you happen to be winged, I too get ahead of you with another wing. Thus are the nuptials of Pasithea to Hypnos. Eros indeed keeps watch; the theft of the wing is a pledge by Hera for this. And what wonder if Hera received this too from the Graces. For she also borrowed the cestus-girdles from Aphrodite. If, then, you recognized the creature from the symbols (for it is not set forth obscurely or with difficulty), you might perhaps be praised; but if not, you will find it lying at the end in pentagon 9, at the signs of the means of the Lydian enharmonic mode [it is among the last ones], a pi and a sigma turned away. 1.18 Against an Elephant Battle. The ancients considered elephants a great benefit in battles, to startle horses unaccustomed to the first sight of them and men, and having equipped them with towers to be a source of fear, as if a wall were walking before the phalanx. The trumpeting is sharp and the charge unbearable. For their tusks are in other respects sufficient for the overthrow of any crowd, and they also fitted them with spear-points analogous to their size, and they protected most of them with broad breastplates, and they also gave javelins to the beasts to throw with their trunk. It was a portable phalanx, an image of all kinds of advantageous warfare; on the one hand, the discharge of missiles from above by many skillful men, on the other, what was at their feet was unconquerable; and ahead, indeed, were the routs of the enemy; the battle was not on equal terms; one had to fight against the elephant as if against a wall. And the crowds, being overthrown, since the shield-wall was always broken, offered their dissolved rank easily to the enemy for destruction, just as if, when a bronze-beaked ship has been broken by the slightest ramming of a trireme, the whole raging sea broke it apart. Who will withstand the rush of a crumbling cliff? A fighting elephant is the image of a mountain; it overthrows [yielding], strikes down, breaks, destroys, but it is not disdainful even of one who is lying down, in the manner of noble beasts; and having seized with its trunk both horse and man and chariot and having brought them down with force and having turned them around, it drags them to its feet; and pressing down with its knees, it crushes them, being sensible of its own weight anyway, but then even heavier from the addition of the towers, so that one is not crushed by a single elephant, but is destroyed by a great combination of weight. How might one defend against a beast difficult to fight, armed both with many natural advantages and with the arts of men? It overthrows the one standing, overtakes the one fleeing, crushes the one fallen, terrifies the horseman, strikes the charioteers from its tower. First, then, one must set light javelin-throwers and archers against them <and> no longer station cavalry opposite them, so that the army is not thrown into confusion by the <fear> of the horses from their unfamiliarity; and the trumpeters should blow a fearsome blast, so that the clang of the instrument, opposing the beast's roar, blunts the threat. Let the peltasts, then, aim at the elephant, using a target that cannot be missed, and let the archers shoot fire-bearing arrows at the towers. For any missile that strikes home is sufficient for the destruction of the whole thing; for the beast, sensing the flame and fearing the danger of the fire, will shake off the battlements placed upon it, and one might compare the falling tower to a sacked city. But if it is wounded itself in its bare parts, it at once fears the enemy, but turning upon its friends, it rages more fiercely. For like a mountain flame or a rushing torrent, [or] being enraged, it thus especially kills, wounds, slays, casts down, tramples, and it hates the very dead, heaps up corpses and blocks the paths of those who flee, as if taking vengeance on its friends because it has suffered these things on their account. I, however, think it better not to resist the elephant at the beginning, nor to go close to the multiplied danger, but to anticipate its threats, its charges, its battles, its fallings; for having been surrounded and having fallen, it will destroy many. Caltrops are forged of iron, sharp, stable, thick. These, along the path of the beasts, are thrown in dense numbers by those feigning retreat [they stand within], and having been trodden on they stop the elephant, penetrating the hides of its feet; for by the very weight with which it tramples other things, by this it is itself caught, treading with its whole body.
πτερόεις τυγχάνεις, προλαμβάνω σε κἀγὼ ἄλλῳ πτερῷ. Οὕτως οἱ Πασιθέας πρὸς Ὕπνον γάμοι. Ἀγρυπνοῦσι μὲν ὁ Ἔρως· ἐγγύη δὲ ὑπὸ Ἥρατούτου ἡ κλοπὴ τοῦ πτεροῦ. Τί δὲ θαῦμα εἰ καὶ τοῦτο παρὰ Χαρί των ἔλαβεν ἡ Ἥρα. Καὶ γὰρ παρὰ τῆς Ἀφροδίτης τοὺς κεστοὺς ἐδανείσατο. Εἰ μὲν οὖν ἐπέγνως ἐκ συμβόλων τὸ ζῷον (οὐ γὰρ ἀσαφῶς ἢ δυσλήπτως ἔκκειται), τάχα ἐπαινοῖο· εἰ δ' οὖν, ἐπὶ τέλει κείμενον εὑρήσεις ἐν πενταγώνῳ θʹ, πρὸς σημείοις μέσων ἐναρμονίου τρόπου τοῦ Λυδίου [πρὸς τοῖς τελευταίοις δ' ἐστίν], πῖ καὶ σίγμα ἀπεστραμμένον. 1.18 Πρὸς ἐλεφάντων μάχην Μέγα ὄφελος ἐνόμιζον ἐς τὰς μάχας τοὺς ἐλέφαντας οἱ παλαιοί, ἵππους ἀήθεις τῷ θεάματι πρώτῳ καὶ ἄνδρας ἐκπλῆξαι, αὐτούς τε πυργώσαντες φόβον εἶναι, ὡσανεὶ πρὸ τῆς φάλαγγος τείχους βαδίζοντος. Κλαγγή τ' ὀξεῖα καὶ ἀφόρητος ἡ ἐμβολή. Αὐτάρκη μὲν γὰρ καὶ ἄλλως τὰ κέρατα ἐς παντὸς ἀνατροπὴν ὄχλου, τοῖς δὲ καὶ ἐφήρμοζον ἀναλόγους πρὸς τὸ μέγεθος αἰχμάς, τά τε πλεῖστα πλατέσι παρέφραττον θώραξιν, ἐδίδοσαν δὲ καὶ ἀκόντια τοῖς θηρίοις τῇ προνομαίᾳ βαλεῖν. Φάλαγξ ἦν φορητή, παντοία πολέμου πλεονεκτοῦντος εἰκών· ὑπερδεξίων μὲν ἀνδρῶν ἄνωθε πολλῶν ἀφέσεις βελῶν, τὰ δ' ἐν ποσὶν ἀκαταμάχητα· καὶ πρόσω γε φυγαὶ πολέμιαι· οὐκ ἐξ ἰσοτιμίας ἡ μάχη· πρὸς τὸν ἐλέφαντα τειχομαχῆσαι ἔδει. Ἀνατραπέντες δὲ οἱ ὄχλοι, ἀεὶ ῥαγέντος τοῦ συνασπισμοῦ, εὔκολον παρεῖχον εἰς ὄλεθρον τὴν λελυμένην τοῖς ἐναντίοις τάξιν, ὥσπερ ἂν εἰ ῥαγείσης νεὼς χαλκοστόμου τριήρους ἐμβολῇ ὀλιγίστῃ τὸ πᾶν τραχυνθεὶς ὁ κλύδων διέλυσε. Τίς ὑποστήσεται κρημνοῦ ῥαγέντος φοράν; Μάχιμος ἐλέφας ὄρους ἐστὶν εἰκών· ἀνατρέπει [εἴκων], καταβάλλει, ῥήγνυσι, διαφθείρει, οὐχ ὑπερηφανεῖ δὲ οὐδὲ τὸν κείμενον, θηρίων τρόπον εὐγενῶν· σπασάμενος δὲ τῇ προνομαίᾳ καὶ [τὸν] ἵππον καὶ ἄνδρα καὶ ἅρμα καὶ κατενεγκὼν βίᾳ καὶ περιτρέψας ἄχρι τῶν αὑτοῦ ποδῶν σύρει· καὶ τοῖς γόνασιν ἐπερεισάμενος, συντρίβει μὲν καὶ ἄλλως τοῦ οἰκείου ἄχθους ᾐσθημένος, τότε δὲ καὶ βαρύτερος τῇ τῶν πύργων ἐπιθήκῃ, ὥστ' οὐχ ὑφ' ἑνός τις ἐλέφαντος θλίβεται, ἀλλὰ πολλῇ βαρύτητος συμβολῇ φθείρεται. Πῶς ἀμύνηταί τις θηρίον δύσμαχον πολλοῖς τε τοῖς ἐκ φύσεως πλεονεκτήμασι καὶ ταῖς τῶν ἀνθρώπων τέχναις καθωπλισμένον; Ἀνατρέπει τὸν ἑστηκότα, τὸν φεύγοντα καταλαμβάνει, τὸν πεσόντα συντρίβει, τὸν ἱππέα ἐκφοβεῖ, τοὺς ἁρματηλάτας πυργόθεν βάλλει. Πρῶτον μὲν οὖν κούφους ἀκοντιστάς τε καὶ τοξότας ἀνθιστάνειν χρὴ <καὶ> μηκέτι κατ' αὐτοὺς ἱππικὸν τάττειν, ὡς μὴ συνταράττεσθαι τὸ στράτευμα τῷ τῶν ἵππων ἐκ τῆς ἀηθείας <φόβῳ>· φοβερὸν δὲ τοὺς σαλπιγκτὰς ἐμβοᾶν, ὡς τοῦ θηρίου ῥοίζῳ τὴν τοῦ ὀργάνου κλαγγὴν ἀνθισταμένην ἀμβλύνειν τὴν ἀπειλήν. Οἱ πελτασταὶ μὲν οὖν ἐπὶ τὸν ἐλέφαντα στοχαζέσθωσαν, οὐκ ἀστοχήτῳ χρώμενοι τῷ σκοπῷ, οἱ τοξόται δὲ οἰστοὺς πυρφόρους ἐπὶ τοὺς πύργους βαλλέτωσαν. Ἐμπαγὲν γὰρ τὸ τυχὸν βέλος ἐς τὸν τοῦ παντὸς ὄλεθρον ἀρκεῖ· τῆς γὰρ φλογὸς αἰσθόμενον τὸ θηρίον καὶ τὸν κίνδυνον τοῦ πυρὸς φοβηθέν, τὰς ἐπικειμένας ἐπάλξεις ἀποσείεται, κἂν ἀπεικάσαι τις πίπτοντα πύργον πόλει πεπορθημένῃ. Ἂν δὲ αὐτὸς ἐς τὰ γυμνὰ τρωθῇ, δέδοικε μὲν ἤδη τοὺς πολεμίους, ἐς δὲ τοὺς φίλους τραπεὶς χαλεπώτερον μαίνεται. Οἷα γὰρ φλὸξ ὄρειος ἢ χειμάρρους κατάντης, [ἢ] ὀργιζόμενος οὕτως μάλιστα κτείνει, τιτρώσκει, ἀναιρεῖ, καταβάλλει, πατεῖ, καὶ αὐτοὺς μισεῖ τοὺς νεκρούς, σωρεύει πτώματα καὶ φράττει τὰς τῶν φευγόντων ὁδούς, ὥσπερ ἀμυνόμενος τοὺς φίλους ὅτι ταῦτα δι' ἐκείνους πέπονθεν. Ἐγὼ μέντοι κρεῖττον ἡγοῦμαι τὴν ἀρχὴν τῷ ἐλέφαντι μὴ ἐνστῆναι, μηδὲ ὁμόσε χωρῆσαι τῷ πολυπλασιασθέντι κινδύνῳ, προλαβεῖν δὲ αὐτοῦ τὰς ἀπειλάς, τὰς ἐμβολάς, τὰς μάχας, τὰ πεσήματα· πολλοὺς γὰρ ἀναλώσει κυκλωθεὶς καὶ πεσών. Τρίβολοι χαλκεύονται σιδηροῖ, ὀξεῖς, ἑδραῖοι, παχεῖς. Οὗτοι, κατὰ τὴν πορείαν τῶν θηρίων, ὑπὸ τῶν πλαττομένων ἀναχωρεῖν ῥιπτοῦνται [ἱστᾶσιν ἔνδον] πυκνοί, καὶ πατηθέντες τὸν ἐλέφαντα ἱστᾶσιν, ἐνδύντες ταῖς τῶν ποδῶν βύρσαις· ᾧ γὰρ τἄλλα στείβει βάρει, τούτῳ αὐτὸς ἁλίσκεται ὅλῳ πατῶν