Pausanias, Description of Greece, W.H.S. Jones (Translator), H.A. Ormerod (Translator), 7.19.5

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[5] The innocent youths and maidens who perished because of Melanippus and Comaetho suffered a piteous fate, as did also their relatives; but the pair, I hold, were exempt from suffering, for the one thing¹ that is worth a man's life is to be successful in love.

Description of Greece. Pausanias. W.H.S. Jones (Translator), H.A. Ormerod (Translator). Cambridge, MA. 1918-1935.

Sponsored by Perseus Project, Tufts University.

Funding provided by The Annenberg CPB/Project.

Current edition Perseus

Description of Greece (English) (Pausanias. Pausanias Description of Greece, Volumes 1-4. Jones, W.H.S. (William Henry Samuel), translator; Ormerod, Henry Arderne, translator. London, New York: W. Heinemann, G.P. Putnam's Sons, 1918-1935.)

Editions (1)

Ἑλλάδος Περιηγήσεως Perseus (Pausanias. Pausaniae Graeciae descriptio, Volumes 1-3. Spiro, Friedrich, editor. Leipzig: Teubner, 1903.) — 7.19.5 focus

[5] τέως δὲ ὄνομα εἶχεν οὐδέν. παίδων δὲ καὶ παρθένων ὁπόσοι μὲν ἐς τὴν θεὸν οὐδὲν εἰργασμένοι Μελανίππου καὶ Κομαιθοῦς ἕνεκα ἀπώλλυντο, αὐτοί τε οἰκτρότατα καὶ οἱ προσήκοντές σφισιν ἔπασχον, Μελάνιππον δὲ καὶ Κομαιθὼ συμφορᾶς ἐκτὸς γενέσθαι τίθεμαι· μόνον γὰρ δὴ ἀνθρώπῳ ψυχῆς ἐστιν ἀντάξιον κατορθῶσαί τινα ἐρασθέντα.

Translations (1)

English (Jones and Ormerod; retranslated Gregory Nagy, CHS, 2018) (OCR draft) Experimental (CHS Pausanias Reader retranslation by Gregory Nagy, based on Jones and Ormerod, with marked Greek terms, notes, quotations, and bibliographic attributions preserved.) — 7.19.5 focus

[5] None of the boys [ paides] and girls [ parthénoi] who perished because of Melanippos and Komaitho had done anything wrong against the goddesss [ theos (feminine)], and yet they still suffered [ paskhein] in a most pitiful way, as did also those who were near-and-dear [ pros-(h)ēkontes] to them, but those two [= Melanippos and Komaitho], I propose, escaped from misfortune [ sumphorā]. I say this because the only thing there is for a human [ anthrōpos] that is worth one’s own life in exchange is this: achieving-success [ katorthōsai] in loving-passionately [ erân].

Notes on the current edition

Description of Greece

1. With the reading of the MSS.: “for to man only is it worth one's life to be successful in love.”

New Alexandria Commentaries

Gregory Nagy, Editors: Angelia Hanhardt and Keith DeStone, Web producer: Noel Spencer, Consultant for images: Jill Curry Robbins, \[\[Noel gives this a separate URN\]\]

Scroll I. Attica

Here is where the role of Pausanias as an occasional novelist becomes most overt. He is now ostentatiously claiming that the original human sacrifice of Komaitho and Melanippos was not a total misfortune for them, unlike the yearly human sacrifices of couples who experienced the same form of death—because at least the original couple were passionately in love with each other, whereas the couples who were put to death year after year thereafter were not paired as lovers. To have the good fortune of experiencing passionate love is worth all the suffering, as Pausanias concludes before he leaves behind his temporary role as the all-understanding narrator.

source

Pausanias Description of Greece 7.19.5

W.H.S. Jones (Translator), H.A. Ormerod (Translator)

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