Texts and translations for “What Pandora let out and what she left in.”

{For website viewers: In the event that your browser will not reproduce the Greek text, you can find it in Arrighetti’s or West’s work listed in the references, among other places.  The Greek words in the footnotes are (in transliteration): for n. 1, gēras; for n. 3, gunē, epembale, and Pandōrē; and for n. 4, pithou.}

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Hesiod, Works and Days 90-104:

πρὶν μὲν γὰρ ζώεσκον ἐπὶ χθονὶ φῦλ΄ ἀνθρώπων     90

νόσφιν ἄτερ τε κακῶν καὶ ἄτερ χαλεποῖο πόνοιο

νούσων τ΄ ἀργαλέων αἵ τ΄ ἀνδράσι κῆρας[1] ἔδωκαν·

[αἶψα γὰρ ἐν κακότητι βροτοὶ καταγηράσκουσιν·][2] {= Od. 19.360}

ἀλλὰ γυνὴ χείρεσσι πίθου μέγα πῶμ΄ ἀφελοῦσα

ἐσκέδας΄· ἀνθρώποισι δ΄ ἐμήσατο κήδεα λυγρά. 95

μούνη δ΄ αὐτόθι Ἐλπὶς ἐν ἀρρήκτοισι δόμοισιν

ἔνδον ἔμιμνε πίθου ὑπὸ χείλεσιν, οὐδὲ θύραζε

ἐξέπτη· πρόσθεν γὰρ ἐπέμβαλε πῶμα πίθοιο

αἰγιόχου(?)[3] βουλῇσι Διὸς νεφεληγερέταο.

ἄλλα δὲ μυρία λυγρὰ κατ΄ ἀνθρώπους ἀλάληται· 100

πλείη μὲν γὰρ γαῖα κακῶν, πλείη δὲ θάλασσα·

νοῦσοι δ΄ ἀνθρώποισιν ἐφ΄ ἡμέρῃ, αἱ δ΄ ἐπὶ νυκτὶ

αὐτόματοι φοιτῶσι κακὰ θνητοῖσι φέρουσαι

σιγῇ, ἐπεῖ φωνὴν ἐξείλετο μητίετα Ζεύς.

 

For human tribes lived all over the earth before (Pandora arrived)         90

free of and far from evils, and far from hard pain

and from the wearying diseases that bring doom {Musäus: old age} to men;

[for mortals grow old quickly when suffering;]

but the woman took the great lid of (some) jar away with her hands

and dispersed it[4] {i.e., its contents}, and wrought grievous cares for humanity. 95

Elpis {= Expectation or Hope} alone there in the unbreakable construction

remained inside under the lip of the jar, and not to the outside

did fly; for first (the woman?)[5] closed the lid of the jar

by the will of aegis-bearing(?), cloud-gathering Zeus.

Otherwise, countless evils roam among humans;            100

for full is the earth of evils, and full is the sea;

diseases by night, and others by day, to humans

come and go of themselves, bringing evil to mortals

silently, since Zeus the counselor (had?)[6] removed their voices.

vv. 498-500:

πολλὰ δ΄ ἀεργὸς ἀνήρ, κενεὴν ἐπὶ ἐλπίδα μίμνων,

χρηίζων βιότοιο, κακὰ προσελέξατο φυμῷ·

ἐλπὶς δ΄ οὐκ ἀγαθὴ κεχρημένον ἄνδρα κομίζει.

 

Many an idling man, in attending empty elpides

while in need of sustenance, is speaking poorly to his heart;

elpis is not a good companion for the man in need.

 

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