Sappho Criticizes Her Brother

Recently two as yet unknown poems by Sappho were discovered, one of which, btw, confirms our man Herodotus — the father of prose — as a better historian than he is usually given credit for by the champions of Thucydides (i.e. historians in the employ of the state that won.) Indeed, Herodotus spoke of the so-called “brother poem” a poem in which Sappho criticized her brother Charaxos or his mistress, which is one of the two poems just discovered & readable for the first time. “Readable” — if you have ancient Greek: the one English translation I have seen so far doesn’t really cut the mustard. It is given in a TLS blog piece by Dirk Obbink that does  offer a fair amount of context for the two poems — to read it, click here. I’ll just reproduce the Greek below & maybe someone will propose a better translation & send it to me?

 The Brothers Poem

[. . .]

ἀλλ’ ἄϊ θρύλησθα Χάραξον ἔλθην
νᾶϊ σὺν πλήαι. τὰ μέν οἴομαι Ζεῦς
οἶδε σύμπαντές τε θέοι· σὲ δ᾽οὐ χρῆ
ταῦτα νόησθαι,

ἀλλὰ καὶ πέμπην ἔμε καὶ κέλεσθαι
πόλλα λίσσεσθαι βασίληαν Ἤραν
ἐξίκεσθαι τυίδε σάαν ἄγοντα
νᾶα Χάραξον

κἄμμ’ ἐπεύρην ἀρτέμεας. τὰ δ’ ἄλλα
πάντα δαιμόνεσσιν ἐπιτρόπωμεν·
εὐδίαι γὰρ ἐκ μεγάλαν ἀήταν
αἶψα πέλονται.

τῶν κε βόλληται βασίλευς Ὀλύμπω
δαίμον’ ἐκ πόνων ἐπάρωγον ἤδη
περτρόπην, κῆνοι μάκαρες πέλονται
καὶ πολύολβοι·

κἄμμες, αἴ κε τὰν κεφάλαν ἀέρρη
Λάριχος καὶ δή ποτ᾽ ἄνηρ γένηται,
καὶ μάλ’ ἐκ πόλλαν βαρυθυμίαν κεν
αἶψα λύθειμεν.

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