Complete Works of Pindar

by Pindar

the games were predominantly aristocratic assemblies, reflecting the expense and leisure needed to attend such events,

The odes typically feature a grand and engaging opening, often with a famous mythological setting.

Like homer’s invocation of the muse. Also the father of history

compound adjectives.

😢

periphrases

err...

misle...

number of layers in the st...

often dig...

the event where the victory was gained is never described in detail,

a wreath of wild parsley.

void firmament by day,

The sky is void of stars in the day

Myth of a god initiating a race of people

earth-enfolding Poseidon

Identity of a god with the physical phenomenon he’s not only responsible for, but essentially is. This might b why gods were assumed to be immortal and unchanging, because their natural phenomena are perpetual, they too must be perpetual. Vis a vis maybe deities which were patrons of cities which could be conquered, destroyed might’ve been seen as a lesser class of less than immortal; a city and its surrounding farms may be razed but the phenomenon of farming continues elsewhere, so the god of a city is limited, but the good of corn is forever Likewise a certain body of water may dry up so it’s naiad died, but the hoy of the ocean is eternal

Seems like an artifact of Bronze Age tradition, like homer

AKRAGAS,

Home of empedicles originator of fohur elements hypothesis. 25th C BC

476.

I think this is 14 years after tge birth of empedocles so hes nearly a contemporary

feast was founded from the chief spoils of war,

Cf malthusian essay on population thaft war relieves scarcity of food

Time the father of all

In whatt way is time a father. Maybe he means thatt just as a father generates offspring time generates all events as if time is the primordial stuff of happenings

reverse:

Reversal of fortune. Change from bad to good

crowns

Of parsley or somesuch

One judgeth under earth,

A myth about some god being the judge of sin?

refrained their souls from all iniquity, travel the road of Zeus unto the tower of Kronos: there round the islands of the blest the Ocean-breezes blow, and golden flowers are glowing, some from the land on trees of splendour, and some the water feedeth, with wreaths whereof they entwine their hands: so ordereth Rhadamanthos’ just decree, whom at his own right hand hath ever the father Kronos, husband of Rhea, throned above all worlds8. Peleus

Myth that good peiple go to god's beautiful road and tower

The sea-sand none hath numbered;

Similar to genesis when god spoke to abraham

For Pindar’s ideas as to a future life see especially the fragments of his Dirges which remain to us. He seems to have been influenced by Pythagoreanism.

device, fitting to feet

Does this mean this ode was meant to accompany dance? It already accompanied music as it says the lyre, and that’s conducive to dance. Were the others too? Previously it mentioned a lute. Maybe only this one though bec it’s during a feast and for some reason that was conducive to dance, like a smaller and intimate group rather than an entire region gathered to celebrate a contest every four years.

fulfilling Herakles’ behests of old, hath laid upon one’s hair above his brows pale-gleaming glory of olive.

Attribution of the games and its rules to Heracles mythical to make them authoritative and important just as in an earlier ode Pindar attributed to the victor divine pedigree. No. Now I see “that tree” refers to the above mentioned olive, as he reiterated below, it was a crown of greatness

tree from Ister’s shadowy springs

Does tree mean a parent that gives rise to the branch of posterity or an actual tree which might’ve been named in some myth. If it’s a parent and if ister is perhaps some god, this is another claim for authority by divine pedigree

the Hyperborean folk, who serve Apollo.

My dictionary says its a very northerly folk in a region beyond the north wind which enjoys a warm climate and plentiful produce. I wonder what gave the idea of this myth. Not atlantean Cyprus, which was to the south. Maybe the powerful Persian invasion and Maybe Pindar didn’t understand where they were from

eye of Even,

?was the orb of the moon imagined to be the eye of some celestial named Even?

the land that lieth behind the blast of the cold North-wind:

Sounds like the above mentioned hyperboria

he halted and marvelled at the trees: and sweet desire thereof possessed him that he might plant them at the end of the course which the race-horses should run

Whom is this referring to? Is it theron the victor-host or is it some god in a myth, which would again lend authority to the game and its participants

Water be the Best6,

Pathless the things beyond, pathless alike to the unwise and the wise. Here I will search no more; the quest were vain.

Therons victory prize is already the best; nothing is better, and a search for more should be directed to no path, and such a search would be in vain, because therons prize is the best. Hurray!

gift

Karban minchah

six twin altars

perplexity

The disarray of a destroyed city

let him not seek to become a god.

Theme of hubris. But unclear whuch particular behavior would cross the line. Maybe its failure to serve gods altar as mentioned above

Deeds of no risk are honourless whether done among men or among hollow ships;

Sounds like inane propaganda unless risk is a poor translation for effort

the Muses shall not say me nay.

lay with Poseidon

Divine pedigree

put from her silver pitcher and her girdle of scarlet web,

Her womb

steep rock of lofty Kronion;

?

then surely he, O son of Sostratos, with his loud-thundering sire, is the accomplisher of this thy bliss.

You owe your victory to hermes’s divine help

Phintis was Agesias’ charioteer.

If so, what was Agesias’s role? Was he merely a nominal sponsor?

the iris was considered a symbol of immortality.

I wonder why The iris flower found in ny gardens only blossoms for a short while

Hera was worshipped in her prenuptial as well as her postnuptial state.

It was a custom between correspondents who wished for secrecy to have duplicate [Greek: skutalai], or letter-sticks. The writer wrote on a roll wrapt round his stick, and the receiver of the letter read it wrapt similarly on his. And thus Aineas the bearer of this ode would teach the chorus of Stymphalians how rightly to sing and understand it. See [Greek: skutalae] in Dict. Ant.

How did this offer privacy Did it offer a code?

I. e. of Stymphalos and Syracuse. Agesias was a citizen of both, and thus his two homes are compared to two anchors.