Not yet had she ceased speaking and he gave her the splendid apple, beautyâs offering, the great treasure of Aphrogeneia,a a plant of war, of war an evil seed. And she, holding the apple in her hand, uttered her voice and spake in mockery of Hera and manly Athena:
ãYield to me, accustomed as ye be to war, yield me the victory. Beauty have I loved and beauty follows me. They say that thou, mother of Ares, didst with travail bear the holy choir of the fair-tressed Graces.b But to-day they have all denied thee and not one hast thou found to help thee. Queen but not of shields and nurse but not of fire, Ares hath not holpen thee, though Ares rages with the spear: the flames of Hephaestus have not holpen thee, though he brings to birth the breath of fire. And how vain is thy vaunting, Atrytonec! whom marriage sowed not nor mother bare, but cleaving of iron and root of iron made thee spring without bed of birth from the head of thy sire. And how, covering thy body in brazen robes, thou dost flee from love and pursuest the works of Ares, untaught of harmony and wotting not of concord. Knowest thou not that such Athenas as thou are the more unvaliant — exulting in glorious wars, with limbs at feuds, neither men nor women?äd
Thus spake Cypris and mocked Athena. So she got the prize of beauty that should work the ruin of
a Aphrodite.
b The Graces are generally said to be daughters of Zeus and Eurynome (Hes. Th. 907), but the names of the parents are variously given. Here their mother is Hera.
c i.e. Athena sprang from the head of Zeus (who before her birth had swallowed her mother Metis) when it was cleft by the axe of Hephaestus or Prometheus (Hes. Th. 924, Hom. H. 28, Pind. O. vii. 35, Apollod. i. 3. 6).
d Cf. 302 ff.