Priapeia
Priaepia
by divers poets in English verse and prose. Translated by Sir Richard Burton and Leonard C. Smithers
- Thou who bidest so chaste with mind ever set upon banquets
- And with a futtering crew alway thy palace was filled:
- Then that thou learn of these which were most potent of swiving,
- Wont wast thou to bespeak, saying to suitors erect--
- 'Than my Ulysses none was better at drawing the bowstring
- Whether by muscles of side or by superior skill;
- And, as he now is deceased, do ye all draw and inform me
- Which of ye men be the best so that my man he become.'
- Thy heart, Penelope, right sure by such pow'r I had pleasèd,
- But at the time not yet had I been made of mankind.