Odyssey

The Odyssey (The Story of Ulysses -- The World's Greatest Adventure Saga), Homer, Translated by W. H. D. Rouse, New York, 1937, 1960, Mentor Books, The New American Library.


When the story starts, Odysseus (Ulysses in Latin), a man "who was never at a loss," the ever-ready, has been missing from his home for twenty years.  He left his beautiful wife Penelopeia and his infant son Telemachos, left his beloved island of Ithaca and his cattle and servants, to fight and sack Troy.  But the gods are fickle and he was delayed in his return, held captive in the cave of the beautiful goddess Calypso, daughter of Atlas, on her island of Ogygia.  There he sleeps with Calypso by night and weeps for his Ithaca, wife and home, by day.


Meanwhile, back at home, many men of Ithaca and beyond have come to woo the beautiful Penelopeia.  They eat Odysseus' livestock and drink his wine and make sport with his maids.  At first, Penelopeia put them off by telling them she must finish spinning a shroud for her father-in-law before she can see them.  She would spin all day and at night she would unravel what she had spun during the day.  But she was found out.  She could not put them off much longer.  And all the while these violent men squander Telemachos' inheritance.


Odysseus always found aid from the gods but for various circumstances he fell out of favor, especially with Poseidon, the brother of Zeus, King of Kings, Lord of Lords.  So, after those twenty years, while Poseidon was away from Olympus visiting the Ethiopians, the other gods were gathered and Athena, daughter of Zeus and Odysseus' special protector, convinced her father and the others to have mercy on noble Odysseus.  Zeus sent his son, winged Hermes, to Calypso to announce his decision.  Athena, herself, went to Ithaca disguised as Mentes, an old family friend of Odysseus, and spoke to Telemachos.  She advised him to call together the great men on the nation and make known the intolerable situation in his home.  Then find a ship and go to Pylos and Sparta and make inquiries about the fate of his father.


He took her advice but the meeting did not provide any relief from the army of would-be bridegrooms.  Telemachos went home and gathered provisions for the journey from his father's store while Athena "Bright Eyes," in the form of Telemachos, borrowed a ship and assembled a crew.  She traveled with him in the form of Mentes and introduced him to King Nestor of Pylos, a comrade of Odysseus.  Here he appealed for any knowledge of the whereabouts of his illustrious father, to which Nestor unhappily could supply none but hope.  He advised Telemachos to go to see King Menelaos and seek answers there.  Athena left them in the evening and in the morning, when "dawn showed her rosy fingers," Telemachos, accompanied by Perisistratos, one of Nestor's sons, in chariots supplied by the generous king, departed for Lacedaimon and King Menelaos.  There he asked the king and beautiful Helen, daughter of Zeus, she for whom Troy was besieged, of any word of his father.  But, alas, they too rued the disappearance of that mighty hero but could affirm neither that he still lived or that the holy arrow of Artemis had granted him sweet sleep.  As had Nester before him, Menelaos killed livestock and feasted Telemachos, who so resembled his famous father.  They spilled the drops (dropped the first few drops of wine for the gods) and toasted the legend of Odysseus.


Calypso, just having received the command of Zeus from Hermes, went to Odysseus and told him she was sending him home.  She instructed him to build a raft and provendered him with food, wine and clothing.  On the eighteenth day of his journey he was within sight of the island of the Phaiacians.  Unfortunately, Poseidon, Earthshaker, on his way home from the Ethiopians, saw him and stirred up the winds and seas against him.  As he was being buffeted, Ino, the White Sea Goddess, took pity on him and gave him her veil to wrap around himself to keep him afloat.  He pulled himself ashore, threw the veil back into the sea per her instructions and crawled under a thicket to sleep.


In the morning, he awoke to see Nausicaa, daughter of King Alcinoos and Queen Arete, washing clothes and playing with her ladies by the water.  Athena had inspired her to come here today.  Odysseus, naked, with only a branch of leaves to cover himself, appealed to Nausicaa as one who had endured much and traveled far.  She had her girls feed and bathe him and provide him with clothing and advised him how he should approach the king:  by first approaching the queen.  Nowhere was the fame of Odysseus not known for during the feast the king provided for him, the minstrel sang a song of a quarrel between Odysseus and Achilles and how it betokened the successful taking of the City of Troy.  Odysseus had not told anyone his name but when he heard the song he covered his face and wept.  Finally the king, seeing how he was moved, beseeched him to tell him who he was and how he came to be on his island.  In gratitude for the king's hospitality, he gave in.  This is the story he told.


After Odysseus left Troy on his way home to Ithaca, Zeus, Cloudgatherer, caused the winds to still and so the men had to row their ship.  They finally made land and Odysseus sent two of his men out to find out where they were.  The men encountered some lotus-eaters who gave them some lotus which caused them to want nothing but to stay and eat lotus.  Odysseus brought them back to the ship by force and sailed onward.  


Next he came to the Cyclopians.  These are giants of men with a single eye who live in caves and are the law unto themselves.  Odysseus took twelve men and went out to see what type of inhabitants live here.  He came upon the cave of the Cyclops Polyphemus, a son of Poseidon.  He was not there but they helped themselves to his wine and cheese.  When he arrived home with his sheep, the Cyclops had no desire for conversation.  Instead, he covered the cave opening with a stone too huge for even Odysseus to move and plucked up two of Odysseus' men and dined on them.  Then he went to sleep.  The next day "Goggle-eye" gobbled two more men.  Odysseus, never without a plan, stepped forward and offered the Cyclops the wine he had brought from the ship, a delicious nectar given to him by a priest of Apollo.  'Who are you?' Polyphemus demanded.  'I am Noman,' Odysseus replied.  When sleep overtook the Cyclops, Odysseus drove a sharpened pole into his eye.  (For this did Poseidon hold a grudge against Odysseus.)  At that he bellowed so loud that he comrades outside the cave heard him and asked what was going on.  'Noman is killing me,' to which they replied, 'Well, if no man is with you then you are alone.'  The Cyclops pushed away the stone and sat by the opening to catch anything that attempted to pass by.  When dawn came, the sheep padded out to pasture.  Odysseus tied sheep together in threes and one man to the underside of each trio.  He himself grabbed onto the largest ram and as they all went by, the Cyclops felt their backs and ascertained that none were men.


Next they came to the floating island of Aiolia, where Aiolos, a friend of the immortal gods, lived.  He bottled the winds in a bag which he gave Odysseus, leaving only the west wind free to speed them on their way home.  When they were within sight of Ithaca, Odysseus fell asleep.  His men, believing the bag held treasure to which they were entitled, opened it and unleashed the winds which drove them wildly back to Aiolia.  This situation convinced Aiolos that Odysseus and his men were enemies of the gods and he sent them away without any further help.


They sailed for seven days and came to the land of the midnight sun.  All of his ships but the one Odysseus himself sailed in anchored in the harbor.  But they were met with wickedness.  The men sent ashore were killed and eaten by the inhabitants and the ships moored in the harbor were smashed with rocks thrown by them.  Only Odysseus' ship escaped.


On the third day after that, they came to the island of Aiaia where lived Circe, daughter of Helios, the giver of light, and granddaughter of Oceanos.  She was a terrible goddess with lovely hair.  Odysseus sent twenty-three men, half of his crew, out to find someone to direct them toward their home.  They came upon Circe's house.  Outside it were wolves and lions, tame and wagging their tails.  Circe invited the men inside and fed them drugged cheese and wine.  When they had eaten, she tapped them with her wand and they became pigs, which she herded into a pen.  Only one was not changed for he suspected treachery and stayed outside.  He ran back to tell Odysseus the story.  Odysseus set off at once but on his way encountered Hermes, son of Zeus, who gave him a charm to protect him from the drugs and he advised him what to do when Circe tapped him with her wand.  He entered her house and she gave him the drugged wine and cheese.  When she touched him with her wand he drew his sword and rushed at her as if to kill her.  She shrieked, fell to the floor and embraced his knees, asking him who he was and begging him to lay with her.  He answered and complied but only after making her swear a solemn oath that she would free his men and do no further evil against them.  They stayed with her for a year and when pressed to let them go home, Circe told Odysseus that she will help him but first he must journey to Hades and speak to the soul of Teiresias the seer.


When they put ashore at the edge of the world, they made a sacrifice to the gods for All Souls.  Odysseus sat by the slaughtered animals and held all the souls back until he could talk to Teiresias.  Among those who came were the soul of his dead mother, who was still alive when he left Ithaca twenty years ago.  She told him his father still lived but was wasting away over the loss of his son.  Then Teiresias came forward and, after drinking some of the blood of the victims, told him that he would indeed return home to Ithaca but not without hardships.  He advised him the route he should take and the dangers that lay ahead.


They returned to Circe's island and provisioned the ship.  Then, after, Odysseus told his men all that Teiresias had foretold to him, they set off.  They passed the isle where the Sirens sang so sweetly that any man who heard them would never see home or family again.  Odysseus plugged the ears of his men with wax but he told them to tie him to the mast and if he ordered them to untie him, that they should tie him even tighter.  


Next they passed through the strait where Scylla, that six headed monster, guarded one side and Charybdis swallowed up ships and even the salt water itself on the other side.  Odysseus steered close to Scylla, knowing she would gobble up six of his men, but that being better than losing all to Charybdis.  Next came the island of Helios, where Teiresias strictly forbade Odysseus from harming even a single animal of any of the flocks or herds  that belonged to the sun god.  But the men demanded they land and fix a decent meal on shore.  Once they landed, however, the winds blew in the wrong direction and they had to stay there a month.  By the end of that time the food they had on board ran out and the wild game grew scarce and, while Odysseus slept, the men killed and ate some of Helios' cattle.  When he awoke he rued the day he landed, for Teiresias had told him if any of Helios' animals were harmed, his men would all die and Odysseus himself would return to Ithaca but only after much travail.  After six days of feasting, the winds changed and they set off once more.  But Zeus, Cloudgatherer, brought up a storm and smashed the ship and Odysseus drifted on a piece of his shattered craft for nine days before he came ashore on Calypso's island.


Odysseus held his listeners spellbound as he finished his tale.  None were unmoved.  The Phaiacians, known for their hospitality were also superior sailors.  Their ships had no rudders for they knew where to go by themselves, and they nearly flew through the water.  King Alcinoos once more toasted the great Odysseus and made ready for his departure.  They left at night and Odysseus fell asleep on deck.  


When he awoke he was on shore in his native land.  Beside him were the gifts the Phaiacians had given him.  Athena approached him as a young shepherd.  He greeted her and asked where he was (she had caused a mist to shroud the island's features).  As they spoke, he cunningly tried to conceal his identity but, of course, she was not fooled.  She stroked his cheek and smiled and became visible as her beautiful self.  Lifting the mist, he saw he was on his beloved island and here was his guardian, the goddess Pallas Athena.  She helped him hide his gifts and told him of the situation in his home.  They plotted together how to bring the pretenders to justice.  Then she changed him to an old beggar and told him to go first to his own swineherd, one of the few of his servants who remained faithful to him after these twenty years.  She herself would find his son, Telemachos, and bring him home.  Then the two of them could deal with the vicious and violent men that have besieged his home.


Odysseus found the swineherd, Eumaios, a man loyal to his master and to his master's son.  He deplored what was happening in the home of Odysseus and to his herds and his wife.  Athena found Telemachos with King Menelaos and put into his mind the desire to return home.  She also warned him of a plot by his mother's suitors to kill him and advised him how to avoid it.  And before he returned to his home, he should go the shack of the swineherd, Eumaios.  This he did and there met the stranger who was staying with swineherd.  Telemachos bid the swineherd go to his mother and tell her he was home and safe (for she also knew about the plot to kill him).  When father and son were alone in the hut, Athena walked up to the door.  She hid herself from Telemachos but Odysseus saw her and she motioned for him to come outside.  She told him to reveal himself to his son and to make plans for the destruction of the pretenders but to tell no other soul that he, Odysseus, had returned.  He walked back into the hut, his form now younger and stronger and Telemachos was amazed.  Was he a god?  No, he was his own father, come back to reclaim what was his.  Then they plotted to kill the marauders but he warned Telemachos to say nothing of his return to anyone, not even his mother.


The next day Telemachos went home to his mother and he told her of his adventures but that no none knew where his father was or even if he was still alive.  Then Eumaios arrived and the stranger followed.  Telemachos saw him and instructed that he be given a loaf of bread for beggars were always treated well in the house of Odysseus.  Penelopeia, the grieving but gracious hostess, instructed nurse Eurycleia, who had been both Telemachos' and Odysseus' nanny, to bathe the stranger and prepare a bed for him.  In doing so, Nanny noticed the scar on his leg, put there by a wild boar when he was not much older than Telemachos, and she knew her master.  He commanded her to hold her tongue and tell no one, not even her mistress.  Then Penelopeia came and questioned him herself, for he said he had news of Odysseus.  He told her he had fought side-by-side with Odysseus and that soon he would return.  Even now he was near his beloved Ithaca.  But she had been waiting for so many years that she couldn't believe it was true.  Philoitios, a drover, arrived with cattle for the merry-makers but it was plain to Odysseus that this man took no enjoyment in his part of their amusement.  


Penelopeia devised a contest, the prize being her hand in marriage.  Whoever could string the bow of Odysseus and shoot an arrow through the eye of twelve lined-up ax heads (an ax head had the shape of a "P") she would marry.  The bow was no ordinary bow, as nothing about Odysseus was ordinary.  It had been owned by a brawny man and given to him by the man's son.  None of the brave talkers stepped forward to try the bow so Telemachos started up.  He had no intention of wedding his mother but merely wished to goad the others on and to test his own manhood.  He tried three times and almost succeeded in stringing the bow but his father signaled to him and he desisted.  As others tried their hands, none with any success, Odysseus took the drover and swineherd outside and spoke to them.  He revealed himself to them and asked for their assistance in the upcoming melee.  Then they went back inside.  Telemachos, at Odysseus' request, had earlier spoken to Nanny, telling her to have all the women in their rooms and not to come out, no matter what they heard.


After all the suitors had failed to even put the string on the bow, the beggar, Odysseus, asked if he might have a try.  They all berated him but Penelopeia herself stepped in and upbraided them: 'it is not fair to deny any guest of Telemachos.'  So Odysseus lifted the bow and studied it as the bride-grooms studied him and mocked him.  He tested the balance and toyed with it and then, in a swift, clean motion he strung the bow, laid an arrow on it and let fly.  It cleared through every ax opening.  The mockers were dumbfounded.  Odysseus ripped off his rags and let the remaining arrows fly, not at axes, though, but at enemies.  Telemachos, who had earlier removed all of his father's armaments from the walls, brought up four sets for himself, his father, the swineherd and the drover.  The three donned the battle dress and, after Odysseus' arrows were exhausted, he did the same.  Athena came, in the form of Mentor to goad on the warriors.  Then she took the shape of a swallow and flew up in the rafters where she diverted the pretenders' spears from their targets.  When all was finished, bodies and gore were everywhere.  Only two were saved: Phemios Terpiades, the minstrel, and Medon, the marshal, who took no enjoyment in the actions of the violent braggarts.


Odysseus called for Nanny to bring down all the women who had disgraced themselves with these men and made them clean the hall.  They dragged the bodies out and stacked them by the fence.  They scraped up the gore from the floors, sponged down the furniture and fumigated the room with sulfur.  When all was cleaned up, Odysseus and the three hung the hussies by their necks in the yard.


Then Nanny went to Penelopeia's room and roused her.  She told him Odysseus had returned, he was downstairs even now and he had killed the ruffians.  She would not believe her, she had waited too long.  But Nanny persisted.  She had seen the scar on his leg.  She knew him right away.  She came down but still was cold.  They ate but she did not sit by him.  He bathed and Athena restored his youth and virility.  He did look like the husband of her youth.  Then she set a trap for him.  She told him she had his bed set outside where he might sleep on it.  He flew into a rage.  One of the bed posts was the trunk of an olive tree still rooted in the ground.  The other bed framing was attached to it.  To move the bed meant that the tree had to be uprooted.  He and she were the only ones that knew about this because he constructed the bed himself.  This brought her to tears and she flew into his arms.  They slept long that night: Athena saw to that.  She held Dawn on her golden throne and would not allow her to drive her golden team, Flasher and Flamer, across the sky until Athena thought Odysseus and Penelopeia had slept long enough.


Now when Hermes led the souls of Odysseus' carnage through the house of Hades, those already there stopped and asked what disaster could have caused such a procession.  One of them explained what had happened and then it was understood: "Happy Odysseus, always ready for any danger!"  


But in Ithaca, the families of the slain still had to be dealt with.  Odysseus went to see his father, Laertes, to assure him that he still lived and that the stain that had soiled his house had been cleansed.  His father kissed him and hugged him and after taking a bath, Athena increased his stature and filled out his flesh to make him look years younger.


In town, word was spreading of the demise of the sons and brothers at the avenging hand of Odysseus.  Many a father and brother stood and bewailed the iniquity that had befallen their loved ones.  In the midst of the haranguing, Medon and the minstrel happened along.  They told of the battle and how the gods were clearly assisting Odysseus.  Then an old man who alone saw forward and backward spoke.  He advised them that it was their own recklessness that brought on the tragedy.  Some cheered for his words but others sided with the grievers.  These took arms and headed toward the house of Odysseus.


Athena, looking down from Olympus, asked her father if he was to have more bloodshed but Zeus put it back to her saying that it was her plan that was in effect.  He would advise, however, that the two sides be brought to an amicable settlement.  This was her wish as well and off she flew to Ithaca.  


As the mob approached, Odysseus and the three, along with his father and his father's servants, armed themselves to meet them.  Odysseus let fly a spear from a long way off and split the head of the leader.  Then he and the rest attacked the front-most and killed them but Athena appeared as Mentor and called to them to stop and be appeased.  The mob dropped their weapons, turned and walked back to the town.  Odysseus took this as a sign of victory and began to fall upon them but Zeus hurled a thunderbolt at the feet of Mentor as a sign.  Then Mentor made peace between both parties and Odysseus and Penelopeia lived to a ripe old age together.


© Lester L. Noll

4-Oct-2001