Odyssey 3.411 · Book 3, lines 411–414
Nestor enthroned, ringed by his sons
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Νέστωρ αὖ τότʼ ἐφῖζε Γερήνιος, οὖρος Ἀχαιῶν, σκῆπτρον ἔχων. περὶ δʼ υἷες ἀολλέες ἠγερέθοντο ἐκ θαλάμων ἐλθόντες, Ἐχέφρων τε Στρατίος τε Περσεύς τʼ Ἄρητός τε καὶ ἀντίθεος Θρασυμήδης.
Now Nestor the Gerenian sat there in turn, guardian of the Achaeans, holding his sceptre. And around him his sons gathered in a throng, coming from their chambers: Echephron and Stratios, Perseus and Aretos, and godlike Thrasymedes.
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The setting
Now Nestor sits in the ancestral seat with the sceptre of authority. His grown sons come out from their rooms and gather around him — a short name-catalogue of five: Echephron, Stratios, Perseus, Aretos, and Thrasymedes.
A note on this passage
Nestor takes the seat with the sceptre in hand, 'guardian of the Achaeans,' and his household assembles around him: five grown sons come out of their rooms and are named one by one — Echephron, Stratios, Perseus, Aretos, Thrasymedes.
The catalogue is a form of wealth. To be ringed at dawn by a throng of grown sons, sceptre in hand, is the picture of a patriarchy that has held. The reader carries the other house alongside it without being told: Odysseus has exactly one son, unarmed among enemies, and no such muster will gather at his gate. Nestor's roll-call of names is quietly everything Ithaca lacks.
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