A tribute to Ancient Greek astronomers

Looking through this book (Portuguese) on astronomy and astrophysics the other day I particularly enjoyed the section in the beginning on the astronomers of the ancient world, and thought a reminder here on their achievements would be worth writing, mostly a translation of the page or two in the book there but with a number of changes and additions. It's pretty amazing what one can do with just the naked eye and a lot of careful careful record keeping.

Interestingly, ancient astronomy is also quite a bit more fascinating than recent astronomy a few decades old. Astronomy and space exploration from the 1970s and 1980s was interesting at the time and we owe much of what we know of the universe thanks to that, but from a technological standpoint it's really just a less advanced version of the techniques we use now. Somewhat smaller telescopes, less impressive probes, simple landers instead of rovers, etc. On the other hand a lot of the techniques used in the ancient world have been forgotten and their rediscovery can be both helpful and inspirational, kind of like how Leonardo da Vinci's flying machine drawings are more interesting and unique now than a Boeing 707 (the Boeing 787, however, is very exciting). This post on the astrolabe is a good example of that.

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Thales statue at
Union Station in
Washington, D.C.

Thales of Miletus (~624 - 546 B.C.) introduced to Greece the fundamentals of geometry and astronomy, brought from Egypt. He saw Earth as a flat disc in a vast expanse of water. Along with his disciple


Anaximander (~610 - 546 B.C.), also from Miletus, they were the first to propose celestial models based on the movement of celestial bodies and not as godly manifestations. Anaximander discovered the obliquity of the ecliptic, namely the inclination of the Earth's equator in relation to the annual apparent trajectury of the Sun in the sky.

Possible rendering of Anaximander's world map:

Pythagoras with bells!

Pythagoras of Samos (~572 - 497 B.C.) thought the Earth, the Moon and other celestial objects to be spheres. He believed that the planets, Sun and Moon were transported by separate speheres that carried the stars. He emphasized the importance of mathematics in the description of cosmological models that could be compared with the observed movements of celestial bodies, in a regularity of "cosmic harmony". The Pythagoreans (his followers) were the first to call the universe the "cosmos", a word indicating a rational, symetrical and beautiful order.

Philolaus of Crete (~470 - 390 B.C.) introduced the idea of the movement of the Earth: he imagined that the Earth turned along its own axis and, along with the Sun, Moon and the planets, revolved around a "central fire" that would be the centre of the universe and the source of all light and energy.

Eudoxius of Cnidus (408 - 344 B.C.) was the first to propose the duration of the year as 365 days and 6 hours. He explained the observed movements of the Sun, Moon and planets through a complex and ingenious system of 27 concentric spheres that moved at different velocities around the Earth, fixed in the centre.

Aristotle of Stageira (384 - 322 B.C.) gathered and systematized the astronomical knowledge of his time, seeking rational explanations for all natural phenomena. He explained that the phases of the Moon depended on how much of the face of the Moon illuminated by the Sun was facing the Earth at any given time. He also explained eclipses: that an eclipse of the Sun happens when the Moon passes between the Earth and the Sun; an eclipse of the Moon happens when the Moon enters into the Earth's shadow. Aristotle argued for the sphericity of the Earth, given that the shadow of the Earth on the Moon during a lunar eclipse is always round. He believed in a geocentric model of the universe partially due to his observation of the stars: since the stars did not move amongst each other (at least, not to the naked eye) they must be fixed, unlike planets which wandered to and fro. To him the universe was composed of a number of concentric spheres that rotated around the Earth, and the stars were fixed on one of them. Had Aristotle lived long enough to observe the motion of stars amongst each other (that is, a lifespan thousands of years long instead of decades) he certainly would have come to a different conclusion about their fixed nature.

Aristarchus of Samos (310 - 230 B.C.) was the first to propose a heliocentric (Sun-centred) model consistent with the Solar System, predating Copernicus by almost 2000 years. He arranged the planets in the order of distance from the Sun, in the same order we have them arranged today. He developed a method to determine the relative distances of the Sun, Moon and the Earth, and measured the relative size of the Earth, Sun and Moon. He calculated that the Sun was about 30 times larger than the Moon (the actual diameter of the Sun is 400 times greater), concluding that the Sun could not be in orbit around the Earth because a body that large could not orbit a body as small as the Earth.

Eratosthenes of Cyrene (276 - 194 B.C.), librarian and director of the Library of Alexandria from 240 to 194 B.C., was the first to measure the diameter of the Earth. He noted that in the Egyptian city of Syene (now Aswan), on the first day of spring at noon the sunlight would reach the base of a large pit, meaning that the Sun was perpendicular to the Earth at that location. In Alexandria to the north though this did not occur. Measuring the shadow with a vertical rod, Erastothenes observed that in Alexandria at the same day and hour, the Sun was about seven degrees further to the south. The rest of this is best explained by quoting Wikipedia:

Eratosthenes calculated the circumference of the earth without leaving Egypt...He also knew, from measurement, that in his hometown of Alexandria, the angle of elevation of the sun would be 1/50 of a full circle (7°12') south of the zenith at the same time. Assuming that Alexandria was due north of Syene he concluded that the meridian arc distance from Alexandria to Syene must be 1/50 of the total circumference of the earth. His estimated distance between the cities was 5000 stadia (about 800 km) by estimating the time that he had taken to travel from Syene to Alexandria by camel. He rounded the result to a final value of 700 stadia per degree, which implies a circumference of 252,000 stadia. The exact size of the stadion he used is frequently argued. The common Attic stadion was about 185 m, which would imply a circumference of 46,620 km, i.e. 16.3% too large. However, if we assume that Eratosthenes used the "Egyptian stadion" of about 157.5 m, his measurement turns out to be 39,690 km, an error of less than 1%.

Hipparchus of Nicaea (190 - 120 B.C.), considered to be the greatest astronomer of the pre-Christian era, constructed an observatory on the isle of Rhodes, where he carried out observations from 160 to 127 B.C. From this he compiled a catalogue showing the position and magnitude of 850 stars. Magnitude, which specifies the brightness of a star (and any other object), was divided into six categories - category 1 being the brightest, and 6 the hardest to see with the naked eye. Hipparchus correctly deduced the direction of the celestial poles, and even the precession of the poles, a process taking 26000 years by which the rotational axis of the Earth wobbles about like that on a spinning top, eventually reaching the original point. To find out this precession, he compared the position of various stars with those catalogued by Timocharis of Alexandria and Aristillus of Alexandria some 150 years earlier (around 283 to 260 B.C.). These were members of the Alexandrian School in the 3rd century B.C., the first to measure the distance of the stars from fixed points in the sky (ecliptic coordinates). Hipparchus also calculated the Moon was a distance of 59 radii from the Earth, which was only off by a single radius (the actual number is 60), and the duration of a year with a margin of error of just 6 minutes.

Ptolemy (85 A.D. - 165 A.D.) was the last major astronomer of the ancient world. A Roman citizen, it is unknown whether he was Greek or Egyptian. He compiled a series of thirteen volumes on astronomy known as the Almagest, the greatest source of information on astronomy in Greece. Ptolemy's greatest contribution was a geometric representation of the Solar System with circles, epicycles and equants, which allowed one to predict the movement of the planets with considerable precision, and was used until the Renaissance in the 16th century. Despite the destruction of the Library of Alexandria, a copy of the Almagest was found in Persia (Iran) in 765 A.D. and translated into Arabic. The Spanish Gerard de Cremona (1114 - 1187 A.D.) translated a copy of the Almagest into Latin left behind by the Arabs in Toledo, Spain.

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Scholar of Ancient Greek stops by Reddit to answer a flood of questions

Last week I spent about two days answering questions on Reddit under a subreddit called IAMA where interesting / talented / famous / etc. people can offer to answer questions, and if the submission is interesting it will be voted up and receive more attention.

Around that time I noticed on /r/Christianity that a certain poster's grandfather was a professor of Ancient Greek, and perhaps would be interested in answering some questions. Yesterday the professor himself showed up and started the IAMA, and the submission has been massively upvoted and questions are everywhere. So bookmark this thread and/or keep an eye on this user page if you're interested in Biblical Greek. He also happens to be the authour of a textbook that takes Biblical Greek, adds an interlineary (literal) English translation below, followed by an actual translation to the right. There is a screenshot of the textbook here.

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One more site in addition to Greekbible.com: Blueletterbible.org

Greekbible.com has been the site I've always gone to when taking a look at the original text for a certain passage, but today I came across a site that does the same thing but in much more detail called Blueletterbible.org. The existence of this site certainly isn't news for Biblical scholars but it is for me, hence the post on it today.

The example linked to where I first found out about it was this one, originating from a discussion on what the original text in the "if someone asks you to go a mile, go two" means - whether the original Greek actually means a mile, or some other unit. This is a good example as Blueletterbible.org gives the meaning and pronunciation of each word right away whereas Greekbible.com requires one to click on each word to see the meaning in a pop-up window, but at the same time Greekbible.com gives the definition of the word for mile (milion), which is:

μίλιον,n \{mil'-ee-on}
1) a mile, among the Romans the distance of a thousand paces or eight stadia, about 1.5 km [somewhat less than our mile]

Also, Blueletterbible.org has the text and reading of the Old Testament as well, whereas Greekbible.com is for the NT only.

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Dungeons & Dragons alignments for religious and mythical characters

If you've ever played D&D or seen the somewhat famous Batman alignment chart, you'll know what this is about. Wherever possible I've tried to include the original text of what the people featured here have said (or what was written about them), but with some the text is either too long or the original text was too hard (=annoying) to find. If you happen to have it on hand though for one with a short quote then leave it in the comments below and I'll alter the image.

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Bart Ehrman: "It's almost a peculiarly American version of Christianity that says that to be a Christian you have to believe in the Bible"

This is what every single New Testament should look like. Now there's no more forgetting that the original was written in Greek.

Bart Ehrman of Misquoting Jesus (which I just finished reading) has an interview in Salon today with a part that I consider to be very important about Biblical literalism:

You say you don't believe that pursuing this kind of scholarship impacts one's belief. But I have difficulty understanding that. Once you begin to view the Bible as being humanly constructed, and study the history of how the biblical canon was constructed, it requires a mental schizophrenia to view the contingent, all-too-human doctrine that emerged from this process as something that contains the ultimate truth about the nature of reality. How do you reconcile those two ways of looking at the world?

Well, yeah, I can see how it would seem like schizophrenia. I think, though, the situation is this. People who are evangelical Christians, who think the Bible is the only source for truth and doctrine, have real problems with accepting that there can be discrepancies and contradictions and different points of view. But there are a lot of Christians who simply don't have that view of the Bible. If the Bible is not the be-all and end-all for somebody's faith, then the historical problems in the Bible don't really touch their faith.

It's almost a peculiarly American version of Christianity that says that to be a Christian you have to believe in the Bible. It's actually a modern invention, located in America and wherever American missionaries have gone out. But historically, Christianity has never been about belief in the Bible. So that historical problems don't shake up people who have a historically grounded understanding of the Bible.

It's worth remembering that during the early history of Christianity there wasn't even a New Testament, and Christians at the time were involved in writing their own content as opposed to the type you usually see today where the books that make up the Bible have by and large been decides and no changes are made unless new documents emerge that bring about changes to a translation.

I'm of the opinion that churches should be more involved in teaching members (and themselves) a few basics of the Greek language (such as being able to read the alphabet, perhaps some other easy things like identifying plurals, how to recognize words that have been borrowed into English etc.) in order to avoid the impression that the New Testament just somehow came into existence one day, and in English no less. I also think that Bibles should always have the original text used next to the translation, not only to assist those that are able to read the original language to a certain extent, but also to really drive the point home that this is a translated work. A lot of misunderstandings could quite easily be avoided in this way.

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International Auxiliary Languages and early Christianity

Marcion (natus circa annum 85 in Sinope in Ponto; obiit anno 160) fuit theologus. Ecclesiae christianae theologiam eius hereticam putant, quia inter cetera Marcion Vetus Testamentum ut a demiurgo et non a Deo concitato recusavit. Theologia Marcionis prope illam gnosticorum est, ergo materiam et corpus (inter urinas et faecas nascimur) signa mali putat.

I'm reading Bart Ehrman's Misquoting Jesus right now, and so far it's as interesting as I had hoped. Most interesting about the first part is the depiction of Christianity from the very beginning up until about the 4th century when it suddenly became mainstream, as it looks almost exactly like the IAL movement right now. I'll summarize a few points he makes, in no particular order:

Literacy at the time was extremely low, so written texts were always meant to be read out loud in groups by people that could read them. Because Christianity was an underground religion during the beginning it lacked official support by any nations and thus the people that promoted it mostly had to do so in their spare time. That meant that the people behind Christianity in the beginning were mostly non-professional people that wrote and copied texts as a labour of love as opposed to being paid to do so because they were professional scribes.

In the IAL movement: same thing. It's also composed of people that are mostly working out of their free time because they see the goal they are working toward as something the world would be much better off with than without. As of yet there aren't all that many people that are capable of making money off of IALs, with the exception of a very few people in the Esperanto movement that perhaps make money from writing and selling books, traffic to their sites, or some other way that hasn't occurred to me.

This discussion came up on another forum because of this article (the part I'm quoting here is more interesting than the actual study, which I see as a bit limited since it only involved brain scans of people looking at simple sentences as opposed to people actually involved in religious experiences):

Grafman says that probably means religions appeared as humans evolved the ability to handle complicated social interactions during the past 60,000 years or so.

Joseph Bulbulia, an expert on the cognitive psychology of religion at Victoria University in New Zealand, says most evidence of religious behavior only dates back about 10,000 years, raising questions about why humans didn't become religious sooner.

But he agrees that religious belief probably had a role in human evolution because it has helped societies survive and thrive for thousands of years.

Religion As A Social Behavior

Without religion, Bulbulia says, "large scale cooperation, which now spans the world, would be impossible. He adds that humans differ from other species in their ability to cooperate in very large groups.

Religion can help foster cooperation because it ensures that people share the same set of rules about behavior, and think they'll be punished if they don't follow them, Bulbulia says. Religion also unites people, especially in times of great uncertainty.

I think there's some truth to that, but it's a bit too simple: I would say that perhaps new religions or new branches of religions (plus new schools of thought outside religion) contribute a lot to large-scale cooperation, as was the case with early Christianity above. When a religion becomes more established it can often have the opposite effect though as people begin to enter the movement that probably wouldn't have been interested without the long-term benefits (a steady job, that is), and don't care so much about propagation and debating new ideas so much as retaining the status quo. Apparently this was the case with the publication of the Greek New Testament in the 17th century, which took quite a few years to get papal support even though it was ready to be published, and the church at that time looked down on Greek Orthodox followers, even though they were the ones that were most capable of reading and understanding the New Testament the way it was written, as opposed to a less authentic Latin translation.

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Lots of Bart Ehrman to hear online

Almost two years ago Professor Bart Ehrman appeared on the Daily Show to promote his new book at the time about how the Bible has been altered over time by scribes as it was copied over and over again (lest you forget, at the time the only way to copy a book was to write out the whole thing):

The Daily Show With Jon StewartM - Th 11p / 10c

Bart Ehrman

Daily Show Full Episodes
Important Things With Demetri Martin

Political Humor
Joke of the Day

Great interview! I thought, and then forgot all about looking for more interviews by Prof. Ehrman online. It turns out though that there's quite an extensive list of interviews on his site here, some of them over an hour in length (my favourite length for an interview of this nature when there's so much to talk about). It's always been my opinion that churches should focus a bit more on giving the congregation a basic knowledge of Greek, considering that this is the language the New Testament is written in. Of course not everybody is a linguist and there should be no linguistic barrier to belonging to a religion, but a basic knowledge is definitely doable. By this I mean being able to read the alphabet and a bit of discussion every once in a while on what certain Greek words mean, and this is important because the word hell in the NT is usually either Hades or Gehenna, and Hades is a dark and gloomy place where the English word hell is (now) thought of being exactly the opposite. English also has enough loanwords from Greek that knowing how to read the alphabet would be of some help even without knowing anything about the language.

In addition to that, all Bibles (Old and New Testament) should have the original language parallel to translations in other languages to remind people of their origin.

Curious about the original Greek of a certain passage and don't know how to check? Why, Greekbible.com of course.

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Promotion of Latin and Greek in Brittany, France - Printemps de l'Antiquité. La promotion du latin - grec

Britannia Minor, qui in occidentalibus Europae inter Canalem Britannicum et Oceanum Atlanticum stat, in Galliam insita est, sed non illa disnocetur. Consecrationibus imperiis Romanis, Britannia Minor adventu Britannorum a Britannia Magna in occidentem armoricae aedificata est.

Here's a short piece of information in French on the 4th annual Printemps de l'Antiquité, which seems to be an event to promote the study of Latin and Greek in the area, and will take place in March. I bet Olivier knows more about this than I do.

L'Association régionale des enseignants de langues anciennes en Bretagne (Arela) organise, pour la quatrième fois, le Printemps de l'Antiquité en Bretagne, opération destinée à la promotion de l'enseignement du latin et du grec. De nombreuses expositions et conférences, visites de sites de l'époque gallo-romaine, sont prévues du 9 au 22mars sur le territoire de l'académie de Rennes. Le concours de langues anciennes, auquel devraient participer plus de 1.300 collégiens et lycéens de l'Éducation nationale et de l'enseignement privé, ainsi que des membres de l'Université du temps libre de Belle-Ile-en-Mer(56), constitue l'événement de ce Printemps de l'Antiquité. Après les Jeux Olympiques en 2008, le concours aura pour thème, cette année, la femme dans l'Antiquité. Les épreuves se dérouleront le mardi 10mars, de 10h à 12h, dans les établissements scolaires. Le programme complet du Printemps de l'Antiquité est consultable sur le site: www.arela-bretagne.levillage.org

The Regional Association for the Learning of Ancient Languages in Brittany (Arela) is organizing for the fourth time the Spring of Antiquity in Brittany, an operation destined for the promotion of the study of Latin and Greek. Numerous expositions and conferences and visits to sites of the Gallo-Roman epoch are schedules for the 9th to the 22nd of March in the territory of the Academy of Rennes. The competition of ancient languages which should have more than 1,300 secondary students participating (national and private schools) as well as the Université du temps libre in Belle-Ile-en-Mer, constitute the event of this Spring of Antiquity. After the Olympic Games in 2008 the theme for the contest this year will be Women in Antiquity. The tests will take place in schools on Tuesday the 10th of March from 10 to 12 o'clock. The complete program of Spring of Antiquity is viewable on the site: www.arela-bretagne.levillage.org

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Haitian Creole dictionary, Interlingua, Indo-European and other things

Fotografi DVD syantifik yo mete sou wobo an pou misyon nan fiti yo; moun yo ap twouve anndan l tout istwa nou konnen anlè planèt mas. Source

On scribd.com I just noticed there's a Haitian Creole - English dictionary of almost 200 pages, which comes from the page here on Haiti and Haitian Creole.

For purposes of comparison it would be nice to see a Haitian Creole - English - French - Interlingua dictionary someday. It would look something like this:

Haitian	English	French	Interlingua
egzak	exact	exact	exacte
egzale	exhale	exhaler	exhalar
egzamen	quiz, test	examen	examine
egzamine	examine, view	examiner	examinar
egzan	exempt	exempt	exempte
egzanp	example	exemple	exemplo
egzanplè	exemplary	exemplaire	exemplar
lajan	currency	argent	moneta (argento)
lakou	yard	cour	corte

It's a pity though that Haiti is economically so bad off because it's very close to the United States and were it better off it would be able to serve as a place to practice one's French (and Creole) by those that live in the area (Mexico too), hate the cold of Quebec in the winter, and/or don't have the funds to live there for a space of months at a time. The Independent today has an article though on Haiti's tiny foray into the world of tourism again:

Remarkably Haiti might just be finding its way back onto the map. Rising world food prices have hit the people harder than in most countries. And Haiti is still subject to those "don't go there unless you're nuts" government advisories, but they're led by US State Separtment concerns about kidnapped Americans – almost all of whom are, in fact, Haitian-Americans. Tourists have not been targets. The turnaround began with UN intervention in 2004. To general Haitian acclaim the Brazilian personnel who led the UN forces tended to shoot first and check which gang the bodies had belonged to afterwards. As a result law and order soon returned

Haiti is often not a very pretty place. The shocking deforestation which has gone hand in hand with the country's descent to "poorest country in the western hemisphere" status means it can look dusty and impoverished. The roads are potholed and battered; the infrastructure is limited; but there's also exuberant colour, some amazing sights, music to rival nearby Cuba, and it's certainly not overrun by tourists.

I also wrote a few days ago about another article mentioning how New York plans to have foreign language service available in Haitian Creole among other languages.

Back to scribd.com: there's quite a bit of good content there that generally isn't picked up all that well by Google, so you might want to give it a look to see what you can find there that a regular search won't turn up. Here's Moby Dick in French for example. I noticed also that the people at dnghu.org have had their Indo-European grammar up there for a year now. If the project succeeds it'll be in part because of how tech savvy they are. Since uploading it there it's had over 4000 views, which perhaps isn't that much over a year but still, it's 4000 more views than would have been had without being uploaded to that site as well. Any blogger or site owner could also embed the grammar into their site whenever they want.

Oh, and if you know Portuguese you can learn Biblical Greek for free too.

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Robert Graves the Greek Myths in English, French, Gothic, Ancient Greek, Indo-European, Latin, Sambahsa-mundialect, and Sanskrit

Image source: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Image:Phrixos_und_Helle.jpg

The ever-talented Olivier Simon, the creator of Sambahsa-mundialect, has sent me a translation of a paragraph from Robert Graves' The Greek Myths from French into Gothic, Ancient Greek, Indo-European, Latin, Sambahsa-mundialect, and Sanskrit. I put the French version into the automatic translator and fixed up the incorrect parts, though I'm not going to bother changing the names and place names.

Here they are:

English:

"This Phrixos was a handsome young man, which had Biadicé as a loving aunt, the woman of Cretheus; as he had refused his advances, she accused him of trying to rape her. The Béotiens, believing that what Biadicé told was true, approved the wise decision of Apollo to sacrifice an expiatory victim and demanded the death of Phrixos. Here, Athamas, crying heavily, led Phrixos to the summit of the mountain. He was on the verge of having his throat cut when Hercules came running and pulled the sacrificial flint from his hand: "My father Zeus, Herakles exclaimed, abhors human sacrifices! "Nevertheless Phrixos would have perished in spite of this intervention, if a ram golden winged hadn't suddenly rushed at the top of Mount Olympus to save him:

"Climb on my back," said the ram, and immediately Phrixos obeyed.

"Bring me also, cried Hellé, do not leave me at the mercy of my father! "

Texte original (d’après R.Graves, Les mythes grecs) :

« Ce Phrixos était un beau jeune homme, dont s’était éprise sa tante Biadicé, la femme de Créthée ; comme il avait refusé ses avances, elle l’accusa d’avoir essayé de la violer. Les Béotiens, croyant que ce que racontait Biadicé était vrai, approuvèrent la sage décision d’Apollon de sacrifier une victime expiatoire et demandèrent la mort de Phrixos. Là-dessus, Athamas, pleurant abondamment, conduisit Phrixos au sommet de la montagne. Il était sur le point de lui trancher la gorge quand Héraclès arriva en courant et arracha le silex sacrificiel de sa main : « Mon père Zeus, s’exclama Héraclès, a horreur des sacrifices humains ! » Néanmoins Phrixos aurait péri malgré cette intervention, si un bélier d’or ailé ne s’était soudain précipité du haut de l’Olympe pour le sauver :

« Grimpe sur mon dos », dit le bélier, et aussitôt Phrixos obéit.

« Emporte-moi aussi, implora Hellé, ne me laisse pas à la merci de mon père ! »

Gothic:

Sa Friksus was skauns juggalaù§s §izei sô fadarswistar is Biadika, Kre§iwis qinô, fria§wàmildei was ; untê §ôs bidôs afwarp, wrohida ei dugann ija gawaldan. Boiotans, §àiei galaùbi§êdun ei Biadika sunja qa§, andnêmun Appoljins snutrana mun afar hvamma tibr hunsli§ wàir§an skuldêdeiwa jah gabêdjun Friksaùs dau§u. §anuh filutagrjands A§ams tiauh Friksu du fàirgunjis giblin. Skuldêdeiwa §anna kusman is kappôn nibài Herakles duatrênni jah hunslasah us §àim handiwê is hniaùpi. « Tius, fadar meins, Herakles hrôpida, fijài§ manniska hunsla ! » Akei Friksus dau§nôdêdi auk mi§ §amma ingreipa nibài gul§eins fidleins wi§rus fram Olimpa draùsi swa-ei ina bàirgi.

« Hlaup ana §ata tiuhi mein ! » qa§ wi§rus, jah Friksus ufhausida andwair§o.

« Bàir mik auk mi§ §is, Hella ba§, ni lêtas mik in waldufnja §is fadrs meinis ! ».

Ancient Greek:

Houtos ho Phrixos ên kalos neanias, hô hê têthis autou Biadikê, hê gunê tou Kretheôs ealôkei ; hôs êrnêto tas aitêseis autês, katêgorêsen autou peirathênai tou biazesthai autên. Hoi Boiotes, pisteuontes hoti hê Biadikê êlêtheuen, epênesan to sophon bouleuma tou Apollônos tou thuesthai katharsion kai êtêsanto ton thanaton tou Phrixou. Meta touto, ho Athamas ho dakruôn aphthonôs êgagen ton Phrixon epi tên akrôreian. Emellen temnein ton larugga autou en tô ton Hêraklea prosedramen kai apespasen ton lithon tês thusias ek toin kheroin autou : « Ho patêr mou, ho Zeus, ho Hêraklês aneboêsen, bdeluttetai tas thusias tas anthrôpeias ! ». Homôs, ho Phrixos an apolôlê, kaiper paragignomenos, ei krios khrusous pterôtos mê embalê kata tês akras tou Olumpou pros to sôzein auton.

« Anarrikhêsai epi ton nôton mou ! » eipen ho krios, kai autika ho Phrixos hupekousen.

« Apofere kai se, hê Hellê apekalesen, mê lipês eme tê exousia tou patros mou ! »

Indo-European:

So Bhriksos êst kalos yuwenis leubhos p@truwiây swây Gwiadikây, esrey Kredheows ; tôy ksubhusey budhôns swôns emembhseto iskwusey yebhtum îm. Boiotes, kred didhêntes Gwiadikâm werobhânti@m, epriyer Apollônos dnsrom modom diprosio spendiosio eprkskerkwe Bhriksosio mrtum. Nâ plukwid plangonts Adhamas edukset Bhriksom gyorakrom. Êst temtusos eyos gutr kwôm Heraklewos drât adi ewouletkwe diprokestrom ghesrbhyôm eyos : « Diewi, P@teri menoy, Heraklewos ewoukwet, kados sont ghomenôs spondôs ! » Tou Bhriksos mryeto tâ@ gwmti@ nspktâ@ mê kenekos petrgtos wedhris okuptyet Olumpakrod salwe@tum im.

« Skande gurnom menom ! » wedhris bhât, kitodkwe Bhriksos klouset.

« Bhere emekwe kom, Hellâ emoldhet, mê linkwyes me kratoy p@tros menosio!”.

Latin :

Ille Phrixus pulcher juvenis erat cujus amita Biadica, uxor Crethei, amore capta erat ; quoniam is sollicitationes recusaverat, eum accusavit quod ei vim adhibere tentavisset. Boeoti, credentes Biadicam verum dicere, sapientem Apollonis sententiam piamenti immolandi approbaverunt atque mortem Phrixi poposcerunt. Tum Athamas abundanter lacrimans Phrixum summum ad montem duxit. Hujus jugulum secturus erat cum Herculus accurrit ac e manibus silicem sacrificii eripuit : « Pater meus Juppiter, exclamavit Herculus, sacrificia humana detestatur ! » Tamen Phrixus perivisset quanquam intercesserat nisi aries aureus alatus repente de Olympo se praecipitavisset qui eum salvaverit.

« Scande in tergus ! » ait aries, et statim Phrixus oboedivit.

« Aufer me quoque, Hella imploravit, ne me relinquas in arbitrio patris mei ! »

Sambahsa-mundialect :

So Phrixos eet un bell yuwen dia quom eis tante Biadike, esor os Kretheus, se hieb enliubht ; dat is hieb refusen ays beuds, ia accusit iom ob peitus dwinghyehbhe iam. I Boiots, credeihnd od quo Biadike lohg eet ver, approbeer Apollons hakime decision os maule un diber ed bud Phrixios mohrt. Itak, Athamas, plukwid plangend, duxit Phrixum ad id ghyorakro. Vahsit tehme eis gurgule kun Heraklais accurs ed rohv id maulflint ex eis hands : « Zeus mien pater, scricit Heraklais, hat menscen mauls in horror ! » Lakin Phrixos habiet nohcen speit tod intervention sei un golden pterct hamel ne se habiet stayg precipiten ud id Olympakro kay salve iom.

« Skand ep mien regv ! » iey is hamel, ed fauran Phrixos obedih.

« Behr meschi con te, implorit Helle, mae linkwas me ei mercie miens pater ! ».

Sanskrit :

Esa BhrikSo âsît sundaras kumaro yaM pitrbhaginî Biadiçâ, Kradhor jâyâ, avanat ; taM protsâhakân protikSiptavantaM paryavadîd yatanaM dûSayituM tâm. BoyotâH, manyanto BiadiçâM satyavâdâm, abhyanandiSur Apallño dakSaM niçcayaM medhyasya baler huvanîyasya câprkSaN BhrikSasya mrtyum. Ato bahu rodano ‘Dhamo BhrikSam anaiSîd giryagram. Tadâsît kartiSyams tadgalam yadâ Heraçravopâdhâvîc câgrhad asiM tadhastâbhyâm : « Pitâ me Dyaus, Heraçravo vyakrukSat, dveSti manuSyânâM homân ! » Tadapi BhrikSo ‘bhaviSyad huto yadapi Heraçravo ‘ntarjagâma mâbhaviSyad haimo garudurano âpapadvân Olumpâgrâd uddhartuM tam.

« Skanda prStham ! » avadîd uraNaH, ca BhrikSo ‘nvarodhiSta sadyaH.

« Bhara ca mâM samyak, ayâciSta Hellâ, mâ ricyâ mâM pitur adhikare ! ».

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