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Notes Display Latin text | translated by Theodore C. Williams Book III Chapter 27: Anchises dies | Next chapter Return to index Previous chapter |
Off the Sicilian shore an island lies, wave-washed Plemmyrium, called in olden days Ortygia; here Alpheus, river-god, from Elis flowed by secret sluice, they say, beneath the sea, and mingles at thy mouth, fair Arethusa! with Sicilian waves. Our voices hailed the great gods of the land with reverent prayer; then skirted we the shore, where smooth Helorus floods the fruitful plain. Under Pachynus' beetling precipice we kept our course; then Camarina rose in distant view, firm-seated evermore by Fate's decree; and that far-spreading vale of Gela, with the name of power it takes from its wide river; and, uptowering far, the ramparts of proud Acragas appeared, where fiery steeds were bred in days of old. Borne by the winds, along thy coast I[Note 1] fled, Selinus, green with palm! and past the shore of Lilybaeum with its treacherous reef; till at the last the port of Drepanum received me to its melancholy strand. Here, woe is me I outworn by stormful seas, my sire, sole comfort of my grievous doom, Anchises ceased to be. O best of sires! Here didst thou leave me in the weary way; through all our perils -- O the bitter loss! -- borne safely, but in vain. King Helenus, whose prophet-tongue of dark events foretold, spoke not this woe; nor did Celaeno's curse of this forebode. Such my last loss and pain; such, of my weary way, the destined goal. From thence departing, the divine behest impelled me to thy shores, O listening queen! [Note 2] Note 1: I = Aeneas Events: Alpheus and Arethusa, The wanderings of Aeneas, Death of Anchises |
692-715 Sicanio praetenta sinu iacet insula contra Plemyrium undosum; nomen dixere priores Ortygiam. Alpheum fama est huc Elidis amnem occultas egisse uias subter mare, qui nunc ore, Arethusa, tuo Siculis confunditur undis. iussi numina magna loci ueneramur, et inde exsupero praepingue solum stagnantis Helori. hinc altas cautes proiectaque saxa Pachyni radimus, et fatis numquam concessa moueri apparet Camerina procul campique Geloi, immanisque Gela fluuii cognomine dicta. arduus inde Acragas ostentat maxima longe moenia, magnanimum quondam generator equorum; teque datis linquo uentis, palmosa Selinus, et uada dura lego saxis Lilybeia caecis. hinc Drepani me portus et inlaetabilis ora accipit. hic pelagi tot tempestatibus actus heu, genitorem, omnis curae casusque leuamen, amitto Anchisen. hic me, pater optime, fessum deseris, heu, tantis nequiquam erepte periclis! nec uates Helenus, cum multa horrenda moneret, hos mihi praedixit luctus, non dira Celaeno. hic labor extremus, longarum haec meta uiarum, hinc me digressum uestris deus appulit oris. |