Aeneid V.424-518
NOT CLICKBAIT: You'll NEVER Believe What This Boxer Does With His Prize Bull 😱!
Then our ancestor, Anchises’s son, lifts up a like pair of gloves,
and protects the hands of both contestants equally.
Immediately each takes up his stance, poised on his toes,
and fearlessly raises his arms high in front of him.
Keeping their heads up and well away from the blows
they begin to spar, fist to fist, and provoke a battle,
the one better at moving his feet, relying on his youth,
the other powerful in limbs and bulk; but his slower legs quiver,
his knees are unsteady, and painful gasps shake his huge body.
They throw many hard punches at each other but in vain,
they land many on their curved flanks, or their chests
are thumped loudly, gloves often stray to ears
and brows, and jaws rattle under the harsh blows.
Entellus stands solidly, not moving, in the same stance,
avoiding the blows with his watchful eyes and body alone.
Dares, like someone who lays siege to a towering city
or surrounds a mountain fortress with weapons,
tries this opening and that, seeking everywhere, with his art,
and presses hard with varied but useless assaults.
Then Entellus, standing up to him, extends his raised right:
the other, foreseeing the downward angle of the imminent blow,
slides his nimble body aside, and retreats;
Entellus wastes his effort on the air and the heavy man
falls to the ground heavily, with his whole weight,
as a hollow pine-tree, torn up by its roots, sometimes falls
on Mount Erymanthus or mighty Mount Ida.
The Trojans and the Sicilian youths leap up eagerly;
a shout lifts to the sky, and Acestes is the first to run forward
and with sympathy raises his old friend from the ground.
But that hero, not slowed or deterred by his fall,
returns more eagerly to the fight and generates power from anger.
Then shame and knowledge of his own ability revive his strength,
and he drives Dares in fury headlong across the whole arena,
doubling his punches now, to right and left. No pause, or rest:
like the storm clouds rattling their dense hailstones on the roof,
as heavy are the blows from either hand as the hero
continually batters at Dares and destroys him.
Then Aeneas, their leader, would not allow the wrath to continue
longer, nor Entellus to rage with such bitterness of spirit,
but put an end to the contest and rescued the weary Dares,
speaking gently to him with these words:
“Unlucky man, why let such savagery depress your spirits?
Don’t you see another has the power: the gods have changed sides?
Yield to the gods.” He spoke and, speaking, broke up the fight.
But Dare’s loyal friends led him away to the ships,
his weakened knees collapsing, his head swaying from side to side,
spitting out clots of blood from his mouth, teeth amongst them.
Called back they accept the helmet and sword,
leaving the winner’s palm and the bullock for Entellus.
At this the victor, exultant in spirit and glorying in the bullock,
said: “Son of the Goddess, and all you Trojans,
know now what physical strength I had in my youth,
and from what fate you’ve recalled and rescued Dares.”
He spoke and planted himself opposite the bullock,
still standing there as prize for the bout, then, drawing back
his right fist, aimed the hard glove between the horns
and broke its skull, scattering the brains: the ox
fell quivering to the ground, stretched out lifeless.
Standing over it he poured these words from his chest:
“Eryx, I offer you this, the better animal, for Dares’s life:
the winner here, I relinquish the gloves and my art.”
Immediately Aeneas invites together all who might wish
to compete with their swift arrows, and sets out the prizes.
With a large company he raises a mast from Serestus’s ship,
and ties a fluttering dove, at which they can aim
their shafts, to a cord piercing the high mast.1
The men gather and a bronze helmet receives the lots
tossed into it: the first of them all to be drawn,
to cheers of support, is Hippocoon son of Hyrtaces,
followed by Mnestheus, the winner of the boat race
a while ago, Mnestheus crowned with green olive.
Eurytion’s the third, your brother, O famous Pandarus,
who, ordered to wreck the treaty, in the past,
was the first to hurl his spear amongst the Greeks.
Acestes is the last name out from the depths of the helmet,
daring to try his own hand at the youthful contest.
Then they take arrows from their quivers, and, each man
for himself, with vigorous strength, bends the bow into an arc,
and first through the air from the twanging string
the son of Hyrcanus’s shaft, cutting the swift breeze,
reaches the mark and strikes deep into the mast.
The mast quivered, the bird fluttered its wings in fear,
and there was loud applause from all sides.
Then Mnestheus eagerly took his stand with bent bow,
aiming high, his arrow notched level with his eyes.
But to his dismay he was not able to hit the bird
herself with the shaft, but broke the knots of hemp cord
that tied her foot as it hung from the mast:
she fled to the north wind and the dark clouds, in flight.
Then Eurytion who had been holding his bow ready, with drawn
arrow for some time, called on his brother to note his vow,
quickly eyed the dove, enjoying the freedom of the skies,
and transfixed her, as she beat her wings beneath a dark cloud.
She dropped lifeless, leaving her spirit with the starry heavens,
and, falling, brought back to earth the shaft that pierced her.
tum satus Anchisa caestus pater extulit aequos
et paribus palmas amborum innexuit armis. 425
constitit in digitos extemplo arrectus uterque
bracchiaque ad superas interritus extulit auras.
abduxere retro longe capita ardua ab ictu
immiscentque manus manibus pugnamque lacessunt,
ille pedum melior motu fretusque iuventa, 430
hic membris et mole valens; sed tarda trementi
genua labant, vastos quatit aeger anhelitus artus.
multa viri nequiquam inter se vulnera iactant,
multa cavo lateri ingeminant et pectore vastos
dant sonitus, erratque auris et tempora circum 435
crebra manus, duro crepitant sub vulnere malae.
stat gravis Entellus nisuque immotus eodem
corpore tela modo atque oculis vigilantibus exit.
ille, velut celsam oppugnat qui molibus urbem
aut montana sedet circum castella sub armis, 440
nunc hos, nunc illos aditus, omnemque pererrat
arte locum et variis adsultibus inritus urget.
ostendit dextram insurgens Entellus et alte
extulit, ille ictum venientem a vertice velox
praevidit celerique elapsus corpore cessit; 445
Entellus viris in ventum effudit et ultro
ipse gravis graviterque ad terram pondere vasto
concidit, ut quondam cava concidit aut Erymantho
aut Ida in magna radicibus eruta pinus.
consurgunt studiis Teucri et Trinacria pubes; 450
it clamor caelo primusque accurrit Acestes
aequaevumque ab humo miserans attollit amicum.
at non tardatus casu neque territus heros
acrior ad pugnam redit ac vim suscitat ira.
tum pudor incendit viris et conscia virtus, 455
praecipitemque Daren ardens agit aequore toto
nunc dextra ingeminans ictus, nunc ille sinistra.
nec mora nec requies: quam multa grandine nimbi
culminibus crepitant, sic densis ictibus heros
creber utraque manu pulsat versatque Dareta. 460
Tum pater Aeneas procedere longius iras
et saevire animis Entellum haud passus acerbis,
sed finem imposuit pugnae fessumque Dareta
eripuit mulcens dictis ac talia fatur:
'infelix, quae tanta animum dementia cepit? 465
non viris alias conversaque numina sentis?
cede deo.' dixitque et proelia voce diremit.
ast illum fidi aequales genua aegra trahentem
iactantemque utroque caput crassumque cruorem
ore eiectantem mixtosque in sanguine dentes 470
ducunt ad navis; galeamque ensemque vocati
accipiunt, palmam Entello taurumque relinquunt.
hic victor superans animis tauroque superbus
'nate dea, vosque haec' inquit 'cognoscite, Teucri,
et mihi quae fuerint iuvenali in corpore vires 475
et qua servetis revocatum a morte Dareta.'
dixit, et adversi contra stetit ora iuvenci
qui donum astabat pugnae, durosque reducta
libravit dextra media inter cornua caestus
arduus, effractoque inlisit in ossa cerebro: 480
sternitur exanimisque tremens procumbit humi bos.
ille super talis effundit pectore voces:
'hanc tibi, Eryx, meliorem animam pro morte Daretis
persolvo; hic victor caestus artemque repono.'
Protinus Aeneas celeri certare sagitta 485
invitat qui forte velint et praemia dicit,
ingentique manu malum de nave Seresti
erigit et volucrem traiecto in fune columbam,
quo tendant ferrum, malo suspendit ab alto.
convenere viri deiectamque aerea sortem 490
accepit galea, et primus clamore secundo
Hyrtacidae ante omnis exit locus Hippocoontis;
quem modo navali Mnestheus certamine victor
consequitur, viridi Mnestheus evinctus oliva.
tertius Eurytion, tuus, o clarissime, frater, 495
Pandare, qui quondam iussus confundere foedus
in medios telum torsisti primus Achiuos.
extremus galeaque ima subsedit Acestes,
ausus et ipse manu iuvenum temptare laborem.
tum validis flexos incurvant viribus arcus 500
pro se quisque viri et depromunt tela pharetris,
primaque per caelum nervo stridente sagitta
Hyrtacidae iuvenis volucris diverberat auras,
et venit adversique infigitur arbore mali.
intremuit malus micuitque exterrita pennis 505
ales, et ingenti sonuerunt omnia plausu.
post acer Mnestheus adducto constitit arcu
alta petens, pariterque oculos telumque tetendit.
ast ipsam miserandus auem contingere ferro
non valuit; nodos et vincula linea rupit 510
quis innexa pedem malo pendebat ab alto;
illa Notos atque atra volans in nubila fugit.
tum rapidus, iamdudum arcu contenta parato
tela tenens, fratrem Eurytion in vota vocavit,
iam vacuo laetam caelo speculatus et alis 515
plaudentem nigra figit sub nube columbam.
decidit exanimis vitamque reliquit in astris
aetheriis fixamque refert delapsa sagittam.
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