Odyssey 4.778 · Book 4, lines 778–780
Twenty picked men launch the ambush
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ὣς εἰπὼν ἐκρίνατʼ ἐείκοσι φῶτας ἀρίστους, βὰν δʼ ἰέναι ἐπὶ νῆα θοὴν καὶ θῖνα θαλάσσης. νῆα μὲν οὖν πάμπρωτον ἁλὸς βένθοσδε ἔρυσσαν,
So having spoken, he chose twenty men, the best of them, and they set off to go to the swift ship and the shore of the sea. First of all they dragged the ship down into the deep of the salt sea,
Word by word
The setting
Antinous carries the plot into action: the suitors' sea-ambush of Telemachus is launched. The lines use the standard formulas for manning and launching a ship — here bent to waylaying the prince on his way home.
A note on this passage
Antinous turns words into motion: he picks twenty of the best men, and they make for the fast ship drawn up on the shore, hauling it first down into the deep. The ambush is under way, and the passage breaks off with the ship just entering the water.
This is the fixed launching type-scene — the muster of picked men, the ship dragged to sea — the poem's machinery for sending heroes out. Here it equips a crime: twenty of the best set against a single young man. The launch even mirrors Telemachus's own earlier sailing; his would-be killers put out to sea just as he did, the formula of departure turned into the shape of a trap.
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