Archilochos QUOTES

1 " Her breasts and her dark hair were perfume
and even an old man would desire her. "

2 " Passionate love relentlessly twists a chord
under my heart and spreads deep mist on my eyes,
stealing the unguarded brains from my head. "

― Archilochos

3 " Like the Mykonians, Perikles,
you drink our unmixed wine
and pay for nothing.
You broke into this party, uninvited,
and act as if among old friends.
Your stomach has tricked the brains in your skull
and now you are shameless. "

― Archilochos

4 " As the figtree on its rock feeds many crows,
so this simple girl sleeps with strangers. "

― Archilochos

5 " His penis is swollen
like a donkey from Priene
taking his fill of barley. "

― Archilochos

6 " Many of them, I hope, will be dried up
by the sharp rays of the sun in its zenith,
by the sun in the time of the Dog Star. "

― Archilochos

7 " My javelin is good white bread and Ismarian wine.
When I find rest on my javelin I drink wine. "

― Archilochos

8 " O father Zeus, you who control the cosmos,
and oversee the actions of man,
his criminal and lawful acts,
you also judge the arrogance and trial of wild beasts. "

― Archilochos

9 " Lady, you are much too old
to rub yourself with perfume. "

― Archilochos

10 " You have taken in many blind eels. "

― Archilochos

11 " She is a common woman for rent,
but what sensuality and fat ankles.
O fat whore for hire! "

― Archilochos

12 " Say goodbye to the island Paros,
farewell to its figs and the seafaring life. "

― Archilochos

13 " This wheatless island stands like a donkey's back.
It bristles with a tangle of wild woodland.
Oh,
there is no country so beautiful,
no sensual earth that keys my passion
as these plains around the river Siris. "

― Archilochos

14 " Let brawling waves beat his ship
against the shore, and have the mop-haired Thracians
take him naked at Salmydessos,
and he will suffer a thousand calamities
as he chews the bread of slaves.
His body will stiffen in freezing surf
as he wrestles with slimy seaweed,
and his teeth will rattle like a helpless dog,
flopped on his belly in the surge,
puking out the brine. Let me watch him grovel
in mud—for the wrong he did me:
as a traitor he trampled on our good faith,
he who was once my comrade. "

― Archilochos

15 " Go take your cup and walk along the timber deck
Of our roaming ship; drain the hollow casks
Of all their red wine. How can we stay sober
on the watch when all the rest are drunk? "

― Archilochos

16 " The gold booty of Gyges means nothing to me.
I don't envy that Lydian king, nor am I jealous
of what gods can do, nor of the tyrants' great
powers. All these are realms beyond my vision. "

― Archilochos

17 " My lord Apollo, single out the guilty ones,
and in your customary way, destroy them all. "

― Archilochos

18 " Look, Glaukos, how heavy seawaves leap skyward!
Over the Gyrai rocks hangs a black cloud,
a signal of winter storm.
From the unforseen comes fear. "

― Archilochos

19 " When dead no man finds respect or glory from men
of his town. Rather, we hope while alive for some
favor from the living. The dead are always scorned. "

― Archilochos

20 " I live here miserable and broken with desire,
pierced through to the bones by the bitterness
of this god-given painful love.

O comrade, this passion makes my limbs limp
and tramples over me. "

― Archilochos

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