Penelope's Test

Greathearted, home at last, I was bathed by Eurynome and rubbed with golden oil, and clothed again. Athena changed me from an old beggar, back to my old self. But she made me look taller, and massive, with crisping hair in curls. She lavished beauty over me before I appeared in front of Penelope again. When I saw Penelope I said:

“Strange woman, the immortals of Olympus made you hard, harder than any. Who else in the world would keep aloof as you do from her husband if he returned to her from years of trouble, cast on his own land in the twentieth year? Nurse, make up a bed for me to sleep on.” Penelope spoke:

“Strange man, if man you are….This is no pride on my part nor scorn for you –not even wonder, merely. I know so well how you –how he– appeared boarding the ship for Troy. But all the same…Make up his bed for him, Eurycleia. Place it outside the bedchamber my lord built with his own hands. Pile the big bed with fleeces, rugs, and sheets of purest linen.” What she said angered me, for I had made our bed out of a tree, and it could not be moved. I spoke with anger:

“Who dared to move my bed? No builder had the skill for that –unless a god came down to turn the trick. No mortal in his best days could budge it with a crowbar. There is our pact and pledge, our secret sign, built into that bed –my handiwork and no one else’s!” I explained how I built the bed and why it was so important.

Penelope ran to me with eyes brimming tears and throwing her arms around me, she said:

“Do not rage at me, Odysseus!” Penelope asked me to forgive her and explained her reasoning for testing me. She rejoiced and gazed upon me, her white arms around me pressed as though forever.

Odysseus' Revenge

Before beginning my revenge I had my son, Telemachus, take all the armor, shields, and swords and hide them in a room so that the suitors could not fight against us. I spoke to the suitors:
“So much for that. Your clean-cut game is over. Now watch me hit a target that no man has hit before, if I can make this shot. Help me, Apollo.” I planned to get my revenge and I turned to Antinous first. He was ridiculing me and was the cruelest of all the suitors. When Antinous went to sip his wine, I shot an arrow at his throat. Backward and down he went, letting the wine cup fall from his shocked hand. The suitors' anger flared and they yelled cursing words at me. So I replied:
“You yellow dogs, you thought I’d never make it home from the land of Troy. You took my house to plunder….You dared bid for my wife while I was still alive. Contempt was all you had for the gods who rule wide heaven. Your last hour has come. You die in blood.”
The other suitors began to fear me once I told them what I had in store for them. The suitors pleaded with me. They told me that Antinous made them do it all, but I did not believe them, nor did I care. I fought the suitors with Telemachus by my side. My faithful swine herder and the cow herder also assisted us. Athena sent down a thundercloud to shield me. The suitors ran madly, trying to get free. But it was hopeless, none made it out alive.
               

The Challenge

Pressed by the suitors to choose a husband from among them, Penelope said that she will marry the man who can string my bow and shoot an arrow through twelve ax handle sockets. The suitors attempted, but all of them failed. Still in disguise, I asked for a turn. In one motion I strung the bow and  I slid my right hand down the cord and plucked it. The vibrating hummed and sang a swallow’s note. I made it through all the sockets and won the challenge. The suitors were angry and surprised at the same time. Zeus thundered overhead, one loud crack for a sign. I laughed within. I said to Telemachus:

“Telemachus, the stranger you welcomed in your hall has not disgraced you. I did not miss; neither did I take all day stringing the bow. My hand and eye are sound, not as contemptible as the young men say. The hour has come to cook their lordships’ mutton–supper by daylight. Other amusements later, with song and harping that adorns a feast.”

Telemachus agreed. He belted his sword on, clapped hand to his spear, and with a clink and glitter of keen bronze stood by his chair, in the forefront near his father.

Penelope

In the evening, Penelope interrogated me. I was still disguised as an old beggar. She said to me:
"Friend, let me ask you first of all: who are you, where do you come from, of what nation and parents were you?" So I replied:
"My lady, never a man in the wide world should have a fault to find with you. Your name has gone out under heaven like the sweet honor of some god-fearing king, who rules in equity over the strong..." I could not tell her who I was...yet. She told me that if her husband was to return, she could possibly be happy once again.
"How could I? Wasted with longing for Odysseus, while here they press for marriage." Penelope said. She also told me about how she had been stalling the suitors by weaving a shroud for Lord Laertes when cold Death comes to lay him on his bier. But she would weave during the day, and unweave what she did late at night when everyone is sleeping. One night someone caught Penelope, so she had no choice but to finish weaving. After telling me about herself, she said:
"But you too confide in me, tell me your ancestry. You were not born of mythic oak or stone."
I made up a tale that mentioned Odysseus and I declared that her husband will soon be home. I told her:
"You see, then, he is alive and well, and headed homeward now, no more to be abroad far from his island, his dear wife and son. Here is my sworn word for it. Witness this, god of the zenith, noblest of the gods, and Lord Odysseus' hearthfire, now before me: I swear these things shall turn out as I say. Between this present dark and one day's ebb, after the wane, before the crescent moon, Odysseus will come"

The Suitors

     Still disguised as a beggar, I entered my home. I was then stopped in my tracks by the suitor, Antinous. He bellowed out then, "God! What evil wind blew in this pest? Get over, stand in the passage! Nudge my table, will you? Egyptian whips are sweet to what you'll come to here, you nosing rat, making your pitch to everyone! These men have bread to throw away on you because it is not theirs. Who cares? Who spares another's food, when he has more than plenty?" 
     With disgust I backed away, and spoke,
"A pity that you have more looks than heart. You'd grudge a pinch of salt form your own larder to your own handyman. You sit here, fat on others' meat, and cannot bring yourself to rummage out a crust of bread for me!" And all the while my son, brave and strong of heart, sat there watching, fists balled in anger. 
     I could see the anger in Antinous' eyes when he answered "You think you'll shuffle off and get away after that impudence? Oh, no you don't!" The stool he let fly hit my right shoulder, on the packed muscle under my shoulder blade- it had no effect that anyone saw. I shook my head as I walked on, thinking of the bloody death I would deal to this monster of a man later. I turned to face the crowd and met eyes with all as I spoke,
"One word only, my lords, and suitors of the famous queen. One think i have to say. There is no pain, no burden for the heart when blows come to a man, and he defending his own cattle- his own cows and lambs. He it was otherwise. Antinous hit me for being driven on by hunger- how many bitter seas men cross for hunger! May Antinous meet his death before his wedding day!" 
     There were many threats made and people did take up for me, the old beggar, people with good still in their hearts. My wife, Penelope, heard the blow and knew who gave it. She murmured now: "Would god you could be hit yourself, Antinous- hit by Apollo's bow shot!" 
     Her housekeeper put in: "He and no other? If all we pray for this to pass, not one would live to dawn!"
     Her mistress spoke softly to her: "Oh, Nan they are a bad lot; they intend ruin for all of us; but Antinous appears a blacker-hearted hound than any. Here is a poor man come, a wanderer driven by want to beg his bread, and everyone in hall gave bits, to cram his bag-only Antinous threw a stool, and banged his shoulder!" 
      The mistress, thinking in her chamber among her maids, she called to the forester and said: "Go to that man on my behalf, Eumaeus, and send him here so I can greet and question him. Abroad in the great world, he may have heard rumors about Odysseus. He may have known him!" 
     My wife, still had hope in her heart that I would return, but did not know, I had already returned. We would be together soon, and forever more! 

Argus

Outside the palace, I stood there; I spotted a dog lying on a pile of dung. My dog, as I left him when I went away for war. Old and treated as rubbish he laid there and I wish to go to him, but I cannot for risk of being found out. My dog, my companion lay there in pain and I must watch him wither. I speak and as he hears my voice, he struggles to wag his tail and point his nose. The dog I left behind had no strength to move toward me. My dog can finally rest easy now that he knows that I am safe and will be happy. As I turn away I wipe a salt tear from my cheek hiding it from Eumaeus.
          "I marvel that they leave this hound to lie here on the dung pile; he would have been a fine dog, form the look of him, I can't say as to his power and speed when he was young." I say to Eumaeus. 
He replies, "A hunter owned him but the man is dead in some far place.  If this old hound could show the form he had when Lord Odysseus left him, going to Troy, you'd see him swift and strong. He never shrank from any savage thing he'd brought to bay in the deep woods; on the sent no other dog kept up with him. Now misery has him in leash. His owner died abroad, and here the women salves will take no care of him. You know how servants are: without a master they have no will to labor, or excel. For Zeus who views the wide, into the death and darkness that awaits, that instant Argus closes his eyes and after seeing his master, he dies. And I walk foward, ready to face the Suitors, to get my revenge...

      “World takes away half the manhood of a man that day, he goes into captivity and slavery."
      As we walk away, toward the death and darkness waiting for us, my dog closes his eyes and dies. And I keep walking, ready to face the suitors and my revenge that is sure to follow...

Twenty years gone, and I am back again...

I finished telling my story to the Phaeacians. The next day, young Phaeacian noblemen conducted me home by ship. I arrived in Ithaca after being gone for twenty years. Athena appeared and told me of the situation at home. Numerous suitors, who thought I was dead, have been continually seeking the hand of Penelope, my wife, in marriage. They also had been eating my livestock. The suitors were planning to kill Telemachus, my son, because he would inherit my lands. Both Penelope and Telemachus still hoped I would return. Telemachus journeyed to Pylos and Sparta to learn about my fate. Athena disguised me as an old beggar and I went to see my old swine herder, Eumaeus. While Eumaeus and I were eating breakfast, Telemachus arrived.

I told Telemachus that I was his father. When I told him he shouted out and refused to believe that I was his father. I told him about my plan to kill the suitors and how Athena had changed me into an old beggar to disguise myself so that I could surprise the suitors.  I asked Telemachus how many suitors were in the home so that we could be prepared for the attack. He said that there were ten or even twice ten men. From Dulichium alone there were fifty-two picked men, with armorers, a half a dozen; twenty-four came from Same, twenty from Zacynthus; our own island accounts for twelve. Around 108 men were in my home, hoping for my wife’s hand in marriage and eating my livestock. No one could know who I was when we arrived at the house. So I said to my son: “Now one thing more. If son of mine you are and blood of mine, let no one hear Odysseus is about. Neither Laertes, nor the swineherd here, nor any slave, nor even Penelope. But you and I alone must learn how far the women are corrupted; we should know how to locate good men among our hands, the loyal and respectful, and the shirkers who take you lightly, as alone and young.” I could not for tell what was to come, however, I hoped for the best.