Odyssey 4.347 · Book 4, lines 347–350
I will hide no word
Read the full text in our reader
ταῦτα δʼ ἅ μʼ εἰρωτᾷς καὶ λίσσεαι, οὐκ ἂν ἐγώ γε ἄλλα παρὲξ εἴποιμι παρακλιδόν, οὐδʼ ἀπατήσω, ἀλλὰ τὰ μέν μοι ἔειπε γέρων ἅλιος νημερτής, τῶν οὐδέν τοι ἐγὼ κρύψω ἔπος οὐδʼ ἐπικεύσω.
But these things, which you ask me and entreat, I for my part would not answer aside, speaking evasively, nor will I deceive you; but what the old man of the sea, unerring, told me, of these I will hide no word, nor conceal it.
Word by word
The setting
Menelaus turns at last to Telemachus's real question. He promises a straight answer, drawn from what Proteus — the unerring old god of the sea — once told him, and swears to hide nothing.
A note on this passage
This is the pivot from feeling to report. Menelaus vows he will not dodge or deceive: he will pass on exactly what the old sea-god told him, hiding not one word. The heaping of negatives — not aside, nor deceive, nor hide, nor conceal — is an oath of full disclosure.
The undercurrent is the source he names: γέρων ἅλιος νημερτής, the 'unerring old man of the sea,' Proteus. Menelaus's own truthfulness borrows its authority from the god's. What follows will be reliable not because a king says so, but because it came, under duress, from a divinity who cannot lie. The tale is certified before it is told.
Read the full commentary — and tap any word for its dictionary entry — in the interlinear reader.
Open Odyssey 4.347 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 4.347 — The Great Library Project interlinear edition · greatlibraryproject.com/book/odyssey/4.347/