Odyssey 1.279 · Book 1, lines 279–283
Fit out a ship and go seek word of your father
Read the full text in our reader
σοὶ δʼ αὐτῷ πυκινῶς ὑποθήσομαι, αἴ κε πίθηαι· νῆʼ ἄρσας ἐρέτῃσιν ἐείκοσιν, ἥ τις ἀρίστη, ἔρχεο πευσόμενος πατρὸς δὴν οἰχομένοιο, ἤν τίς τοι εἴπῃσι βροτῶν, ἢ ὄσσαν ἀκούσῃς ἐκ Διός, ἥ τε μάλιστα φέρει κλέος ἀνθρώποισι.
And to you yourself I will give shrewd counsel, if you will heed it. Fit out a ship with twenty oarsmen, the best there is, and go to learn of your father, long gone, in case some mortal may tell you, or you hear a rumor from Zeus, which above all brings men their tidings.
Word by word
The setting
Now the counsel turns to Telemachus himself. Mentes lays out the plan that will launch the whole ‘Telemachy’: man a ship, sail out, and gather news of the long-absent Odysseus — from men, or from a rumor sent by Zeus.
A note on this passage
This is the sailing-order that sets the next three books in motion. Man a good ship, twenty rowers, and go — to Pylos and Sparta, as the next lines say — to gather news of Odysseus. The boy who has only ever been acted upon is told, plainly, to act.
The undercurrent is how Homer thinks news travels. Word may come from a man, or as ὄσσα — rumor felt as a thing sent from Zeus, the anonymous report that ‘most of all brings tidings to men.’ And the word for the tidings is κλέος: at once the news of the father and the fame that keeps him spoken of. To go seeking κλέος of Odysseus is already to begin earning his own.
Read the full commentary — and tap any word for its dictionary entry — in the interlinear reader.
Open Odyssey 1.279 in the full reader
Always open passages in the reader
From the Great Library
You are reading a page of the Odyssey — the whole book is free in our interlinear reader.
The Great Library Project presses the classics in their original languages, glossed word by word — free to read, always. Browse the whole library.
Also on our shelves:
Odyssey 1.279 — The Great Library Project interlinear edition · greatlibraryproject.com/book/odyssey/1.279/