Menelaus addresses the sea god Proteus (4.512-599)


Ί will do all these things, just as you say.
But tell me this, and tell me the truth:
Did all the Achaeans make it home in their ships,
All those whom Nestor and I left at Troy?
Or did any die on shipboard, or in their friends’ arms,
After winding up the war?’

“ to which Proteus said:

‘Why, son of Atreus, ask me about this?
You don’t need to know. Nor do I think
You will be free from tears once you have heard it.
Many were killed in the war. You were there
And know who they were. Many, too, survived.
On the homeward journey two heroes died.
Another still lives, perhaps, held back by the sea.
‘Ajax went down among his long-oared ships.
Poseidon had driven him onto Gyrae’s rocks
But saved him from the sea. He would have escaped,
Despite Athena’s hatred, but he lost his wits
And boasted loudly that he had survived the deep
In spite of the gods. Poseidon heard this boast,
And with his trident he struck Gyrae’s rock
And broke it asunder. One part held firm,
But the other part, upon which Ajax sat
In his blind arrogance, fell into the gulf
And took Ajax with it. And so he perished,
His lungs full of saltwater.

Your brother, though,
Out ran the fates in his hollow ships,
With the help of Hera. But when he was nearing
Malea’s heights, a stormwind caught him
And carried him groaning over the teeming sea
To the frontier of the land where Thyestes once lived
And after him Thyestes’ son, Aegisthus.
Then the gods gave him a following wind
And safe passage homeward. Agamemnon
Rejoiced to set foot on his ancestral land.
He fell to the ground and kissed the good earth
And hot tears of joy streamed from his eyes,
So glad was he to see his homeland again.
But from a high lookout a watchman saw him.
Aegisthus had treacherously posted him there
And promised a reward of two bars of gold.
He had been keeping watch for a year by then
So that Agamemnon would not slip by unseen
And unleash his might, and now he reported
His news to Aegisthus, who acted quickly
And set a trap. He chose his twenty best men
And had them wait in ambush. Opposite them,
On the hall’s farther side, he had a feast prepared,
And then he drove off in his chariot,
Brooding darkly, to invite Agamemnon.
So he brought Agamemnon up to the palace
Unaware of his doom and slaughtered him
The way an ox is slaughtered at the stall.
None of Agamemnon’s men was left alive,
Nor any of Aegisthus’. All were slain in the hall.’

“Proteus spoke, and my heart was shattered.
I wept and wept as I sat on the sand, losing
All desire to live and see the light of the sun.
When I could not weep or flail about any more,
The unerring Old Man of the Sea addressed me:

‘Weep no more, son of Atreus. We gain nothing
By such prolonged bouts of grief. Instead,
Go as quickly as you can to your native land.

Either Aegisthus will still be alive, or
Orestes may have beat you to it and killed him,
And you may happen to arrive during his funeral.’

“These words warmed my heart, although
I was still in shock. Then I asked him:

Ί know now what became of these two,
But who is the third man, the one who’s alive,
But held back by the sea, or perhaps is dead.
I want to hear about him, despite my grief.’
“Proteus answered me without hesitation:
‘It is Laertes’ son, whose home is in Ithaca.
I saw him on an island, shedding salt tears,
In the halls of Calypso, who keeps him there
Against his will. He has no way to get home
To his native land. He has no ships left,
No crew to row him over the sea’s broad back.
As for you, Menelaus, Zeus’ cherished king,
You are not destined to die and to meet your fate
In bluegrass Argos. The immortals will take you
To the ends of the earth and the Elysian Fields,
Where Rhadamanthus lives and life is easiest.
No snow, nor storm, nor heavy rain comes there,
But a sighing wind from the West always blows
Off the Ocean, a cooling breeze for men.
For Helen is your wife, and in the gods’ eyes
You are the son-in-law of great Zeus himself.’


[After Odysseus kills the suitors, Hermes leads them into Hades where they encounter the ghosts of Agamemnon and Achilles in conversation. The suitors then exchange some words with Agamemnon about the duplicity and malevolence of women]

Hermes, meanwhile, was calling forth
The ghosts of the suitors. He held the wand
He uses to charm mortal eyes to sleep
And make sleepers awake; and with this beautiful,
Golden wand he marshaled the ghosts,
Who followed along squeaking and gibbering.

Like bats deep inside an eerie cave
Flit and gibber when one of them falls
From the cluster clinging to the rock overhead.

So too these ghosts, as Hermes led them
Down the cold, dank ways, past
The streams of Ocean, past the White Rock,
Past the Gates of the Sun and the Land of Dreams,
Until they came to the Meadow of Asphodel,
Where the spirits of the dead dwell, phantoms
Of men outworn.

Here was the ghost of Achilles,
And those of Patroclus, of flawless Antilochus,
And of Ajax, the best of the Achaeans
After Achilles, Peleus’ incomparable son.
These ghosts gathered around Achilles
And were joined by the ghost of Agamemnon,
Son of Atreus, grieving, he himself surrounded
By the ghosts of those who had died with him
And met their fate in the house of Aegisthus.
The son of Peleus was the first to greet him:

“Son of Atreus, we believed that you of all heroes
Were dear to thundering Zeus your whole life through,
For you were the lord of the great army at Troy,
Where we Greeks endured a bitter campaign.
But you too had an early rendezvous with death,
Which no man can escape once he is bom.
How much better to have died at Troy
With all the honor you commanded there!
The entire Greek army would have raised you a tomb,
And you would have won glory for your son as well.
As it was, you were doomed to a most pitiable death.”

And the ghost of Agamemnon answered:

“Godlike Achilles, you did have the good fortune
To die in Troy, far from Argos. Around you fell
Some of the best Greeks and Trojans of their time,
Fighting for your body, as you lay there
In the howling dust of war, one of the great,
Your horsemanship forgotten. We fought all day
And would never have stopped, had not Zeus
Halted us with a great storm. Then we bore your body
Back to the ships and laid it on a bier, and cleansed
Your beautiful flesh with warm water and ointments,
And the men shed many hot tears and cut their hair.
Then your mother heard, and she came from the sea
With her saltwater women, and an eerie cry
Rose over the deep. The troops panicked,
And they would have run for the ships, had not
A man who was wise in the old ways stopped them,
Nestor, whose counsel had prevailed before.
Full of concern, he called out to the troops:

‘Argives and Achaeans, halt! This is no time to flee.
It is his mother, with her immortal nymphs,
Come from the sea to mourn her dead son.’

“When he said that the troops settled down.
Then the daughters of the Old Man of the Sea
Stood all around you and wailed piteously,
And they dressed you in immortal clothing.
And the Muses, all nine, chanted the dirge,
Singing responsively in beautiful voices.
You couldn’t have seen a dry eye in the army,
So poignant was the song of the Muses.
For seventeen days we mourned you like that,
Men and gods together. On the eighteenth day
We gave you to the fire, slaughtering sheep
And horned cattle around you. You were burned
In the clothing of the gods, with rich unguents
And sweet honey, and many Greek heroes
Paraded in arms around your burning pyre,
Both infantry and charioteers,
And the sound of their marching rose to heaven.
When the fire had consumed you,
We gathered your white bones at dawn, Achilles,
And laid them in unmixed wine and unguents.
Your mother had given us a golden urn,
A gift of Dionysus, she said, made by Hephaestus.
In this urn we mingled your white bones,
Achilles, with those of the dead Patroclus.
Just apart lie the bones of Antilochus
Whom you honored most after Patroclus died.
Over them all we spearmen of the great army
Heaped an immense and perfect barrow
On a headland beside the broad Hellespont
So that it might be seen from far out at sea
By men now and men to come.

Your mother, Thetis,
Had collected beautiful prizes from the gods
And now set them down in the middle of the field
To honor the best of the Achaean athletes.
You have been to many heroes’ funeral games
Where young men contend for prizes,
But you would have marveled at the sight
Of the beautiful prizes silver-footed Thetis
Set out for you. You were very dear to the gods.
Not even in death have you lost your name,
Achilles, nor your honor among men.
But what did I get for winding up the war?
Zeus worked out for me a ghasty death
At the hands of Aegisthus and my murderous wife.”

As these two heroes talked with each other,
Quicksilver Hermes was leading down
The ghosts of the suitors killed by Odysseus.
When Hermes and these ghosts drew near,
The two heroes were amazed and went up to see
Who they were. The ghost of Agamemnon
Recognized one of them, Amphimedon,
Who had been his host in Ithaca, and called out:

“Amphimedon! Why have you come down
Beneath the dark earth, you and your company,
All men of rank, all the same age? It’s as if
Someone had hand-picked the city’s best men.
Did Poseidon sink your ships and drown you
In the wind-whipped waves? Was it that, or
Did an enemy destroy you on land
As you cut off their cattle and flocks of sheep—
Or as they fought for their city and women?
Tell me. Remember who is asking—
An old friend of your house. I came there
With godlike Menelaus to urge Odysseus
To sail with the fleet to Ilion. A full month
That journey to Ithaca took us—hard work
Persuading Odysseus, destroyer of cities.”

The ghost of Amphimedon responded:

“Son of Atreus, most glorious Agamemnon,
I remember all that, just as you tell it,
And I will tell you exactly what happened to us,
And how it ended in our bitter death.
We were courting the wife of Odysseus,
Long gone by then. She loathed the thought
Of remarrying, but she wouldn’t give us a yes or no.
Her mind was bent on death and darkness for us.
Here is one of the tricks she dreamed up:
She set up a loom in the hall and started weaving—
A huge, fine-threaded piece—and then came out and said:

‘Young men—my suitors, since Odysseus is dead—
Eager as you are to marry me, you must wait
Until I finish this robe—it would be a shame
To waste my spinning—a shroud for the hero
Laertes, when death’s doom lays him low.
I fear the Achaean women would reproach me
If he should lie shroudless for all his wealth.’

“We went along with this appeal to our honor.
Every day she would weave at the great loom,
And every night she would unweave by torchlight.
She fooled us for three years with her craft.
But in the fourth year, as the seasons rolled by,
And the moons waned, and the days dragged on,
One of her women who knew all about it
Told us, and we caught her unweaving
The gloried shroud. Then we forced her to finish it.
When it was done she washed it and showed it to us,
And it shone like the sun or the moon.

It was then
That some evil spirit brought Odysseus
From who knows where to the border of his land,
Where the swineherd lived. Odysseus’ son
Put in from Pylos in his black ship and joined him.
These two, after they had plotted an ugly death
For the suitors, came up to the town, first Telemachus
And then later Odysseus, led by the swineherd,
Who brought his master wearing tattered clothes,
Looking for all the world like a miserable old beggar,
Leaning on a staff, his rags hanging off him.
None of us could know who he was, not even
The older men, when he showed up like that.
We threw things at him and gave him a hard time.
He just took it, pelted and taunted in his own house,
Until, prompted by Zeus, he and Telemachus
Removed all the weapons from the hall
And locked them away in a storeroom.
Then he showed all his cunning. He told his wife
To set before the suitors his bow and grey iron—

Implements for a contest, and for our ill-fated death.
None of us were able to string that bow.
We couldn’t even come close. When it came
Around to Odysseus, we cried out and objected,
‘Don’t give the bow to that beggar,
No matter what he says!’ Telemachus alone
Urged him on and encouraged him to take it.
And he did. The great Odysseus
Took the bow, strung it easily, and shot an arrow
Straight through the iron. Then he stood on the threshold,
Poured the arrows out, and glaring around him
He shot Lord Antinous. And then he shot others,
With perfect aim, and we fell thick and fast.
You could see that some god was helping them,
The way they raged through the hall, cutting us down
Right and left; and you could hear
The hideous groans of men as their heads
Were bashed in. The floor smoked with blood.
That’s how we died, Agamemnon. Our bodies
Still lie uncared for in Odysseus’ halls.
Word has not yet reached our friends and family,
Who could wash the black blood from our wounds
And lay us out with wailing, as is due the dead.”

And the ghost of Agamemnon responded:

“Well done, Odysseus, Laertes’ wily son!
You won a wife of great character
In Icarius’ daughter. What a mind she has,
A woman beyond reproach! How well Penelope
Kept in her heart her husband, Odysseus.
And so her virtue’s fame will never perish,
And the gods will make among men on earth
A song of praise for steadfast Penelope.
But Tyndareus’ daughter was evil to the core.
Killing her own husband, and her song will be
A song of scorn, bringing ill-repute
To all women, even the virtuous.”

That was the drift of their talk as they stood
In the Dark Lord’s halls deep under the earth.