Authors: Virgil
He wept. We spared him and and even began to pity him.
Priam spoke first and ordered him to be freed from the manacles
and the ropes that tied him, and spoke these friendly words:
‘Whoever you are, from this moment on forget the Greeks
whom you have lost. You will be one of us. But now give full
150 and truthful answers to the questions I ask you: why have they
set up this huge monster of a horse? Who proposed it? What is
the purpose of it? Does it have some supernatural power? Is it
an engine of war?’
Sinon was ready with all his Greek arts and stratagems.
Raising to the skies the hands we had just freed from their
shackles, he cried: ‘I call upon you, eternal fires of heaven and
your inviolable godhead. I call upon the altars and the impious
swords from which I have escaped. I call upon the sacred ribbons
which I wore as sacrificial victim. It is no sin for me to break my
sacred oaths of allegiance to the Greeks. It is no sin for me to
hate these men and bring all their secrets out into the open. I
160 am no longer subject to the laws of my people. Only you must
stand by your promises. If I keep Troy safe, Troy must keep its
word and save me, if what I say is true, and what I offer is a full
and fair exchange.
‘All the hopes and confidence of the Greeks in this war they
started have always depended upon the help of Pallas Athene.
But ever since the impious Diomede and Ulixes, the schemer
behind all their crimes, took it upon themselves to tear the
fateful Palladium, the image of the goddess, from her own sacred
temple in Troy, ever since they slew the guards on the heights
of the citadel and dared to touch the sacred bands on the head
of the virgin goddess with blood on their hands, from that
170 moment their hopes turned to water and ebbed away from them,
their strength was broken and the mind of the goddess was set
against them. Tritonian Pallas gave clear signs of this by sending
portents that could not be doubted. No sooner had they laid
down the image in the Greek camp, than its eyes glared and
flashed fire, the salt sweat streamed over its limbs and by some
miracle the image of the goddess leapt three times from the
ground with her shield and spear quivering. Calchas declared
that they had to take to instant flight across the sea, and prophesied
that Troy could not be sacked by Argive weapons unless
they first took the omens again in Argos, and then brought back
to Troy the divine image which they have now carried away
180 across the sea on their curved ships. So now they have set sail
for their native Mycenae to rearm and to muster their gods to
come with them and they will soon remeasure the ocean and be
back here when you least expect them. This is how Calchas
interprets the omens, and on his advice they have set up this
effigy of a horse to atone for the violation of the Palladium and
the divinity of Pallas, and for their deadly sin of sacrilege. But
he told them to make it an immense structure of interlaced
timbers soaring to the sky, so that it could not be taken through
the gates and brought into the city or protect the people should
they receive it with their traditional piety. For if your hands
190 violate this offering to Minerva, then total destruction shall fall
upon the empire of Priam and the Trojans (and may the gods
rather send that on his own head). But if your hands raise it up
into your city, Asia shall come unbidden in a mighty war to the
walls of Pelops, and that is the fate in store for our descendants.’
The trap was laid. These were the arts of the liar Sinon, and
we believed it all. Cunning and false tears had overcome the
men who had not been subdued by Diomede, son of Tydeus,
nor Achilles of Larisa, not by ten years of siege nor a thousand
ships.
200 And now there came upon this unhappy people another and
yet greater sign, which caused them even greater fear. Their
hearts were troubled and they could not see what the future
held. Laocoon, the chosen priest of Neptune, was sacrificing a
huge bull at the holy altar, when suddenly there came over the
calm water from Tenedos (I shudder at the memory of it), two
serpents leaning into the sea in great coils and making side by
side for the shore. Breasting the waves, they held high their
blood-stained crests, and the rest of their bodies ploughed the
waves behind them, their backs winding, coil upon measureless
coil, through the sounding foam of the sea. Now they were on
210 land. Their eyes were blazing and flecked with blood. They
hissed as they licked their lips with quivering tongues. We grew
pale at the sight and ran in all directions, but they made straight
for Laocoon. First the two serpents seized his two young sons,
twining round them both and feeding on their helpless limbs.
Then, when Laocoon came to the rescue with his sword in his
hand, they seized him and bound him in huge spirals, and soon
their scaly backs were entwined twice round his body and twice
220 round his throat, their heads and necks high above him as he
struggled to prise open their coils, his priestly ribbons befouled
by gore and black venom, and all the time he was raising horrible
cries to heaven like the bellowing of a wounded bull shaking
the ineffectual axe out of its neck as it flees from the altar. But
the two snakes escaped, gliding away to the highest temples
of the city and making for the citadel of the heartless Pallas, the
Tritonian goddess, where they sheltered under her feet and
under the circle of her shield.
At that moment a new fear crept into all their trembling
230 hearts. They said that Laocoon had been justly punished for his
crime. He had violated the sacred timbers by hurling his sinful
spear into the horse’s back, and they all shouted together that
it should be taken to a proper place and prayers offered up to
the goddess. We breached the walls and laid open the buildings
of our city. They all buckled to the task, setting wheels to roll
beneath the horse’s feet and stretching ropes of flax to its neck.
The engine of Fate mounted our walls, teeming with armed
men. Unmarried girls and boys sang their hymns around it
240 and rejoiced to have a hand on the rope. On it came, gliding
smoothly, looking down on the heart of the city. O my native
land! O Ilium, home of the gods! O walls of the people of
Dardanus, famous in war! Four times it stopped on the very
threshold of the gate, and four times the armour clanged in its
womb. But we paid no heed and pressed on blindly, madly, and
stood the accursed monster on our consecrated citadel. Even at
this last moment Cassandra was still opening her lips to foretell
the future, but God had willed that these were lips the Trojans
would never believe. This was the last day of a doomed people
and we spent it adorning the shrines of the gods all through the
city with festal garlands.
250 Meanwhile the sky was turning and night was rushing up
from the Ocean to envelop in its great shadow the earth, the sky
and the treachery of the Greeks, while the Trojans were lying
quiet in their homes, their weary bodies wrapped in sleep. The
Greek fleet in full array was already taking the army from
Tenedos through the friendly silence of the moon and making
for the shore they knew so well, when the royal flagship raised
high the fire signal and Sinon, preserved by the cruelty of the
divine Fates, stealthily undid the pine bolts of the horse and
260 freed the Greeks from its womb. The wooden horse was open,
and the Greeks were pouring gratefully out of its hollow chambers
into the fresh air, the commanders Thessandrus and
Sthenelus and fierce Ulixes sliding down the rope they had
lowered, and with them Acamas, Thoas, Neoptolemus of the
line of Peleus, Machaon, who came out first, Menelaus and
Epeos himself, the maker of the horse that tricked the Trojans.
They moved into a city buried in wine and sleep, slaying the
guards and opening the gates to let in all their waiting comrades
and join forces as they had planned.
It was the time when rest, the most grateful gift of the gods,
was first beginning to creep over suffering mortals, when Hector
270 suddenly appeared before my eyes in my sleep, full of sorrow
and streaming with tears. He looked as he did when he had been
dragged behind the chariot, black with dust and caked with
blood, his feet swollen where they had been pierced for the
leather thongs. What a sight he was! How changed from the
Hector who had thrown Trojan fire on to the ships of the Greeks
or come back clad in the spoils of Achilles. His beard was filthy,
his hair matted with blood, and he had on his body all the
280 wounds he had received around the walls of his native city. In
my dream I spoke to him first, forcing out my words, and I too
was weeping and full of sorrow: ‘O light of Troy, best hope and
trust of all Trojans, what has kept you so long from us? Long
have we waited for you, Hector. From what shores have you
come? With what eyes do we look upon you in our weariness
after the death of so many of your countrymen, after all the
sufferings of your people and your city? What has so shamefully
disfigured the face that was once so serene? What wounds are
these I see?’
There was no reply. He paid no heed to my futile questions,
but heaved a great groan from the depths of his heart and said:
‘You must escape, son of the goddess. You must save yourself
290 from these flames. The enemy is master of the walls and Troy is
falling from her highest pinnacle. You have given enough to
your native land and to Priam. If any right hand could have
saved Troy, mine would have saved it. Into your care she now
commends her sacraments and her household gods. Take them
to share your fate. Look for a great city to establish for them
after long wanderings across the sea.’ These were his words,
and he brought out in his own hands from her inmost shrine the
mighty goddess Vesta with the sacred ribbons on her head and
her undying flame.
Meanwhile the city was in utter confusion and despair.
300 Although the house of my father Anchises stood apart and was
screened by trees, the noise was beginning to be heard and the
din of battle was coming closer and closer. I shook the sleep
from me and climbed to the top of the highest gable of the roof,
and stood there with my ears pricked up like a shepherd when
a furious south wind is carrying fire into a field of grain, or a
mountain river whirls along in spate, flattening all the fields, the
growing crops and all the labour of oxen, carrying great trees
headlong down in its floods while the shepherd stands stupefied
on the top of the rock, listening to the sound without knowing
310 what it is. Then in that moment I knew the truth. The treacherous
scheming of the Greeks was there to see. Soon the great
house of Deiphobus yielded to the flames and fell in ruins. Soon
his neighbour Ucalegon was burning and the broad waters of
the strait of Sigeum reflected the flames. The clamour of men
and the clangour of trumpets rose to high heaven. Mindlessly I
put on my armour, for reason had little use for armour, but my
heart was burning to gather comrades for battle and rush to the
citadel with them. Frenzy and anger drove me on and suddenly
it seemed a noble thing to die in arms.
I now caught sight of Panthus, just escaped from the weapons
of the Greeks, Panthus, son of Othrys, priest of Apollo and of
320 the citadel. He was carrying in his hands the sacraments and the
defeated gods from the temple, and dragging his young grandson
along behind him in a mad rush to the door of my father’s
house. ‘Where is our strong-point? Where are we rallying?’ I
had scarcely time to speak before he replied, groaning: ‘The last
day has come for the people of Dardanus. This is the hour they
cannot escape. The Trojans are no more. Ilium has come to an
end and with it the great glory of the race of Teucer. Pitiless
Jupiter has given everything over to Argos. The Greeks are
masters of the burning city. The horse stands high in the heart
330 of it, pouring out its armed men, and Sinon is in triumph,
spreading the flames and gloating over us. The great double
gates are open and Greeks are there in their thousands, as many
as ever came from great Mycenae. Others have blocked the
narrow streets with their weapons levelled. Their lines are drawn
up and the naked steel is flashing, ready for slaughter. Only the
first few guards on the gates are trying to fight and offering blind
resistance.’