: there Rheia arms all the ranks of heaven for the Indian War.
(15) In the fifteenth, I sing the sturdy Nicaia, the rosy-armed beast-slayer defying Love.
BOOK I
The first contains Cronion, light-bearing ravisher of the nymph, and the starry heaven battered by Typhon’s hands.
Tell the tale, Goddess, of Cronides’ courier with fiery flame, the gasping travail which the thunderbolt brought with sparks for wedding-torches, the lightning in waiting upon Semele’s nuptials; tell the naissance of Bacchos twice-born, whom Zeus lifted still moist from the fire, a baby half-complete born without midwife; how with shrinking hands he cut the incision in his thigh and carried him in his man’s womb, father and gracious mother at once – and well he remembered another birth, when his own head conceived, when his temple was big with child, and he carried that incredible unbegotten lump, until he shot out Athena scintillating in her armour.
[11] Bring me the fennel, rattle the cymbals, ye Muses! put in my hand the wand of Dionysos whom I sing: but bring me a partner for your dance in the neighbouring island of Paros, Proteus of many turns, that he may appear in all his diversity of shapes, since I twang my harp to a diversity of songs. For if, as a serpent, he should glide along his winding trail, I will sing my god’s achievement, how with ivy-wreathed wand he destroyed the horrid hosts of Giants serpent-haired. If as a lion he shake his bristling mane, I will cry “Euoi!” to Bacchos on the arm of buxom Rheia, stealthily draining the breast of the lionbreeding goddess. If as a leopard he shoot up into the air with a stormy leap from his pads, changing shape like a master-craftsman, I will hymn the son of Zeus, how he slew the Indian nation, with his team of pards riding down the elephants. If he make his figure like the shape of a boar, I will sing Thyone’s son, love-sick for Aura the desirable, boarslayer, daughter of Cybele, mother of the third Bacchos late-born. If he be mimic water, I will sing Dionysos diving into the bosom of the brine, when Lycurgos armed himself. If he become a quivering tree and tune a counterfeit whispering, I will tell of Icarios, how in the jubilant winepress his feet crushed the grape in rivalry.
[34] Bring me the fennel, Mimallons! On my shoulders in place of the wonted kirtle, bind, I pray, tight over my breast a dapple-back fawnskin, full of the perfume of Maronian nectar; and let Homer and deep-sea Eidothea keep the rank skin of the seals for Menelaos. Give me the jocund tambours and the goatskins! but leave for another the double-sounding pipe with its melodious sweetness, or I may offend my own Apollo; for he rejects the sound of breathing reeds, ever since he put to shame Marsyas and his god-defiant pipes, and bared every limb of the skin-stript shepherd, and hung his skin on a tree to belly in the breezes.
[45] Then come now, Goddess, begin with the long search and the travels of Cadmos.
[46] Once on the Sidonian beach Zeus as a high-horned bull imitated an amorous bellow with his changeling throat, and felt a charming thrill; little Eros heaved up a woman, with his two arms encircling her middle. And while he lifted her, at his side the sea-faring bull curved his neck downwards, spread under the girl to mount, sinking sideways on his knees, and stretching his back submissive, he raised up Europa; then the bull pressed on, and his floating hoof furrowed the water of the trodden brine noiselessly with forbearing footsteps. High above the sea, the girl throbbing with fear navigated on bullback, unmoving, unwetted. If you saw her you would think it was Thetis perhaps, or Galateia, or Earthshaker’s bedfellow, or Aphrodite seated on Triton’s neck. Aye, Seabluehair marvelled at the waddle-foot voyage; Triton heard the delusive lowing of Zeus, and bellowed an echoing note to Cronos’ son with his conch by way of wedding song; Nereus pointed out to Doris the woman carried along, mingling wonder with fear as he saw the strange voyager and his horns.
[65] But the maiden, a light freight for her bull-barge, sailed along oxriding, with a horn for steering-oar, and trembled at the high heaving of her watery course, while Desire was the seaman. And artful Boreas bellied out all her shaking robe with amorous breath, love-sick himself, and in secret jealousy, whistled on the pair of unripe breasts. As when one of the Nereids has peeped out of the sea, and seated upon a dolphin cuts the flooding calm, balanced there while she paddles with a wet hand and pretends to swim, while the watery wayfarer half-seen rounds his back and carries her dry through the brine, while the cleft tail of the fish passing through the sea scratches the surface in its course, – so the bull lifted his back: and while the bull stretched, his drover Eros flogged the servile neck with his charmed girdle, and lifting bow on shoulder like a pastoral staff, shepherded Hera’s bridegroom with Cypris’ crook, driving him to Poseidon’s watery pasture. Shame purpled the maiden cheek of Pallas unmothered, when she spied Cronion ridden by a woman. So Zeus clove the course with watery furrow, but the deep sea did not quench his passion – for did not the water conceive Aphrodite by a heavenly husbandry, and bring her forth from the deeps? Thus a girl steered the bull’s unboisterous passage, herself at once both pilot and cargo.
[90] One saw this mimic ship of the sea, alive and nimble-kneed, – an Achaian seaman passing by, and he cried out in this fashion: “O my eyes, what’s this miracle? how comes it that he cuts the waves with his legs, and swims over the barren sea, this land-pasturing bull? Navigable earth – is that the new creation of Cronides? Shall the farmer’s wain trace a watery rut through the brine-sprent deep? That’s a bastard voyage I descry upon the waves! Surely Selene has gotten an unruly bull, and leaves the sky to traipse over the high seas! Or no – deepwater Thetis drives a coach on a floating racecourse! This sea-bull is a creature very different from the land-bull, has a fishlike shape; must be a Nereïd with other looks, not naked now, but in long flowing robes, driving this bull unbridled to march afoot on the waters, a new fashion that! If it is Demeter wheatenhaired, cleaving the gray back of the sea with waterfaring oxhoof, then thou, Poseidon, must have turned landlubber and migrated to the thirsty back of earth, afoot behind the plow, and cut Demeter’s furrow with thy sea-vessel, blown by land-winds, tramping a voyage on the soil! Bull, you are astray out of your country; Nereus is no bulldrover, Proteus no plowman, Glaucos no gardener; no marshground, no meadows in the billows; on the barren sea there’s no tillage, but sailors cut the ship-harbouring water with a steering-oar, and do not split with iron; Earthshaker’s hinds do not sow in the furrows, but the sea’s plant is seaweed, sea’s sowing is water, the sailor is the farmer, the only furrow is the ship’s grain and wake, the hooker is the plow.
[118] “But how came you to have dealings with a maid? Do bulls also go mad with love, and ravish women? Has Poseidon played a trick, and ravished a girl under the shape of a horned bull like a river-god? Has he woven another plot to follow the bedding of Tyro, just as he did the other day, when the watery paramour came trickling up with counterfeit ripples like a bastard Enipeus?”
[125] So the Hellenic sailor spoke his amazement as he passed by. Then the girl presaged her union with the bull; and tearing her hair, she broke out in lamentable tones: “Deaf Water, voiceless Coasts! Say to the Bull, if cattle can hear and hearken, ‘Merciless, spare a girl!’ Ye Coasts, pray tell my loving father that Europa has left her native land, seated up
on a bull, my ravisher, my sailor, and I think, my bed-fellow. Take these ringlets to my mother, ye circling Breezes. Aye Boreas, I conjure thee, receive me on thy pinions in the air, as thou didst ravish thine Athenian bride! But stay, my voice! or I may see Boreas in love, like the Bull!” So the girl spoke, as the bull ferried her on his back.
[137] Then Cadmos, passing in his travels from land to land, followed the never-staying tracks of the bull turned bridesman. He came to the bloodstained cave of Arima, when the mountains had moved from their seats and were beating at the gate of inexpugnable Olympos, when the gods took wing above the rainless Nile, like a flight of birds far out of reach, oaring their strange track in the winds of heaven, and the seven zones of the sky were sore assailed.
[145] This was the reason. Zeus Cronides had hurried to Pluto’s bed, to beget Tantalos, that mad robber of the heavenly cups; and he laid his celestial weapons well hidden with his lightning in a deep cavern. From underground the thunderbolts belched out smoke, the white cliff was blackened; hidden sparks from a fire-barbed arrow heated the watersprings; torrents boiling with foam and steam poured down the Mygdonian gorge, until it boomed again.
[154] Then at a nod from his mother, the Earth, Cilician Typhoeus stretched out his hands, and stole the snowy tools of Zeus, the tools of fire; then spreading his row of rumble-rattling throats, he yelled as his warcry the cries of all wild beasts together: the snakes that grew from him waved over his leopards’ heads, licked the grim lions’ manes, girdled with their curly tails spiral-wise round the bulls’ horns, mingled the shooting poison of their long thin tongues with the foam-spittle of the boars.
[163] Now he laid the gear of Cronides in a cubby-hole of the rock, and spread the harvest of his clambering hands into the upper air. And that battalion of hands! One throttled Cynosuris beside the ankle-tip of Olympos; one gripped the Parrhasian Bear’s mane as the rested on heaven’s axis, and dragged her off; another caught the Oxdrover and knocked him out; another dragged Phosphoros, and in vain under the circling turning-post sounded the whistling of the heavenly lash in the morning; he carried off the Dawn, and held in the Bull, so that timeless, half-complete, horsewoman Season rested her team. And in the shadowy curls of his serpenthair heads the light was mingled with gloom; the Moon shone rising in broad day with the Sun.
