Laudator Temporis Acti

Greek Anthology 9.153 (by Agathias Scholasticus), translated (at second hand) by Ezra Pound, in his Poems and Translations, ed. Richard Sieburth (New York: The Library of America, 2003), p. 314:

Whither, O city, are your profits and your gilded shrines,
And your barbecues of great oxen,
And the tall women, walking your streets, in gilt clothes,
With their perfume in little alabaster boxes?
Where are the works of your home-born sculptors?

Time’s tooth is into the lot, and war’s and fate’s too.
Envy has taken your all
Save your douth and your story.

ὦ πόλι, πῆ σέο κεῖνα τὰ τείχεα, πῆ πολύολβοι
    νηοί; πῆ δὲ βοῶν κράατα τεμνομένων;
πῆ Παφίης ἀλάβαστρα, καὶ ἡ πάγχρυσος ἐφεστρίς;
    πῆ δὲ Τριτογενοῦς δείκελον ἐνδαπίης;
πάντα μόθος χρονίη τε χύσις καὶ Μοῖρα κραταιὴ
    ἥρπασεν, ἀλλοίην ἀμφιβαλοῦσα τύχην.
καί σε τόσον νίκησε βαρὺς φθόνος· ἀλλ᾽ ἄρα μοῦνον
    οὔνομα σὸν κρύψαι καὶ κλέος οὐ δύναται.

W.R. Paton's translation:

Where are those walls of thine, O city, where thy temples full of treasure, where the heads of the oxen thou wast wont to slay? Where are Aphrodite’s caskets of ointment and her mantle all of gold? Where is the image of thy own Athena? Thou hast been robbed of all by war and the decay of ages, and the strong hand of Fate, which reversed thy fortunes. So far did bitter Envy subdue thee; but thy name and glory alone she cannot hide.

Pound's translation is entitled "Troy" and is part of a group with the heading

HOMAGE TO QUINTUS SEPTIMIUS FLORENTIS CHRISTIANUS
                              (Ex libris Graecæ).

Quintus Septimius Florentis [sic, should be Florens] Christianus is Florent Chrestien (1541-1596), whose posthumous Epigrammata ex Libris Graecae Anthologiae (Lutetiae: Ex Typographia Roberti Stephani, 1608) contains this Latin translation of Agathias' poem on p. 23: Transcription:

Quò tua nunc abiêre, vrbs, mœnia? quò pretiosa
    Fana, & cæsorum tot capita alta boum?
Quò Veneris bene olens alabastrum, atque aurea vestis?
    Quò nunc indigenæ Palladis effigies?
Omnia tempus edax, bellúmque, inuictáque fata
    Abripuêre, alia sorte dedêre frui.
Inuidia ò quantum nocuit tibi! sed tua nusquam
    Celari virtus, nec tua fama potest.

As has been noted by others, Pound's "profits" in the first line is probably a misunderstanding of mœnia (walls) for mœnera, i.e. munera. Likewise "home-born sculptures" is a mistake, because in "indigenæ Palladis effigies" the adjective indigenæ modifies Palladis, not effigies.

Finally, Pound's parenthetical "(Ex libris Graecæ)" makes no sense, because the adjective Graecæ is left without a noun to modify. He should have written "Ex libris Graecæ Anthologiæ".

Labels: typographical and other errors