Sophocles' TRACHINIAE Complete

Translated by R. Jebb.

Sophocles Bilingual Anthology  Studies  Sophocles in Print

57 Pages

Page 7

(epode)

Yea, starry night abides not with men, nor tribulation, nor wealth;
in a moment it is gone from us, and another hath his turn of gladness,
and of bereavement. So would I wish thee also, the Queen, to keep
that prospect ever in thy thoughts; for when hath Zeus been found
so careless of his children?

Deianeira: Ye have heard of my trouble, I think, and that hath brought
you here; but the anguish which consumes my heart- ye are strangers
to that; and never may ye learn it by suffering! Yes, the tender plant
grows in those sheltered regions of its own! and the Sun-god's heat
vexes it not, nor rain, nor any wind; but it rejoices in its sweet,
untroubled being, til such time as the maiden is called a wife, and
finds her portion of anxious thoughts in the night, brooding on danger
to husband or to children. Such an one could understand the burden
of my cares; she could judge them by her own.

Well, I have had many a sorrow to weep for ere now; but I am going
to speak of one more grievous than them all.

When Heracles my lord was going from home on his last journey, he
left in the house an ancient tablet, inscribed with tokens which he
had never brought himself to explain to me before, many as were the
ordeals to which he had gone forth. He had always departed as if to
conquer, not to die. But now, as if he were a doomed man, he told
me what portion of his substance I was to take for my dower, and how
he would have his sons share their father's land amongst them. And
he fixed the time; saying that, when a year and three months should
have passed since he had left the country, then he was fated to die;
or, if he should have survived that term, to live thenceforth an untroubled
life.

Such, he said, was the doom ordained by the gods to be accomplished
in the toils of Heracles; as the ancient oak at Dodona had spoken
of yore, by the mouth of the two Peleiades. And this is the precise
moment when the fulfilment of that word becomes due; so that I start
up from sweet slumber, my friends, stricken with terror at the thought
that I must remain widowed of the noblest among men.

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