Aristophanes' THESMOPHORIAZUSAE (The Women's Festival) Complete

A Literal Translation, with Notes.

Aristophanes Bilingual Anthology  Studies  Aristophanes in Print

66 pages - You are on Page 40

SIXTH WOMAN. Bring faggots, Mania! (To Mnesilochus.) You will be mere charcoal soon.

CHORUS. Grill away, roast me, but you, my child, take off this Cretan robe and blame no one but your mother for your death. But what does this mean? The little girl is nothing but a skin filled with wine and shod with Persian slippers.[605] Oh! you wanton, you tippling woman, who think of nothing but wine; you are a fortune to the drinking-shops and are our ruin; for the sake of drink, you neglect both your household and your shuttle!

SIXTH WOMAN. Faggots, Mania, plenty of them.

MNESILOCHUS. Bring as many as you like. But answer me; are you the mother of this brat?

SIXTH WOMAN. I carried it ten months.[606]

MNESILOCHUS. You carried it?

SIXTH WOMAN. I swear it by Artemis.

MNESILOCHUS. How much does it hold? Three cotylae?[607] Tell me.

[605] A woman's footgear.--On undressing the supposed child, Mnesilochus perceives that it is nothing but a skin of wine.

[606] Dr. P. Menier repeatedly points out in his "La medecine et les poètes latins," that the ancient writers constantly spoke of ten months as being a woman's period of gestation.

[607] A cotyla contained nearly half a pint.

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