Early Modern Mythological Texts: Troia Britanica IV (51-119)
Thomas Heywood. Troia Britanica (1609)
CANTO IV (51-119)
Stanzas 51-60 — 61-70 — 71-80 — 81-90 — 91-100 — 101-110 — 111-119 — Heywood’s Endnotes to Canto IV — Back to Stanzas 1-50
He never bids God speed you on the way,
Because he knows not what your bosoms smother.
His phrase is “verily”, “by yea and nay”,
“In faith”, “in truth”, “good neighbour”, or “good brother”,
And when he borrows money, ne’er will pay,
One of th’ elect must common with another,
And when the poor his charity entreat,
You labour not and therefore must not eat.
He will not preach, but lecture, nor in white,
Because the elders of the Church command it,
He will no cross in Baptism, none shall fight
Under that banner, if he may withstand it,
Nor our ancient Fathers’ Latin cite,
The cause may be he doth not understand it.
His followers preach all faith, and by their works,
You would not judge them Catholics, but Turks.
He can endure no organs but is vexed
To hear the choristers shrill anthems sing.
He blames degrees in th’ academy next,
And ’gainst the liberal arts can Scripture bring.
And when his tongue hath run beside the text,
You may perceive him his loud clamours ring
’Gainst honest pastimes, and with piteous phrase,
Rail against hunting, hawking, cocks and plays.
With these the Brownists in some points cohere,
That likewise hold the marriage ring profane,
Commanded prayers they’ll not endure to hear,
And to subscribe to canons they disdain.
They hold more sin a cornered cap to wear
Than cut a purse; leave these as wild and vain,
By thee, Opinion, realms have been confounded
What darest not thou, where thou art firmly grounded?
55
To the first world now let my muse retire,
And see how strong thou wast Opinion then,
To create deities I must aspire
And give eternity with my frail pen.
Such as the world did in those days admire,
It deified, and so made gods of men:
The Cretan Jupiter, to heaven translated,
And Saturn, sire of all the gods instated,
56
Made Juno queen of heaven, Venus of pleasure,
Ceres of corn, and Bacchus god of wine,
Cupid of love, Mars war and Mammon treasure,
Pallas of wisdom, and of speech divine,
God Mercury: men did their godhoods measure
By their own thoughts, and unto such resign
Their special honours, in whose hearts they guest
Most power in that, which they on earth professed.
This made the heathen kings by Jove to swear,
Their queens at Juno’s sacred altar kneel
Child-bearing women chaste Lucina fear,
Soldiers at Mars his shrine, to hang their steel,
The swains to honour Ceres, by whose cheer
Their grain decayed or prospered, this made kneel
Drunkards to Bacchus, Orpheus strung his lyre
To Phoebus, god of music, and of fire.
To Esculapius the physicians prayed,
Shepherds to Pan, and Poets to the Muses,
A God of Neptune navigators made,
And he that gardens loves, Pomona chooses.
Chaste virgins still implore Diana’s aid,
And who that loves, God Cupid’s name refuses,
Vulcan commandeth smiths, Flora flowers,
Aeolus winds, and Pluto infernal powers.
The poets write, three brothers lots did cast
For th’ universal empire: to Jove fell
Th’ Olympic heavens, which all the rest surpassed,
Great Neptune with his three-forked mace must dwell
Within the bosom of the ocean vast
And guide the seas, black Pluto governs hell.
Opinion, whence these gods build all their glory,
Must be the base to our succeeding story.
Whilst thus Egyptian Belus was instated,
The reverend Moses in Mount Nebo died,
And captain Joshua second judge created,
The Thracian Boreas, from her mother’s side
Stole fair Orithyia, having long awaited,
To make the beauteous virgin his sweet bride,
From whose rude arms she never could be freed:
But leaving these, of Belus we proceed.
The blustering winds before they had a king
To lock them fast within his brazen caves,
Great devastations o’er the earth did bring,
Tossing black tempests on the curlèd waves:
’Tis said rough Boreas shaked his flaggy wing,
’Gainst his three brothers with opposèd braves,
Who with such mortal hate, at variance fell,
They made heaven shake, earth reel, the ocean swell.
|
No Mediterren’ sea, before this brawl, Was known in the earth’s arms to be enclosed, The seas tossed by the winds, brake down the wall, Which for his bounds the fates had interposed. At such dissention, the four brothers fall, Having the reins of all their gusts unloosed, They cleft the earth; the ocean full of pride, Thrusts in, and two main lands shoulders aside. |
How the Mediterranean sea first came |
|
His train of waves by Calpe he brought in, And through his deep abysms leads them to war. He peoples every place where he has been With his broad waters who are still at jar With the torn earth more roomth and space to win, For his unbounded limits stretched so far That they have pierced the agèd Tellus’ heart, And from Europa, Africa still part. |
The middle- earth sea that parts Europe from Africa. |
|
So was Italia and Sicilia one, Till the rough gusts the ocean did invade, Who forced a channel, where before was none, And twixt these kingdoms large irruption made, Therefore the gods th’ unbridled winds t’ atone, That their commandless furies might be stayed, Surprised them, and to Aeolus bound in chains Gave them, and he their roughness still restrains. |
lib.1 Argonautica |
With Jove’s lascivious pastimes I proceed,
As chiefly to the fall of Troy allied,
O you Jove’s daughters born of heavenly seed,
My brain and pen by inspiration guide,
That what the fates have against Troy decreed
Of Priam’s glory and Achilles’ pride,
Of Hector’s valour and bright Helen’s fate,
With all your aids I may at large delate.
Not how on Semele Jove Bacchus got,
Nor in the shape of bull Europa stale,
Of swan-transformed Leda speak I not,
Nor of Mnemosyne frame I my tale,
Nor how Asopis did her honour blot,
Nor Astery by Jove turned to a quail,
Nor how for Nycteis he himself transformed,
Nor Io’s rape, at which queen Juno stormed.
But how he ravished Danae, that bright lass,
By many suitors, but in vain, assailed,
How she was closed in a tower of brass,
Which with a golden ladder the prince scaled.
What cannot gold, whose brightness doth surpass?
How oft hath gold ’bove women’s strength prevailed?
Laps that have had ’gainst all temptations power,
Have spread themselves wide to a golden shower.
From Jupiter of Arcad’, and a dame
Called Isis did one Epaphus proceed.
To him was born a son of ancient fame,
Hight Belus, who great part of Egypt freed
From tyranny; and after swayed the same.
He had a sister too, who soon decreed
Arcad’ to change for Afric, and her name
Lybia, from whom the grim Busiris came.
|
Belus two children had (so the fame runs) Danaus and Egyptus: Danaus he Had fifty girls, Egyptus fifty sons, ’Twixt whom these brothers a full match decree. All parts are pleased, not one the marriage shuns, False Danaus, with his daughters doth agree, As with their bridegrooms in their beds they lay, The fifty husbands in one night to slay. |
Danaus Egyptus |
Save young Hypermnestra, not a maid
But in her husband’s bosom sheathed her knife.
And she alone the bloody plot bewrayed,
And to her Lynceus proved a loyal wife,
Of all Egyptus’ sons, he by her aid,
Alone did from the murther scape with life,
Of whom, as they in nuptial loved remained,
He Abas got, Abas in Argos reigned.
|
Abas Acrisius got, from him descended Bright Danae, of whom we now entreat, Whose beauty’s fame is through the earth extended. Acrisius, jealous of his father’s seat, To Egypt hies, and there his prayers commended, Offering large quantities of gold and wheat, At the God Belus his great grandsire’s shrine, Of his fair daughter’s fortunes to divine. |
The tale of Jupiter & Danae |
72
This answer he returns: “Away, be gone,
Thou son of Abas; Danae forth shall bring
A gallant boy, shall turn thee into stone,
And after thee in Argos reign sole king.”
Acrisius now hath turned his mirth to moan,
From whence his joys should grow, his sorrows spring,
His hoped issue and successive heir,
Late, all his pleasure, now is all his care.
|
He intimates that from her womb shall rise A gallant boy, that shall his grandsire kill, And Argos’ crown by force of arms surprise. He swears the maid shall live a virgin still, And to prevent his fate, doth straight devise A tower impregnable, built on a hill, Strong of itself; but yet to make it sure, |
The building of Darrain tower |
The guiltless lady wonders at the state
Of this new work, not knowing why ’tis built,
To see sharp pinnacles themselves elate
So high towards heaven, the arches richly gild,
Huge marble columns to support the gate,
In every place rich tinctures largely spilt,
The terrace with white ivory pillars railed,
And the cross-ebon bars, with gild studs nailed.
It seems too strong for pleasure, and for war
It shows too neat; but now the work is ended,
Who that beholds it shining from afar,
But with admiring thoughts the work commended?
The nearer you approach, the more you are
Inflamed with wonder, not a stair ascended
But of white marble, not a door but brass,
The windows glazed with crystals, not with glass.
All things prepared, the king will Danae carry
To view the tower, she gives it due with praise.
He thus proceeds: “Child, thou shalt never marry,
But in this place of pleasure end thy days,
And in this brazen circuit ever tarry.”
The Lady starts, and thinks too long she stays
In that loathed place which now to her appears
No palace, but a dungeon full of fears.
And asking why she must be kept a slave,
Or how she hath deserved so strict a doom,
To be so young put in her marble grave,
(For what’s a prison, but a living tomb?)
Or for what cause she may no husband have,
But live an anch’ress in so strict a room,
Knowing herself a princess ripe and fit,
Wronged, as she thinks, not to be married yet.
Acrisius tells her what great Belus spake,
When he with orisons kneeled at his throne,
That from her womb the world a son would take,
That shall his grandsire change into a stone.
She interrupts him, and thus silence brake:
“O would you be eternal, lived alone,
And never die? What would Acrisius have,
More than an heir to lodge him in his grave?
Did you not into stone great Abas turn,
And Abas to his father Lynceus so,
Their funeral trunks to sacred ashes burn,
O’er which their monumental marbles grow,
O father, no man can his fate adjourn,
Shall these your eyes be closed up by a foe?
Or can you deem your own blood shall betray you?
Who are more fit within your stone to lay you?
What you did to your father, let my son
Perform to you: successively succeed.
Your father’s glass is out, yours must be run,
Leave then your crown to one of Abas’ breed.”
“In vain”, quoth he, “we cannot thus be won,
To alter what’s unchangeably decreed;
Here shalt thou live, but royally attended,
Like a bright queen, and from a king descended.”
So leaves her guarded with a troop of maids,
And envious beldams that were past their lust.
These, with rewards and threats the king invades
In his high charge, to be severe and just,
But most the matrons, fittest for such trades,
Rather than wanton wenches, he dare trust:
Lovers may lovers favour, crones are past it,
And envy, but not pity those would taste it.
So doth the full-fed stomach meat deny
Unto the famished. So the drunkard spills
Wine in abundance, which would cheer the dry.
Cold age the appetite of hot lust kills.
Danae thy beauty’s fame is sounded high,
’Mongst many other kings: Jove’s ears it fills.
He loves her by her fame, and longs to see her,
Nor are his thoughts at peace before he see her.
A thousand bracelets, jewels, pearls and rings,
With gold of sundry stamps the king prepares,
And having readied all these costly things,
In a poor peddler’s truss, he packs his wares,
So hies to Danae’s tower (love gave him wings)
Hope sometime cheers him, sometimes he despairs,
At length arrives there, in an evening late,
And falls his rich pack at the castle gate,
Where two lean, wrinkled crones stand sentinel,
To give the watchword to Acrisius’ guard,
Appointed straight to ring the ’larum bell,
If any man once near the castle dared.
The peddler asks who in that palace dwell,
Or how they call the place. “Hast thou not heard
Of Danae”, quoth the beldam, looking sour,
“Whom Argos’ king closed in his brazen tower?”
He views the place, and finds it strongly seated,
Not to be won by arms, but scaled by sleight.
“I came from Crete,” quoth he, “and was entreated
Here to deliver tokens of some weight
From great king Jupiter.” Their cold bloods heated
With hope of gain, they cheer their age-dulled sight,
And with a covetous longing, earn to view
What precious knacks he from his hamper drew.
A thousand several trinkets he displays;
“If this be Danae’s tower”, quoth he, “then these
Belong to you”. The crones his bounty praise,
And in their hands two costly jewels seize.
The younger ladies now are come to gaze,
Not one among them but he seeks to please:
Some gold, some stones, some rings, some pearls he gave
And all have something though they nothing crave.
Bleared with these gifts their charge they quite forget,
And every lady’s eye dwells on her prize.
Coming fore Danae, she beholds them set
With sundry brooches sparkling in her eyes,
And asking whence they had them, they bid fet
The peddler up, who hath of fairer size,
Brighter aspect, and for a queen to wear,
In worth not to be valued, yet not dear.
Danae commands him up, he glad ascends,
And through their bribed hands freely is admitted
Even to her chamber. Gold, thy might extends
Beyond all opposition, the best witted
Thou canst corrupt, dive through the hearts of friends,
By thee are walled towns entered, sconces splitted,
By thee are armies swayed, camps overrun,
Children the fathers spoil, and sire the son.
89
No wonder then if gold the peddler brought,
To enter where, besides him, no man came.
Behold the goddess this great king hath sought,
O how her bright eye doth his soul inflame!
Pearls, jewels, rings, and gold, he sets at naught,
Yea, all the world, if valued with this dame.
Variety of costly gems he shows her,
And makes her of them all, the free disposer.
So wills the Cretan king, nor will he take
One mite in way of chaffer or set price.
She thanks the peddler for his master’s sake,
And how to please him, asks her maids’ advice.
But they so much of their own ouches spake,
Whose brightness did their thoughts imparadise,
That they contend whose jewel rarest glisters,
Whilst Jove in Danae’s ear, thus softly whispers:
“Behold what love can do: that king of Crete
That prizes Danae above any rate,
Wrapped in coarse garments, for a king unmeet,
For Danae’s love and grace, despising state,
Prostrates himself at thy imperial feet,
Resolved before he entered Darrain’s gate
Thy beauty, virtue, youth, and fame to save,
Buried already on this brazen grave.
For Lady, to what purpose are you fair?
As good to have a tanned and wrinkled hide,
Why is your hands so white, your brow so rare?
An Ethiope’s face masked, shows as full of pride.
These brazen walls that only judges are
Of your bright looks, all wonder are denied.
Your goddess’ shape is to the senseless stone
No better than the beauty of yon crone.
What difference makes the dead twixt grace and scorn?
What lustre gives Apollo to the blind?
What are the choicest dainties if forborn?
What’s music to the ears whom deafness bind?
What is the costliest garment if not worn?
Or being worn, if none his riches mind?
What show’s in jewels hid behind a screen?
What’s state unknown? What’s beauty if not seen?”
The princess sighs, as knowing all is true,
When Jupiter proceeds: “Renownèd dame,
Set this rich beauty to the broad world’s view,
These rare perfections let the world proclaim,
Whom thousand kingly suitors shall pursue.
Unmask this beauty: to that end I came.
O, lead not here a base condemnèd life!
That may abroad live a free queen and wife.
Pity your servant Jupiter, whose treasure,
Whose life, whose crown, whose fortunes are all yours.
Rob not yourself of all earth’s glorious pleasure,
Pity your youth whose pride a jail devours.
A dungeon takes of such perfections seizure,
That should command all free enthronèd powers,
And die not here, t’ eternal bonds betrayed,
Robbed of all sweets, that for your taste were made.
You are a woman desperate here, and lost,
Kept from man’s sight, for which you were created,
And, beauteous princess, which should touch you most,
Your jealous father by the world is rated
As one that coops you but to spare his cost,
And envying you a queen should be instated,
A tyrant, that prefers his jealous fears,
Before your virtue, beauty, youth and years.
Grant me your love, O grant it, blush not, Queen,
That love shall be your ransom from this place,
This prisoned beauty shall abroad be seen,
And empresses shall homage to your face,
And then this jail where you have cloistered been
You will despise, and term Acrisius base,
That gold in brass and pearl in stone would shroud,
Muffling the bright sun in so base a cloud.”
Her tender heart relents, his amorous shape
Appears out of his base, unknown disguise,
And if her heart his sweet words cannot scape,
No wonder if his feature charm her eyes.
She knows no peasant dares attempt her rape,
Nor any base thought aim at her surprise,
And save king Jupiter by fame held peerless,
She knows no prince so bold, so rich, so fearless.
99
But as she would reply, her virgin guard
Began to leave their conference and draw near them,
Which Jupiter espying, straight prepared
His bounteous pack with more rewards to cheer them.
And whilst they asked the princess how she fared,
He ransacks for more trifles, and doth bear them
Unto the female waiters, Danae’s train,
So with fresh toys he bribes them once again.
100
They throng about him round, to be served first,
And as they taste his bounty, start aside,
Comparing which is best, and who’s the worst,
More words and wagers must the strife decide,
And whilst these gems are by the ladies pursed,
And none near Danae and king abide,
She views the amorous prince with more satiety,
And he the princess courts with fresh variety.
She neither gives him promise, nor denial,
Neither repulse, nor grant, so women use,
When men, in sight of others, make their trial,
They will not say you shall, lest you abuse
Their friendly grant, but take them free from spial,
And say withal, they shall nor will, nor choose,
Then you shall find them weakly, fighting fall,
And willingly, unwilling prostrate all.
Give lovers opportunity, their loves
Are half won to their hands without more suit.
The man that verbal courtship only moves,
Shall all his lifetime in vain words dispute,
When one that proffers fair, and fine force proves,
Speeds with his action, though his tongue be mute,
For every maid takes one thing from her mother,
Whilst her tongue one thing speaks, to think another.
The night grows old, and the bright lamps of heaven,
Are half burnt out: the beldams call to rest,
What shall the peddler do, so late be driven
Out of his inn, the lodge that likes him best,
To lie with Charles’ Wain and the Hyads seven,
He hath deserved more grace they dare protest.
To turn him out at this time might seem cruel,
That bought his bed with many a high prized jewel.
And yet to harbour him, they needs must fear,
Because they shall incur Acrisius’ ire,
If such a tiding should arrive his ear,
Their bodies all were doomed unto the fire,
But by what means can king Acrisius hear?
Beside, what peasant peddler dares aspire
To Danae’s bed and all their lives betray?
Fain they would have him gone, and fain to stay.
105
His bounty hath prevailed, and he provided
A private lodging in a place remote.
Danae unto her princely couch is guided,
So much her handmaids in their favours dote,
They careless pluck her door too, the lock slided
Besides his fastening place, which none doth note.
Then take their toys, and to their beds they bear them,
Longing for day, that they in sight may wear them.
A general hushtness hath the world possessed,
And all the tower surprised with golden dreams.
Alone king Jupiter abandons rest,
Still wishing for Apollo’s golden beams.
Desperate of hope, he knows not what is best,
When rising, from afar he spies bright gleams
Pierce from his window, as from Danae’s tower,
In th’ humid night’s most taciturnal hour.
He knows sad sleep hath ceased upon the many
He hears no waking clock, nor watch to jar,
He ventures forth, and searching, finds not any.
And in his way to this new-blazing star,
He lays his ear to every rift and cranny,
Till he with fearful strides hath won so far,
That he must now these marble steps ascend,
Which led unto the bower of his fair friend.
108
Where coming, with a soft and trembling pace,
To touch the door, he feels it yield him way,
And freely gives him entrance to the place
Where his divinest mistress Danae lay.
He kissed her finger, hand, neck, breast and face,
And every thing the white sheet durst betray,
That done, into her silver arms he crept,
And all this while the amorous virgin slept.
Imagine how she waking grew amazed,
Imagine him a double rhetoric using,
Action and words: sometimes herself she raised
To call for help, his dalliance quite refusing.
Imagine then how he his love emblazed:
He at her scorn, she at his boldness musing,
His gifts, his name, his love plead on his part,
’Gainst him, her fame, her fear and her chaste heart.
Love makes him eloquent and chief occasion,
Makes him bold too, she’s bashful and withstands,
He lays to her both battery and persuasion,
And much ado she hath to paste his hands,
Being girt in arms, how can she scape invasion,
Or break the compass of his ivory bands:
She would be gone, he woos her to lie still,
So he’ll no violence use, she sayth she will.
O bankrupt Jove, in midst of all thy blisses
Joyless, and yet with pleasures ringed about.
He woos again with courtship mixing kisses,
A thousand batteries, Danae hath held out:
And still the sieger his irruption misses.
They parley, but conclude not, both are stout:
Sometimes he strives, then she begins to threat,
Then he from striving falls again t’ entreat.
112
What cannot opportunity and place
Bed-fellowship and love, if they conspire?
A comely feature and a courtly face,
Courtship and name of king to win desire?
All these in Jupiter entreat for grace,
All these have set her amorous heart afire,
And ’gainst all these, the least of which command,
Save bashfulness, sh’ hath nothing to withstand.
113
And that’s too weak ’gainst things of their ability,
Yet it is of a temper, not to yield,
For though it be subdued with much facility,
T’ will proudly seem still to maintain the field.
It reigns in many that profess civility,
Who all their pleasures on compulsion build:
For bashful women long since learnt this skill,
What they would give, to grant against their will.
114
Women are weak and weak ones must obey.
Fair Danae is but woman, and must fall,
Her glory is that she hath held him play,
And kept her friendly foe so long from all.
What should she do, the prince will have no nay
Her guard’s asleep, if she for help should call:
What with compulsion, love, force and fair words,
She lies confused and he the princess boards.
|
This night the warlike Perseus was begot, And now the early day star ’gins to rise Who calls the prince up, least the beldam trot Should find his night-walk with her jealous eyes. But she their private sport suspected not, Nor knew the king in his assumed disguise; Tears when they part are in abundance shed, When he must leave the princely Danae’s bed. |
Perseus |
It is compounded and between them sworn,
That Jove must come in arms by such a day,
By whom the lass must be from Argos borne.
So takes his leave, he dare no longer stay,
The sun is called up by the early morn,
High time, to send the peddler on his way:
They praise the largesse of their bounteous guest,
But of his jewels, Danae keeps the best.
117
Leave Jove towards Crete, and Danae in sad plight,
For his departure, whom she tenders dearly.
She never loved until this ominous night,
And now to see him part, she riseth early,
Gladly with him she would have ta’en her flight,
But fears her father would revenge severely
Her bold attempt, and back return her weeping,
To spend her future youth in stricter keeping.
118
Besides she fears, that which indeed was true,
That she of Jove’s seed might conceive a son,
Which if the jealous king Acrisius knew,
At these sad tidings he would frantic run.
The princess to her chamber now withdrew,
Armed with this hope, that Jove the deed had done,
Th’ only renowned, rich, puissant and of power,
By force of arms, to free her from the tower.
Now to record what I remembered erst,
How Troos in Troy his neighbour kings out-shined,
And in the same place where it was reversed,
How all Troy’s fame king Tantalus repined.
But how the Phrygian forces were dispersed
By Troos is to another place assigned.
Here should I speak how Troy to fame aspired,
But my muse flags and my dull pen is tired.
[Heywood’s endnotes to Canto IV]
|
Esculapius, the son of Apollo and the Nymph Coronis; others think, of Arsinoe the daughter of Leucippus. He was taught his physic of Chiron the Centaur, which Tzetzes, Chiliades 10, and Lactantius, Liber de falsa religione, both affirm he had a sister called Eriope, a wife, Epione and a son Machaon and Podalirius. He was called Aulonius, Medicus, Oncaeata, Leuctricus, Gortynius, Corylaeus, Agnitas Booneta, and he was born among the Epidaurians. |
Homerus hymnographus / Pausanias, in Messeniacis
Orpheus in Hymn. |
|
Jupiter won from Esculapius the isle Paphos, and gave it to his daughter Venus. Paphos was built by Aeos, son to Typhon. |
|
|
In Saturn ended the Golden World, and in his son Jupiter began the Brazen Age. |
|
|
Aeolus was son to Acesta and Jupiter, because the clouds and mists rising about the seven Eolian Islands, of which he was king, did always portend tempestuous gusts and blasts, therefore the Poets feigned him to be king and god of the winds. |
|
|
Epaphus, the son of Isis and Jupiter Belus, builded the famous Egyptian Memphis, the year before Christ came into the world 1492. Orosius writes, that the fifty marriages concluding in nine and forty murders, was the year before Christ 1473 for which Danaus was expulsed his realm, and fled to the Argives, where he spent the remainder of his age. The year after this unnatural massacre, Aaron deceased amongst the Israelites. |
|
|
By Isis some say is meant Io, and by Jupiter Belus, Jupiter of Crete, Ovid in his Metamorphoses: |
|
Huic Epaphus magni genitus de semine tandem
Creditur esse Iovis.
|
Epaphus and Phaeton, the one the son of Jupiter by Io, the other the son of Phoebus by Clymene, being at some difference about their bloods, Phaeton leaves his mother, to travail to the Palace of the Sun, where asking his unhappy boon as a sure testimony of his descent from Phoebus, he by his rashness and pride fired the world, and was struck headlong from the Chariot of the Sun, by one of Jupiter’s thunderbolts. |
|
|
Of Jupiter it is thus remembered, of Europa he begot Minos and Rhadamantus, Arcas of Callisto, Pelasgus of Niobe, Sarpedon and Argus of Laodamia, Hercules of Alcmena, Taygetus of Taygete, Amphion and Zetus of Antiope, Castor, Helena, Pollux, and Clytemnestra of Leda, Perseus of Danae, Deucalion of Iodoma, Britomartis of Carme the daughter of Eubulus, Aethilius the father of Endymion of Protogenia, Epaphus of Io, Aegina of the daughter of Asopus, Arcesilaus and Carbius of Torrebia, Colaxes of Ora, Cyrnus of Cyrna, Dardanus of Electra, Hiarbas of Garamantis, Preces, Proserpina, and Tityus, with infinite others, too long to recount. |
Callimachus, De conditis insulis
Archelaus, Liber de fluminibus |
Fit taurus, cygnus satyrusque aurumque ob amorem,
Europae, Laedes, Antiopae, Danaes.
Zeus kuknos, tauros, saturos krusos di’ erota
Ledes, Europes, Antiopes, Danaes.
|
Apollo exiled by Jupiter kept Admetus’ sheep, which Pindarus in Pythicis affirms, or his oxen, as Horace, 1 Carminum. And therefore he had the title to be called ever after, the god of pastures. As Virgil, Georgics, 3: |
Lucianus, in Dialogis Mortuorum Callimachus, in hymn. |
Te quoque, magna Pales, et te memorande canemus
pastor ab Amphryso.
The end of the fourth Canto.
Back to Canto IV (1-50)
Notes to Canto IV
On to Canto V (1-50)
How to cite
Nathalie Vienne-Guerrin, ed., 2014. Troia Britanica Canto IV, 51-119 (1609). In A Dictionary of Shakespeare's Classical Mythology: A Textual Companion, ed. Yves Peyré (2009-).
http://www.shakmyth.org/page/Early+Modern+Mythological+Texts%3A+Troia+Britanica+IV
+%2851-119%29
<< back to top >>