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Athena now put it in
Penelope's mind to make the suitors try their skill with the bow
and with the iron axes, in contest among themselves, as a means of
bringing about their destruction. She went upstairs and got the store
room key, which was made of bronze and had a handle of ivory; she
then went with her maidens into the store room at the end of the
house, where her husband's treasures of gold, bronze, and
wrought iron were kept, and where was also his bow, and the quiver
full of deadly arrows that had been given him by a friend whom he had
met in Lacedaemon - Iphitos the son of Eurytos. The two fell in with
one another in Messene at the house of Ortilokhos, where Odysseus was
staying in order to recover a debt that was owing from the whole
dêmos; for the Messenians had carried off three hundred
sheep from Ithaca, and had sailed away with them and with their
shepherds. In quest of these Odysseus took a long journey while still
quite young, for his father and the other chieftains sent him on a
mission to recover them. Iphitos had gone there also to try and get
back twelve brood mares that he had lost, and the mule foals that
were running with them. These mares were the death of him in the end,
for when he went to the house of Zeus’ son, mighty Herakles, who
performed such prodigies of valor, Herakles to his shame killed him,
though he was his guest, for he feared not heaven's vengeance,
nor yet respected his own table which he had set before Iphitos, but
killed him in spite of everything, and kept the mares himself. It was
when claiming these that Iphitos met Odysseus, and gave him the bow
which mighty Eurytos had been used to carry, and which on his death
had been left by him to his son. Odysseus gave him in return a sword
and a spear, and this was the beginning of a fast friendship,
although they never visited at one another's houses, for
Zeus’ son Herakles killed Iphitos ere they could do so. This
bow, then, given him by Iphitos, had not been taken with him by
Odysseus when he sailed for Troy; he had used it so long as he had
been at home, but had left it behind as having been a keepsake from a
valued friend.
Penelope presently reached the oak
threshold of the store room; the carpenter had planed this duly, and
had drawn a line on it so as to get it quite straight; he had then
set the door posts into it and hung the doors. She loosed the strap
from the handle of the door, put in the key, and drove it straight
home to shoot back the bolts that held the doors; these flew open
with a noise like a bull bellowing in a meadow, and Penelope stepped
upon the raised platform, where the chests stood in which the fair
linen and clothes were laid by along with fragrant herbs: reaching
thence, she took down the bow with its bow case from the peg on which
it hung. She sat down with it on her knees, weeping bitterly as she
took the bow out of its case, and when her tears had relieved her,
she went to the room where the suitors were, carrying the bow and the
quiver, with the many deadly arrows that were inside it. Along with
her came her maidens, bearing a chest that contained much iron and
bronze which her husband had won as prizes. When she reached the
suitors, she stood by one of the bearing-posts supporting the roof of
the room, holding a veil before her face, and with a maid on either
side of her. Then she said:
"Listen to me you suitors, who
persist in abusing the hospitality of this house because its owner
has been long absent, and without other pretext than that you want to
marry me; this, then, being the prize that you are contending for, I
will bring out the mighty bow of Odysseus, and whomsoever of you
shall string it most easily and send his arrow through each one of
twelve axes, him will I follow and quit this house of my lawful
husband, so goodly, and so abounding in wealth. But even so I doubt
not that I shall remember it in my dreams."
As she spoke, she told Eumaios to
set the bow and the pieces of iron before the suitors, and Eumaios
wept as he took them to do as she had bidden him. Hard by, the
stockman wept also when he saw his master's bow, but Antinoos
scolded them. "You country louts," said he, "silly simpletons; why
should you add to the sorrows of your mistress by crying in this way?
She has enough to grieve her in the loss of her husband; sit still,
therefore, and eat your dinners in silence, or go outside if you want
to cry, and leave the bow behind you. We suitors shall have to
contend [athlos] for it with might and main, for we
shall find it no light matter to string such a bow as this is. There
is not a man of us all who is such another as Odysseus; for I have
seen him and remember him, though I was then only a
child."
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