Herodotus, Histories 1.30.4 · 1.30.4
Why Tellus
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Herodotus — ἀποθωμάσας δὲ Κροῖσος τὸ λεχθὲν εἴρετο ἐπιστρεφέως·
Croesus — Κοίῃ δὴ κρίνεις Τέλλον εἶναι ὀλβιώτατον;
Herodotus — ὃ δὲ εἶπε
Solon — Τέλλῳ τοῦτο μὲν τῆς πόλιος εὖ ἡκούσης παῖδες ἦσαν καλοί τε κἀγαθοί, καί σφι εἶδε ἅπασι τέκνα ἐκγενόμενα καὶ πάντα παραμείναντα· τοῦτο δὲ τοῦ βίου εὖ ἥκοντι, ὡς τὰ παρʼ ἡμῖν, τελευτὴ τοῦ βίου λαμπροτάτη ἐπεγένετο·
Croesus, amazed at what was said, asked sharply: "On what grounds do you judge Tellus most blessed?" He said: "Tellus, first, lived when his city prospered and had fine, good sons, and saw children born to all of them, and all of them surviving; second, when he was well off as things go with us, the most glorious end of his life came upon him."
Word by word
The setting
Croesus is astonished and asks for reasons. Solon gives two.
A note on this passage
Croesus is jolted: <em>epistrepheōs</em>, "sharply, with a turn." Solon answers like a man counting on his fingers: <em>touto men… touto de</em>, "first… second." First, a life whose goods came in the right order: his city was doing well, his sons were <em>kaloi te kagathoi</em>, the Greek phrase for fine men, handsome and good, and every one of them had children who lived. Second, the end. Nothing here is spectacular. It is a list of ordinary blessings, kept all the way through.
Notice the small hedge in the middle, <em>hōs ta par' hēmin</em>, "as things go with us." Tellus was well off by Athenian standards, which to a man who has just walked through the treasure-houses of Sardis means modest. Solon measures a life by its <em>teleutē</em>, its ending, and the ending is what Croesus has not yet thought about. The next sentence tells us what Tellus's was.
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