Nemean

Pindar

Pindar. Arnson Svarlien, Diane, translator. Created for the Perseus Project, 1990.

  1. Daughter of Rhea, you who have received the town hall under your protection, Hestia, sister of Zeus the highest and of Hera who shares his throne, welcome Aristagoras to your dwelling, and welcome to a place near your splendid scepter his companions,
  2. who, in honoring you, guard Tenedos and keep her on a straight course;
  3. often they worship you, first of the gods, with libations, and often with the savor of burnt sacrifice. Lyres and songs peal among them, and Themis, who belongs to Zeus the god of hospitality, is honored with everlasting feasts. With glory to the end
  4. may he fulfill his twelve-month office, with his heart unwounded.
  5. I call that man blessed in his father Hagesilas, in his marvellous body, and in his inborn steadiness. But if any man who has prosperity surpasses others in beauty, and displays his strength by being best in the games,
  6. let him remember that his robes are thrown around mortal limbs, and that he will clothe himself with earth, the end of all.
  7. Yet it is right for him to be praised in the good words of his fellow-citizens, and for us to adorn him with the honeyed sound of songs. For in contests of those who live around him, sixteen
  8. splendid victories crowned Aristagoras and his illustrious fatherland, in wrestling and in the proud pancratium.
  9. But the too hesitant hopes of his parents restrained the boy’s strength from attempting the contests at Pytho and Olympia. For I swear by the power of Oath: in my judgment, whether he went to Castalia
  10. or to the well-wooded hill of Cronus, he would have returned home in finer fashion than the opponents who strove against him,