Sibylline Oracles

Historical printed page 388

THE SIBYLLINE BOOKS. Book III, Lines 500—563 the Great King, (500) and opened with falsehood their filthy mouth. Therefore shall he (501) mar- vellously bring them low with His scourges more than any (502) land, and God shall send on them a bitter fate, (503) burning their cities from the ground and their many foundations. (504) Woe to thee, much-vexed Crete. To thee shall come a scourge (505) and a dread eternal destruction. And al] the earth shall see thee once more wreathed in smoke, (507) and fire shall never leave thee but thou shalt burn. (508) Woe unto thee, Thrace: how shalt thou come to the yoke of bondage: (509) when Galatians mingled with the sons of Dardanus (10) swoop on to ravage Hellas, then shall be thine evil day, (11) and to a strange land thou shalt give (thine own) and receive nought. (12) {Woe unto thee, Gog and Magog, and to all the several tribes, (13) Marsians and Daciansj, how many evils fate brings near to you: (14) (many, too), to the sons of the Lycians, Mysians and Phrygians. (15) And many tribes of the Pamphylians and Lydians shall fall, (16) of Moors and Ethiopians and nations of barbarous speech, (17) Cappadocians and Arabians. But why should I proclaim the fate of each severally ? (18) for upon all nations who dwell on the earth (19) the Most High shall send a grievous scourge. (20) But whensoever a numerous barbarian ‘race shall fall upon the Greeks, (21) it shall destroy many heads of picked men, (22) and many of men’s fat flocks shall they ravish, (23) and herds of horses and mules and lowing oxen. (24) And well-built houses shall they lawlessly burn with fire. (25) And many miserable wights shall they carry by force as slaves to another land, (26) children and tender deep-girdled women, (27) snatched from their chambers and with delicate feet falling forward. (28) They shall see them in bonds at the hand of strange-tongued foes (29) suffering every horror of outrage. And they shall have (30) no man to lend them but a little aid in war and to succour their lives. (31) They shall see the foe reaping the enjoyment of their own possessions and of all their wealth, (32) and trembling shall be underneath their knees. (33) An hundred shall flee and one shall slay them all: (34) and five shall rout a heavy squadron; and they, thrown one against another (35) in shameful confusion by the dread din of battle, (36) shall bring exultation to the foe but to Greeks mourning. (37) Then all Hellas shall lie under the yoke of slavery, (38) and war and pestilence shall come upon all mankind at once, (39) and God shall make the great heaven above brazen, (40) and drought over the whole earth, and it of iron. (41) Then all mankind shall grievously lament (42) no sowing and no ploughing: and fire upon earth (43) shall He send down column upon column, who created heaven and earth: (44) and of all mankind the third part shall be destroyed. (45) Hellas, why dost thou put thy trust in governors, (46) mortal men who are powerless to escape the consummation of death? (47) With what view dost thou proffer vain gifts to the dead (48) and sacrifice to idols? Who has put error in thine heart, (49) that thou shouldst perform these rites and forsake the face of Mighty God? (50) Reverence the name of the Father of all and forget him not. (51) There are a thousand years and five hundred more, (52) since the reign of the haughty kings (53) of the Greeks who were the pioneers of evils to mankind, (54) holding fast to many idols of defunct gods, (55) whereby ye have been taught to think vain things. (56) But when the wrath of the great God shall be upon you, (57) then shall ye know the face of the great God. (58) And every soul of men with deep groans, (59) upraising their hands straight to the broad heaven, (60) shall begin to call to his succour the Mighty king, (61) and to seek who shall come as a deliverer from the mighty wrath. (62) But come and learn this and store it in thy mind, (63) how many shall be the woes of the 505. destruction. The reading follows a conjecture of Wilamowitz, ἐξαλάπαξις for ἐξαλαπάξει. 509. The Gaulish invasion of 280 B.C. 510. The line as it stands is unmetrical. swoop on to ravage Hellas, then shall be thine evil day. Read°E\\ad’ ἐπέσσυνται πορθεῖν, τότε σοι κακὺν ἔσται. 511. (thine own). Supply τὸ σόν after δώσεις. 512-13. The lines are corrupt and the names of the tribes cannot be restored with certainty. For Marsians we should perhaps read Mardians, a tribe inhabiting the hill country of Hyrkania. 520 ff. Probably referring to the Roman invasion culminating in the capture of Corinth in 146 B.C.: so Hilgenfeld. The reference, however, may be to the Gaulish invasion of 279 B.C. J 533. Cf. Isa. xxx. 17;° Deut. xxxii. 30. 534. Squadron (λόχον), Wilamowitz’s conjecture for ‘ wrath (χόλον). 539. Cf. Deut. xxvili. 23; 1 En. Ixxx. 2; Jub. xxiii. 18. 543. column upon column. Alexandre’s suggestion πολύνηστον is followed for the unintelligible πολὺν ἱστόν. 544. shall be destroyed, ἔσσετ᾽ ἄϊστον, a conjecture for ἔσσεται αὖθις. 545, 547-9. Quoted by Lact. Div. Just. i. 15. 15. 554. holding fast, κατέχοντες, a conjecture for θανεόντων, which leaves no governing verb. 563. A line has evidently dropped out after this. That inserted is a mere conjecture. Apparently the meaning is that the doom of Hellas is irrevocably fixed. 388