Jason and the Argonauts (14 page)

Lately, with Heracles gone far away,

haughty Amycus and his subject soldiers

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had started cheating me, for years now chipping

such large tracts from my realm that they have pushed

their kingdom's borders to the grass that lines

the deeply flowing Hypius River.

Now, though,

they have received their punishment from you,

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and I suspect the gods were there supporting

Tyndareus' son the day he beat

Amycus and defeated all his henchman

in battle. Therefore I shall gladly give you

whatever help I can, since this is simply

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what weaker men should do when stronger men

have done a good turn first. And I shall order

Dascylus my son to join your quest.

With him among you, you should find the natives

you meet along the way hospitable

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as far off as the river Thermodon.

Furthermore, I shall build a lofty temple

atop the Acherousian heights to honor

Tyndareus' sons, and every sailor

who sees their shrine, even from far away,

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will ask their aid. Once I have built the temple,

I shall consecrate, outside the city,

some fertile acres in our well-tilled plains

to yield them honor as if they were gods.”

All day the heroes took delight in feasting,

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then bustled back down to the ship. King Lycus

gathered his train to follow them and gave them

numberless gifts. What's more, he sent his son

to make the quest among them.

It was then

that
Idmon son of Abas reached his destined

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demise. Though he excelled at seercraft,

his seercraft did not protect him, no,

necessity was pushing him toward doom.

There was a meadow near a reedy river.

A white-tusked boar was lounging in it, cooling

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its flanks and massive belly in the mud—

a lethal beast. Even the marsh nymphs feared it

feeding alone along the river flats.

No mortal knew that it was there.

When Idmon

was strolling on the muddy riverbank,

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it rushed out of some purlieu in the willows,

gored his thigh, cut through cartilage and femur.

Idmon shrieked and fell. His friends called out,

and Peleus quickly loosed a spear and struck

the monster as it fled into the swamp.

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When it returned and charged them, Idas pierced it,

and it collapsed upon the sharp tip, squealing.

Leaving it thus impaled, they trundled Idmon

back to the
Argo
where he coughed up blood

and shortly died in his inconsolable

comrades' arms.

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They thought no more of sailing

but stayed there, grieving, to entomb the body.

Three days they wailed and on the fourth interred him

with hero's honors. Lycus and his subjects

joined in the mourning, slaughtered many sheep

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as funeral offerings around the tomb,

as is the custom for the dear departed.

So in a foreign country Idmon's barrow

was heaped up, and a marker planted on it

for future generations to admire—

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a wild olive tree, the tree of shipwrights,

a tree that still is flourishing today

under the Acherousian cliffs.

Because

I heed the Muses' will, I must declare,

upfront, this fact as well: Phoebus Apollo

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commanded the Boeotians and Niseans

to worship Idmon as a city founder

and build a town around his barrow tree.

Today, though, all the Mariandynians there

venerate Agamestor rather than

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god-fearing Idmon, Aeolus' grandson.

Who else died there? (The heroes surely raised

a second barrow for a fallen comrade

because two mounds are standing to this day.)

Tiphys it was, the son of Hagnias—

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so runs the story. It was not his fate

to steer the
Argo
farther toward its goal.

Once they had buried Idmon, a malignant

disease afflicted Tiphys, left him prostrate

and bedrid far, far, from his fatherland.

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Struck by these dreadful blows, the men gave way

to absolute despair. Once they had buried

this second fallen comrade,
they collapsed

beside the sea in utter helplessness,

shrouded their bodies tightly in their cloaks,

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and lost all love of food and drink. Grief-stricken,

they threw their hearts away because returning

to Greece was now outside their expectations.

They would have stayed there, grieving, even longer

had Hera not stepped in and filled Ancaeus

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with special bravery. Astypylaia

conceived him underneath the god Poseidon

and birthed him next to the Imbrasus River,

and he was wise in all the ways of seacraft.

This fellow rushed to Peleus and said:

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“Son of Aeacus, how can it be noble

to rest a long time in a foreign land,

shirking our task? Surely the son of Aeson

recruited me out of Parthenia

to undertake this journey for the fleece

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more for my expertise in steering ships

than making war. Therefore, don't have the slightest

fear for the
Argo
. There are expert sailors

among us, none of whom would wreck the voyage

if we should set him at the helm. Go swiftly,

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tell our comrades all these things, be firm,

force them to think again about the quest.”

So he explained, and Peleus' spirit

leapt with delight, and he was quick to shout:

“Why, comrades, are we clinging to a sorrow

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as profitless as this? These two have died,

I think, the death they were allotted. Think, now,

there are other steersmen in our crew,

a number of them, so stop wasting time,

cast off your woes and rouse yourselves for labor.”

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Jason had nothing but despair to offer:

“Son of Aeacus, where are all these helmsmen?

Those we regarded as our guides and experts

are lying there more dead to hope than I am.

Thus I foresee an evil ending for us

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beside our fallen friends if we can neither

reach the city of extreme Aeëtes

nor pass beyond the Rocks again and back

to Greece. An evil fate, one without glory,

will hide us here to age in idleness.”

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So he lamented, but Ancaeus promptly

offered himself as helmsman of the
Argo
.

A god's encouragement had urged him on.

Next, Nauplius, Erginus, and Euphemus

stood up in eagerness to man the tiller,

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but others held them back because Ancaeus

was favored by the bulk of the assembly.

Therefore at sunrise, after twelve days mourning,

they boarded, since a stiff west wind was blowing.

Quickly they rowed out through the Acheron,

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then trusted in the wind, unfurled the canvas,

and, with the sail spread taut, went coasting onward,

cleaving their way in favorable weather.

Soon they passed the mouth of Callichorus,

“River of Gorgeous Dancing.”

It was here,

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they say, that
the Nysaean son of Zeus,

after departing from the Indic tribes

and settling at Thebes, initiated

secret rites and set up choral dances

before the cave where he had once spent mirthless,

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unearthly nights. Ever since then the locals

have called the nearby river “Gorgeous Dancing”

and the cave “The Hostel.”

Next they sighted

the tomb of Sthenelus the son of Aktor.

While he was marching homeward after waging

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glorious war upon the Amazons

(he had gone there with Heracles), an arrow

struck him and laid him dead upon the beach.

The heroes sailed no farther for a time

because Persephone herself had sent up

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Sthenelus' shade. With tears and wailing

the ghost had begged her, please, please, let him see,

just for a little, soldiers like himself.

Watching them from the barrow's crest, he seemed

such as he was when first he went to war—

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a four-billed, formidable helmet gleaming

upon his head, its crest a deep dark red.

Then he descended back into the gloom.

The heroes marveled at the vision. Mopsus

son of Ampycus saw it as a sign

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and urged the men to beach the ship and honor

the hero with libations.

So they furled

the sail, ran the hawsers to the beach,

and paid homage to Sthenelus' tomb

by pouring offerings and sacrificing

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sheep to his shade. They also raised, nearby,

an altar to Apollo Ship-Preserver

and burned thigh pieces on it. Orpheus

enshrined a lyre there as well—that's why

the spot is known as Lyra to this day.

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Then, since the wind was calling, they embarked,

unfurled the sail, and used the sheets to pull it

taut, and the
Argo
coasted out to sea

with bellied canvas, as on lofted wings

a hawk goes coasting swiftly through the air,

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its pennons poised and level. Like a hawk, then,

the
Argo
passed the seaward-flowing stream

Parthenius, a very gentle river.

Artemis often stops there after hunting

and bathes her body in its soothing waters

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before she joins the gods upon Olympus.

They coasted without pausing all night long,

skirting Seisamus, rugged Erythini,

Cromna, Crobialus, tree-lined Cytorus.

Just as the sun first cast its beams they rounded

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Carambis and were pushing past the Long Shore

the whole day through, the whole night under oar,

until they beached on the Assyrian coast.

Here Zeus himself had settled Sinopa

the daughter of Asopus and allowed her

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lasting virginity, but only after

she hoodwinked him with his own lover's oaths.

When he was aching for her love, he promised

to give her anything her heart desired,

and, clever girl, she asked for maidenhood.

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When Phoebus tried in turn to lie with her,

she tricked him in the same way, then deceived

Halys the River God as well. What's more,

no mortal ever stole her innocence

with vehement caresses.

On this coast

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three sons of brave Deimarchus the Triccean—

Deileon, Phlogius, and Autolycus—

had camped out ever since they lost
their comrade

Heracles. As soon as they discerned

the party of heroic men, they ran

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to meet them and explain their destitution.

They did not desire to be marooned there

forever, so they climbed aboard, and soon

a stiff nor'wester started blowing.

So,

with new recruits, the heroes took to sea

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before the eager gale and coasted past

the Halys River, then the nearby Iris,

then the sandy delta of Assyria.

That day they also rounded, at a distance,

the cape that guards the Amazonian harbor

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where the hero Heracles once ambushed

Melanippa daughter of the war god

when she went traveling abroad. Her sister

Hippolyta was quick to pay the ransom,

and he returned her safe and sound.

Because

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the sea had turned too turbulent for travel,

the heroes anchored at the harbor where

the Thermodon goes down into the sea.

There is no river like the Thermodon,

none that divides into as many branches.

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Reckon them up, the tally would be only

four shy of a hundred. But the true

headwater is a single stream that tumbles

down mountains called the “Amazonian Heights”

onto a lowland where it multiplies,

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its rills meandering this way, that way,

one near, one far, each seeking lower ground.

Most of them dissipate anonymously,

but several merge to form the Thermodon,

which hurls itself, a vaulted span of froth,

into the Hostile Sea.

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The men might well

have lingered for a time there, making war

upon the Amazons, and they would surely

have suffered losses if they had because

the Amazons in the Doean plain

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were not at all docile and civilized.

Savage aggression and the works of Ares

were all their care. In fact, they claimed descent

from Ares and the nymph Harmonia.

She bedded down beside him in a dale

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in the Acmonian woods and bore him daughters

that dote on war.