Iliad by Homer - Join iZDOT

Homer’s Iliad
roof of a high house to keep the wind out. Their backbones cracked
as they tugged at one another with their mighty arms- and sweat
rained from them in torrents. Many a bloody weal sprang up on
their sides and shoulders, but they kept on striving with might and
main for victory and to win the tripod. Ulysses could not throw
Ajax, nor Ajax him; Ulysses was too strong for him; but when the
Achaeans began to tire of watching them, Ajax said to ulysses,
“Ulysses, noble son of Laertes, you shall either lift me, or I you,
and let Jove settle it between us.”
He lifted him from the ground as he spoke, but Ulysses did not
forget his cunning. He hit Ajax in the hollow at back of his knee, so
that he could not keep his feet, but fell on his back with Ulysses
lying upon his chest, and all who saw it marvelled. Then Ulysses in
turn lifted Ajax and stirred him a little from the ground but could
not lift him right off it, his knee sank under him, and the two fell
side by side on the ground and were all begrimed with dust. They
now sprang towards one another and were for wrestling yet a third
time, but Achilles rose and stayed them. “Put not each other
further,” said he, “to such cruel suffering; the victory is with both
alike, take each of you an equal prize, and let the other Achaeans
now compete.”
Thus did he speak and they did even as he had said, and put on
their shirts again after wiping the dust from off their bodies.
The son of Peleus then offered prizes for speed in running- a
mixing-bowl beautifully wrought, of pure silver. It would hold six
measures, and far exceeded all others in the whole world for
beauty; it was the work of cunning artificers in Sidon, and had been
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