Odyssey 4.754 · Book 4, lines 754–757
Take heart — the line will hold
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Eurycleia — μηδὲ γέροντα κάκου κεκακωμένον· οὐ γὰρ ὀίω πάγχυ θεοῖς μακάρεσσι γονὴν Ἀρκεισιάδαο ἔχθεσθʼ, ἀλλʼ ἔτι πού τις ἐπέσσεται ὅς κεν ἔχῃσι δώματά θʼ ὑψερεφέα καὶ ἀπόπροθι πίονας ἀγρούς.
And do not distress the old man, already afflicted; for I do not think the line of Arceisius is utterly hated by the blessed gods, but surely there will still be someone to possess the high-roofed halls and the rich fields far off.
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The setting
Still speaking to Penelope, the old nurse finishes her comfort, turning from prayer to the household: old Laertes in his grief, and the endurance of Odysseus's family — the line of Arceisius, his grandfather.
A note on this passage
Eurycleia closes her comfort with an argument from the household: spare old Laertes, already broken, and trust that the gods have not wholly turned against the line of Arceisius. Someone of the blood will live to hold the high-roofed halls and the far fields. She answers fear with the durability of the house.
What she promises is an heir who will possess the halls and the rich fields — and that possession is precisely what the suitors are gathered to seize. The nurse means Telemachus safe and grown; the same phrase names the prize the suitors eat toward. In this poem the estate, the oikos, is never mere background: it is the thing everyone is fighting to hold.
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