Text and Translation

Abstract

Broken by war and rejected by the fates, the leaders of the Danaans, as so many years had now slipped away, build a Horse, the size of a mountain - the craft is the goddess Pallas's - and weave cut fir into her sides. All the Greeks' hope and their confidence in the war they had begun always relied on Pallas' assistance. The princes Thessandrus and Sthenelus, and terrible Ulysses slipped down the rope they had lowered; so too did Acamas and Thoas and Neoptolemus grandson of Peleus, the pre-eminent Machaon and Menelaus and the architect of the trick himself, Epeius. The famous fifty bedchambers, a generous expectation of grandchildren, the doors standing proudly with the spoils of barbarian gold, have collapsed: where the fire has given out, the Greeks take hold.Keywords: Danaans; goddess Pallas; Greeks; Neoptolemus; Ulysses