Odyssey 7.31 · Book 7, lines 31–36
The Phaeacians keep to their ships
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Athena — μηδέ τινʼ ἀνθρώπων προτιόσσεο μηδʼ ἐρέεινε. οὐ γὰρ ξείνους οἵδε μάλʼ ἀνθρώπους ἀνέχονται, οὐδʼ ἀγαπαζόμενοι φιλέουσʼ ὅς κʼ ἄλλοθεν ἔλθῃ. νηυσὶ θοῇσιν τοί γε πεποιθότες ὠκείῃσι λαῖτμα μέγʼ ἐκπερόωσιν, ἐπεί σφισι δῶκʼ ἐνοσίχθων· τῶν νέες ὠκεῖαι ὡς εἰ πτερὸν ἠὲ νόημα.
Look at none of the men, nor question them. For these folk do not much tolerate stranger men, nor with affection do they befriend whoever comes from elsewhere. Trusting in their swift, speeding ships they cross the great gulf, for the Earth-shaker granted it to them; their ships are swift as if a wing or a thought.
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The setting
Athena, disguised as a young Phaeacian girl carrying a pitcher, is guiding the shipwrecked Odysseus toward the palace of King Alcinous. She has just told him to walk in silence; here she finishes warning him about the Phaeacians' guarded nature toward outsiders.
A note on this passage
Athena, still in her girl's disguise, finishes her warning. The Phaeacians are not unkind so much as insular: they live at the edge of the world and do not much care for the men who wash up there. Their genius is the sea, and their pride is their ships, swift enough to cross the great gulf as lightly as a wing or a thought.
The undercurrent is a quiet unease beneath the wonder to come. This is the most hospitable house Odysseus will find, yet the approach is hedged with caution: say nothing, look at no one. Even Phaeacia, half fairy-tale and half real, keeps a wary distance from the stranger, and the poem lets us feel that distance before it opens the golden doors.
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