‘Tell us, ‘we cry, ‘on what you rely, now that you are our prisoner.’ At last he lays aside his fear and speaks these words: We urge him to say from what blood he is sprung and what tidings he brings. For as he stood amid the gazing crowd, dismayed, unarmed, and cast his eyes about the Phrygian bands, ‘Alas!’ he cried, ‘what land now, what seas can receive me? Or what fate at the last yet awaits my misery? No place at all have I among the Greeks, and the Trojans themselves, too, wildly clamour for vengeance and my life.’ At that wail our mood was changed and all violence checked.
Hear now the treachery of the Greeks and from a single crime learn the wickedness of all. From all sides, in eagerness to see, the Trojan youth run streaming in and vie in mocking the captive. To compass this very end and open Troy to the Achaeans, deliberately, stranger though he was, he had placed himself in their path, confident in spirit and ready for either event, either to ply his crafty wiles or to meet certain death. “But meanwhile some Dardan shepherds with loud shouts were haling to the king a youth whose hands were bound behind his back. And had the gods’ decrees, had our mind not been perverse, he would have driven us to violate with steel the Argive den, and Troy would now be standing, and you, lofty citadel of Priam, would still abide! The spear stood quivering and with the cavity’s reverberation the vaults rang hollow, sending forth a moan. Whatever it be, I fear the Greeks, even when bringing gifts.’ So saying, with mighty force he hurled his great spear at the beast’s side an the arched frame of the belly.
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“Then, foremost of all and with a great throng following, Laocoön in hot haste runs down from the citadel’s height, and cries from afar: ‘My poor countrymen, what monstrous madness is this? Do you believe the foe has sailed away? Do you think that any gifts of the Greeks are free from treachery? Is Ulysses known to be this sort of man? Either enclosed in this frame there lurk Achaeans, or this has been built as an engine of war against our walls, to spy into our homes and come down upon the city from above or some trickery lurks inside. The wavering crowd is torn into opposing factions. But Capys, and they whose minds were wiser in counsel, bid us either hurl headlong into the sea this guile of the Greeks, this distrusted gift, or fire it with flames heaped beneath or else pierce and probe the hollow hiding place of the belly. Some are amazed at maiden Minerva’s gift of death, and marvel at the massive horse: and first Thymoetes urges that it be drawn within our walls and lodged in the citadel either it was treachery or the doom of Troy was already tending that way. Here the Dolopian bands encamped, here cruel Achilles here lay the fleet here they used to meet us in battle. The gates are opened it is a joy to go and see the Doric camp, the deserted stations and forsaken shore. So all the Teucrian land frees itself from its long sorrow. We thought they had gone and before the wind were bound for Mycenae. Hither they sail and hide themselves on the barren shore. “There lies in sight an island well known to fame, Tenedos, rich in wealth while Priam’s kingdom stood, now but a bay and an unsafe anchorage for ships. Here, within its dark sides, they stealthily enclose the choicest of their stalwart men and deep within they fill the huge cavern of the belly with armed soldiery. They pretend it is an offering for their safe return this is the rumour that goes abroad. “Broken in war and thwarted by the fates, the Danaan chiefs, now that so many years were gliding by, build by Pallas’ divine art a horse of mountainous bulk, and interweave its ribs with planks of fir.
Yet if such is your desire to learn of our disasters, and in few words to hear of Troy’s last agony, though my mind shudders to remember and has recoiled in pain, I will begin. What Myrmidon or Dolopian, or soldier of the stern Ulysses, could refrain from tears in telling such a tale? And now dewy night is speeding from the sky and the setting stars counsel sleep. “Too deep for words, O queen, is the grief you bid me renew, how the Greeks overthrew Troy’s wealth and woeful realm – the sights most piteous that I saw myself and wherein I played no small role. All were hushed, and kept their rapt gaze upon him then from his raised couch father Aeneas thus began: BOOKS 7 - 12 AENEID BOOK 2, TRANSLATED BY H.
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