Page:Iliad Buckley.djvu/133

 

BOOK THE SEVENTH.

 

ARGUMENT.

Hector challenges the bravest of the Greeks to single combat, and nine of the chiefs having cast lots, Ajax is appointed to meet him. Having protracted the contest till night, the combatants exchange gifts, and separate. A truce is then made for the purpose of burying the dead, and the Greeks fortify their camp.

Thus having said, illustrious Hector rushed forth from the gates, and with him went his brother Alexander, for both were eager in soul to wage war and to fight. As when the deity has given a prosperous wind to expecting mariners, after they have become weary, agitating the deep with well-polished oars, and their limbs are relaxed with toil; thus then did those two appear to the expecting Trojans. Then they slew, the one,^[1] indeed, Menesthius, son of king Areithoüs, who dwelt in Arne, whom the club-bearer Areithoüs and large-eyed Philomedusa brought forth; but Hector smote Eïoneus with his sharp spear upon the neck, under his well-wrought brazen helmet,^[2] and relaxed his limbs. And Glaucus, son of Hippolochus, leader of the Lycian heroes, in fierce engagement smote Iphinous, son of Dexias, upon the shoulder with his spear, as he vaulted on his swift mares.

1. i. e., Paris. The construction is an instance of the σχῆμα καθ' ὅλον καὶ μέρος. See Jelf, Gk. Gr. § 478, and my note on Æsch. Prom. p. 8.
2. Apollonius, Lex. p. 734, seems to regard the στεφάνη as a distinct kind of helmet, or cap. So, also, the Schol. and Hesych. t. ii. p. 186, and p. 1266. Others understand the rim of the helmet. Paschal. de Coronis, i. 2: "Eam galeæ partem quam Hesychius dicit habere ἐξοχὰς, id quod in galea eminentissimum est. Et vero apud Plutarchum distinguitur τὸ κράνος galea ἀπὸ τῆς στεφάνης, ab ejus parte quæ est in ipsius summitate."