PISTHETAERUS. By Zeus, no! but I am hunting for fine, tasty words to break down the hardness of their hearts.—I grieve so much for you, who at one time were kings….
CHORUS. We kings! Over whom?
PISTHETAERUS. … of all that exists, firstly of me and of this man, even of Zeus himself. Your race is older than Saturn, the Titans and the Earth.
CHORUS. What, older than the Earth!
PISTHETAERUS. By Phoebus, yes.
CHORUS. By Zeus, but I never knew that before!
PISTHETAERUS. 'Tis because you are ignorant and heedless, and have never read your Aesop. 'Tis he who tells us that the lark was born before all other creatures, indeed before the Earth; his father died of sickness, but the Earth did not exist then; he remained unburied for five days, when the bird in its dilemma decided, for want of a better place, to entomb its father in its own head.
EUELPIDES. So that the lark's father is buried at Cephalae.[220]
EPOPS. Hence, if we existed before the Earth, before the gods, the kingship belongs to us by right of priority.
EUELPIDES. Undoubtedly, but sharpen your beak well; Zeus won't be in a hurry to hand over his sceptre to the woodpecker.