Page:The Remains of Hesiod the Ascraean, including the Shield of Hercules - Elton (1815).djvu/10

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iv
PREFACE.

its existence. Some specimens of a work equally curi- ous fioni its rareness, and interesting as an example of our ancient poetry, are appended to this translation. Parnell lias iriven a sprightly imitation of the Pan- dora, under the title of " Hesiod, or the Rise of Woman : " and Broome, the coadjutor of Pope in the Odyssey, has paraphrased the battle of the Titans and the Tartarus.'* The translation by Thomas Cooke omits the splendid heroical fragment of " Tlie Shield," which I have restored to its leeitimate con- nexion. It was first published in 1728; reprinted in 1740; and has been inserted in the collections of Anderson and Chalmers.

' This translator obtained from his contemporaries the name of " Hesiod Cooke." He was thouffht a good Grecian ; and translated against Pope the episode of Thersites, in the Iliad, with some success; which procured him a place in the Dunciad :

Be thine, my stationer, this magic gift, Cooke shall be Prior, and Concanen Swift :

and a passage in " The Epistle to Dr. Arbuthnot "

  • A blank-verse translation of the Battle of the Titans may

be found in Bryant's " Analysis : " and one of the descriptive part of "The Shield" in the "Exeter Essays." Isaac Ritson translated the Theogony ; but the work has remained in MS.