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The Argonautica, Line 3: Medea comes into the story

Book 3, lines 247–249. The Argonauts have reached the palace of Aeetes, king of Colchis.

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• 3.247 Medea comes into the story. The other rooms were home to the handmaids and to Aeetes' two daughters, Chalciope…
• 3.250 Hecate's priestess. For Hera was keeping her at home; before this she hardly ever came into…
• 3.744 Night over land and sea. Then night drew darkness over the earth. Out at sea the sailors looked from…
• 3.751 Medea cannot sleep. But sweet sleep did not come to Medea at all. In her longing for…
• 3.756 Like sunlight on water. like a gleam of sunlight dancing on the walls of a house, thrown up…
• 3.761 Pain under the skin. Tears of pity flowed from her eyes, and inside her a smoldering pain wore…
• 3.766 She changes her mind. At one moment she would give him the drugs to charm the bulls, at…
• 3.771 Wretched me. "Wretched me, which way now, this trouble or that? My mind is helpless every…
• 3.778 Let him die. Let him die in his ordeal, if it is his fate to die in…
• 3.785 Away with shame. Away with shame, away with honor! Let him be saved by my will and…
• 3.791 What the Colchian women will say. But even dead I will be mocked; they will wink at each other over…
• 3.798 Better to die tonight. Ah me, my ruin! It would be far better to leave life this very…
• 3.802 The casket of drugs. She spoke, and went to fetch the casket where she kept her many drugs,…
• 3.808 Fear of Hades. She was already untying the straps of the casket, eager to take them out,…
• 3.813 The sun is sweeter. She remembered all the pleasures of the living; she remembered her merry friends, as…
• 3.817 Waiting for dawn. And she put the casket back down from her knees, her mind changed by…
• 3.822 Dawn. Again and again she unbarred her doors to watch for the light. Then Dawn…
• 3.828 She dresses at first light. As soon as the girl saw the first light of dawn, she bound up…
• 3.835 Pacing the house. And there in the house she paced back and forth, forgetting the sorrows the…
• 3.838 Twelve handmaids. She called her handmaids, the twelve girls her own age who slept in the…
• 3.844 The Promethean drug. Meanwhile she took out of the hollow casket the drug they call Promethean. If…
• 3.851 From Prometheus' blood. It first sprang up when the flesh-eating eagle, in the glens of the Caucasus,…
• 3.858 Seven baths, seven calls to Brimo. Its juice, dark like the sap of a mountain oak, she had gathered in…
• 3.864 The earth bellows. And the dark earth shook and bellowed beneath her as the Titan's root was…
• 3.867 The drug in her sash. She took the drug out and put it in the fragrant sash tied around…
• 3.948 Waiting at the temple. Nor could Medea turn her mind to anything else, though she sang. Whatever song…
• 3.956 Like Sirius. But not long after, he appeared to her longing eyes, springing up high like…
• 3.962 Her heart falls. Her heart dropped out of her breast, and her eyes too grew dim; a…
• 3.967 Two trees in a calm. And the two stood face to face, silent and speechless, like oaks or tall…
• 3.973 Jason speaks. The son of Aeson saw that she had fallen into a ruin sent by…
• 3.980 Speak openly. But since we have come to each other in goodwill, in a holy place…
• 3.985 By Hecate, and by Zeus of strangers. I entreat you by Hecate herself, by your parents, and by Zeus, who holds…
• 3.990 Fame in Greece. And afterward I would repay you with thanks for your help, as is right…
• 3.997 Ariadne. Once, too, the maiden Ariadne, daughter of Minos, kindly freed Theseus from cruel trials,…
• 3.1005 Favor from the gods. So for you too there will be favor from the gods, if you save…
• 3.1008 A smile sweet as nectar. So he spoke, honoring her; and she cast her eyes aside and smiled a…
• 3.1013 She gives him the drug. Freely, sparing nothing, she took the drug out of her fragrant sash, and he…
• 3.1017 Like dew on roses. Such a sweet flame did Love flash from the golden head of Aeson's son;…
• 3.1022 Eyes down, eyes up. Both of them, at one moment, fixed their eyes on the ground in shame;…
• 3.1026 Listen now. "Listen now to how I will devise help for you. When my father, as…
• 3.1030 The pit and the ewe. …bathe in the stream of the tireless river, and alone, apart from the others,…
• 3.1035 Honey for Hecate; do not look back. And appease Hecate, the only child of Perses, pouring from a cup the hive-work…
• 3.1042 At dawn, the salve. At dawn, soak this drug, strip, and anoint your body with it as with…
• 3.1046 Proof against bronze and fire. And besides, let your shield, spear and all, and your sword be sprinkled with…
• 3.1052 The earthborn rising. As soon as you have yoked the mighty oxen and quickly ploughed through the…
• 3.1057 The stone, and the fleece. …secretly throw a heavy stone among them; and they will fight over it like…

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