None in the leap spring with so strong a bound,

Or firmer, in the wrestling, press the ground.”


Thus spoke the king; the attending peers obey;

In state they move, Alcinous lends the way;

His golden lyre Demodocus unstrung,

High on a column in the palace hung;

And guided by a herald’s guardian cares,

Majestic to the lists of Fame repairs.


Now swarms the populace: a countless throng,

Youth and hoar age; and man drives man along.

The games begin; ambitious of the prize,

Acroneus, Thoon, and Eretmeus rise;

The prize Ocyalus and Prymneus claim,

Anchialus and Ponteus, chiefs of fame.

There Proreus, Nautes, Eratreus, appear

And famed Amphialus, Polyneus’ heir;

Euryalus, like Mars terrific, rose,

When clad in wrath he withers hosts of foes;

Naubolides with grace unequall’d shone,

Or equall’d by Laodamas alone.

With these came forth Ambasineus the strong:

And three brave sons, from great Alcinous sprung.


Ranged in a line the ready racers stand,

Start from the goal, and vanish o’er the strand:

Swift as on wings of winds, upborne they fly,

And drifts of rising dust involve the sky.

Before the rest, what space the hinds allow

Between the mule and ox, from plough to plough,

Clytonius sprung: he wing’d the rapid way,

And bore the unrivall’d honours of the day.

With fierce embrace the brawny wrestlers join;

The conquest, great Euryalus, is thine.

Amphialus sprung forward with a bound,

Superior in the leap, a length of ground.

From Elatreus’ strong arm the discus flies,

And sings with unmatch’d force along the skies.

And Laodam whirls high, with dreadful sway,

The gloves of death, victorious in the fray.


While thus the peerage in the games contends,

In act to speak, Laodamas ascends.


“O friends (he cries), the stranger seems well skill’d

To try the illustrious labours of the field:

I deem him brave: then grant the brave man’s claim,

Invite the hero to his share of fame.