Epeisodion 4
Messenger
Ho there! Who is at the palace-gates? Open the door, summon Jocasta forth. Ho there! once again I call; in spite of this long delay,
come forth; listen, noble wife of Oedipus, cease your lamentation and your tears of woe.
1070
Jocasta
Surely you have not come, dear friend, with the sad news of Eteocles’ death, beside whose shield you have always marched, warding off from him the enemy’s darts?
What tidings are you here to bring me? Is my son alive or dead? Tell me.
1075
Messenger
He is alive, do not fear that, so that I may rid you of your terror.
Jocasta
Well? How is it with the seven towers that wall us in?
Messenger
They stand unshattered; the city is not plundered.
Jocasta
Have they been in jeopardy of the Argive spear?
1080
Messenger
Yes, on the very brink; but our Theban warriors proved stronger than Mycenae’s might.
Jocasta
One thing tell me, by the gods, if you know anything of Polyneices; for this too is my concern, if he is alive.
Messenger
As yet your sons are living, the pair of them.
1085
Jocasta
God bless you! How did you succeed in beating off from our gates the Argive army, when beleaguered? Tell me, so that I may go within and cheer the old blind man, since our city is still safe.
Messenger
After Creon’s son, who gave up his life for his country, had taken his stand on the turret’s top and plunged a dark-hilted sword through his throat to save this land, your son told off seven companies with their captains to the seven gates to keep watch on the Argive warriors,
1090
and stationed cavalry to cover cavalry, and infantry to support infantry, so that assistance might be close at hand for any weak point in the walls. Then from our lofty towers we saw the Argive army with their white shields leaving
1095
Teumesus, and, when near the trench, they charged up to our Theban city at a run. In one loud burst from their ranks and from our walls rang out the battle-cry and trumpet-call.
1100
First to the Neitian gate, Parthenopaeus, son of the huntress,
led a company bristling with thick rows of shields, and he had his own device in the centre of his shield: Atalanta slaying the Aetolian boar with an arrow shot from far. To the gates of Proetus
1105
came the prophet Amphiaraus, bringing the victims on a chariot; he had no boastful sign, but weapons chastely plain.
1110
Next lord Hippomedon came marching to the Ogygian gates with this device in the middle of his shield:
Argus the all-seeing dappled with eyes on the watch, some open with the rising stars, others hiding when they set, as could be seen after he was slain.
1115
At the Homoloian gates Tydeus had his post,
a lion’s skin with shaggy mane upon his shield, while the Titan Prometheus bore a torch in his right hand, to fire the town.
1120
Your own Polyneices led the battle against the Fountain gate; upon his shield for a device
were the colts of Potniae galloping at frantic speed, revolving by some clever contrivance on pivots by the handle, so as to appear distraught.
1125
At Electra’s gate Capaneus brought up his company, bold as Ares for the battle;
this device his shield bore upon its iron back: an earth-born giant carrying on his shoulders a whole city which he had wrenched from its base, a hint to us of the fate in store for Thebes.
1130
Adrastus was at the seventh gate;
a hundred vipers engraved on his shield, as he bore on his left arm the hydra the boast of Argos, and serpents were carrying off in their jaws the sons of Thebes from within our very walls. Now I was able to see each of them,
1135
as I carried the watch-word along to the leaders of our companies.
1140
To begin with, we fought with bows and thonged javelins, with slings that shoot from far and crashing stones; and as we were conquering, Tydeus and your son suddenly cried aloud:
