Kitap 15
Relate, O Muses, guardian deities
622
of poets (for you know, and the remote
antiquity conceals it not from you),
the reason why an island, which the deep stream
of Tiber closed about, has introduced
Coronis' child among the deities
guarding the city of famed Romulus.
A dire contagion had infested long
the Latin air, and men's pale bodies were
deformed by a consumption that dried up
the blood. When, frightened by so many deaths,
they found all mortal efforts could avail
them nothing, and physicians' skill had no
effect, they sought the aid of heaven. They sent
envoys to Delphi center of the world,
and they entreated Phoebus to give aid
in their distress, and by response renew
their wasting lives and end a city's woe.
While ground, and laurels and the quivers which
the god hung there all shook, the tripod gave
this answer from the deep recesses hid
within the shrine, and stirred with trembling their
“What you are seeking here,
O Romans, you should seek for nearer you.
Then seek it nearer, for you do not need
Apollo to relieve your wasting plague,
you need Apollo's son. Go then to him
with a good omen and invite his aid.”
After the prudent Senate had received
Phoebus Apollo's words, they took much pains
to learn what town the son of Phoebus might
inhabit. They despatched ambassadors
under full sail to the coast of Epidaurus.
When the curved ships had touched the shore, these men
in haste went to the Grecian elders there
and prayed that Rome might have the deity
whose presence would drive out the mortal ill
from their Ausonian nation; for they knew
response unerring had directed them.
