Aelian on the Swans' Song (I)
A note to Pseudodoxia Epidemica, Book III, chapter 27

From Aeliani de natura animalium libri XVII, II.xxxii (see also V.xxxiv and X.xxxvi). In the translation after Gesner's, from the Jacobs edition of 1832 (p. 30):

XXXII. Cycnus, quem non solum poetae, sed multi etiam solutae orationis scriptores, Apollinis ministrum faciunt, quid [musica vel] cantu possit, non habeo quod affirmem; veteres tamen persuasum sibi habuerunt, cycnea, ut appellant, modulatione decantata, mox eum exspirare. Quod si ita est, liberalior in hanc avem natura, quam in homines bonos et honestos, fuerit, et quidem merito: nempe his laudem ac luctum a morte tribuunt alii, cycni vero ipsi sese vel laude vel luctu moribundi prosequuntur.

Κύκνος δέ, ὅνπερ οὖν καὶ θεράποντα Ἀππόλλωνι ἔδοσαν ποιηταί, καὶ λόγοι μέτων ἀφειμένοι πολλοί, τὰ μὲν ἄλλα ὅπως μούσης τε καὶ ᾠδῆς ἔχει ἐιπεῖν οὐκ οἶδα· πεπίστευται δὲ ὑπὸ τῶν ἄνω τοῦ χρόνου, ὅτι τὸ κύκνειον οὕτω καλούμενον ᾄσας εἶτα ἀποθνήσκει. Τιμᾷ δὲ ἄρα αὐτὸν ἡ φύσις, καὶ τῶν καλῶν καὶ άγαθῶν άνθρώπων μᾶλλον, καὶ έικότως· εἴγε τούτους μὲν καὶ έπαινοῦσι καὶ θρηνοῦσιν ἐκεῖνοι, ἄλλοι δὲ εἴ τοῦτο ἐθέλοις εἴτε ἐκεῖνο, ἑαυτοῖς νέμουσιν.


This page is by James Eason.


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