Notes on the dog days of summer from ancient Greece..
| τὸν δ᾽ ὃ γέρων Πρίαμος πρῶτος ἴδεν ὀφθαλμοῖσι παμφαίνονθ᾽ ὥς τ᾽ ἀστέρ᾽ ἐπεσσύμενον πεδίοιο, ὅς ῥά τ᾽ ὀπώρης εἶσιν, ἀρίζηλοι δέ οἱ αὐγαὶ φαίνονται πολλοῖσι μετ᾽ ἀστράσι νυκτὸς ἀμολγῷ, ὅν τε κύν᾽ Ὠρίωνος ἐπίκλησιν καλέουσι. λαμπρότατος μὲν ὅ γ᾽ ἐστί, κακὸν δέ τε σῆμα τέτυκται, καί τε φέρει πολλὸν πυρετὸν δειλοῖσι βροτοῖσιν: ὣς τοῦ χαλκὸς ἔλαμπε περὶ στήθεσσι θέοντος. ἦμος δὴ λήγει μένος ὀξέος ἠελίοιο ἦμος δὲ σκόλυμός τ᾽ ἀνθεῖ καὶ ἠχέτα τέττιξ
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Priam saw him first, with his old man’s eyes, A single point of light on Troy’s dusty plain. Sirius rises late in the dark, liquid sky On summer nights, star of stars, Orion’s Dog they call it, brightest Of all, but an evil portent, bringing heat And fevers to suffering humanity. Achilles’ bronze gleamed like this as he ran. When the piercing power and sultry heat of the sun abate, and almighty Zeus sends the autumn rains, and men’s flesh comes to feel far easier,—for then the star Sirius passes over the heads of men, who are born to misery, only a little while by day and takes greater share of night—then, when it showers its leaves to the ground and stops sprouting, the wood you cut with your axe is least liable to worm. But when the artichoke flowers, and the chirping grass-hopper sits in a tree and pours down his shrill song continually from under his wings in the season of wearisome heat, then goats are plumpest and wine sweetest; women are most wanton, but men are feeblest, because Sirius parches head and knees and the skin is dry through heat. |
Rat & Raven 