The Argonautica

sitting there idly? No men dwell in the city,

but now the men live settled on the Thracian mainland

and plow the wheat-rich furrows. Every painful sorrow

I now recount in truth, that every man may know it.

Thoas my father ruled the city's gathered people;

then, setting out from their homeland, all our men

would often sack the steadings of Thracians dwelling opposite

from their ships, and bring home boundless spoils with maidens.

But Cypris, baneful goddess, brought her purpose onward,

and cast a soul-destroying delusion deep in every heart.

They came to hate their lawful wives; yielding to folly,

they drove each woman from the halls in reckless madness;

and shared their beds nightly with spear-won captive women,

cruel men. Long we endured, in hope that sometime

at last they might reform their minds; but every day the double

misfortune worsened; true-born children lost all honor

within the halls, while a dark illegitimate race arose.

Unmarried girls and widows suffered all alike,

mothers roamed through town, aimless, unkempt, and uncared for.

No father gave the slightest thought to his own daughter,

though fathers watched each daughter slaughtered before their eyes

at a reckless stepmother's hands; nor did children keep from mothers

shameful abuse, as once they used to ward it off;

nor sisters held one place within their brothers' hearts.