Over my head with Ibycus frag. 5

I’m sure I’m trying something way beyond my ability here, but hey…

I’ve been having fun lately reading through Pausanius in English translation (Penguin Classics) and when I found something he said about Ibycus, I looked the guy up in my Oxford Classical Dictionary (2nd ed.) and the article said a couple of the fragments of his’ poetry were about love and nature and were supposed to be quite beautiful. So I thought I’d give one of them a try at translating. I dug up the folllowing in Page’s Poetae Melici Graeci:

ἦρι μὲν αἵ τε Κυδώνιαι
μηλίδες ἀρδόμεναι ῥοᾶν
ἐκ μοταμῶν, ἵνα Παρθένων
κῆπος ἀκήρατος, αἵ τ’ οἰνανθίδες
αὐχόμεναι σκιεροῖσιν ὑφ’ ἕρνεσιν
οἰναρέοις θαλέθοισιν· ἐμοί δ’ ἔρος
οὐδεμίαν κατάκοιτος ὥραν.
τε ὐπὸ στερομᾶς φλέγων
Θρηίκιος Βορέας
ἀίσσων παρὰ Κύπριδος ἀζαλέαις
μανίαισιν ἐρεμνὸς ἀθαμβὴς
ἐγκρατέως πεδόθεν φυλάσσει
ἡμετέρας φρένας

Below is my rough (and trying to be poetic not literal ) translation, relying mostly on looking up unfamiliar words in the Cambridge Greek Lexicon and occasionally LSJ:

Springtime,
when the Cydonian apple trees
and the bushy groves of young maidens
are watered by streams from rivers,
And growing vine-clusters bloom
under the shady shoots of young vine leaves.
Not for me, though;
Passion visits my bed no more.
It’s now a season of nothingness,
beneath those flashes of lightning
from the North Wind coming from Thrace,
flashing forth from Aphrodite,
scorching madness,
shameless darkness,
blasting our hearts.

I’m sure some of this is wrong – but it was fun trying!

I’m open to feedback :slight_smile:

Cheers,
Mitch

1 Like

You certainly succeeded there!

A season of nothingness? It’s all rather too Poundian for me, and ἐμοἰ δ᾿ ἔρος οὐδεμίαν κατάκοιτος ὥραν must mean almost the opposite of “Passion visits my bed no more.”

How would you translate ἐμοἰ δ᾿ ἔρος οὐδεμίαν κατάκοιτος ὥραν?

OK how about this:

“In no season is passion at rest for me”

i.e. “My passion is never at rest. It’s like the North Wind etc.”

(taking οὐδεμίαν ὥραν as accusative of time in apposition to ἐμοἰ ἔρος κατάκοιτος)

Yes Mitch that’s it. οὐδεμίαν ὥραν with κατάκοιτος.