Diotimos Library · Greek Antiquity Collection · Bilingual Edition
The Argonautica
Ancient Greek with an independent metrical English translation
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English Page · Branch 198 of 245
Book IV · Lines 651–674
Ancient Greek
p. 406The Argonautica: Book IV
p. 407of Zeus; therefore altars and sacred rites have been established
forever. Their aid attended not that voyage alone;
Zeus entrusted future sailors' ships to their protection.
Leaving the Stoechades once more, they crossed to Aethalia,
the island where, after exertion, they scraped away with pebbles
their sweat; the stones lie scattered thickly down the beach
the color of skin, with their quoits and wondrous tattered garments;
and there a harbor is reported bearing Argo's name.
Swiftly from there they sailed onward through the swell of the sea,
keeping the Tyrrhenian shores of Ausonia steadily in view.
They reached Aeaea's renowned harbor, and out from the vessel
cast cables by the beach; there they encountered Circe
bathing her head in brine's bright, glistening waters;
Night dreams had filled her deepest heart with fear.
Her chambers, every palace court, seemed weeping blood;
a massed flame devoured all her magic drugs,
drugs that enchanted every stranger entering her halls;
She quenched the glowing blaze herself in murderous blood
scooped in her hands; then all her deadly terror ceased.
At morning's coming, wet with briny ocean water
she woke and kept washing clean both her tresses and garments.
Beasts came with her, though not like the flesh-eating creatures
nor yet resembling men in their bodies, but each was compounded
mixed limb with limb; in throngs they came, like sheep
Socrates
Reading The Argonautica · Book IV · Lines 651–674
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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