Lucian of Samosata, Lexiphanes, Austin Morris Harmon (Translator), 15

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[15] “What was that you said, Eudemus?” said I. “Do you enjoin alogy upon us as if we were inarticulate and elinguid? My tongue is already pregnant with utterance, and in sooth I set sail in the intent to archaise with you and wash you up with my tongue, one and all. But you have treated me as if a three-masted vessel were sailing before the wind with full kites, running easy and spooming over the billows, and then someone, letting go double-tongued refrainers,¹ pigs of iron,² and bowers, were to curb the impetuosity of her course, begrudging her the fair wind.”

“Well, then,” quoth he, “you, if you like, may sail and swim and course over the main, but I from off the land, with a drink at my elbow, like Homer’s Zeus, shall look upon you either from a bald cop or the pitch of heaven as you drive and the wind gives your vessel a saucy fairing from astern.”

Lexiphanes. Lucian of Samosata. Austin Morris Harmon (Translator). United States. Perseus 5.0.

Funding provided by National Endowment for the Humanities.

Current edition Perseus

Lexiphanes (English) (Lucian, Vol. 5. Harmon, Austin Morris, editor. London: William Heinemann, Ltd.; Cambridge, MA: Harvard University Press, 1936 (printing).)

Editions (1)

Λεξιφάνης Perseus (Lucian, Vol. 5. Harmon, Austin Morris, editor. London: William Heinemann, Ltd.; Cambridge, MA: Harvard University Press, 1936 (printing).) — 15 focus

Λεξιφάνης

τί ταῦτα ἔφησθα, ὦ Εὔδημε; ἦν δʼ ἐγώ· ἀλογίαν ἡμῖν ἐπιτάττεις ὡς ἀστόμοις οὖσι καὶ ἀπεγλωττισμένοις; ἐμοὶ δὲ ἡ γλῶττά τε ἤδη λογᾷ καὶ δὴ ἀνηγόμην γε ὡς ἀρχαιολογήσων ὑμῖν καὶ κατανίψων ἀπὸ γλώττης ἅπαντας. ἀλλὰ σὺ τὸ ὅμοιον εἰργάσω με ὥσπερ εἴ τις ὁλκάδα τριάρμενον ἐν οὐρίῳ πλέουσαν, ἐμπεπνευματωμένου τοῦ ἀκατίου, εὐφοροῦσάν τε καὶ ἀκροκυματοῦσαν, ἕκτοράς τινας ἀμφιστόμους καὶ ἰσχάδας σιδηρᾶς ἀφεὶς καὶ ναυσιπέδας ἀναχαιτίζοι τοῦ δρόμου τὸ ῥόθιον, φθόνῳ τῆς εὐηνεμίας.

Οὐκοῦν, ἦ δʼ ὅς, σὺ μέν, εἰ βούλει, πλεῖ καὶ νεῖ καὶ θεῖ κατὰ τοῦ κλύδωνος, ἐγὼ δὲ ἀπόγειος πίνων ἅμα ὥσπερ ὁ τοῦ Ὁμήρου Ζεὺς ἢ ἀπὸ φαλάκρων ἢ ἀπὸ τῆς ἀκρουρανίας ὄψομαι διαφερόμενόν σέ τε καὶ τὴν ναῦν πρύμνηθεν ὑπὸ¹ τοῦ ἀνέμου κατουρουμένην.

Translations (1)

Lexiphanes Perseus (The Works of Lucian of Samosata, Vol. 2. Fowler, Henry Watson and Fowler, Francis George, translators. Oxford: Clarendon Press, 1905.) — 15 focus

[15] ‘What is this you say, Eudemus? says I; 'You would exact mutation from us? are we so hard-mouthed, so untongued'? For my tongue, tis garriturient. I was just getting under way, and making ready to hail you with a fine old Attic shower. 'Tis as if a three-master were satling before the breeze, with stay-sails wind-bellied, scudding along wave-skimming, and you should throw out two-tongued anchorage and iron stoppers and ship-fetters, and block her foaming course, in envy of her fair-windedness.’ ‘Why then, if you will, splash and dash and crash through the waves; and I upsoaring, and drinking the while, will watch like Homer's Zeus from some bald-crowned bill or from Heaven-top, while you and your ship are swept along with the wind behind you.’

Notes on the current edition

Lexiphanes

In view of the fact that to the Greeks Hector was a “holder,” Lexiphanes can cause us to imagine that hero performing new and strange feats.

For ἰσχάς (“fig”) used, in the sense “holder,” to apply to an anchor, cf. Athen., 99 c—p, where it is attributed to Sophocles (Fr. 761 Pearson).

Lucian of Samosata Lexiphanes 15

Austin Morris Harmon (Translator)

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