Love, Worship and Death Part 7

Though till the gates of Heracles thy land-marks thou extend, Their share in earth is equal for all men at the end; And thou shalt lie as Irus lies, one obol all thy store, And be resolved into an earth that is thine own no more.

Note 11

ALPHEUS

2ND CENTURY A.D.

MYCENAE

The cities of the hero age thine eyes may seek in vain, Save where some wrecks of ruin still break the level plain.

So once I saw Mycenae, the ill-starred, a barren height Too bleak for goats to pasture,--the goat-herds point the site.

And as I pa.s.sed a greybeard said, 'Here used to stand of old A city built by giants, and pa.s.sing rich in gold.'

Note 12

MACEDONIUS

6TH CENTURY A.D.

THE THRESHOLD

Spirit of Birth, that gave me life, Earth, that receives my clay, Farewell, for I have travelled The stage that twixt you lay.

I go, and have no knowledge From whence I came to you, Nor whither I shall journey, Nor whose I am, nor who.

NOTES

Note 1.

In this, No. 68 of the Sappho fragments, I have followed the reading

_?at?????sa d? ?e?sea? ??d? p?ta ?a?s??a_ _s??e?_ _?sset' ??d' ???? e?? ?ste????_

rather than

_?at?????sa d? ?e?sea? p?ta, ??? ?a?s??a s??e?._ _?sset' ??te t?t' ??t' ?ste????_

'Dying thou shalt lie in nothingness, nor of thee There nor thereafter shall memory abide.'

Note 2.

A portion of this fragment was adopted by Catullus.

Note 3.

Anacreon's date is 563-478 B.C. It must, alas, be admitted that the poems attributed to him are, with the exception of a few fragments, all of them dubious and most of them certainly spurious. He had a great number of imitators down to a much later time, and a considerable number of the pseudo-Anacreontic poems are preserved in an appendix to the Palatine anthology. It may be a.s.sumed that some of them reflect a portion of his spirit, and many of them are graceful in conceit and beautiful in form. The specimens here given must be cla.s.sed upon the productions of his later imitators, although they are inserted in the place where in chronological order the real Anacreon would have followed.

Note 4.

The portraiture of the Greeks was executed with tinted wax, and not with colours rendered fluid by a liquid or oily medium. The various tints and tones of wax were probably laid on with the finger tips or with a spatula.

Note 5.

There was more than one Plato, but the great Plato is evidently referred to in the prefatory poem of Meleager as included among the poets of his anthology.

Captives from Eretria were established in a colony in Persia by Darius after the first Persian war. The colony at Ardericca was, however, hundreds of miles from Ecbatana.

If the epigram on Lais is not attributed to the great Plato by the most competent authorities, the dates of the two famous courtesans who bore the name would not exclude the possibility of his being the author.

Note 6.

Tychon is identified with Priapus.

Note 7.

Rintho founded a new school of serio-comic drama about 300 B.C. The ivy was sacred to Dionysus, in whose wors.h.i.+p the drama had its origin.

Note 8.

Also attributed to Meleager. The phrase, _?s?a??? ?ss' ??da_, here quoted is from Erinna's lament for Baucis, one of the rare surviving lyrics of the Rhodian poetess.

Note 9.