HKB
slew the Solymoi, and Chimaira breathing fire. I will keep silence touching the fate of him: howbeit Pegasos hath in Olympus found a home in the ancient stalls of Zeus.
But for me who am to hurl straight the whirling javelin it is not meet to spend beside the mark my store of darts with utmost force of hand: for to the Muses throned in splendour and to the Oligaithidai a willing ally came I, at the Isthmos and again at Nemea. In a brief word will I proclaim the host of them, and a witness sworn and true shall be to me in the sweet-tongued voice of the good herald[9], heard at both places sixty times.
Now have their acts at Olympia, methinks, been told already: of those that shall be hereafter I will hereafter clearly speak. Now I live in hope, but the end is in the hands of gods. But if the fortune of the house fail not, we will commit to Zeus and Enyalios the accomplishment thereof.
Yet other glories won they, by Parnassos' brow, and at Argos how many and at Thebes, and such as nigh the Arcadians[10] the lordly altar of Zeus Lykaios shall attest, and Pallene, and Sikyon, and Megara, and the well-fenced grove of the Aiakidai, and Eleusis, and lusty Marathon, and the fair rich cities beneath Aetna's towering crest, and Euboea. Nay over all Hellas if thou searchest, thou shalt find more than one sight can view.
O king Zeus the Accomplisher, grant them with so light feet[11] to move through life, give them all honour, and sweet hap of their goodly things.
[Footnote 1: The clan of the Oligaithidai, to which Xenophon belonged.]
[Footnote 2: I. e. as a prize. But the passage may be taken differently as referring to the symbolical identification of Dionysos with the bull. Dithyrambic poetry was said to have been invented or improved by Arion of Corinth.]
[Footnote 3: This refers to the introduction into architecture by the Corinthians of the pediment, within or above which were at that time constantly placed images of eagles.]
[Footnote 4: The feast of Athene Hellotis.]
[Footnote 5: Nemea.]
[Footnote 6: The Lykians who fought under Glaukos on the Trojan side were of Corinthian descent.]
[Footnote 7: Poseidon.]
[Footnote 8: A bull.]
[Footnote 9: Proclaiming the name and city of the winner in the games.]
[Footnote 10: Reading [Greek: Arkasin asson].]
[Footnote 11: As in their foot-races.]
XIV.
FOR ASOPICHOS OF ORCHOMENOS,
WINNER IN THE BOYS' SHORT FOOT-RACE.
This ode was to be sung, probably by a chorus of boys, at the winner's city Orchomenos, and most likely in the temple of the three or Graces, Aglaia, Euphrosyne and Thalia.
The date of the victory is B.C. 476.
O ye who haunt the land of goodly steeds that drinketh of Kephisos' waters, lusty Orchomenos' queens renowned in song, O Graces, guardians of the Minyai's ancient race, hearken, for unto you I pray. For by your gift come unto men all pleasant things and sweet, and the wisdom of a man and his beauty, and the splendour of his fame. Yea even gods without the Graces' aid rule never at feast or dance; but these have charge of all things done in heaven, and beside Pythian Apollo of the golden bow they have set their thrones, and worship the eternal majesty of the Olympian Father.