Thursday, July 21, 2022

 

Loss of Vigor

Greek Anthology 11.30 (by Philodemus), tr. Richard Thomas in "'Death', Doxography, and the 'Termerian Evil' (Philodemus, Epigr. 27 Page = A.P. 11.30)," Classical Quarterly 41 (1991) 130-137 (at 130):
I who in time past was good for five or nine times, now, Aphrodite, hardly manage once from early night to sunrise. The thing itself, already often only at half-strength, is gradually dying. That's the last straw. Old age, old age, what will you do later when you come to me, if even now I am as languid as this?

ὁ πρὶν ἐγὼ καὶ πέντε καὶ ἐννέα, νῦν, Ἀφροδίτη,
   ἓν μόλις ἐκ πρώτης νυκτὸς ἐς ἠέλιον.
οἴμοι καὶ τοῦτ' αὐτὸ κατὰ βραχύ, πολλάκι δ᾽ ἤδη
   ἡμιθαλές, θνῄσκει· τοῦτο τὸ Τερμέριον.
ὦ γῆρας γῆρας, τί ποθ᾽ ὕστερον ἢν ἀφίκηαι        5
   ποιήσεις, ὅτε νῦν ὧδε μαραίνομεθα;


3 οἴμοι καὶ τοῦτ' αὐτὸ Jacobs: οἴμοι καὶ τοῦτο P
4 ἡμιθαλές Page: ἡμιθανές P
In his Loeb Classical Library translation, W.R. Paton resorts to the decent obscurity of Latin for the first couplet:
Qui prius ego et quinque et novem fututiones agebam, nunc, O Venus, vix unam possum ab prima nocte ad solem. And alas, this thing (it has often been half-dead) is gradually dying outright. This is the calamity of Termerus2 that I suffer. Old age, old age, what shalt thou do later, if thou comest, since already I am thus languid?

2 A proverbial expression for an appropriate punishment. The robber Termerus used to kill his victims by butting them with his head, and Heracles broke his head.



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