The Acharnians | Page 6

Jargon, no doubt meaningless in all languages.
AMBASSADOR Do you understand what he says?
DICAEOPOLIS By Apollo, not I!
AMBASSADOR (TO THE PRYTANES) He says that the Great King
will send you gold. Come, utter the word 'gold' louder and more
distinctly.
PSEUDARTABAS Thou shalt not have gold, thou gaping-arsed
Ionian.[1]
f[1] The Persians styled all Greeks 'Ionians' without distinction; here
the Athenians are intended.
DICAEOPOLIS Ah! may the gods forgive me, but that is clear enough!
AMBASSADOR What does he say?
DICAEOPOLIS That the Ionians are debauchees and idiots, if they
expect to receive gold from the barbarians.
AMBASSADOR Not so, he speaks of medimni[1] of gold.

f[1] A Greek measure, containing about six modii.
DICAEOPOLIS What medimni? Thou are but a great braggart; but get
your way; I will find out the truth by myself. Come now, answer me
clearly, if you do not wish me to dye your skin red. Will the Great King
send us gold? (PSEUDARTABAS MAKES A NEGATIVE SIGN.)
Then our ambassadors are seeking to deceive us? (PSEUDARTABAS
SIGNS AFFIRMATIVELY.) These fellows make signs like any Greek;
I am sure that they are nothing but Athenians. Oh! ho! I recognize one
of these eunuchs; it is Clisthenes, the son of Sibyrtius.[1] Behold the
effrontery of this shaven rump! How! great baboon, with such a beard
do you seek to play the eunuch to us? And this other one? Is it not
Straton?
f[1] Noted for his extreme ugliness and his obscenity. Aristophanes
frequently holds him to scorn in his comedies.
HERALD Silence! Let all be seated. The Senate invites the King's Eye
to the Prytaneum.[1]
f[1] Ambassadors were entertained there at the public expense.
DICAEOPOLIS Is this not sufficient to drive one to hang oneself?
Here I stand chilled to the bone, whilst the doors of the Prytaneum fly
wide open to lodge such rascals. But I will do something great and bold.
Where is Amphitheus? Come and speak with me.
AMPHITHEUS Here I am.
DICAEOPOLIS Take these eight drachmae and go and conclude a
truce with the Lacedaemonians for me, my wife and my children; I
leave you free, my dear citizens, to send out embassies and to stand
gaping in the air.
HERALD Bring in Theorus, who has returned from the Court of
Sitalces.[1]
f[1] King of Thrace.
THEORUS I am here.
DICAEOPOLIS Another humbug!
THEORUS We should not have remained long in Thrace...
DICAEOPOLIS Forsooth, no, if you had not been well paid.
THEORUS ...if the country had not been covered with snow; the rivers
were ice-bound at the time that Theognis[1] brought out his tragedy
here; during the whole of that time I was holding my own with Sitalces,
cup in hand; and, in truth, he adored you to such a degree, that he wrote

on the walls, "How beautiful are the Athenians!" His son, to whom we
gave the freedom of the city, burned with desire to come here and eat
chitterlings at the feast of the Apaturia;[2] he prayed his father to come
to the aid of his new country and Sitalces swore on his goblet that he
would succour us with such a host that the Athenians would exclaim,
"What a cloud of grasshoppers!"
f[1] The tragic poet. f[2] A feast lasting three days and celebrated
during the month Pyanepsion (November). The Greek word contains
the suggestion of fraud.
DICAEOPOLIS May I die if I believe a word of what you tell us!
Excepting the grasshoppers, there is not a grain of truth in it all!
THEORUS And he has sent you the most warlike soldiers of all
Thrace.
DICAEOPOLIS Now we shall begin to see clearly.
HERALD Come hither, Thracians, whom Theorus brought.
DICAEOPOLIS What plague have we here?
THEORUS 'Tis the host of the Odomanti.[1]
f[1] A Thracian tribe from the right bank of the Strymon.
DICAEOPOLIS Of the Odomanti? Tell me what it means. Who has
mutilated them like this?
THEORUS If they are given a wage of two drachmae, they will put all
Boeotia[1] to fire and sword.
f[1] The Boeotians were the allies of Sparta.
DICAEOPOLIS Two drachmae to those circumcised hounds! Groan
aloud, ye people of rowers, bulwark of Athens! Ah! great gods! I am
undone; these Odomanti are robbing me of my garlic![1] Will you give
me back my garlic?
f[1] Dicaeopolis had brought a clove of garlic with him to eat during
the Assembly.
THEORUS Oh! wretched man! do not go near them; they have eaten
garlic[1].
f[1] Garlic was given to game-cocks, before setting them at each other,
to give them pluck for the fight.
DICAEOPOLIS Prytanes, will you let me be treated in this manner, in
my own country and by barbarians? But I oppose the discussion of
paying a wage to the Thracians; I announce an omen; I