Thursday, October 14, 2010

here's a poem written a millenium ago, against war, and against the merchants of death who profit from war. It's the work of a monk named Eugenius Vulgaris -

METRUM PARHEMIACUM TRAGICUM

O sorrowful and ancient days,
Where learned ye to make sepulchres?
Who taught you all the evil ways,
Wherein to wound men's souls in wars?

Woe to that sacrificial priest,
First craftsman of the blacksmith's forge,
Who saw strange shapes within his fire,
And hammered out illgotten swords.

Whoever fashioned first the first the bow,
And flight of arrows, swift, secure,
Launched anger on the air and made
The bitterness of death more sure.

Who tempered spearheads for their work,
He breathed upon the anvil death;
He hammered out the slender blade,
And from the body crushed the breath.

He gave to death a thrusting spear,
Who first drew up his battle-hosts.
Long since hath fared his vaunting soul
To dwell a ghost amid the ghosts.

English version by the poet and medievalist, Helen Waddell. I've tried to find the meaning of the title without success. Parhemiacum?

O tristia secla priora,
que vos docuere sepulcra
animisque parando nociva
belli fabricare pericla?

Heu quis prior ille piator
qui cusor in arte fabrina
variavit in igne figuras,
cudens gladii male formas?

Quis denique Martia primus
arcus volucresque sagittas
ignivit et edidit iras,
mortes stabilivit amaras?

Qui spicula cudit in usus,
conflavit in incude funus;
lamne tenuavit et ictus,
ventris vacuaret ut haustus.

Docuit quoque cuspide mortem
qui duxit in ordine martem;
amiserat et quia mentem
umbre tenuere tumentem

Change of subject; a fellow worker, a retired miner has commented on the media's reporting of the rescue of the Chilean miners. He used the word 'hypocrisy', and quoted a poem of Joe Corrie's from which I lift a snippet -

But a week today all will be forgotten,
And the Member of Parliament,
The coalowner,
The parson,
The Press,
And the public,
Will keep storing up their venom and their hatred,
For the next big miners' strike.

4 comments:

Jemmy Hope said...

Correction: the poet's name is Eugenius Vulgarius, NOT Vulgaris.

Benjamin Eugene said...

Thank you for posting this. It's hard to find such ancient things online. I would rather look in a library, but I live in a small town and I owe fines. =)

Jemmy Hope said...

You're welcome, friend. If you're interested in Latin you might find something to your taste at -
www.thelatinlibrary.com/index.html
Both classical Roman and medieval texts are to be found there.

Jemmy Hope said...

Can't get that link to work, except as www.thelatinlibrary.com