Odyssey 4.770 · Book 4, lines 770–773
A suitor's boast, and Antinous rises
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A suitor — ἦ μάλα δὴ γάμον ἄμμι πολυμνήστη βασίλεια ἀρτύει, οὐδέ τι οἶδεν ὅ οἱ φόνος υἷι τέτυκται. ὣς ἄρα τις εἴπεσκε, τὰ δʼ οὐκ ἴσαν ὡς ἐτέτυκτο. τοῖσιν δʼ Ἀντίνοος ἀγορήσατο καὶ μετέειπε·
Surely now the much-wooed queen is preparing a marriage for us, nor does she know at all that murder is readied for her son. So one would speak, but they did not know how it had been ordained. And to them Antinous spoke and addressed them:
Word by word
The setting
In the hall the suitors, who have laid an ambush for Telemachus at sea, boast among themselves. One jeers that Penelope is preparing to marry, blind to the murder they have set for her son. Then Antinous, their ringleader, stands to speak.
A note on this passage
One of the suitors gloats: the much-wooed queen is finally arranging a marriage — for one of them — never guessing that death has been prepared for her son at sea. Then the narrator turns the knife: so a suitor spoke, but they did not know how things had really been ordained. Antinous rises to answer.
One verb does the work twice. The murder has been readied (τέτυκται) for Telemachus; but how it had been ordained (ἐτέτυκτο) reaches past their plot to a shaping they cannot see. The same word of contrivance frames the plotters and their doom. The suitor jeers at Penelope's blindness in the very sentence that lays bare his own — he sees the trap he set and not the one closing on him.
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