Hesiod, the Homeric Hymns, and Homerica
sailing. Then you will not wreck your ship, nor will the sea destroy
the sailors, unless Poseidon the Earth-Shaker be set upon it, or Zeus,
the king of the deathless gods, wish to slay them; for the issues of
good and evil alike are with them. At that time the winds are steady,
and the sea is harmless. Then trust in the winds without care, and haul
your swift ship down to the sea and put all the freight on board; but
make all haste you can to return home again and do not wait till the
time of the new wine and autumn rain and oncoming storms with the
fierce gales of Notus who accompanies the heavy autumn rain of Zeus and
stirs up the sea and makes the deep dangerous.
(ll. 678-694) Another time for men to go sailing is in spring when a
man first sees leaves on the topmost shoot of a fig-tree as large as
the foot-print that a cow makes; then the sea is passable, and this is
the spring sailing time. For my part I do not praise it, for my heart
does not like it. Such a sailing is snatched, and you will hardly avoid
mischief. Yet in their ignorance men do even this, for wealth means
life to poor mortals; but it is fearful to die among the waves. But I
bid you consider all these things in your heart as I say. Do not put
all your goods in hallow ships; leave the greater part behind, and put
the lesser part on board; for it is a bad business to meet with
disaster among the waves of the sea, as it is bad if you put too great
a load on your waggon and break the axle, and your goods are spoiled.
Observe due measure: and proportion is best in all things.
(ll. 695-705) Bring home a wife to your house when you are of the right
age, while you are not far short of thirty years nor much above; this
is the right age for marriage. Let your wife have been grown up four
years, and marry her in the fifth. Marry a maiden, so that you can
teach her careful ways, and especially marry one who lives near you,
but look well about you and see that your marriage will not be a joke
to your neighbours. For a man wins nothing better than a good wife,
and, again, nothing worse than a bad one, a greedy soul who roasts her
man without fire, strong though he may be, and brings him to a raw 1335
old age.
(ll. 706-714) Be careful to avoid the anger of the deathless gods. Do
not make a friend equal to a brother; but if you do, do not wrong him
first, and do not lie to please the tongue. But if he wrongs you first,
offending either in word or in deed, remember to repay him double; but
if he ask you to be his friend again and be ready to give you
satisfaction, welcome him. He is a worthless man who makes now one and
now another his friend; but as for you, do not let your face put your
heart to shame 1336.
(ll. 715-716) Do not get a name either as lavish or as churlish; as a
friend of rogues or as a slanderer of good men.
(ll. 717-721) Never dare to taunt a man with deadly poverty which eats
out the heart; it is sent by the deathless gods. The best treasure a
man can have is a sparing tongue, and the greatest pleasure, one that
moves orderly; for if you speak evil, you yourself will soon be worse
spoken of.
(ll. 722-723) Do not be boorish at a common feast where there are many
guests; the pleasure is greatest and the expense is least 1337.
(ll. 724-726) Never pour a libation of sparkling wine to Zeus after
dawn with unwashen hands, nor to others of the deathless gods; else
they do not hear your prayers but spit them back.
(ll. 727-732) Do not stand upright facing the sun when you make water,
but remember to do this when he has set towards his rising. And do not
make water as you go, whether on the road or off the road, and do not
uncover yourself: the nights belong to the blessed gods. A scrupulous
man who has a wise heart sits down or goes to the wall of an enclosed
court.
(ll. 733-736) Do not expose yourself befouled by the fireside in your
house, but avoid this. Do not beget children when you are come back
from ill-omened burial, but after a festival of the gods.
(ll. 737-741) Never cross the sweet-flowing water of ever-rolling
rivers afoot until you have prayed, gazing into the soft flood, and
washed your hands in the clear, lovely water. Whoever crosses a river
with hands unwashed of wickedness, the gods are angry with him and
bring trouble upon him afterwards.
(ll. 742-743) At a cheerful festival of the gods do not cut the
withered from the quick upon that which has five branches 1338 with
bright steel.
(ll. 744-745) Never put the ladle upon the mixing-bowl at a wine party,
for malignant ill-luck is attached to that.
(ll. 746-747) When you are building a house, do not leave it
rough-hewn, or a cawing crow may settle on it and croak.
(ll. 748-749) Take nothing to eat or to wash with from uncharmed pots,
for in them there is mischief.
(ll. 750-759) Do not let a boy of twelve years sit on things which may
not be moved 1339, for that is bad, and makes a man unmanly; nor yet a
child of twelve months, for that has the same effect. A man should not
clean his body with water in which a woman has washed, for there is
bitter mischief in that also for a time. When you come upon a burning
sacrifice, do not make a mock of mysteries, for Heaven is angry at this
also. Never make water in the mouths of rivers which flow to the sea,
nor yet in springs; but be careful to avoid this. And do not ease
yourself in them: it is not well to do this.
(ll. 760-763) So do: and avoid the talk of men. For Talk is
mischievous, light, and easily raised, but hard to bear and difficult
to be rid of. Talk never wholly dies away when many people voice her:
even Talk is in some ways divine.
(ll. 765-767) Mark the days which come from Zeus, duly telling your
slaves of them, and that the thirtieth day of the month is best for one
to look over the work and to deal out supplies.
(ll. 769-768) 1340 For these are days which come from Zeus the
all-wise, when men discern aright.
(ll. 770-779) To begin with, the first, the fourth, and the seventh—on
which Leto bare Apollo with the blade of gold—each is a holy day. The
eighth and the ninth, two days at least of the waxing month 1341, are
specially good for the works of man. Also the eleventh and twelfth are
both excellent, alike for shearing sheep and for reaping the kindly
fruits; but the twelfth is much better than the eleventh, for on it the
airy-swinging spider spins its web in full day, and then the Wise One
1342, gathers her pile. On that day woman should set up her loom and
get forward with her work.
(ll. 780-781) Avoid the thirteenth of the waxing month for beginning to
sow: yet it is the best day for setting plants.
(ll. 782-789) The sixth of the mid-month is very unfavourable for
plants, but is good for the birth of males, though unfavourable for a
girl either to be born at all or to be married. Nor is the first sixth
a fit day for a girl to be born, but a kindly for gelding kids and
sheep and for fencing in a sheep-cote. It is favourable for the birth
of a boy, but such will be fond of sharp speech, lies, and cunning
words, and stealthy converse.
(ll. 790-791) On the eighth of the month geld the boar and
loud-bellowing bull, but hard-working mules on the twelfth.
(ll. 792-799) On the great twentieth, in full day, a wise man should be
born. Such an one is very sound-witted. The tenth is favourable for a
male to be born; but, for a girl, the fourth day of the mid-month. On
that day tame sheep and shambling, horned oxen, and the sharp-fanged
dog and hardy mules to the touch of the hand. But take care to avoid
troubles which eat out the heart on the fourth of the beginning and
ending of the month; it is a day very fraught with fate.
(ll. 800-801) On the fourth of the month bring home your bride, but
choose the omens which are best for this business.
(ll. 802-804) Avoid fifth days: they are unkindly and terrible. On a
fifth day, they say, the Erinyes assisted at the birth of Horcus (Oath)
whom Eris (Strife) bare to trouble the forsworn. {[0-9]} (ll. 805-809)
Look about you very carefully and throw out Demeter’s holy grain upon
the well-rolled 1343 threshing floor on the seventh of the mid-month.
Let the woodman cut beams for house building and plenty of ships’
timbers, such as are suitable for ships. On the fourth day begin to
build narrow ships.
(ll. 810-813) The ninth of the mid-month improves towards evening; but
the first ninth of all is quite harmless for men. It is a good day on
which to beget or to be born both for a male and a female: it is never
an wholly evil day.
(ll. 814-818) Again, few know that the twenty-seventh of the month is
best for opening a wine-jar, and putting yokes on the necks of oxen and
mules and swift-footed horses, and for hauling a swift ship of many
thwarts down to the sparkling sea; few call it by its right name.
(ll. 819-821) On the fourth day open a jar. The fourth of the mid-month
is a day holy above all. And again, few men know that the fourth day
after the twentieth is best while it is morning: towards evening it is
less good.
(ll. 822-828) These days are a great blessing to men on earth; but the
rest are changeable, luckless, and bring nothing. Everyone praises a
different day but few know their nature. Sometimes a day is a
stepmother, sometimes a mother. That man is happy and lucky in them who
knows all these things and does his work without offending the
deathless gods, who discerns the omens of birds and avoids
transgressions.
THE DIVINATION BY BIRDS
Proclus on Works and Days, 828: Some make the _Divination by Birds_,
which Apollonius of Rhodes rejects as spurious, follow this verse
(_Works and Days_, 828).
THE ASTRONOMY
Fragment #1—Athenaeus xi, p. 491 d: And the author of “The Astronomy”,
which is attributed forsooth to Hesiod, always calls them (the
Pleiades) Peleiades: ‘but mortals call them Peleiades’; and again, ‘the
stormy Peleiades go down’; and again, ‘then the Peleiades hide
away....’
Scholiast on Pindar, Nem. ii. 16: The Pleiades.... whose stars are
these:—‘Lovely Teygata, and dark-faced Electra, and Alcyone, and bright
Asterope, and Celaeno, and Maia, and Merope, whom glorious Atlas
begot....’ ((LACUNA)) ‘In the mountains of Cyllene she (Maia) bare
Hermes, the herald of the gods.’
Fragment #2—Scholiast on Aratus 254: But Zeus made them (the sisters of
Hyas) into the stars which are called Hyades. Hesiod in his Book about
Stars tells us their names as follows: ‘Nymphs like the Graces 1401,
Phaesyle and Coronis and rich-crowned Cleeia and lovely Phaco and
long-robed Eudora, whom the tribes of men upon the earth call Hyades.’
Fragment #3—Pseudo-Eratosthenes Catast. frag. 1: 1402 The Great
Bear.]—Hesiod says she (Callisto) was the daughter of Lycaon and lived
in Arcadia. She chose to occupy herself with wild-beasts in the
mountains together with Artemis, and, when she was seduced by Zeus,
continued some time undetected by the goddess, but afterwards, when she
was already with child, was seen by her bathing and so discovered. Upon
this, the goddess was enraged and changed her into a beast. Thus she
became a bear and gave birth to a son called Arcas. But while she was
in the mountains, she was hunted by some goat-herds and given up with
her babe to Lycaon. Some while after, she thought fit to go into the
forbidden precinct of Zeus, not knowing the law, and being pursued by
her own son and the Arcadians, was about to be killed because of the
said law; but Zeus delivered her because of her connection with him and
put her among the stars, giving her the name Bear because of the
misfortune which had befallen her.
Comm. Supplem. on Aratus, p. 547 M. 8: Of Bootes, also called the
Bear-warden. The story goes that he is Arcas the son of Callisto and