A True Story (2.20-2.23)

Hardly two or three days had passed before I went up to Homer the poet when we were both at leisure, and questioned him about everything. “Above all,” said I, “where do you come from? This point in particular is being investigated even yet at home.” “Iam not unaware,” said he, “that some think me a Chian, some a Smyrniote and many a Colophonian. As a matter of fact, I am a Babylonian, and among my fellow-countrymen my name was not Homer but Tigranes. Later on, when I was a hostage ‘(homeros) among the Greeks, I changed my name.” I went on to enquire whether the bracketed lines had been written by him, and he asserted that they were all his own: consequently I held the grammarians Zenodotus and Aristarchus guilty of pedantry in the highest degree. Since he had answered satisfactorily on these points, I next asked him why he began with the wrath of Achilles; and he said that it just came into his head that way, without any study. Moreover, I wanted to know whether he wrote the Odyssey before the Iliad, as most people say: he said no.

At about this time arrived Pythagoras of Samos who had undergone seven transformations, had lived in seven bodies and had now ended the migrations of his soul. All his right side was of gold. Judgment was pronounced that he should become a member of their community, but when I left the point was still at issue whether he ought to be called Pythagoras or Euphorbus. Empedocles came too, all burned and his body completely cooked, [*] but he was not received in spite of his many entreaties.

As time went on their games came round, the Games of the Dead. The referees were Achilles, serving for the fifth time, and Theseus for the seventh. The full details would make a long story, but I shall tell the principal things that they did. In wrestling the winner was Caranus, the descendant of Heracles, who defeated Odysseus for the championship. The boxing was a draw between Areius the Egyptian, who is buried at Corinth, and Epeius. For combined boxing and wrestling they offer no

Hardly had the games been concluded when word came that those who were under punishment in the place of the wicked had burst their bonds, had overpowered their guard, and were advancing on the island: that théy were under the leadership of Phalaris of Acragas, Busiris the Egyptian, Diomed of Thrace, and Sciron and Pityocamptes. When Rhadamanthus heard of this he mustered the heroes on the shore. They were led by Theseus, Achilles and Ajax, the son of Telamon, who by this time had recovered his wits. They engaged and fought, and the heroes won. Achilles contributed most to their success, but Socrates, who was stationed on the right wing, was brave, too—far more so than when’ he fought at - Delium in his lifetime. When four of the enemy came at him he did not run away or change countenance. For this they afterwards gave him a special reward, a beautiful great park in the suburbs, where he used to gather his comrades and dispute: he named the place the Academy of the Dead.