An image from a 1539 printing of Works and Days
Works and Days (in ancient Greek Ἔργα καὶ Ἡμέραι / Erga kaí Hemérai, which sometimes goes by the Latin name Opera et Dies, as in the OCT) is a Greek poem of some 800 verses written by Hesiod (around 700 BC). The poem revolves around two general truths: labour is the universal lot of Man, but he who is willing to work will get by. Scholars have seen this work against a background of agrarian crisis in mainland Greece, which inspired a wave of documented colonisations in search of new land.
It also repeats the story of Prometheus, which is also written in Theogony, and the theft of fire from Zeus and the resulting punishment of man with Pandora and her jar with Hope only left inside it.1
This work lays out the five Ages of Man, as well as containing advice and wisdom, prescribing a life of honest labour and attacking idleness and unjust judges (like those who decided in favour of Perses) as well as the practice of usury. It describes immortals who roam the earth watching over justice and injustice2. The poem regards labour as the source of all good, in that both gods and men hate the idle, who resemble drones in a hive3.
Works and Days contains the earliest recorded mention of the star Sirius, as the Greek Σείριος (Seirios, "glowing" or "scorcher").
References
- ^ There is some debate about the simple and obvious translation of "elpis" as "hope". Some scholars argue that is really should be translated as "expectation" since the root word is from "suppose". And in this context it is argued that what was left in the jar was not Hope as we know it, but the "expectation of ills" so that Man would be unpleasently surprised by ills that befell him instead of expecting them. Confer W.J. Verdenius, "Commentaries on Hesiod", et al. Also written in Tandy and Neale's translation of "Works and Days". p.64, note 37.
- ^ Hesiod, Works and Days, Canto III, [250]: "Verily upon the earth are thrice ten thousand immortals of the host of Zeus, guardians of mortal man. They watch both justice and injustice, robed in mist, roaming abroad upon the earth". (cf. also, J. A. Symonds, p. 179).
- ^ Hesiod, Works and Days, [300]: "Both gods and men are angry with a man who lives idle, for in nature he is like the stingless drones who waste the labour of the bees, eating without working".
Selected translations
- Athanassakis, Apostolos N., Theogony ; Works and days ; Shield / Hesiod ; introduction, translation, and notes, Baltimore : Johns Hopkins University Press, 1983. ISBN 0801829984
- Cooke, Hesiod, Works and Days, Translated from the Greek, London, 1728
- Frazer, R.M. (Richard McIlwaine), The Poems of Hesiod, Norman : University of Oklahoma Press, 1983. ISBN 0806118377
- Most, Glenn, translator, Hesiod, 2 vols., Loeb Classical Library, Cambridge, Massachusetts, 2006-07.
- Schlegel, Catherine M., and Henry Weinfield, translators, Theogony and Works and Days, Ann Arbor, Michigan, 2006
- Sinclair, Thomas Alan (translator), Hesiodou Erga kai hemerai, London, Macmillan and co., 1932.
- Tandy, David W., and Neale, Walter C. [translators], Works and Days: a translation and commentary for the social sciences, Berkeley: University of California Press, 1996. ISBN 0520203836
- West, Martin Litchfield (translator), Hesiod Works & Days, Oxford University Press, 1978, ISBN 0-19-814005-3. Edited with Prolegomena and Commentary.
Further reading
- Bartlett, Robert C. "An Introduction to Hesiod's Works and Days", The Review of Politics 68 (2006), p.177-205, University of Notre Dame.
- Beall, E.F., What Pandora let out and what she left in, paper read at the annual meeting of the Classical Association of the Atlantic States, October 6, 2006
- Clay, Jenny Strauss, Hesiod’s Cosmos, Cambridge, 2003.
- Kenaan, Vered Lev, Pandora’s Senses : The Feminine Character of the Ancient Text, Madison, Wisconsin, 2008.
- Lamberton, Robert, Hesiod, New Haven : Yale University Press, 1988. ISBN 0300040687. Cf. Chapter III, "The Works and Days", pp.105-133.
- Nelson, Stephanie A., God and the Land: The Metaphysics of Farming in Hesiod and Vergil, New York and Oxford, 1998
- Nisbet, Gideon, Hesiod, Works and Days: A Didaxis of Deconstruction?, Greece and Rome 51 (2004), pp.147-63.
- Peabody, Berkley, The Winged Word: A Study in the Technique of Ancient Greek Oral Composition as Seen Principally Through Hesiod's Works and Days, State University of New York Press, 1975. ISBN 0873950593
- Verdenius, Willem Jacob, A Commentary on Hesiod Works and Days vv 1-382 (Leiden: E.J. Brill, 1985). ISBN 9004074651
External links
