Odyssey 6.102 · Book 6, lines 102–106
Like Artemis on the mountains
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οἵη δʼ Ἄρτεμις εἶσι κατʼ οὔρεα ἰοχέαιρα, ἢ κατὰ Τηΰγετον περιμήκετον ἢ Ἐρύμανθον, τερπομένη κάπροισι καὶ ὠκείῃς ἐλάφοισι· τῇ δέ θʼ ἅμα νύμφαι, κοῦραι Διὸς αἰγιόχοιο, ἀγρονόμοι παίζουσι, γέγηθε δέ τε φρένα Λητώ·
And just as Artemis the archer goes over the mountains — along towering Taygetus or Erymanthus, delighting in boars and swift deer; and with her the nymphs, daughters of Zeus who bears the aegis, play across the wild country, and Leto is glad at heart;
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The setting
The famous simile begins: Nausicaa at play among her maids is compared to the goddess Artemis roaming the hills with her band of nymphs.
A note on this passage
The simile lifts the whole scene to Olympus. Nausicaa and her maids at their ball-game become Artemis striding the ridges of Taygetus and Erymanthus with her nymphs, hunting boar and deer, while her mother Leto watches and is glad. It is a picture of a tall figure at the centre of a moving, joyful company.
The choice of goddess is exact. Artemis is the virgin huntress, unmarried, first among her companions — which is precisely what the poem wants said about Nausicaa just before a naked stranger stumbles into the scene. And Leto's gladness, a mother's pride in a daughter who outshines the rest, points quietly ahead to Nausicaa's own mother, Arete, whose favor Odysseus will soon have to win.
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