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Link to an image of this page  Link to an image of this page  [Ddd2r f394r as 392]

IUSTA VINDICTA.

Just recompense

Emblema 170.

Cyclops being stabbed in the eye.
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Dum[1] residet Cyclops sinuosi in faucibus antri,
Haec secum teneras concinit inter oves:
Pascite vos herbas, sociis ego pascar Achivis,
Postremumque Utin viscera nostra ferent.
Audiit haec Itachus, Cyclopaque lumine cassum
Reddidit, en paenas ut suus auctor habet[2]?[3]

Sitting in the mouth of his arching cave, the Cyclops sang thus to himself amidst his gentle sheep: Do you feed on grass; I shall feed on the Greek companions, and last of all my belly shall get No-man. The man from Ithaca heard this and made the Cyclops eyeless. See how the one who plotted misfortune collects it himself!

Notes:

1.  Corrected from the Errata.

2.  A proverbial sentiment: cf. Erasmus, Adagia 3091, Di tibi dent tuam mentem.

3.  For the story of Ulysses (the man from Ithaca) in the Cyclops’ cave and his escape by blinding the Cyclops, see Homer, Odyssey 9.177 ff. Ulysses had told the Cyclops his name was No-man. (Utis l. 4).

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Link to an image of this page  Link to an image of this page  [Zz1v p722]

Iusta ultio.

Just revenge

EMBLEMA CLXXIII.

A bird on the branch of a tree holding a scorpion in its beak.
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Raptabat volucres captum pede corvus in auras
Scorpion, audaci praemia parta gulae.
Ast ille infuso sensim per membra veneno,
Raptorem in Stygias compulit ultor aquas.
O risu res digna: aliis qui fata parabat,
Ipse perit, propriis succubuitque dolis.[1]

A raven was carrying off into the flying winds a scorpion gripped in its talons, a prize won for its audacious gullet. But the scorpion, injecting its poison drop by drop through the raven’s limbs, despatched the predator to the waters of the Styx and so took its revenge. - What a laughable thing! The one who was preparing death for others himself perishes and has succumbed to his own wiles.

Notes:

1.  This is a fairly free translation of Anthologia graeca 9.339. See Erasmus, Adagia 58, Cornix scorpium, where the Greek epigram is again translated.

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