Diotimos Library · Greek Antiquity Collection · Bilingual Edition
The Argonautica
Ancient Greek with an independent metrical English translation
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English Page · Branch 170 of 245
Book III · Lines 1394–1407
Ancient Greek
p. 348The Argonautica: Book III
p. 349some lay supine; some sprawled across their arms and sides,
their bodies looked in form like monstrous creatures of the sea.
And many were wounded, never lifting one foot from earth,
and as far as their bodies thrust up into open air,
that far their heavy, flaccid heads bent them earthward.
So, I suppose, saplings droop beneath Zeus's endless rain,
newly nourished in the nursery, bowing low to earth,
snapped from the root, the hard-won labor of orchard-keeping men;
then dark dejection and destroying grief come down upon
the plot's plant-tending master; so that day King Aeetes
felt heavy sorrows settle deep within his heart.
He turned and went back to the city, mixed among the Colchians,
brooding darkly how to thwart the heroes with all speed.
Daylight died away; Jason's ordeal stood accomplished.
Socrates
Reading The Argonautica · Book III · Lines 1394–1407
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Socrates will begin with this book and its sources.About This Reading Edition
Apollonius’s Argonautica follows Jason and the Argonauts from their gathering at Pagasae through the voyage to Colchis and the difficult return home. This exact line-for-line edition pairs the Ancient Greek poem with an independent metrical English translation prepared by Diotimos Editions, preserving one English verse for every Greek reading line across all four books.
Historical Text and Translation
The Greek reading text follows the Perseus transcription derived from George W. Mooney’s 1912 edition, pinned to a stable canonical-greekLit commit. Mooney and LSJ provide the principal controls for Books I–III; Peter Hulse’s Dickinson commentary directly supports Book IV. Deleted records and canonical numbering gaps remain documented rather than being silently repaired. The supplied release identifies itself as a complete source-audited working edition and recommends independent classicist review before print publication.
About Diotimos Editions
Diotimos Editions prepared this independent translation directly from the Greek. Its six-beat English house form preserves the poem’s source order, imagery, learned names, narrative delays, shifts of register, and line-by-line correspondence while allowing syntax to move across adjacent verses where the Greek requires it.
Rights
Apollonius’s ancient Greek source work is in the public domain. The 2026 English translation and Diotimos editorial matter are original to this edition and remain © 2026 Diotimos. The pinned Perseus Greek transcription is reused under CC BY-SA 4.0.
- public-domain-base-witnessPinned Perseus Greek transcription — canonical-greekLit
- print-control-and-commentaryGeorge W. Mooney’s 1912 Argonautica — Internet Archive
- book-four-commentaryApollonius Argonautica, Book IV — Dickinson College Commentaries
- lexical-controlLiddell–Scott–Jones Greek-English Lexicon — Scaife ATLAS
- greek-transcription-licenseCreative Commons Attribution-ShareAlike 4.0