Morning all! I've been revising "Somnus" by Statius (from Thebaid X) and have been struck by just how damn gorgeous it is that I had to share it. Sucks, of course, to be reading an effective poem about sleeping when you need to be wide awake and working, but it's just lovely.

Here's the Latin:

stat super occiduae nebulosa cubilia Noctis
Aethiopasque alios, nulli penetrabilis astro,
lucus iners, subterque cauis graue rupibus antrum
it uacuum in montem, qua desidis atria Somni
securumque larem segnis Natura locauit.
limen opaca Quies et pigra Obliuio seruant
et numquam uigili torpens Ignauia uultu.
Otia uestibulo pressisque Silentia pennis
muta sedent abiguntque truces a culmine uentos
et ramos errare uetant et murmura demunt alitibus.
non hic pelagi, licet omnia clament
litora, non ullus caeli fragor; ipse profundis
uallibus effugiens speluncae proximus amnis
saxa inter scopulosque tacet: nigrantia circum
armenta omne solo recubat pecus, et noua marcent
germina, terrarumque inclinat spiritus herbas.
mille intus simulacra dei caelauerat ardens
Mulciber: hic haeret lateri redimita Voluptas,
hic comes in requiem uergens Labor, est ubi Baccho,
est ubi Martigenae socium puluinar Amori
obtinet. interius tecti in penetralibus altis
et cum Morte iacet, nullique ea tristis imago
cernitur. hae species. ipse autem umentia subter
antra soporifero stipatos flore tapetas
incubat; exhalant uestes et corpore pigrostrata calent,
supraque torum niger efflat anhelo
ore uapor; manus haec fusos a tempore laeuo
sustentat crines, haec cornu oblita remisit.
adsunt innumero circum uaga Somnia uultu,
uera simul falsis permixtaque ~flumina flammis~
Noctis opaca cohors, trabibusque ac postibus haerent,
aut tellure iacent. tenuis, qui circuit aulam,
inualidusque nitor, primosque hortantia somnos
languida succiduis expirant lumina flammis.

It describes first the home of Sleep, set in a hollow cave beneath the home of Night, then the guardians of the gates - and the description enters further and further until it reaches Sleep himself, drowsing on a gorgeous couch.

I'm working on a proper translation, because I think Vapitreem in particular will think it's ace. But I'm as slow working a poet as I am an artist, musician or author, so it may not see the (rosy fingered) light of day for a few months.

Proper translation is important - take "Mulciber ardens", describing the star Mulciber. "Ardens" means burning with love, burning with glory, with ambition, glowing outstanding and fierce - but "simply burning Mulciber" gives him all the bathos of an overheated bit of toast. Even "ardent Mulciber", which is closer to the meaning, is further from the poetry. Its not just glowing a little bit - ardens is really, really bright. A silmaril would be ardens. All in the way a Roman would say "Hiroshima, Auswitz, Pearl Harbour - well they're place names. Aren't they?"

At the same time, you want to keep the rhythm, the pace, the shape of the original - which in Roman terms, is a futatrix because word order is so flexible. In first year Latin, you will be told word order is "subject, object, verb". What they don't tell you is once you progress from first year Latin and into the world of genuine classical texts, you will never ever see this order ever again. Caesar - usually - does it, but he's the great exception. If you reread the poem above, the subject of the first sentence - lucus iners - is actually three lines from the start. I suppose to Roman ears it'd be the equivalent of talking like Dr Seuss all the time, but it does make translation harder.

Roman poets could, with far more freedom than ours, shove any word they liked at the start or end of a sentence to emphasise it, or rearrange them to make rhythm or alliteration work better.

at clipeum, tot ferri terga, tot aeris, quem pellis totiens obeat circumdata tauri, uibranti cuspis medium transuerberat ictu loricaeque moras et pectus perforat ingens.

This is the moment Turnus throws a spear at young hero Pallas in the Aeneid's climactic three-book battle. We've already had a few pages of boasting, taunting, prayers to gods and all the things a Classic hero does before attacking. Turnus has just said "Now see if my spear is better than yours!", and this is the descrption of it flying through the air at Pallas.

Semi-literal translation: but the shield (so many layers of iron, so many of leather), which many times was wrapped around with the skin of a bull - the vibrating point of the speartip passed through the middle of it, and through the delay of the breastplate - and pierced the great chest.

Watch how Virgil just piles up the adjectives as he describes literally everything about the spear's journey, keeping the audience on tenterhooks till the final moment to tell them what they want to know - is Pallas gonna be OK? The answer, by the way, is a big fat no - no one survives being hit in the chest in the Classical world, and the forthcoming deathscene is both hideously bloody and very upsetting. Pallas, along with Lausus and ultimately Turnus himself, is one of the many people in that epic who do not deserve to be killed.

Word painting is my favourite trick in their handbook. See:

nunc media Aenean secum per moenia ducit

Translation: now she leads Aeneas with her through the middle of the walls

But literally: now middle Aeneas with her through the walls she leads.

I've highlighted some words to demonstrate how Virgil places Aeneas and Dido literally between the words meaning "through the middle of the walls". He also uses this trick in the battle scenes when single heroes are surrounded by crowds with spears. See above "pectus peforat ingens" - chest it pierced great, i.e. it pierced the great chest. It is always effective. In English, you simply can't get close.

I stand by Seamus Heaney's Book of the Year award for Beowulf. Sure, he didn't write the story. But what he did do is arguably twice as challenging.

Until then, I leave you my perfectly literal translation - with the challenge for anyone reading it to also attempt an artistic, poetic English rendition for me to enjoy. I'll happily contribute help about the exact meaning of Latin words e.t.c. if anyone wanted to attempt it. The passage certainly deserves the treatment, as it sounds stupid rendered straight. So here's the best I can do for this evening:


"Motionless light stands above the cloudy beds of western Night and the Aethop's other realm - penetratable by no star - and beneath gloomy, hollow rocks lies a cave in the empty mountain, where sluggish Nature has placed the halls and untroubled hearth of Sleep.

Dusky Quiet and dull Oblivion guard the doorposts, and sluggish Forgetfulness whose countenance is never awake. Leisure and Silence sit mute in the forecourt with folded wings, and drive grim winds from the roof, and prevent the branchs from swaying, and supress the murmurs from the birds. Not here is the din of the sea - though all the shores roar - not ere is an sound of the sky. The fast flowing torrent itself rushing beside the cave in the deep valley among the cliffs and rocks - is silent: the sheep in black herds round about recline one and all, and new buds wither, and the air makes the grass droop.

Burning Mulciber (*le sigh...*) composes a thousand images of the god within - here Pleasure crowned with garlands sticks to his side, here Labour as a companion drooping in rest. Sometimes the couch holds the company of Bacchus, sometimes of Love son of Mars. Further in - in the innermost retreat of the palace - he lies also with Death, and that sad image is percieved by no one.

All these are images: he himself however slumbers beneath the humid cave on coverlets crammed with drowsy flowers; his clothes reek (*i.e. with perfume*), and the blankets are warm with his unwilling body - from his breathing mouth, black heat exhales above the bed - this hand holds his hair from his left temple, the other lets drop the forgetful horn (*reference to something or other*)

Wandering dreams with innmerable shapes are present with truth mixed in with lies all at once - water with fire - the shady cohorts of Night stick to the beams and doorposts, or lie on the ground. Weak and unreal glow, which surrounds the house, encouraging first sleep - languid light with flame prone to falling."

Now isn't that just wonderful?