Odyssey 5.18 · Book 5, lines 18–20
And now the son is hunted
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νῦν αὖ παῖδʼ ἀγαπητὸν ἀποκτεῖναι μεμάασιν οἴκαδε νισόμενον· ὁ δʼ ἔβη μετὰ πατρὸς ἀκουὴν ἐς Πύλον ἠγαθέην ἠδʼ ἐς Λακεδαίμονα δῖαν.
Now once again they are bent on killing his beloved son as he returns home; for he went after news of his father to holy Pylos and to divine Lacedaemon.
Word by word
The setting
Athena's closing point. It is not only Odysseus who is in danger: the suitors now plot to murder Telemachus, who has sailed to Pylos and Sparta seeking news of his father (the voyage of Books 3–4). The whole household is under threat.
A note on this passage
The plea ends on the son. While Odysseus is stuck on the island, the suitors are planning an ambush for Telemachus, who has gone to Pylos and Sparta in search of word of his father. Father and son are both in peril at once, one on the sea and one on the road home.
With this Athena stitches the two plots into a single emergency. The poem has spent four books on Telemachus's journey; here she ties the son's danger to the father's so that one decision on Olympus can be made to answer both. The word ἀγαπητὸν, 'beloved,' is also the word for an only child — the suitors' plan is not just a killing but the end of a house's whole line.
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