Chapter 16, The Trojan War
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♠ Aischylos, Palamedes fr 181 R – Tragicorum Graecorum Fragmenta 3, p. 295, ed. S. L. Radt. Göttingen 1985.
♠ Sophokles, Palamedes fr 479 R – Tragicorum Graecorum Fragmenta vol. 4, pp. 386-87, ed. S.L. Radt. Göttingen 1977.
♠ Sophokles, Nauplios Katapleon – Tragicorum Graecorum Fragmenta vol. 4, pp. 353-61, ed. S.L. Radt. Göttingen 1977.
♠ Servius, scholia at Vergil, Aeneid 2.81 – See below
♠ Euripides, Palamedes Fr 580 N² – Tragicorum Graecorum Fragmenta, pp. 543-44, ed. A. Nauck, 2nd ed. Leipzig 1889.
♠ Kypria – See Pausanias, Description of Greece 10.31.2
Palamedes, as I know from reading the epic poem Cypria, was drowned when he put out to catch fish, and his murderers were Diomedes and Odysseus. Greek Text
♠ Scholia to Euripides, Orestes 432 – See below
♠ Diktys Cretensis, Journal of the Trojan War 2.14-15
At the same time an oracle of the Pythian god was reported to us. We must, it said, choose Palamedes to offer a sacrifice to the Sminthian Apollo; we must all grant Palamedes this honor. Many of us were happy to obey this oracle, remembering the zeal and love Palamedes had shown throughout the army; but some of the leaders disliked him. Nevertheless, whatever our feelings, we did what was ordered and had Palamedes offer a hundred victims in behalf of all the army. Chryses, Apollo’s priest in this region, presided over the offering.
Meanwhile Alexander, having learned what was happening, gathered a force of armed men and came to prevent the sacrifice. But before he could reach the temple, the two Ajaxes killed a great number of his men and put him to flight.
Chryses (who, as we have said above, was the priest of Sminthian Apollo) feared harm from both armies and pretended to favour those from each side who approached him.
During the sacrifice, Philoctetes, who was standing in the temple near the altar, was suddenly bitten by a serpent. Everyone who saw what had happened raised a shout, and Ulysses rushed forward and slew the serpent. Soon afterwards we sent Philoctetes, with a few other men, to be cured of his poison on Lemnos, for the inhabitants of this island, which was sacred to Vulcan, claimed that their priests were wont to cure cases like his.
[15] During the same time Diomedes and Ulysses devised a plot to kill Palamedes.6 (It is characteristic of human nature to yield to resentments and envy; one does not easily allow oneself to be surpassed by a better.) Accordingly, these two, pretending to have found gold in a well, persuaded Palamedes – they wanted, they said, to share the treasure with him – to be the one to descend. He suspected nothing; and so, when no one else was nearby, they let him down by means of a rope, and then, picking up stones which were lying on around, they quickly stoned him to death. Thus Palamedes, the best of men and the army’s favourite, one whose counsel and courage had never failed, died in a way he ill deserved, treacherously slain by the most unworthy men. There were those who suspected Agamemnon of having shared in this plot, for Palamedes was very popular with the soldiers, most of whom wanted him as their king and openly said that he should be made commander-in-chief. After burning the body, a ceremony which was attended, like a public funeral, by all the Greeks, the ashes were placed in a golden urn. Latin Text
♠ Servius, scholia at Vergil, Aeneid 2.81 – Servii Grammatici qui feruntur in Vergilii Carmina commentarii: Aeneis, ed G. Thilo and H. Hagen, Vol. 1 pp. 230-31. Leipzig 1878
♠ Vatican Mythographer I 35 – Vatican Mythographers – Scriptores rerum mythicarum Latini tres Romae nuper reperti 1, p. 12, ed. G. H. Bode. Celle 1834.
♠ Vatican Mythographer II 200 – Vatican Mythographers – Scriptores rerum mythicarum Latini tres Romae nuper reperti 1, p. 12, ed. G. H. Bode. Celle 1834.
♠ Scholia at Euripides, Orestes 432 – Scholia in Euripidem, ed. E. Schwartz, vol. 1, pp. 147-49. Berlin 1887.
Edited by Elena Bianchelli, Retired Senior Lecturer of Classical Languages and Culture, Univ. of Georgia, January 2023
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