The Birds

truly our own.”93 Epops Come now, what must be done? Pisthetaerus First give our city a great and famous name, then sacrifice to the gods. Euelpides I think so too. Epops Let’s see. What shall our city be called? Pisthetaerus Will you have a high-sounding Laconian name? Shall we call it Sparta? Euelpides What! call my town Sparta? Why, I would not use esparto for my bed,94 even though I had nothing but bands of rushes. Pisthetaerus Well then, what name can you suggest? Euelpides Some name borrowed from the clouds, from these lofty regions in which we dwell⁠—in short, some well-known name. Pisthetaerus Do you like Nephelococcygia?95 Epops Oh! capital! truly ’tis a brilliant thought! Euelpides Is it in Nephelococcygia that all the wealth of Theovenes96 and most of Aeschines’97 is? Pisthetaerus No, ’tis rather the plain of Phlegra,98 where the gods withered the pride of the sons of the Earth with their shafts. Euelpides Oh! what a splendid city! But what god shall be its patron? for whom shall we weave the peplus?99 Pisthetaerus Why not choose Athene Polias?100 Euelpides Oh! what a well-ordered town ’twould be to have a female deity armed from head to foot, while Clisthenes101 was spinning! Pisthetaerus Who then shall guard the Pelargicon?102 Epops One of us, a bird of Persian strain, who is everywhere proclaimed to be the bravest of all, a true chick of Ares.103 Euelpides Oh! noble chick! What a well-chosen god for a rocky home! Pisthetaerus Come! into the air with you to help the workers who are building the wall; carry up rubble, strip yourself to mix the mortar, take up the hod, tumble down the ladder, an you like, post sentinels, keep the fire smouldering beneath the ashes, go round the walls, bell in hand,104 and go to sleep up there yourself; then despatch two heralds, one to the gods above, the other to mankind on earth and come back here. Euelpides As for yourself, remain here, and may the plague take you for a troublesome fellow! Pisthetaerus Go, friend, go where I send you, for without you my orders cannot be obeyed. For myself, I want to sacrifice to the new god, and I am going to summon the priest who must preside at the ceremony. Slaves! slaves! bring forward the basket and the lustral water. Chorus I do as you do, and I wish as you wish, and I implore you to address powerful and solemn prayers to the gods, and in addition to immolate a sheep as a token of our gratitude. Let us sing the Pythian chant in honour of the god, and let Chaeris accompany our voices. Pisthetaerus To the flute-player. Enough! but, by Heracles! what is this? Great gods! I have seen many prodigious things, but I never saw a muzzled raven.105 Epops Priest! ’tis high time! Sacrifice to the new gods. Priest I begin, but where is he with the basket? Pray to the Vesta of the birds, to the kite, who presides over the hearth, and to all the god and goddess-birds who dwell in Olympus. Chorus Oh! Hawk, the sacred guardian of Sunium, oh, god of the storks! Priest Pray to the swan of Delos, to Latona the mother of the quails, and to Artemis, the goldfinch. Pisthetaerus ’Tis no longer Artemis Colaenis, but Artemis the goldfinch.106 Priest And to Bacchus, the finch and Cybele, the ostrich and mother of the gods and mankind. Chorus Oh! sovereign ostrich, Cybele, the mother of Cleocritus,107 grant health and safety to the Nephelococcygians as well as to the dwellers in Chios⁠ ⁠… Pisthetaerus The dwellers in Chios! Ah! I am delighted they should be thus mentioned on all occasions.108 Chorus … to the heroes, the birds, to the sons of heroes, to the porphyrion, the pelican, the spoonbill, the redbreast, the grouse, the peacock, the horned-owl, the teal, the bittern, the heron, the stormy petrel, the fig-pecker, the titmouse⁠ ⁠… Pisthetaerus Stop! stop! you drive me crazy with your endless list. Why, wretch, to what sacred feast are you inviting the vultures and the sea-eagles? Don’t you see that a single kite could easily carry off the lot at once? Begone, you and your fillets and all; I shall know how to complete the sacrifice by myself. Priest It is imperative that I sing another sacred chant for the rite of the lustral water, and that I invoke the immortals, or at least one of them, provided always that you have some suitable food to offer him; from what I see here, in the shape of gifts, there is naught whatever but horn and hair. Pisthetaerus Let us address our sacrifices and our prayers to the winged gods. A poet Oh, Muse! celebrate happy Nephelococcygia in your hymns. Pisthetaerus What have we here? Where did you come from, tell me? Who are you? Poet I am he whose language is sweeter than honey, the zealous slave of the Muses, as Homer has it. Pisthetaerus You a slave! and yet you wear your hair long? Poet No, but the fact is all we poets are the assiduous slaves of the Muses, according to Homer. Pisthetaerus In truth your little cloak is quite holy too through zeal! But, poet, what ill wind drove you here? Poet I have composed verses in honour of your Nephelococcygia, a host of splendid dithyrambs and parthenians109 worthy of Simonides himself. Pisthetaerus And when did you compose them? How long since? Poet Oh! ’tis long, aye, very long, that I have sung in honour of this city. Pisthetaerus But I am only celebrating its foundation with this sacrifice;110 I have only just named it, as is done with little babies. Poet “Just as the chargers fly with the speed of the wind, so does the voice of the Muses take its flight. Oh! thou noble founder of the town of Aetna,111 thou, whose name recalls the holy sacrifices,