Thursday, April 27, 2017

 

Call for an End to Civil Strife

Alcaeus, fragment 70, lines 9-12 (tr. David A. Campbell, with his Greek text and apparatus):
... and may we forget this anger; and let us relax from the heart-eating strife and civil warring, which one of the Olympians has aroused among us, leading the people to ruin ...

... ἐκ δὲ χόλω τῶδε λαθοίμεθ . . [·
χαλάσσομεν δὲ τὰς θυμοβόρω λύας
ἐμφύλω τε μάχας, τάν τις Ὀλυμπίων
ἔνωρσε, δᾶμον μὲν εἰς ἀυάταν ἄγων ...


9 λαθώμεθ᾿ Wilamowitz fort. -μεθ᾿ αὖ Lobel
The same, tr. M.L. West:
                          Let's put rage out of mind,
and let's wind down this spirit-gnawing strife
of kith and kin that some Olympian's roused,
bringing the people to calamity ...
Elementary notes to aid my feeble understanding (I don't have access to a commentary):
ἐκ ... λαθοίμεθ: tmesis for middle optative of ἐκλανθάνω (forget utterly, with genitive)
χόλω τῶδε: Aeolic for Attic χόλου τοῦδε
τὰς θυμοβόρω λύας: Aeolic for Attic τῆς θυμοβόρου λύης, genitive after χαλάσσομεν (LSJ s.v. χαλάω, sense II: have a remission of)
ἐμφύλω ... μάχας: Aeolic for Attic ἐμφύλου ... μάχης, genitive after χαλάσσομεν
ἀυάταν: Aeolic for Attic ἄτην



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