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Perry 4: Hawk and Nightingale

I've decided to use del.icio.us tags, with "aesopus" as the username, to make it easier to keep track of the different types of fables. When you click on the links below, you will be taken to the latest listings at del.icio.us of the relevant materials. In Perry 567 there is a story about a hawk who has caught the nightingale's chicks and tells her she has to sing if she wants to save them.

Perry 004: all items

Perry 004: Latin texts

Perry 004: English translations

Perry 004: illustrations

You will also find additional Latin versions not yet cited in del.icio.us - check the various Latin texts at this wiki which you will find listed on the HOME page.

Here is the latest RSS FEED from del.icio.us for this fable:

NOTE ABOUT HESIOD: There is already a famous story about the hawk and the nightingale in Hesiod's Works and Days: (ll. 202-211) And now I will tell a fable for princes who themselves understand. Thus said the hawk to the nightingale with speckled neck, while he carried her high up among the clouds, gripped fast in his talons, and she, pierced by his crooked talons, cried pitifully. To her he spoke disdainfully: `Miserable thing, why do you cry out? One far stronger than you now holds you fast, and you must go wherever I take you, songstress as you are. And if I please I will make my meal of you, or let you go. He is a fool who tries to withstand the stronger, for he does not get the mastery and suffers pain besides his shame.' So said the swiftly flying hawk, the long- winged bird.

In Greek:

νῦν δ᾽ αἶνον βασιλεῦσιν ἐρέω φρονέουσι καὶ αὐτοῖς·

ὧδ᾽ ἴρηξ προσέειπεν ἀηδόνα ποικιλόδειρον

ὕψι μάλ᾽ ἐν νεφέεσσι φέρων, ὀνύχεσσι μεμαρπώς·

ἡ δ᾽ ἐλεόν, γναμπτοῖσι πεπαρμένη ἀμφ᾽ ὀνύχεσσι,

μύρετο· τὴν ὅ γ᾽ ἐπικρατέως πρὸς μῦθον ἔειπεν·

<δαιμονίη, τί λέληκας; ἔχει νύ σε πολλὸν ἀρείων·

τῆι δ᾽ εἶς, ἧι σ᾽ ἂν ἐγώ περ ἄγω καὶ ἀοιδὸν ἐοῦσαν·

δεῖπνον δ᾽, αἴ κ᾽ ἐθέλω, ποιήσομαι ἠὲ μεθήσω.

ἄφρων δ᾽, ὅς κ᾽ ἐθέληι πρὸς κρείσσονας ἀντιφερίζειν·

νίκης τε στέρεται πρός τ᾽ αἴσχεσιν ἄλγεα πάσχει.>

ὣς ἔφατ᾽ ὠκυπέτης ἴρηξ, τανυσίπτερος ὄρνις.