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84
HESIOD.
The vaulted sky, the mount Olympian flashed
With his continual presence, for he passed
Incessant forth, and scattered fires on fires.
Hurled from his hardy grasp the lightnings flew
Reiterated swift: the whirling flash
Cast sacred splendour, and the thunderbolt
Fell: roared around the nurture-yielding earth
In conflagration; for on every side
The immensity of forests crackling blazed:
Yea, the broad earth burned red, the streams that mix
With ocean and the deserts of the sea.
Round and around the Titan brood of earth
Rolled the hot vapour on its fiery surge.
The liquid heat air's pure expanse divine
Suffused: the radiance keen of quivering flame
That shot from writhen lightnings, each dim orb,
Strong though they were, intolerable smote,
And scorched their blasted vision: through the void
Of Erebus the preternatural glare
Spread mingling fire with darkness. But to see
With human eye and hear with the ear of man
Had been as if midway the spacious heaven
Hurtling with earth shocked—e'en as nether earth
Crashed from the centre, and the wreck of heaven
Fell ruinous from high. So vast the din
When, gods encountering gods, the clang of arms
Commingled, and the tumult roared from heaven."
—E. 908-939.
With his continual presence, for he passed
Incessant forth, and scattered fires on fires.
Hurled from his hardy grasp the lightnings flew
Reiterated swift: the whirling flash
Cast sacred splendour, and the thunderbolt
Fell: roared around the nurture-yielding earth
In conflagration; for on every side
The immensity of forests crackling blazed:
Yea, the broad earth burned red, the streams that mix
With ocean and the deserts of the sea.
Round and around the Titan brood of earth
Rolled the hot vapour on its fiery surge.
The liquid heat air's pure expanse divine
Suffused: the radiance keen of quivering flame
That shot from writhen lightnings, each dim orb,
Strong though they were, intolerable smote,
And scorched their blasted vision: through the void
Of Erebus the preternatural glare
Spread mingling fire with darkness. But to see
With human eye and hear with the ear of man
Had been as if midway the spacious heaven
Hurtling with earth shocked—e'en as nether earth
Crashed from the centre, and the wreck of heaven
Fell ruinous from high. So vast the din
When, gods encountering gods, the clang of arms
Commingled, and the tumult roared from heaven."
—E. 908-939.
To heighten the turmoil, the winds and elements fight on the side of Zeus. The tide of battle turns. Jove's huge auxiliaries overwhelm the Titans with a succession of great missiles, send them sheer beneath the earth, and consign them to a durance "as far beneath, under earth, as heaven is from earth, for equal is the
