Living
Maxims of Theognis: O sovereign Phœbus, thou thyself
Translated by Rev. J. Banks (Bohn, 1856) · From Hesiod, Callimachus and Theognis (Bohn, 1856)
O sovereign Phœbus, thou thyself fencedst the citadel in favour to Alcathous, son of Pelops; do thou then ward off from this city the insolent army of Medes, that so thy people, in cheerfulness, as spring comes on, may send thee splendid hecatombs, delighting themselves with lyre, and lovely festival, with choirs of pæans, and shoutings around thine altar. For of a truth I fear, when I look on the folly and people-destroying seditions of the Greeks. Yet do thou, Phœbus, propitiously guard this our city. For I have gone aforetime both to the Sicilian land, and I have gone to Eubœa’s vine-clad plain, and to Sparta, splendid city of reed-nursing Eurotas, and all did with alacrity entreat-me-kindly when I came. But no pleasure in them came over my spirit; so much, I wot, is nought else dearer than our father-land.
This translation is printed as prose in its source edition.
Codex Note
Literal prose translation by the Rev. J. Banks (Bohn, 1856), printed as prose: the plain-sense companion to Frere’s verse version. Banks’s hyphenated compounds are his own.
Cite this poem
MLA
Megara, Theognis of. “Maxims of Theognis: O sovereign Phœbus, thou thyself.” Translated by Rev. J. Banks. Poetry Codex, poetrycodex.com/poem/theognis/265/.
Chicago
Megara, Theognis of. “Maxims of Theognis: O sovereign Phœbus, thou thyself.” Translated by Rev. J. Banks. Poetry Codex. https://poetrycodex.com/poem/theognis/265/.
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