“O god that o’er the doomed Atridan halls.”
I am afraid I stand alone, among the translators, in translating δαῖμον in this and similar places, by the English word god; but persuaded as I am that the English words Fiend and Demon are steeped in modern partly Gothic, partly Christian associations of a character essentially opposed to the character and genius of the Greek theology, I choose rather to offend the taste than to confound the judgment of my reader in so important a matter. The Greeks habitually attributed to their gods actions and sentiments, which we attribute only to devils and demons. Such beings (in the English sense) were, in fact, altogether unknown to the Greeks. Their gods, as occasion required, performed all the functions of our Devil; so that, to use a familiar illustration, instead of the phrase, what the devil are you about? so familiar to a genuine English ear, the Athenians would have said, what the god are you about? Hence the use of δαιμόνιε in Homer.
“The unrelenting old Alastor.”
Along with Sym. and Con. I retain the Greek word here, partly from the reason given in the previous note with regard to δαίμων, partly because the word is familiar to many poetical ears from Shelley’s poetry, partly, also, because I take care so to explain it in the context, that it cannot be misunderstood by the English reader. The Greek word ἀλάστωρ means an evil genius. Clement of Alexandria, in a passage quoted by Sym. (Protrept c. II.) classes the Alastors of the ancient tragedy with the Furies and other terrible ministers of heaven’s avenging justice. About the etymology of the word the lexicographers and critics are not agreed. Would there be any harm in connecting it with ἀλαστέω (Il. XII. 163), and ἐπαλαστέω (Odys. I. 252), so that it should signify an angry or wrathful spirit.
“Falling he fell, and dying died.”
I have here taken advantage of a Hebraism familiar, through the pages of the Bible, to the English ear, in order to give somewhat of the force of the fine alliteration in the original κάππεσε, κάτθανε. καὶ καταθάψομεν. In the next three lines I have filled up a blank in the text, by what must obviously have been the import of the lost lines, if, indeed, Paley, Klausen, and Con. are not rather right in not insisting on an exact response of stanza to stanza in the anapæstic systems of the musical dialogue.
“While great Jove lives.”