Sophocles, Ajax — Greek text with English translation

AthenaAlways, son of Laertes, have I observed you on the prowl to snatch some means of attack against your enemies. So now at the tent of Ajax by the ships where he has his post at the camp’s outer edge, I watch you for a long time as you hunt and scan his newly pressed tracks, in order to see whether he is inside or away. Your course leads you well to your goal, like that of a keen-scenting Laconian hound. For the man has just now gone in, with sweat dripping from his head and from his hands that have killed with the sword. There is no further need for you to peer inside these doors. Rather tell me what your goal is that you have shown such eagerness for, so that you may learn from her who holds the knowledge.

OdysseusVoice of Athena, dearest to me of the gods, how clearly, though you are unseen, do I hear your call and snatch its meaning in my mind, just as I would the bronze tongue of the Tyrrhenian trumpet! And now you have discerned correctly that I am circling my path on the track of a man who hates me, Ajax the shield-bearer. It is he and no other that I have been tracking so long. For tonight he has done us a deed beyond comprehension—if he is indeed the doer. We know nothing for certain, but drift in doubt. And so I of my of accord took up the burden of this search. For we recently found all the cattle, our plunder, dead—yes, slaughtered by human hand—and with them the guardians of the flocks. Now, all men lay responsibility for this crime to him. And further, a scout who had seen him bounding alone over the plain with a newly-wet sword reported to me and declared what he saw. Then immediately I rush upon his track, and sometimes I follow his signs, but sometimes I am bewildered, and cannot read whose they are. Your arrival is timely, for truly in all matters, both those of the past and those of the future, it is your hand that steers me.

AthenaI know it, Odysseus, and some time ago I came on the path as a lookout friendly to your hunt.

OdysseusAnd so, dear mistress, do I toil to good effect?

AthenaKnow that that man is the doer of these deeds.

OdysseusThen to what end did he thrust his hand so senselessly?

AthenaHe was mad with anger over the arms of Achilles.

OdysseusWhy, then, his onslaught upon the flocks?

AthenaIt was in your blood, he thought, that he was staining his hand.

OdysseusThen was this a plot aimed against the Greeks?

AthenaYes, and he would have accomplished it, too, had I not been attentive.

OdysseusAnd what reckless boldness was in his mind that he dared this?

AthenaUnder night’s cover he set out against you, by stealth and alone.

OdysseusAnd did he get near us? Did he reach his goal?

AthenaHe was already at the double doors of the two generals.

OdysseusHow, then, did he restrain his hand when it was eager for murder?

AthenaIt was I who prevented him, by casting over his eyes oppressive notions of his fatal joy, and I who turned his fury aside on the flocks of sheep and the confused droves guarded by herdsmen, the spoil which you had not yet divided. Then he fell upon them and kept cutting out a slaughter of many horned beasts as he split their spines in a circle around him. At one time he thought that he was killing the two Atreidae, holding them in his very hand; at another time it was this commander, and at another that one which he attacked. And I, while the man ran about in diseased frenzy, I kept urging him on, kept hurling him into the snares of doom. Soon, when he rested from this toil, he bound together the living oxen along with all the sheep and brought them home, as though his quarry were men, not well-horned cattle. And now he abuses them, bound together, in the house. But to you also will I show this madness openly, so that when you have seen it you may proclaim it to all the Argives. Be of good courage and stand your ground, and do not regard the man as a cause of disaster for you. I will turn away the beams of his eyes and keep them from landing on your face. (To Ajax.) You there, you who bind back your captive’s arms, I am calling you, come here! I am calling Ajax! Come out in front of the house!