Odyssey 4.605 · Book 4, lines 605–608
An island that leans on the sea
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ἐν δʼ Ἰθάκῃ οὔτʼ ἂρ δρόμοι εὐρέες οὔτε τι λειμών· αἰγίβοτος, καὶ μᾶλλον ἐπήρατος ἱπποβότοιο. οὐ γάρ τις νήσων ἱππήλατος οὐδʼ ἐυλείμων, αἵ θʼ ἁλὶ κεκλίαται· Ἰθάκη δέ τε καὶ περὶ πασέων.
In Ithaca there are no broad courses, nor any meadow; she is goat-grazed, and lovelier than horse-pasturing land. For none of the islands is fit for driving horses, nor rich in meadows — islands that lean sloping to the sea; but Ithaca, beyond them all.
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The setting
Telemachus explains why horses are useless to him: Ithaca is a rugged goat-island with no room to run a chariot. He sets it, and the other small islands, against horse-rearing mainland country.
A note on this passage
The reason is geography. Ithaca is stony and steep, a place for goats, not for the level tracks a chariot needs; the small western islands all tilt down to the water, none of them horse-country. It is a plain practical point, made with a homelander's exactness.
And yet the refusal turns into love. The same rough island that cannot use a horse is called 'lovelier' than any rich horse-pasture — αἰγίβοτος set proudly against ἱππόβοτος. This is the note the whole poem keeps sounding: Ithaca is poor and hard, and it is the one place worth the whole journey home. Odysseus himself will later call it rugged but a good nurse of men.
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