Homer’s Epigrams

Homer

Homer. Hesiod, The Homeric Hymns and Homerica. Evelyn-White, Hugh G. (Hugh Gerard), editor. London: William Heinmann; New York: The Macmillan Co., 1914.

  1. Thestorides, full many things there are that mortals cannot sound;
  2. but there is nothing more unfathomable than the heart of man.
  1. Hear me, Poseidon, strong shaker of the earth,
  2. ruler of wide-spread, tawny Helicon!
  3. Give a fair wind and sight of safe return
  4. to the shipmen who speed and govern this ship.
  5. And grant that when I come to the nether slopes of towering Mimas
  6. I may find honorable, god-fearing men.
  7. Also may I avenge me on the wretch who deceived me
  8. and grieved Zeus the lord of guests and his own guest-table.
  1. Queen Earth, all bounteous giver of honey-hearted wealth,
  2. how kindly, it seems, you are to some,
  3. and how intractable and rough for those with whom you are angry.
  1. Sailors, who rove the seas and whom a hateful fate has made as
  2. the shy sea-fowl, living an unenviable life,
  3. observe the reverence due to Zeus who rules on high, the god of strangers;
  4. for terrible is the vengeance of this god afterwards for whosoever has sinned.