Odyssey 3.162 · Book 3, lines 162–164
Some turn back to Agamemnon
Read the full text in our reader
οἱ μὲν ἀποστρέψαντες ἔβαν νέας ἀμφιελίσσας ἀμφʼ Ὀδυσῆα ἄνακτα δαΐφρονα, ποικιλομήτην, αὖτις ἐπʼ Ἀτρεΐδῃ Ἀγαμέμνονι ἦρα φέροντες·
Some turned back their curved ships and went — around lord Odysseus, the battle-wise, the cunning-minded — bearing favour once more to Agamemnon, son of Atreus.
Word by word
The setting
The seagoing half now splits again. One group reverses course — the crews around Odysseus — to sail back and rejoin Agamemnon at Troy.
A note on this passage
The fracture deepens. One group swings its curved ships around and heads back — the crews gathered about Odysseus — to rejoin Agamemnon and do him a fresh courtesy. Nestor gives Odysseus his full formulaic honours here: lord, battle-wise, of the intricate mind.
For Telemachus, listening, this is a needle. His father was on the road home and turned back, of his own accord, to stand again beside Agamemnon. The 'cunning-minded' man chose the longer way, and the choice is the first link in the ten-year chain that has left his son fatherless. Nestor cannot know that; the poem lets the son hear his father praised for the very turn that undid him.
Read the full commentary — and tap any word for its dictionary entry — in the interlinear reader.
Open Odyssey 3.162 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 3.162 — The Great Library Project interlinear edition · greatlibraryproject.com/book/odyssey/3.162/