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Foreign literature of ancient eras, the Middle Ages and the Renaissance in brief. Cheat sheet: briefly, the most important

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Table of contents

1. Greece
2. Rome
3. Azerbaijani literature
4. English literature
5. Armenian literature
6. Georgian literature
7. Indian (Sanskrit) literature
8. Irish literature
9. Icelandic literature
10. Spanish literature
11. Italian literature
12. Chinese literature
13. German literature
14. Dutch literature
15. Persian-Tajik literature
16. Portuguese literature
17. Turkmen literature
18. French literature
19. Japanese literature

The myths of most peoples are myths primarily about gods. The myths of ancient Greece are an exception: for the most part they are not about gods, but about heroes. Heroes are sons, grandsons and great-grandchildren of gods from mortal women; they performed feats, cleansed the land of monsters, punished the villains and entertained their strength in internecine wars. When it became hard for the Earth from them, the gods made it so that they themselves killed each other in the greatest war - the Trojan:

"Ilion", "Troy" - two names of the same mighty city in Asia Minor, near the coast of the Dardanelles. From the first of these names, the great Greek poem about the Trojan War is called the Iliad. Before her, only short oral songs about the exploits of heroes, such as epics or ballads, existed among the people. A great poem of them was composed by the legendary blind singer Homer, and he composed it very skillfully: he chose only one episode from a long war and unfolded it so that it reflected the entire heroic age. This episode is the "wrath of Achilles", the greatest of the last generation of Greek heroes.

The Trojan War lasted ten years. Dozens of Greek kings and leaders gathered on a campaign against Troy on hundreds of ships with thousands of soldiers: a list of their names takes up several pages in the poem. The main leader was the strongest of the kings - the ruler of the city of Argos Agamemnon; with him were his brother Menelaus (for whose sake the war began), the mighty Ajax, the ardent Diomedes, the cunning Odysseus, the wise old Nestor and others; but the most courageous, strong and dexterous was the young Achilles, the son of the sea goddess Thetis, who was accompanied by his friend Patroclus. The Trojans were ruled by the gray-haired king Priam, at the head of their army was the valiant son of Priam Hector, with him his brother Paris (because of whom the war began) and many allies from all over Asia. The gods themselves took part in the war: the silver-armed Apollo helped the Trojans, and the heavenly queen Hera and the wise warrior Athena helped the Greeks. The supreme god, the thunderer Zeus, followed the battles from the high Olympus and carried out his will.

The war started like this. The wedding of the hero Peleus and the sea goddess Thetis was celebrated - the last marriage between gods and mortals. (This is the same marriage from which Achilles was born.) At the feast, the goddess of discord threw a golden apple, destined for the "most beautiful." Three people argued over an apple: Hera, Athena and the goddess of love Aphrodite. Zeus ordered the Trojan prince Paris to judge their dispute. Each of the goddesses promised him their gifts: Hera promised to make him king over the whole world, Athena - a hero and sage, Aphrodite - the husband of the most beautiful of women. Paris gave the apple to Aphrodite. After that, Hera and Athena became the eternal enemies of Troy. Aphrodite helped Paris seduce and take away to Troy the most beautiful of women - Helen, daughter of Zeus, wife of King Menelaus. Once upon a time, the best heroes from all over Greece wooed her and, in order not to quarrel, they agreed as follows: let her choose who she wants, and if someone tries to recapture her from the chosen one, all the rest will go to war with him. (Everyone hoped that he would be the chosen one.) Then Helen chose Menelaus; now Paris has recaptured her from Menelaus, and all her former suitors have gone to war against him. Only one, the youngest, did not marry Elena, did not participate in the general agreement and went to war only in order to show off his valor, show strength and acquire glory. It was Achilles. So that still none of the gods interfered in the battle. The Trojans continue their onslaught, led by Hector and Sarpedon, the son of Zeus, the last of the sons of Zeus on earth. Achilles coldly watches from his tent how the Greeks flee, how the Trojans approach their very camp: they are about to set fire to the Greek ships. From above, Hera also sees the flight of the Greeks and, in desperation, decides to deceive in order to divert the harsh attention of Zeus. She appears before him in the magic belt of Aphrodite, arousing love, Zeus flares up with passion and unites with her at the top of Ida; a golden cloud envelops them, and the earth around them blooms with saffron and hyacinths. After love comes sleep, and while Zeus sleeps, the Greeks gather their courage and stop the Trojans. But sleep is short; Zeus awakens, Hera trembles before his anger, and he tells her: "Be able to endure: everything will be your way and the Greeks will defeat the Trojans, but not before Achilles pacifies his anger and goes into battle: so I promised the goddess Thetis."

But Achilles is not yet ready to "lay down his anger", and instead of him, his friend Patroclus comes out to help the Greeks: it hurts him to look at his comrades in trouble. Achilles gives him his soldiers, his armor, which the Trojans are used to being afraid of, his chariot harnessed by prophetic horses that can speak and prophesy. “Repel the Trojans from the camp, save the ships,” says Achilles, “but don’t get carried away with the pursuit, don’t endanger yourself! Indeed, seeing the armor of Achilles, the Trojans trembled and turned back; and then Patroclus could not resist and rushed to pursue them. Sarpedon, the son of Zeus, comes out to meet him, and Zeus, looking from a height, hesitates: "Should we not save our son?" - and the unkind Hera recalls:

"No, let fate be done!" Sarpedon collapses like a mountain pine, the battle boils around his body, and Patroclus rushes further, to the gates of Troy. “Away!” Apollo shouts to him, “Troy is not destined to take either you or even Achilles.” He does not hear; and then Apollo, wrapped in a cloud, strikes him on the shoulders, Patroclus loses his strength, drops his shield, helmet and spear, Hector strikes him with the last blow, and Patroclus, dying, says: "But you yourself will fall from Achilles!"

The news reaches Achilles: Patroclus has died, Hector flaunts in his Achilles armor, his friends hardly carried the dead body of the hero out of the battle, the triumphant Trojans are chasing them. Achilles wants to rush into battle, but he is unarmed; he comes out of the tent and screams, and this scream is so terrible that the Trojans, shuddering, retreat. Night falls, and all night Achilles mourns his friend and threatens the Trojans with terrible revenge; meanwhile, at the request of his mother, Thetis, the lame blacksmith god Hephaestus in his copper forge forges a new marvelous weapon for Achilles. This is a shell, a helmet, greaves and a shield, and the whole world is depicted on the shield: the sun and stars, the earth and the sea, a peaceful city and a warring city, in a peaceful city there is a court and a wedding, an ambush and a battle in front of a warring city, and around - rural areas, plowing , harvest, pasture, vineyard, village festival and dancing round dance, and in the middle of it - a singer with a lyre.

Morning comes, Achilles puts on divine armor and calls the Greek army to a gathering. His anger did not fade away, but now he is not directed at Agamemnon, but at those who killed his friend - at the Trojans and Hector. He offers reconciliation to Agamemnon, and he accepts it with dignity: "Zeus and Fate blinded me, but I myself am innocent." Briseis is returned to Achilles, rich gifts are brought to his tent, but Achilles almost does not look at them: he is eager to fight, he wants to take revenge.

The fourth battle is coming. Zeus removes the bans: let the gods themselves fight for whom they want! The warrior Athena converges in battle with the frantic Ares, the sovereign Hera with the archer Artemis, the sea Poseidon must converge with Apollo, but he stops him with sad words:

Achilles is terrible. He grappled with Aeneas, but the gods pulled Aeneas out of his hands: Aeneas is not destined to fall from Achilles, he must survive both Achilles and Troy. Enraged by the failure, Achilles destroys the Trojans without counting, their corpses clutter up the river, the river god Scamander attacks him, sweeping the ramparts, but the fiery god Hephaestus pacifies the river.

The surviving Trojans run in droves to escape to the city; Hector alone, in yesterday's Achilles armor, covers the retreat. Achilles attacks him, and Hector takes flight, voluntary and involuntary: he is afraid for himself, but wants to distract Achilles from others. Three times they run around the city, and the gods look at them from the heights. Again Zeus hesitates: "Should we save the hero?" - but Athena reminds him:

"Let fate be done." Again, Zeus lifts the scales, on which two lots lie - this time Hectors and Achilles. The bowl of Achilles flew up, the bowl of Hector leaned towards the underworld. And Zeus gives a sign: Apollo - to leave Hector, Athena - to come to the aid of Achilles. Athena holds Hector, and he comes face to face with Achilles. "I promise, Achilles," says Hector, "if I kill you, I will take off your armor, but I won't touch your body; you promise me the same." "There is no place for promises: for Patroclus I myself will tear you to pieces and drink your blood!" Achilles screams. Hector's spear strikes the Hephaestus shield, but in vain; Achilles' spear strikes Hector's throat, and the hero falls with the words: "Fear the revenge of the gods: and you will fall after me." "I know, but first - you!" Achilles answers. He ties the body of the slain enemy to his chariot and drives the horses around Troy, mocking the dead, and on the city wall old Priam weeps for Hector, the widow Andromache and all the Trojans and Trojans weep.

Patroclus is avenged. Achilles arranges a magnificent burial for his friend, kills twelve Trojan captives over his body, celebrates a commemoration. It would seem that his anger should subside, but it does not subside. Three times a day, Achilles drives his chariot with the body of Hector tied around Patroclus' mound; the corpse would have long since smashed against the stones, but Apollo was invisibly guarding it. Finally, Zeus intervenes - through the sea Thetis, he announces to Achilles: "Do not rage with your heart! After all, you don’t have long to live either. Be humane: accept the ransom and give Hector for burial." And Achilles says, "I obey."

At night, the decrepit king Priam comes to the tent of Achilles; with him is a wagon full of ransom gifts. The gods themselves let him pass through the Greek camp unnoticed. He falls to the knees of Achilles;

"Remember, Achilles, about your father, about Peleus! He is just as old; maybe enemies are pressing him; but it is easier for him, because he knows that you are alive and hopes that you will return. I am alone: ​​from of all my sons, only Hector was my hope - and now he is no more. For the sake of your father, have pity on me, Achilles: here I kiss your hand, from which my children fell.

Equal grief brings enemies together: only now the long anger in Achilles' heart subsides. He accepts the gifts, gives Priam the body of Hector and promises not to disturb the Trojans until they betray their hero to the ground. Early at dawn, Priam returns with the body of his son to Troy, and mourning begins: the old mother cries over Hector, the widow Andromache cries, Helen cries, because of whom the war once began. A funeral pyre is lit, the remains are collected in an urn, the urn is lowered into the grave, a mound is poured over the grave, a memorial feast is celebrated for the hero. "So the sons buried the warrior Hector of Troy" - this line ends the Iliad.

Before the end of the Trojan War, there were still many events. The Trojans, having lost Hector, no longer dared to go beyond the city walls. But other, more and more distant peoples came to their aid and fought with Hector: from Asia Minor, from the fabulous land of the Amazons, from distant Ethiopia. The most terrible was the leader of the Ethiopians, the black giant Memnon, also the son of the goddess; he fought with Achilles, and Achilles overthrew him. It was then that Achilles rushed to attack Troy - then he died from the arrow of Paris, which Apollo directed. The Greeks, having lost Achilles, no longer hoped to take Troy by force - they took it by cunning, forcing the Trojans to bring into the city a wooden horse in which the Greek knights were sitting. The Roman poet Virgil will later tell about this in his Aeneid. Troy was wiped off the face of the earth, and the surviving Greek heroes set off on their way back.

M. L. and V. M. Gasparov

The Trojan War was started by the gods so that the time of heroes would end and the present, human, iron age would come. Who did not die at the walls of Troy, he had to die on the way back.

Most of the surviving Greek leaders sailed to their homeland, as they sailed to Troy - in a common fleet through the Aegean Sea. When they were halfway there, the sea god Poseidon broke out in a storm, the ships were swept away, people drowned in the waves and crashed on the rocks. Only the chosen ones were destined to be saved. But even those were not easy. Perhaps only the wise old Nestor managed to calmly reach his kingdom in the city of Pylos. The supreme king Agamemnon overcame the storm, but only to die an even more terrible death - in his native Argos he was killed by his own wife and her avenging lover; the poet Aeschylus will later write a tragedy about this. Menelaus, with Helen returned to him, was carried by the winds far into Egypt, and it took him a very long time to get to his Sparta. But the longest and most difficult of all was the path of the cunning king Odysseus, whom the sea carried around the world for ten years. About his fate, Homer composed his second poem:

The Iliad is a heroic poem, its action takes place on a battlefield and in a military camp. "Odyssey" is a fabulous and everyday poem, its action takes place, on the one hand, in the magical lands of giants and monsters, where Odysseus wandered, on the other hand, in his small kingdom on the island of Ithaca and in its environs, where Odysseus was waiting for his wife Penelope and his son of Telemachus. As in the Iliad, only one episode, "the wrath of Achilles", is chosen for the narrative, so in the "Odyssey" - only the very end of his wanderings, the last two stages, from the far western edge of the earth to his native Ithaca. About everything that happened before, Odysseus tells at a feast in the middle of the poem, and tells very briefly: all these fabulous adventures in the poem account for fifty pages out of three hundred. In the Odyssey, the fairy tale sets off life, and not vice versa, although readers, both ancient and modern, were more willing to re-read and recall the fairy tale.

In the Trojan War, Odysseus did a lot for the Greeks - especially where they needed not strength, but intelligence. It was he who guessed to bind Elena's suitors with an oath to help her chosen one against any offender, and without this the army would never have gathered on a campaign. It was he who attracted the young Achilles to the campaign, and without this the victory would have been impossible. It was he, when, at the beginning of the Iliad, the Greek army, after a general meeting, almost rushed from Troy on the way back, managed to stop him. It was he who persuaded Achilles, when he quarreled with Agamemnon, to return to the battle. When, after the death of Achilles, the best warrior of the Greek camp was to receive the armor of the slain, Odysseus received them, and not Ajax. When Troy could not be taken by siege, it was Odysseus who came up with the idea of ​​​​building a wooden horse, in which the bravest Greek leaders hid and thus penetrated into Troy - and he is one of them. The goddess Athena, the patroness of the Greeks, loved Odysseus the most of them and helped him at every step. But the god Poseidon hated him - we will soon find out why - and it was Poseidon who, with his storms, did not allow him to reach his homeland for ten years. Ten years under Troy, ten years in wanderings - and only in the twentieth year of his trials does the action of the Odyssey begin.

It begins, as in the Iliad, Zeus' will. The gods hold a council, and Athena intercedes with Zeus for Odysseus. He is a prisoner of the nymph Calypso, who is in love with him, on an island in the very middle of a wide sea, and languishes, in vain wishing "to see at least smoke rising from his native shores in the distance." And in his kingdom, on the island of Ithaca, everyone already considers him dead, and the surrounding nobles demand that Queen Penelope choose a new husband from among them, and a new king for the island. There are more than a hundred of them, they live in the Odysseus Palace, feast and drink wildly, ruining the Odysseus economy, and have fun with the Odysseus slaves. Penelope tried to deceive them: she said that she had made a vow to announce her decision not before weaving a shroud for old Laertes, Odysseus's father, who was about to die. During the day she wove in front of everyone, and at night she secretly unraveled what was woven. But the servants betrayed her cunning, and it became more and more difficult for her to resist the insistence of the suitors. With her is her son Telemachus, whom Odysseus left as a baby; but he is young and is not considered.

And now an unfamiliar wanderer comes to Telemachus, calls himself an old friend of Odysseus and gives him advice: "Finish the ship, go around the surrounding lands, collect news about the missing Odysseus; if you hear that he is alive, you will tell the suitors to wait another year; if you hear that he is dead - you will say that you will celebrate the wake and persuade your mother to marry. He advised and disappeared - for Athena herself appeared in his image. So Telemachus did. The suitors resisted, but Telemachus managed to leave and board the ship unnoticed - for the same Athena helped him in this, Telemachus sails to the mainland - first to Pylos to the decrepit Nestor, then to Sparta to the newly returned Menelaus and Elena. The talkative Nestor tells how the heroes sailed from under Troy and drowned in a storm, how Agamemnon later died in Argos and how his son Orestes avenged the killer; but he knows nothing about the fate of Odysseus. The hospitable Menelaus tells how he, Menelaus, getting lost in his wanderings, on the Egyptian coast, waylaid the prophetic sea elder, the seal shepherd Proteus, who knew how to turn into a lion, and a boar, and a leopard, and a snake, and into water, and into tree; how he fought with Proteus, and overcame him, and learned from him the way back; and at the same time he learned that Odysseus was alive and suffering in the middle of the wide sea on the island of the nymph Calypso. Delighted by this news, Telemachus is about to return to Ithaca, but then Homer interrupts his story about him and turns to the fate of Odysseus.

The intercession of Athena helped: Zeus sends the messenger of the gods Hermes to Calypso: the time has come, it's time to let Odysseus go. The nymph grieves: "Did I save him from the sea, did I want to give him immortality?" - but dare not disobey. Odysseus does not have a ship - you need to put together a raft. For four days he works with an ax and a drill, on the fifth - the raft is lowered. For seventeen days he sails, ruling over the stars, on the eighteenth a storm breaks out. It was Poseidon, seeing the hero escaping from him, that swept the abyss with four winds, the logs of the raft scattered like straw. "Oh, why didn't I die near Troy!" cried Odysseus. Two goddesses helped Odysseus: a kind sea nymph threw him a magical veil that saved him from drowning, and faithful Athena calmed three winds, leaving the fourth to carry him by swimming to the near shore. For two days and two nights he swims without closing his eyes, and on the third wave they throw him onto land. Naked, tired, helpless, he buries himself in a pile of leaves and falls into a dead sleep.

It was the land of the blessed feacs, over which the good king Alkinos ruled in a high palace: copper walls, golden doors, embroidered fabrics on the benches, ripe fruits on the branches, eternal summer over the garden. The king had a young daughter, Nausicaa; At night, Athena appeared to her and said: "Soon you will be married, but your clothes are not washed; gather the maids, take the chariot, go to the sea, wash your dresses." They left, washed, dried, began to play ball; the ball flew into the sea, the girls screamed loudly, their cry woke up Odysseus. He rises from the bushes, terrible, covered with dried sea mud, and prays: "Whether you are a nymph or a mortal, help me: let me cover my nakedness, show me the way to people, and may the gods send you a good husband." He bathes, anoints himself, dresses, and Nausicaä, admiring, thinks: "Ah, if only the gods would give me such a husband." He goes to the city, enters Tsar Alcinous, tells him about his misfortune, but does not name himself; touched by Alkina, he promises that the Phaeacian ships will take him wherever he asks.

Odysseus sits at the Alkinoic feast, and the wise blind singer Demodocus entertains the feasters with songs. "Sing about the Trojan War!" - asks Odysseus; and Demodocus sings about the wooden horse of Odysseus and the capture of Troy. Odysseus has tears in his eyes. "Why are you crying?" says Alkinoy. "That's why the gods send death to the heroes, so that the descendants sing glory to them. Is it true that someone close to you fell near Troy?" And then Odysseus opens: "I am Odysseus, the son of Laertes, the king of Ithaca, small, rocky, but dear to the heart ..." - and begins the story of his wanderings. There are nine adventures in this story.

The first adventure is with the lotophages. The storm took the Odyssey ships from under Troy to the far south, where the lotus grows - a magical fruit, after tasting which, a person forgets about everything and does not want anything in life except the lotus. The lotus-eaters treated the Odyssey companions to the lotus, and they forgot about their native Ithaca and refused to sail further. By force of them, weeping, they took them to the ship and set off.

The second adventure is with the Cyclopes. They were monstrous giants with one eye in the middle of their foreheads; they herded sheep and goats and did not know wine. Chief among them was Polyphemus, the son of the sea Poseidon. Odysseus wandered into his empty cave with a dozen companions. In the evening, Polyphemus came, huge as a mountain, drove a herd into the cave, blocked the exit with a block, asked: "Who are you?" - "Wanderers, Zeus is our guardian, we ask you to help us." - "I'm not afraid of Zeus!" - and the Cyclops grabbed two, smashed them against the wall, ate them with bones and snored. In the morning he left with the herd, again blocking the entrance; and then Odysseus came up with a trick. He and his comrades took a Cyclops club, a large one,

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like a mast, sharpened, burned on fire, hid; and when the villain came and devoured two more comrades, he brought him wine to put him to sleep. The monster liked the wine. "What is your name?" - he asked. "Nobody!" Odysseus answered. "For such a treat, I'll eat you, Nobody, last!" - and drunken cyclops snored. Then Odysseus and his companions took a club, approached, swung it and plunged it into the single giant's eye. The blinded ogre roared, other Cyclops ran: "Who offended you, Polyphemus?" - "Nobody!" - "Well, if no one, then there is nothing to make noise" - and dispersed. And in order to get out of the cave, Odysseus tied his comrades under the belly of the Cyclopean rams so that he would not grope them, and so, together with the herd, they left the cave in the morning. But, already sailing away, Odysseus could not stand it and shouted:

"Here's an execution from me, Odysseus from Ithaca, for offending the guests!" And the Cyclops furiously prayed to his father Poseidon: "Don't let Odysseus swim to Ithaca - and if it's destined to do so, then let him swim a long time, alone, on a strange ship!" And God heard his prayer.

The third adventure is on the island of the wind god Eol. God sent them a fair wind, and tied the rest in a leather bag and gave Odysseus: "When you swim - let go." But when Ithaca was already visible, the tired Odysseus fell asleep, and his companions untied the bag ahead of time; a hurricane arose, they rushed back to Aeolus. "So the gods are against you!" - Eol said angrily and refused to help the disobedient.

The fourth adventure is with the lestrigons, wild cannibal giants. They ran to the shore and brought down huge rocks on the Odysseus ships; eleven of the twelve ships perished, Odysseus and a few comrades escaped on the last.

The fifth adventure is with the sorceress Kirka, the queen of the West, who turned all aliens into animals. She brought wine, honey, cheese and flour with a poisonous potion to the Odyssey messengers - and they turned into pigs, and she drove them into a barn. He escaped alone and in horror told Odysseus about this; he took a bow and went to help his comrades, not hoping for anything. But Hermes, the messenger of the gods, gave him a divine plant: a black root, a white flower, and the spell was powerless against Odysseus. Threatening with a sword, he forced the sorceress to return the human form to his friends and demanded: "Get us back to Ithaca!" - "Ask the way of the prophetic Tiresias, the prophet from the prophet-

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kov,” said the sorceress. “But he is dead!” “Ask the dead man!” And she told me how to do it.

The sixth adventure is the most terrible: the descent into the realm of the dead. The entrance to it is at the end of the world, in the country of eternal night. The souls of the dead in it are incorporeal, insensible and thoughtless, but after drinking the sacrificial blood, they acquire speech and reason. On the threshold of the kingdom of the dead, Odysseus slaughtered a black ram and a black sheep as a sacrifice; the souls of the dead flocked to the smell of blood, but Odysseus drove them away with a sword until the prophetic Tiresias appeared before him. After drinking blood, he said:

“Your troubles are for insulting Poseidon; your salvation is if you don’t offend the Sun-Helios; if you offend, you will return to Ithaca, but alone, on a strange ship, and not soon. and you will have a long kingdom and a peaceful old age." After that, Odysseus allowed other ghosts to the sacrificial blood. The shadow of his mother told how she died of longing for her son; he wanted to hug her, but under his arms there was only empty air. Agamemnon told how he died from his wife: "Be careful, Odysseus, it's dangerous to rely on wives." Achilles said to him:

"I'd rather be a laborer on earth than a king among the dead." Only Ajax did not say anything, not forgiving that Odysseus, and not he, got the armor of Achilles. From afar I saw Odysseus and the infernal judge My-nos, and the eternally executed proud Tantalus, the cunning Sisyphus, the impudent Titius; but then horror seized him, and he hurried away, towards the white light.

The seventh adventure was Sirens - predators, seductive singing luring sailors to death. Odysseus outwitted them: he sealed the ears of his companions with wax, and ordered himself to be tied to the mast and not let go, no matter what. So they sailed past, unharmed, and Odysseus also heard singing, the sweetest of which is none.

The eighth adventure was the strait between the monsters Skilla and Charybdis: Skilla - about six heads, each with three rows of teeth, and twelve paws; Charybdis - about one larynx, but such that in one gulp it drags the whole ship. Odysseus preferred Skilla Charybdis - and he was right: she grabbed six of his comrades from the ship and ate six of his comrades with six mouths, but the ship remained intact.

The ninth adventure was the island of the Sun-Helios, where

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his sacred herds are seven herds of red bulls, seven herds of white rams. Odysseus, mindful of the covenant of Tiresias, took a terrible oath from his comrades not to touch them; but opposite winds blew, the ship stopped, the satellites were hungry, and when Odysseus fell asleep, they slaughtered and ate the best bulls. It was scary: the flayed skins moved, and the meat on the skewers lowed. The Sun-Helios, who sees everything, hears everything, knows everything, prayed to Zeus: "Punish the offenders, otherwise I will descend into the underworld and will shine among the dead." And then, as the winds subsided and the ship sailed from the shore, Zeus raised a storm, struck with lightning, the ship crumbled, the satellites drowned in a whirlpool, and Odysseus, alone on a fragment of a log, rushed across the sea for nine days, until he was thrown ashore on the island of Calypso.

This is how Odysseus ends his story.

King Alkina fulfilled his promise: Odysseus boarded the Phaeacian ship, plunged into an enchanted dream, and woke up already on the foggy coast of Ithaca. Here he is met by the patroness Athena. “The time has come for your cunning,” she says, “hide, beware of suitors and wait for your son Telemachus!” She touches him, and he becomes unrecognizable: old, bald, poor, with a staff and a bag. In this form, he goes deep into the island - to ask for shelter from the good old swineherd Evmey. He tells Eumeus that he comes from Crete, fought near Troy, knew Odysseus, sailed to Egypt, fell into slavery, was with pirates and barely escaped. Eumeus calls him to the hut, puts him to the hearth, treats him, grieves for the missing Odysseus, complains about violent suitors, pities Queen Penelope and Prince Telemachus. The next day, Telemachus himself comes, having returned from his wandering - of course, Athena herself also sent him here. In front of him, Athena returns Odysseus his true appearance, mighty and proud. "Are you a god?" - asks Telemachus. "No, I am your father," Odysseus replies, and they, embracing, cry with happiness,

The end is near. Telemachus goes to the city, to the palace; behind him wander Eumeus and Odysseus, again in the form of a beggar. At the palace threshold, the first recognition is made: the decrepit Odysseus dog, who for twenty years has not forgotten the voice of the owner, raises his ears, crawls up to him with his last strength and dies at his feet. Odysseus enters the house, goes around the room, asks the suitors for alms, suffers ridicule and beatings. Suitors pit him against another beggar, younger and stronger; Odysseus

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unexpectedly for everyone knocks him over with one blow. The grooms laugh: "Let Zeus send you what you want for this!" - and do not know that Odysseus wishes them a speedy death. Penelope calls the stranger to her: has he heard the news of Odysseus? "I heard," says Odysseus, "he is in a distant land and will soon arrive." Penelope can't believe it, but she is grateful for the guest. She tells the old maid to wash the wanderer's dusty feet before going to bed, and invites him to be in the palace at tomorrow's feast. And here the second recognition takes place: the maid brings in the basin, touches the guest's legs and feels the scar on her lower leg, which Odysseus had after hunting the boar in his younger years. The hands trembled, the leg slipped out: "You are Odysseus!" Odysseus clamps her mouth: "Yes, it's me, but be quiet - otherwise you will ruin the whole thing!"

The last day is coming. Penelope calls the suitors to the banquet room: "Here is the bow of my dead Odysseus; whoever pulls it and shoots an arrow through twelve rings on twelve axes in a row will become my husband!" One after another, one hundred and twenty suitors try on the bow - not a single one can even pull the bowstring. They already want to postpone the competition until tomorrow - but then Odysseus gets up in his impoverished form: "Let me try too: after all, I was once strong!" The suitors are indignant, but Telemachus stands up for the guest:

"I am the heir of this bow, to whom I want - I give it; and you, mother, go to your women's affairs." Odysseus takes up the bow, easily bends it, rings the bowstring, the arrow flies through the twelve rings and pierces the wall. Zeus thunders over the house, Odysseus straightens up to his full heroic height, next to him is Telemachus with a sword and a spear. "No, I have not forgotten how to shoot: now I will try another target!" And the second arrow hits the most impudent and violent of suitors. "Ah, you thought that Odysseus was dead? No, he is alive for truth and retribution!" The suitors grab their swords, Odysseus strikes them with arrows, and when the arrows run out - with spears, which the faithful Eumeus brings. The suitors rush about the ward, the invisible Athena darkens their minds and diverts their blows from Odysseus, they fall one by one. A pile of dead bodies is piled up in the middle of the house, faithful slaves and slaves crowd around and rejoice when they see their master.

Penelope did not hear anything: Athena sent a deep sleep on her in her chamber. The old maid runs to her with good news:

25

Odysseus is back. Odysseus punished the suitors! She does not believe: no, yesterday's beggar is not at all like Odysseus, as he was twenty years ago; and the suitors were probably punished by angry gods. "Well," says Odysseus, "if the queen has such an unkind heart, let them make a bed for me alone." And here the third, main recognition takes place. "Well," says Penelope to the maid, "take the guest to his rest the bed from the king's bedroom." “What are you saying, woman?” Odysseus exclaims, “this bed cannot be moved, instead of legs it has an olive stump, I myself once knocked it together and adjusted it.” And in response, Penelope weeps with joy and rushes to her husband: it was a secret, they alone knew a sign.

It's a victory, but it's not peace yet. The fallen suitors have relatives left, and they are ready to take revenge. With an armed crowd, they go to Odysseus, he comes forward to meet them with Telemachus and several henchmen. The first blows are already thundering, the first blood is shed - but Zeus's will puts an end to the brewing discord. Lightning flashes, striking the ground between the fighters, thunder rumbles, Athena appears with a loud cry: "... Do not shed blood in vain and stop the evil enmity!" - and the frightened avengers retreat. And then:

With these words, the Odyssey ends.

M. L. and V. M. Gasparov

On a hot summer afternoon, the mouse prince Krokhobor drank water from the swamp and met the frog king Vzdulomord there. He turned to him, as Homer addressed Odysseus: "Wanderer, who are you? from what kind are you? and where did you come from?" Word for word, they met, the frog put the mouse on his back and took him to show the wonders of the amphibian kingdom. They were sailing peacefully, when suddenly the frog saw a water snake ahead, got scared and dived into the water from under his friend. The unfortunate mouse drowned, but managed to utter a terrible curse: "... Terrible you will not escape retribution from the army of mice!"

And indeed, the mice, having learned about the death of their prince, were excited. Tsar Khlebogryz delivered a touching speech: “I am an unfortunate father, I have lost three sons: the eldest died from a cat, the middle one from a mousetrap, and the youngest, beloved, dies from a frog! they arm themselves according to all the epic rules, only instead of armor they have pods, instead of spears, needles, instead of helmets, halves of a nut. Kyagushki too: instead of shields - cabbage leaves, instead of spears of reeds, instead of helmets - snail shells. "We went out to fight fully armed, and everyone was full of courage..."

Zeus, as in the Iliad, calls the gods and invites them to help whoever wants to. But the gods are careful. “I don’t like mice or frogs,” says Athena, “the mice gnaw at my tissues and put them into repair expenses, and the frogs don’t let me sleep by croaking ...” And on the shore of the swamp, the battle is already starting and they are already dying (in impeccably Homeric terms) first heroes:

The mice win. Especially among them stands out "the glorious hero Bludotsap, the famous son of Breadscraper." Zeus himself, looking at his exploits, says, "shaking his head contritely":

Zeus throws lightning from heaven - mice and frogs shudder, but do not stop fighting. We have to use another means - crayfish come out against the belligerents. "Crooked claws, arched back, skin like bones", they begin to mercilessly grab both mice and frogs; both of them scatter in horror, and in the meantime the sun sets - "And the one-day war by the will of Zeus comes to an end."

M. L. Gasparov

Everyone knows: Greek mythology is, first of all, a lot of names. This is for us; and for the Greeks themselves there were even more. Almost every town or village had its own local deities; and even about those that were common, in each city they told in their own way. Those who lived all their lives in one place and knew little about others, this did not bother them much. But those who often moved from city to city and from region to region, as, for example, wandering singers, there were many inconveniences from this. In order to sing, mentioning many gods and heroes, it was necessary to coordinate local traditions and at least agree on who is whose son and who is who's husband. And in order to remember better - to state these genealogies in collapsible verses and say that these verses were dictated by the Muses themselves, the goddesses of reason, words and songs.

This is what the singer Hesiod did from under the Vita Mountain - Helikon, where the Muses supposedly lead their round dances. From this came the poem "feogony" (or "Theogony"), which in Greek means "On the origin of the gods" - from the very beginning of the universe and until mortal heroes began to be born from the immortal gods. More than three hundred names are named and linked to each other on thirty pages. All of them fit into three mythological eras: when the most ancient gods ruled, headed by Uranus; when the elder gods ruled - the Titans, led by Kron; and when the younger gods began to rule and rule - the Olympians, led by Zeus.

In the beginning there was Chaos ("gaping"), in which everything was merged and nothing was divided. Then Night, Earth-Gaia and Dungeon-Tartar were born from it. Then the Day was born from the Night, and from the Earth-Gaia - the Sky-Uranus and the Sea-Pont. Sky-Uranus and Gaia-Earth became the first gods:

the starry Sky lay on the wide Earth and fertilized it. And the first creatures of the gods swirled around - sometimes ghostly, sometimes monstrous.

Death, Sleep, Sorrow, Labor, Lies, Revenge, Execution, and most importantly, Rock were born from Night: the three goddesses Moira ("Shares"), who measure life for each person and determine misfortune and happiness. From the Sea were born the elder sea god, the good Nereus, his two brothers and two sisters, and from them - many, many monsters. These are the Gorgons, killing with a glance; Harpies stealing human souls; underground Echidna - a maiden in front, a snake in the back; fire-breathing Chimera - "in front of a lion, behind a dragon and a goat in the middle"; the insidious Sphinx, a lioness woman who destroyed people with cunning riddles; the three-bodied giant Gerion; the many-headed hellish dog Kerberus and the many-headed swamp snake Hydra; winged horse Pegasus and many others. Even among Gaia and Uranus, the first generations were monstrous: three hundred-armed fighters and three one-eyed blacksmiths - Cyclopes, inhabitants of the black dungeon - Tartarus.

But they were not the main ones. The main ones were the Titans - twelve sons and daughters of Uranus and Gaia. Uranus was afraid that they would overthrow him, and did not allow them to be born. One by one, they bloated the womb of Mother Earth, and now she became unbearable. "From gray iron" she forged a magic sickle and gave it to the children; and when Uranus again wanted to connect with her, the youngest and most cunning of the Titans, named Kronos, cut off his genital member. With a curse, Uranus recoiled into the sky, and his severed member fell into the sea, whipped up white foam, and from this foam came ashore the goddess of love and desire Aphrodite - "Foamy".

The second kingdom began - the kingdom of the Titans: Krona and his brothers and sisters. One of them was called Ocean, he became related to the old Nereus, and from him were born all the streams and rivers in the world. The other was called Hyperion, from him the Sun-Helios, the Moon-Selene and the Dawn-Eos were born, and from the Dawn - the winds and stars. The third was called Iapetus, from him the mighty Atlas was born, who stands in the west of the earth and holds the sky on his shoulders, and the wise Prometheus, who is chained to a pillar in the east of the earth, and for what - this will be discussed further. But the chief was Cronus, and his dominion was disturbing.

Cron was also afraid that the children born to him would be overthrown. By his sister Rhea he had three daughters and three sons, and each newborn he took away from her and swallowed alive. Only the youngest, named Zeus, she decided to save. She gave the crown to swallow a large stone wrapped in swaddling clothes, and hid Zeus in a cave on the island of Crete. There he grew up, and when he grew up, he tricked Kron into regurgitating his brothers and sisters. The elder gods - the Titans and the younger gods - the Olympians came together in a fight. "The sea roared, the earth groaned and the sky gasped." The Olympians freed the fighters from Tartarus - the Hundred Hands and the blacksmiths - the Cyclopes; the first struck the Titans with stones of three hundred hands, and the second fettered thunder and lightning to Zeus, and the Titans could not stand against this. Now they themselves were imprisoned in Tartarus, in the very depths: how much from heaven to earth, so much from earth to Tartarus. The Hundred-armed stood guard, and Zeus the Thunderer with his brothers took power over the world.

The third kingdom began - the kingdom of the Olympians. Zeus took the sky with the celestial mountain Olympus as an inheritance; his brother Poseidon is the sea, where both Nereus and Oceanus obeyed him; the third brother, Hades, is the underworld of the dead. Their sister Hera became the wife of Zeus and bore him the wild Ares, the god of war, the lame Hephaestus, the blacksmith god, and the bright Hebe, the goddess of youth. Sister Demeter, the goddess of arable land, gave birth to Zeus's daughter Persephone; she was kidnapped by Hades, and she became the underground queen. The third sister, Hestia, goddess of the hearth, remained virgin.

Zeus was also in danger of being overthrown: the old Gaia and Uranus warned him that the daughter of the Ocean, Metis-Wisdom, should give birth to a daughter smarter than everyone and a son stronger than everyone. Zeus connected with her, and then swallowed her, as Cronus once swallowed his brothers. The smartest daughter was born from the head of Zeus: it was Athena, the goddess of reason, labor and war. And the son, stronger than all, remained unborn. From another of the daughters of the Titans, Zeus gave birth to the twins Apollo and Artemis: she is a huntress, he is a shepherd, as well as a healer, as well as a soothsayer. From the third, Zeus was born Hermes, the watchman of crossroads, the patron of road travelers and merchants. Another one gave birth to three Horas - goddesses of order; from one more - three Haritas, goddesses of beauty; from one more - nine Muses, goddesses of reason, words and songs with which this story began. Hermes invented the stringed lyre, Apollo plays it, and the Muses dance around him.

Two sons of Zeus were born from mortal women, but nevertheless they ascended Olympus and became gods. This is Hercules, his beloved son, who went around the whole earth, freeing her from evil monsters: it was he who defeated the Hydra, and Geryon, and Kerberos, and others. And this is Dionysus, who also went around the whole earth, working miracles, teaching people to plant grapes and make wine, and instructing them when to drink in moderation, and when without restraint.

And where did mortal people themselves come from, Hesiod does not say: maybe from rocks or trees. The gods did not like them at first, but Prometheus helped them survive. People were supposed to honor the gods by sacrificing some of their food to them. Prometheus arranged a cunning division: he slaughtered the bull, put separately the bones covered with fat, and the meat covered with the stomach and skin, and invited Zeus to choose a share for the gods and a share for people. Zeus was deceived, chose the bones and from evil decided not to give people fire for cooking meat. Then Prometheus himself stole the fire on Olympus and brought it to people in an empty reed. For this, Zeus punished both him and the people. He created the first woman, Pandora, for people, "on grief for men", and, as you know, a lot of bad things came from women. And Prometheus, as it is said, he chained to a pillar in the east of the earth and sent an eagle every day to peck out his liver. Only many centuries later did Zeus allow Hercules, in his wanderings, to shoot this eagle and free Prometheus.

But it turned out that the gods need people more than the gods thought. The gods had yet another struggle to face - with the Giants, the younger sons of Gaia-Earth, born from drops of Uranium blood. And it was destined that the gods would defeat them only if at least one person helped them. So, it was necessary to give birth to such powerful people who could help the gods. It was then that the gods began to descend to mortal women, and the goddesses give birth from mortal men. Thus was born a tribe of heroes; the best of them was Hercules, he saved the gods in the war with the Giants. And then this tribe died in the Theban war and the Trojan war. But before that, Hesiod did not finish writing: his story ends at the very beginning of the heroic age. "Theogony", the genealogy of the gods, ends here.

M. L. Gasparov

In mythical Greece, there were two of the most powerful kingdoms: Thebes in Central Greece and Argos in Southern Greece. There was once a king in Thebes named Laius. He received a prophecy: "Do not give birth to a son - you will destroy the kingdom!" Laius did not obey and gave birth to a son named Oedipus. He wanted to destroy the baby; but Oedipus escaped, grew up on a foreign side, and then accidentally killed Laius, not knowing that this was his father, and married his widow, not knowing that this was his mother. How this happened, and how it was revealed, and how Oedipus suffered for it, another playwright, Sophocles, will tell us. But the worst - the death of the kingdom - was yet to come.

Oedipus from an incestuous marriage with his own mother had two sons and two daughters: Eteocles, Polynices, Antigone and Yemen. When Oedipus renounced power, his sons turned away from him, reproaching him for his sin. Oedipus cursed them, promising them to share power among themselves with the sword. And so it happened. The brothers agreed to rule alternately, each for a year. But after the first year, Eteocles refused to leave and expelled Polyneices from Thebes. Polynices fled to the southern kingdom - to Argos. There he gathered his allies, and seven of them went to the seven gates of Thebes. In the decisive battle, the two brothers met and killed each other: Eteocles wounded Polynices with a spear, he fell to his knee, Eteocles hovered over him, and then Polynices hit him from below with a sword. Enemies faltered, Thebes were saved this time. Only a generation later, the sons of seven leaders came to Thebes on a campaign and wiped Thebes off the face of the earth for a long time: the prophecy came true.

Aeschylus wrote a trilogy about this, three tragedies: "Laius" - about the king-culprit, "Oedipus" - about the king-sinner and "Seven against Thebes" - about Eteocles, the king-hero who gave his life for his city. Only the last one has survived. She is static in the old way, almost nothing happens on the stage; only the king stands majestically, the herald comes and goes, and the choir wails pitifully.

Eteocles announces: the enemy is approaching, but the gods are the protection of Thebes; let each do his duty. The messenger confirms: yes, seven leaders have already sworn on the blood to win or fall, and they are throwing lots, who should go to which gate. The Theban women's choir rushes about in horror, smells death and prays to the gods for salvation. Eteocles appeases them: war is a man's business, and a woman's business is to stay at home and not embarrass the people with their fear.

The messenger appears again: the lots are cast, the seven leaders go on the attack. The central, most famous scene begins: the distribution of the gates. The Messenger describes each of the seven menacingly; Eteocles calmly answers and firmly issues orders.

"At the first gate is the hero Tydeus: a helmet with a mane, a shield with bells, on the shield is a starry sky with a month." "The strength is not in the mane and not in the bells: as if the black night did not overtake him." And against the chief of Argos, Eteocles sends the Theban. "At the second gate is the giant Kapanei, on his shield is a warrior with a torch; he threatens to burn Thebes with fire, neither people nor gods are afraid of him." "He who is not afraid of the gods will be punished by the gods; who is next?" And Eteocles sends out the second leader.

"At the third gate - your namesake, Eteocles of Argos, on his shield a warrior with a ladder climbs the tower." "Let's defeat both - and the one with the shield, and the one who is on the shield." And Eteocles sends out the third leader.

"At the fourth gate - the strongman Hippomedon: the shield is like a millstone, on the shield the snake Typhon blazes with fire and smoke", "He has Typhon on his shield, we have Zeus with lightning, the winner of Typhon." And Eteocles sends out the fourth leader.

"At the fifth gate is the handsome Parthenopaeus, on his shield is the miracle Sphinx, which tormented Thebes with riddles." "And a solver was found for the living Sphinx, and the drawn one is even more fearless for us." And Eteocles sends out the fifth leader.

"At the sixth gate is the wise Amphiaraus: he is a prophet, he knew that he was going to die, but he was lured by deceit; his shield is clean, and there are no signs on it." "It is bitter when the righteous shares fate with the evil: but as he foresaw, so it will come true." And Eteocles sends out the sixth leader.

"At the seventh gate is your brother Polynices himself: either he will die, or he will kill you, or he will drive you out with dishonor, as you did him; and on his shield is written the goddess of Truth." "Woe to us from the Oedipus curse! But not with him is the holy Truth, but with Thebes. I myself will go against him, king against king, brother against brother." - "Do not go, king," the choir pleads, "it is a sin to shed brotherly blood." “Better death than disgrace,” Eteocles replies and leaves.

There is only a choir on the stage: women in a gloomy song foresee trouble, remembering the prophecy of Laia: "Kingdom - fall!" - and the curse of Oedipus: "Power - to divide with a sword!"; it's payback time. So it is - a messenger enters with a message: six victories at six gates, and before the seventh both brothers fell, killing each other - the end of the Theban royal family!

The funeral lament begins. They bring in a stretcher with the murdered Eteocles and Polyneices, go out to meet their sisters Antigone and Yemena. The sisters start lamentations, the choir echoes them. They remember that the name Eteocles means "Glorious", they remember that the name Polynices means "Many-sided" - by name and fate. "Slayed by the slain!" - "The murderer is killed!" - "intentioning evil!" - "Suffering from evil!" They sing that the kingdom had two kings, the sisters had two brothers, but there was not one: this is what happens when the sword divides power. The tragedy ends with a long cry.

M. L. Gasparov

The most powerful king in the last generation of Greek heroes was Agamemnon, ruler of Argos. It was he who commanded all the Greek troops in the Trojan War, quarreled and reconciled with Achilles in the Iliad, and then defeated and ravaged Troy. But his fate turned out to be terrible, and the fate of his son Orestes - even more terrible. They had to commit crimes and pay for crimes - their own and others'.

Agamemnon's father Atreus fought fiercely for power with his brother Fiesta. In this struggle, Fiesta seduced the wife of Atreus, and for this Atreus killed two small children of Fiesta and fed their unsuspecting father with their meat. (About this cannibalistic feast, Seneca would later write the tragedy "Fiestes".) For this, a terrible curse fell on Atreus and his family. The third son of the fiesta, named Aegisthus, escaped and grew up in a foreign land, thinking only of one thing: revenge for his father.

Atreus had two sons: the heroes of the Trojan War, Agamemnon and Menelaus. They married two sisters: Menelaus - Elena, Agamemnon - Clytemnestra (or Clytemestre). When the Trojan War began because of Helen, the Greek troops under the command of Agamemnon gathered to sail to the harbor of Aulis. Here they had an ambiguous sign: two eagles tore apart a pregnant hare. The fortuneteller said: two kings will take Troy, full of treasures, but they will not escape the wrath of the goddess Artemis, the patroness of pregnant women and women in childbirth. And indeed, Artemis sends contrary winds to the Greek ships, and in atonement she demands a human sacrifice for herself - the young Iphigenia, the daughter of Agamemnon and Clytemnestra. The duty of the leader wins in Agamemnon the feelings of the father; he gives Iphigenia to die. (About what happened to Iphigenia, Euripides will later write a tragedy.) The Greeks sail under Troy, and Climnestra, mother of Iphigenia, remains in Argos, thinking only about one thing - about revenge for her daughter.

Two avengers find each other: Aegisthus and Clytemnestra become lovers and for ten years, while the war drags on, they are waiting for the return of Agamemnon. Finally, Agamemnon returns, triumphant - and then revenge overtakes him. When he bathes in the bath, Clytemnestra and Aegisthus throw a veil over him and hit him with an axe. After that, they rule in Argos as king and queen. But the little son of Agamemnon and Clytemnestra, Orestes, remains alive: the feeling of the mother defeats the calculation of the avenger in Clytemnestra, she sends him to a foreign land so that Aegisthus does not destroy his father and son. Orestes grows up in distant Phocis, thinking only about one thing - about revenge for Agamemnon. For his father, he must kill his mother; he is scared, but the prophetic god Apollo imperiously tells him: "This is your duty."

Orestes has grown up and comes to take revenge. With him is his Phocian friend Pylades - their names have become inseparable in myth. They pretend to be travelers who brought news, both sad and joyful at once: as if Orestes had died in a foreign land, as if Aegisthus and Clytemnestra were no longer threatened with any revenge. They are let in to the king and queen, and here Orestes fulfills his terrible duty: first he kills his stepfather, and then his own mother.

Who will now continue this chain of death, who will take revenge on Orestes? Aegisthus and Clytemnestra have no avenger children left. And then the very goddesses of vengeance, the monstrous Erinnia, take up arms against Orestes;

they send madness on him, he rushes about in despair throughout Greece and finally falls to the god Apollo: "You sent me to revenge, you save me from revenge." God vs Goddesses:

they are for the ancient belief that the maternal relationship is more important than the paternal one, he is for the new belief that the paternal relationship is more important than the maternal one. Who will judge the gods? People. In Athens, under the supervision of the goddess Athena (she is a woman, like Erinnia, and she is courageous, like Apollo), the court of elders gathers and decides: Orestes is right, he must be cleansed of sin, and Erinnia, in order to propitiate them, a sanctuary will be erected in Athens , where they will be honored under the name of Eumenides, which means "Good Goddesses".

According to these myths, the playwright Aeschylus wrote his trilogy "Oresteia" - three tragedies continuing each other: "Agamemnon", "Choephors", "Eumenides".

Agamemnon is the longest tragedy of the three. It starts out weird. In Argos, on the flat roof of the royal palace, a sentinel slave lies and looks at the horizon: when Troy falls, a fire will be lit on the mountain closest to it, they will see him across the sea on another mountain and light the second, then the third, and so the fiery message will reach Argos: the victory is won, Agamemnon will soon be home. He has been waiting without sleep for ten years under the heat and cold - and now the fire breaks out, the sentinel jumps up and runs to notify Queen Clytemnestra, although he feels: this news is not good.

Enter the chorus of the elders of Argos: they still do not know anything. In a long song they recall all the disasters of the war - and the deceit of Paris, and the betrayal of Elena, and the sacrifice of Iphigenia, and the current unrighteous power in Argos: why all this? Apparently, this is the world law: without suffering, you will not learn. They repeat the chorus:

"Woe, woe, alas! but let there be victory for good." And the prayer seems to come true: Clytemnestra comes out of the palace and announces: "Good is victory!" - Troy is taken, the heroes return, and whoever is righteous - a good return, and whoever is sinful - unkind.

The choir responds with a new song: it contains gratitude to the gods for the victory and anxiety for the victorious leaders. Because it is difficult to be righteous - to observe the measure: Troy fell for pride, now we would not fall into pride ourselves: a small happiness is more true than a big one. And for sure: the messenger of Agamemnon appears, confirms the victory, commemorates ten years of torment near Troy and talks about the storm on the way back, when the whole sea "blossomed with corpses" - apparently, there were many unrighteous people. But Agamemnon is alive, close and great, like a god. The choir sings again, how guilt gives birth to guilt, and again curses the instigator of the war - Elena, sister of Clytemnestra.

And finally, Agamemnon enters with the captives. He is really great, like a god: "Victory is with me: be it with me here too!" Clytemnestra, bending down, lays a purple carpet for him. He recoils: "I am a man, and only god is worshiped in purple." But she quickly persuades him, and Agamemnon enters the palace in purple, and Clytemnestra enters after him with an ambiguous prayer: "O Zeus the Accomplisher, do everything that I pray for!" The measure has been exceeded: retribution is approaching. The choir sings of a vague premonition of trouble. And he hears an unexpected response: the captive of Agamemnon, the Trojan princess Cassandra, remained on the stage, Apollo once fell in love with her and gave her the gift of prophecy, but she rejected Apollo, and for this no one believes her prophecies. Now she screams with broken cries about the past and future of the Argive house: human slaughter, eaten babies, a net and an ax, drunken blood, her own death, the chorus of Erinnes and the son who executes his mother! Chorus is scared. And then, from behind the stage, Agamemnon's groan is heard: "Oh horror! An ax smashes in my own house! .. Woe to me! Another blow: life is leaving." What to do?

In the inner chambers of the palace lie the corpses of Agamemnon and Cassandra, above them - Clytemnestra. "I lied, I cheated - now I'm telling the truth. Instead of secret hatred - open revenge: for the murdered daughter, for the captive concubine. And the avenging Erinnias are for me!" The choir cries in horror about the king and curses the villain: the demon of revenge has settled in the house, there is no end to the trouble. Aegisthus stands next to Clytemnestra: "My strength, my truth, my revenge for Fiesta and his children!" The elders from the choir go to Aegisthus with drawn swords, Aegisthus calls the guards, Clytemnestra separates them: "The harvest of death is already so great - let the powerless bark, and our business is to reign!" The first tragedy is over.

The action of the second tragedy is eight years later: Orestes has grown up and, accompanied by Pylades, comes to take revenge. He bends over the grave of Agamemnon and, as a sign of fidelity, puts a cut strand of his hair on it. And then he hides because he sees the choir approaching.

These are the choephors, the libation-servers, from whom the tragedy is called. Libations of water, wine and honey were made on the graves to honor the dead. Clytemnestra continues to be afraid of Agamemnon and the dead, she has terrible dreams, so she sent her slaves here with libations, led by Elektra, sister of Orestes. They love Agamemnon, hate Clytemnestra and Aegisthus, yearn for Orestes: "Let me be different from my mother," Electra prays, "and let Orestes return to avenge his father!" But maybe he's already back? Here is a strand of hair on the grave - the same color as Elektra's hair; here is a footprint in front of the grave - a footprint with Electra's foot. Elektra and the choephors don't know what to think. And then Orestes comes to them.

Recognition is made quickly: of course, at first Elektra does not believe, but Orestes shows her: "Here is my hair: put a strand on my head, and you will see where it is cut off; here is my cloak - you yourself wove it for me when I was still a child ". Brother and sister hug each other: "We are together, the truth is with us, and Zeus is above us!" The truth of Zeus, the command of Apollo and the will to revenge unite them against the common offender - Clytemnestra and her Aegisthus. Calling to the choir, they pray to the gods for help. Did Clytemnestra dream that she gave birth to a snake and the snake stung her in the chest? May this dream come true! Orestes tells Electra and the choir how he will penetrate the palace to the evil queen; the choir responds with a song about the evil women of the past - about the wives who, out of jealousy, killed all the men on the island of Lemnos, about Skilla, who killed her father for the sake of her lover, about Alfea, who, avenging her brothers, exhausted her own son,

The embodiment of the plan begins: Orestes and Pylades, disguised as wanderers, are knocking at the palace. Clytemnestra comes out to them. “I passed through Phokis,” Orestes says, “and they told me: tell Argos that Orestes is dead; if they want, let them send for the ashes.” Clytemnestra cries out: she feels sorry for her son, she wanted to save him from Aegisthus, but did not save him from death. Unrecognized Orestes with Pylades enter the house. The growing tragedy is interrupted by an almost comical episode: the old nanny Orestes is crying in front of the choir, how she loved him as a baby, and fed, and watered, and washed diapers, and now he is dead. "Do not cry - maybe not dead!" the eldest in the choir tells her. The hour is near, the chorus calls out to Zeus: "Help!"; to the ancestors: "Change anger to mercy!"; to Orestes: "Be firm! if the mother screams:" son! - you answer her: "father!"

Is Aegisthus: to believe or not to believe the news? He enters the palace, the choir stops, and a blow and a groan come from the palace. Clytemnestra runs out, followed by Orestes with a sword and Pylades. She opens her breasts: "Pity! with this breast I nursed you, at this breast I cradled you." Orestes is scared. "Pylades, what to do?" he asks. And Pylades, who had not said a word before, said: "And the will of Apollo? What about your oaths?" Orestes no longer hesitates. "It was fate that judged me to kill my husband!" cries Clytemnestra. "And to me - you," Orestes replies. "You, son, will you kill me, mother?" "You are your own killer." "Mother's blood will take revenge on you!" - "The blood of the father is more terrible." Orestes leads his mother into the house - to be executed. The choir sings in dismay: "The will of Apollo is the law for mortals; evil will soon pass."

The inside of the palace opens, the corpses of Clytemnestra and Aegisthus lie, above them is Orestes, stunning with the bloody veil of Agamemnon. He already feels Erinnia's insane approach. He says: "Apollo ordered me, in revenge for my father, to kill my mother; Apollo promised me to cleanse me of bloody sin. As a wanderer-beggar with an olive branch in my hands, I will go to his altar; and you be witnesses of my grief." He runs away, the choir sings: "Something will happen?" This is where the second tragedy ends.

The third tragedy, "Eumenides", begins in front of the temple of Apollo at Delphi, where the middle of the earth's circle; this temple belonged first to Gaia-Earth, then to Themis-Justice, now to Apollo-Broadcaster. At the altar - Orestes with a sword and an olive branch of the petitioner; around the chorus of Erinnes, daughters of the Night, black and monstrous. They are asleep: it was Apollo who brought them to sleep in order to rescue Orestes. Apollo tells him: "Run, cross the earth and the sea, appear in Athens, there will be judgment." "Remember me!" - prays Orestes. "I remember," Apollo replies. Orestes runs away.

Is the shadow of Clytemnestra. She calls out to the Erinnias: "Here is my wound, here is my blood, and you sleep: where is your revenge?" The Erinnies wake up and curse Apollo in chorus: "You save a sinner, you destroy the eternal Truth, the younger gods trample on the older ones!" Apollo accepts the challenge: there is the first, still short argument. "He killed his mother!" "And she killed her husband." - "A husband to a wife is not native blood: matricide is worse than muicide." - "A husband to a wife is native by law, a mother's son is native by nature; and the law is the same everywhere, and in nature it is not holier than in family and society. So put Zeus, entering into a legal marriage with his Hero." - "Well, you are with the young gods, we are with the old ones!" And they rush away to Athens: Erinnia - to destroy Orestes, Apollo - to save Orestes.

The action is transferred to Athens: Orestes sits in front of the temple of the goddess, embracing her idol, and appeals to her court, the Erinnias sing the famous "knitting song" around him: He runs away - we follow him; he goes to Hades - we follow him; here is the voice of the ancient Truth! Athena appears from the temple:

“It’s not for me to judge you: whoever I condemn will become an enemy to the Athenians, but I don’t want that; let the best of the Athenians themselves judge, make their own choice.” Choir in alarm: what will people decide? Will the ancient order collapse?

Judges come out - Athenian elders; behind them - Athena, in front of them - on the one hand Erinnia, on the other - Orestes and his mentor Apollo. The second, main dispute begins. "You killed your mother." "And she killed her husband." - "Husband to wife - not native blood." - "I am such a mother - also not my own blood." - "He renounced kinship!" “And he’s right,” Apollo intervenes, “the father is closer to the son than the mother: the father conceives the fetus, the mother only grows it in the womb. The father can give birth without a mother: here is Athena, without a mother, born from the head of Zeus!” “Judge,” Athena says to the elders. One by one they vote, dropping stones into bowls: into the bowl of condemnation, into the bowl of justification. Count: the votes are divided equally. “Then I also give my vote,” says Athena, “and I give for justification: mercy is higher than anger, male kinship is higher than female.” Since then, in all centuries in the Athenian court, with an equality of votes, the defendant was considered acquitted - "the voice of Athena."

Apollo with victory, Orestes leave the stage with gratitude. The Erinnias remain before Athena. They are in a frenzy: ancient foundations are crumbling, people are trampling on tribal laws, how to punish them? Should famine, plague, death be sent to the Athenians? “It’s not necessary,” Athena convinces them. “Mercy is higher than bitterness: send fertility to the Athenian land, large families to Athenian families, a fortress to the Athenian state. Tribal revenge undermines the state from the inside with a chain of murders, and the state must be strong in order to resist external enemies. Be merciful to the Athenians , and the Athenians will forever honor you as "Good goddesses" - Eumenides. And your sanctuary will be between the hill where my temple stands, and the hill where this court judges. And the choir gradually pacifies, accepts a new honor, blesses the Athenian land: "Away with strife, let there be no blood for blood, let there be joy for joy, let everyone rally around common causes, against common enemies." And no longer by the Erinnes, but by the Eumenides, under the leadership of Athena, the choir leaves the stage.

M. L. Gasparov

With the titan Prometheus, the benefactor of mankind, we have already met in Hesiod's poem "Theogony". There he is a clever trickster who arranges the division of sacrificial bull meat between people and gods so that the best part goes to people for food. And then, when the angry Zeus does not want people to be able to boil and fry the meat they got, and refuses to give them fire, Prometheus steals this fire secretly and brings it to people in a hollow reed. For this, Zeus chains Prometheus to a pillar in the east of the earth and sends an eagle to peck out his liver. Only after many centuries the hero Hercules will kill this eagle and free Prometheus.

Then this myth began to be told differently. Prometheus became more majestic and exalted: he is not a cunning and thief, but a wise seer. (The very name "Prometheus" means "Provider".) At the beginning of the world, when the older gods, the Titans, fought with the younger gods, the Olympians, he knew that the Olympians could not be taken by force, and offered to help the Titans by cunning; but those, arrogantly relying on their strength, refused, and then Prometheus, seeing their doom, went over to the side of the Olympians and helped them win. Therefore, the massacre of Zeus with his former friend and ally began to seem even more cruel.

Not only that, Prometheus is also open to what will be at the end of the world. The Olympians are afraid that just as they overthrew the Titan fathers in their time, the new gods, their descendants, will someday overthrow them. They don't know how to prevent it. Knows Prometheus; then Zeus torments Prometheus to learn this secret from him. But Prometheus is proudly silent. Only when Zeus' son Hercules is not yet a god, but only a hero-worker - in gratitude for all the good that Prometheus has done to people, kills the tormenting eagle and eases Prometheus's torment, then Prometheus, in gratitude, reveals the secret of how to save the power of Zeus and all the Olympians. There is a sea goddess, the beautiful Thetis, and Zeus seeks her love. Let him not do this: it is destined by fate that Thetis will have a son stronger than his father. If it is the son of Zeus, then he will become stronger than Zeus and overthrow him: the power of the Olympians will come to an end. And Zeus refuses the thought of Thetis, and Prometheus, in gratitude, frees him from execution and takes him to Olympus. Thetis, on the other hand, was given in marriage to a mortal man, and from this marriage the hero Achilles was born to her, who was indeed stronger than not only his father, but also all people in the world.

It is from this story that the poet Aeschylus made his tragedy about Prometheus.

The action takes place on the edge of the earth, in distant Scythia, among the wild mountains - maybe this is the Caucasus. Two demons, Power and Violence, introduce Prometheus onto the scene; the fire god Hephaestus must chain him to a mountain rock. Hephaestus feels sorry for his comrade, but he must obey the fate and will of Zeus: "You were sympathetic to people beyond measure." The arms, shoulders, legs of Prometheus are shackled, an iron wedge is driven into the chest. Prometheus is silent. The deed is done, the executioners leave, the Power throws contemptuously: "You are the Providence, so provide for how to save yourself!"

Only left alone, Prometheus begins to speak. He addresses the sky and the sun, the earth and the sea: "Look what I endure, God, from God's hands!" And all this for the fact that he stole fire for people, opened the way for a life worthy of a person.

There is a choir of nymphs - Oceanid. These are the daughters of the Ocean, another titan, they heard in their sea distances the roar and clang of the Promethean shackles. “Oh, it would be better for me to languish in Tartarus than to writhe here in front of everyone!” Prometheus exclaims. “But this is not forever: Zeus will not achieve anything from me by force and will come to ask me for his secret humbly and affectionately.” "Why is he executing you?" - "For mercy to people, for he himself is merciless." Behind the Oceanids comes their father Ocean: he once fought against the Olympians along with the rest of the Titans, but he reconciled, resigned, forgiven and peacefully splashes around all the corners of the world. Let Prometheus also humble himself, otherwise he will not escape even worse punishment: Zeus is vengeful! Prometheus contemptuously rejects his advice: "Do not take care of me, take care of yourself: no matter how Zeus punishes you for sympathizing with the criminal!" The ocean is leaving, the Oceanids sing a compassionate song, commemorating in it Prometheus's brother Atlanta, who is also tormented at the western end of the world, supporting the copper firmament with his shoulders.

Prometheus tells the choir how much good he has done for people. They were unreasonable, like children - he gave them mind and speech. They were languishing with worries - he inspired them with hope. They lived in caves, frightened of every night and every winter - he forced them to build houses from the cold, explained the movement of heavenly bodies in the change of seasons, taught writing and counting in order to pass on knowledge to descendants. It was he who pointed out for them the ores underground, harnessed the oxen to the plow for them, made carts for earthly roads and ships for sea routes. They were dying of diseases - he opened them healing herbs. They did not understand the prophetic signs of the gods and nature - he taught them to guess by bird calls, and by sacrificial fire, and by the entrails of sacrificial animals. “Truly you were a savior for people,” says the chorus, “how did you not save yourself?” "Fate is stronger than me," Prometheus replies. "And stronger than Zeus?" - "And stronger than Zeus." - "What is the fate of Zeus?" - "Do not ask: this is my great secret." The choir sings a mournful song.

In these memories of the past, the future suddenly breaks in. The beloved of Zeus, Princess Io, who has been turned into a cow, runs onto the stage. (At the theater, it was an actor in a horned mask.) Zeus turned her into a cow to hide from the jealousy of his wife, the goddess Hera. Hera guessed this and demanded a cow for herself as a gift, and then sent a terrible gadfly to her, who drove the unfortunate woman around the world. So she got, exhausted by pain to the point of madness, and to the Prometheus mountains. Titan, "protector and intercessor of man," pities her; he tells her what further wanderings she will have in Europe and Asia, through heat and cold, among savages and monsters, until she reaches Egypt. And in Egypt she will give birth to a son from Zeus, and the descendant of this son in the twelfth generation will be Hercules, an archer who will come here to save Prometheus - even against the will of Zeus. "And if Zeus won't allow it?" "Then Zeus will die." - "Who will destroy him?" - "Himself, having planned an unreasonable marriage." - "Which?" "I won't say another word more." Here the conversation ends: Io again feels the sting of the gadfly, again falls into madness and rushes away in despair. The Oceanid Chorus sings: "Let the lust of the gods blow us away: their love is terrible and dangerous."

It is said about the past, it is said about the future; now it's the turn of the scary real. Here comes the servant and messenger of Zeus - the god Hermes. Prometheus despises him as a hanger-on of the hosts of the Olympians. "What did you say about the fate of Zeus, about unreasonable marriage, about threatening death? Confess, otherwise you will suffer bitterly!" - "It is better to suffer than to be a servant, like you; and I am immortal, I saw the fall of Uranus, the fall of Cronus, I will see the fall of Zeus." - "Beware: you will be in the underground Tartarus, where the Titans are tormented, and then you will stand here with a wound in your side, and the eagle will peck at your liver." - "I knew all this in advance; let the gods rage, I hate them!" Hermes disappears - and indeed Prometheus exclaims:

This is the end of the tragedy.

M. L. Gasparov

In Athens they said: "Above all in human life is the law, and the unwritten law is higher than the written." The unwritten law is eternal, it is given by nature, every human society rests on it: it orders to honor the gods, love relatives, pity the weak. Written law - in each state its own, it is established by people, it is not eternal, it can be issued and canceled. The Athenian Sophocles composed the tragedy "Antigone" about the fact that the unwritten law is higher than the written one.

Oedipus the king was in Thebes - a sage, a sinner and a sufferer. By the will of fate, he had a terrible fate - not knowing, kill his own father and marry his own mother. Of his own free will, he executed himself - he gouged out his eyes so as not to see the light, just as he did not see his involuntary crimes. By the will of the gods, he was granted forgiveness and a blessed death. Sophocles wrote the tragedy Oedipus Rex about his life, and the tragedy Oedipus in Colon about his death.

From an incestuous marriage, Oedipus had two sons - Eteocles and Polygoniks - and two daughters - Antigone and Ismene. When Oedipus abdicated and went into exile, Eteocles and Polyneices began to rule together under the supervision of the old Creon, Oedipus' relative and adviser. Very soon the brothers quarreled: Eteocles expelled Polynices, he gathered a large army on the foreign side and went to war against Thebes. There was a battle under the walls of Thebes, in a duel brother and brother met, and both died. About this Aeschylus wrote the tragedy "Seven against Thebes". At the end of this tragedy, both Antigone and Ismene appear, mourning the brothers. And about what happened next, Sophocles wrote in Antigone.

After the death of Eteocles and Polyneices, Creon assumed power over Thebes. His first act was a decree: to bury Eteocles, the legitimate king who fell for the fatherland, with honor, and to deprive Polynices, who brought enemies to his native city, of burial and throw it to the dogs and vultures. This was not customary: it was believed that the soul of the unburied could not find peace in the afterlife, and that revenge on the defenseless dead was unworthy of people and objectionable to the gods. But Creon did not think about people and not about the gods, but about the state and power.

But a weak girl, Antigone, thought about people and gods, about honor and piety. Polynices is her brother, like Eteocles, and she must take care that his soul finds the same afterlife peace. The decree has not yet been announced, but she is already ready to transgress it. She calls her sister Ismena - the tragedy begins with their conversation. "Will you help me?" - "How is it possible? We are weak women, our destiny is obedience, for the unbearable there is no demand from us:

I honor the gods, but I will not go against the state." - "Well, I will go alone, at least to death, and you stay if you are not afraid of the gods." - "You are mad!" - "Leave me alone with my madness." - "Well, go; I love you anyway".

The choir of Theban elders enters, instead of alarm, jubilation sounds: after all, victory has been won, Thebes has been saved, it's time to celebrate and thank the gods. Creon comes out to meet the choir and announces his decree: honor to the hero, shame to the villain, the body of Polynices is thrown into reproach, guards are assigned to him, whoever violates the royal decree, death. And in response to these solemn words, a guard runs in with inconsistent explanations: the decree has already been violated, someone sprinkled the corpse with earth - albeit symbolically, but the burial took place, the guards did not follow, and now they answer him, and he is horrified. Creon is furious: find the culprit or keep the guards from killing their heads!

“A man is powerful, but impudent!” the choir sings. , that one is dangerous." Who is he talking about: a criminal or Creon?

Suddenly the chorus falls silent, amazed: the guard returns, followed by the captive Antigone. “We brushed the earth off the corpse, sat down to guard further, and suddenly we see: the princess comes, cries over the body, again showers with earth, wants to make libations, - here she is!” - "Did you violate the decree?" - "Yes, because it is not from Zeus and not from the eternal Truth: the unwritten law is higher than the written one, to break it is worse than death; if you want to execute - execute, your will, but my truth." - "Are you going against fellow citizens?" - "They are with me, they are only afraid of you." "You're a disgrace to your brother-hero!" "No, I honor the dead brother." - "Enemy will not become a friend even after death." - "To share love is my destiny, not enmity." Ismene comes out to their voices, the king showers her with reproaches: "You are an accomplice!" “No, I didn’t help my sister, but I’m ready to die with her.” "Don't you dare die with me - I chose death, you choose life." - "They are both mad," Creon interrupts, "lock them up, and may my decree be fulfilled." - "Death?" - "Death!" The choir sings in horror: there is no end to God's wrath, trouble after trouble - like wave after wave, the end of the Oedipal race: the gods amuse people with hopes, but do not let them come true.

It was not easy for Creon to decide to condemn Antigone to execution. She is not only the daughter of his sister - she is also the bride of his son, the future king. Creon calls the prince: "Your bride has violated the decree; death is her sentence. The ruler must be obeyed in everything - legal and illegal. Order - in obedience; and if order falls, the state will perish." “Perhaps you are right,” the son objects, “but why then does the whole city grumble and pity the princess? Or are you alone just, and all the people you care about are lawless?” - "The state is subject to the king!" Creon exclaims. "There are no owners over the people," the son answers him. The king is adamant: Antigone will be walled up in an underground tomb, may the underground gods, whom she honors so much, save, and people will no longer see her, "Then you will not see me again!" And with these words, the prince leaves. “Here it is, the power of love!” the chorus exclaims. “Eros, your banner is the banner of victories! Eros is the catcher of the best prey!

Antigone is led to her execution. Her strength is over, she cries bitterly, but does not regret anything. The lament of Antigone echoes the lament of the choir. "Here, instead of a wedding, I have an execution; instead of love, I have death!" - "And for that you have eternal honor: you yourself have chosen your own path - to die for God's truth!" - "I will go alive to Hades, where my father Oedipus and mother, the victorious brother and the defeated brother, but they are buried dead, and I am alive!" - "A family sin on you, pride carried you away: honoring the unwritten law, you can not transgress the written one." - "If God's law is higher than human law, then why should I die? Why pray to the gods, if they declare me impious for piety? If the gods are for the king, I will atone for my guilt; but if the gods are for me, the king will pay." Antigone is taken away; the choir in a long song commemorates the sufferers and sufferers of bygone times, the guilty and the innocent, equally affected by the wrath of the gods.

The royal judgment is over - God's judgment begins. To Creon is Tiresias, a favorite of the gods, a blind soothsayer - the one who warned Oedipus. Not only the people are dissatisfied with the royal reprisal - the gods are also angry: the fire does not want to burn on the altars, the prophetic birds do not want to give signs. Creon does not believe: "It is not for man to defile God!" Tiresias raises his voice: "You violated the laws of nature and the gods: you left the dead without burial, you closed the living in the grave! Now being in the city is an infection, as under Oedipus, and you will pay the dead for the dead - lose your son!" The king is embarrassed, he asks the chorus for advice for the first time; give in? "Give in!" the choir says. And the king cancels his order, orders to free Antigone, to bury Polyneices: yes, God's law is higher than human. The choir sings a prayer to Dionysus, the god born in Thebes: help your fellow citizens!

But it's too late. The messenger brings the news: neither Antigone nor the bridegroom is alive. The princess was found hanged in an underground tomb; and the king's son embraced her corpse. Creon entered, the prince threw himself on his father, the king recoiled, and then the prince plunged his sword into his chest. The corpse lies on the corpse, their marriage took place in the grave. The messenger is silently listening to the queen - the wife of Creon, the mother of the prince; having listened, turns and leaves; and a minute later a new messenger runs in: the queen threw herself on the sword, the queen killed herself, unable to live without her son. Creon alone on the stage mourns himself, his family and his guilt, and the choir echoes him, as Antigone echoed: "Wisdom is the highest good, pride is the worst sin, arrogance is the execution of the arrogant, and in old age she teaches unreasonable reason." With these words, the tragedy ends.

M. L. and V. M. Gasparov

"Trachinyanki" means "girls from the city of Trakhina". Trakhin ("rocky") is a small town in the remote mountainous outskirts of Greece, under Mount Etoi, not far from the glorious Thermopylae Gorge. It is famous only for the fact that the greatest of the Greek heroes, Hercules, the son of Zeus, lived his last years in it. On Mount Ete, he accepted a voluntary death at the stake, ascended to heaven and became a god. The unwitting culprit of his martyrdom was his wife Dejanira, faithful and loving. She is the heroine of this tragedy, and the choir of Trachin girls are her interlocutors.

Almost all Greek heroes were kings in different cities and towns, except for Hercules. He worked out his future divinity by forced labor in the service of an insignificant king from southern Greece. For him, he performed twelve feats, one more difficult than the other. The last was the descent to Hades, the underworld, behind the terrible three-headed dog that guarded the realm of the dead. There, in Hades, he met the shadow of the hero Meleager, also a fighter against monsters, the most powerful of the older heroes. Meleager said to him: "There, on earth, I have left a sister named Dejanira; take her as a wife, she is worthy of you."

When Hercules finished his forced service, he went to the edge of Greece to woo Dejanira. He arrived just in time: the Aheloy River, the largest in Greece, flowed there, and its god demanded Dejanira for his wife. Hercules grappled with God in the struggle, crushed him like a mountain; he turned into a snake, Hercules squeezed his throat; he turned into a bull, Hercules broke his horn. Aheloy submitted, the rescued Dejanira went to Hercules, and he took her with him on the way back.

The path lay across another river, and the ferryman on that river was the wild centaur Ness, half-man, half-horse. He liked Dejanira and wanted to kidnap her. But Hercules had a bow and there were arrows poisoned with the black blood of the many-headed snake Hydra, which he had once defeated and cut down. The arrow of Hercules overtook the centaur, and he realized that his death had come. Then, in order to take revenge on Hercules, he said to Dejanira: “I loved you, and I want to do good to you. Take blood from my wound and keep it from light and people. If your husband loves another, then smear his clothes with this blood, and his love will come back to you." Dejanira did just that, not knowing that Nessus' blood was poisoned by the arrow of Hercules.

Time passed, and she had to remember this blood. Hercules was visiting a familiar king in the city of Echalia (two days' journey from Trakhin), and he fell in love with the royal daughter Iola. He asked the king to have her as his concubine. The tsar refused, and the tsar's son mockingly added: "It does not suit her to be behind someone who served for twelve years as a forced slave." Hercules got angry and pushed the king's son off the wall - the only time in his life he killed the enemy not by force, but by deceit. The gods punished him for this - once again they gave him into slavery for a year to the dissolute overseas queen Omphale. Dejanira didn't know anything about it. She lived alone in Trachin with her young son Gill and patiently waited for her husband's return.

Here begins the drama of Sophocles.

On the stage of Dejanira, she is full of anxiety. leaving, Hercules told her to wait for him a year and two months. He had a prophecy: if you die, then from the dead; and if you do not die, then return and finally find rest after labors. But now a year and two months have passed, and he is still gone. Did the prophecy come true, and he died from some dead, and will not return to live out his days in peace next to her? The choir of Trakhinian women encourages her: no, even though there are joys and troubles in every life, Father Zeus will not leave Hercules! Then Dejanira calls her son Gill and asks him to go in search of his father. He is ready: a rumor has already reached him that Hercules spent a year in slavery at Omphala, and then went on a campaign against Echalia - to take revenge on the offender king. And Gill goes to look for him under Echalia.

As soon as Gill leaves, the rumor is indeed confirmed: messengers come from Hercules - to tell about the victory and about his near return. There are two of them, and they are not faceless, as usual in tragedies: each has its own character. The eldest of them leads a group of silent captives with him: yes, Hercules served his year with Omphala, and then went to Echalia, took the city, captured the captives and sends them as slaves to Dejanira, and he himself must make thanksgiving sacrifices to the gods and will immediately follow. Dejanira is sorry for the captives: just that they were noble and rich, and now they are slaves. Dejanira speaks to one of them, the most beautiful, but she is silent. Dejanira sends them to the house - and then a second messenger approaches her. "The elder did not tell you the whole truth. Not out of revenge, Hercules took Echalia, but out of love for Princess Iola: it was you who was talking to her now, but she was silent." Reluctantly, the senior messenger admits: this is so. "Yes," says Dejanira, "love is God, man is powerless before it. Wait a little: I will give you a gift for Hercules."

The choir sings a song in praise of all-powerful love. And then Dejanira tells the Trakhinians about her gift for Hercules: this is a cloak that she rubbed with the very blood of Ness in order to regain Hercules' love, because she is offended to share Hercules with a rival. "Is it reliable?" the choir asks. "I'm sure, but I haven't tried it." - "Confidence is not enough, you need experience." - "Will now be". And she gives the messenger a closed chest with a cloak: let Hercules put it on when he makes thanksgiving sacrifices to the gods.

The choir sings a joyful song in praise of the returning Hercules. But Dejanira is afraid. She rubbed her cloak with a tuft of sheep's wool, and then threw this bloody tuft to the ground - and suddenly, she says, it boiled in the sun with dark foam and spread over the earth in a red-brown spot. Is trouble threatening? had the centaur deceived her? Isn't it a poison instead of a love spell? Indeed, before the chorus has time to calm her down, Gill enters with a swift step: "You killed Hercules, you killed my father!" And he tells: Hercules put on a cloak, Hercules slaughtered sacrificial bulls, Hercules lit a fire for burnt offering, - but when the fire breathed heat on the cloak, it seemed to stick to his body, bit into his bones with pain, like fire or snake venom, and Hercules fell into writhing, cursing both the cloak and the one who sent it. Now he is being carried on a stretcher to Trakhin, but will they carry him alive?

Dejanira silently listens to this story, turns and disappears into the house. The choir sings in horror about the coming disaster. A messenger runs out - the old nurse of Deianira: Deianira killed herself. In tears, she walked around the house, said goodbye to the altars of the gods, kissed the doors and thresholds, sat down on the marriage bed and plunged the sword into her left breast. Gill is in despair - he did not have time to stop her. The choir is in double horror: the death of Dejanira in the house, the death of Hercules at the gate, what is more terrible?

The end is coming. Hercules is brought in, he rushes about on a stretcher with frantic cries: the conqueror of monsters, the most powerful of mortals, he dies from a woman and calls to his son: "Revenge!" In between moans, Gill explains to him: Deianira is no longer there, her fault is involuntary, it was she who was once deceived by an evil centaur. Now it is clear to Hercules: the prophecies have come true, it is he who perishes from the dead, and the rest that awaits him is death. He orders his son: "Here are my last two testaments: the first - take me to Mount This and lay me on a funeral pyre; the second - that Iola, which I did not have time to take for myself, take you so that she is the mother of my descendants." Gill is horrified: to burn his father alive, to marry the one who is the cause of the death of both Hercules and Dejanira? But he cannot resist Hercules. Hercules is carried away; no one yet knows that from this fire he will ascend to heaven and become a god. Gill accompanies him with the words:

And the choir says:

M. L. Gasparov

This is a tragedy about fate and freedom: not the freedom of a person to do what he wants, but to take responsibility even for what he did not want.

In the city of Thebes, King Laius and Queen Jocasta ruled. King Laius received a terrible prediction from the Delphic oracle: "If you give birth to a son, you will die by his hand." Therefore, when a son was born to him, he took him away from his mother, gave him to a shepherd and ordered him to take him to the mountain pastures of Cithaeron, and then throw him to be eaten by predatory animals. The shepherd felt sorry for the baby. On Cithaeron, he met a shepherd with a flock from the neighboring kingdom of Corinth and gave the baby to him without saying who he was. He took the baby to his king. The Corinthian king had no children; he adopted the baby and raised him as his heir. They named the boy - Oedipus.

Oedipus grew up strong and smart. He considered himself the son of the Corinthian king, but rumors began to reach him that he was adopted. He went to the Delphic oracle to ask: whose son is he? The oracle replied: "Whoever you are, you are destined to kill your own father and marry your own mother." Oedipus was horrified. He decided not to return to Corinth and went wherever his eyes looked. At a crossroads, he met a chariot, an old man with a proud bearing rode on it, around - several servants. Oedipus stepped aside at the wrong time, the old man hit him with a goad from above, Oedipus hit him with a staff in response, the old man fell dead, a fight broke out, the servants were killed, only one ran away. Such road accidents were not uncommon; Oedipus went on.

He reached the city of Thebes. There was confusion: on the rock in front of the city, the monster Sphinx settled, a woman with a lion's body, she asked riddles to passers-by, and who could not guess, she tore them to pieces. King Laius went to seek help from the oracle, but on the way he was killed by someone. The Sphinx asked Oedipus a riddle: "Who walks on four in the morning, two in the afternoon, and three in the evening?" Oedipus replied: "This is a man: a baby on all fours, an adult on his feet and an old man with a staff." Defeated by the right answer, the Sphinx threw herself off the cliff into the abyss; Thebes were freed. The people, rejoicing, declared the wise Oedipus king and gave him the wife of Laiev, the widow of Jocasta, and as assistants - the brother of Jocasta, Creon.

Many years passed, and suddenly God's punishment fell upon Thebes: people died from pestilence, cattle fell, bread dried. The people turn to Oedipus: "You are wise, you saved us once, save us now." This prayer begins the action of the tragedy of Sophocles: the people stand in front of the palace, Oedipus comes out to them. "I have already sent Creon to ask the oracle's advice; and now he is already hurrying back with the news." The oracle said: "This is God's punishment for the murder of Laius; find and punish the murderer!" - "Why haven't they searched for him until now?" - "Everyone was thinking about the Sphinx, not about him." "Okay, now I'll think about it." The choir of the people sings a prayer to the gods: turn your wrath away from Thebes, spare the perishing!

Oedipus announces his royal decree: find the murderer of Laius, excommunicate him from fire and water, from prayers and sacrifices, expel him to a foreign land, and may the curse of the gods fall on him! He does not know that by this he curses himself, but now they will tell him about it. In Thebes lives a blind old man, the soothsayer Tiresias: will he not indicate who the murderer is? "Don't make me talk," Tiresias asks, "it won't be good!" Oedipus is angry: "Are you yourself involved in this murder?" Tiresias flares up: "No, if so: you are the murderer, and execute yourself!" - "Is not Creon eager for power, is it he who persuaded you?" - "I do not serve Creon and not you, but the prophetic god; I am blind, you are sighted, but you do not see what sin you live in and who your father and mother are." - "What does it mean?" - "Guess for yourself: you are the master of it." And Tiresias leaves. The choir sings a frightened song: who is the villain? who is the killer? Is it Oedipus? No, you can't believe it!

An excited Creon enters: does Oedipus really suspect him of treason? "Yes," says Oedipus. "Why do I need your kingdom? The king is a slave of his own power; it is better to be a royal assistant, like me." They shower each other with cruel reproaches. At their voices, Queen Jocasta, the sister of Creon, the wife of Oedipus, comes out of the palace. "He wants to expel me with false prophecies," Oedipus tells her. “Do not believe,” Jocasta answers, “all the prophecies are false: Laia was predicted to die from her son, but our son died as a baby on Cithaeron, and Laia was killed at a crossroads by an unknown traveler.” - "At the crossroads? where? when? what was Lay in appearance?" - "On the way to Delphi, shortly before your arrival to us, and he looked gray-haired, straight and, perhaps, like you." - "Oh horror! And I had such a meeting; was it not me that traveler? Was there a witness?" - "Yes, one escaped; this is an old shepherd, he has already been sent for." Oedipus in agitation; the choir sings an alarmed song: "Human greatness is unreliable; gods, save us from pride!"

And this is where the action takes a turn. An unexpected person appears on the scene: a messenger from neighboring Corinth. The Corinthian king has died, and the Corinthians call Oedipus to take over the kingdom. Oedipus is clouded: "Yes, all prophecies are false! It was predicted to me to kill my father, but now - he died a natural death. But I was also predicted to marry my mother; and as long as the queen mother is alive, there is no way for me to Corinth." “If only this holds you back,” says the messenger, “calm down: you are not their own son, but an adopted one, I myself brought you to them as a baby from Cithaeron, and some shepherd gave you there.” “Wife!” Oedipus turns to Jocasta, “isn’t this the shepherd who was with Laius? Hurry! Whose son I really am, I want to know!” Jocasta already understood everything. "Do not inquire," she pleads, "it will be worse for you!" Oedipus does not hear her, she goes to the palace, we will not see her anymore. The choir sings a song: maybe Oedipus is the son of some god or nymph, born on Cithaeron and thrown to people? so it happened!

But no. They bring in an old shepherd. "Here is the one whom you gave me in infancy," the Corinthian messenger tells him. "Here is the one who killed Laius before my eyes," the shepherd thinks. He resists, he does not want to speak, but Oedipus is implacable. "Whose child was it?" he asks. “King Laius,” the shepherd answers. “And if it’s really you, then you were born on the mountain and we saved you on the mountain!” Now Oedipus finally understood everything. "Cursed is my birth, cursed is my sin, cursed is my marriage!" he exclaims and rushes to the palace. The choir sings again: "Human greatness is unreliable! There are no happy people in the world! Oedipus was wise; Oedipus was king; and who is he now? Paricide and incest!"

A messenger runs out of the palace. For involuntary sin - voluntary execution: Queen Jocasta, mother and wife of Oedipus, hanged herself in a noose, and Oedipus, in despair, embracing her corpse, tore off her gold clasp and stuck a needle into his eyes so that they would not see his monstrous deeds. The palace swings open, the chorus sees Oedipus with a bloodied face. "How did you decide? .." - "Fate decided!" - "Who inspired you?.." - "I am my own judge!" For the murderer of Laius - exile, for the defiler of the mother - blindness; "O Cithaeron, o mortal crossroads, o double-marriage bed!" Faithful Creon, forgetting the offense, asks Oedipus to stay in the palace: "Only the neighbor has the right to see the torment of his neighbors." Oedipus prays to let him go into exile and says goodbye to the children: “I don’t see you, but I cry for you ...” The choir sings the last words of the tragedy:

M. L. Gasparov

Colon is a place north of Athens. There was a sacred grove of the goddesses Eumenides, terrible guardians of truth - those about whom Aeschylus wrote in the Oresteia. In the middle of this grove stood an altar in honor of the hero Oedipus: it was believed that this Theban hero was buried here and guards this land. How the ashes of the Theban hero ended up in the Athenian land - this was told in different ways. According to one of these stories, Sophocles wrote the tragedy. He himself was from Colon, and this tragedy was the last in his life.

From an incestuous marriage with his mother, Oedipus had two sons and two daughters: Eteocles and Polynices, Antigone and Ismene. When Oedipus blinded himself for his sins and retired from power, both sons recoiled from him. Then he left Thebes and went off to wander no one knows where. Together with him, the faithful daughter of Antigone left - a guide for a decrepit blind man. Blinded, he saw the light of his soul: he realized that by voluntary self-punishment he atoned for his involuntary guilt, that the gods had forgiven him and that he would die not a sinner, but a saint. This means that sacrifices and libations will be made on his grave, and his ashes will be the protection of the land where he will be buried.

Blind Oedipus and the weary Antigone enter the stage and sit down to rest. "Where are we?" asks Oedipus. "This is a grove of laurels and olives, grapes curl here and nightingales sing, and in the distance - Athens," Antigone replies. A watchman comes out to meet them:

"Get out of here, this place is forbidden to mortals, here dwell the Eumenides, daughters of Night and Earth." “Oh happiness! Here, under the shadow of Eumenides, the gods promised me a blissful death. Go, tell the Athenian king: let him come here, let him give me a little, and get a lot,” asks Oedipus. "From you, blind beggar?" - the watchman is surprised. "I am blind, but my mind is sighted." The watchman leaves, and Oedipus prays to the Eumenides and all the gods: "Fulfill the promise, send me the long-awaited death."

A chorus of colonial inhabitants appears: they are also angry at first, seeing a stranger on holy ground, but his pitiful appearance begins to inspire them with sympathy. "Who are you?" “Oedipus,” he says. "Paricide, incest, away!" - "My sin is terrible, but involuntary; do not persecute me - the gods are just and you will not be punished for my guilt. Let me wait for your king."

But instead of the king, another tired woman appears from the far side - Ismene, the second daughter of Oedipus. She has bad news. In Thebes, strife, Eteocles expelled Polyneices, he gathers the Seven against Thebes; the gods predicted: "If Oedipus is not buried in a foreign land, Thebes will stand." And now an embassy has been sent for Oedipus. “No!” shouts Oedipus. “They renounced me, they expelled me, now let them destroy each other! And I want to die here, in the Athenian land, for her good, for her enemies to fear.” Chorus is touched. "Then make a cleansing, make a libation of water and honey, propitiate Eumenides - only they can forgive or not forgive the murder of a relative." Ismene prepares the rite, Oedipus, in roll call with the choir, mourns his sin.

But here is the Athenian king: this is Theseus, the famous hero and wise ruler. "What are you asking, old man? I am ready to help you - we are all equal under the eyes of the gods, today you are in trouble, and tomorrow I will." - "Bury me here, do not let the Thebans take me away, and my ashes will be the protection of your country." "Here's my word to you." Theseus leaves to order, and the choir sings the praises of Athens, Colon and the gods, their patrons:

Athena the mistress, Poseidon the horseman, Demeter the farmer, Dionysus the vinedresser.

"Don't deceive me!" Antigone pleads. "Here comes the Theban ambassador with the soldiers." This is Creon, a relative of Oedipus, the second man in Thebes under Oedipus, and now under Eteocles. "Forgive our fault and have pity on our country: it is your own, but this one, although good, is not yours." But Oedipus is firm: "You did not come out of friendship, but out of need, but I have no need to go with you." “There will be a need!” Creon threatens. “Hey, grab his daughters: they are our Theban subjects! And you, old man, decide whether you will go with me or stay here, without help, without a guide!” The choir grumbles, the girls cry, Oedipus curses Creon: "As you leave me alone, so you will be left alone in your declining years!" This curse will come true in the tragedy of Antigone.

Theseus comes to the rescue. "An insulter to my guest is an insulter to me too! Do not dishonor your city - let the girls go and go away." - "For whom do you intercede? - argues Creon. - For a sinner, for a criminal?" - "My sin is involuntary," Oedipus replies with tears, "and you, Creon, sin of your own free will, attacking the weak and the weak!" Theseus is firm, the girls are saved, the choir praises Athenian prowess.

But the trials of Oedipus are not over. As the Theban Creon asked him for help, now the exiled son Polynices came to him to ask for help. That one was arrogant, this one was touching. He weeps about his misfortune and Oedipal misfortune - let the unfortunate man understand the unfortunate man! He asks for forgiveness, promises Oedipus if not a throne, then a palace, but Oedipus does not listen to him. "You and your brother killed me, and your sisters saved me! Be honored to them, and death to you: do not take Thebes for you, kill your brother brother, and may the curse of Eumenides-Erinnius be on you." Antigone loves her brother, she begs him to disband the army, not to destroy the homeland. "Neither I nor my brother will yield," Polynices replies. "I see death and I'm going to die, and the gods protect you, sisters." The choir sings: “Life is short; death is inevitable; there are more sorrows in life than joys. The best share is not to be born at all; the second share is to die sooner.

The end is coming. Thunder rumbles, lightning flashes, the choir calls to Zeus, Oedipus calls to Theseus. “My last hour has come: now I will enter the sacred grove alone with you, find the treasured place, and my ashes will rest there. Neither my daughters nor your citizens will know it; only you and your heirs will keep this secret, and until she is kept, the Oedipus coffin will protect Athens from Thebes. Follow me! and Hermes leads me, bringing down souls to the underworld. The choir, falling on its knees, prays to the underground gods: "Let Oedipus descend peacefully into your kingdom: he deserved it with torment."

And the gods heard: the messenger announces the miraculous end of Oedipus, He walked as if seeing, he reached the appointed place, washed himself, dressed in white, said goodbye to Antigone and Ismene, and then an unknown voice was heard:

"Go, Oedipus, don't delay!" The companions' hair stirred, they turned and walked away. When they turned, Oedipus and Theseus stood side by side; when they looked back, only Theseus was standing there, shielding his eyes, as if from an unbearable light. Whether Oedipus was lifted up by lightning, whether a whirlwind carried him away, whether the earth took him into her bosom - no one knows. The sisters return for the messenger, mourning their father, for the sisters - Theseus; the sisters go to their native Thebes, and Theseus with the chorus repeat the covenant of Oedipus and his blessing: "May it be indestructible!"

M. L. and V. M. Gasparov

This is a tragedy with a happy ending. At the dramatic competitions in Athens, there was a custom: each poet presented a "trilogy", three tragedies, sometimes even picking up each other on topics (like Aeschylus), and after them, to relieve a gloomy mood - a "satyr drama", where the characters and the action were also from myths, but the choir certainly consisted of merry satyrs, goat-legged and tailed companions of the god of wine Dionysus; Accordingly, the plot for her was chosen cheerful and fabulous. But it was not possible to adapt the chorus of satyrs to every myth; and so the poet Euripides tried to make a final drama with both a fabulous plot and a happy ending, but without any satyrs. This was the Alcestis.

The fairy-tale plot here is the struggle of Hercules with Death. The Greeks, like all nations, once imagined that Death is a monstrous demon that comes to the dying, grabs his soul and takes him to the underworld. For a long time, they no longer believed in such a demon seriously, and not myths, but fairy tales were told about him. For example, how the cunning Sisyphus took Death by surprise, put him in chains and kept him captive for a long time, so that people on earth stopped dying, and Zeus himself had to intervene and put things in order. Or how the main hero of Greek myths, the worker Hercules, once grappled with Death hand-to-hand, overpowered her and snatched her soul, which the demon had already taken to the underworld. It was the soul of the young queen Alcestis (Alcesta), the wife of King Admet,

Here is how it was. The god Apollo quarreled with his father, the Thunderer Zeus, and was punished by him: Zeus ordered him to serve as a shepherd for a mortal man, King Admetus, for a whole year. Admetus was a kind and gentle host, and Apollo also repaid him with kindness. He made drunk the adamant Moira, goddesses of fate, measuring the terms of human life, and achieved a miracle for Admet: when the time comes for Admet to die, someone else can die for him, Admet, and he, Admet, will live his life for this other . Time passed, it was time for Admet to die, and he began to look for a person among his relatives who would agree to accept death instead of him. The old father refused, the old mother refused, and only his young wife, Queen Alcestis, agreed. She loved him so much that she was ready to give her life for him so that he would continue to reign with glory, raise their children and remember her.

This is where the tragedy of Euripides begins. On the stage - the god Apollo and the demon of Death. The demon came for the soul of Alcestis; he triumphantly triumphs: stealing a young life is more pleasant than the life of a mature husband. "You triumph early! - Apollo tells him. - Beware: soon a man will come here who will master you."

A choir of local residents enters the stage: they are alarmed, they love both the good king and the young queen, they do not know which gods to pray for the mortal misfortune to pass. The royal servant tells them: nothing can help, the last hour has come. Alcestis prepared for death, washed herself, dressed in mortal attire, prayed to the domestic gods: "Keep my husband and grant my children not an untimely death, like me, but due, in the declining days!" She said goodbye to her marriage bed: "Ah, if another wife comes here, she will not be better than me, but only happier!" She said goodbye to her children, servants and her husband: poor Admet, he remains to live, but is tormented by longing, as if dying. Now they will carry her out of the palace to say goodbye to the sunlight. "Oh, grief, grief," the choir sings. "If you can, Apollo, intercede!"

Alcestis is carried out of the palace, Admet is with her, their little son and daughter are with them. A general weeping begins; Alcestis says goodbye to earth and sky, she can already hear the splash of the afterlife river. She turns to Admet: "Here is my last request: do not take another wife, do not take a stepmother to our children, be a protector to your son, give a worthy husband to your daughter!" “I will not take another wife,” Admet answers her, “I will mourn for you until the end of my days, there will be neither joy nor songs in my house, and you appear to me even in dreams and meet me in the underworld when I die! Oh Why am I not Orpheus, who prayed for his beloved with a song from the underground king! Alcestis' speeches are getting shorter, she is silent, she is dead. The choir sings a parting song to the deceased and promises her eternal glory among the living.

This is where Hercules comes in. He goes north, he is assigned another forced feat: to deal with the cruel king, who kills passing guests and feeds them with the meat of his cannibal mares. King Admet is his friend, he wanted to rest and refresh himself in his house; but there is sadness, sadness, mourning in the house - maybe it would be better for him to look for another shelter? "No," Admetus tells him, "do not think badly, leave me my worries; and my slaves will feed you and put you to bed." "What are you, king, - asks the chorus, - is it sufficient business - burying such a wife, to receive and treat guests?" “But is it sufficient,” Admet answers, “to burden friends with your grief? Good for good: the guest is always holy.” The choir sings about the generosity of King Admet, and how kind the gods are to him, and how kind he is to friends.

Alcestis is buried. In every tragedy there is a dispute - a dispute breaks out and hope for the body. The old father of Admet comes out to say goodbye to the dead and says touching words to her. Here Admetus loses his composure: "You didn't want to die for me - that means you are to blame for her death!" he shouts. “The term of death was yours,” the father answers, “you did not want to die; so do not reproach me too, because I do not want to die, and be ashamed of the wife you did not spare.” Cursing each other, father and son part ways.

And Hercules, not knowing anything, feasts behind the scenes; among the Greeks, he was always considered not only a strong man, but also a glutton. The slave complains to the audience: he wants to cry about the good queen, and he must serve the stranger with a smile. "Why are you so gloomy?" Hercules asks him. "Life is short, tomorrow is unknown, let's rejoice while we are alive." Here the slave cannot stand it and tells the guest everything as it is. Hercules is shocked - both by the devotion of the queen to her husband, and by the nobility of the king in front of a friend. "Where is Alcestis buried?" The servant points. “Be of good cheer, heart,” says Hercules, “I fought with the living, now I’m going out to Death itself and I’ll rescue a wife for a friend even from the underworld.”

While Hercules is gone, there is weeping on the stage. Admetus is no longer suffering about the deceased - about himself: “The grief for her is over, eternal glory has begun for her. !" The choir consoles him sadly: such is fate, and one does not argue with fate.

Hercules returns, followed by a silent woman under a veil. Hercules blames Admet: “You are my friend, and you hid your grief from me? Be ashamed! God is your judge, and I have a request for you. Now I had a hard fight and a fistfight, I won, and this woman was my reward I'm going north to serve my service, and you, please, shelter her in your palace: if you want - a slave, but if you want - when your longing passes, - and a new wife. - "Do not say this: my longing has no end, and it hurts me to look at this woman: she reminds me of Alcestis in height and article. Do not trouble my soul!" - "I'm your friend, do I really want you bad? Take her by the hand. Now look!" And Hercules pulls off the veil from his companion. "Is this Alcestis? alive? not a ghost? You saved her! Stay! Share my joy!" - "No, the matter is waiting. And you, be kind and righteous, make sacrifices to the gods of heaven and the underworld, and then the mortal spell will fall from her, and she will speak and will be yours again." - "I'm happy!" - exclaims Admet, stretching his arms to the sun, and the chorus ends the tragedy with the words: "... The ways of the gods are unknown, what is expected for us is impossible, and the impossible is possible for them: we saw it."

M. L. Gasparov

There is a myth about the hero Jason, the leader of the Argonauts. He was the hereditary king of the city of Iolka in Northern Greece, but power in the city was seized by his elder relative, the imperious Pelius, and in order to return it, Jason had to accomplish a feat: with his fellow heroes on the Argo ship, sail to the eastern edge of the earth and there , in the country of Colchis, get the sacred Golden Fleece, guarded by a dragon. Apollonius of Rhodes later wrote a poem about this voyage called Argonautica.

In Colchis, a mighty king, the son of the Sun, ruled; his daughter, the sorceress Medea, fell in love with Jason, they swore fidelity to each other, and she saved him. First, she gave him witchcraft potions, which helped him first to endure the test feat - to plow arable land on fire-breathing bulls - and then to put the dragon's guardian to sleep. Secondly, when they sailed from Colchis, Medea, out of love for her husband, killed her own brother and scattered pieces of his body along the shore; the Colchians pursuing them lingered, burying him, and could not overtake the fugitives. Thirdly, when they returned to Iolk, Medea, in order to save Jason from the deceit of Pelias, invited the daughters of Pelias to slaughter their old father, promising after that to resurrect him young. And they slaughtered their father, but Medea renounced her promise, and the parricide daughters fled into exile. However, Jason failed to get the kingdom of Iolk: the people rebelled against the foreign sorceress, and Jason with Medea and two young sons fled to Corinth. The old Corinthian king, having looked closely, offered him his daughter as a wife and the kingdom with her, but, of course, so that he would divorce the sorceress. Jason accepted the offer: perhaps he himself was already beginning to be afraid of Medea. He celebrated a new wedding, and the king sent an order to Medea to leave Corinth. On a solar chariot harnessed by dragons, she fled to Athens, and told her children: "Give your stepmother my wedding gift: an embroidered cloak and a gold-woven headband." The cloak and bandage were saturated with fiery poison: the flames engulfed the young princess, the old king, and the royal palace. The children rushed to seek salvation in the temple, but the Corinthians, in a rage, stoned them to death. What happened to Jason, no one knew for sure.

It was hard for the Corinthians to live with the notoriety of child-killers and wicked people. Therefore, the legend says, they begged the Athenian poet Euripides to show in the tragedy that it was not they who killed the Jason children, but Medea herself, their own mother. It was difficult to believe in such horror, but Euripides made him believe it.

“Oh, if those pines from which the ship on which Jason sailed had never collapsed…” - the tragedy begins. This is Medea's old nurse speaking. Her mistress has just learned that Jason is marrying a princess, but does not yet know that the king tells her to leave Corinth. Behind the scenes, the moans of Medea are heard: she curses Jason, herself, and the children. "Take care of the children," says the nurse to the old teacher. The choir of Corinthian women is in alarm: Medea would not have called out a worse misfortune! "Tsar's pride and passion are terrible! Peace and measure are better."

The groans ceased, Medea goes out to the choir, she says firmly and courageously. "My husband was everything for me - I have nothing more. O miserable fate of a woman! They give her to a strange house, pay a dowry for her, buy her a master; it hurts her to give birth, like in a battle, and leaving is a shame. You are local, You are not alone, but I am alone." The old Corinthian king comes forward to meet her: immediately, in front of everyone, let the sorceress go into exile! "It's hard for you to know more than others: from this fear, from this hatred. Give me at least a day's time: to decide where I should go." The king gives her a day to term. "Blind man!" she says after him. "I don't know where I'm going, but I know I'll leave you dead." Who - you? The choir sings a song about universal untruth: oaths are violated, rivers flow backwards, men are more insidious than women!

Jason enters; an argument begins. "I saved you from the bulls, from the dragon, from Pelias - where are your oaths? Where should I go? In Colchis - the ashes of my brother; in Iolka - the ashes of Pelias; your friends are my enemies. O Zeus, why do we know how to recognize fake gold, but not a fake person!" Jason replies: “It was not you who saved me, but the love that moved you. I am counting on salvation: you are not in wild Colchis, but in Greece, where they know how to sing glory to me and you. My new marriage is for the sake of children: born from you, they are not full, and in my new house they will be happy. - "Happiness is not needed at the cost of such an insult!" - "Oh, why can't people be born without women! there would be less evil in the world." The choir sings a song about wicked love.

Medea will do her job, but where will she go then? Here the young Athenian king Aegeus appears: he went to the oracle to ask why he had no children, and the oracle answered incomprehensibly. "You will have children," says Medea, "if you give me shelter in Athens." She knows that Aegeus will have a son on a foreign side - the hero Theseus; knows that this Theseus will drive her out of Athens; he knows that later Aegeus will die from this son - he will throw himself into the sea with false news of his death; but is silent. "Let me die if I let you drive you out of Athens!" - says Egey, Medea doesn't need anything else now. Aegeus will have a son, and Jason will have no children - neither from his new wife, nor from her, Medea. "I will uproot Jason's race!" - and let descendants be horrified. The choir sings a song in praise of Athens.

Medea reminded of the past, secured the future - now her concern is about the present. The first is about her husband. She calls Jason, asks for forgiveness - "we women are like that!" - flatters, tells the children to Embrace their father: "I have a cloak and bandage, the legacy of the Sun, my ancestor; let them offer them to your wife!" - "Of course, and God grant them a long life!" Medea's heart shrinks, but she forbids herself pity. The choir sings: "Something will happen!"

The second concern is about children. They carried the presents and returned; Medea cries over them for the last time. "I gave birth to you, I nursed you, I see your smile - is it really the last time? Lovely hands, dear lips, royal faces - won't I spare you? Father stole your happiness, father deprives you of your mother; I pity you - my laugh enemies; this must not happen! Pride is strong in me, and anger is stronger than me; it's decided!" The choir sings: "Oh, it's better not to give birth to children, not to lead at home, to live in thought with the Muses - are women weaker in mind than men?"

The third concern is about the homeowner. A messenger runs in: "Save yourself, Medea: both the princess and the king died from your poison!" - "Tell, tell, the more, the sweeter!" The children entered the palace, everyone admires them, the princess rejoices at the dresses, Jason asks her to be a good stepmother for the little ones. She promises, she puts on an outfit, she shows off in front of a mirror; suddenly the color escapes from the face, foam appears on the lips, the flame covers her curls, the burnt meat shrinks on the bones, the poisoned blood oozes like resin from the bark. The old father, screaming, falls on her body, the dead body wraps around him like ivy; he sits to shake it off, but he himself becomes dead, and both, charred, lie, dead. "Yes, our life is just a shadow," the messenger concludes, "and there is no happiness for people, but there are successes and failures."

Now there is no turning back; if Medea does not kill the children herself, others will kill them. "Do not hesitate, heart: only a coward hesitates. Be silent, memories: now I do not mother them, I will cry tomorrow." Medea leaves the stage, the choir sings in horror: "The ancestor sun and the highest Zeus! hold her hand, do not let murder multiply by murder!" Two children's groans are heard, and it's all over.

Jason bursts in: "Where is she? On earth, in the underworld, in the sky? Let her be torn to pieces, if only I could save the children!" "It's too late, Jason," the choir tells him. The palace opens, above the palace - Medea on the Sun chariot with dead children in her arms. "You are a lioness, not a wife!" shouts Jason. "You are the demon with which the gods struck me!" "Call whatever you want, but I hurt your heart." - "And own!" - "My pain is light to me when I see yours." - "Your hand killed them!" - "And before that - your sin." - "So let the gods execute you!" "Gods do not hear perjurers." Medea disappears, Jason calls out to Zeus in vain. The chorus ends the tragedy with the words:

M. L. Gasparov

Theseus ruled in ancient Athens. Like Hercules, he had two fathers - the earthly one, King Aegeus, and the heavenly one, the god Poseidon. He accomplished his main feat on the island of Crete: he killed the monstrous Minotaur in the labyrinth and freed Athens from tribute to him. The Cretan princess Ariadne was his assistant: she gave him a thread, following which he left the labyrinth. He promised to take Ariadne as his wife, but the god Dionysus demanded her for himself, and for this the goddess of love Aphrodite hated Theseus.

The second wife of Theseus was an Amazon warrior; she died in battle, and Theseus left her son Hippolytus. The son of an Amazon, he was not considered legal and was not brought up in Athens, but in the neighboring city of Troezen. The Amazons didn't want to know men - Hippolytus didn't want to know women. He called himself a servant of the virgin hunting goddess Artemis, initiated into the underground mysteries, which the singer Orpheus told people about: a person must be clean, and then he will find bliss behind the grave. And for this, the goddess of love Aphrodite also hated him.

The third wife of Theseus was Phaedra, also from Crete, the younger sister of Ariadne. Theseus took her as his wife in order to have legitimate children-heirs. And here begins the revenge of Aphrodite. Phaedra saw her stepson Hippolytus and fell in love with him with mortal love. At first, she overcame her passion: Hippolyte was not around, he was in Troezen. But it so happened that Theseus killed the relatives who had rebelled against him and had to go into exile for a year; together with Phaedra, he moved to the same Troezen. Here the stepmother's love for her stepson flared up again; Phaedra went mad from her, fell ill, fell ill, and no one could understand what was happening to the queen. Theseus went to the oracle; in his absence, tragedy struck.

Actually, Euripides wrote two tragedies about this. The first one has not survived. In it, Phaedra herself revealed herself in love to Hippolytus, Hippolytus rejected her in horror, and then Phaedra slandered Hippolytus to the returned Theseus: as if this stepson had fallen in love with her and wanted to dishonor her. Hippolyte died, but the truth was revealed, and only then Phaedra decided to commit suicide. This story is best remembered by posterity. But the Athenians did not like him: Phaedra turned out to be too shameless and evil here. Then Euripides composed a second tragedy about Hippolyte - and it is before us.

The tragedy begins with Aphrodite's monologue: the gods punish the proud, and she will punish the proud Hippolytus, who abhors love. Here he is, Hippolyte, with a song in honor of the virgin Artemis on his lips: he is joyful and does not know that punishment will fall on him today. Aphrodite disappears, Hippolytus comes out with a wreath in his hands and dedicates it to Artemis - "pure from pure". "Why don't you honor Aphrodite too?" - asks his old slave. “I do, but from afar: the night gods are not to my liking,” Hippolyte replies. He leaves, and the slave prays for him to Aphrodite: "Forgive his youthful arrogance: that's why you, the gods, are wise to forgive." But Aphrodite will not forgive.

A choir of women from Trezen enters: they have heard a rumor that Queen Phaedra is ill and delirious. From what? Wrath of the gods, evil jealousy, bad news? Phaedra, tossing about on her bed, is carried out to meet them, with her old nurse. Phaedra raves: "I would like to hunt in the mountains! To the flower meadow of Artemidin! To the coastal horse races" - all these are Hippolytus' places. The nurse persuades: "Wake up, open up, pity if not yourself, then the children: if you die, they will not reign, but Hippolytus." Phaedra shudders, "Don't say that name!" Word for word: "the cause of the disease is love"; "the cause of love is Hippolyte";

"There is only one salvation - death." The nurse opposes: "Love is the universal law; resisting love is fruitless pride; and there is a cure for every disease." Phaedra understands this word literally: maybe the nurse knows some kind of healing potion? Nurse leaves; the choir sings: "Oh, let Eros blow me!"

From behind the stage - noise: Phaedra hears the voices of the nurse and Hippolytus. No, it was not about the potion, it was about Hippolyte's love: the nurse revealed everything to him - and in vain. Here they go on stage, he is indignant, she prays for one thing: "Just don't say a word to anyone, you swore!" - "My tongue swore, my soul had nothing to do with it," Hippolyte replies. He pronounces a cruel denunciation of women: “Oh, if it were possible to continue one’s race without women! A husband spends money on a wedding, a husband takes in-laws, a stupid wife is difficult, a smart wife is dangerous - I will keep the oath of silence, but I curse you!” He's leaving; Phaedra, in despair, stigmatizes the nurse: "Damn you! I wanted to be saved from dishonor by death; now I see that death cannot be saved from it either. There is only one last resort," and she leaves without naming him. This remedy is to blame Hippolytus before his father. The choir sings: "This world is terrible! I would run away from it, I would run away!"

From behind the scene - crying: Phaedra in the noose, Phaedra died! There is anxiety on the stage: Theseus appears, he is horrified by an unexpected disaster. The palace swings open, a general cry begins over the body of Phaedra, But why did she commit suicide? In her hand are writing boards;

Theseus reads them, and his horror is even greater. It turns out that it was Hippolyte, the criminal stepson, who encroached on her bed, and she, unable to bear the dishonor, laid hands on herself. “Father Poseidon!” Theseus exclaims. “You once promised me to fulfill my three wishes, here is the last of them: punish Hippolytus, let him not survive this day!”

Hippolyte appears; he is also struck by the sight of the dead Phaedra, but even more by the reproaches that his father brings down on him. "Oh, why can't we recognize a lie by sound!" Theseus shouts. Lies are your holiness, lies are your purity, and here is your accuser. Get out of my sight - go into exile!" - "Gods and people know - I have always been pure; Here is my oath to you, but I am silent about other excuses, - Hippolytus replies. - Neither lust pushed me to Phaedra the stepmother, nor vanity - to Phaedra the queen. I see: the wrong one came out clean from the case, but the truth did not save the clean. Execute me if you wish." - "No, death would be your mercy - go into exile!" - "Forgive me, Artemis, forgive me, Troezen, forgive me, Athens! you have never had a person with a purer heart than I. Ippolit leaves; the choir sings: “Fate is changeable, life is terrible; God forbid that I know the cruel laws of the world!"

The curse comes true: a messenger arrives. Hippolyte in a chariot left Troezen along a path between the rocks and the seashore. “I don’t want to live as a criminal,” he cried to the gods, “but I just want my father to know that he is wrong, and I am right, alive or dead.” Then the sea roared, a wave rose above the horizon, a monster arose from the shaft, like a sea bull; the horses shied away and carried away, the chariot hit the rocks, the young man was dragged over the rocks. The dying man is carried back to the palace. "I am his father, and I am dishonored by him," says Theseus, "let him expect neither sympathy nor joy from me."

And here above the stage is Artemis, the goddess Hippolyta. “He is right, you are wrong,” she says. “Phaedra was not right either, but she was moved by the evil Aphrodite. Cry, king; I share your grief with you.” Hippolyte is brought in on a stretcher, he groans and begs to finish him off; Whose sins is he paying for? Artemis leans over him from a height:

"This is the wrath of Aphrodite, it was she who killed Phaedra, and Phaedra Hippolyta, and Hippolytus leaves Theseus inconsolable: three victims, one more unfortunate than the other. Oh, what a pity that the gods do not pay for the fate of people! Aphrodite will also be grief - she also has a favorite hunter Adonis, and he will fall from my, Artemis, arrow. And you, Hippolyte, will be eternally remembered in Troezen, and every girl before marriage will sacrifice a strand of hair to you. Hippolyte dies, having forgiven his father; the chorus ends the tragedy with the words:

M. L. Gasparov

The name "Hercules" means "Glory to the goddess Hera". The name sounded ironic. The goddess Hera was the queen of heaven, the wife of the supreme Thunderer Zeus. And Hercules was the last of the earthly sons of Zeus: Zeus descended to many mortal women, but after Alcmene, the mother of Hercules, to no one. Hercules was supposed to save the gods of the Olympians in the war for power over the world against the earthly Giants who rebelled against them: there was a prophecy that the gods would defeat the Giants only if at least one mortal person came to their aid. Hercules became such a person. Hera should, like all gods, be grateful to him. But she was the lawful wife of Zeus, the patroness of all lawful marriages, and the illegitimate son of her husband, and even the most beloved, was hated by her. Therefore, all the legends about the earthly life of Hercules are legends about how the goddess Hera pursued him.

There were three main stories. First, about the twelve exploits of Hercules: Hera arranged so that the mighty Hercules had to serve twelve forced services to the insignificant king Eurystheus. Secondly, about the madness of Hercules: Hera sent a frenzy on him, and he killed his own children from the bow, mistaking them for enemies. Thirdly, about the martyrdom of Hercules: Hera made Hercules' wife, without knowing it herself, give him a cloak soaked in poison, which tormented the hero so much that he burned himself at the stake. On the self-immolation of Hercules, Sophocles wrote his tragedy "The Trachinian Woman". And about the madness of Hercules, Euripides wrote the tragedy "Hercules".

In different parts of Greece, as always, these myths were told in different ways. In Central Greece, in Thebes, where Hercules was allegedly born, the story of madness was best remembered. In the south, in Argos, where Hercules served King Eurystheus, the story of the twelve labors was best remembered. In the north, near Mount Eta, where Hercules' funeral pyre was, they told of his self-immolation. And in Athens they said differently: as if Hercules did not burn himself, but found the last shelter from the wrath of Hera here, in Athens, with his young friend, the Athenian hero Theseus. This little-spread myth was taken by Euripides to unravel his tragedy. And his wife Hercules is not called Dejanira (like Sophocles), but Megara (as they called her in Thebes).

Hercules' heavenly father was Zeus, and Hercules' earthly father was the hero Amphitryon, the husband of his mother Alcmene. (The Roman Plautus would later write a comedy about Amphitryon, Alcmene and Zeus.) Amphitrion lived in Thebes; Hercules was also born there, where he married the Theban princess Megara, from there he went to Argos to serve King Eurystheus. Twelve years - twelve services in a foreign land; the latter is the most terrible: Hercules had to go underground and bring out the monstrous three-headed dog that guarded the realm of the dead. And from the realm of the dead - people knew - no one ever returned. And Hercules was considered dead. The neighboring evil king Lik (whose name means "wolf") took advantage of this. He captured Thebes, killed the Theban king, Megara's father, and Megara, and her children, and the old Amphitryon sentenced to death.

Here begins the tragedy of Euripides. On the stage are Amphitrion, Megara and her three little silent sons and Hercules. They sit in front of the palace at the altar of the gods - as long as they hold on to it, they will not be touched, but their strength is already running out, and there is nowhere to wait for help. The Theban elders come to them, leaning on staffs, forming a choir - but is this really help? Amphitrion in a long monologue tells the audience what happened here, and ends with the words: "Only in trouble will we know who is a friend and who is not." Megara is in despair, and yet Amphitrion encourages her: "Happiness and misfortune are replaced by a succession: what if Hercules takes it and returns?" But this is unbelievable.

An evil face appears. "Do not cling to life! Hercules will not return from the other world. Hercules is not a hero at all, but a coward; he always fought not face to face, with a sword and a spear, but from a distance, with arrows from a bow. And who will believe that he is the son of Zeus, and not yours, old man! Now I have the upper hand, and you - death. Amphitryon accepts the challenge: "Ask the fallen Giants if he is Zeus's son! An archer in battle can be more dangerous than an armored man. Thebes have forgotten how much they owe to Hercules - so much the worse for them! And the rapist will pay for violence." And here comes Megara. “Enough: death is terrible, but you won’t go against fate. Hercules cannot be revived, and the villain cannot be reasoned with. Let me dress my sons in funeral clothes - and lead us to execution!”

The choir sings a song in praise of the exploits of Hercules: how he beat the stone lion and wild centaurs, the many-headed Hydra and the three-bodied giant, caught the sacred doe and tamed predatory horses, defeated the Amazons and the sea king, lifted the sky on his shoulders and brought golden paradise apples to earth, descended to the land of the dead, and from there there is no way out ... Megara and Amphitrion take the Heracles sons out: "Here they are, he bequeathed Thebes to one, Argos to another, Echalia to one, lion skin to one, club to another, bow and arrows to the third, and now they are finished. Zeus, if you want to save them, save them! Hercules, if you can present yourself to us, appear!"

And Hercules is. He has just left the realm of the dead, his eyes are not accustomed to the sun, he sees his children, his wife, his father in funeral clothes and does not believe himself: what is the matter? Megara and Amphitrion, excited, hurriedly explain to him: now Lik will come to lead them to their execution. "Then - everyone to the palace! and when he enters, he will deal with me. I was not afraid of the hellish dog - will I be afraid of the pitiful Face?" The chorus praises the young strength of Hercules. Lik enters, steps into the palace, the choir stops; the groan of the perishing Face is heard from behind the stage, and the choir sings a victorious, solemn song. He does not know that the worst is yet to come.

Two goddesses appear above the stage. These are Irida, the messenger of Hera, and Lissa, the daughter of the Night, the deity of madness. While Hercules performed twelve feats, he was under the protection of Zeus, but the feats are over, and now Hera will take her. Madness will attack Heracles like a hunter on prey, like a rider on a horse, like hops on a drunkard. The goddesses disappear, there is only a choir on the stage, he is horrified, from behind the stage - screams, music thunders, the earth trembles, a frightened messenger runs out. He says: after slaying Lika, Hercules began to offer a cleansing sacrifice, but suddenly froze, his eyes became bloodshot, foam appeared on his lips: "It's not him, not Eurystheus, but I need Eurystheus, my tormentor! Here are his children!" And he attacks his own sons. One hides behind a column - Hercules hits him with an arrow. Another rushes to his chest - Hercules crushes him with a club. With the third, Megara flees to a distant rest - Hercules breaks open the wall and strikes both. He turns to Amphitrion and is ready to kill his father - but then the mighty goddess Athena, the patroness of Hercules, appears, hits him with a huge stone, he collapses and falls into a dream, and then only the household members tie him up and screw him to the fragment of the column.

The inner chambers of the palace: Hercules is sleeping at the column, above him is the unfortunate Amphitrion, around are the bodies of Megara and children. Amphitrion and the choir mourn him as dead. Hercules is slowly awakening, he does not remember anything and does not understand - maybe he is back in hell? But now he recognizes his father, now he hears about what happened, his hands are untied, he sees his crime, understands his guilt and is ready to execute himself by throwing himself on the sword. And then there is Theseus.

Theseus is young, but already glorious: he freed a whole region from robbers, he killed the Minotaur bull-man in Crete and saved his Athens from tribute to this monster, he descended into the kingdom of the dead to get the underground mistress Persephone for a friend, and only Hercules rescued him from there and brought to the white light. He heard that the evil Face was rampant in Thebes, and hurried to help, but appeared too late. “I must die,” Hercules tells him. “I brought the wrath of Hera to Thebes; I eclipsed all the glory of my exploits with the horror of this crime; death is better than life under a curse; let Hera triumph!” “No need,” Theseus answers him. “No one is sinless: even the Olympians in the sky are sinful against their father Titan, Everyone is subject to an evil fate, but not everyone is able to resist it; will you flinch? Leave Thebes, live with me in Athens but live! And Hercules concedes. “Only in trouble do we know who is a friend and who is not,” he repeats. “Hercules never wept, and now sheds a tear. Forgive me, the dead! Hera tied us into one knot."

And, leaning on a friend, Hercules leaves the stage.

M. L. Gasparov

The ancient Greeks called Tauris the modern Crimea. The Tauri lived there - a Scythian tribe that honored the goddess-maiden and brought her human sacrifices, which in Greece had long since gone out of custom. The Greeks believed that this maiden goddess is none other than their Artemis the huntress. They had a myth, at the outset and at the denouement of which Artemis stood, and both times - with a human sacrifice, - however, imaginary, unaccomplished. The plot of this myth was on the Greek coast, in Aulis, and the denouement was on the Scythian coast, in Tauris. And between the plot and the denouement stretched one of the most bloody and cruel stories of Greek mythology.

The great Argos king Agamemnon, the main leader of the Greek army in the Trojan War, had a wife, Clytemnestra, and had three children from her: the eldest daughter Iphigenia, the middle daughter Electra and the youngest son Orestes. When the Greek army sailed on a campaign against Troy, the goddess Artemis demanded that Agamemnon sacrifice her daughter Iphigenia to her. Agamemnon did it; how this happened, Euripides showed in the tragedy "Iphigenia in Aulis". At the last moment, Artemis took pity on the victim, replaced the girl on the altar with a doe, and Iphigenia rushed off on a cloud to distant Tauris. There stood the temple of Artemis, and in the temple a wooden statue of the goddess was kept, as if it had fallen from heaven. At this temple, Iphigenia became a priestess.

Of the people, no one saw and did not know that Iphigenia was saved: everyone thought that she died on the altar. Her mother Clytemnestra harbored a mortal hatred for her child-killing husband for this. And when Agamemnon returned victorious from the Trojan War, she, avenging her daughter, killed him with her own hand. After that, her son Orestes, with the help of his sister Electra, avenging his father, killed his own mother. After that, the goddesses of blood feud Erinnia, avenging Clytemnestra, sent madness to Orestes and drove him in agony throughout Greece until he was saved by the god Apollo and the goddess Athena. In Athens there was a trial between the Erinnes and Orestes, and Orestes was acquitted. Aeschylus spoke about all this in detail in his trilogy "Oresteia".

He didn't talk about just one thing. To atone for guilt, Orestes had to accomplish a feat: to get the idol of Artemis in distant Tauris and bring it to the Athenian land. His assistant was his inseparable friend Pylades, who married his sister Electra. How Orestes and Pylades did their job and how, at the same time, Orestes found his sister Iphigenia, whom he considered dead long ago, Euripides wrote the tragedy "Iphigenia in Taurida" about this.

Action - in Tauris in front of the temple of Artemis. Iphigenia goes out to the audience and tells them who she is, how she escaped in Aulis and how she now serves Artemis in this Scythian kingdom. The service is hard: all the foreigners that the sea will bring here are sacrificed here to Artemis, and she, Iphigenia, must prepare them for death. What about her father, mother, brother, she does not know. And now she had a prophetic dream: the Argos palace collapsed, only a column stands among the ruins, and she dresses this column in the same way as strangers are dressed here before the victim. Of course, this column is Orestes; and the death rite can only mean that he died. She wants to mourn him and leaves to call her servants for this.

While the stage is empty, Orestes and Pylades enter it. Orestes is alive and in Tauris; they are assigned to steal an idol from this temple, and they are looking at how to get there. They will do this at night, and wait out the day in a cave by the sea where their ship is hidden. There they go, and Iphigenia returns to the stage with a choir of servants; together with them, she mourns both Orestes, and the evil fate of her ancestors, and her bitter fate in a foreign land.

The herald interrupts their weeping. Just on the seashore, the shepherds seized two strangers; one of them fought in a fit and conjured the pursuers of Erinnia, and the other tried to help him and protect him from the shepherds. Both were taken to the king, and the king ordered them to be sacrificed to Artemis in the usual rite: let Iphigenia prepare for the prescribed ceremony. Iphigenia is confused. Usually this service with a bloody sacrifice is a burden to her; but now, when the dream told her that Orestes was dead, her heart hardened and she almost rejoiced at their future execution. Oh, why didn't they bring here the perpetrators of the Trojan War - Helen and Menelaus! The choir mourns for a distant homeland.

Bring in the prisoners. They are young, she feels sorry for them. "What is your name?" she asks Orestes. He is gloomy silent. "Where are you from?" - From Argos. - "Did Troy fall? Did the culprit survive Elena? And Menelaus? And Odysseus? And Achilles? And Agamemnon? How! He died from his wife! And she from her son! And the son - is Orestes alive?" - "Alive, but in exile - everywhere and nowhere." - "Oh happiness! My dream turned out to be false." - "Yes, dreams are false and even gods are false," says Orestes, thinking about how they sent him for salvation, and brought him to death.

“If you are from Argos, then I have a request for you,” says Iphigenia. “I have a letter to my homeland; I will spare and let one of you go, and let him give the letter to whom I tell.” And she leaves for the letter. Orestes and Pylades begin a noble dispute, which of them will stay alive: Orestes orders Pylades to be saved, Pylades - Orestes. Orestes overpowers in a dispute: "I killed my mother, do I really have to kill my friend as well? Live, remember me and do not believe the false gods." "Do not anger the gods," Pylades tells him, "death is near, but has not yet come." Iphigenia brings out the writing boards. "Who will take them?" - "I," says Pylades. "But to whom?" “To Orestes,” replies Iphigenia. “Let him know that his sister Iphigenia did not die in Aulis, but serves Artemis of Tauride; let him come and save me from this difficult service.” Orestes does not believe his ears. "I have to give this letter to Orestes?" Pylades asks. - and he hands the writing boards to a comrade. Iphigenia can't believe her eyes. “Yes, I am your brother Orestes!” shouts Orestes. “I remember the coverlet woven by you, where you depicted an eclipse of the sun, and the lock of hair that you left to your mother, and the great-grandfather’s spear that stood in your chamber!” Iphigenia throws herself into his arms - just think, she almost became the murderer of her brother! With jubilant songs they celebrate recognition.

The unexpected came true, but the main thing remained: how can Orestes get and take away the idol of Artemis from the Tauride temple? The temple is guarded, and the guards cannot be dealt with. “I came up with it!” says Iphigenia, “I will deceive the king with cunning, and for this I will tell him the truth. I will say that you, Orestes, killed your mother, and you, Pylades, helped him; therefore, you are both unclean, and your touch has defiled goddess. Both you and the statue need to be cleansed - bathed in sea water. So you, and I, and the statue will go out to the sea - to your ship. " Decision is made; the choir sings a song in honor of Artemis, rejoicing at Iphigenia and envying her: she will return to her homeland, and they, the servants, will long for a long time in a foreign land.

Iphigenia leaves the temple with a wooden statue of the goddess in her hands, towards her - the king. Serving Artemis is a woman's business, the king does not know its subtleties and obediently trusts Iphigenia. Cleansing an idol is a sacrament, let the guards leave, and the inhabitants do not leave their houses, and the king himself will fumigate the temple so that the goddess has a clean abode. (This is also true: the goddess needs to be cleansed of the blood of human sacrifices, and her pure abode will be in the Athenian land.) The king enters the temple, Iphigenia, with a prayer to Artemis, follows to the sea, followed by Orestes and Pylades. The choir sings a song in honor of the prophetic Apollo, the mentor of Orestes: yes, there are false dreams, but there are no false gods!

The denouement is coming. A messenger runs in, calls the king: the captives fled, and with them - the priestess, and with her - the idol of the goddess! They, the guards, stood for a long time turning away so as not to see the sacraments, but then they turned around and saw a ship near the shore, and fugitives on the ship; the guards rushed towards them, but it was too late; rather to the ships to intercept the criminals! However, here, as often happens in the denouement of Euripides, the "god from the machine" appears: the goddess Athena appears above the stage. “Stop, king: the cause of the fugitives is pleasing to the gods; leave them alone and let these women from the choir go after them. in memory of Tauris, on the main feast, her idol will be spattered with blood. And you, Iphigenia, will become the first priestess in this temple, and your descendants will honor your grave there. And I hasten to follow you to my Athens. Vey, fair wind!" Athena disappears, the Taurian king remains on his knees, the tragedy is over.

M. L. Gasparov

The Trojan War began. The Trojan prince Paris seduced and kidnapped Helen, the wife of the Spartan king Menelaus. The Greeks gathered on them with a huge army, led by the king of Argos Agamemnon, brother of Menelaus and husband of Clytemnestra, sister of Helen. The army stood in Aulis - on the Greek coast facing Troy. But it could not sail away - the goddess of these places Artemis, the hunter and patroness of women in childbirth, sent a calm or even contrary winds to the Greeks.

Why Artemis did this was told in different ways. Maybe she just wanted to protect Troy, which was patronized by her brother Apollo. Perhaps Agamemnon, having fun hunting at his leisure, struck a deer with one arrow and exclaimed excessively proudly that Artemis herself would not have hit the mark - and this was an insult to the goddess. Or maybe a sign happened: two eagles grabbed and tore a pregnant hare, and the fortuneteller said: this means that two kings will take Troy, full of treasures, but they will not escape the wrath of Artemis, the patroness of pregnant women and women in childbirth. Artemis needs to be appeased.

How to propitiate Artemis - there was only one story about this. The fortuneteller said: the goddess demands a human sacrifice for herself - let the native daughter of Agamemnon and Clytemnestra, the beautiful Iphigenia, be slaughtered on the altar. Human sacrifice in Greece has long been out of the ordinary; and such a sacrifice, that a father should sacrifice his daughter, was quite unheard of. And yet they made a sacrifice. Messengers were sent for Iphigenia: let them bring her to the Greek camp, King Agamemnon wants to marry her to the best Greek hero - Achilles. Iphigenia was brought, but instead of a wedding, death awaited her: they tied her up, tied her mouth so that her screams would not interfere with the ceremony, carried her to the altar, the priest raised a knife over her ... But here the goddess Artemis had mercy: she enveloped the altar in a cloud, threw the priest under the knife instead the girl was a sacrificial doe, and Iphigenia was carried away through the air to the ends of the earth, to Tauris, and made her priestess there. Euripides wrote another tragedy about the fate of Iphigenia in Tauris. But none of the Greeks knew what had happened: everyone was sure that Iphigenia had fallen on the altar. And the mother of Iphigenia, Clytemnestra, harbored a mortal hatred for Agamemnon, her child-killing husband. How many terrible deeds followed this, Aeschylus will later show in his Oresteia.

It was about this sacrifice of Iphigenia that Euripides wrote his tragedy. There are three heroes in it: first Agamemnon, then Clytemnestra and, finally, Iphigenia herself.

The action begins with a conversation between Agamemnon and his faithful old slave. Night, silence, calm, but there is no peace in the heart of Agamemnon. Good for a servant: his work is obedience; hard for the king: his business is a decision. It fights the duty of the leader: to lead the army to victory - and the feeling of the father: to save his daughter. At first, the leader's debt overpowered him: he sent an order to Argos to bring Iphigenia to Aulis - as if for a wedding with Achilles. Now the feeling of the father overcame: here is a letter with the cancellation of this order, let the old man deliver it to Argos to Clytemnestra as soon as possible, and if the mother and daughter have already left, let him stop them on the way and return them back. The old man goes on his way, Agamemnon - to his tent; the sun rises. A chorus of local women appears: they, of course, do not know anything and in a long song they sincerely glorify the great conceived campaign, listing leader after leader and ship after ship.

The song of the choir breaks off with an unexpected noise. The old slave did not go far: when leaving the camp, he was met by the one who needed this war most and dearest of all - King Menelaus; without thinking twice, he took away the secret letter, read it and now showers Agamemnon with reproaches: how, he betrayed himself and the army, he brings a common cause for the sake of his family affairs - does he want to save his daughter? Agamemnon flares up: didn’t Menelaus start all this common business for the sake of his own family affairs - in order to return his wife? "The vainglorious one!" shouts Menelaus, "you have coveted the command and take on too much!" "Madman!" shouts Agamemnon, "I take on a lot, but I won't take a sin on my soul!" And then - new frightening news: while the brothers were arguing, Clytemnestra and Iphigenia, who had not been warned by anyone, had already arrived at the camp, the army already knew about this and was making noise about the princess's wedding. Agamemnon droops: he sees that he cannot stand alone against all. And Menelaus droops: he understands that he is the ultimate culprit in the death of Iphigenia. The choir sings a song with good and bad love: Elena's love, which caused this war, was not good.

Enter Clytemnestra and Iphigenia, descend from the chariot; why does Agamemnon meet them so sadly? "Royal cares!" Is Iphigenia really expecting a wedding? "Yes, she will be led to the altar." And where is the wedding sacrifice to the gods? "I cook it." Agamemnon persuades Clytemnestra to leave her daughter and return to Argos. "No, never: I am a mother, and at the wedding I am the hostess." Clytemnestra enters the tent, Agamemnon goes to the camp; the choir, realizing that sacrifice and war cannot be avoided, drowns out the sadness with a song about the impending fall of Troy.

Behind all this, one more participant in the action, Achilles, was forgotten. His name was used to deceive without telling him. Now he, as if nothing had happened, approaches the tent of Agamemnon: how long to wait for the campaign, the soldiers grumble! Clytemnestra comes out to meet him and greets him as a future son-in-law. Achilles is at a loss, Clytemnestra too; is there cheating here? And the old slave reveals to them the deceit: both the intent against Iphigenia, and the torment of Agamemnon, and his intercepted letter. Clytemnestra is in despair: she and her daughter are trapped, the whole army will be against them, the only hope is in Achilles, because he is deceived just like they are! “Yes,” Achilles replies, “I will not tolerate the king playing in my name, like a robber with an ax; I am a warrior, I obey the boss for the good of the cause, but refuse obedience in the name of evil; whoever touches Iphigenia will deal with me! " The choir sings a song in honor of Achilles, commemorates the happy wedding of his father with the sea goddess Thetis - so unlike the current bloody wedding of Iphigenia.

Achilles went to his soldiers; instead of him, Agamemnon returns: "The altar is ready, it's time for the sacrifice" - and sees that his wife and daughter already know everything. “Are you preparing a daughter as a sacrifice?” asks Clytemnestra. “Will you pray for a happy journey? and a happy return? to me, from whom you take away an innocent daughter for the whore Helen? to whom sisters and brother who will shy away from your bloody hands? and are you not even afraid of the right revenge? - "Be sorry, father," conjures Iphigenia, "it is so joyful to live, but it is so scary to die!" “What is scary and what is not scary, I know myself,” Agamemnon answers, “but all of Greece is in arms so that strangers do not dishonor her wives, and for her I do not feel sorry for either my blood or yours.” He turns and leaves; Iphigenia mourns her fate with a plaintive song, but the words of her father sunk into her soul.

Achilles returns: the soldiers already know everything, the whole camp is in full swing and demands the princess as a sacrifice, but he, Achilles, will defend at least one against all. “No need!” Iphigenia suddenly straightens up. “Do not draw swords at each other - save them against strangers. If it is about the fate and honor of all Greece - let me be its savior! Truth is stronger than death - I will die for the truth; and men and the wives of Greece will honor me with glory." Achilles is in admiration, Clytemnestra is in despair, Iphigenia sings a jubilant song to the glory of the bloodthirsty Artemis and goes to her death to these sounds.

Here ends the tragedy of Euripides. Then the ending followed - Artemis appeared in the sky and announced to the suffering Clytemnestra that her daughter would be saved, and the doe would die under the knife. Then a messenger came and told Clytemnestra what he saw when the sacrifice was performed: the rite of the rite, the torment of Agamemnon, the last words of Iphigenia, the blow of the priest, the cloud over the altar and the wind that finally blew the sails of the Greek ships. But this ending was preserved only in a later alteration; how Clytemnestra responded to this, how the fatal thought of revenge on her husband arose in her heart, we do not know.

M. L. Gasparov

Riders are not just horsemen: this was the name of the whole estate in Athens - those who had enough money to keep a war horse. These were wealthy people who had small estates outside the city, lived on their income and wanted Athens to be a peaceful, closed agricultural state.

The poet Aristophanes wanted peace; that is why he made the riders the chorus of his comedy. They performed in two hemichoirs and, to make it funnier, rode on toy wooden horses. And in front of them, the actors played a buffoonish parody of Athenian political life. The owner of the state is the old People, decrepit, lazy and out of his mind, and he is courted and flattered by cunning politicians-demagogues: whoever is more obsequious is stronger. There are four of them on the stage: two are called by their real names, Nikias and Demosthenes, the third is called the Kozhevnik (his real name is Cleon), and the fourth is called the Sausage Man (Aristophanes invented this main character himself).

It was a difficult time for peaceful agitation. Nicias and Demosthenes (not comedic, but real Athenian generals; do not confuse this Demosthenes with the famous orator of the same name who lived a hundred years later) had just surrounded a large Spartan army near the city of Pylos, but they could not defeat and capture him. They offered to use this to conclude a profitable peace. And their opponent Cleon (he really was a leather craftsman) demanded to finish off the enemy and continue the war until victory. Then the enemies of Cleon offered him to take command himself - in the hope that he, who had never fought, would be defeated and leave the stage. But a surprise happened: Cleon won a victory at Pylos, brought the Spartan captives to Athens, and after that there was no way out of him in politics at all: whoever tried to argue with Cleon and denounce him was immediately reminded: "And Pylos? And Pylos ?" - and had to shut up. And so Aristophanes took upon himself the unthinkable task: to make fun of this "Pylos", so that at any mention of this word the Athenians would remember not Cleon's victory, but Aristophanes' jokes and would not be proud, but would laugh.

So, on the stage is the house of the owner of the People, and in front of the house two of his servant-servants, Nicias and Demosthenes, are sitting and grieving: they were in the owner's favor, and now they were wiped off by a new slave, a scoundrel tanner, They two brewed a glorious mess in Pylos, and he snatched it from under their noses and offered it to the People. He slurps, and the tanner throws all the tidbits. What to do? Let's look at the ancient predictions! War is a disturbing, superstitious time, people recalled (or invented) ancient dark prophecies and interpreted them in relation to current circumstances. While the tanner is sleeping, let's steal the most important prophecy from under his pillow! Stole; it says: "The worst is conquered only by the worst: there will be a rope-maker in Athens, and his cattle breeder will be worse, and his tanner will be worse, and his sausage-maker will be worse." The tightrope politician and the cattle breeder politician have already been in power; now there is a tanner; I need to find a sausage maker.

Here is a sausage maker with a meat tray. "Are you a scientist?" - "Only beaters." - "What did you study?" - "Steal and unlock." - "What do you live for?" - "And in front, and behind, and sausages." - "Oh, our savior! Do you see this people in the theater? Do you want to be the ruler over them all? Twirl the Council, yell in the assembly, drink and fornicate at public expense? Stand with one foot in Asia, the other in Africa?" - "Yes, I'm of a low kind!" - "All the better!" - "Yes, I'm almost illiterate!" - "That's good!" - "And what to do?" - "The same as with sausages: knead more abruptly, add salt more strongly, sweeten more flatteringly, call out louder." - "And who will help?" - "Riders!" On wooden horses, riders enter the stage, chasing Cleon the tanner. "Here is your enemy: surpass him with bragging, and the fatherland is yours!"

A bragging contest ensues, interspersed with fights. "You're a tanner, you're a swindler, all your soles are rotten!" - "But I swallowed the whole Pylos in one gulp!" - "But first he filled the womb with the entire Athenian treasury!" - "The sausage maker himself, the intestine himself, he himself stole the leftovers!" - "No matter how strong, no matter how pouting, I'll still shout it out!" The choir comments, incites, remembers the good morals of the fathers and praises the citizens for the best intentions of the poet Aristophanes: there were good writers of comedies before, but one is old, the other is drunk, but this one is worth listening to. So it was supposed to be in all the old comedies.

But this is a saying, the main thing is ahead. At the noise from the house, the old People staggeringly comes out: which of the rivals loves him more? "If I don't love you, let them cut me to pieces!" the tanner shouts. "And let them chop me into minced meat!" - shouts the sausage man. "I want your Athens to rule over all of Greece!" - "So that you, the People, suffer on campaigns, and he profits from every prey!" - "Remember, People, how many conspiracies I saved you from!" - "Do not believe him, it was he himself who muddied the water in order to catch a fish!" - "Here's my sheepskin to warm your old bones!" - "And here is a pillow under your ass, which you rubbed while rowing at Salamis!" - "I have a whole chest of good prophecies for you!" - "And I have a whole shed!" One by one these prophecies are read - a grandiloquent set of meaningless words -' and one by one they are interpreted in the most fantastic way: each for his own benefit and for the evil of the enemy. Of course, it turns out much more interesting for a sausage maker. When the prophecies end, well-known sayings come into play - and also with the most unexpected interpretations on the topic of the day. Finally, it comes to the proverb: "There is, besides Pylos, Pylos, but there is also Pylos and a third!" (in Greece there were indeed three cities under this name), there are a lot of untranslatable puns on the word "Pylos". And that's it - the goal of Aristophanes has been achieved, not one of the spectators will remember this Cleon's "Pylos" without a cheerful laugh. "Here's to you, People, from me a stew!" - "And from me porridge!" - "And from me a pie!" - "And from me the wine!" - "And from me it's hot!" - "Oh, tanner, look, they're carrying money, you can profit!" - "Where where?" The tanner rushes to look for money, the sausage-maker picks up his roast and brings it away from him. "Oh, you scoundrel, you bring someone else's from you!" - "And isn't that how you appropriated Pylos after Nikias and Demosthenes?" - "It doesn't matter who fried - honor to the one who brought it!" - proclaims the People. The tanner is driven by the neck, the sausage-maker is proclaimed the chief adviser of the People. The choir sings along with all this in verses in praise of the People and in reproach to such and such a libertine, and such and such a coward, and such and such a embezzler, all under their own names.

The twist is fabulous. There was a myth about the sorceress Medea, who threw the old man into a cauldron of potions, and the old man came out as a young man. So behind the scenes the sausage-maker throws the old Folk into a boiling cauldron, and it comes out young and flourishing. They march across the stage, and the People majestically announce how good it will be for good people to live now and how the bad ones will rightly pay (and such and such, and such and such), and the choir rejoices that the good old days are returning, when everyone lived freely, peacefully and satisfyingly.

M. A. Gasparov

Socrates was the most famous philosopher in Athens. For his philosophy, he later paid with his life: he was brought to trial and executed precisely because he questioned too much, corrupted (allegedly) morals and thereby weakened the state. But before that it was still far away: at first he was only brought out in a comedy. At the same time, they attributed to him something that he had never said or thought, and against which he himself argued: that's what comedy is for.

The comedy was called "Clouds", and its chorus consisted of Clouds - fluttering bedspreads and for some reason long noses. Why "Clouds"? Because philosophers first of all began to think about what the whole diverse set of objects around us consists of. Maybe from water, which can be both liquid, and solid, and gaseous? or from fire, which is constantly moving and changing? Or from some "uncertainty"? Then why not from the clouds that change shape every minute? So the Clouds are the new gods of the new philosophers. This had nothing to do with Socrates: he was just a little interested in the origin of the universe, and more in human deeds, good and bad. But comedy was all the same.

Human actions are also a dangerous business. Fathers and grandfathers did not think and did not reason, but from their youth they firmly knew what was good and what was bad. The new philosophers began to reason, and they seemed to succeed, as if it were possible to prove by logic that the good is not so good, and the bad is not bad at all. This is what worried the Athenian citizens; Aristophanes wrote the comedy Clouds about this.

A strong man named Strepsiades lives in Athens, and he has a son, a young dandy: he reaches for the nobility, is fond of horse racing and ruins his father with debts. The father cannot even sleep: thoughts of creditors gnaw at him like fleas. But it dawned on him that some new wise men had sprung up in Athens, who knew how to make untruth true by evidence, and truth untruth. If you learn from them, then maybe you will be able to fight off creditors in court? And now, in his old age, Strepsiades goes to study.

Here is the house of Socrates, on it is a sign: "The Thinking House." A student of Socrates explains how subtle things are dealt with here. For example, a student was talking to Socrates, a flea bit him, and then jumped over and bit Socrates. How far did she jump? It's like counting: we measure human jumps with human steps, and flea jumps must be measured with flea ones. I had to take a flea, imprint its legs on wax, measure its step, and then measure the jump with these steps. Or one more thing: does a mosquito buzz with its larynx or ass? His body is tubular, he flies quickly, air flies into his mouth, and flies out through his ass, so it turns out that his ass. What is it? Geographical map: look, this circle is Athens. “I won’t believe it at all: in Athens, every step is arguing and chicanery, and not a single one is visible in this circle.”

Here is Socrates himself: hanging in a hammock over the very roof. For what? To understand the universe, you need to be closer to the stars. "Socrates, Socrates, I conjure you by the gods: teach me such speeches so that I don't have to pay my debts!" - "What gods? We have new gods - Clouds." - "And Zeus?" - "Why Zeus? They have thunder, they have lightning, and instead of Zeus they are driven by the Whirlwind." - "How is it - thunder?" - "But how bad air in your stomach grumbles, so it grumbles in the clouds, this is thunder." - "And who punishes sinners?" - "But does Zeus punish them? If he punished them, it would not be good for such and such, and such and such, and such and such, but they go to their lives!" - "What about them?" - "And what's the tongue for? Learn to argue - you'll punish them yourself. Whirlwind, Clouds and Tongue - this is our sacred trinity!" Meanwhile, the choir of Clouds flocks to the stage, praises the Sky, praises Athens and, as usual, recommends the public the poet Aristophanes.

So how do you get rid of creditors? “Easier than simple: they will take you to court, and you swear by Zeus that you didn’t take anything from them; Zeus has long been gone, so you won’t get anything for a false oath.” So, really, the truth can no longer be reckoned with? "But look." The main dispute begins, Large baskets are brought onto the stage, in them, like fighting cocks, sit Pravda and Krivda. They crawl out and run into each other, and the chorus urges on. "Where in the world have you seen the truth?" - "At the highest gods!" - "Is it with them, where Zeus overthrew his own father and put him in chains?" - "And among our ancestors, who lived sedately, humbly, obediently, respected the elderly, defeated enemies and had learned conversations." - "You never know what the ancestors had, but now you won’t achieve anything with humility, be impudent - and you will win! People have something different - by nature, something else - by agreement; what is by nature is higher! Drink, walk, fornicate, follow nature! And if they catch you with someone else's wife - say: I'm like Zeus, I sleep with everyone who likes me! Word for word, slap in the face for a slap in the face, look - Falsehood is indeed stronger than Truth.

Strepsiades with Radehonka's son. The creditor comes: "Pay the debt!" Strepsiades swears to him: "Zeus sees, I didn't take a penny from you!" - "Zeus will smash you!" - "The clouds will already protect!" The second creditor arrives. "Pay interest!" - "And what is interest?" - "The debt lies and grows every month: so pay with an increase!" - "Tell me, rivers flow and flow into the sea; does it grow?" - "No, where does he grow!" - "Then why should the money grow? You won't get a penny from me!" Creditors run away cursing, Strepsiades triumphs, but the choir of Clouds warns: "Beware, retribution is near!"

Retribution comes from an unexpected side, Strepsiades quarreled with his son: they did not agree in their views on the poems of Euripides. The son, without thinking twice, grabs a stick and beats his father. The father is horrified: "There is no such law - to beat fathers!" And the son says: “If we want, we’ll take it and start it! It’s impossible to beat the fathers by agreement, but by nature, why not?” Here only the old man understands what trouble he is in. He calls out to the Clouds: "Where have you taken me?" The clouds answer: "Do you remember the word of Aeschylus: we learn from suffering!" Taught by bitter experience, Strepsiades grabs a torch and runs to deal with Socrates - to set fire to his "thinking room". Screams, fire, smoke, and comedy is over.

M. L. Gasparov

The name "Lysisgrata" means "Destroyer of War". This name was given by Aristophanes to the heroine of his fantastic play about how women, with their female means, achieved what men could not - they put an end to a great war. The war was between Athens and Sparta, it dragged on for ten years, it was Aristophanes who opposed it in the comedy "Riders". Then there were several years of truce, and then the war began again. Aristophanes has already despaired that the landowners-riders will be able to cope with the war, and he composes a comedy-tale, where the world is upside down, where women are smarter and stronger than men, where Lysistrata really destroys the war, this disastrous male undertaking. How? Arranging a pan-Greek women's strike. Comedies were supposed to be obscene, such is the law of the spring theatrical festival; in "Lysistratus" there was a place to play all the prescribed obscenities.

Every strike starts with a deal. Lysistrata gathers deputies from all over Greece to the square in front of the Athenian acropolis for conspiracy. They gather slowly: some have laundry, some have cooking, some have children. Lysistrata is angry: "I convene you for a big deal, but at least you have something! Now, if something else was big, I suppose they would have flocked at once!" Finally got together. "Do we all miss our husbands?" - "All!" - "Do we all want the war to end?" - "All!" - "Are you ready to do everything for this?" - "For all!" - "So this is what needs to be done: until the men reconcile - do not sleep with them, do not give in to them, do not touch them!" - "Oh!!!" - "Ah, so you are ready for anything!" - "Let's jump into the fire, cut ourselves in half, give the earrings-rings - but not this !!!" Persuasion, perekora, persuasion begin. "A man cannot resist a woman: Menelaus wanted to deal with Elena - but when he saw, he himself rushed into bed with her!" - "And if they seize and force them by force?" - "Lie down with a deck, and let him suffer!" Finally, they agreed, they take a solemn oath over a huge wineskin with wine: “I will not give myself to either my husband or my lover <…> I will not throw up my white legs in front of a rapist <…> I will not stand like a lioness over the gate <…> But I will change - from now on let me have water drink!"

Words are spoken, deeds begin. A choir of women occupies the Acropolis of Athens. The choir of men - of course, the old men, because the young are at war - is attacking the acropolis. The old men are shaking with fiery torches, the women are threatening with buckets of water. "And I'll burn your girlfriends with this spark!" - "And I'll fill your fire with this water!" Quarrel, fight, soaked old men run away. "Now I see: Euripides is the wisest of poets: after all, he said about women that there are no shameless creatures!" The two choirs bicker with songs.

The oldest old man, the State Councilor, wanders onto the stage, barely moving his legs. The main part of any Greek drama begins - the dispute.

"Why are you prying into your own business?" the adviser says. "War is a man's business!" (This is a quote from Hector's farewell to Andromache in the Iliad). - "No, and women," replies Lysistrata, "we lose our husbands in the war, we give birth to children for the war, should we not take care of peace and order!" - "You, women, started to rule the state?" - "We, the women, rule the household chores, and not bad!" - "Yes, how do you unravel the affairs of state?" - "But just as every day we unravel the yarn on the spinning wheel: we will comb the scoundrels, we will iron the good people, we will knit good threads from the outside,

The adviser and the choir, of course, cannot stand such impudence, squabbles, fights, dashing songs from both sides begin again, and again the women come out victorious,

But it's too early to celebrate! Women are people too, they also miss men, they just look how to run away from the acropolis, and Lysistrata catches them and appeases them. "Oh, I have wool left on the couch, I need to roll!" - "We know what kind of hair you have: sit!" - "Oh, I have an unrolled canvas, I need to roll it!" - "We know, sit down!" - "Oh, now I'm giving birth, now I'm giving birth, now I'm giving birth!" - "You're lying, yesterday you weren't even pregnant!" Again, persuasion, again admonishment: “Do you think it’s easier for men? Whoever outlasts someone will win. But look: one man is already running, he can’t stand it anymore! Well, who is his wife here? lure him, kindle him, let him feel what it's like without us!" An abandoned husband appears under the wall of the acropolis, his name is Kinesias, which means "Pusher". All comic actors relied on large leather phalluses, and this one is now downright gigantic. "Come down to me!" - "Ah, no, no, no!" - "Have pity on him!" "Oh, sorry, sorry, sorry!" - "Lie down with me!" - "Settle down first." "Maybe we can make peace." “Then, maybe I’ll lie down.” - "I swear to you!" - "Well, now, I'm just running for the rug." - "Come on!" - "Now, just bring a pillow." - "There are no more forces!" - "Ah, ah, how without a blanket." - "You will bring me!" - "Wait, I'll bring you rubbed butter." - "And without butter you can!" - "Horror, horror, butter of the wrong kind!" And the woman hides, and the man writhes with passion and sings, as he howls, about his torments. The choir of old people sympathizes with him.

There is nothing to do, you need to calm down. Athenian and Spartan ambassadors converge, their phalluses are of such size that everyone immediately understands each other without words. Negotiations begin. Lysistrata descends to those who are talking, recalls the old friendship and alliance, praises for valor, scolds for absurd quarrelsomeness. Everyone wants peace, and wives, and plowing, and harvests, and children, and drinking, and fun as soon as possible. Without bargaining, they give what they seize by one in exchange for what is seized by others. And, glancing at Lysistrata, they exclaim: “how smart!”, not forgetting to add: “how beautiful!”, “how slender!” And in the background, the women's choir is flirting with the old man's choir: "Let's make peace and live again soul to soul!" And the old man's choir replies:

The world is concluded, the choirs sing; "We do not remember evil, we will forget evil! .." Athenian and Spartan husbands grab their wives and leave the stage with songs and dances.

M. L. Gasparov

There were three famous writers of tragedies in Athens: the eldest - Aeschylus, the middle - Sophocles and the youngest - Euripides. Aeschylus was powerful and majestic, Sophocles was clear and harmonious, Euripides was tense and paradoxical. Having looked once, the Athenian spectators for a long time could not forget how his Phaedra was tormented by passion for her stepson, and his Medea stood up for the rights of women with a chorus. The old men watched and cursed, while the young admired.

Aeschylus died long ago, back in the middle of the century, while Sophocles and Euripides died half a century later, in 406, almost simultaneously. Disputes immediately began between amateurs: which of the three was better? And in response to such disputes, the playwright Aristophanes staged the comedy "The Frogs" about this.

"Frogs" - this means that the choir in the comedy is dressed in frogs and begins its songs with croaking lines:

But these frogs are not simple: they live and croak not just anywhere, but in the hellish river Acheron, through which the old shaggy boatman Charon transports the dead to the next world. Why this comedy needed the other world, Acheron and frogs, there are reasons for that.

The theater in Athens was under the auspices of Dionysus, the god of wine and earthly vegetation; Dionysus was portrayed (at least sometimes) as a beardless gentle youth. This Dionysus, worried about the fate of his theater, thought: "I'll go down to the underworld and bring Euripides back to the light so that the Athenian stage is not completely empty!" But how to get to that world? Dionysus asks Hercules about this - after all, Hercules, a hero in a lion's skin, went down there for the terrible three-headed hellish dog Kerberos. "Easier than easy," says Hercules, "strangle yourself, poison yourself, or throw yourself off the wall." - "Too stuffy, too tasteless, too cool; better show how you yourself walked." - "Here is the afterlife boatman Charon will transport you across the stage, and there you will find yourself." But Dionysus is not alone, with him a slave with luggage; Is it possible to send it with a companion? Here is the funeral procession. "Hey, dead man, take our bag with you!" The deceased readily rises on a stretcher: "Will you give me two drachmas?" - "Nothing!" - "Hey, gravediggers, carry me on!" - "Well, throw off at least half a drachma!" The dead man is indignant: "So that I come to life again!" There is nothing to do, Dionysus and Charon are rowing dry across the stage, and a slave with luggage runs around. Dionysus is unaccustomed to rowing, grunts and swears, and the chorus of frogs mocks him: "Brekekekeks, coax, coax!" They meet at the other end of the stage, exchanging afterlife impressions: "Have you seen the local sinners, and thieves, and false witnesses, and bribe-takers?" - "Of course, I saw it, and now I see it," and the actor points to the rows of spectators. The audience is laughing.

Here is the palace of the underground king Hades, Eak sits at the gate. In myths, this is a majestic judge of human sins, but here it is a noisy gatekeeper slave. Dionysus throws on a lion's skin, knocks. "Who's there?" - "Hercules has come again!" - "Ah, villain, ah, scoundrel, it was you who stole Kerber from me just now, my dear dog! Wait a minute, here I will unleash all hellish monsters on you!" Aeacus leaves, Dionysus is horrified; gives the slave Heracles the skin, puts on his dress himself. They approach the gate again, and in them the servant of the underground queen: "Hercules, our dear, the hostess remembers you so much, she prepared such a treat for you, come to us!" The slave is radekhonek, but Dionysus grabs him by the cloak, and they, quarreling, change clothes again. Eak returns with the guards of hell and cannot understand at all who is the master here, who is the slave here. They decide: he will whip them in turn with rods - whoever screams first, that, therefore, is not a god, but a slave. Beats. "Oh oh!" - "Aha!" - "No, it was I who thought: when will the war end?" - "Oh oh!" - "Aha!" - "No, it's a thorn in my heel ... Oh-oh! .. No, I remembered bad verses ... Oh-oh! .. No, I quoted Euripides." - "I can't figure it out, let the god Hades figure it out himself." And Dionysus enters the palace with a slave.

It turns out that the next world also has its own competitions of poets, and until now Aeschylus was known as the best, and now the newly deceased Euripides disputes this glory with him. Now there will be judgment, and Dionysus will be the judge; now poetry will be "measured with elbows and weighed with weights." True, Aeschylus is dissatisfied: "My poetry did not die with me, but Euripides died and at his fingertips." But he is appeased: the trial begins. There is already a new chorus around those who are suing - the croaking frogs have remained far away in Acheron. The new choir is the souls of the righteous: at that time, the Greeks believed that those who lead a righteous life and were initiated into the mysteries of Demeter, Persephone and Iacchus would not be insensitive in the next world, but blessed. Iacchus is one of the names of Dionysus himself, so such a chorus is quite appropriate here.

Euripides accuses Aeschylus: “Your plays are boring: the hero stands, and the choir sings, the hero says two or three words, then the play ends. Your words are old, cumbersome, incomprehensible. But everything is clear with me, everything is like in life, and people, and thoughts, and words. Aeschylus objects: “A poet must teach goodness and truth. Homer is famous for showing examples of valor to everyone, and what example can your depraved heroines set? ".

Aeschylus reads his poems - Euripides finds fault with every word: "Here you have Orestes over his father's grave praying to him" to hear, to heed ...", but "to hear" and "to heed" is a repetition!

(“An eccentric,” Dionysus reassures him, “Orestes is speaking to the dead, but here, no matter how much you repeat, you won’t tell!”) Euripides reads his poems - Aeschylus finds fault with every line: “All your dramas begin with genealogies:“ Hero Pelops , who was my great-grandfather…”, “Hercules, who…”, “That Cadmus, who…”, “That Zeus, who…”. Dionysus separates them: let them speak one line at a time, and he, Dionysus, with scales in his hands Euripides utters a clumsy and cumbersome verse: "Oh, if the boat stopped its run ..."; Aeschylus - smooth and harmonious: "A river stream pouring through the meadows ..." Dionysus suddenly shouts: "Aeschylus is heavier !" - "Yes, why?" - "He wet the verses with his stream, so they pull more."

Finally, the verses are put aside. Dionysus asks the poets for their opinion on the political affairs in Athens and again spreads his hands: "One answered wisely, and the other - wiser." Which of the two is better, whom to bring out of the underworld? "Aeschylus!" Dionysus announces. "And promised me!" Euripides is outraged. "Not I - my tongue promised," Dionysus answers in Euripides' verse (from "Hippolytus"). "Guilty and not ashamed?" “There is no guilt where no one sees,” Dionysus replies with another quote. "Are you laughing at me over the dead?" - "Who knows, life and death are not one and the same?" Dionysus replies with a third quotation, and Euripides falls silent.

Dionysus and Aeschylus are going on their way, and the underground god admonishes them: “Tell such and such a politician, and such and such a myrrheater, and such and such a poet, that it’s time for them to come to me ...” The choir accompanies Aeschylus with doxology to both the poet and Athens: so that they will quickly win and get rid of such and such politicians, and from such and such world-eaters, and from such and such poets.

M. L. Gasparov

This comedy in translation has another name - "Hater". Her main character, the peasant Knemon, lost faith in people at the end of his life and hated literally the whole world. However, he was probably a grump from birth. For his wife left him precisely because of his bad temper.

Knemon lives in a village in Attica, near Athens. He cultivates a meager field and raises a daughter whom he loves without memory. His stepson Gorgias also lives nearby, who, despite the bad temper of his stepfather, treats him well.

Sostratus, a rich young man who accidentally sees Knemon's daughter, falls in love with her and makes every possible attempt to get acquainted with a beautiful modest girl, and at the same time with her unsociable father.

At the beginning of the first act, the forest god Pan (his cave-sanctuary is located right there, not far from the house and field of Knemon) tells the audience a brief background to future events. By the way, it was he who made Sostratus fall in love with the daughter of an unsociable grumbler.

Kherea, a friend and host of Sostratus, advises the lover to act decisively. However, it turns out that Sostratus has already sent the slave Pyrrhus to the estate of Knemon for reconnaissance, who by the time of our action returns in a panic; Knemon drove him away in the most unambiguous way, pelting him with earth and stones ...

Knemon appears on the stage, not noticing those present, and says to himself:

Seeing Sostratus, timidly standing nearby, the old man utters an angry-ironic tirade and goes into the house. Meanwhile, Khnemon's daughter appears on the scene with a jug. Her nurse, scooping up water, dropped a bucket into the well. And by the time father returns from the field, the water must be heated.

Sostratus standing right there (he is neither alive nor dead from happiness and excitement) offers the girl help: he will bring water from the source! The proposal was accepted favorably. The acquaintance took place.

The presence of Sostratus is discovered by Dove, the servant of Gorgias. He warns the owner: a young man is “grazing” nearby, who clearly has his eye on Sister Gorgia. And whether he has honest intentions - It is not known ...

Sostratus enters. Gorgias, not only a decent and hardworking, but also a determined young man, at first misjudged him ("Immediately seen in his eyes - a scoundrel"), decides to still talk with the stranger. And after the conversation, as a smart person, he understands his initial mistake. Soon both are imbued with mutual sympathy.

Gorgias honestly warns the lover how difficult it will be to negotiate with his stepfather - the father of the girl. But, on reflection, he decides to help Sostratus and gives him a number of tips.

To begin with, in order to "enter the image", a rich young man selflessly devotes himself all day to unusual field work for him, so that the suspicious Knemon decides: Sostratus is a poor man who lives by his own labor. This, both young men hope, will at least reconcile the old man with the thought of the possible marriage of his beloved daughter.

And in the sanctuary of Pan, the relatives of Sostratus and himself are preparing for solemn sacrifices. The noise of sacred preparations (near his house!) infuriates Knemon. And when first the slave Geta, and then the cook Sikon knock on his door with a request to borrow some dishes, the old man finally becomes furious.

Returning from the field, Sostratus has changed so much in a day (tanned, hunched over from unusual work and can barely move his legs) that even the slaves do not recognize their master. But, as they say, there is no evil without good.

Returns from the field and Knemon. He is looking for a bucket and a hoe (both the old maid Simiha dropped into the well). Meanwhile, Sostratus and Gorgias leave for the sanctuary of Pan. They are almost friends now.

Knemon, in anger, tries to descend into the well himself, but the rotten rope breaks, and the evil old man falls into the water. Simiha, who ran out of the house, announces this with a cry.

Gorgias understands: the "finest hour" of Sostratus has come! Together they pull the groaning and cursing Knemon out of the well.

But it is Sostratus that the smart and noble Gorgias ascribes the leading role in saving the grumpy old man. Knemon begins to soften and asks Gorgias to take care of his sister's marriage in the future.

Sostratus, in response, offers Gorgias as his wife to his sister. At first, the honest young man tries to refuse:

A respectable young man is also embarrassed by the fact that he is poor, and the Sostratus family are rich people:

Dissatisfied at first with the prospect of a second "unequal marriage" and Kallipid - the father of Sostratus. But in the end, he agrees to both weddings.

Finally, Knemon also surrenders: the grump even agrees that the slaves take him to the sanctuary of Pan. The comedy ends with the words of one of the slaves addressed to the audience:

makes it possible to imagine the following: Gabrotonon recognizes Pamphila (they met at that ill-fated Tauropoly festival), and the offended and dishonored wife Kharisia recognizes his ring and understands: the culprit of her misfortune is her own husband!

And Charisius so far only knows that his wife is the mother of an illegitimate child. At the same time, he understands that he himself is far from flawless and has no right to judge Pamphila so harshly. But then the kind Gabrotonon appears and tells Charisius everything he knows. The unlucky young reveler is happy: he and Pamfila have a son!

Smikrin's dissatisfaction is also replaced by joy: he became the happy grandfather of a five-month-old grandson! Everyone is satisfied and even happy. So safely, as expected, the comedy ends.

Yu. V. Shanin

The text of the comedy has survived only in fragments, but philologists have reconstructed it.

The action takes place on Corinth Street. There are two houses on the stage. One belongs to the commander of the mercenaries, the chiliarch Polemon, the second belongs to the parents of the young man Moschion.

The Goddess of Ignorance tells the traditional (familiar to us from the "Arbitration Court") plot, but built differently.

During childbirth, the wife of the Athenian merchant Patek dies. This sad event coincides with another: Patek's ship with goods dies at sea, the merchant is completely ruined. And in order not to raise children in poverty, Patek decides to give them to someone. Abandoned twins, a boy and a girl, are found by a poor old woman. It’s already hard for her, the years take their toll, and there is an endless war in Corinth ...

The old woman gives the boy Moschion to the rich Athenian Mirinna, who has long dreamed of a son, and keeps the girl Glikera with her. Moschion is brought up in the house of the rich Mirinna, knowing no refusal in anything, while Glikera grows modest and diligent. But the semi-beggarly existence forces the foster mother to give the beautiful pupil to Polemon. The Corinthian commander is crazy about a beautiful mistress.

Before dying, the old woman tells Glikera that she has a brother who lives nearby. Moschion, unaware of this, begins courting Glikera. In the absence of Polemon, he seeks intimacy with her and kisses her. Glikera, thinking that her brother knows everything, does not resist kisses. But suddenly Polemon returns home and in anger cuts off Glikera's scythe with a sword (hence the name of the comedy).

After that, Polemon, enraged by the "treason" of Glikera, accompanied by Sosia's squire, leaves for the village. And offended by groundless suspicions, Glikera asks her neighbor Mirinna to take her in. The slow-witted, but extremely curious Dove, the slave of Moschion, decides that the mother did this in the interests of her son, a varmint. And the arrogant young man, who every now and then boasts of his successes with hetaerae, is confident in his irresistibility ...

Polemon, angry and yearning in rural solitude, sends a squire home to reconnoiter. But the clumsy and sleepy Sosia does not report any news. Sent a second time, he nevertheless discovers that changes have taken place in his master's house.

The tipsy Polemon and his warriors are going to storm Myrinna's house in anger, where Glikera has taken refuge. But Patek, who appears on the scene (father of Glikera and Moschion and, by chance, an old friend of Polemon), convinces the raging commander to postpone the assault. Because it would be illegal. After all, not being married to Gliker, he does not have the right to dictate his will to her:

Polemon tells Patek how well Glikera lived with him, shows her rich outfits. And he gave all this to his beloved!

Meanwhile, the unsuspecting Moschion waits for Glikera to throw herself into his arms. And Patek, fulfilling the request of Polemon, goes as a truce to Myrinna's house. Just at this time, at the request of Glikera, the servant-slave Dorida brings a box with the girl's things from Polemon's house. Yes, with the very things that were found with abandoned babies!

As she thoughtfully sorts through the jewels, Patek, who is present, recognizes the belongings of his late wife. He tells Glikera how her mother died, how he went bankrupt and decided to get rid of the children. The girl confirms that she has a brother and calls his name.

Moschion, who crept up unnoticed at this time, hears everything and at the same time experiences disappointment and joy at the same time - after all, he found a sister, who, of course, cannot be his mistress ...

Polemon, restless with excitement, impatiently awaits news. The maid Dorida assures him that everything will end well. But Polemon does not believe that his beloved will forgive him, and he hurries to Myrinna's house. Patek and Glikera come out to meet him. An old friend solemnly announces: he agrees that Polemon should marry his daughter. As a dowry for her, he gives three talents. Polemon is happy and asks to forgive him rash insults and other sins of jealousy.

Moschion is both happy and upset. But the father reports that he has found a good bride. So, to everyone's joy, the comedy ends.

Yu. V. Shanin

Titan Prometheus, chained to the rocks of the Caucasus, asks Zeus to free him. But no, the punishment is still insufficient: after all, Prometheus not only stole the fire of Zeus and gave it to people, but also (the worst thing) created a woman!

Therefore, the heavy chains and the eagle daily devouring Prometheus' liver, which grows again during the night, are only a prelude to the coming torment.

Prometheus offers to open the future to Zeus as a reward for liberation. He, doubting at first the prophetic gift of the titan, immediately gives up: Prometheus unmistakably guesses that Zeus is going on a date with Thetis - a nereid, one of the sea goddesses. And he warns Zeus: if a Nereid gives birth to a son, he will overthrow his father from the Olympic throne. Convinced and even slightly moved by this prediction, Zeus refuses a fatal date and orders the blacksmith god Hephaestus to release Prometheus.

Called to account for his cruel tricks, Eros asks Zeus to have mercy on him, for he is supposedly still a child. “Are you a child?!” Zeus exclaims indignantly. “After all, you, Eros, are much older than Ialeta.

As punishment for the numerous bullying, Zeus intends to tie Eros. After all, it was by his grace that he was forced, in order to win the love of women, to turn into a bull, an eagle, a swan, a satyr, and could not appear to them in his true form.

Eros reasonably objects that no mortal can stand the sight of Zeus and dies of fear. He invites Zeus not to throw lightning, not to shake menacingly with his aegis, and to take on a more peaceful, pleasant look, in the manner of Apollo or Dionysus.

Zeus indignantly rejects this proposal, but he also does not want to refuse the love of earthly beauties. He demands that amorous pleasures cost him less effort. With this condition he releases Eros.

Out of jealousy, Hera turned the beautiful Io into a heifer and assigned the hundred-headed shepherd Argus to her guard. But Zeus, in love with Io, orders Hermes to kill Argus, lead Io across the sea to Egypt and make her there Isis, the goddess who controls the floods of the Nile and the winds, the patroness of sailors.

Zeus, falling in love with the pretty shepherdess Ganymede, turns into a giant eagle and kidnaps the boy. Ganymede, who is poorly versed in the Olympic hierarchy, still considered the main deity of the forest Pan and is distrustful of the words of Zeus about his universal power.

Ganymede asks to quickly return him home, to the slopes of Mount Ida: the herds were left unattended, his father will pour him out for absence. Zeus patiently explains that now the boy is forever freed from shepherd's worries - he will become a celestial.

Ganymede is perplexed: what should he do here if there are no herds in the sky, and with whom will he play here?! Zeus promises him Eros as a comrade and as many grandmas as he likes for the game. And he kidnapped the boy he loved so that they slept together.

The simple-minded Ganymede is even more perplexed: after all, when he slept with his father, he often got angry that his son tossed and turned restlessly in his sleep, and drove him to his mother - the boy honestly warns. And when he heard that Zeus was going to hug him all night long, he firmly declares that he will sleep at night. Although he does not forbid Zeus to kiss him. And a pleased Zeus tells Hermes to give Ganymede a drink of immortality, teach him how to serve a goblet and bring the gods to the feast.

Hera reproaches Zeus for being too fond of Ganymede. The father of the gods left his mortal mistresses on Earth, but Ganymede made him a celestial. And in addition, taking a goblet from the hands of a handsome butler, Zeus kisses him every time! Did Hephaestus and Hera serve badly at the table?!

An angry Zeus replies that Hera's jealousy only inflames his passion for the beautiful Phrygian. Of course, Hera, if she wants, can still use the services of her grubby blacksmith son at feasts. But to him, Zeus, only Ganymede will serve, whom he will now kiss twice: both taking the cup from the boy’s hands and returning it.

Hera indignantly complains to Zeus that Ixion, taken to heaven, fell in love with her and sighs incessantly. This offends Hera. Zeus offers to play a trick on the lover: slip him a cloud, giving the latter the appearance of Hera. If, having taken wishful thinking, Ixion then begins to boast that he conquered the wife of Zeus and took possession of her, he will be thrown into Hades and tied to an ever-revolving wheel as a punishment not for love (there is nothing wrong in this!), But for boasting.

Hephaestus admiringly tells Apollo about the newly born Hermes, the son of Maya. The newborn is not only very beautiful, but also promisingly friendly. Apollo reports in response that the dexterous baby has already managed to steal Poseidon's trident, the sword of Ares, and from him, Apollo, and arrows. Here Hephaestus discovers that his ticks have disappeared ...

Hermes is gifted all-round: in a playful struggle he defeated Eros, substituting the bandwagon, and made a cithara from a tortoise shell and seven strings, and plays in such a way that Apollo envies him.

The awakened Hephaestus goes to Hermes for the stolen ticks hidden in the diapers of a newborn.

Zeus orders Hephaestus with a sharp ax to cut ... his head. The frightened blacksmith god is forced to reluctantly obey, and Athena is born. She is not only militant, but also very beautiful. Hephaestus suddenly falls in love with her. But Zeus cools his ardor: Athena would prefer to remain forever a virgin,

Poseidon came to Zeus. But Hermes does not let him in, since Zeus has just ... given birth. But this time not from the head (as recently Athena), but from the hip. So he bore the fruit of one of his many sympathies with the Theban Semele, giving birth instead of her, for Semele died. Thus, he is both the father and mother of the child, whose name is Dionysus.

Hermes gives Helios the order of Zeus: not to leave on his fiery chariot either tomorrow or the day after tomorrow. Zeus needs to prolong the night in order to have time to conceive a hitherto unknown hero with the Boeotian Alcmene: under the cover of the deepest darkness, a great athlete will be made. Then Hermes gives the order to Selene to move slowly, and to Snu not to let people out of his arms so that they do not notice such a long night. So that Hercules could come into the world.

Selena confesses to Aphrodite that she has fallen in love with the beautiful Endymion. She regularly descends to him from the sky when Endymion sleeps, spreading a cloak on a rock. Selena literally dies of love for a young man.

Aphrodite reproaches her son Eros for unheard of tricks not only with mortals, but also with the celestials. By his will, Zeus turns into whatever Eros wants. He brings Selena down to Earth. And Helios, basking in the arms of Klymene, forgets to leave on time in his fiery chariot to the sky. Even the venerable Rhea, the mother of so many gods, was forced by Eros to fall in love with the young Phrygian Attis. Mad with love, she harnessed the lions to her chariot and rushes through the mountains and forests in search of her beloved. Eros justifies himself to his mother: is it bad to turn the eyes of people and gods to beauty ?!

At the feast of the gods, Hercules starts a quarrel with Asclepius, demanding that he recline below him, who has accomplished so many feats. He scornfully recalls: Asclepius struck Zeus with his lightning for the fact that with his art he revived people doomed by the gods to death, thereby neglecting both the laws of nature and the will of the celestials. Asclepius calmly remarks that it was he who, by the way, put in order the same Hercules, who was thoroughly burned on a funeral pyre ...

Zeus stops their squabble, noting: Asclepius has the right to a higher place, because he died and was taken to heaven before Hercules.

Apollo is sad. When asked by Hermes about the cause of sadness, he answers: he accidentally killed his favorite, the beautiful Hyacinth, the son of King Ebal of Laconia. When both of them were busy throwing discs, the west wind Zephyr, who unrequitedly loved Hyacinth, blew so much out of jealousy that the disc thrown by Apollo changed direction and killed the young man. In memory of the beloved, Apollo grew a beautiful flower from drops of his blood, but still remained inconsolable. Hermes reasonably objects: "Apollo, you knew that you made a mortal's favorite; so you should not complain that he died."

Hermes and Apollo are surprised: the lame blacksmith god Hephaestus, far from being handsome, received two beautiful goddesses as his wife: Aphrodite and Harita. But they, handsome men, athletes and musicians, are unhappy in love. Apollo never achieved Daphne's reciprocity, and Hyacinth himself killed the disc. True, once Hermes knew the caresses of Aphrodite and, as a result, Hermaphrodite was born ...

However, the loving Aphrodite is very supportive of Ares, often forgetting about her grubby and sweaty wife. Rumor has it that Hephaestus is preparing nets to entangle lovers with them and catch them on a bed. And Apollo confesses: for the sake of the arms of Aphrodite, he gladly agreed to be caught.

Consumed by a long-standing and mutual hostility, Hera and Latona reproach each other for the real and imaginary vices of children. To Latona's caustic remark that Hephaestus is lame, Hera replies: on the other hand, he is a skilled craftsman and enjoys the respect of Aphrodite. But the masculine Artemis, the daughter of Latona, lives in the mountains and, according to the Scythian custom, kills strangers. As for Apollo, although he is considered omniscient, he did not foresee that he would kill Hyacinth with the disk, and he did not imagine that Lafna would run away from him.

Latona replies that Hera is simply jealous of her: the beauty of Artemis and the musical gift of Apollo delight everyone. Hera is angry. In her opinion, Apollo owes his musical victories not to himself, but to the excessive favor of the judges. Artemis is rather ugly than beautiful. And if she were really a virgin, she would hardly help women in childbirth. The enraged Latona throws Hera: "The time will come, and I will again see you crying, when Zeus leaves you alone, and he himself descends to earth, turning into a bull or a swan."

Laughing Hermes tells Apollo that Hephaestus skillfully woven nets entangled Aphrodite and Ares at the moment when they made love. Taken by surprise, naked, they burned with shame when all the gods looked at them mockingly. Hephaestus himself laughed the loudest. Hermes and Apollo confess to each other that they would be ready to find themselves in the nets of Hephaestus.

Hera tells Zeus that his son Dionysus is not only obscenely effeminate, but also wanders, intoxicated, in the company of crazy women and dances with them day and night long. He looks like anyone, but not like his father Zeus.

The Thunderer objects: the pampered Dionysus not only took possession of all of Lydia and subjugated the Thracians, but even conquered India, capturing the king there, who dared to resist. And all this in the midst of incessant round dances and drunken dances. And those who dared to offend him, not respecting the sacraments, Dionysus bound with a vine. Or forced the criminal's mother to tear her son apart like a young deer. Are these not courageous deeds worthy of the son of Zeus? Hera is outraged: wine leads to madness and the herd is the cause of many crimes. But Zeus sharply objects: it is not wine and Dionysus that are to blame, but the people themselves, who drink without measure, without even mixing wine with water. And the one who drinks in moderation becomes only more cheerful and kind, without harming anyone.

Aphrodite asks Eros in surprise: why does he, easily subjugating all the gods - Zeus, Apollo, Poseidon, even his own mother Rhea, spare Athena?

Eros admits: he is afraid of Athena - her terrible look frightens the insidious baby. Yes, even this terrible shield with the head of Medusa Gorgon. Whenever Eros tries to approach, Athena stops him with a threat of immediate reprisal.

But the muses, Eros admits, he deeply respects and therefore spares. "Well, let them, if they are so sedate. But why don't you shoot Artemis?" - "I can't catch her at all: she keeps running around the mountains. Besides, she has a passion - hunting." But Eros struck her brother Apollo with his arrows more than once.

Zeus sends Hermes to Thrace, so that Paris will decide the dispute between the three goddesses: which of them should be awarded an apple with the inscription "Most Beautiful". Paris, although he is the son of King Priam, grazes herds on the slopes of Ida and, of course, becomes shy when he sees Hera, Aphrodite and Athena who appear before him. But when Hermes explains to him the order of Zeus, the prince gradually comes to his senses and begins to admiringly look at the goddesses, clearly not knowing which one to prefer. He is also embarrassed by the fact that Hera is the wife of Zeus, while the other two are his daughters. In such a delicate situation, it is especially dangerous to make a mistake. But Hermes assures Paris that Zeus relies entirely on his taste and objectivity.

Emboldened, Paris asks Hermes for guarantees that the two rejected will not take revenge on him. Then he asks the goddesses to undress and approach him one by one. The first to undress is Hera, white-skinned and hairy-eyed. She offers Paris: if he awards her a reward, he will become master over all of Asia.

Athena is also trying to bribe the judge with a promise: he will be invincible in battles. Paris modestly replies that he is a peaceful man, military exploits do not appeal to him. But, like Here, he promises to judge honestly, regardless of the gifts.

Aphrodite asks to examine her more carefully. During the inspection (which clearly gives Paris pleasure), she skillfully and unobtrusively praises his beauty. Paris, they say, deserves a better fate than a shepherd's life in the wild mountains. Why do cows need his beauty? He could find a worthy mate even in Hellas. Aphrodite tells the interested judge about one of the most beautiful women - Helen, the wife of the Spartan king Menelaus, daughter of Leda, granddaughter of Zeus. Paris becomes more and more interested in her story. Then Aphrodite invites him to go on a trip to Hellas and see the beauty himself in Lacedaemon: "Helen will see you, and there I will make sure that she falls in love and leaves with you." This seems incredible to Paris, but the goddess assures: everything will be exactly as she promises. She gives Paris her sons Himeros and Eros as guides. With their common help (the arrows of Eros and everything else), the plan will come true. Having taken the word from the goddess that she would not deceive, Paris (already inflamed in absentia with love for Elena) awards the apple to Aphrodite.

Ares anxiously and with obvious distrust informs Hermes about Zeus's boast: he, they say, will lower the chain from the sky, and all the gods, grabbing onto it, will not be able to pull the thunderer down. But he, if he wants, will raise on this chain not only all the gods, but also the earth with the sea.

Ares doubts such a fantastic power of the father of the gods. Moreover, recently Poseidon, Hera and Athena, indignant at his outrages, almost grabbed Zeus and, perhaps, would have tied him up, if not for Thetis, who took pity on him and called on the hundred-armed Briareus for help. But Hermes interrupts Ares: "Shut up, I advise; it is not safe for You to say such things, and for me to listen to them."

Hermes is surprised: Pan calls him father! He indignantly says that the goat-legged and horned Pan cannot be his son. But he recalls that somehow Hermes got along with the Spartan Penelope, while taking on the appearance of a goat.

Hermes embarrassedly recalls: so it was. And Pan asks him not to be ashamed of such a son: he is respected and loved not only by the dryads, nymphs and maenads of Dionysus, but also by all the Athenians to whom he rendered a service at Marathon: he instilled fear in the souls of the Persians (hence the word "panic"). Hermes is even touched: he asks Pan to come and hug him. But, he immediately adds, "don't call me father in front of strangers."

Apollo is surprised: Eros, Hermaphrodite and Priapus, so dissimilar among themselves, are brothers! Dionysus replies that this is not surprising. And it is not their mother Aphrodite who is guilty of the dissimilarity of the brothers, but different fathers.

Tired and annoyed, Hermes complains to his mother Maya about the wild overload. He must not only serve the gods at feasts, tirelessly spread the orders of Zeus around the earth, be present in the palestras, serve as a herald in public assemblies, but also not sleep at night and lead the souls of the dead to Pluto ... In addition, Zeus constantly sends Hermes to inquire about the health of his numerous earthly lovers. "I can not take it anymore!" Hermes complains to his mother. But she advises her son to reconcile: “You are still young and must serve your father as much as he wishes. And now, since he sends you, run quickly to Argos, and then to Boeotia, otherwise he will probably beat you for slowness: lovers always irritable."

Zeus is angry. Helios, yielding to the persistent requests of his son phaeton, entrusted him with a fiery chariot. But the arrogant young man could not do it. Uncontrolled horses carried the chariot away from the usual track: part of the earth was burned, and the other died from frost. To prevent a complete catastrophe, Zeus had to kill Phaeton with lightning. Helios justifies himself: he supposedly warned and instructed his son, as he should. But Zeus interrupts him: if Helios once again allows himself such a thing, he will know how much stronger Zeus' perun burns his fire. He orders Phaeton to be buried on the banks of Eridanus, where he fell from the chariot. The tears of the sisters shed on his grave, let them turn into amber, and they themselves will become blacksmiths.

Apollo asks Hermes to teach him to distinguish between the twin brothers Castor and Polydeuces. Hermes explains: Polydeuces, a powerful fist fighter, is easy to recognize: on his face there are traces of crushing blows, “But tell me one more thing; why don’t they both come to us together, but each of them alternately becomes a dead man, then a god? " Hermes also explains this: when it turned out that one of the sons of Leda should die, and the other should become immortal, they thus divided immortality among themselves. But Apollo does not calm down: he himself predicts the future, Asclepius heals, Hermes teaches gymnastics and wrestling, and performs a host of other important things. But what do the Dioscuri do? Hermes also explains this: Castor and Polydeuces help Poseidon: they go around the seas and, if necessary, provide assistance to sailors in distress.

Yu. V. Shanin

Gathered once again to return to the land of Polideucus, Diogenes gives instructions. He should tell the cynic Menippus (ridiculing all empty-talking philosophers-disputers) that in the realm of the dead he will have even more reasons for fun and ridicule, because here tyrants, rich people and satraps are extremely pitiful and powerless. And he advises all philosophers to stop senseless disputes. Diogenes tells the rich to inform them that there is no need to hoard jewelry, collecting talent after talent, for they will soon go underground, where they need only one obol to pay Charon for transportation.

But the poor should not complain about fate: in the realm of the dead, everyone is equal - both the rich and the poor. Polydeuces promises to fulfill these and other orders of Diogenes.

Croesus complains to Pluto: the restless Menippus, a cynic philosopher, continues to taunt the rich and lords in the underworld: “We all cry, remembering our earthly fate: this one, Midas, is gold, Sardanapalus is a great luxury, I, Croesus, - his countless treasures, and he laughs at us and swears, calling us slaves and scum ... "

Menippus admits to Pluto that this is true: he takes pleasure in ridiculing those who mourn the lost blessings of the earth. Pluto encourages everyone to stop strife. But Menippe believes that the former satraps and the rich are only worthy of ridicule: "Fine, that's right. Cry, and I will sing along to you, repeating:" Know thyself! "This is a very good refrain to your moans."

Menippus is indignant: ordinary Amphilochus and Trophonius were honored with temples after their death, and people consider them prophets. But the heroes Trophonius and Amphilochus modestly answer that gullible people give them honors voluntarily. As for the prophetic gift, Trophonius is ready to predict the future to anyone who descends into his Lebadeiskaya cave. And to the question of Menippus, who is the hero, Trophonius answers: "This is a creature made up of a god and a man." “I don’t understand, Trophonius, what you are saying; I see one thing clearly: you are a dead man, and nothing more,” Menippus concludes the dialogue.

Hermes reminds Charon that he owes him a lot: five drachmas for the anchor, and even for wax to cover up holes in the boat, for nails, for the rope with which the yard is attached to the mast, and for much more. Charon replies with a sigh that he can’t pay yet: “Now I just can’t, Hermes, but if some kind of plague or war sends a lot of people to us, then it will be possible to earn something by cheating the dead on the moving fee” . But Hermes does not want to return what was spent in such a sad way. He agrees to wait. He only notices with a sigh that if earlier mostly courageous people, mostly dead from wounds received in the war, fell into the underworld, now it’s not at all like that: one was poisoned by his wife, the other died from gluttony, and most die because of money intrigues. And Charon agrees with him.

Pluto asks Hermes to prolong the life of the ninety-year-old childless rich Eucrates. But those chasing his money, who want to receive the inheritance of Kharin, Damon and others, quickly drag them to the kingdom of the dead. Hermes is surprised: he believes that this is unfair. But Pluto says that those who long for the sudden death of their neighbor, pretending to be his friends, are themselves worthy of a quick death. And Hermes agrees: it will only be fair to throw such a joke with the scoundrels. And let the industrious Eucritus, like Iolaus, throw off the burden of old age and become younger again, and the young scoundrels who are waiting for his death, in the prime of their hopes, will die like bad people.

Terpsion complains to Pluto: he died in his thirtieth year of life, and the ninety-year-old Fukrit is still alive! But Pluto considers this fair: Fukrit did not wish death on anyone, but Terpsion and young people like him flatteringly look after the elderly, suck up to them in the hope of receiving an inheritance. Doesn't such greed deserve punishment?!

Terpsion, on the other hand, laments that he did not sleep for many nights, greedily calculating the possible date of Fukrit's death and the amount of the alleged inheritance. As a result, he overworked himself and died first. Pluto energetically promises that other self-serving nurses will soon descend into his realm. And let Fukrit live on until he buries all the flatterers who are hungry for someone else's good.

Kallidemides tells Zenophant how he died due to the fatal mistake of a slave. Wanting to quickly send old Ptheodore to the other world, he persuaded the butler to give the owner a bowl of poisoned wine. But he confused the vessels (accidentally or not - it is not known) and as a result, the young poisoner himself drained the bowl of poison. And old Pteodorus, realizing what had happened, laughed merrily about the butler's mistake.

Knemon tells Damnipp how he was fooled by fate. He intensively looked after the childless rich man Germolai in the hope of the latter's inheritance. And in order to guarantee himself the favor of the old man, he read out the will, where he declared Hermolai as his heir (so that he would do the same out of a sense of gratitude). But a beam suddenly collapsed on Knemon, and old Hermolai received all his property. So Knemon fell into his own trap.

Ninety-eight-year-old Polystratus finally got into the realm of the dead and tells Simil that he lived especially well for the last two decades. The best men of the city sought the location of the childless old man, hoping to become his heirs. Without refusing their courtship (and promising everyone to make him the heir), Polystratus deceived them all: he made the recently bought handsome Phrygian, a slave and his favorite, the heir.

And since he suddenly became rich, now the most noble are already looking for his location.

Charon is going to carry another batch of the dead and draws their attention to the deplorable state of his ship. He invites passengers to get rid of excess cargo and asks Hermes to see to it. The messenger of the gods takes over. At his direction, the Cynic philosopher Menippus readily throws down his pitiful sack and stick. And Hermes puts him in a place of honor near the helmsman. Hermes orders the handsome Hermolai to take off his long hair, blush and, in general, all his skin. He orders the tyrant Lampich to leave all wealth on the shore, and at the same time - arrogance and arrogance. The commander has to abandon weapons and trophies. The philosopher-demagogue is forced to part not only with lies, ignorance and the desire for empty arguments, but also with a shaggy beard and eyebrows. And when the annoyed philosopher demands that Menippus leave his freedom, frankness, nobility and laughter, Hermes energetically objects: these are all easy things, it is not difficult to transport them, and they will even help on a sad journey. And Charon's boat sets sail from the shore.

Cratet ironically tells Diogenes that the rich cousins ​​Merich and Aristaeus, being peers, looked after each other in every possible way and each declared the other heir in the hope of outliving him. As a result, both died at the same hour during a shipwreck.

But Crates and Diogenes did not wish death to each other, because they did not claim the meager property of a brother, quite content with the mutual exchange of wise thoughts - the best of inherited wealth.

Alexander and Hannibal dispute primacy in the realm of the dead. Minos invites everyone to tell about their deeds. The great commanders list their well-known victories and conquests, while trying in every possible way to humiliate the opponent. But when Minos is about to make a decision, Scipio suddenly gives his voice and reminds that it was he who defeated Hannibal. As a result, Minos awards the championship to Alexander, the second place to Scipio, and Hannibal is third.

Diogenes mockingly remarks: Alexander ended up in the realm of the dead, despite his supposedly divine origin. The great commander is forced to agree. In the meantime, for thirty days now, his body has been lying in Babylon, awaiting a magnificent funeral in Egypt, so that he will thus become one of the Egyptian gods. Diogenes sarcastically remarks that Alexander did not grow wiser even after his death: he believes in such nonsense. And in addition, he also cries, remembering earthly honors and delights. Didn't his teacher, the philosopher Aristotle, teach his student: wealth, honors and other gifts of fate are not eternal. Alexander with annoyance admits that his mentor was a greedy flatterer. He argued that wealth is also good: thus, he was not ashamed to accept gifts. In conclusion, Diogenes advises Alexander to regularly drink water from Lethe in large sips: this will help him forget and stop mourning for Aristotle's blessings.

Alexander, having met his father in the next world, is forced to admit his earthly origin. Yes, he knew this before, but he supported the version of his divine genealogy in order to make it easier to conquer the world: most of the conquered peoples did not dare to resist God.

Philip mockingly remarks that almost everyone whom his son conquered was not worthy opponents both in courage and in combat skills. Not at all like the Hellenes, whom he, Philip, defeated ... Alexander recalls that he defeated both the Scythians and even Indian elephants. Didn't he destroy the Greek Thebes?!

Yes, Philip heard about it. But it is funny and sad to him that Alexander adopted the customs of the peoples he had conquered. And his vaunted courage was not always reasonable. And now, when people saw his dead body, they were finally convinced: Alexander is not a god at all. And Philip advises his son to part with pompous conceit, to know himself and understand that he is a simple dead man.

Antilochus reproaches Achilles for being ignoble and unreasonable: he declared that it is better to serve the living as a day laborer for a poor plowman than to reign over all the dead. That is not the way to speak to the most glorious of heroes. Moreover, Achilles voluntarily chose death in a halo of glory.

Achilles justifies himself: posthumous glory on earth is useless to him, and among the dead - complete equality. He has lost everything here: the dead Trojans are no longer afraid of Achilles, and the Greeks show no respect.

Antilochus consoles him: such is the law of nature. And he advises Achilles not to grumble at fate, so as not to make others laugh.

Diogenes, in his usual ironic manner, asks Hercules: how did he, the son of Zeus, also die ?! The great athlete objects:

"The real Hercules lives in the sky, and I am only his ghost." But Diogenes doubts whether it turned out the other way around: Hercules himself is in the realm of the dead, and in heaven is only his ghost.

Hercules is enraged by such impudence and is ready to punish the scoffer. But Diogenes reasonably remarks: "I have already died once, so I have nothing to fear from you." Then Hercules angrily explains: what was in him from the earthly father of Amphitryon, then died (and this is he, who is underground), and what is from Zeus lives in heaven with the gods. And these are not two Hercules, but one in two images. But Diogenes does not let up: he already sees not two, but three Hercules. The real Hercules lives in heaven, his ghost is in the realm of the dead, and the body turned to dust. Even more outraged by this sophistry, Hercules asks: "Who are you?!" And he hears in response: "Diogenes of Sinop is a ghost, and he himself lives with the best among the dead and laughs at Homer and all this high-flown chatter."

Tantalus dies of thirst, standing on the shore of the lake: water flows through his fingers, and he cannot even wet his lips. To the question of Menippus, how he, long dead, can feel thirsty, Tantalus explains: this is precisely the punishment that has befallen him: the soul feels thirsty, as if it were a body.

The philosopher Menippus, who has fallen into the realm of the dead, asks Hermes to show him the famous beauties and beauties and is surprised to learn that Narcissus, Hyacinth, Achilles, Elena, and Leda are now monotonous skulls and skeletons, nothing more. And the fact that Elena was so beautiful during her lifetime that for her sake a thousand ships with Hellenes sailed to Troy, causes only mocking surprise in Menippus: did the Achaeans really not understand: they are fighting for what is so short-lived and will soon fade!

But Hermes invites him to stop philosophizing and quickly choose a place for himself among the other dead.

The leader of the Thessalians Protesilaus, the first of the Greeks who died during the siege of Troy at the hands of Hector, wants to strangle Helen (although in the realm of shadows this is both impossible and pointless). He explains to Eak that he died precisely because of Elena. But he immediately agrees that Menelaus, who led the Hellenes under Troy, is probably guilty of everything. And Menelaus (he, of course, is also here) blames everything on Paris - a guest who treacherously kidnapped the owner's wife. Paris asks Protesilaus to remember that both of them were passionately in love during their lifetime and therefore must understand each other. And Protesilaus is ready to punish Eros, who is guilty of everything. But Eak recalls: "You forgot about your young wife and, when you landed on the shore of the Troas, you jumped from the ship before the others, recklessly endangering yourself out of mere thirst for glory, and therefore died first." And Protesilaus comes to the conclusion: it is not Elena and not other mortals who are guilty of his premature death, but the goddesses of fate Moira.

Menippus asks Aeacus to show the sights of the underworld: he wants to see its most famous inhabitants.

The philosopher is amazed: all the glorious heroes of Homer's poems turned into dust - Achilles, Agamemnon, Odysseus, Diomedes, and many others. But most of all, his sages are attracted - Pythagoras, Socrates, Solon, Thales, Pittacus ... Only they do not feel sad among the dead: they always have something to talk about.

After talking with them, Menippus does not refrain from reproaching Empedocles that he, they say, threw himself into the crater of Etna out of an empty thirst for glory and considerable stupidity. But he tells Socrates that everyone on earth considers him worthy of admiration and reveres him in every possible way. And then he goes to Sardanapalus and Croesus to laugh, listening to their sorrowful cries. Eak returns to his porter duties.

Menippus asks Cerberus to tell how Socrates entered the underworld. And the three-headed dog recalls: Socrates behaved with dignity only at the beginning of the journey, and looking into the cleft and seeing the darkness, he wept like a baby and began to grieve for his children. And all the sophistical principles were already forgotten here ...

Only Diogenes and he, Menippus, behaved with dignity: they entered the kingdom of the dead of their own free will and even with laughter. All other philosophers were not up to par.

The lame carrier Charon demands from Menippus the usual payment for delivery to the next world - one obol. But he doesn't want to pay. For, among other things, he does not have a single coin. And he offers to pay Hermes - who delivered him to the limits of the kingdom of the dead ...

"I swear by Zeus, it would be profitable for me to get a job if I also had to pay for the dead!" - exclaims the messenger of the gods. And to Charon's reproaches that he is the only one who sailed into the kingdom of the dead for nothing, Menippus calmly objects: no, not for nothing. After all, he drew water from a leaky boat, helped to row and was the only one of all who did not cry. But Charon does not calm down. And Menippe offers: "Then take me back to life!" "For Aak to beat me for this?!" Charon is horrified. And to his question, who is sitting in his boat, Hermes says: he transported her husband for free, infinitely free, not considering anyone or anything! It's Menippus!

Protesilaus, the first of the Greeks to die near Troy, begs Pluto to let him go to earth for only one day: even the Lethean waters did not help him forget his beautiful wife. But for the same reason, Eurydice was given to Orpheus, and Alcestis was released out of mercy for Hercules. And besides, Protesilaus hopes to persuade his wife to leave the world of the living and go down to hell with her husband: then Pluto will already have two dead people instead of one!

Eventually Pluto and Persephone agree. Hermes returns Protesilaus to his former blooming appearance and brings the eternally in love to the ground. And after him, Pluto reminds him: "Do not forget that I let you go only for one day!"

The Carian Mausolus, the tyrant of Halicarnassus, is proud of his conquests, the beauty and size of the tomb (one of the seven wonders of the world: the name "mausoleum" came from it). But Diogenes reminds the king: now he is deprived of both conquered lands and influence. As for beauty, now his bare skull is difficult to distinguish from the skull of Diogenes. And is it worth being proud of the fact that you are lying under a heavier stone mass than others ?!

"So, all this is useless? The mausoleum will be equal to Diogenes?!" - exclaims the tyrant. “No, not equal, most respected, not at all. Mausoleum will cry, remembering the earthly blessings that he thought to enjoy, and Diogenes will laugh at him. For after himself he left among the best people the glory of a man living a life higher than the tombstone of Mausoleum , and based on firmer ground."

The handsome Nireus sung by Homer and the ugly, sharp-headed hunchback Thersites (ridiculed in the Iliad) appeared before Menippus in the realm of shadows. The philosopher admits that now they are equal in appearance: their skulls and bones are quite similar. "So I'm not in the least prettier here than Thersites?" - Nirey asks offendedly. Menippus replies: "And you are not handsome, and no one at all: equality reigns in the underworld, and here everyone is alike."

The wise centaur Chiron, educator of Asclepius, Achilles, Theseus, Jason and other great ones, renounced immortality in favor of Prometheus. He explains to Menippus that he preferred to die also because he was tired of the monotony of earthly life: the same sun, moon, food, the constant change of seasons ... Happiness is not in what we always have, but in what is not available to us. In the underworld, Chiron likes universal equality and that no one feels hunger and thirst.

But Menippus warns Chiron that he may fall into conflict with himself: monotony also reigns in the realm of shadows. And it's pointless to look for a way out into a third life. Menippe reminds the thoughtful and even despondent centaur: the smart one is content with the present, happy with what he has, and nothing seems unbearable to him.

Three philosophers - Diogenes, Antisthenes and Crates - head to the entrance to the underworld in order to look at the "new replenishment". On the way, they tell each other about those who arrived here with them: everyone, regardless of their position in society and prosperity, behaved unworthily - they cried, complained, and some even tried to resist. Such Hermes hoisted onto his back and carried by force. But all three philosophers behaved with dignity ...

Here they are at the entrance. Diogenes addresses the ninety-year-old old man: "Why are you crying if you died at such an advanced age?"

It turns out that this is a half-blind and lame childless fisherman, almost a beggar, by no means bathed in luxury. And yet he is convinced that even a poor life is better than death. And Diogenes advises him to consider death as the best medicine against adversity and old age.

Menippus asks the soothsayer Tiresias whether he really was not only a man, but also a woman during his lifetime. Having received an affirmative answer, he inquires in what state Tiresias felt better. And, having heard that in the female, he immediately cites the words of Medea about the painful severity of the female lot. And to the pathetic reminders of Tiresias about the transformation of beautiful women into birds and trees (Aedona, Daphne and others), Menippus skeptically remarks that he will believe this only after hearing the stories of those who have been transformed. And even the well-known prophetic gift of Tiresias is questioned by the restless skeptic Menippus: "You only act like all soothsayers: your custom is not to say anything understandable and sensible."

Agamemnon reproaches Ayanth: having killed himself, you blame Odysseus for this, who claimed the armor of Achilles. But Ayant persists:

other leaders refused this award, but Odysseus considered himself the most worthy. This was the reason for the violent madness of Ayanta: “I can’t stop hating Odysseus, Agamemnon, even if Athena herself ordered me to!”

The judge of the underworld, Minos, distributes punishments and rewards. He orders the robber Sostratus to be thrown into a fiery stream - Piriflegeton. But Sostratus asks to listen to him: after all, everything that he did was predetermined by the Moirai. And Minos agrees with this. And having heard a few more examples given by Sostratus, with annoyance in his soul he comes to the conclusion: Sostratus is not only a robber, but also a sophist! And reluctantly orders Hermes: "Release him: the punishment is removed from him." And already turning to Sostratus: "Just don't teach the other dead to ask such questions!"

Yu. V. Shanin

Menippus tells the Friend about his extraordinary journey, striking the interlocutor with accurate data on the distance from the Earth to the Moon, to the Sun and, finally, to the very sky - the abode of the Olympian gods. It turns out that Menippus returned to Earth only today; he stayed with Zeus.

A friend doubts: did Menippus really surpass Daedalus, turning into a hawk or a jackdaw ?! He ironically: "How, O greatest brave man, were you not afraid to fall into the sea and give him the name of Menippean in your own name, as that of his son - Icarian?"

Menippus has long been interested in everything related to the nature of the universe: the origin of thunder and lightning, snow and hail, the change of seasons, the variety of forms of the moon, and much more. First he turned to the long-bearded and pale philosophers. But each of them only disputed the opinion of others, arguing the opposite, and demanded that only he be believed. Taking a lot of money from Menippus for science, they doused him with a rain of origins, goals, atoms, voids, matter, ideas and other things. Walking only on the ground, often being weak and even short-sighted, they boastfully talked about the exact dimensions of the Sun, stars and features of supralunar space. How many stades from Megara to Athens, they do not know. But the distances between the luminaries are allegedly known to them, they measure the thickness of the air and the depth of the ocean, the circumference of the Earth, and much more. Speaking of subjects that are far from clear, they are not content with assumptions, but stubbornly insist on being right, arguing, for example, that the Moon is inhabited, that the stars drink water, which the Sun, like on a well rope, draws from the sea and equally distributes between them.

Menippe is also outraged by the inconsistency of the philosophers' judgments, their "complete disagreement" on the question of the world: some argue that it is not created and will never perish, others recognize the Creator, but at the same time cannot explain where he came from. There is no agreement among these scientists about the finiteness and infinity of being, some believe that there are a large number of worlds, while others believe that this world is the only one. Finally, one of them, far from being a peace-loving person, considers discord to be the father of the entire world order. Also, some believe that there are many gods, while others believe that God is one. And others generally deny the existence of gods, leaving the world to its fate, depriving it of its lord and leader.

Having completely lost patience with this confusion of judgments, Menippus decides to find out everything himself, having risen to heaven. Catching a large eagle and a hawk, he cuts off their wings and, taking into account the tragic experience of Daedalus with fragile wax, tightly ties the wings to his shoulders with straps. After test flights from the acropolis, the daredevil flew over a large part of Hellas and reached Taygetos. From this famous mountain, Menippus flies to Olympus and, stocking up there with the lightest food, soars into the sky. Breaking through the clouds, he flew up to the moon and sat down on it to rest and, like Zeus, surveyed all the lands known to him from Hellas to India.

The Earth seemed to Menippus very small - smaller than the Moon. And only after looking closely, he distinguished the Colossus of Rhodes and the towers on Foros. Taking advantage of the advice of the philosopher Empedocles, who had come from somewhere on the moon, he remembered that one of his wings was an eagle's! But no living creature sees better than an eagle! At that very moment, Menippus began to distinguish even individual people (his eyesight was so amazingly sharpened). Some sailed on the sea, the second fought, the third cultivated the land, the fourth sued; I saw women, animals, and in general everything that "feeds the fertile soil."

Menippus also saw how people continually sin. Debauchery, murders, executions, robberies took place in the palaces of the Libyan, Thracian, Scythian and other kings. "And the life of private individuals seemed even funnier. Here I saw Hermodorus the Epicurean, taking a false oath because of a thousand drachmas; the Stoic Agathocles, who accused one of his students before the court for non-payment of money; orator Clinius, stealing a cup from the temple of Asclepius ... " In a word, in the diverse life of earthlings, the funny, the tragic, the good and the bad mixed up. Most of all, Menippus laughed at those who argue about the boundaries of their possessions, because from above all Hellas seemed to him "the size of a finger of four." From such a height, people seemed to Menippus akin to ants - after all, ants, apparently, have their own builders, soldiers, musicians and philosophers. Moreover, according to legend, for example, Zeus created the warlike Myrmidons from ants.

After looking at all this and laughing heartily, Menippus flew even higher. At parting, the Moon asked Zeus to intercede for her. Terrestrial philosophers-talkers spread all sorts of fables about the Moon, and, to be honest, she is tired of this. It will no longer be possible for the moon to remain in these places if it does not grind the philosophers to powder and does not shut up these talkers. Let Zeus destroy the Stoa, strike the Academy with thunder and stop the endless ranting of the Peripatetics.

Having risen to the extreme sky, Menippus was met by Hermes, who immediately reported to Zeus about the arrival of the earthly guest. The king of the gods graciously received him and listened patiently. And then he went to that part of the sky, from where the prayers and requests of people were best heard.

On the way, Zeus asked Menippus about earthly affairs: how much wheat is now in Hellas, whether heavy rains are needed, whether at least someone from the Phidias family is alive, and whether those who robbed the temple in Dodona were detained. Finally came the question; "What do people think of me?" "About you, lord, their opinion is the most pious. People consider you the king of the gods."

Zeus, however, doubts: the times have passed when people revered him both as the supreme god, and as a prophet, and as a healer. And when Apollo founded a soothsayer in Delphi, Asclepius in Pergamon a hospital, a temple of Bendida appeared in Thrace, and Artemis in Ephesus, people fled to the new gods, but now Zeus is sacrificed only once every five years in Olympia. And Menippus does not dare to object to him ...

Sitting on the throne where he usually listened to prayers, Zeus began to take turns removing the covers from the holes resembling wells. From there, people's requests were heard: "Oh Zeus, let me achieve royal power!", "Oh Zeus, let onions and garlic grow!", "Oh gods, let my father die as soon as possible!", "Oh Zeus, let me I will be crowned at the Olympic competitions! ...

Sailors asked for a fair wind, farmers for rain, fullers for sunny weather. Zeus listened to everyone and acted as he saw fit.

Then he removed the lid from another well and began to listen to those who pronounce oaths, and then he turned to divination and oracles. After all, he gave instructions to the winds and weather: "Today let it rain in Scythia, let thunder rumble in Libya, and let it snow in Hellas. You, Boreas, blow in Lydia, and you, Notus, remain calm."

After that, Menippus was invited to the feast of the gods, where he reclined beside Pan and the Caribantes - the gods, so to speak, of the second rank. Demeter gave them bread, Dionysus gave them wine, and Poseidon gave them fish. According to the observations of Menippus, the highest gods themselves were treated only to nectar and ambrosia. The greatest joy was given to them by the children rising from the victims.

During dinner, Apollo played the cithara, Silenus danced the kordak, and the Muses sang from Hesiod's Theogony and one of Pindar's victorious odes.

The next morning, Zeus ordered all the gods to come to the meeting. The occasion is the arrival of Menippus in heaven. And earlier, Zeus disapproved of the activities of some philosophical schools (Stoics, Academicians, Epicureans, Peripatetics and others): "Hiding behind the glorious name of Virtue, wrinkling their foreheads, long beards, they walk around the world, hiding their vile lifestyle under a decent appearance."

These philosophers, corrupting the youth, contribute to the decline of morals. Not caring about the benefit of the state and private individuals, they condemn the behavior of others, respecting those who shout and swear the loudest. Despising the industrious artisans and farmers, they will never help the poor or the sick. “But all of them are surpassed by the so-called Epicureans with their impudence. Reviling us, the gods, without any hesitation, they go so far as to dare to assert that the gods do not care at all about human affairs…”

All the gods are outraged and ask to immediately punish the wicked philosophers. Zeus agrees. But I have to postpone the execution of the sentence: the next four months are sacred - God's peace has been declared. But already next year, all philosophers will be mercilessly exterminated by Zeves lightning. As for Menippus, although they met him favorably here, it was decided to take away his wings, "... so that he no longer comes to us and let Hermes lower him to Earth today."

Thus ended the meeting of the gods. Menippus returned to Earth and hurried to Keramik to tell the philosophers walking there the latest news.

Yu. V. Shanin

The first surviving Greek novel is set in the XNUMXth century BC. BC e. - the time of the highest power of the Persian kingdom, the Peloponnesian conflict, the Greco-Persian wars and many other historical events.

The beautiful Kalliroya, daughter of the famous Syracusan strategist Hermocrates (historical person), and the young Kherei fell in love with each other. And although Kalliroi's father was against this marriage, the side of the lovers was taken by ... The People's Assembly of Syracuse (an unusual detail from a modern point of view!) And the wedding took place.

But the happiness of the newlyweds was short-lived. The intrigues of the rejected suitors (and the divinely beautiful Kalliroi had many of them) led to the fact that Kherei, who was jealous by nature, suspected his wife of treason. A quarrel breaks out, ending tragically. For a long time, Kalliraia, who lost consciousness for a long time, is taken by her relatives for the deceased and buried alive ...

The sea robber Feron was tempted by a rich burial. Kalliroya, who had already woken up by that time from a deep faint (a terrible awakening in her own grave!) is captured by pirates, who take her to the Asia Minor city of Miletus and sell her into slavery there. Her master is the recently widowed, noble and wealthy Dionysius ("... the main man in Miletus and in all Ionia").

Dionysius is not only rich, but also noble. He passionately falls in love with Calliroy and asks a beautiful slave to become his wife.

But the captive Syracusan woman is disgusted even by the thought of this, for she still loves only Kherey and, moreover, is expecting a child.

In this critical situation (the position of a slave whom the master wants to make mistress), the clever Kalliroya, after long hesitation, pretends to agree, but under various plausible pretexts, the wedding asks to be postponed ...

Meanwhile, a robbed tomb is discovered in Syracuse that does not contain Callirhoe. And expeditions to Libya, Italy, Ionia are sent to search for her ...

And now a boat with mourning items was detained in the sea - decorations from a robbed tomb. Half-dead Feron, the leader of the pirates, lies right there. Brought to Syracuse, he confesses to his deed under torture. The people's assembly unanimously sentences him to death: "Following Feron, when he was taken away, there was a large crowd of people. He was crucified in front of the grave of Kalliroi: from the cross he looked at the sea, along which he carried the captive daughter of Hermocrates ..."

And then an embassy headed by Kherei is sent from Syracuse to Miletus - to rescue Kallira from slavery. Having reached the shores of Ionia and getting off the ship, Kherei comes to the temple of Aphrodite - the culprit of both his happiness and misfortunes. And then he suddenly sees the image of Kalliroi (brought to the temple by Dionysius in love). The junior priestess reports: Kalliroya became the wife of the Ionian ruler and their common mistress.

...Suddenly, a large detachment of barbarians attacks the peaceful ship of the Syracusans. Almost all of them died. Only Kherei and his faithful friend Polycharm were taken prisoner and sold into slavery.

All this is not a coincidence. Phocas, the devoted housekeeper of Dionysius, seeing the Syracusan ship with the embassy, ​​realized what this threatened his master. And he sent a guard detachment to the arriving ship.

... And Kalliroya sees a captive husband in a dream. And, unable to restrain herself any longer, she tells Dionysius that she had a husband, who probably died.

In the end, the housekeeper Fock confesses to his deed: the corpses of the Syracusans swayed on the bloody waves for a long time. Thinking that her lover is also dead, Kalliroya sadly exclaims: "The vile sea! You brought Chaerea to Miletus to die, and me for sale!"

... Delicate and noble Dionysius advises Kallirae to arrange a burial for Kherei (the Greeks did this for who knows where the dead - they built an empty cenotaph tomb). And on a high bank near the harbor of Miletus, a grave is erected ...

But Kalliroya cannot come to her senses and even calm down a little. Meanwhile, from her heavenly beauty, men even faint. This happened, for example, with the Carian satrap Mithridates, who saw Kallira while visiting Dionysius.

Namely, Kherei and Polycharm fall into slavery to Mithridates. And - a new twist of fate: for imaginary participation in the rebellion of slaves, they are threatened with crucifixion. But by a happy coincidence, the faithful Polycharm gets the opportunity to talk with Mithridates, and Kherey is literally taken down from the cross at the last moment ...

The satrap confirms what they already know: Kalliroya is the wife of Dionysius and they even had a son. But he (like everyone else) does not know that the child is not from the Ionian ruler, but from Kherey. This is unknown to the unfortunate father, who exclaims, turning to the satrap: "I beg you, Vladyka, give me back my cross. By forcing me to live after such a message, you are subjecting me to even more cruel torture than the cross!"

...Cherei writes a letter to Kallira, but it falls directly into the hands of Dionysius. He does not believe that Kherei is alive: it is, they say, the insidious Mithridates wants to disturb the peace of Kalliroi with false news about her husband.

But circumstances develop in such a way that Artaxerxes himself, the great king of Persia, summons Dionysius with Calliroy and Mithridates for a fair trial ...

So, Dionysius and Kalliroey go to Babylon to Artaxerxes at the king's headquarters. Mithridates rushes there by a shorter route, through Armenia.

On the way, the satraps of all the royal regions honorably meet and see off Dionysius and his beautiful companion, the rumor of whose unsurpassed beauty flies ahead of her.

Excited, of course, and Persian beauties. And not without reason. For Artaxerxes himself falls in love with Callira at first sight...

The day of the king's judgment is coming. And Mithridates lays out his main trump card - the living Kherei, whom he brought with him. And it turns out that Dionysius wants to marry her husband's wife?! Or a slave?!

But the king hesitates with the decision, postponing the court session from day to day, as he falls more and more in love with Kallira. And his chief eunuch informs the Syracusan woman of this. But she pretends that she does not understand, does not believe in the possibility of such sacrilege: with the living queen Sostrata, the king makes such an indecent proposal to her?! No, the eunuch is definitely confusing something: he misunderstood Artaxerxes.

By the way, it was Sostrata who was instructed by the king to take care of Callira and, thanks to the wise and tactful behavior of the latter, the women even managed to make friends.

... And the desperate Kherey was going to commit suicide more than once. But every time he is saved by the faithful Polycharm.

Meanwhile, the senior eunuch of Artaxerxes is already openly beginning to threaten Kallirae, who does not agree to respond to the feelings of the great king ...

"But all the calculations and all sorts of kind conversations were quickly changed by Fate, which found a reason for the development of completely new events. The king received a report that Egypt had fallen away from him, having gathered a huge military force ..."

The troops of the Persian king, urgently leaving Babylon, cross the Euphrates and go towards the Egyptians. As part of the Persian army and the detachment of Dionysius, who wants to earn the favor of Artaxerxes on the battlefield.

Kalliroya also travels in a numerous royal retinue, while Chaereus is sure that she remained in Babylon, and is looking for her there.

But there is no limit to the deceit of men in love with Callira. A specially trained (and prudently left in Babylon) man informed Kherei that, as a reward for faithful service, the king had already given Dionysius as a wife to Kallira. Although this was not the case, the king himself still hoped to win the favor of the Syracusan beauty.

... And at this time the Egyptian took city after city. And having fallen into despair, Kherei, to whom freedom was returned, having gathered a detachment of devoted compatriots, goes over to the Egyptian side. As a result of a brilliant military operation, he takes possession of the previously impregnable Phoenician city of Tire ...

Artaxerxes decides to speed up the movement of his huge army and, in order to move on lightly, leaves the entire retinue with Sostrata at the head (and with her and Callira) in a fortress on the island of Arad.

And the victorious Egyptian, conquered by the military talents of Kherey, appoints him a navarch, placing him at the head of the entire fleet.

... But military happiness is changeable. The Persian king throws more and more troops into battle. And everything was decided by the lightning strike of the detachment of Dionysius, who kills the Egyptian and brings his head to Artaxerxes. As a reward for this, the king allows him to finally become the husband of Kalliroi ...

And Kherey, meanwhile, defeated the Persians at sea. But neither one nor the other knows about mutual successes and defeats, and each considers himself a complete winner.

... Navarch Kherei with his fleet laid siege to Arad, not yet knowing that there was his Kalliroya. And Aphrodite finally took pity on them: the long-suffering spouses meet.

They spend the whole night in warm embraces and tell each other about everything that happened to them during the time of separation. And Kherei begins to regret that he betrayed the noble (so he believes) Persian king. But what to do next?! And, after conferring with his comrades-in-arms, Kherey makes the best decision: to sail home to his native Syracuse! And Queen Sostrata with all her retinue Kherei with honor (and with reliable protection) is sent on a ship to King Artaxerxes with a letter where she explains everything and thanks for everything. And Kalliroya writes words of gratitude to the noble Dionysius in order to somehow console him.

...From the shore of the Syracuse Harbor, the inhabitants are anxiously watching the approach of an unknown fleet. Among the silent observers is the strategist Hermocrates.

On the deck of the flagship there is a luxurious tent, And when its canopy finally rises, those standing on the pier suddenly see Kherey and Kalliroy!

The joy of parents and all fellow citizens already desperate for long months of uncertainty is boundless. And the People's Assembly demanded that Kherey tell about everything that he and Kallirae experienced together and one by one. His story evokes the most contradictory feelings among those present - both tears and joy. But in the end, there is more joy ...

Three hundred Greek warriors who selflessly fought under the command of Kherey receive the honorary right to become citizens of Syracuse.

And Kherei and Kalliroya publicly thank the faithful Polycharm for his boundless devotion and support in difficult trials. The only sad thing is that their son remained in Miletus with Dionysius. But everyone believes that in time the boy will arrive with honor in Syracuse.

Kalliroya goes to the temple of Aphrodite and, embracing the legs of the goddess and kissing them, says: “Thank you, Aphrodite! You again let me see Kherei in Syracuse, where I saw him as a girl by your own will. I don’t grumble at you for the suffering I experienced , mistress: they were destined to me by Fate. I beg you: never again separate me from Kherey, but grant us to live happily together and die to both of us at the same time.

Yu. V. Shanin

The action takes place on the island of Lesbos, well known to the Greeks, in the Aegean Sea, and not even on the entire island, but in only one village on its outskirts.

There lived two shepherds, one goatherd, another sheep breeder, one slave, the other free. Once a goatherd saw: his goat was feeding a thrown child - a boy, and with him a purple diaper, a gold clasp and a knife with an ivory handle. He adopted him and named him Daphnis. A little time passed, and the sheep breeder also saw: his sheep was feeding a thrown child - a girl, and with her a bandage embroidered with gold, gilded shoes and gold bracelets. He adopted her and named her Chloe. They grew up, he was handsome, she was beautiful, he was fifteen, she was thirteen, he pastured his goats, she her sheep, frolicked together, were friends, "and you could sooner see that sheep and goats graze separately than meet Daphnis separately with Chloe."

It was summer, and a misfortune happened to Daphnis: he stumbled, fell into a wolf pit and nearly died. Chloe called her neighbor, a young shepherd, and together they pulled Daphnis out of the pit. He did not hurt himself, but was covered in earth and mud. Chloe led him to the stream and, while he was bathing, she saw how beautiful he was, and felt something strange in herself: “I am sick, but I don’t know what; I’m not injured, but my heart hurts; ". She did not know the word "love", but when the Boötes neighbor argued with Daphnis who was more beautiful, and they decided that Chloe should kiss the one she liked best, Chloe immediately kissed Daphnis. And after this kiss, Daphnis also felt something strange in himself: “My spirit has been captured, my heart wants to jump out, my soul is melting, and yet again I want her kiss: was it not some kind of potion that was on Chloe’s lips?” He didn't know the word "love" either.

Autumn came, the grape holidays came, Daphnis and Chloe were having fun with everyone, and then an old shepherd came up to them. “I had a vision,” he said, “a little Eros appeared to me with a quiver and a bow and said: “Do you remember how I pastured you with your bride? and now I'm grazing Daphnis and Chloe." "And who is Eros?" - teenagers ask. "Eros is the god of love, stronger than Zeus himself; he reigns over the world, over the gods, people and cattle; there is no cure for Eros either in drinking, or in food, or in conspiracies, the only remedy is to kiss, hug and lie naked, cuddled up, on the ground. Daphnis and Chloe thought and realized that their strange longings were from Eros. Having overcome timidity , they began to kiss each other, and then hug, and then lie naked on the ground, but the languor did not pass, and they did not know what to do next.

Then trouble happened already with Chloe: young rich loafers from a neighboring city, having quarreled with the villagers, attacked them, stole the herd and stole the beautiful shepherdess with him. Daphnis, in desperation, prayed to the rural gods - the nymphs and Pan, and Pan unleashed his "panic horror" on the kidnappers: he braided the loot with ivy, ordered the goats to howl like wolves, set fire on the land, and noise on the sea. The frightened villains immediately returned the prey, the reunited lovers swore fidelity to each other - "I swear by this herd and the goat that fed me: I will never leave Chloe!" - and the old shepherd played the flute to them and told how once the god Pan was in love with a nymph, and she ran away from him and turned into a reed, and then he made such a flute from the reeds with unequal trunks, because theirs was unequal Love.

Autumn passed, winter passed, icy and snowy, a new spring came, and the love of Daphnis and Chloe continued - all the same innocent and painful. Then the wife of a neighboring landowner spied on them, young and crafty. She liked Daphnis, she took him to a secluded clearing and told him: "I know what you and Chloe lack; if you want to know it, become my student and do everything I say." And when they lay down together, she and nature itself taught Daphnis everything that was needed. "Just remember," she said in parting, "it's a joy for me, and for the first time Chloe will be ashamed, and scared, and hurt, but don't be afraid, because it's supposed to be so by nature." And yet Daphnis was afraid to hurt Chloe, and therefore their love dragged on as before - in kisses, caresses, hugs, gentle chatter, but nothing more.

The second summer came, and suitors began to woo Chloe. Daphnis is in grief: he is a slave, and they are free and prosperous. But good rural nymphs came to his aid: in a dream they told the young man where to find a rich treasure. Chloe's adoptive parents are happy, and so are the Daphnisovs. And they decided: when in the autumn the landowner will go around his estate, ask him to agree to the wedding.

Autumn followed the summer, the landowner appeared, and with him the depraved and cunning took root. He liked the handsome Daphnis, and he begged him from the owner: "Everyone is submissive to beauty: they even fall in love with a tree, a river and a wild beast! So I love the body of a slave, but beauty is free!" Is there really no wedding? Then the old man, the adoptive father of Daphnis, threw himself at the owner's feet and told how he had once found this baby in a rich attire: maybe, in fact, he is a freeborn and cannot be sold and donated? The landowner looks: “Oh gods, aren’t these things that my wife and I once left with our son, whom we planted so as not to split the inheritance? And now our children have died, we bitterly repent, ask your forgiveness, Daphnis, and We invite you back to your father's house." And he took the young man with him.

Now Daphnis is rich and noble, and Chloe is poor, as she was: will the wedding be upset, will the landowner reject such a daughter-in-law? The same accustomer helps out: he is afraid that the owner will not be angry with him because of Daphnis, and therefore he himself persuaded him not to interfere with the union of lovers. The girl was taken to the manor's house, there was a feast, at the feast - the surrounding rich people, one of them saw Chloe, saw her children's bandage in her hands and recognized her daughter in her: once he went bankrupt and left her from poverty, and now got rich and found his child again. They celebrate the wedding, on it are all the guests, and then the grooms rejected by Chloe, and even the beauty that once taught Daphnis love. The newlyweds are led to the bedchamber, "and then Chloe found out that everything they did in the oak forest was just shepherd's jokes."

They live happily ever after, their children are fed by goats and sheep, and the nymphs, Eros and Pan rejoice, admiring their love and consent.

M. L. Gasparov

A native of Phoenicia from the city of Emessa (Hellenized and predominantly with a Greek population), Heliodorus had a spiritual order. It is known that the local synod, believing that "Ethiopica" corrupts the youth, demanded that Heliodor burn his book in public or abandon the priesthood. And Heliodor preferred the latter.

Presumably, the events of the novel refer to the XNUMXth or XNUMXth century. BC e. The place of initial action is North Africa (Egyptian coast).

The beautiful Chariclea and the mighty handsome Theagen fell in love and secretly got engaged. But fate has prepared for them many difficult trials. Young Hellenes have to flee from Delphi, where they met and became acquainted at the Pythian Games (sacred celebrations dedicated to Apollo).

At the beginning of the novel, they are captured by Egyptian robbers from the militant tribe of Bukols (booths) and get acquainted with their compatriot, the Athenian Knemon. Also a prisoner, he becomes not only a translator, but also a faithful companion of Theagen and Chariclea.

Knemon was also forced to leave his homeland, fearing the revenge of his stepmother who was unrequitedly in love with him.

The noble beauty of Theagenes and Chariclea is so sublime that the Bootes at first mistake them for celestials. The leader of the robbers, Thiamid, falls in love with an Hellenic woman and, traditionally considering her his prey, is going to marry Chariclea.

The son of the Memphis prophet Thiamid became the leader of the robbers only because of the intrigues of his younger brother, who took away his right to hereditary priesthood.

And during the events described, as a noble person, he calls the people to a meeting and turns to his comrades-in-arms with a request to give him a beautiful Hellenic woman in exchange for the part of the captured wealth: "... not out of need for pleasure, but for the sake of posterity, I will have this captive - so I decided <...> First of all, she is of noble birth, I think. I judge this by the jewelry found with her and by how she did not succumb to the troubles that befell her, but retains the same spiritual nobility as in her former share. Then "I feel in her a kind and chaste soul. If by her good looks she conquers all women, if by her bashful look she commands the respect of all who see her, is it not natural that she makes everyone think well of herself? But this is what is more important than all that has been said: she it seems to me a priestess of some god, since even in misfortune she considers shedding sacred robes and a crown to be something terrible and unlawful.I call on all those present to judge whether there can be a more suitable couple than a man from the family of prophets and a girl dedicated to a deity? "

The people approve of his decision. And the smart and far-sighted Chariclea also does not contradict. After all, she really is a priestess of Artemis, chosen by lot for a year. And Theagen (for security reasons she passes him off as her brother) serves Apollo.

Chariclea only asks to wait with the wedding until they arrive in a city where there is an altar or temple of Apollo or Artemis, in order to lay down the priesthood there. Thiamide and the people agree with her. Moreover, they are preparing to storm Memphis, where it would be more decent and worthy to have a wedding than here, in the den of robbers.

But suddenly they are attacked by another, more numerous detachment, seduced not only by rich profits: Petosirides, the younger brother of Thiomides, who has remained in Memphis, is eager to neutralize the applicant for the priestly post, promising a big reward for his capture. In an unequal battle, Thiamid is captured. And everything that is on the island of robbers is set on fire.

Miraculously surviving Theagenes and Chariclea, together with Knemon, manage to escape (from the cave where they were hiding) from the swampy island of the Bootes. After another adventure, the Hellenes meet a noble old man - the Egyptian Calassirid from Memphis.

At one time, in order not to succumb to temptation (suddenly flared passion for the beautiful Thracian), Calasirides, the chief prophet of the temple of Isis in Memphis, goes into voluntary exile and ends up in Hellas, in the holy city of Delphi. There he, received affectionately and favorably, meets the Hellenic sages, who see him as a brother in spirit and knowledge.

One of the Delphic sages Charicles told Calasirides how in difficult years he also wandered around different cities and countries. I also visited Egypt. There, at the Nile rapids, in the city of Katadupy, under mysteriously romantic circumstances, he becomes the adoptive father of a divinely beautiful girl: she was entrusted to him by the Ethiopian ambassador, who arrived in the city to negotiate with the Persian satrap about the rights to own emerald mines: because of them, the Persians with Ethiopians have been arguing for a long time ...

Charicles also received several precious objects that were with the girl. Ethiopian letters were skillfully woven on a silk ribbon, from which it was clear: Chariclea is the daughter of the Ethiopian king Gidasp and queen Persinna. They didn't have children for a long time. Finally, Persinna became pregnant and gave birth to ... a white-skinned girl. And it happened because, before giving birth, she constantly admired the image of Andromeda, the mythical princess saved by Perseus from a sea monster. Namely, Perseus and Andromeda, along with other gods and heroes, the Ethiopians considered their ancestors ...

Not unreasonably fearing that, seeing a white child, Gidasp would suspect her of treason, Persinna handed her daughter over to a reliable person, prudently providing things by which the child could be identified.

So, having grown up and flourished in Delphi, Chariclea devotes herself to Artemis. And only a flash of love for Theagen helps the beautiful priestess to abandon eternal virginity. She agrees to become a bride. Yes, so far only a bride, but not a wife. It is this kind of chaste love at the level of hugs and kisses that is the spiritual core of the whole novel.

In a prophetic dream, Apollo and Artemis instruct Calasirides to take custody of the beautiful couple and return with them to their homeland: "... be their companion, consider them on an equal footing with your children and drive them away from the Egyptians there and in the way that pleases the gods."

There is another driving force of the plot: Kalassirid, it turns out, is the father of the noble robber priest Thiamid and the insidious Petosirides.

Meanwhile, Charicles in Delphi dreams of marrying Chariclea to his nephew Alkamen. But the girl is disgusted even by his appearance. She loves only Theagen.

Obeying the commands of the gods and his own desire, Calassirids (by the way, it was he who helped Theagenes and Chariclea open up to each other), together with the beautiful betrothed, flees on a ship from Hellas to Egypt ...

Thiamid, after severe trials and battles, finally returns to Memphis, and Calasirides embraces his unwittingly reconciled sons, the eldest of whom deservedly takes the place of a prophet in the temple of Isis ...

Meanwhile, having defeated the army of the Persian satrap Oroondat, the Ethiopians led by Hydaspes grant a merciful peace to the vanquished, capturing countless treasures. And their most important trophy was a god-like couple: for the umpteenth time Theagen and Chariclea become captives. But Ethiopians look at them with adoration: beauty conquers everyone, regardless of lifestyle and skin color. However, next to the beautiful, the terrible side by side: Theagen and Chariclea must be sacrificed to the gods of the victors.

But the girl firmly believes that when the long-awaited meeting takes place, the parents will not renounce their daughter even for the sake of the sacred customs of their people.

... Winners and captives are already in the Ethiopian capital of Meroye. Still not knowing anything, Persinna was struck by the sight of the beautiful Hellenic: "If it were given to survive the only time I conceived and sadly died daughter, she would probably be as old as this one."

Chariclea boldly ascends the flaming altar. And the fire recedes, testifying to her purity. Theagen also proved its purity. And then, first the sages-gymnosophists, and then the whole people, rise up against this beautiful and at the same time terrible sacrifice.

Chariclea, unexpectedly for everyone, demands a trial: it is allowed to sacrifice strangers, but not local natives! And then he presents a precious bandage with the history of his birth and the ring of Hydaspes himself.

The sage Sisimitr, who is present right there, admits that it was he, being the Ethiopian ambassador to Egypt, who handed over the little Chariclea to the Hellenic Charicles. Here the servants bring a picture depicting Andromeda and Perseus, and everyone is shocked by the similarity of the real and mythical princesses.

But the fate of Theagen has not yet been decided. He brilliantly endures two unexpected trials: he tames an enraged sacrificial bull and defeats a huge and boastful Ethiopian wrestler in a duel. Chariclea finally reveals to her mother that Theagenes is her husband. And Sisimitr reminds us that the gods also express their will quite definitely: they instilled fear and confusion in the horses and bulls standing in front of the altars and thereby made it clear that the sacrifices that were considered perfect were completely rejected. And he exclaims: "So let us proceed to more pure sacrifices, abolishing human sacrifices for all eternity!" And he concludes: "And I bind this couple with marriage laws and allow them to unite in bonds for childbearing!"

Then, already fully recovered and softened, Gidasp lays on the heads of the young and sacred crowns - signs of the priesthood (he and Persinna used to wear them). And here are the final words of the novel: "The Ethiopian story about Theagene and Chariclea received such a conclusion. It was composed by a Phoenician husband from Emesa, from the clan of Helios, the son of Theodosius Heliodorus."

Yu. V. Shanin

In Greece, there were many myths about the exploits of individual heroes, but only four - about such feats that heroes from different parts of the country unitedly converged on. The last was the Trojan War; penultimate - the campaign of the Seven against Thebes; before that - the Calydonian hunt for a gigantic boar, led by the hero Meleager; and the very first - sailing for the Golden Fleece to the distant Caucasian Colchis on the ship "Argo" led by the hero Jason. "Argonauts" means "sailing on the Argo".

The Golden Fleece is the skin of a sacred golden ram sent down by the gods from heaven. One Greek king had a son and daughter named Frix and Hella, the evil stepmother planned to destroy them and persuaded the people to sacrifice them to the gods; but the indignant gods sent down to them a golden ram, and he carried away his brother and sister far beyond the three seas. The sister drowned on the way, the strait, the current Dardanelles, began to be called by her name. And the brother reached Colchis on the eastern edge of the earth, where the mighty king Eet, the son of the Sun, ruled. A golden ram was sacrificed to the Sun, and its skin was hung on a tree in a sacred grove, guarded by a terrible dragon.

This golden fleece was remembered for this occasion. In Northern Greece there was the city of Iolk, two kings argued for power over it, evil and good. The evil king overthrew the good. The good king settled in silence and obscurity, and gave his son Jason for training to the wise centaur Chiron, a half-man, half-horse, educator of a whole series of great heroes up to Achilles. But the gods saw the truth, and Jason was taken under their protection by the goddess-queen Hera and the goddess-craftswoman Athena. It was predicted to the evil king that a man shod on one foot would destroy him. And such a man came - it was Jason, They said that on the way he met an old woman and asked him to carry her across the river; he endured it, but one of his sandals remained in the river. And this old woman was the goddess Hera herself.

Jason demanded that the invader king return the kingdom to the rightful king and to him, Jason the heir. "Good," the king said, "but prove that you are worthy of it. Frix, who fled to Colchis on a golden-fleeced ram, is our distant relative. Get the golden fleece from Colchis and deliver it to our city - then reign!" Jason accepted the challenge. Master Arg, led by Athena herself, began to build a ship with fifty oars, named after him. And Jason threw a call, and heroes from all over Greece began to gather for him, ready to sail. The poem begins with a list of them.

Almost all of them were sons and grandsons of the gods. The sons of Zeus were the Dioscuri twins, the horseman Castor and the fist fighter Polydeuces. The son of Apollo was the singer Orpheus, who was able to stop the rivers by singing and lead the mountains in a round dance. The sons of the North Wind were the Boread twins with wings behind their shoulders. The son of Zeus was the savior of the gods and people, Hercules, the greatest of heroes, with the young squire Hylas. The grandchildren of Zeus were the hero Peleus, the father of Achilles, and the hero Telamon, the father of Ajax. And behind them came the Argship-ship, and Typhius the helmsman, and Ankey the sailor, dressed in a bearskin - his father hid his armor, hoping to keep him at home. And behind them are many, many others. Hercules was offered to become the main one, but Hercules replied: "Jason gathered us - he will lead us." They made sacrifices, prayed to the gods, at fifty shoulders they moved the ship from the shore into the sea, Orpheus rang out a song about the beginning of heaven and earth, the sun and stars, gods and titans, and, foaming the waves, the ship moves on its way. And after him the gods look from the slopes of the mountains, and the centaurs with the old Chiron, and the baby Achilles in his mother's arms.

The path lay through three seas, one unknown to the other.

The first sea was the Aegean. On it was the fiery island of Lemnos, the realm of criminal women. For an unknown sin, the gods sent madness on the inhabitants: husbands abandoned their wives and took concubines, wives killed their husbands and lived in a female kingdom, like the Amazons. An unfamiliar huge ship frightens them; putting on the armor of their husbands, they gather on the shore, ready to fight back. But the wise queen says: "Let us welcome the sailors: we will give them rest, they will give us children." Madness ends, women welcome guests, take them home - Jason herself is received by the queen herself, myths will still be composed about her - and the Argonauts stay with them for many days. Finally, the industrious Hercules announces: "It's time for work, it's time for fun!" - and lifts everyone on the road.

The second sea was Marmara: wild forests on the shore, wild mountain of the furious Mother of the Gods above the forests. Here the Argonauts had three camps. At the first stop they lost Hercules, His young friend Hylas went for water, bent over the stream with a vessel; the nymphs of the stream splashed, admiring his beauty, the eldest of them rose, threw her arms around his neck and dragged him into the water. Hercules rushed to look for him, the Argonauts waited in vain for him all night, the next morning Jason ordered to sail. Outraged Telamon shouted: "You just want to get rid of Hercules so that his glory does not overshadow yours!" A quarrel began, but then the prophetic god, the Sea Old Man, raised a huge shaggy head from the waves. "You are destined to sail further," he said, "and Hercules to return to those labors and deeds that no one else will accomplish."

At the next parking lot, a wild hero, a barbarian king, the son of the sea Poseidon, came out to meet them: he called all those passing by to a fistfight, and no one could stand against him. From the Argonauts came out against him Dioscurus Polydeuces, the son of Zeus, against the son of Poseidon. The barbarian is strong, the Greek is dexterous - the fierce battle was short-lived, the king collapsed, his people rushed to him, there was a battle, and the enemies fled, defeated.

Having taught the arrogant, I had to come to the aid of the weak. At the last stop in this sea, the Argonauts met with the decrepit king-soothsayer Phineus. For old sins - and which, no one remembers, they tell in different ways - the gods sent stinking monstrous birds to him - harpies. As soon as Phineus sits at the table, harpies swoop in, pounce on food, what they don’t eat, they spoil, and the king dries out from hunger. The winged Boreads, children of the wind, came out to help him: they fly into the harpies, chase them across the sky, drive them to the ends of the earth - and the grateful old man gives wise advice to the Argonauts: how to swim, where to stop, how to escape from dangers. And the main danger is already near.

The third sea in front of the Argonauts is the Black Sea; the entrance to it is between the floating Blue Rocks. Surrounded by boiling foam, they collide and disperse, crushing everything that comes between them. Phineas said:

"Do not rush forward: first release the turtledove - if it flies, then you will swim, but if the rocks crush it, then turn back." They released the dove - she slipped between the rocks, but not quite, the rocks collided and pulled out several white feathers from her tail. There was no time to think, the Argonauts leaned on the oars, the ship was flying, the rocks were already moving to crush the stern, but then they felt a powerful push, it was Athena herself who pushed the ship with an invisible hand, and now it was already in the Black Sea, and the rocks behind them stopped forever and became the shores of the Bosphorus.

Here they suffered a second loss: the helmsman Typhius dies, instead of him Ankey in a bearskin, the best sailor of the survivors, is taken to rule. He leads the ship further, through completely outlandish waters, where the god Apollo himself steps from island to island in front of people, where Artemis-Moon bathes before ascending to heaven. The Amazons swim past the coast, who live without husbands and cut out their right breasts to make it easier to hit with a bow; past the houses of the Blacksmith's Coast, where the first ironworkers on earth live; past the mountains of the Shameless Shore, where men and women converge like cattle, not in houses, but on the streets, and objectionable kings are imprisoned and starved to death; past the island, over which copper birds circle, showering deadly feathers, and from them you need to protect yourself with shields over your head, like tiles. And now the Caucasus Mountains are already visible ahead, and the groan of Prometheus crucified on them is heard, and the wind from the wings of the tormenting titan eagle beats into the sail - it is larger than the ship itself. This is Colchis.

The path has been passed, but the main test lies ahead. The heroes do not know about this, but they know Hera and Athena and think about how to save them. They go for help to Aphrodite, the goddess of love: let her son Eros inspire the Colchis princess, the sorceress Medea, with a passion for Jason, let her help her lover against his father. Eros, a winged boy with a golden bow and fatal arrows, squats in the garden of the heavenly palace and plays money with a friend, the young butler of Zeus: he cheats, wins and gloats. Aphrodite promises him a toy for a favor - a miracle ball made of golden rings, which was once played by the baby Zeus when he was hiding in Crete from the evil father of his Kron. "Give it right away!" - Eros asks, and she strokes his head and says: "First, do your job, and I won't forget." And Eros flies to Colchis. The Argonauts are already entering the palace of King Eet - it is huge and magnificent, in its corners there are four sources - with water, wine, milk and butter. The mighty king comes out to meet the guests, at a distance behind him are the queen and princess. Standing at the threshold, little Eros draws his bow, and his arrow without a miss hits Medea's heart:

Jason asks the king to return the Golden Fleece to the Greeks - if necessary, they will serve him as a service against any enemy. “I will cope with enemies alone,” the son of the Sun arrogantly answers. “But for you I have a different test. I have two bulls, copper-footed, copper-throated, fire-breathing; there is a field dedicated to Ares, the god of war; there are seeds - dragon teeth, from which grow, like ears of corn, warriors in copper armor. At dawn I harness the bulls, I sow in the morning, I gather the harvest in the evening - do the same, and the fleece will be yours. Jason accepts the challenge, although he understands that for him it is death. And then the wise Arg tells him: "Ask Medea for help - she is a sorceress, she is a priestess of the underground Hecate, she knows secret potions: if she does not help you, then no one will help."

When the ambassadors of the Argonauts come to Medea, she sits awake in her chamber: it is terrible to betray her father, it is terrible to destroy a wonderful guest. "Shame keeps her, but impudent passion makes her go" towards her beloved.

Medea met with Jason in the temple of Hecate. Her potion was called "Prometheus Root": it grows where drops of Prometheus' blood fall to the ground, and when it is cut off, the earth trembles, and the titan on the rock lets out a groan. From this root she made an ointment. “Scrub yourself with it,” she said, “and the fire of copper bulls will not burn you. And when copper armor-plates sprout from the dragon’s teeth in the furrows, take a stone block, throw it into their midst, and they will quarrel and kill each other. Then take the fleece, quickly go away - and remember Medea." "Thank you, princess, but I will not leave alone - you will go with me and become my wife," Jason answered her.

He fulfills the order of Medea, becomes powerful and invulnerable, oppresses the bulls under the yoke, sows the field, not touched by either copper or fire. Warriors appear from the furrows - first spears, then helmets, then shields, the brilliance rises to heaven. He throws a stone into the midst of them, big as a millstone, four cannot lift it - a slaughter begins between the soldiers, and he cuts down the survivors himself, like a reaper in the harvest. The Argonauts celebrate their victory, Jason is waiting for his reward - but Medea feels that the king would rather kill the guests than give them the treasure. At night, she runs to Jason, taking only her miraculous herbs with her: "Let's go after the rune - only the two of us, others can't!" They enter the sacred forest, a fleece shines on the oak, a sleepless dragon coils around, its snake body moves in waves, its hissing is carried to the distant mountains. Medea sings incantations, and the waves of his windings become quieter, calmer; Medea touches the dragon's eyes with a juniper branch, and his eyelids close, his mouth falls to the ground, his body stretches into the distance between the trees of the forest. Jason plucks a fleece from a tree, shining like lightning, they board a ship hidden near the shore, and Jason cuts the moorings.

The flight begins - in a roundabout way, along the Black Sea, along the northern rivers, in order to lead the chase astray. At the head of the chase is the brother of Medea, the young heir of Eet; he catches up with the Argonauts, he cuts their path, he demands: "Fleece - to you, but the princess - to us!" Then Medea calls his brother for negotiations, he goes out alone - and dies at the hands of Jason, and the Greeks smash the leaderless Colchians. Dying, he splatters blood on his sister's clothes - now Jason and the Argonauts have the sin of treacherous murder. The gods are angry: storm after storm hits the ship, and finally the ship says to the swimmers in a human voice: "There will be no way for you until the sorceress queen Kirk, the daughter of the Sun, the western sister of the eastern Colchis king, cleanses you of filth." King Eet ruled where the sun rises, Queen Kirk where it sets: the Argonauts sail to the opposite end of the world, where Odysseus will visit a generation later. Kirka performs a cleansing - she sacrifices a pig, with her blood she washes the blood of the murdered from the killers - but refuses to help: she does not want to anger her brother or forget her nephew.

The Argonauts wander through the unknown western seas, through the future Odyssey places. They sail through the Aeolian Islands, and the king of the winds, Eolus, at the request of Hera, sends them a fair wind. They swim up to Skilla and Charybdis, and the sea goddess Thetis - the mother of Achilles, the wife of the Argonaut Peleus - lifts the ship on a wave and throws it so high through the sea gorge that neither monster can reach them. They hear from a distance the enchanting singing of the Sirens, luring the sailors to the cliffs - but Orpheus strikes the strings, and, having heard him, the Argonauts do not notice the singing predators. Finally, they reach the happy country of the feacians - and here they suddenly encounter the second Colchian pursuit. "Give us back Medea!" - demand pursuers. The wise Phaeacian king replies: "If Medea is the runaway daughter of Eet, then she is yours. If Medea is Jason's legal wife, then she belongs to her husband, and only to him." Immediately, secretly from their pursuers, Jason and Medea celebrate the long-awaited wedding - in the Phaeacian sacred cave, on a bed shining with a golden fleece. The Argonauts sail away further, and the pursuit is left with nothing.

It is already quite a bit left to their native shores, but here the last, most difficult test falls on the Argonauts. A storm breaks out, for nine days it carries the ship across all the seas and throws it into a dead bay on the edge of the desert off the coast of Africa, from where ships have no way out: shallows and currents block the way. Having overcome the sea and got used to the water, the heroes managed to wean themselves from the land - even the helmsman Ankey, who led the ship through all the storms, does not know the way from here. The gods show the way: a sea horse with a golden mane comes out of the waves and rushes across the steppe to an unknown shore, and after him, heaving the ship on his shoulders, the exhausted Argonauts stagger, staggering. The transition lasts twelve days and nights - more heroes died here than in the whole journey: from hunger and thirst, in skirmishes with nomads, from the poison of sand snakes, from the heat of the sun and the weight of the ship. And suddenly, on the last day after the sandy hell, a blooming paradise opens up: a fresh lake, a green garden, golden apples and nymph maidens crying over a huge dead snake: "A hero in a lion's skin came here, killed our snake, stole our apples, split the rock, let a stream flow from it all the way to the sea." The Argonauts rejoiced: they see that, even after leaving them, Hercules saved his comrades from thirst and showed them the way. First along the stream, then across the lagoon, and then across the strait into the open sea, and the good sea god pushes them aft, splashing his scaly tail.

Here is the last stage, here is the threshold of the native sea - the island of Crete. He is guarded by a copper giant, driving away the ships with stone blocks, but Medea comes to the side, stares at the giant with a numbing look, and he freezes, recoils, stumbles with his copper heel on a stone and collapses into the sea. And having stocked up on Crete with fresh water and food, Jason and his comrades finally reach their native shores.

This is not the end of the fate of Jason and Medea - Euripides wrote a terrible tragedy about what happened to them later. But Apollonius did not write about one or two heroes - he wrote about a common cause, about the first pan-Greek great campaign. Argonauts go ashore and disperse to their homes and cities - the end of the poem "Argonautica".

M. L. and V. M. Gasparov

In the Phoenician city of Sidon, the author meets a young man who tells him an unusual love story.

A native of Tyre, the young man Clitophon was already preparing to marry Cadligon, his father's daughter from his second marriage. But here comes his uncle Sostratus from the city of Byzantium. And Clitophon falls in love with his daughter - the beautiful Leucippe. The feeling soon becomes mutual.

Clinius, cousin of Clitophon, is in love with the handsome boy Charicles and gives him a magnificent horse. But the very first horse ride ends in tragedy: the horse, frightened by something, suddenly carried and turned off the road into the forest. Having lost power over the horse, Charicles perishes, thrown from the saddle. The grief of Clinius and the parents of Charicles is boundless ...

The storyline of the novel is continually interrupted (or rather, decorated) with beautiful illustrations-inserts - ancient Greek myths about love adventures, passions and sufferings of gods and people, animals, birds and even plants, faithful to each other in their mutual affection. It turns out that this is true even for rivers!

Near the famous Olympia, the Alpheus stream flows: “The sea also marries Alpheus, escorting him to Arethusa. During the Olympic festivities, people gather to the stream and throw various gifts into it, but he swiftly rushes with them straight to his beloved and hurries to give her wedding gifts ".

Leucippe's mother begins to suspect something and puts all sorts of obstacles to the dating of lovers. Of course, Clitophon's father would not approve of this either (he has completely different plans and hopes). But the mutual feeling flares up more and more, and the young lovers decide to run away from their hometown. They also have like-minded friends.

“There were six of us: Leucippe, Satyr, I, Klein and two of his slaves. We drove along the Sidon road and arrived in Sidon at dawn; without stopping, we moved to Beirut, hoping to find a ship anchored there. And indeed! In Beirut we found a ship that was about to weigh anchor. We did not even ask where she was sailing, but immediately got over to her. It was beginning to dawn when we were ready to sail for Alexandria, the great city on the Nile. "

Along the way, young people talk about the oddities of love and each passionately defends his beliefs, relying on personal experience and legends in equal measure.

But the voyage was not successful: a terrible storm rises, the ship begins to sink along with dozens of passengers and sailors. The tragedy is aggravated by the fact that the lifeboat turns out to be the only one for everyone ...

By some miracle, clinging to the wreckage of a dying ship, Leucippe and Clitophon are still saved: a wave carries them ashore near the Egyptian city of Pelusium at the eastern branch of the Nile: “Happy, we stepped onto the earth, giving praise to the immortal gods. But we did not forget to mourn Klinius and Satire, because they were considered dead."

The author describes in detail the streets, temples and, most importantly, paintings and sculptures - the artistic sights of the cities that his heroes had a chance to visit. So, on the wall of the temple in Pelusium, the artist Evanteus depicted Andromeda and Perseus with the head of the Gorgon Medusa and the torment of Prometheus, chained to a rock: an eagle pecks at his liver, the torment of a titan is depicted so realistically that the audience is also imbued with these sufferings. But "Hercules instills hope in the sufferer. He stands and aims from the bow at the Prometheus executioner. Having attached the arrow to the bowstring, he forcefully directs his weapon forward, pulling it to his chest with his right hand, the muscles of which are tense in an effort to pull the elastic bowstring. Everything in it bends, united by a common goal: a bow, a bowstring, a right hand, an arrow.

From Pelusium our heroes sail down the Nile to Alexandria. But fate has prepared a new test for them: they are captured by the robbers, and Leucippe is torn off from Clitophon - they are going to bring the girl to the local god as an expiatory sacrifice.

But here the bandits are put to flight by the most opportunely arrived armed detachment: some of the captives (among them Clitophon) are released. Leucippe remained in the hands of the robbers.

The strategist, having appreciated the horsemanship of Clitophon, even invites him to dinner. From the hill where they are located, terrible preparations are visible in the camp of the bandits: Aeucippe in a sacred robe is led to the altar, and a terrible slaughter is performed in front of the dumbfounded spectators. Then the girl is placed in a coffin and the villains leave the altar.

Under the cover of night darkness, heartbroken Clitophon makes his way to an expensive coffin and wants to commit suicide right there, next to his lifeless beloved. But at the very last moment he is stopped in time by his friends, Satyr and Menelaus (they became friends with the latter during the tragic voyage). It turns out that they also escaped during the shipwreck and ... were captured by the same robbers. Those, in order to test the reliability of the young men, instruct them to do a terrible thing: to sacrifice Leucippe. And they decide, hoping for a good fate. However, not without reason.

They, it turns out, have a fake sword, the blade of which, when pressed lightly, goes into the handle. With the help of this theatrical weapon, friends "sacrifice" Leucippe, who had previously been drugged with a sleeping potion.

So, the lid of the tomb opens, and "Leucippe rose from it. <...> She rushed towards me, we embraced each other and collapsed to the ground without feelings."

Happy friends are together again. They are in the army of the strategist, who is waiting for reinforcements to finally deal with the bandits.

Young people see each other regularly, but their connection is still purely platonic. Artemis appeared in a dream to Leucippe and said: "I will be your intercessor. You will remain virgin until I arrange your marriage and none other than Clitophon becomes your husband."

In the meantime, the strategist Charmides falls in love with Leucippe. But with all sorts of tricks and excuses, she manages to avoid his courtship, and even more so rapprochement with an ardent warrior.

And suddenly Leucippe becomes insane. She rushes at everyone in a rage, and her speech is incoherent. It soon becomes clear that Lewkilpa was drugged with a terrible potion. This was done according to the plan of a warrior who fell in love with her (again a warrior!) - a Forosian of Kherei. He then acts as a "savior" and, having given the girl an antidote and returned her memory, then invites Leucippe and Clitophon to his place on Foros. And there, during the feast, the robbers, friends of Chaerea, kidnap Leucippe.

A sea chase begins, in which the ship of the city authorities also takes part on the side of the victims. The kidnappers are about to be caught!

And then, in front of the eyes of the pursuers, the robbers take Leucippe to the deck and cut off her head, and the headless body is thrown into the waves. Confusion and horror on the ships catching up! Meanwhile, the pirates manage to escape.

"... for a long time I mourned the death of my beloved, then I betrayed the body to burial and returned to Alexandria."

Six months passed, and the grief gradually began to dull: time, as you know, is the best healer.

And suddenly Clinius showed up! It turns out that he was then picked up at sea by a passing ship and delivered directly to Sidon. He said that Sostratus, the father of Leucippe, had already agreed to marry his daughter to Clitophon. But alas, it's too late...

Having learned that the young man is in Alexandria, his father is going to come there. However, events are again "dictated by Aphrodite". The noble and very spectacular Ephesian matron Melita passionately falls in love with Clitophon. Her husband died in a shipwreck. And Melita hopes that not only her beauty, but also the similarity of misfortunes will allow her to get closer to the inconsolable fiance of Leucippe. However, Clitophon is still heartbroken, despite the time and efforts of his friends, and responds to Melita's caresses with great restraint. The matron is literally burning with passion, and the young man, under various pretexts, refuses to become her husband and already in this capacity to share the bed: everything is limited to "permissible caresses."

And suddenly, capricious fate presents the heroes of the novel with a new surprise: it turns out that Leucippe ... is alive! On that terrible day of the sea chase, the pirates, as it turned out only now, beheaded another woman, specially dressed in the tunic of Leucippe, and her body was thrown into the sea, prudently hiding her head.

The robbers profitably sold Leucippe into slavery, and she ended up in ... the estate of Melita (but under the name of Lacana). And the unfortunate lovers met again. Although it is impossible for them to be together yet.

Suddenly, Melita's husband, Fersander, returns. It turns out that he also did not die: and he was not destined to drown in the depths of the sea. And Fersander is naturally enraged and offended by the presence of a young and handsome Tyrian in his house.

Melita's assurances that their relationship is noble and purely friendly do not inspire confidence and are angrily rejected. Cleitophon is thrown into prison. He faces the most incredible charges (including - in the murder), and is preparing a harsh trial.

Fersandr is going to friends for now. And the insidious manager - the overseer of the slaves on the estate - shows him Leucippe, and the offended husband immediately falls in love with her.

Meanwhile, the court, under pressure from Thersander and his supporters, sentences Clitophon to death. But this was preceded by events, without which such a novel is impossible.

Upon learning that Leucippe is her slave Lacan, Melita is at first terribly upset, but then, subdued by the loyalty of Clitophon and touched by the endless suffering of lovers, she tries to organize their escape. Melita gives Clitophon her clothes, and he, unrecognized, leaves her house. But - another failure: on the way they grab him and expose him (both literally and figuratively).

And Sostratus, the father of Leucippe, arrives in Ephesus as a theor (holy ambassador). And only an accident prevents them from meeting on the very first day in the temple of Artemis, for the protection of which the exhausted girl hopes.

Overcoming all obstacles, despite many false accusations, Leucippe proves his innocence. In the cave of the forest god Pan, the syringa sounds wonderful in her honor - a seven-barreled reed flute, which testifies to the virginity of the girl. The nobility of the unfortunate Melita is just as convincingly confirmed. The people, and then the court, take the side of the lovers. And the disgraced Fersander flees the city.

Clitophon, together with his uncle (Sostratus finally hugged his newly found daughter!) And his beloved, having endured so many adventures and trials, returns to Byzantium - his hometown. There they played the long-awaited wedding.

Yu. V. Shanin

The "Comparative Lives" are 23 pairs of biographies: one Greek, one Roman, starting with the legendary kings Theseus and Romulus and ending with Caesar and Antony, whom Plutarch heard about from living witnesses. For historians, this is a precious source of information; but Plutarch did not write for historians. He wanted people to learn how to live by the example of historical figures; therefore, he combined them into pairs according to the similarity of characters and actions, and at the end of each pair he placed a comparison: who was better in what, and worse in what. For the modern reader, these are the most boring sections, but for Plutarch they were the main ones. Here's what it looked like.

Aristides (d. c. 467 BC) was an Athenian statesman during the Greco-Persian Wars. At Marathon, he was one of the commanders, but he himself refused command, handing it over to the leader, whose plan he considered the best. At Salamis, in a decisive battle against Xerxes, he recaptured that island from the Persians, on which a monument was later erected in honor of this battle. Under Plataea, he commanded all the Athenian units in the allied Greek army. He had the nickname Just. His rival was Themistocles; the strife was such that Aristides said: "It would be best for the Athenians to take and throw into the abyss both me and Themistocles." It came to ostracism, the "court of potsherds": everyone wrote on the potsherd the name of the one whom he considered dangerous for the fatherland. An illiterate peasant approached Aristide: "Write here for me: Aristide." - "Do you know him?" - "No, but I'm tired of hearing: Fair yes Fair." Aristide wrote, and he had to. go into exile. However, later, before Salamis, he himself came to Themistocles and said: "Let's give up strife, we have a common cause: you know how to command better, and I will be your adviser." After the victory, recapturing the Greek cities from the Persians, by his courtesy he encouraged them to be friends with Athens, and not with Sparta. Out of this came a great maritime alliance; Aristides traveled to all the cities and distributed the allied contributions among them so fairly that everyone was satisfied. Most of all, they marveled that at the same time he did not take bribes and returned from the detour as poor as he was. When he died, he left no money even for a funeral; the Athenians buried him at public expense, and his daughters were given in marriage with a dowry from the treasury.

Catan the Elder (234 -149 BC) in his youth participated in the II Punic War of Rome with Carthage, in his mature years he fought in Spain and against the Asian king Antiochus in Greece, and died on the eve of the III Punic War, to which he stubbornly called: each he ended his speech with the words: "And besides, it is necessary to destroy Carthage." He was from an humble family and only by his own merits reached the highest state position - censorship: in Rome this was a rarity. Cato was proud of this and in every speech he repeated about his merits; however, when he was asked why he had not yet erected a statue, he said: "Let them ask why they did not erect it, than why they erected it." The censor had to monitor public morals: Cato struggled with luxury, expelled Greek teachers from Rome because their lessons undermined the harsh morals of their ancestors, expelled a senator from the Senate because he kissed his wife in public. He said: "The city will not survive, where they pay more for red fish than for a working ox." He himself set an example with his harsh lifestyle: he worked in the field, ate and drank the same as his farmhands, raised his son himself, wrote for him in large letters the history of Rome, and a book of advice on agriculture ("how to get rich"), and much more. He had many enemies, including the best Roman commander Scipio, the winner of the Carthaginian Hannibal; he overpowered everyone, and accused Scipio of excess of power and unacceptable love for Greek learning, and he retired to his estate. Like Nestor, he survived three generations; already in his old age, fighting off attacks in court, he said: "It's hard when life is lived with some, but you have to justify yourself to others."

Mapping. In the fight against rivals, Cato showed himself better than Aristides. Aristide had to go into exile, and Cato argued with rivals in the courts to a ripe old age and always emerged victorious. At the same time, Aristides was only seriously rivaled by Themistocles, a man of low birth, and Cato had to break into politics when the nobility was firmly in power, and yet he achieved his goal. - In the fight against external enemies, Aristides fought at Marathon, and at Salamis, and at Plataea, but everywhere on the sidelines, and Cato himself won victories in Spain and Greece. However, the enemies that Cato fought were no match for the fearsome hordes of Xerxes. - Aristides died in poverty, and this is not good: a person should strive for prosperity in his home, then the state will also be prosperous. Cato, on the other hand, proved to be an excellent host, and in this he is better. On the other hand, it is not in vain that philosophers say: "Only the gods do not know the need; the fewer needs a person has, the closer he is to the gods." In this case, poverty, which does not come from extravagance, but from moderation of desires, like in Aristides, is better than wealth, even such as in Cato: is it not a contradiction that Cato teaches to get rich, but he himself boasts of moderation? - Aristide was modest, he was praised by others, while Cato was proud of his merits and commemorated them in all his speeches; this is not good. Aristides was not envious, during the war he honestly helped his ill-wisher Themistocles. Cato, out of rivalry with Scipio, almost prevented his victory over Hannibal in Africa, and then forced this great man to retire and retire from Rome; this is downright bad.

Agesilaus (399-360 BC) was a Spartan king, an example of ancient prowess from the time of the beginning of the decline of morals. He was small, lame, fast and unpretentious; he was called to listen to a singer who sang like a nightingale, he replied: "I heard a real nightingale." On campaigns, he lived in front of everyone, and slept in temples: "What people do not see, let the gods see." The soldiers loved him so much that the government reprimanded him: "They love you more than the fatherland." He was elevated to the throne by the famous commander Lysander, declaring his rival the illegitimate son of the former king; Lysander hoped to rule himself from behind Agesilaus, but he quickly took power into his own hands. Agesilaus saved Sparta twice. The first time he went to war against Persia and would have conquered it, as Alexander did later, but he was ordered to return, because all of Greece had rebelled against Sparta. He returned and hit the rebels in the rear; the war dragged on, but Sparta held out. The second time the Spartans were utterly defeated by the Thebans and approached the city itself; Agesilaus with a small detachment took up defense, and the Thebans did not dare to attack. According to ancient law, warriors who fled from the enemy were shamefully deprived of their civil rights; observing this law, Sparta would have remained without citizens. Agesilaus announced: "Let the law sleep today and wake up tomorrow" - and with this he got out of the situation. Money was needed for the war, Agesilaus went to earn it overseas: there Egypt rebelled against Persia, and he was called to be a leader. In Egypt, he liked hard cane most of all: it was possible to weave even more modest wreaths from it than in Sparta. A split began between the rebels, Agesilaus joined those who paid more: "I am fighting not for Egypt, but for the profit of Sparta." Here he died; His body was embalmed and taken to his homeland.

Pompey (106-48 BC) rose in the First Roman Civil War under the dictator Sulla, was the strongest man in Rome between Civil Wars I and II, and died in Civil War II against Caesar. He defeated rebels in Africa and Spain, Spartacus in Italy, pirates throughout the Mediterranean, King Mithridates in Asia Minor, King Tigranes in Armenia, King Aristobulus in Jerusalem, and celebrated three triumphs over three parts of the world. He said that he received any position earlier than he himself expected, and composed earlier than others expected. He was brave and simple; at sixty, he did combat exercises alongside his rank-and-file soldiers. In Athens, on the arch in his honor was the inscription: "The more you are a man, the more you are a god." But he was too direct to be a politician. The Senate was afraid and did not trust him, he concluded an alliance against the Senate with the politicians Crassus and Caesar. Beauty died, and Caesar gained strength, conquered Gaul and began to threaten both the Senate and Pompey, Pompeii did not dare to wage a civil war in Italy - he gathered troops in Greece. Caesar chased after him; Pompeii could surround his troops and starve him out, but chose to give battle. It was then that Caesar exclaimed: "Finally, I will fight not with hunger and deprivation, but with people!" At Pharsalus, Caesar defeated Pompey utterly. Pompey is discouraged; the Greek philosopher said to him: "Are you sure that you would have taken advantage of the victory better than Caesar?" Pompey fled on a ship across the sea to the Egyptian king. The Alexandrian nobles judged that Caesar was stronger, and killed Pompey on the shore during the landing. When Caesar arrived in Alexandria, they presented him with the head and seal of Pompey. Caesar wept and ordered the execution of the assassins.

Mapping. Pompey came to power only by his merits, Agesilaus - not without cunning, declaring another heir illegal, Pompey supported Sulla, Agesilaus - Lysander, but Pompey Sulla always paid honors, Agesilaus ungratefully removed Lysander - in all this, Pompey's behavior was much more laudable . However, Agesilaus showed more statesmanship than Pompey - for example, when he interrupted the victorious campaign by order and returned to save the fatherland, or when no one knew what to do with the defeated, and he came up with the idea that "for one day the laws sleep." Pompey's victories over Mithridates and other kings are, of course, much more magnificent than Agesilaus's victories over the small Greek militias. And Pompey knew how to show mercy to the defeated better - he settled the pirates in cities and villages, and made Tigran his ally; Agesilaus was much more vindictive. However, in his main war, Agesilaus showed more self-control and more courage than Pompey. He was not afraid of reproaches for returning from Persia without a victory, and did not hesitate with a small army to defend Sparta from invading enemies. And Pompey first left Rome in front of the small forces of Caesar, and then in Greece he was ashamed to delay time and accepted the battle when it was beneficial not to him, but to his opponent. Both ended their lives in Egypt, but Pompey swam there out of necessity, Agesilaus out of self-interest, and Pompey fell, deceived by enemies, Agesilaus himself deceived his friends: here again Pompey deserves more sympathy.

Demosthenes (384-322 BC) was the greatest Athenian orator. Naturally tongue-tied and weak-voiced, he exercised himself by making speeches with pebbles in his mouth, or on the shore of a noisy sea, or climbing a mountain; for these exercises, he went to live in a cave for a long time, and in order to be ashamed to return to people ahead of time, he shaved half his head. Speaking at the National Assembly, he said:

"Athenians, you will have in me an adviser, even if you do not want to, but never a flatterer, even if you want." Bribes were given to other speakers to say what the bribe taker wanted; Demosthenes were given bribes to keep him quiet. He was asked: "Why are you silent?" - he answered: "I have a fever"; they joked about him: "Gold Rush!" King Philip of Macedon was advancing on Greece, Demosthenes did a miracle - with his speeches he rallied the intractable Greek cities against him. Philip managed to defeat the Greeks in battle, but grew gloomy at the thought that Demosthenes could destroy with one speech everything that the king had achieved by victories for many years. The Persian king considered Demosthenes his main ally against Philip and sent him a lot of gold, Demosthenes took: "He was the best able to praise the valor of his ancestors, but he did not know how to imitate them." His enemies, having caught him taking bribes, sent him into exile; leaving, he exclaimed: "Oh Athena, why do you love the three most evil animals: the owl, the snake and the people?" After the death of Alexander the Great, Demosthenes again raised the Greeks to war against the Macedonians, the Greeks were again defeated, Demosthenes escaped in the temple. The Macedonians ordered him to leave, he said: "Now, just write a will"; took out the writing tablets, thoughtfully raised the lead to his lips, and fell dead: in the lead he carried poison with him. On the statue in his honor it was written: "If, Demosthenes, your strength was equal to your mind, the Macedonians would never rule Greece."

Cicero (106-43 BC) was the greatest Roman orator. When he studied eloquence in conquered Greece, his teacher exclaimed: "alas, the last glory of Greece goes to the Romans!" He considered Demosthenes a model for all orators; When asked which of Demosthenes' speeches was the best, he replied: "The longest." Like Cato the Elder once, he is from an humble family, only thanks to his oratorical talent he rose from the lowest government posts to the highest. He had to act as both a defender and an accuser; when he was told: "You have ruined more people with accusations than saved with defenses," he replied: "So I was more honest than eloquent." Each position in Rome was held for a year, and then it was supposed to govern a province for a year; usually the governors used it for profit, Cicero - never. In the year in which Cicero was consul and head of state, a conspiracy of Catiline against the Roman Republic was discovered, but there was no direct evidence against Catiline; however, Cicero delivered such a diatribe against him that he fled from Rome, and his accomplices were executed by order of Cicero. Then the enemies took advantage of this to drive Cicero out of Rome; a year later he returned, but his influence weakened, he increasingly retired from business to the estate and wrote essays on philosophy and politics. When Caesar went to power, Cicero did not have the courage to fight him; but when, after the assassination of Caesar, Antony began to rush to power, Cicero threw himself into the struggle for the last time, and his speeches against Antony were as famous as those of Demosthenes against Philip. But strength was on Antony's side; Cicero had to flee, he was overtaken and killed. His severed head, Antony, put on the oratory of the Roman forum, and the Romans were horrified.

Mapping. Which of the two orators was more talented - about this, says Plutarch, he does not dare to judge: this can only be done by someone who is equally fluent in both Latin and Greek. The main advantage of the speeches of Demosthenes was considered weight and strength, the speeches of Cicero - flexibility and lightness; Demosthenes was called a grouch by his enemies, Cicero was called a joker. Of these two extremes, perhaps, De-mosfenov is still better. In addition, Demosthenes, if he praised himself, then unobtrusively, Cicero was conceited to the point of ridiculousness. But Demosthenes was an orator, and only an orator, and Cicero left many works on philosophy, politics, and rhetoric: this versatility, of course, is a great advantage. Both exerted enormous political influence with their speeches; but Demosthenes did not hold high posts and did not pass, so to speak, the test of power, and Cicero was a consul and brilliantly showed himself, suppressing the conspiracy of Catiline. Where Cicero undoubtedly excelled Demosthenes was in unselfishness: he did not take bribes in the provinces, nor gifts from friends; Demosthenes obviously received money from the Persian king and went into exile for bribery. But in exile, Demosthenes behaved better than Cicero: he continued to unite the Greeks in the fight against Philip and succeeded in many ways, while Cicero lost heart, idly indulged in melancholy and then for a long time did not dare to resist tyranny. In the same way, Demosthenes accepted death more worthily. Cicero, although an old man, was afraid of death and rushed about to escape from the killers, while Demosthenes himself took the poison, as befits a courageous person.

Demetrius Poliorketes (336-283 BC) was the son of Antigonus One-Eyed, the oldest and strongest of the generals of Alexander the Great. When, after the death of Alexander, wars for power began between his generals, Antigonus captured Asia Minor and Syria, and Demetrius sent to recapture Greece from the rule of Macedonia. In hungry Athens, he brought bread; speaking about this, he made a mistake in the language, he was corrected, he exclaimed: "For this amendment, I give you another five thousand measures of bread!" He was proclaimed a god, settled in the temple of Athena, and he arranged revels there with his girlfriends, and took taxes from the Athenians for their rouge and whitewash. The city of Rhodes refused to obey him, Demetrius laid siege to it, but did not take it, because he was afraid to burn the workshop of the artist Protogenes, which was near the city wall. The siege towers thrown by him were so huge that the Rhodians, having sold them for scrap, erected a gigantic statue - the Colossus of Rhodes - with the proceeds. His nickname is Poliorket, which means "town-fighter". But in the decisive battle, Antigonus and Demetrius were defeated, Antigonus died, Demetrius fled, neither the Athenians nor other Greeks wanted to accept him. He captured the Macedonian kingdom for several years, but did not hold it. The Macedonians were disgusted by his arrogance: he walked in scarlet clothes with a gold border, in purple boots, in a cloak embroidered with stars, and he received petitioners unkindly: "I have no time." "If there is no time, then there is nothing to be a king!" one old woman called out to him. Having lost Macedonia, he rushed around Asia Minor, his troops left him, he was surrounded and surrendered to the rival king. He sent the order to his son:

"Consider me dead and whatever I write to you, don't listen." The son offered himself as a prisoner instead of his father - to no avail. Three years later, Demetrius died in captivity, drunk and rampaging.

Mark Antony (82-30 BC) rose to prominence in Roman Civil War II fighting for Caesar against Pompey and died fighting for power in Civil War III against Octavian, Caesar's adopted son. From his youth, he loved a wild life, took his mistresses with servants on campaigns, feasted in magnificent tents, rode a chariot drawn by lions; but he was generous with the people, and simple with the soldiers, and he was loved. In the year of the assassination of Caesar, Antony was consul, but he had to share power with Octavian. Together they massacred the rich and noble republicans - then Cicero died; then together they defeated the last republicans Brutus and Cassius, who killed Caesar, Brutus and Cassius committed suicide. Octavian went to pacify Rome and the West, Anthony - to conquer the East. The Asian kings bowed to him, the townspeople staged violent processions in honor of him, his generals won victories over the Parthians and Armenians. The Egyptian queen Cleopatra came out to meet him with a magnificent retinue, as Aphrodite met Dionysus; they married, feasted, drank, gambled, hunted together, spending untold money and, worse, time. When he demanded two taxes from the people in one year, he was told: "If you are a god, then give us two summers and two winters!" He wanted to become king in Alexandria and from there extend his power to Rome; the Romans were indignant, Octavian took advantage of this and went to war with him. They met in a naval battle; in the midst of the battle, Cleopatra turned her ships to flight, Antony rushed after her, and the victory remained with Octavian. Octavian besieged them in Alexandria; Antony challenged him to a duel, Octavian replied: "There are many ways to death." Then Antony threw himself on his sword, and Cleopatra committed suicide by letting herself be stung by a poisonous snake.

Mapping. We will compare these two generals, who started well and ended badly, to see how a good man should not behave. So, the Spartans at the feasts watered the drunken slave and showed the young men how ugly the drunk is. - Demetrius received his power without difficulty, from his father's hands; Antony went to her, relying only on his own strengths and abilities; it inspires more respect. - But Demetrius ruled over the Macedonians, accustomed to royal power, while Antony wanted to subordinate the Romans, accustomed to the republic, to his royal power; it's much worse. In addition, Demetrius won his victories himself, while Antony waged the main war through the hands of his generals. - Both loved luxury and debauchery, but Demetrius at any moment was ready to transform from a sloth into a fighter, while Antony, for the sake of Cleopatra, put off any business and looked like Hercules in slavery to Omphala. But Demetrius in his entertainment was cruel and impious, defiling even temples with fornication, but this was not the case for Anthony. Demetrius, by his intemperance, harmed others, Antony harmed himself. Demetrius was defeated because the army retreated from him, Antony - because he himself abandoned his army: the first is to blame for instilling such hatred for himself, the second - for betraying such love for himself. - Both died a bad death, but the death of Demetrius was more shameful: he agreed to become a prisoner in order to drink and overeat for an extra three years in captivity, while Antony preferred to kill himself rather than give himself into the hands of enemies.

M. L. Gasparov

The most beloved hero of Greek myths was Hercules, a powerful worker who saved the gods from death, and people from terrible monsters, but who did not make himself either a kingdom or happiness. The Greeks composed songs about him first, then tragedies, then comedies. One of these comedies has come down to us in the Latin adaptation of Plautus.

Actually, Hercules himself is not yet on stage here. It's just a matter of his birth. It must be conceived by the god Zeus himself from the mortal woman Alcmene. In order for the hero-savior to become the mightiest of the mighty, a long work is needed - therefore Zeus orders the Sun not to rise for three days so that he has a triple night at his disposal. It is not the first time for Zeus to descend with love to earthly women, but here the case is special. Alcmene has a husband, the commander Amphitrion. She is not only a beautiful woman, but also a virtuous one: she will never cheat on her husband. So, Zeus should appear to her, taking the form of her lawful husband. Amphitryon. And so that the real Amphitryon does not interfere with this, Zeus takes with him the cunning god Hermes, the messenger of the gods, who on this occasion takes the form of Amphitrion's slave named Sosia. The play of Plautus is Latin, so the mythological heroes are renamed in the Roman way: Zeus is Jupiter, Hermes is Mercury, Hercules is Hercules.

The play begins with a prologue: Mercury enters the stage. “I am Mercury, Jupiter and I have come to show you a tragedy. Don’t want a tragedy? Nothing, I’m a god - I’ll turn it into a comedy! Here, on the stage, is the city of Thebes, King Amphitryon went on a campaign, and left his wife at home. Here is Jupiter he visited her, and I was on guard with him: he is in the form of Amphitryon, I am in the form of a slave. But just now both the real Amphitryon and the real slave are returning from the campaign - you need to be on your guard. And here is the slave! "

Sosia enters with a lantern in her hands. He is cheerful - the war is over, victory has been won, booty has been captured. Only the night around is somehow strange: the moon and stars do not rise, do not set, but stand still. And in front of the royal house is someone strange. "Who are you?" - "I am Sosia, the slave of Amphitryon!" - "You're lying, it's me - Sosia, the slave of Amphitrion!" - "By Jupiter, Sosia is me!" "By Mercury, Jupiter won't believe you!" Word for word, it comes to a fight, Mercury's fists are heavier, Sosia moves away, puzzling: "Am I or not me?" And just in time: Jupiter in the form of Amphitryon is just coming out of the house, and Alcmene with him. He says goodbye, she keeps him; he says: “It’s time for me to go to the army, because I secretly came home only for one night, so that you would be the first to hear about our victory from me. "Yeah, sooner than you think!" Mercury remarks to himself.

The night ends, the sun rises, and the real Amphitrion appears with the real Sosia. Sosia tells him that there is a second Sosia in the house, he talked to him and even fought; Amphitrion does not understand anything and swears: "You were drunk, and you saw double, that's all!" Alcmene sits at the threshold and sadly sings about separation and longing for her husband. How about a husband? "I'm glad you're back so soon!" - "Why soon? The trip was long, I haven't seen you for several months!" - "What are you talking about! weren't you just at my place and just left?" An argument begins: which of them is lying or which of them is crazy? And both call the ill-fated Sosia as a witness, and his head is spinning. "Here is a golden bowl from your booty, you yourself just gave it to me!" - "It can't be, it's someone who stole it from me!" - "Who?" - "Yes, your lover, slut!" scolds Amphitrion. He threatens his wife with divorce and leaves for witnesses to confirm: at night he was not at home, but with the army.

Jupiter watches these quarrels from his sky - from the second tier of the theatrical building. He feels sorry for Alcmene, he descends - of course, again in the form of Amphitryon - reassures her: "It was all a joke." As soon as she agrees to forgive him, the real Amphitrion appears on the threshold with a witness. At first, Mercury-Sosia drives him away, and Amphitrion is beside himself: how, the slave does not let his own master into the house? Then Jupiter himself comes out - and as at the beginning of the comedy two Sosias collided, so now two Amphitryons collide, showering each other with abuse and accusing of adultery. Finally, Jupiter disappears with thunder and lightning, Amphitrion falls unconscious, and Alcmene goes into labor in the house.

Everything ends happily. A kind maid runs out to the unfortunate Amphitrion - the only one who recognizes and recognizes him. “Miracles!” she tells him. “The birth was without any pain, twins were born right away, one is a boy like a boy, and the other is so big and heavy, they barely laid it in the cradle. Then, out of nowhere, two huge snakes appear, crawling to the cradle , everyone is terrified; and a big boy, for nothing that a newborn, gets up to meet them, grabs them by the throats and strangles them to death. "Really a miracle!" - Amphitrion, who has come to his senses, marvels. And here Jupiter appears above him in height, finally in his real divine form. “It was I who shared the bed of Alcmene with you,” he addresses Amphitrion, “the eldest of the twins is mine, the youngest is yours, and your wife is clean, she thought that I was you. This son is mine, and your stepson will be the greatest hero in the world - rejoice!" “I rejoice,” Amphitryon replies and addresses the audience: “Let's clap Jupiter!”

M. L. and V. M. Gasparov

A merchant lived in the city of Syracuse, and he had two twin boys who looked like two peas in a pod. The merchant went across the sea and took with him one of the boys - named Menechmus. There was a holiday, the boy was lost in the crowd; another merchant picked him up - from the city of Epidamnus, took him to him, adopted him, and then found him a wife and left all his fortune. The second boy stayed in Syracuse; in memory of the missing man, he was renamed and also called Menechmus. He grew up, went in search of his brother, traveled all over the cities for a long time, and finally reached Epidamnus. This is where the two twins, Menechmus of Epidamnus and Menechmus of Syracuse, collided, and it is clear that many confusions and misunderstandings resulted from this. The confusion is when Menechmus of Epidamnus is mistaken for Menechmus of Syracuse, or vice versa; a misunderstanding is when Menechmus of Epidamnus is mistaken for Menechmus of Epidamnus, but the actions of Menechmus of Syracuse are attributed to him, or vice versa.

On the stage - the city of Epidamnus, there are two houses, in one - the wife of Menechmus of Epidamnus, in the other - hetaera, his mistress. The freeloader of Menechmus of Epidamnus, nicknamed the Table Brush, comes out to the audience - because put him at the table, he will not leave a crumb, He praises his master: he lives freely, loves to eat himself and treats others. So the owner himself leaves the house, scolding his jealous wife; he stole a new cloak from her and is carrying it as a gift to his mistress. She is pleased with the gift and in gratitude orders the cook a dinner for three. "For ten," the cook corrects, "Table Brush will eat for eight."

Menechmus of Epidamnes with a freeloader go to the square on business, and Menechmus of Syracuse appears from the pier with his slave, who came to look for his brother. Of course, both the cook and the hetaera think that this is Menechmus of Epidamnus, and they greet him cheerfully: this is the first confusion. "Listen," says the hetera, "take this stolen cloak to the front, so that my wife does not recognize him on me!" Menechmus of Syracuse swears that he has nothing to do with it, and he didn’t steal his wife’s cloak, and he doesn’t have a wife, and in general he is here for the first time. But, seeing that a woman cannot be persuaded, and a cloak can, perhaps, be appropriated, he decides to have dinner with the beauty and play along with her: "I was joking, of course, I am your dear." They go off to feast, and the servant Menechmus sends to the tavern.

Here the offended Brush appears: he is sure that it was his breadwinner who treated himself without him, and attacks Menechmus of Syracuse with reproaches. This is the second confusion. He does not understand anything and drives him away. The offended freeloader goes to tell the master's wife about everything. She is furious; both sit down to wait for the culprit. And Menechmus of Epidamnus, the local one, is already right there: he is returning from the evil square, cursing himself for being involved in a court case there as a witness and therefore not in time for a feast to a hetaera. The wife and the freeloader attack him with reproaches, the wife - for the stolen cloak, the freeloader - for dinner eaten without him. This is the first misunderstanding. He fights back, but his wife declares: "I won't let you in on the threshold until you bring me a raincoat back!" - and slams the door. "It doesn't hurt, and I wanted to!" - the husband grumbles and resolutely goes to the getter - for consolation and for a cloak. But here, too, he runs into trouble. "What are you talking nonsense, you yourself took the cloak into the face, don't fool me!" - Hetera shouts to him. This is the second misunderstanding. She, too, slams the door on him; and Menechmus of Epidamnus goes wherever his eyes look.

Meanwhile, Menechmus of Syracuse, with a cloak in his hands, not finding his slave in the tavern, returns in confusion. The wife of Menechmus of Epidamnes takes him for a repentant husband, but for the sake of order she still grumbles at him. This is the third confusion. Menechmus of Syracuse does not understand anything, a squabble begins, all fiercer and fiercer; a woman calls for help from her father. The old man knows his daughter well - "from such a grumpy wife, anyone will get a mistress!" But stealing from his wife is too much, and he also begins to reason with the imaginary son-in-law. This is the fourth confusion. Has he gone mad that he does not recognize his own? The quick-witted Menechmus really pretends to be insane - and, like Orestes in the tragedy, he starts shouting: "I hear, I hear God's voice! He tells me: take a torch, burn it out, burn out their eyes! .." The woman hides in the house, the old man runs after the doctor, and Menechmus of Syracuse is saved while he is whole.

Menechmus of Epidamnes returns, and to meet him - the father-in-law and the doctor with reproaches for the staged scene of rabies: this is the third misunderstanding. Menechmus replies with a curse. "Yes, he really is violent!" - the healer exclaims and calls four hefty slaves for help. Menechmus barely fights them off, when unexpected help appears. The servant of Menechmus of Syracuse, without waiting for his master in the tavern, went to look for him, otherwise he always gets into trouble without supervision! There are obvious troubles: here are some guys in broad daylight knitting, it seems, just his owner! This is the fifth confusion. The slave rushes to help the imaginary master, together they scatter and disperse the rapists; in gratitude, the slave asks to be released. It costs nothing to set free another's slave Menechmus of Epidamnus: "Go, I'm not holding you!" - And Menechmus goes to try his luck with the hetera again.

The slave, delighted, rushes to the tavern to collect his belongings and immediately runs into his real master, Menechmus of Syracuse, who did not even think of letting him go free. The squabbles and reproaches begin. This is the fourth misunderstanding. While they are having a squabble, the same squabble is heard from the hetaera's house, and Menechmus of Epidamnus appears on the threshold after a new failure. Here, finally, both brothers face each other on stage. The slave is at a loss: who is his master? This is the sixth and final confusion. A clarification begins: both are Menechmas, both are from Syracuse, and the father is the same ... Truth triumphs, freedom is finally granted to the slave, Menechmus of Epidamnus joyfully prepares to move to his homeland, to his brother, to Syracuse, and the slave announces to the public that on occasion departure, everything is sold: house, land, all utensils, servants "and a lawful wife - if only such a buyer is found!". This is where the comedy ends.

M. L. and V. M. Gasparov

Curculion means "Breadworm". This is the nickname of the one-eyed freeloader, accustomed, cunning and glutton, who leads the intrigue in this comedy. His breadwinner and patron is an ardent young man in love; the girl whom this young man loves belongs to an evil pander and must be redeemed as soon as possible. There is no money, and the lover does not know how to get it; all hope for the dexterous Curculion. The young man sent him to another city - to ask for a loan from his friend, and he secretly makes his way to his beloved. The procurer is sick, the young man is met by a drunken doorkeeper, ready for anything for a jug of wine. The old woman sings the glory of wine: "Ah, wine! ah, wine! the best gift for me! .." The young man sings a serenade to the door hinges, which will now open the door and let out his beloved to him: soul! .. "The old slave looks at the lovers kissing, and grumbles:" It is good to love wisely, but madly - to nothing. Everyone is waiting for the return of Curculio - will he bring the money or not?

Curculio is easy to remember - he is already running across the stage:

They grab him, hold him, treat him, question him. It turns out that all the noise is in vain: there is no money, but there is hope for cunning. In the neighboring city, Curculion accidentally met a boastful warrior, who, it turns out, also noticed the same girl and had already agreed with the pimp about buying her. The money for this is kept by the money changer, who will give them to the one who presents him with a ring with a signet of a warrior as a symbol. Curculion got involved with the warrior in the company, they dined, drank, began to play dice, one fell less, the other more, Curculion considered himself a winner, stole the ring from the finger of the drunken warrior and was like that. Here it is - for such a service it is a sin not to feed him to satiety!

Work begins. Having eaten tightly, Curculio comes to the money changer with a letter sealed with the same signet: a fighter cutting an elephant with a sword. The letter says: I, they say, are such and such a warrior, I instruct the money changer to such and such to pay the pimp so much and so much, and to hand over the redeemed girl to the bearer of this letter. "And who are you?" “I am his servant.” "Why didn't he come himself?" - "Busy with business: erects a monument to his exploits - how he defeated Persia and Syria, Glutton and Opivania, Aiviya and Vinokuriya: half the world in three weeks." - "Well, if so, then I believe that you are from him: another will not come up with such nonsense." And, having stopped the interrogation, the money changer pays the money to the pimp, and he leaves with Kurkulion behind the stage - to the girl.

An unexpected pause: the khorag, the owner of the acting troupe, enters the empty stage and talks to the audience. This is all that remains of the choir that once occupied so much space in comedies. Khorag teases the audience: "Do you want me to tell you where to find someone on the forum? At such and such a temple - liars, at such and such - motes, at the well - impudent, at the canal - dandies, at the court - hook-makers, and at the same time sluts ... "Meanwhile, the pimp hands the girl to Curculio, and he, pleased, leads her to his master, looking forward to a hearty dinner as a reward.

Suddenly a boastful warrior appears - he overslept, missed his ring, hurries to the money changer - there is no more money, hurries to the pimp - the girl is gone.

And his ring - a fighter cutting an elephant with a sword - is with Curculion, and the girl looks and is surprised: her father had exactly the same ring! A warrior bursts in, rushes to the young man: "Give me back my slave!" - "She is free," the young man declares, "if you want, let's go to court, just tell me first: is this your ring?" - "My". - "Where did you get it from?" - "From the father." - "And what was the name of the father? And the mother? And the nurse?" - "So that". “Dear brother!” the girl shouts, throwing herself on the warrior’s neck. Didn’t you have a sister who got lost in childhood? There is a joyful recognition: what happiness that the gods did not allow the marriage of a brother and sister! The wedding of a young man and a girl is a foregone conclusion; now you need to deal with the pimp - how dare he trade a free girl? He is frightened, the girl even feels sorry for the old man: "Have pity on him, he did not offend me, as I entered, I came out honest!" "All right," the warrior says, "let him return the money, and I, so be it, will not drag him to court, nor will I shoot him from a catapult." The procurer pays, a feast is prepared for ransom, and Curculio rubs his belly, waiting for a well-deserved treat.

M. L. and V. M. Gasparov

“This is an unusual comedy!” warns the actor prologue. “There are no obscenities in it; valor".

There were two neighboring regions in Greece, Aetolia and Elis. An old man from Aetolia had two sons, Philopolis and Tyndar. The youngest, Tyndar, was kidnapped by a cunning slave as a small child and sold to Elis. There the owner gave the boy as a companion to his own son Philocrates; Philocrates and Tyndar grew up as friends. Many years passed, between Aetolia and Elis a war broke out. The eldest son of the Aetolian old man, Philopolis, was captured by the Elis, and Philocrates and Tyndares were captured by the Aetolian, and it was the old father who bought them, not knowing that one of the captives was his own son. Truly, "people are played by the gods, like a ball!".

The action takes place in Aetolia. The play begins with a monologue of a hanger-on - even such an unusual comedy could not do without this character. This is the hanger-on of Philopolemus, who was recently taken prisoner; sorry for him, well done was a guy, no one left him hungry! And now you have to lose weight and grow weak until the old father helps his son out. “Be patient,” the old man says to him, “I just bought two Elide captives, a master with a slave, a noble master, maybe he will be able to help out his son for him.”

The old man knows that one of his captives is the master and the other is the slave, but he does not know which is who. In the meantime, the noble Philocrates and the slave Tyndar conspired and exchanged clothes and names. The old man calls a nobleman to him - and Tyndar comes up to him. "What do you like in slavery?" - "What to do, fate plays a man: I was a master, became a slave. I will say one thing: if fate rewards justice, then it will send me a master such as I myself was - meek and not cruel. And I will say something else: if fate rewards justice , then as it is for me here, so will it be for your son in another's captivity. - "Do you want to return to freedom?" - "Who doesn't want to!" - "Help me return my son - I will let you and your slave go and I will not take money." - "Ay whom is he in captivity?" - "At such and such." - "This is a friend of my father, my father will help. Just do this: send to him with this message of my slave, otherwise he will take it and not believe it." "What if your slave runs away and doesn't come back?" - "I'm staying with you as a pledge: as soon as my father redeems me, you will ask him for a ransom immediately for both." The old man agrees, seeing how the two captives are devoted to each other, and sends Philocrates to Elis, not knowing that this is not a slave, but a master.

A break in action is again filled by a hanger-on, longing for the satisfying old days: everyone seems to have degenerated, everyone seems to have agreed, they don’t need any jokes or services, just to bypass the hungry dinner! If they have such a strike - it's time to go to court: let them be fined ten dinners in favor of hangers-on!

Suddenly, an old man returns to the scene, and with him an unexpected person - another Elide prisoner, a friend of the Philocrat, who asked him to meet him. Tyndar is in a panic: this man knows perfectly well who is who, he will reveal to the owner all the deception; "How I feel sorry for the poor rods that will break about me!". Tyndar tries to resist. "This man is crazy," he says to the owner, "he calls me Tyndar, and he will call you Ajax, don't listen to him, stay away from him - he'll kill you!" "This man is a deceiver," the captive says to the owner, "from his youth he is a slave, all Elis knows this, and Philokrates does not even look like that!" The old man's head is spinning. "What does Philocrates look like?" - "Lean, with a sharp nose, black-eyed, white in body, curly-haired, slightly red-haired." - "Woe! the way it is!" - the owner exclaims, hearing the exact description of the one of the captives, whom he himself had just lost his hands on. “It seems that they are telling the truth: there are no truthful slaves, a good one lies for the benefit of the master, and a bad one to the detriment of the master. him to the quarry!" The poor man is taken away, and his unwitting whistleblower bitterly repents, but it's too late.

Here again the freeloader breaks in - no longer dull, but triumphant. "Arrange, master, a feast, and thank me like God! Joyful news: a ship has come, and on it is your son Philopolis, and that captive whom you sent away, and also that slave that once upon a time escaped from you with your youngest son to a foreign land. - "Well, if so - YOU are my eternal guest, I take you to the house as a caretaker for all the supplies!" The old man runs to the pier, the freeloader runs to the pantry. So it is: here is Philopolis, and here is Philokrates - he did not take the opportunity to run away, but fulfilled his promise and returned for his comrade. It can be seen that there is still friendship and nobility in the world! “Well, and you,” the old man addresses the runaway slave, “if you want mercy, confess: what did you do with my son?” - "Sold into slavery - to the father of this one." - "How? So, Tyndar is my son! And I sent him to the quarry!" Tyndar is immediately released, the kidnapper is shackled, Philopolis embraces his brother, Philokrates admires them, and everyone turns to the public in unison:

M. L. and V. M. Gasparov

In this comedy, the main thing is not the plot, but the hero, the "boastful warrior." In the old days, there were no professional warriors in Greece, there were militias. And then, when war became a profession, dashing mercenaries appeared who went to serve anyone, even to the ends of the world, for the most part died, and those who did not die returned to their homeland rich and loudly boasted of the miracles that he saw , and the feats that he allegedly accomplished. Such a boastful, rude warrior who suddenly became rich became a regular character in comedies.

Plautus calls him by the pompous name Pirgopolinik, which means "Conqueror of the Tower". He sits in front of his house and watches how the servants clean his armor - "so that the sun is brighter!". Under him is a hanger-on named Khlebogryz, together they count how many enemies Pyrgopolinik laid down in his campaigns: some in Scythia, some in Persia, only seven thousand, and all in one day! And then back in India, with one left, he broke an elephant’s arm, that is, a leg, and then hitting only half-heartedly! And in general, what a hero he is - and a hero, and a brave man, and a handsome man, and how women love him!

In fact, he is a swindler, a coward and a lecher. This is reported to the public by his slave named Palestrion. Palestrion served in Athens with one young man, and he loved one girl. When the young man was away, this very Pyrgopolinik kidnapped this girl by deceit and took her here, to the city of Ephesus. Palestrion rushed to warn the master, but on the way he was seized by pirates and sold into slavery to the same Pyrgopolinik. However, he managed to send the message to the former owner; he came to Ephesus, settled in the neighborhood of a warrior with a kind old man and secretly sees his beloved. Here on the stage is the house of a warrior, and here is the house of an old man, they are nearby, and between them a clever slave easily built a secret passage.

Everything would be fine, but another slave of the warrior spied on the meeting of the lovers, and the old neighbor is very alarmed: the warrior would not have arranged a pogrom for him. "Okay," says Palestrion, "let's imagine that his girlfriend had a twin sister in Athens, so she settled with her lover with you, old man." As for the witness, he can be confused and intimidated: after all, the demand is from him if he overlooked it. In fact, while the spy is in a hurry with a denunciation, the girl, having made her way through the secret passage, is already at home and falls upon the ill-fated informer as a slanderer; and then, having again moved to a neighbor, she already shows herself openly and, under the guise of her own sister, has mercy on the young man, and the stupid slave's head is completely spinning.

The old neighbor is not opposed to such a prank, so that the Athenian youth is even uncomfortable: there is so much trouble because of him! “In such matters I am glad to help,” the old man replies, “I myself am still greedy for beauties, and they are up to me: educated, witty, amiable - a real Ephesian!” "Why is he still single?" - the young man is surprised. "Freedom above all!" - the old man proudly declares. "What's true is true!" - confirms the worker. “But what about without children?” the young man is surprised. “Who cares about you?” “What are you doing!” the old man waves away, “not a single son will be as attentive and courteous as distant relatives who hope for my inheritance: they carry me in their arms!” - "And it's for the best that you are not married," says the slave.

“Find a hetaera, beautiful and greedy, and marry her off as your wife…” “Why is that?” the old man wonders. a ring…" the young man offers. "I don't understand anything, but I believe you: take it, do whatever you want," the old man decides.

Heroes easily negotiate with hetero; the slave comes to Pyrgopolinik, gives him the ring, praises his neighbor, paints her love. A warrior, of course, believes: how not to fall in love with him? Now, then, it is only necessary to get rid of the Athenian kidnapped by him, so that the new beauty is not jealous. Perhaps it’s even good that her sister appeared here in the neighborhood: the warrior decides to hand her his mistress from hand to hand, and even generously bestow on her to keep quiet, and give the slave Palestrion freedom for her services and send with them escorts, A young man appears, betraying himself for the confidant of the mother of both girls; the warrior gives him his Athenian, she depicts great grief: oh, how hard it is for her to part with such a handsome and hero! A young man with a girlfriend, a slave and gifts safely sail away to Athens.

Virtue has triumphed, but vice has not yet been punished. However, this will not be long. Hetera comes forward and plays, as planned, the old man's wife, in love with Pyrgopolinik. He obediently goes on a date with her to a neighbor's house. There, an old master with strong slaves pounces on him: "How dare you, accursed one, drive up to my wife?" They grab him, beat him, sharpen a knife in order to emasculate him on the spot; with loud cries, the warrior pays off the reprisal with large sums of money and, “limp from the beatings,” flees in disgrace, “I have been deceived, I have been punished - but, alas, deservedly! you to us, the audience, I clap!" This is the moral of the comedy.

M. L. and V. M. Gasparovs

An eternal theme: late in the evening, a father in alarm is waiting at home somewhere for his late son and muttering under his breath that there are no greater worries than parental worries ...

Old Mikion has no children of his own. His brother Demei has two sons. One of them, Aeschines, was adopted by Mikion. Raises a young man within the framework of reasonable permissiveness and complete trust. Demea often rebukes him for this.

And just like that, the son of Demea Ctesiphon falls in love with the harpist Bacchida, who is still the property of the pimp Sannion.

The noble Aeschines, smart and energetic (although, on occasion, he himself is not averse to partying and having fun), severely reins in this money-grubber: Sannion is clearly afraid of him. And there are reasons for this.

Moreover, in order to protect his brother from too serious reproaches, Aeschines takes on some of his sins, really risking damage to his reputation. And this fraternal selflessness is touching.

Sir, a slave of Mikion, is very devoted to his masters: he rescues them both in word and deed. He helped raise both boys. By the way, the quick-witted Sir takes an active part in "taming" the mercenary pimp Sannion.

And again - a traditional plot move: at one time, Aeschines dishonored the good girl Pamfila. The childbirth is already approaching, And honest Aeschines is ready to take on all the cares of fatherhood: he does not renounce anything.

But his imaginary sins (as you remember, he often covered up for his unlucky brother Ctesiphon) damaged his relationship with his bride and her relatives; Aeschines was simply denied a home.

Yet, through the combined efforts of relatives, friends, and devoted servants, truth and peace will be restored. But it's still ahead.

By the way, in such a situation, slaves often turn out to be smarter and more humane than some masters. And perishing resourceful - so perishing always!

Demeya is becoming more and more convinced that his brother achieves more with kindness and kindness than he does with strict restrictions and nit-picking.

Thanks to the friendly assistance of Aeschines and Syrah, the frivolous Ctesiphon is having fun with the singer. Their feelings are sincere and therefore arouse the sympathy of the audience. But this, of course, worries his father Demea. Therefore, at particularly critical moments, the devoted Sir skillfully escorts him away from the place of his son's love dates.

To test the reliability of Aeschines' feelings, his father talks about a fiance-relative from Miletus, who is ready to take Pamphila along with the child. Moreover, Aeshin at one time frivolously (not to say - impermissibly) pulled with matchmaking; his future wife was already in her ninth month!

But, seeing the sincere repentance and even despair of his son, his father reassures him: everything has already been settled and the bride's relatives believed that he was not so guilty, as the rumor kept saying. And the young mother believed too.

Having paid twenty minutes to the procurer for the song, Mikion decides to leave it in the house - it will be more fun to live!

And he admonishes Demeya, who is still grumbling: everyone has the right to live the way they are used to, unless, of course, this bothers others too much.

And Demeya is changing right before our eyes! More recently - severe and arrogant, he becomes friendly even in relation to slaves. And in a fit of feelings, he orders the servants to tear down the fence between the two houses: let the courtyard be common so that the wedding can be played widely, together, and then the bride will not have to go to the groom's house, which in her current position would not be easy.

And finally, the same Demea offers Mikion to grant freedom to the most devoted slave Cyrus. And also his wife.

Yu. V. Shanin

The young man Pamphilus was very indifferent to the hetaera Bacchis. But under the pressure of his parents, reluctantly, he married a neighbor - a respectable Filumena. She loves her young husband. But the heart of that one probably still belongs to the hetera ...

An unforeseen event: a close relative is dying, and Laches, the father of Pamphilus, sends his son to another city on inheritance matters.

In the absence of Pamphilus, the unexpected happens: Filumena returns to her parents' house. This puzzled and upset her mother-in-law Sostrata: she managed to fall in love with her daughter-in-law and does not understand the reasons for her departure. And even attempts to see Filumena are futile: the girl’s mother Mirinna and the maids always say that Filumena is sick and should not be disturbed by visits.

Laches and even the girl's father, Phidippus, are in the dark. They are neighbors, are on good terms: all this is incomprehensible and unpleasant for them. Moreover, even Phidipp is not allowed into the female half of the house to see his daughter (in the gynaecium).

Pamphilus is returning from a trip. By the way, he did not bring any inheritance: the relative is still alive and, it seems, has generally changed his mind about dying.

Pamphil wants to see his wife. And it soon turns out that her illness was quite natural: Filumena gave birth to a boy!

But the seemingly obvious joy is overshadowed by the fact that this child is not from Pamphilus. He was conceived at least two months before the wedding. This was the reason for the urgent move of Filumena under the reliable wing of her mother, away from the eyes and gossip of her neighbors.

She admits that at some holiday she was possessed by a drunken rapist. And now a child is born...

The young mother loves her Pamphilus very much. He, however, does not want to recognize someone else's child. A more reasonable position is taken by the older generation: both Sostratus and Laches are ready to take into the house both Philumena and their little grandson. And Phidipp bitterly reproaches Myrinna for hiding the domestic situation from him (sparing, of course, her daughter's reputation and not wanting to excite her husband).

And Lakhet immediately reminds his son that he is not without sin: well, at least his recent passion for heterosexuals ... Father-grandfather decides to talk directly with Bacchida. And it turns out that as soon as the young man got married, the hetera forbade him to come to her, showing undoubted nobility. Moreover, she agrees to go to Phidipp's house: to tell Filumena and Mirinna that Pamphilus has not visited her since the wedding. And not only tells, but also solemnly swears, And he says, turning to Laches:

During this visit, Mirinna notices a ring on the hetaera's finger And recognizes it: this is Filumena's ring! A ring torn from her finger that fateful night by a rapist and then ... presented to Bacchis.

So, Pamphil himself turned out to be a drunken rake! And the born boy is his own son!

"Bakhida! O Bakhida! You saved me!" - exclaims the happy newlywed and young father.

The comedy ends with a scene of general joy.

Yu. V. Shanin

The action takes place in Athens. It all starts with the monologue of the slave Lav; the owner of his friend Geta, the young Antiphon marries for love and under very ordinary circumstances. Dove goes to return the favor to Goethe: he needed money for a gift to the young. As you can see, the tradition of such gifts has existed for a long time: they collected "gift contributions" not only from relatives and friends, but even from slaves ...

Geta informs Davout that Demiphon and Khremet, old brothers, are returning to the city. One is from Cilicia, the other is from Lemnos. Both of them, leaving, instructed Goethe to look after their sons Antiphon and Phaedria. But in the end, having been repeatedly beaten by the young masters for trying to instruct them, the slave was forced to become an accomplice of the young men in their love affairs.

Phaedria (son of Demiphon) fell in love with the harpist Pamphila. The young master and servant escorted her to and from school every day. Antiphon also visited them.

One day, while waiting for the harpist in the barbershop, they suddenly learned that a misfortune had happened nearby. The poor girl Fania's mother has died, and there is no one to even bury her properly.

Young people go to this house. And Antiphon, helping the sad Phania, falls head over heels in love with her. The feeling is mutual. Antiphon is ready to marry, although he fears the wrath of his father...

The smart and omniscient parasite (in ancient Greek "parasitos" - "freeloader") Formion comes to the rescue. The girl was left an orphan. And by law, the next of kin must take care of her marriage. And now, at an urgently convened court session, it is announced that Phania is related to Antiphon. And the young man immediately marries her, fulfilling his "kindred duty" with quite natural enthusiasm. However, the joy is overshadowed by the thought of the imminent return of his father and uncle, who will hardly approve of his choice. Yes, and Phedria understands that his love for a harpist slave will also not cause delight for her parents ...

Meanwhile, the elderly brothers are already in the harbor of the city. Geta and Phaedria persuade Antiphon to stand firm and explain to his parents: justice forced him to marry. Well, the feeling too. "According to the law, according to the court, they say," Phedria prompts him. But the cowardly Antiphon cowardly leaves the stage, saying goodbye to both of them: "I entrust my whole life and Phania to you!"

Demiphon appears. He is angry. Yes, let the law. But - to despise the father's consent and blessing?!

To Phedria's greeting and the question of whether everything is fine and whether he is healthy, Demiphon replies: "Question! You arranged a beautiful wedding here without me!"

Geta and Phaedria defend the escaped Antiphon with all possible arguments. But Demiphon persists. Yes, according to the law. But the same law grants the right to provide a poor relative with a dowry and give her away. And so - "What was the point of introducing a beggar into the house?!" And Demiphon demands to bring him to the parasite Phormion - the protector of both women and the indirect culprit of these events unpleasant for the old brothers.

But Formion is calm and confident that he will be able to do everything legally and safely:

As you can see, Phormion is not only smart, self-confident, but also noble (although, perhaps, not always disinterestedly).

And Formion goes on the offensive. He accuses Demiphon of leaving a poor relative, and even an orphan, in grief. Yes, her father, they say, was not rich and modest beyond measure, so after his death no one remembered the orphan, everyone turned away from her. Including the prosperous Demiphon...

But Demiphon is calm. He is sure that he has no such relatives: these are the inventions of Phormion. However, wanting to avoid litigation, he suggests: "Take five minutes and take it with you!"

However, Formion does not think to give up positions. Phania is legally married to Demiphon's son. And she will become a joy in old age to both brothers.

Three judicial advisers, very stupid, hesitantly give Demiphon extremely contradictory advice: they are of no use.

But Fedria's business is bad. The pimp Dorion, not waiting for the promised payment for Pamfila (this harpist-singer is his slave), promised to give her to some warrior if Phaedria did not bring the money. But where can you get them?

And although Antiphon himself is still in a rather critical situation, he begs Geta to help his cousin find a way out (that is, money!). For the enamored Phedria is ready to follow the singer to the ends of the earth.

Returned brothers meet. Khremet dejectedly admits to Demiphon that he is alarmed and saddened. It turns out that on Lemnos, where he often visited under the pretext of trading business, he had a second wife. And a daughter, a little younger than Phaedria and therefore his half-sister.

The Lemnos wife came to Athens in search of her husband, and here, not finding him, she died in grief. Somewhere here remained an orphan and his daughter ...

Meanwhile, the restless Phormion, by agreement with Geta, pretends that if Antiphon does not succeed, he himself is ready to marry Phania. But, of course, having received compensation from the old people in the form of a decent dowry. He immediately transfers this money to the pimp for redemption from slavery of his beloved Phaedria.

Phormion, it turns out, knows about Khremet's Lemnosian life and therefore plays for sure. And Khremet, who is still unaware of this, is ready to help Demiphon with money - if only Antiphon would marry the way his parents want. The mutual understanding of the brothers is truly touching.

Antiphon, of course, is in despair. But the faithful slave Geta reassures him: everything will be settled, everything will be completed to everyone's pleasure.

Sofrona, Phania's old nurse, appears on the scene. She immediately recognizes Khremet (however, on Lemnos he bore the name of Stilpon) and threatens to expose her. Khremet begs her not to do it yet. But he, naturally, is interested in the fate of the unfortunate daughter.

Sofrona tells how, after the death of the mistress, she gave Fania a place - she married a decent young man. Young people live just in the house near which they are now standing.

And it turns out that the happy husband Antiphon is Khremet's own nephew!

Khremet entrusted negotiations with Phania to his wife Navsistrata. And the girl fell in love with that. Having learned about her husband's past betrayal, Navsistrata, of course, gave vent to her feelings, but soon changed her anger to mercy: her rival had already died, but life goes on as usual ...

Khremet is infinitely happy: good fate itself arranged everything in the best possible way. Antiphon and Phania, of course, are also happy. And Demiphon agrees to marry his son to his new-found niece (yes, they, in fact, are already married).

Here and everywhere the faithful slave Geta kept pace: after all, to a large extent, thanks to his efforts, everything ended so well.

And Phormion, it turns out, is not only smart and omniscient, but also a kind, decent person: after all, with the money received from the old people, he bought his harpist from slavery for Phaedria.

The comedy ends with the fact that Phormion receives an invitation to a festive dinner at the house of Khremet and Navsistrata.

Yu. V. Shanin

Although Terentius wrote in Latin and for a Roman audience, his characters have Greek names and it is assumed that the action often takes place in Hellas. So it is in this case.

The stern old man Menedemos so pestered his son Klinia for his passion for a poor neighbor's girl that he was forced to run away from his parents' house for military service.

But despite this, the son loves his father. Over time, Menedemos repents. Yearning for his son and tormented by remorse, he decided to wear himself out with incessant labor in the field. At the same time, Menedemos sells most of his slaves (he almost doesn’t need them now) and much more: he wants to accumulate a sum befitting the occasion by the time his son returns.

Neighbor Khremet asks Menedemos about the reasons for these actions of his and, in particular, for such fierce self-torture with hard work. Khremet explains the reason for his interest in the affairs of his neighbor to the oppressed Menedemos as follows:

This and many other phrases from Terence's comedies eventually became popular expressions, surviving in this capacity to this day.

Klinia is in love with poor and honest Antifila and, unable to endure the separation any longer, secretly returns. But not home (he is still afraid of his father's wrath), but to his friend-neighbor Clitophon, the son of Khremet.

And Clitophon is fascinated by hetero Bacchis (which requires significant costs). Parents, of course, do not know about this passion of the unlucky son.

Sir, the smart and savvy slave of Khremet (he hopes for a reward), actively intervenes in the comedy intrigue. Both young men and Sir agree that they will bring Bacchida to Khremet's house, passing her off as the one that Klinia is passionate about. And so it happens. In the role of the servant of Bacchida, the modest Antiphila acts. And not only she: Bacchida arrives with a whole retinue of servants and slaves. And Khremet (thinking that this is Klinia's beloved) resignedly feeds and waters the whole horde. He finally informs Menedemos that his son has secretly returned. The joy of an old father knows no bounds. For the sake of his returned son, he is now ready for anything: to take into the house not only him, but also the bride, whatever she may be! Menedemos was now meek and compliant.

Meanwhile, Sostrata appears on the scene - the mother of Clitophon, the wife of Khremet. In the course of the action, it suddenly turns out that Antifila is Khremet's own daughter. When she was born (probably not at the right time), the annoyed father ordered Sostrata to abandon the child ...

Antifila was brought up by a virtuous old woman, instilling in her all the best qualities that a decent girl should have. Parents joyfully recognize Antifila as their daughter. Clitophon's doubts are also dissipated, whether he is the son of his parents and whether they will still love him. After all, the son of a reveler fraudulently plunged his father into considerable expenses. But the hetaera Bacchides in the end turns out to be not so heartless and dissolute.

As a result, Khremet agrees to give her newfound daughter to Klinia and gives her a decent dowry. Immediately, nearby, he finds a worthy bride for his unlucky son. Happy are Menedemos and his wife, happy are Antiphila and Clinia. And the final words of Khremet sound: "I agree! Well, goodbye! Clap!"

Yu. V. Shanin

When the age of heroes began on earth, the gods very often went to mortal women so that heroes would be born from them. Another thing - goddesses: they only very rarely went to mortal men to give birth to sons from them. So the hero of the Iliad, Achilles, was born from the goddess Thetis; so from the goddess Aphrodite was born the hero of the "Aeneid" - Aeneas.

The poem begins in the middle of Aeneas' path. He sails west, between Sicily and the northern coast of Africa - the one where the Phoenician immigrants are building the city of Carthage right now. It was here that a terrible storm came upon him, sent by Juno: at her request, the god Aeolus released all the winds subject to him.

Aeneas is saved by Neptune, who disperses the winds, smoothes the waves. The sun is clearing, and the last seven ships of Aeneas, with their last strength, are rowing to an unfamiliar shore.

This is Africa, where the young queen Dido rules. An evil brother expelled her from distant Phoenicia, and now she and her fellow fugitives are building the city of Carthage in a new place. "Happy are those for whom strong walls already rise!" - exclaims Aeneas and marvels at the erected temple of Juno, painted with pictures of the Trojan War: the rumor about it has already reached Africa. Dido affably accepts Aeneas and his companions - the same fugitives as she herself. A feast is celebrated in their honor, and at this feast Aeneas leads his famous story about the fall of Troy.

The Greeks for ten years could not take Troy by force and decided to take it by cunning. With the help of Athena-Minerva, they built a huge wooden horse, hid their best heroes in its hollow belly, and they themselves left the camp and hid behind the nearby island with the whole fleet. A rumor was started: it was the gods who stopped helping them, and they sailed back to their homeland, putting this horse as a gift to Minerva - huge, so that the Trojans would not bring it into the gate, because if they had the horse, they themselves would go to war against Greece and conquer victory. The Trojans rejoice, break the wall, bring the horse through the breach. The seer Laocoon conjures them not to do this - "beware of enemies, and those who bring gifts!" - but two gigantic Neptune snakes swim out of the sea, pounce on Laocoön and his two young sons, strangle with rings, sting with poison: after this, no one has any doubts, the Horse is in the city, night falls on the Trojans tired of the holiday, the Greek leaders slip out of wooden monster, the Greek troops silently swim up from behind the island - the enemy is in the city.

Aeneas was sleeping; in a dream, Hector appears to him: "Troy is dead, run, look for a new place across the sea!" Aeneas runs up to the roof of the house - the city is on fire from all over, the flame soars up to the sky and is reflected in the sea, screams and groans from all sides. He calls friends for the last battle: "For the defeated, there is only one salvation - not to dream of salvation!" They fight in the narrow streets, before their eyes the prophetic princess Kassandra is dragged into captivity, before their eyes the old king Priam dies - "the head is cut off from the shoulders, and the body is without a name." He is looking for death, but his mother Venus appears to him: "Troy is doomed, save your father and son!" Aeneas' father is the decrepit Anchis, the son is the boy Askaniy-Yul; with a powerless old man on his shoulders, leading a powerless child by the hand, Aeneas leaves the crumbling city. With the surviving Trojans, he hides on a wooded mountain, builds ships in a distant bay and leaves his homeland. We need to swim, but where?

Six years of wanderings begin. One coast does not accept them, on the other the plague is raging. Monsters of old myths rage at sea crossings - Skilla with Charybdis, predatory harpies, one-eyed cyclops. On land - mournful meetings: here is a bush oozing blood on the grave of the Trojan prince, here is the widow of the great Hector, who suffered in captivity, here is the best Trojan prophet languishing in a distant foreign land, here is the lagging warrior of Odysseus himself - abandoned by his own, he is nailed to his former enemies. One oracle sends Aeneas to Crete, the other to Italy, the third threatens with hunger: "You will gnaw your own tables!" - the fourth orders to descend into the realm of the dead and learn about the future there. At the last stop, in Sicily, decrepit Anchises dies; further - a storm, the Carthaginian coast, and the story of Aeneas is over.

The gods watch over the affairs of people. Juno and Venus do not love each other, but here they shake hands with each other: Venus does not want further trials for her son, Juno does not want Rome to rise in Italy, threatening her Carthage - let Aeneas remain in Africa! The love of Dido and Aeneas, two exiles, begins, the most humane in all ancient poetry. They unite in a thunderstorm, during a hunt, in a mountain cave: lightning instead of torches, and the moans of mountain nymphs instead of a marriage song. This is not good, because a different fate is written for Aeneas, and Jupiter is watching this fate. He sends Mercury in a dream to Aeneas: "Don't you dare delay, Italy is waiting for you, and Rome is waiting for your descendants!" Aeneas suffers painfully. "The gods command - I will not leave you by my will! .." - he says to Dido, but for a loving woman these are empty words. She begs: "Stay!"; then: "Slow down!"; then: "Fear! If there is Rome and there is Carthage, then there will be a terrible war between your and my descendants!" In vain. She sees from the palace tower the distant sails of the Aeneas' ships, builds a funeral pyre in the palace and, climbing on it, rushes to the sword.

For the sake of an unknown future, Aeneas left Troy, left Carthage, but that's not all. His comrades were tired of wandering; in Sicily, while Aeneas is celebrating funeral games at the tomb of Anchises, their wives light Aeneas' ships in order to stay here and not sail anywhere. Four ships perish, the tired ones remain, on the last three Aeneas reaches Italy.

Here, near the foot of Vesuvius, is the entrance to the kingdom of the dead, here the decrepit prophetess Sibyl awaits Aeneas. With a magical golden branch in his hands, Aeneas descends underground: just as Odysseus asked the shadow of Tiresias about his future, so Aeneas wants to ask the shadow of his father Anchises about the future of his descendants. He swims across Hades' river Styx, because of which there is no return for people. He sees a reminder of Troy - the shadow of a friend mutilated by the Greeks. He sees a reminder of Carthage - the shadow of Dido with a wound in his chest; he speaks: "Against your will, I left the shore, queen! .." - but she is silent. To his left is Tartarus, sinners are tormented there: theomachists, parricides, perjurers, traitors. To his right are the fields of the Blessed, where his father Anchises is waiting. In the middle is the river of oblivion Aeta, and above it the souls whirl, who are destined to be cleansed in it and come into the world. Among these souls, Anchises points out to his son the heroes of the future Rome: both Romulus, the founder of the city, and Augustus, its revivalist, and legislators, and tyrant-fighters, and all who will establish the power of Rome over. the whole world. Each nation has its own gift and duty: the Greeks - thought and beauty, the Romans - justice and order:

This is a distant future, but on the way to it there is a near future, and it is not easy. “You suffered at sea - you will also suffer on land,” the Sibyl says to Aeneas, “a new war awaits you, a new Achilles and a new marriage - with a foreigner; you, in spite of trouble, do not give up and march more boldly!” The second half of the poem begins, after the Odyssey - the Iliad.

A day's journey from the Sibylline Hades places - the middle of the Italian coast, the mouth of the Tiber, the region of Latium. Here lives the old wise king Latin with his people - the Latins; next - a tribe of rutuls with a young hero Turnn, a descendant of the Greek kings. Here comes Aeneas; having landed, weary travelers dine, laying vegetables on flat cakes. Ate vegetables, ate cakes. "There are no tables left!" - jokes Yul, the son of Aeneas. “We are at the goal!” Aeneas exclaims. “The prophecy has come true:“ you will gnaw your own tables. ”We did not know where we were sailing - now we know where we sailed.” And he sends messengers to King Latinus to ask for peace, alliance and the hand of his daughter Lavinia. Latin is glad: the forest gods have long told him that his daughter will marry a stranger and their offspring will conquer the whole world. But the goddess Juno is furious - her enemy, the Trojan, has gained the upper hand over her strength and is about to raise a new Troy: "Be there war, be common blood between father-in-law and son-in-law! <...> If I do not bow the heavenly gods, I will raise hell!"

There is a temple in Latium; when the world - its doors are locked, when the war - open; with a push of his own hand, Juno opens the iron doors of war. On a hunt, Trojan hunters mistakenly hunted a tame royal deer, now they are not guests to the Latins, but enemies. King Latin in despair lays down power; young Thurn, who himself wooed the princess Lavinia, and now rejected, gathers a mighty army against the newcomers: here is the giant Mezentius, and the invulnerable Messap, and the Amazon Camilla. Aeneas is also looking for allies: he sails along the Tiber to where King Evander, the leader of the Greek settlers from Arcadia, lives on the site of the future Rome. Cattle graze in the future forum, thorns grow in the future Capitol, in a poor hut the king treats the guest and gives him four hundred fighters, led by his son, young Pallas, to help him. Meanwhile, the mother of Aeneas, Venus, goes to the forge of her husband Vulcan, so that he forges divinely strong armor for her son, as Achilles once did. On the shield of Achilles, the whole world was depicted, on the shield of Aeneas - the whole of Rome: a she-wolf with Romulus and Remus, the abduction of the Sabine women, the victory over the Gauls, the criminal Catiline, the valiant Cato, and, finally, the triumph of Augustus over Antony and Cleopatra, vividly remembered by readers of Virgil. "Aeneas is glad to see pictures on the shield, not knowing the events, and raises both the glory and the fate of his descendants with his shoulder."

But while Aeneas is far away, Turnn with the Italian army approaches his camp: "As ancient Troy fell, so let the new fall: for Aeneas - his fate, and for me - my fate!" Two Trojan friends, the brave and handsome Nis and Euryal, go on a night outing through the enemy camp to get to Aeneas and call on him for help. In the moonless darkness, with noiseless blows, they make their way among the sleeping enemies and go out onto the road - but here at dawn they are overtaken by an enemy siding. Euryalus is captured, Nis - one against three hundred - rushes to his rescue, but dies, both heads are raised on peaks, and the furious Italians go on the attack. Turnn sets fire to the Trojan fortifications, bursts into a breach, crushes dozens of enemies, Juno breathes strength into him, and only the will of Jupiter puts a limit to his success. The gods are excited, Venus and Juno blame each other for a new war and stand up for their favorites, but Jupiter stops them with a wave: if the war is started,

Meanwhile, Aeneas finally returns with Pallas and his detachment; young Askaniy-Yul, the son of Aeneas, rushes out of the camp on a sortie to meet him; the troops unite, the general battle boils, chest to chest, foot to foot, as once near Troy. The ardent Pallant rushes forward, performs feat after feat, finally converges with the invincible Turn - and falls from his spear. Turnn rips off his belt and baldric, and the body in armor nobly allows his comrades-in-arms to be taken out of the battle. Aeneas rushes to take revenge, but Juno saves Turnus from him; Aeneas converges with the fierce Mezentius, wounds him, the young son Mezentius Lavs shields his father with himself, both die, and the dying Mezentius asks to be buried together. The day ends, the two armies bury and mourn their fallen. But the war continues, and the youngest and most flourishing ones are still the first to die: after Nis and Euryal, after Pallas and Lavs, the turn of the Amazon Camilla comes. Growing up in the forests, devoted herself to the huntress Diana, she fights with a bow and an ax against the advancing Trojans and dies, struck down by a dart.

Seeing the death of his fighters, hearing the mournful sobs of old Latinus and young Lavinia, feeling the coming fate, Turn sends a messenger to Aeneas: "Take off the troops, and we will resolve our dispute by a duel." If Turnn wins, the Trojans leave to look for a new land, if Aeneas, the Trojans found their city here and live in alliance with the Latins. Altars have been erected, sacrifices have been made, oaths have been pronounced, two formations of troops stand on two sides of the field. And again, as in the Iliad, suddenly the truce breaks. A sign appears in the sky: an eagle flies into a flock of swans, snatches prey from it, but a white flock falls on the eagle from all sides, makes it throw the swan and puts it to flight. "This is our victory over the alien!" - shouts the Latin fortuneteller and throws his spear into the Trojan formation. The troops rush at each other, a general fight begins, and Aeneas and Turnn look in vain for each other in the fighting crowds.

And Juno looks at them from heaven, suffering, also feeling the coming fate. She turns to Jupiter with a final request:

"Whatever happens according to the will of fate and yours - but do not let the Trojans impose their name, language and character on Italy! Let Latius remain Latium and the Latins Latins! Troy perished - let the name of Troy perish!" And Jupiter answers her: "So be it." From the Trojans and Latins, from the Rutuli, the Etruscans and the Evander Arcadians, a new people will appear and spread their glory throughout the world.

Aeneas and Turnn found each other: "they collided, a shield with a shield, and the ether is filled with thunder." Jupiter stands in the sky and holds the scales with the lots of two heroes on two bowls. Turnn strikes with a sword - the sword breaks on the shield forged by Vulcan. Aeneas strikes with a spear - the spear pierces Turnu and the shield and shell, he falls, wounded in the thigh. Raising his hand, he says: “You won; the princess is yours; I don’t ask for mercy for myself, but if you have a heart, have pity on me for my father: you also had Anchises!” Aeneas stops with a raised sword - but then his eyes fall on the belt and baldric of Turn, which he removed from the murdered Pallas, Aeneev's short-lived friend. "No, you won't leave! Pallas takes revenge on you!" - exclaims Aeneas and pierces the heart of the enemy;

Thus ends the Aeneid.

M. L. Gasparov

The word "metamorphosis" means "transformation". There were a lot of ancient myths that ended with the transformation of heroes - into a river, into a mountain, into an animal, into a plant, into a constellation. The poet Ovid tried to collect all such metamorphosis myths that he knew; there were more than two hundred of them. He recounted them one by one, picking up, binding, inserting into each other; the result was a long poem entitled "Metamorphoses". It begins with the creation of the world - after all, when Chaos was divided into Heaven and Earth, this was already the first transformation in the world. And it ends literally yesterday: a year before the birth of Ovid, Julius Caesar was killed in Rome, a large comet appeared in the sky, and everyone said that it was the soul of Caesar who ascended to heaven, who became a god - and this is also nothing more than transformation.

This is how the poem moves from ancient to modern times. The more ancient - the more majestic, the more cosmic the described transformations: the world flood, the world fire. The flood was a punishment for the first people for their sins - the land became the sea, the surf hit the domes of the mountains, the fish swam between the tree branches, people on fragile rafts died of hunger. Only two righteous people were saved on the two-peak Mount Parnassus - the forefather Deucalion and his wife Pyrrha. The water subsided, a deserted and silent world opened up; with tears they prayed to the gods and heard the answer: "Toss the mother's bones behind your back!" With difficulty they understood: the common mother is the Earth, her bones are stones; they began to throw stones over their shoulders, and behind Deucalion, men grew out of these stones, and behind Pyrrha, women. Thus a new human race appeared on earth.

And the fire was not by the will of the gods, but by the audacity of an unreasonable teenager. The young Phaethon, the son of the Sun, asked his father: "They don't believe me that I am your son: let me ride across the sky in your golden chariot from the east to rolling up" Be your way, - answered the father, - but beware: do not correct either up or down, keep to the middle, otherwise there will be trouble!" And trouble came: at a height the young man's head was spinning, his hand trembled, the horses went astray, Cancer and Scorpio shied away from them in the sky, mountain forests from the Caucasus to Atlas, the rivers boiled from the Rhine to the Ganges, the sea dried up, the soil cracked, the light made its way into the black kingdom of Hades, - and then the old Earth itself, throwing up its head, begged Zeus: "If you want to burn it, burn it, but have mercy on the world, but there will be no new Chaos Zeus struck with lightning, the chariot collapsed, and a verse was written over the remains of Phaeton: "Here Phaeton is slain: daring for greatness, he fell."

The age of heroes begins, the gods descend to mortals, mortals fall into pride. The weaver Arachne challenges the goddess Athena, the inventor of weaving, Athena has the Olympic gods on her fabric, Poseidon creates a horse for people, Athena herself creates an olive, and around the edges are the punishments of those who dared to equal the gods: those turned into mountains, those into birds, those in the steps of the temple. And on Arachne's fabric - how Zeus turned into a bull to kidnap one beauty, a golden rain for another, a swan for a third, a snake for a fourth; how Poseidon turned into a ram, a horse, and a dolphin; how Apollo took the form of a shepherd, and Dionysus a vinedresser, and more, and more. The fabric of Arachne is no worse than the fabric of Athena, and Athena executes her not for work, but for blasphemy: she turns her into a spider that hangs in a corner and forever weaves a web. "Spider" in Greek - "arachne".

Zeus's son, Dionysus the vinedresser, goes around the world as a miracle worker and gives people wine. He punishes his enemies: the sailors who transported him across the sea decided to kidnap such a handsome man and sell them into slavery - but their ship stops, takes root in the bottom, ivy wraps around the mast, clusters hang from the sails, and the robbers bend their bodies, cover themselves with scales and jump like dolphins in the sea. And he endows his friends with anything, but they do not always ask for a reasonable one. The greedy King Midas asked: "May everything I touch become gold!" - and now golden bread and meat break his teeth, and golden water pours down his throat with molten metal. Stretching out his miraculous hands, he prays: "Ah, deliver me from the pernicious gift!" - and Dionysus with a smile orders: "Wash your hands in the river Paktol." The power goes into the water, the king eats and drinks again, and the Paktol river has been rolling golden sand ever since.

Not only the young Dionysus, but also the older gods appear among people. Zeus himself with Hermes in the guise of wanderers bypass human villages, but rude owners drive them away from the rapids. Only in one poor hut did they receive an old man and an old woman, Philemon and Baucis. The guests enter, bowing their heads, sit down on the matting, in front of them is a table with a lame leg propped up by a shard, instead of a tablecloth, its board is rubbed with mint, in clay bowls - eggs, cottage cheese, vegetables, dried berries. Here is wine mixed with water - and suddenly the owners see: a miracle - no matter how much you drink, it does not decrease in the bowls. Then they guess who is in front of them, and in fear they pray: "Forgive us, gods, for the wretched reception." In response to them, the hut is transformed, the adobe floor becomes marble, the roof rises on columns, the walls shine with gold, and the mighty Zeus says: "Ask for what you want!" "We want to remain in this temple of yours as a priest and priestess, and as we lived together, so we die together." And so it was; and when the time came, Philemon and Baucis, in front of each other, turned into oak and linden, only having time to say to each other "Farewell!".

Meanwhile, the age of heroes goes on as usual. Perseus kills the Gorgon, who turns to stone with a glance, and when he puts her severed head prostrate on the leaves, the leaves turn into corals. Jason brings Medea from Colchis, and she turns his decrepit father from an old man into a young one. Hercules fights for his wife with the river god Achelous, he turns into either a snake or a bull - and yet he is defeated. Theseus enters the Cretan Labyrinth and slays the monstrous Minotaur there; Princess Ariadne gave him a thread, he stretched it along the tangled corridors from the entrance to the middle, and then found his way back along it. This Ariadne was taken away from Theseus and made his wife by the god Dionysus, and he threw the crown from her head into the sky, and there it lit up with the constellation of the Northern Crown.

The builder of the Cretan Labyrinth was the Athenian Daedalus, a prisoner of the formidable King Minos, son of Zeus and father of the Minotaur. Daedalus languished on his island, but he could not run: all the seas were in the power of Minos. Then he decided to fly across the sky: "Minos owns everything, but he does not own the air!" Having collected bird feathers, he fastens them with wax, measures the length, aligns the bend of the wing; and his boy Icarus next to him either sculpts lumps of wax, or catches flying feathers. Big wings are ready for the father, small ones for the son, and Daedalus teaches Icarus: "Fly after me, keep to the middle: take it lower - the feathers will become heavy from the spray of the sea; take it higher - the wax will soften from the heat of the sun." They fly; the fishermen on the shores and the plowmen on the arable land look up at the sky and freeze, thinking that these are the gods from above. But again the fate of Phaethon is repeated: Icarus joyfully takes it up, the wax melts, feathers crumble, he grabs air with his bare hands, and now the sea is overflowing his lips, crying out to his father. Since then, this sea has been called the Icarian.

Just as Daedalus was a craftsman in Crete, so Pygmalion was a craftsman in Cyprus. Both of them were sculptors: they said about Daedalus that his statues could walk, about Pygmalion - as if his statue came to life and became his wife. It was a stone girl named Galatea, so beautiful that Pygmalion himself fell in love with her: he caressed the stone body, dressed, decorated, languished, and finally prayed to the gods:

"Give me a wife like my statue!" And the goddess of love Lfrodita responded: he touches the statue and feels softness and warmth, he kisses her, Galatea opens her eyes and at once sees a white light and the face of a lover. Pygmalion was happy, but his descendants were unhappy. He had a son, Kinyra, and Kinyra had a daughter, Mirra, and this Mirra fell in love with her father with incestuous love. The gods, in horror, turned into a tree, from the bark of which, like tears, fragrant resin oozes, still called myrrh. And when it was time to give birth, the tree cracked, and from the crack appeared a baby named Adonis. He grew up so beautiful that Aphrodite herself took him as her lover. But not for good: the jealous god of war Ares sent a wild boar on him while hunting, Adonis died, and a short-lived anemone flower grew from his blood.

And also Pygmalion had either a great-grandson, or a great-granddaughter, named either Kenida, or Keney. She was born a girl, the sea Poseidon fell in love with her, took possession of her and said: “Ask me for anything She answered: “So that no one else could dishonor me like you, I want to be a man!” She began these words with a female voice, ended with a male "And in addition, rejoicing at this desire of Kenida, God gave her male body invulnerability from wounds. At that time, the king of the Lapith tribe, a friend of Theseus, was celebrating a crowded wedding. The guests at the wedding were centaurs, half-humans, half-horses from neighboring mountains, wild and violent. Unusual Unfortunately, they got drunk and attacked women, the Lapiths began to defend their wives, the famous battle of the Lapiths with the centaurs began, which Greek sculptors liked to depict. uprooted pines and blocks of rocks. It was then that Kenei showed himself - nothing took him, the stones bounced off him like hail from the roof, spears and swords broke like granite. Then the centaurs began to throw tree trunks at him: "Let the wounds be replaced load!" - a whole mountain of trunks grew over his body and at first oscillated, as in an earthquake, and then subsided. And when the battle was over and the trunks were dismantled, then under them lay the dead girl Kenida,

The poem is nearing its end: old Nestor tells about the battle of the laliths with the centaurs in the Greek camp near Troy. Even the Trojan War is not complete without transformations. Achilles fell, and two carried his body out of the battle: the powerful Ajax carried him on his shoulders, the dexterous Odysseus repelled the attacking Trojans. The famous armor forged by Hephaestus remained from Achilles: who will get it? Ajax says: "I was the first to go to war; I am the strongest after Achilles; I am the best in open battle, and Odysseus is only in secret tricks; armor is for me!" Odysseus says: "But only I gathered the Greeks for war; only I attracted Achilles himself; only I kept the army from returning for the tenth year; mind is more important than strength; armor is for me!" The Greeks award the armor to Odysseus, the offended Ajax rushes to the sword, and a hyacinth flower grows from his blood, on which the spots form the letters "AI" - a mournful cry and the beginning of Ajax's name.

Troy fell, Aeneas sails with the Trojan shrines to the west, at each of his parking he hears stories of transformations, remembered in these distant lands. He wages war for Latium, his descendants rule in Alba, and it turns out that the surrounding Italy is no less rich in legends about transformations than Greece. Romulus founds Rome and ascends to heaven - he himself turns into a god; seven centuries later, Julius Caesar will save Rome in civil wars and also ascend as a comet - he himself will turn into a god. In the meantime, the successor of Romulus, Numa Pompilius, the wisest of the ancient Roman kings, listens to the speeches of Pythagoras, the wisest of the Greek philosophers, and Pythagoras explains to him and to the readers what are the transformations about which the stories were woven in such a long poem.

Nothing lasts forever, says Pythagoras, except for the soul alone. She lives, unchanged, changing bodily shells, rejoicing in new ones, forgetting about the old ones. The soul of Pythagoras once lived in the Trojan hero Euphorbus; he, Pythagoras, remembers this, but people usually do not remember. From human bodies, the soul can pass into the bodies of animals, and birds, and again people; therefore the wise will not eat meat.

And every flesh, every body, every substance is changeable. Everything flows: moments, hours, days, seasons, human ages change. The earth becomes thinner into water, water into air, air into fire, and again the fire condenses into thunderclouds, the clouds shed rain, the earth grows fat from the rain. The mountains were the sea, and sea shells are found in them, and the sea floods the once dry plains; rivers dry up and new ones break through, islands break off from the mainland and grow together with the mainland. Troy was mighty, and now in the dust, Rome is now small and weak, but will be omnipotent: "Nothing stands in the world, but everything is renewed forever."

It is about these eternal changes of everything that we see in the world that the old stories about transformations - metamorphoses remind us.

M. L. Gasparov

The heroes of this tragedy are two villainous kings from the city of Argos, Atreus and Fiesta. The son of this Atreus was the famous leader of the Greeks in the Trojan War, Agamemnon - the one who was killed by his wife Clytemnestra, and her son Orestes was killed for this (and Aeschylus wrote his "Oresteia" about this). When the Greeks asked why such horrors were, they answered: "For the sins of the ancestors." The series of these sins began a very long time ago.

The first sinner was Tantalus, the mighty king of Asia Minor. The gods themselves descended from heaven to feast in his palace. But Tantalus turned out to be wicked: he did not believe that the gods were omniscient, and decided to test them with a terrible test. He slaughtered his son Pelop, boiled it in a cauldron and served his meat to the table of the gods. The gods were indignant: they resurrected and healed Pelop, and cast Tantalus into Hades and executed him with "tantalum torments" - eternal hunger and thirst. He stands in the river under the shade of fruit branches, but he cannot eat or drink; when it reaches for the fruits, they escape; when it leans towards the water, it dries up.

The second sinner was that same Pelops, the son of Tantalus. From Asia Minor, he came to Southern Greece and recaptured it from the evil king, who forced the aliens to compete with him in a chariot race, and killed the defeated. Pelops defeated him by cunning: he bribed the royal driver, he took out the bushing that held the wheel on the axle, the chariot crashed, and the king died. But PeloP wanted to hide his cunning; instead of a reward, he pushed the royal charioteer into the sea, and he, falling, cursed both Pelops and all his descendants for treachery.

In the third generation, Atreus and Thyestes, the sons of Pelops, became sinners. They began to argue for power over Argos. In the Pelopov herd there was a golden-fleeced ram - a sign of royal power; Atreus inherited it, but Fiesta seduced Atreus' wife and stole the ram. Discord began, Fiesta was expelled and lived in misery, in poverty. The kingdom went to Atreus, but this was not enough for him: he wanted to take revenge on his brother for seducing his wife. He remembered Tantalus's cannibal feast: he decided to slaughter the children of Fiesta and feed Fiesta with their meat. And so he did; the gods were horrified, the Sun itself turned from the heavenly path so as not to see the terrible meal. This is what Seneca wrote his bloody tragedy.

Premonition of horrors begins from the very first lines. The shadow of Tantalus appears from the underworld, it is driven by Erinnia (in Latin - "fury"): "You slaughtered your son as food for the gods - now inspire your grandson to slaughter the sons of another grandson as food for his father!" - "Let me go - it's better to endure torture than to be tortured!" - "Do your job: let the sinners under the earth rejoice in their executions, let them know that it is more terrible on earth than in hell!" The faceless choir sings about the sins of Tantalus - now they multiply in his offspring.

An inspired thought comes to Atreus' mind: "The king is worthless, slowing down to take revenge! Why am I not yet criminal? Villainy awaits between brother and brother - who will be the first to reach out to him?" "Kill the fiesta," the adviser says. "No: death is mercy: I have planned more." - "What did you decide to destroy the fiesta?" - "The fiesta itself!" - "How will you lure him into captivity?" - "I will promise half the kingdom: for the sake of power he will come." - "Aren't you afraid of God's punishment?" - "Let the Pelops' house collapse on me - if only it collapsed on my brother." The choir, looking at this, sings: no, the king is not the one who is rich and powerful! the true king is the one who is alien to passions and fears, who is firm and calm in spirit.

Fiesta learned this in exile, but not completely. He bore the trouble, but he did not bear the hardships. He knows: "There is no kingdom greater than to be contented without kingdoms! Villainy lives in palaces - not in huts"; but in his heart is fear. "What are you afraid of?" the son asks. "Total," replies the fiesta, and nevertheless goes to Atreus. Atreus steps forward. "I'm glad to see my brother!" he says (and it's true). "Be king with me!" "Leave me in insignificance," replies Fiesta, "Are you giving up happiness?" - "Yes, because I know: happiness is changeable." - "Do not deprive me of the glory of sharing power!" Atreus says. "To be in power is an accident, to give power is valor." And Fiesta concedes. The choir is glad of the world, but reminds itself: joy does not last long.

As usual, the messenger tells about villainy. There is a dark grove dedicated to Pelops, where trunks groan and ghosts roam; there, at the altar, like sacrificial animals, Atreus slaughtered the fiesta sons - he cut off the head of one, cut the throat of another, pierced the heart of the third. The earth trembled, the palace shook, a black star rolled down from heaven. "Oh God!" the choir exclaims. No, the horror is ahead: the king cuts the bodies, the meat boils in the cauldron and hisses on the skewers, the fire does not want to burn under them, the smoke hangs over the house in a black cloud. The fiesta, who does not know trouble, feasts with his brother and marvels that a piece does not go down his throat, that his anointed hair stands on end. The chorus looks into the sky, where the Sun has turned back halfway, darkness rises from the horizon - isn't this the end of the world, won't the world mix up in a new Chaos?

Atreus triumphs: "It's a pity that the darkness and that the gods do not see my work - but it's enough for me that Fiesta sees him! Here he drinks the last cup, where the blood of his sons is mixed with wine. It's time!" The severed heads of the Fiesta children are brought in on a platter. "Do you recognize the sons?" "I recognize my brother! Oh, let me at least bury their bodies!" "They're already buried - in you." - "Where is my sword, so that I pierce myself?" - "Pierce - and pierce your sons." - "What are the sons guilty of?" "Because you are their father." - "Where is the measure of villainy?" - "There is a measure of crime - there is no measure of retribution!" - "Roar, gods, with lightning: let me myself become a funeral pyre for my sons!" "You seduced my wife - you yourself would have killed my children first if you didn't think they were yours." - "Gods-avengers, be the punishment of Atreus." - "And you eternal punishment - your sons in you!"

The choir is silent.

M. L. Gasparov

The hero of the novel Lucius (is it a coincidence with the author's name?!) travels around Thessaly. On the way, he hears fascinating and scary stories about witchcraft, transformations and other witch tricks. Lucius arrives in the Thessalian city of Hypata and stays at the house of a certain Milo, who is "stuffed with money, terribly rich, but utterly stingy and known to everyone as a vile and dirty man." Throughout the ancient world, Thessaly was famous as the birthplace of magical art, and soon Lucius is convinced of this from his own sad experience.

In the house of Milo, he begins an affair with the maid Photis, who reveals to her lover the secret of her mistress. It turns out that Pamphila (that's the name of Milo's wife) with the help of a wonderful ointment can turn into, say, an owl. Lucius passionately wants to experience this, and Photis eventually gives in to his requests: she assists in such a risky business. But, having secretly entered the mistress's room, she mixed up the drawers, and as a result, Lucius turns not into a bird, but into a donkey. He remains in this guise until the very end of the novel, knowing only that in order to turn back he needs to taste rose petals. But various obstacles stand in his way every time he sees another rose bush.

The newly-minted donkey becomes the property of a gang of robbers (they robbed the house of Milo), who use it, of course, as a pack animal: "I was more dead than alive, from the severity of such luggage, from the steepness of the high mountain and the length of the journey."

More than once on the verge of death, exhausted, beaten and half-starved, Lucius involuntarily participates in raids and lives in the mountains, in a den of robbers. There, daily and nightly, he listens and remembers (having turned into a donkey, the hero, fortunately, has not lost his understanding of human speech) more and more terrible stories about robber adventures. Well, for example, - a story about a mighty robber who dressed in a bearskin and in this guise entered the house chosen by his comrades for robbery.

The most famous of the inserted short stories of the novel is "Cupid and Psyche" - a marvelous tale about the youngest and most beautiful of the three sisters: she became the beloved of Cupid (Cupid, Eros) - an insidious archer.

Yes, Psyche was so beautiful and charming that the god of love himself fell in love with her. Transferred by the affectionate Zephyr to the fabulous palace, Psyche took Eros into her arms every night, caressing her divine lover and feeling that she was loved by him. But at the same time, the beautiful Cupid remained invisible - the main condition for their love meetings ...

Psyche persuades Eros to let her see her sisters. And, as always happens in such fairy tales, envious relatives incite her to disobey her husband and try to see him. And so, during the next meeting, Psyche, long consumed by curiosity, lights a lamp and, happy, joyfully looks at her beautiful husband sleeping next to her.

But then hot oil splashed from the wick of the lamp: “Feeling the burn, the god jumped up and, seeing the stained and broken oath, quickly freed himself from the hugs and kisses of his unfortunate wife and, without uttering a word, rose into the air.”

The goddess of love and beauty Venus, feeling a rival in Psyche, in every possible way pursues the chosen one of her arrow-bearing and capricious son. And with purely feminine passion, he exclaims: "So he really loves Psyche, my rival in self-proclaimed beauty, the thief of my name ?!" And then he asks two celestials - Juno and Ceres - "to find the escaped flyer Psyche", passing her off as her slave.

Meanwhile, Psyche, "moving from place to place, day and night anxiously looking for her husband, and more and more desires, if not with the caresses of her wife, then at least with slavish pleas to soften his anger." On her thorny path, she finds herself in a distant temple of Ceres and with industrious obedience wins her favor, And yet the goddess of fertility refuses to give her shelter, for she is connected with Venus "by the bonds of ancient friendship."

Juno also refuses to shelter her, saying: "Laws that prohibit patronizing foreign runaway slaves without the consent of their masters keep me from this." And at least it’s good that the goddesses didn’t betray Psyche to the angry Venus.

Meanwhile, she asks Mercury to announce, so to speak, the universal search for Psyche, announcing her signs to all people and deities. But Psyche at that time herself was already approaching the chambers of her indomitable and beautiful mother-in-law, deciding to surrender to her voluntarily and timidly hoping for mercy and understanding.

But her hopes are in vain. Venus cruelly taunts the unfortunate daughter-in-law and even beats her. The goddess, in addition to everything, is infuriated by the very thought of the prospect of becoming a grandmother: she is going to prevent Psyche from giving birth to a child conceived by Cupid: "Your marriage was unequal, besides, concluded in a country estate, without witnesses, without the consent of the father, he cannot be considered valid, so that an illegitimate child will be born from him, if I allow you to denounce him at all.

Then Venus gives Psyche three impossible tasks (which later became "eternal plots" of world folklore). The first of these is to sort out a myriad of rye, wheat, poppy, barley, millet, peas, lentils and beans - ants help Psyche do it. Also, with the help of the good forces of nature and local deities, she copes with the rest of the duties.

But Cupid, meanwhile, suffered in separation from his beloved, whom he had already forgiven. He turns to his father Jupiter with a request to allow this "unequal marriage". The chief Olympian called all the gods and goddesses, ordered Mercury to immediately deliver Psyche to heaven and, holding out a bowl of ambrosia to her, said: “Accept, Psyche, become immortal. May Cupid never leave your arms and may this union be forever and ever! "

And a wedding was played in heaven, at which all the gods and goddesses danced merrily, and even Venus, who had already become kinder by that time. "So Psyche was duly handed over to the power of Cupid, and when the time came, a daughter was born to them, whom we call Pleasure."

However, Zeus can be understood: firstly, he was not entirely disinterested, because for agreeing to this marriage he asked Cupid to find him another beauty on Earth for love pleasures. And secondly, as a man, not devoid of taste, he understood the feelings of his son ...

Lucius heard this touchingly tragic story from a drunken old woman who kept house in the robbers' cave. Thanks to the preserved ability to understand human speech, the hero turned into a donkey learned many other amazing stories, for he was almost constantly on the road, on which he came across many skillful storytellers.

After many misadventures, constantly changing owners (mostly evil and only occasionally good), Lucius the donkey eventually flees and finds himself one day on a secluded Aegean coast. And then, watching the birth of the Moon rising from the sea, he inspiredly addresses the goddess Selena, who has many names among different peoples: cruelty some deity, let me at least be given death, if life is not given! And the royal Isis (Egyptian name for Selene-Moon) appears to Lucius and points the way to salvation. It is no coincidence that this particular goddess in the ancient world was always associated with all the mysterious actions and magical transformations, rituals and mysteries, the content of which was known only to the initiates. During the sacred procession, the priest, warned in advance by the goddess, gives the unfortunate man the opportunity to finally taste the rose petals, and in front of the admiringly exalted crowd, Lucius regains his human form.

The adventure novel ends with a chapter on religious sacraments. And this happens quite organically and naturally (after all, we are always talking about transformations - including spiritual ones!).

After going through a series of sacred rites, knowing dozens of mysterious initiations and finally returning home, Lucius returned to the judicial activities of a lawyer. But, in a higher rank than before, and with the addition of sacred duties and positions.

Yu. V. Shanin

The text of the first adventurous (or picaresque) novel known in world literature has survived only in fragments: fragments of the 15th, 16th, and presumably 14th chapter. There is no beginning, there is no end, And in total, apparently, there were 20 chapters ...

The protagonist (the narration is being conducted on his behalf) is an unbalanced young man Encolpius, who has become proficient in rhetoric, is clearly not stupid, but, alas, not an impeccable person. He is hiding, fleeing punishment for robbery, murder, and, most importantly, for sexual sacrilege, which brought the wrath of Priapus, a very peculiar ancient Greek god of fertility, on him. (By the time of the novel, the cult of this god flourished in Rome. Phallic motifs are obligatory in the images of Priapus: many of his sculptures have been preserved)

Encolpius with fellow parasites Ascyltus, Giton and Agamemnon arrived in one of the Hellenic colonies in Campania (a region of ancient Italy). On a visit to the rich Roman horseman Lycurgus, they all "intertwined in pairs." At the same time, not only normal (from our point of view), but also purely male love is in honor here. Then Encollius and Ascyltus (still recently former "brothers") periodically change their sympathies and love situations. Askilt is fond of the cute boy Githon, and Encolpius hits on the beauty Tryphaena ...

Soon the action of the novel is transferred to the estate of the shipowner Likha. And - new love weaves, in which the pretty Dorida, the wife of Leah, also takes part. As a result, Encolpius and Giton have to urgently escape from the estate.

On the way, a dashing lover-rhetorician climbs onto a ship that has run aground, and manages to steal an expensive mantle from the statue of Isis and the helmsman's money. Then he returns to the estate to Lycurgus.

... Bacchanalia of Priapus' fans - wild "pranks" of Priapus harlots ... After many adventures, Encolpius, Giton, Ascyltus and Agamemnon end up at a feast in the house of Trimalchio - a wealthy freedman, a dense ignoramus who imagines himself to be very educated. He energetically rushes into the "high society".

Conversations at the feast. Stories about gladiators. The owner importantly informs the guests: "Now I have two libraries. One is Greek, the second is Latin." But it immediately turns out that in his head the famous heroes and plots of the Hellenic myths and the Homeric epic were mixed up in the most monstrous way. The self-confident arrogance of an illiterate owner is boundless. He graciously addresses the guests and at the same time, yesterday's slave himself, is unjustifiably cruel to the servants. However, Trimalchio is quick-witted...

On a huge silver platter, servants bring in a whole boar, from which thrushes suddenly fly out. They are immediately intercepted by birders and distributed to guests. An even grander pig is stuffed with fried sausages. Immediately there was a dish with cakes: “In the middle of it was Priapus made of dough, holding, as usual, a basket with apples, grapes and other fruits. We greedily pounced on the fruits, but already new fun increased the fun. fountains of saffron ... "

Then three boys bring in the images of the three Lares (the guardian gods of the home and family). Trimalchio reports: their names are the Procurer, the Lucky and the Baiter. To entertain those present, Niceroth, a friend of Trimalchio, tells a story about a werewolf soldier, and Trimalchio himself tells a story about a witch who stole a dead boy from the coffin and replaced the body with a fofan (straw stuffed animal).

Meanwhile, the second meal begins: blackbirds stuffed with nuts and raisins. Then a huge fat goose is served, surrounded by all sorts of fish and fowl. But it turned out that the most skillful cook (by the name of Daedalus!) created all this from ... pork.

“Then something began that is simply embarrassing to tell: according to some unheard-of custom, curly-haired boys brought perfume in silver bottles and rubbed them on the legs of those reclining, after entangling their shins, from the knee to the very heel, with flower garlands.”

The cook, as a reward for his art, was allowed to lie down at the table for a while with the guests. At the same time, the servants, serving the next dishes, were sure to sing something, regardless of the presence of voice and hearing. Dancers, acrobats and magicians also entertained the guests almost continuously.

Touched, Trimalchio decided to announce ... his will, a detailed description of the future magnificent tombstone and an inscription on it (of his own composition, of course) with a detailed listing of his titles and merits. Even more touched by this, he cannot refrain from delivering the corresponding speech: “Friends! And slaves - people: they are fed with the same milk as us. And it’s not their fault that their fate is bitter. However, by my grace, they will soon drink free water , I set them all free in my will<,..> I now announce all this so that the servants will love me now just as they will love me when I die.

The adventures of Encolpius continue. One day he wanders into the Pinakothek (art gallery), where he admires the paintings of the famous Hellenic painters Apelles, Zeuxis and others. Immediately he meets the old poet Eumolpus and does not part with him until the very end of the story (or rather, until the end known to us).

Eumolpus speaks almost continuously in verse, for which he was repeatedly stoned. Although his poetry was not bad at all. And sometimes very good ones. The prose outline of the "Satyricon" is often interrupted by poetic inserts ("The Poem of the Civil War", etc.). Petronius was not only a very observant and talented prose writer and poet, but also an excellent imitator-parodist: he masterfully imitated the literary style of his contemporaries and famous predecessors.

... Eumolpus and Encolpius are talking about art. Educated people have a lot to talk about. Meanwhile, the handsome Giton returns from Ascylt with a confession to his former "brother" Encolpius. He explains his betrayal by fear of Askilt: "For he possessed a weapon of such magnitude that the man himself seemed only an appendage to this structure." A new twist of fate: all three find themselves on Lich's ship. But not all of them are equally welcome here. However, the old poet restores the world. Then he entertains his companions with the "Tale of the Inconsolable Widow".

A certain matron from Ephesus was distinguished by great modesty and marital fidelity. And when her husband died, she followed him into the burial vault and intended to starve herself to death there. The widow does not give in to the persuasion of relatives and friends. Only a faithful servant brightens up her loneliness in the crypt and just as stubbornly starves, The fifth day of mourning self-torture has passed ...

"... At this time, the ruler of that region ordered, not far from the dungeon, in which the widow was crying over a fresh corpse, to crucify several robbers. And so that someone would not pull off the robber bodies, wanting to put them in burial, one soldier was placed on guard near the crosses. At night, he noticed that a rather bright light was pouring from somewhere among the tombstones, heard the groans of the unfortunate widow and, out of curiosity inherent in the whole human race, wanted to know who it was and what was happening there. beauty, as if before some miracle, as if coming face to face with the shadows of the afterlife, he stood for some time in confusion. Then, when he finally saw the dead body lying before him, when he examined her tears and her scratched face, this is only a woman who, after the death of her husband, cannot find peace for herself from grief. Then he brought his modest dinner to the crypt and began to convince the weeping beauty so that she would stop killing herself in vain and not torment her breasts with useless sobs.

After some time, a faithful maid joins the soldier's persuasion. Both convince the widow that it is too early for her to rush to the next world. Far from immediately, but the sad Ephesian beauty nevertheless begins to succumb to their admonitions. At first, exhausted by a long fast, she is seduced by food and drink. And after some time, the soldier manages to win the heart of a beautiful widow.

“They spent in mutual embraces not only this night, on which they celebrated their wedding, but the same thing happened the next, and even the third day. And the doors to the dungeon in case one of the relatives came to the grave and acquaintances, of course, were locked up so that it would seem as if this most chaste of wives died over the body of her husband.

Meanwhile, relatives of one of the crucified, taking advantage of the absence of guards, removed from the cross and buried his body. And when the amorous guard discovered this and, trembling with fear of the coming punishment, told the widow about the loss, she decided: "I prefer to hang the dead than to destroy the living." According to this, she gave advice to pull her husband out of the coffin and nail him to an empty cross. The soldier immediately took advantage of the sensible woman's brilliant thought. And the next day, all the passers-by wondered how the dead man climbed onto the cross.

A storm rises on the sea. Likh dies in the abyss. The rest continue to rush along the waves. Moreover, even in this critical situation, Eumolpus does not stop his poetic recitations. But in the end, the unfortunate escape and spend a restless night in a fishing hut.

And soon they all end up in Crotona - one of the oldest Greek colonial cities on the southern coast of the Apennine Peninsula. This, by the way, is the only geographical point specifically designated in the text of the novel available to us.

In order to live comfortably and carefree (as they are used to) and in a new city, adventure friends decide: Eumolpus will impersonate a very wealthy person, who is considering who to bequeath all his untold wealth. No sooner said than done. This enables resilient friends to live in peace, enjoying not only a warm welcome from the townspeople, but also unlimited credit. For many Crotonians counted on a share in the will of Eumolpus, and vying with each other tried to win his favor.

And again a series of love adventures follows, not so much as the misadventures of Encolpius. All his troubles are connected with the already mentioned wrath of Priapus.

But the Crotonians have finally seen the light, and there is no limit to their just anger. The townspeople are vigorously preparing reprisals against the cunning. Encolpius with Giton manages to escape from the city, leaving Eumolpus there.

The people of Croton deal with the old poet according to their ancient custom. When some disease raged in the city, the citizens kept and fed one of their compatriots for a year in the best way at the expense of the community. And then sacrificed:

this "scapegoat" was thrown from a high cliff. This is exactly what the Crotonians did with Eumolpus.

Yu. V. Shanim

The veracity of this legend is evidenced by the Bisutun rock with images carved on it, the ruins of Medain, traces of a milk stream, the passion of the unfortunate Farhad, the rumor about the ten-stringed saz of Barbad ...

In ancient Iran, not yet illuminated by the light of Islam, the just king Hormuz reigns. The Almighty will grant him a son, like a wonderful pearl caught from the "royal sea". His father names him Khosrov Parviz (Parviz - "Hanging at the chest" of court nurses).

Khosrow grows, matures, learns, comprehends all the arts, becomes eloquent. At ten years old, he is an invincible warrior, a well-aimed archer. At fourteen he began to think about the meaning of good and evil. The mentor Buzurg-Umid teaches the youth many wisdoms, reveals to him the secrets of earth and heaven. In the hope that longevity would be granted to such a worthy heir, the shah began to punish criminals, all lechers and robbers more severely. The country is prospering, but a misfortune happened... One day Khosrov, who had gone to the steppe to hunt, makes a halt in a green meadow. All night he drinks with friends, and in the morning he gets drunk. The prince's horse was caught by the inhabitants of a neighboring village for injury. One of Khusrau's slaves picks several bunches of unripe grapes in a strange vineyard, thinking that they are ripe. The Shah is informed that Khosrow is doing lawlessness and is not afraid of the king of kings. Hormuz orders that the sinews of the horse be cut, that the guilty slave be handed over to the owner of the vineyard, and the throne of the prince be transferred to the owner of the house that gave shelter to revelers. They break the legs of a musician who has disturbed the night's peace, and break the strings on the chang. Justice is one for all.

The penitent Khosrov puts on a shroud and, sword in hand, prostrates himself before his father's throne. The gray-haired elders cry out for forgiveness. The Shah's heart is touched. He kisses his son, forgives and appoints him as the leader of the army. The face of Khosrov now "radiates justice", "royal features" appear on his face. In a dream, he sees his great grandfather Anushirvan, announcing that he will be rewarded for the fact that his grandson humbled his pride. Having tasted sour grapes without a sour mine, he will receive in his arms a beauty, sweeter than whom the world has ever seen. Resigned to the loss of the horse, he will get the black horse Shabdiz. The hurricane will not overtake even the dust from under the hooves of this horse. In return for the throne given to the peasant, the prince will inherit the throne, similar to the "golden tree". Having lost the changist, Khosrow will find the marvelous musician Barbad...

Khosrov's friend Shapur, who traveled the world from the Maghreb to Lahore, Mani's rival in painting and the winner of Euclid in drawing, tells of miracles seen on the shores of the Derbent Sea. The formidable queen Shemira, also called Mekhin Banu, rules there. She commands Arran as far as Armenia, and the clanging of the weapons of her troops is heard in Isfahan. Mehin Banu does not have a husband, but she is happy. In blooming spring he lives in Mugan, in summer - in the Armenian mountains, in autumn he hunts in Abkhazia, in winter the queen is drawn to dear Barda. Only her niece lives with her. The girl's black eyes are a source of living water, the camp is a silvery palm tree, braids are "two blacks for collecting dates." Shapur enthusiastically depicts the beauty of a girl whose lips are sweetness itself, and her name is "Sweet" Shirin. Seventy moon-faced charmers from noble families serve Shirin, who lives in luxury. More precious than all the treasures is Mehin Banu - black as rock, the horse Shabdiz, hobbled with a golden chain. Khosrow, delighted with the story of his friend, loses sleep, thinks only of the unknown peri. Finally, he sends Shapur to Armenia for Shirin. Shapur rushes in the Armenian mountains, where the azure rocks are dressed in yellow and red clothes of flowers.

Dismounting at the walls of an ancient monastery, he listens to a wise monk who speaks of the birth of Shabdiz. Having learned from the monks that tomorrow there will be games of court beauties in the meadow, the skillful painter Shapur draws a portrait of Khosrov, ties the drawing to a tree and disappears. The beauties are feasting on the lawn, suddenly Shirin sees a portrait and spends several hours in contemplation. The girls, frightened that Shirin has gone mad, tear up the drawing and take the princess to another meadow. The next morning, Shirin finds a new drawing on the path. Morning again, and again Shirin finds a portrait of a beautiful young man and suddenly notices his own image in the drawing. Girlfriends promise Shirin to find out everything about the depicted handsome man. In the image of a magician, Shapur appears, who says that he portrayed the prince Khosrov Parviz in the portrait, but in life the prince is even more beautiful, because the portrait is "faithful to signs, but devoid of soul." Shapur describes the wisdom and valor of Khosrov, burning with passion for Shirin, invites her, saddling Shabdiz, to run to Khosrov and hands her a ring with the name of the prince. The enamored Shirin persuades Mehin Banu to free Shabdiz from the fetters. The next morning, leaving with her friends to hunt, she overtakes them and rushes on Shabdiz on the way to the Shah's capital Medain. But Mehin Banu, who dreamed of a future trouble, does not order to start the chase. In sorrow, the queen decides to wait for the return of Shirin. Meanwhile, Shirin, tired on the way, covered with "dust of forests and hills", tied her horse to a tree on a deserted lawn to bathe in the source.

Khusrau is in bad shape. The insidious enemy, wishing to quarrel between the prince and his father, minted dirhems with Khosrov's name and sent them around the cities. "The old wolf trembled before the young lion." Buzurg-umid offers Khosrov to leave the palace for a while, to get away from troubles and intrigues. Khosrov gallops along the road towards Armenia. Having made a stop on the lawn and leaving the slaves at a distance, he sees a horse, "decorated like a peacock, on a leash and a tender pheasant bathing in a paradise source." Suddenly, naked Shirin saw Khosrov in the moonlight and, ashamed, covered herself with the waves of her hair. The noble Khosrow turns away. The young man is in a traveling dress, but he looks so much like a prince from a portrait. Shirin decides that this is not the place for explanations. Khosrow looks back, but Shirin has already left on Shabdiz.

Desperate, the prince rushes to the Armenian kingdom. Shirin arrives at Medain and shows Khusrau's ring. Shabdiz is placed in the royal stable. Communicating with the servants as an equal, Shirin tells stories about himself. It becomes clear to her: the beautiful young man was Khosrow himself. Sad and resigned, Shirin refers to the will of Khosrov and orders the architect to build a castle for her in the mountains. The builder, bribed by envious women, chooses the hottest and most disastrous place. Nevertheless, Shirin moves to a new home with several maids. Meanwhile, Khosrov is in Armenia, the nobles come to him with offerings. Finally, Mehin Banu herself royally receives the guest. Khosrow agrees to spend the winter in Barda. Here he drinks "bitter wine and mourns for the Sweet". The feast sparkles with all colors. Wine jugs, viands, flowers, pomegranates and oranges… Shapur appears and tells Khosrov about how he persuaded Shirin to escape. Khosrow understands that the girl who bathed in the stream was Shirin, that now she is in Medain. He again sends Shapur for Shirin. Feasting with Mehin Banu, Khosrow spoke of Shirin. Upon learning that Shirin has been found, the queen gives Shapur Gulgun, the only horse capable of keeping up with Shabdiz. Shapur finds Shirin in the monastery, which seemed to him a dungeon, and takes her away on Gulgun. Khosrow learns of his father's death and, grieving, reflects on the vicissitudes of fate. He ascends to the throne of his father. At first, he pleases all the oppressed with his justice, but gradually moves away from public affairs. Every day he is on the hunt, not a moment passes without wine and fun. Yet his heart draws him to Shirin. The courtiers say that Shapur took her away. She is reminded of Shabdiz. Shah takes care of him, remembering the moon-faced one. Mehin Banu met Shirin affectionately, without reproach. She has already guessed the "signs of love" in both her niece and the young Shah. Shirin is again among her friends - indulging in the same pastimes ...

Meanwhile, Bahram Chubin, who has an iron will, having described the vices of Khosrov (including excessive love for Shirin) in secret messages, overthrows him from the throne. "The head is more valuable than the crown" - and Khosrow is saved on Shabdiz. He runs to the Mugan steppe, where he meets Shirin, who has gone hunting. They get to know each other, both shed tears of happiness. Shirin is unable to part with Khosrov. Shirin on interchangeable horses sends the news of the arrival of a noble guest. In the luxurious palace, Khosrow tastes the sweetness of communion with Shirin. Mehin Banu decided to "secure the brushwood from the fire." Shirin swears an oath to her not to be alone with Khosrov, to talk to him only in public. Khosrov and Shirin hunt together and have fun. One day, in the midst of a feast, a lion breaks into Khusrau's tent. The Shah kills the lion with a blow from his fist. Shirin kisses Khosrov's hand, he kissed his beloved on the lips... At the feast, the princess and her friends tell parables about love; Khosrow's heart rejoices, he yearns for intimacy with his beloved. She sees that "her chastity is about to be put to shame" and runs away from Khosrow's embrace. Their explanation is endless. Shirin tells Khosrow that defeating a woman is not a manifestation of courage, pacifying one's ardor is courage, and calls on him to regain his kingdom. Khosrow is offended by Shirin, because because of his love for her, he lost his kingdom. Having replaced the crown with a helmet, Khosrow on Shabdiz gallops to Constantinople to the Roman Caesar. Caesar is pleased with this success and gives his daughter Mariam as the shah. With an innumerable Rumian army, Khosrow sets out on a campaign and utterly defeats Bahram Chubin, who flees to Chin (China). Once again Khosrow reigns in Median. In his palace is young Mariam, but for Shirin's hair he is ready to give a hundred kingdoms, like rich Khotan. Days pass in regrets and memories, and Shirin, having parted with Khosrov, lives "without a heart in his chest." Mehin Banu dies, having handed Shirin the keys to the treasures. Shirin's board is generous. The subjects rejoice, the prisoners are free, taxes from the peasants and the tax levied at the city gates are abolished, cities and villages are well-organized. But the queen yearns for Khosrov and asks the caravaners about him. Learning about Khosrov's success, she rejoices, distributes jewelry to people, but, having heard about Mariam, she marvels at the inconstancy of her heart ... Mariam is strict, she made Khosrov swear allegiance even in Rum. Shirin, grieving, transfers power to a close associate, travels to Medain, settles in his red-hot castle and sends a message to Khosrov, but the lovers are afraid of Mariam and cannot see each other ...

Longing for Shirin deprives Khosrov of strength, and he orders the musician and singer Barbad to appear at the feast. Barbad sings thirty songs, and for each song Khosrow gives him a pearl robe. Khosrow dares to ask Miriam for indulgence towards Shirin, but Mariam's mouth is bitterer than poison. She replies that Khosrov will not be able to taste halva, let him be content with dates! And yet one day he decides to send Shapur for Shirin. But Shirin refuses secret dates. The beauty, who lives in the "heart-pressing" valley, drinks only milk, sheep and mare, but it is difficult to deliver it, because poisonous grass grows in the gorge, like a snake's sting, and the shepherds drove away their herds and herds. The maids get tired delivering milk, we should shorten their path. Shapur tells about the architect Farhad, young and wise. They studied together in Chin, but "he threw the brushes to me, he got the cleaver." Farhad was introduced to Shirin. Punching mountains, he himself looks like a mountain. The body is like an elephant, and in this body is the strength of two elephants. Shirin spoke with Farhad, and even Plato can lose his senses from the sounds of her voice. Shirin talks about his business: it is necessary to lay a canal in stones from a distant pasture to the castle, so that milk will flow here by itself. Shirin's wish is a command for Farhad. Under the blows of his pickaxe, the stones become wax. For a month, Farhad cuts a channel in the rocks and lays it out with hewn stones. Seeing Farhad's work, Shirin praises him, makes him sit taller than his entourage, gives expensive earrings with stones, but farhad puts gifts at Shirin's feet and leaves for the steppe, shedding tears.

Longing for Shirin in the evenings, Farhad comes to a milk stream and drinks sweet milk. The rumor about the fate of the architect passes from mouth to mouth, and it reaches the ears of Khosrov. He felt a strange joy when he learned that another madly in love had appeared, but jealousy prevailed. He calls on Farhad and argues with him, but farhad is unable to renounce his dream of Shirin. Then Khosrov offers Farhad to break a passage through the granite mountain Bisutun for the glory of Shirin. Farhad agrees, but on the condition that Khosrow renounces Shirin. The work is unbearable, but the master immediately begins to work. First of all, he carved the image of Shirin on the rock, depicted Khosrov riding Shabdiz. Crushing rocks, cutting into a mountain, farhad sacrifices his life. Shirin visits him at Mount Bisutun, welcomes him, gives him a bowl of milk. Horse Shirin stumbled in the mountains. Farhad carries Shirin along with her horse all the way to the castle. And he goes back to his work. Khosrow is devastated by the news of Shirin's meeting with Farhad, he is informed that the work is close to completion. The advisers suggest that he send a messenger to Farhad with the news of Shirin's death. Hearing about this, Farhad in desperation throws the pick into the sky, and as it falls, it breaks his head. Khosrow writes Shirin a letter expressing feigned condolences. Mariam dies. Out of respect for her rank, Khosrow maintains a full period of mourning, continuing to dream of the unbending Shirin. To "spur" her, he decided to resort to tricks: you need to find another lover. Hearing about the charms of the Isfahan beauty Shakar, he goes to Isfahan.

Feasting with Khosrov, Shakar every time waits for his intoxication and replaces himself with a slave at night. Convinced of the chastity of the beauty, Khosrow marries her, but soon, having had enough, he exclaims:

"I can't live without Shirin! How long can you fight with yourself?" At the head of a magnificent procession, Khosrow, under the pretext of hunting, rushes to the possessions of Shirin. Seeing her beloved, Shirin loses consciousness, but Khosrov is drunk, and, fearing him, ashamed of rumors, she orders the castle doors to be closed. A brocade tent was pitched for Khosrov, refreshments were sent, from the fortress wall Shirin threw rubies under the hooves of Shabdiz, showered pearls on Khosrov's head. Their long conversation, full of reproaches, threats, arrogant pride and love, does not lead to peace. Shirin reproaches Khosrov: he had fun when Shapur worked with a pen, and Farhad with a pick. She is proud, and outside of marriage, the Shah does not get what he wants. Khosrow drives away in anger, complaining to Shapur along the way. He is humiliated. Shapur calls for patience. After all, Shirin is exhausted. Truly she suffers because Khosrow has abandoned her. Shirin abandons his castle and arrives in the rags of a slave at Khosrov's camp. Shapur triumphantly leads her to a magnificent tent, and he hurries to Khosrov, who has just woken up. In a dream, he saw that he took a burning lamp in his hands. Interpreting the dream, Shapur foreshadows Khosrov's bliss with Shirin.

Khosrow feasts and listens to the musicians. Shirin, the mistress of Khosrov, appears in the tent and falls at his feet like a slave. Shirin and Khosrov are attracted to each other like a magnet and iron, and yet the beauty is impregnable. The shah tells the astrologers to calculate an auspicious day for the marriage. A horoscope is being drawn up. Khosrow brings Shirin to Medain, where the wedding is being celebrated. Shirin invites Khosrov to forget the wine, because from now on she is for him both a cup of wine and a cupbearer. But he comes to the bedchamber drunk to the point of insensibility. Shirin sends an elderly relative to Khosrow to make sure that he is able to distinguish the moon from the clouds. Terrified, Khosrow sobers up in the blink of an eye. In the morning he is awakened by Shirin's kiss. The lovers are finally happy, they reach the peak of their desires, and the next night and day they sleep soundly. Humayun Khosrov gives the beauty to Shapur, Nakisa, a musician and nobleman, became Humeyla's husband, Samanturk was given to Barbad. Buzurg-Umid married a Khotan princess. Shapur also received the entire kingdom of Mechin Banu. Khosrow is blissful, spending time in the arms of Shirin. Now he plays backgammon, sitting on a golden throne, then he rides Shabdiz, then he eats the honey of Barbad's game. But jasmine gray hair had already appeared in dark violet hair. He thinks about the frailty of existence. Shirin, a wise mentor, guides Khosrow on the path of justice and wisdom. Shah listens to the parables and teachings of Buzurg-Umid and repents of his deeds. He is already ready with a light heart to part with the insidious world. Shiruye, his unlucky and wicked son from Mariam, brings grief to Khosrov. Khosrow secludes himself in the temple of fire, Shiruye seizes the throne, Only Shirin is allowed to the prisoner and consoles him. Shiruye mortally wounds his father, Khosrow dies, bleeding and not daring to disturb the sleep of Shirin, who is sleeping next to him. Shirin wakes up and, seeing a sea of ​​blood, weeps. Having washed the body of the Shah with camphor and rose water, having dressed him, she herself puts on everything new. The parricide wooed Shirin, but, having buried Khosrov, she struck herself with a dagger in the tomb of her beloved.

M. I. Sinelnikov

A successful, hospitable, generous ruler of the Amir tribe lives in Arabia. He is "glorious, like a caliph", but like a "candle without light", for he is devoid of offspring. Finally, Allah heeded his prayers and gave him a wonderful son. The baby is entrusted to the nurse, and time pours "milk of tenderness" into the growing child. Case - that was the name of the boy, which means in Arabic "Measure of talent", excels in learning. Several girls study with the boys. One of them soon became famous for her intelligence, spiritual purity, rare beauty. Her curls are like night, and her name is Layla ("Night"). Case, "having stolen her heart, ruined his soul." The love of children is mutual. Fellow students learn arithmetic, meanwhile lovers compose a dictionary of love. Love cannot be hidden. Case is exhausted from love, and those who did not stumble on her path called him Majnun - "Mad". Fearing gossip, the relatives hid Layla from Majnun. Weeping, he wanders the streets and the bazaar. Moaning, he sings the songs he composed. And after him everyone shouts: "Madman! Madman!" In the morning, Majnun leaves for the desert, and at night secretly makes his way to the house of his beloved to kiss the locked door. Once, with several faithful friends, Majnun comes to the tent of his beloved. Layla takes off the veil, revealing her face. Majnun complains to her about the evil fate. From fear of the intrigues of rivals, they look at each other aloofly and do not know that fate will soon deprive them of even this single look.

After consulting with the elders of the tribe, Majnun's father decided "to redeem the ornaments of foreigners at the cost of hundreds of ornaments." At the head of a magnificent caravan, he solemnly goes to the Leili tribe - to woo a beautiful woman for his son. But Layla's father rejects the matchmaking: Case is noble by birth, but insane, marriage with a madman does not bode well. Relatives and friends admonish Majnun, offer him hundreds of beautiful and rich brides in exchange for Layla. But Majnun leaves his home and in rags with a cry of "Layli! Leyli!" runs through the streets, wanders in the mountains and in the sands of the desert. Saving his son, the father takes him with him to the Hajj, hoping that the worship of the Kaaba will help in trouble, but Majnun prays not for his healing, but only for the happiness of Layla. His illness is incurable.

The Leyli tribe, indignant at the gossip of the nomads, the "vanity", from which the beauty "as if in the heat", hardened. The military leader of the tribe draws his sword. Death threatens Majnun. His father is looking for him in the desert to save him, and finds him in some ruins - a sick man possessed by an evil spirit. He takes Majnun home, but the madman escapes, rushing only to the desired Nejd, the homeland of Leyla, On the way he composes new gazelles.

Meanwhile, Layla is in despair. Unbeknownst to her family, she climbs onto the roof of the house and looks at the road all day, hoping that Majnun will come. Passers-by greet her with beloved poems. She responds to verses with verses, as if "jasmine sends a message to the cypress." One day, walking in a blooming garden, Leyli hears someone's voice singing a new gazelle: "Majnun is suffering, but Leyli ... In what spring garden is she walking?" A friend, shaken by Layla's sobs, tells her mother about everything. Trying to save their daughter, Leyla's parents sympathetically accept the matchmaking of a wealthy young man, Ibn Salam.

The mighty Naufal found out about the sorrows of Majnun and was filled with compassion for him. He invited the unfortunate wanderer to his place, kindly, offered help. Majnun promises to pull himself together and wait patiently. He is cheerful, drinks wine with a new friend and is reputed to be the wisest in the assembly of sages. But days pass, patience runs out, and Majnun tells Naufal that if he does not see Leili, he will lose his life. Then Naufal leads a select army into battle and demands Layla from her tribe, but he failed to win the bloody battle. Unable to hear the lamentations of the discouraged Majnun, Naufal gathers his army again and finally wins. However, even now Layla's father is ready to prefer even his own slavery and the death of his daughter to her marriage to a madman. And those close to Naufal are forced to agree with the old man. Naufal leads his army away in sorrow. Having lost hope, Majnun disappears. He wanders for a long time in the sands of the desert, finally comes to a beggar old woman who leads him on a rope and collects alms. In a state of complete madness, Majnun gets to Layla's native places. Here his relatives found him and, to their great despair, were convinced that they "forgotten both dwellings and ruins", everything was erased from memory, except for the name of Leyli.

With a huge ransom, with rare gifts from Byzantium, China and Taif, the messenger of Ibn Salam comes to Leyla's father. They played a wedding, and Ibn Salam took Leyli to his house. But when the lucky man tried to touch the newlywed, he received a slap in the face. Leili is ready to kill her unloved husband and die. Ibn Salam, in love, agrees to confine himself to "seeing her." Majnun learns about Leyli's marriage, the messenger also tells him about Leyli's sadness and chastity. Majnun is confused. The unfortunate father dreams of finding a medicine that would heal his son. Looking into the face of the old man who came to him, Majnun does not recognize his own father. After all, he who forgets himself will not be able to remember others. The father names himself, cries with his son and calls him to courage and prudence, but Majnun does not heed him. The desperate father woefully says goodbye to the doomed madman. Soon, Majnun learns about the death of his father from a stranger, who reminded that "besides Layla, there are relatives." Day and night Majnun cries at the grave and asks for forgiveness from the "star that bestowed light." From now on, wild animals of the desert became his friends. Like a shepherd with a flock, Majnun walks in a crowd of predators and shares with them the offerings of the curious. He sends his prayers to heaven, to the hall of the Most High, prays to the stars. Suddenly he receives a letter from Layla. The beauty handed her message to the messenger with bitter words: "I am madder than a thousand Majnuns." Majnun reads a message in which Layli speaks of her pity for her friend of children's games, who is tormented because of her, assures her of her fidelity, chastity, mourns her father Majnun as her own, calls for patience. Leyli writes: "Do not be sad that you have no friends, am I not your friend?" Hurrying, Majnun writes a reply letter. Leyli looked at Majnun's message and watered it with tears. The letter is crowded with words of love and impatience, reproaches and envy for the lucky Ibn Salam, who at least sees the face of Leyla. "The balm will not heal my wound," Majnun writes, "but if you are healthy, there is no sorrow."

Majnun is visited by his uncle Selim Amirit in the desert. Fearing the animals surrounding the nephew, he greets him from afar. He brought Majnun clothes and food, but the halvah and biscuits also go to the beasts.

Majnun himself eats only herbs. Selim seeks to please Majnun, tells a parable in which the same hermit is praised. Delighted by the understanding, Majnun asks to tell about the affairs of his friends, inquires about the health of his mother: "How does that bird with broken wings live? .. I long to see her noble face." Feeling that the voluntary exile loves his mother, Selim brings her to Majnun. But the tearful complaints of the mother, who bandaged her son's wounds and washed his head, are powerless. "Leave me with my sorrows!" - Majnun exclaims and, falling, kisses the ashes at the mother's feet. With tears, the mother returned home and said goodbye to the mortal world. This sad news is brought to him by the contrite Selim. Majnun sobbed like the strings of a chang and fell to the ground like glass on a stone. He cries at the graves of his parents, his relatives bring him to his senses, try to detain him in his native land, but Majnun runs away to the mountains with groans. Life, even if it lasted a thousand years, seems to him a moment, because "its basis is death."

Like a snake's tail, a string of disasters stretches behind Leyla. The husband guards her and mourns his fate. He tries to caress Leyli, to please her, but she is stern and cold. The elder who came to the house tells about the fate of the one who "shouts like a herald and wanders through the oases", calling on his beloved. Layla's cypress camp became "reed" from her sobs. Having given the old man her pearl earrings, she sends him for Majnun.

The wanderer lies at the foot of the mountain, surrounded by animals, guarding him like a treasure. Seeing the old man from afar, Majnun rushed to him, "like a child to milk." Finally, he is promised a date in a palm grove. "How can a thirsty man escape from the Euphrates? How can the wind fight against ambergris?" Majnun sits under a palm tree in the agreed place and waits for Layla. Leili, accompanied by the old man, goes, but stops ten steps from her beloved. She does not love her husband, but is incapable of treason. He asks Majnun to read poetry, Majnun sang for Layla. He sings that she seems to him a mirage, a spring that only a thirsty traveler dreams of. There is no longer faith in earthly happiness... Again Majnun rushes into the desert, and the gloomy Leyli returns to her tent. Songs about unhappy love of Majnun were heard by the noble young man Salam of Baghdad, who had experienced a sublime feeling. Salam finds Majnun and offers him his service. He longs to hear the songs of Majnun and asks to consider himself one of the tamed animals. Affectionately greeting Salam, Majnun tries to reason with him. He who is tired of himself will not get along with anyone except animals. Salam pleads not to reject his help. Majnun condescends to prayers, but is unable to accept the delicious treat. Salam consoles Majnun. After all, he himself experienced a similar feeling, but burned out; "When youth passes, the fiery furnace cools down." Majnun in response calls himself the king of the kings of love. Love is the meaning of his whole life, it is irresistible, The interlocutor is ashamedly silent. For several days, new friends travel together, but Salam cannot live without sleep and bread, and now he says goodbye to Majnun, goes to Baghdad, "loading his memory with many qasidas."

Leili is like a treasure that guards snakes. She pretends to be cheerful with Ibn Salam, but weeps alone and, exhausted, falls to the ground.

Ibn Salam fell ill. The healer restored his strength, but Ibn Salam does not listen to the healer's advice. The body, exhausted by "the first disease, the second disease passed to the wind." The soul of Ibn Salam "got rid of worldly torments."

Layla, saddened, mourns him, although she has gained the desired freedom. But, grieving for the departed, in her soul she remembers her beloved. According to the custom of the Arabs, Leyli was left alone in her tent, because now she has to stay at home for two years, not showing her face to anyone. She got rid of the pesky visitors, and, alas, now she has a legitimate reason to cry. But Leili mourns another grief - separation from her beloved. She prays: "Lord, unite me with my light, from the fire of whose suffering I burn!"

In the days of leaf fall, bloody drops flow from the leaves, the "face of the garden" turns yellow. Layla is sick. As if from a high throne, she fell "into the well of affliction." She, alone, "swallowed grief" and is now ready to part with her soul. Layli knows one thing: Majnun will come to her grave. Saying goodbye to her mother, the dying woman leaves Majnun in her care.

Majnun's tears over Layla's grave are inexhaustible, as if a downpour gushed from dark clouds. He whirls in a crazy dance and composes verses about eternal separation, But "soon, soon, soon" Allah will connect him with the departed. Only two or three more days Majnun lived in such a way that "death is better than that life." He dies, hugging the grave of his beloved. Loyal wolves guard his decayed bones for a long time, the Tribe of Majnun learns of his death. After mourning the sufferers, the Arabs bury him next to Leyli and plant a flower garden around the graves. Lovers come here, here the suffering are healed of ailments and sorrows.

M. I. Sinelnikov

Denmark was once ruled by a king from the glorious family of the Scyldings named Hrodgar. He was especially successful in wars with his neighbors and, having accumulated great wealth, he decided to perpetuate the memory of himself and his reign. He decided to build a magnificent banquet hall for the royal squad. Hrodgar spared neither strength nor money for the construction, and the most skillful craftsmen built a hall for him, which was not equal in the whole wide world. As soon as the decoration of the marvelous hall was completed, Hrothgar began to feast in it with his warriors, and the whole neighborhood resounded with the ringing of expensive goblets and the songs of royal singers. But the merry festivities of the glorious Hrothgar did not last long, foamy beer and golden honey did not flow long, cheerful songs did not sound for long ... The noise of King Hrothgar's feasts reached the lair of the terrible huge monster Grendel, who lived nearby in fetid swamps. Grendel hated people, and their fun aroused anger in him... And then one night this monster crept silently to the hall of Hrothgar, where, after a long wild feast, careless warriors settled down to rest... Grendel grabbed thirty knights and dragged him to his lair. In the morning, the cries of horror were replaced by cliques of merriment, and no one knew where the terrible disaster came from, where Hrodgar's knights had gone. After much contrition and conjecture, carelessness prevailed over fears and fears, and Hrodrap with his warriors again started feasts in the wondrous hall. And disaster struck again - the monstrous Grendel began to carry away several knights every night. Soon everyone already guessed that it was Grendel who invaded the hall at night and kidnapped peacefully sleeping warriors. No one dared to engage in single combat with a wild monster. Hrodgar prayed in vain to the gods to help him get rid of a terrible scourge. The feasting in the hall ceased, the fun ceased, and only Grendel occasionally climbed there at night in search of prey, sowing horror around,

The rumor of this terrible disaster reached the land of the Gauts (in southern Sweden), where the glorious king Hygelak ruled. And now the most famous knight of Higelak, the hero Beowulf, declares to his master that he wants to help King Hrothgar and will fight the monstrous Grendel. Despite all attempts to dissuade him from his plan, Beowulf equips the ship, selects fourteen of the most courageous warriors from his squad and sails to the shores of Denmark. Encouraged by happy omens, Beowulf makes landfall. Immediately, a coast watchman drives up to the aliens, asks them about the purpose of their arrival and hurries up with a report to King Hrothgar. Beowulf and his comrades, meanwhile, put on armor, dismantle weapons and, along a road paved with colorful stones, head to the banquet hall of King Hrothgar. And anyone who sees the warriors who sailed from the sea marvels at their strong build, fancy helmets decorated with images of boars, sparkling chain mail and wide swords, heavy spears that the heroes carry with ease. The overseas squad is met by Wulfgar, one of King Hrothgar's close associates. After questioning them, he reports to the king - they say, important guests have arrived, the leader calls himself Beowulf. Hrothgar knows this glorious name, he knows that the valiant Beowulf is equal in strength to thirty mighty knights, and the king orders the guests to be called soon, hoping that deliverance from the great misfortune has come with them. Wulfgar conveys royal greetings and an invitation to a feast to visiting guests.

Beowulf and his retinue, with their spears in a corner, folding their shields and swords, in the same helmets and armor follow Wulfgar; only two warriors remain to guard the weapons. Beowulf greets Hrodgar with a bow and says that, they say, I am the native nephew of the Gaut king Hygelak, having heard about the disasters suffered by the Danes from the terrible Grendel, I sailed to fight the monster. But, deciding on this feat, Beowulf asks the king that only he and his comrades be allowed to go to the monster; in the event of the death of Beowulf, so that his armor (better than which there is none in the whole wide world, for the blacksmith Vilund is more blacksmith) was sent to King Higelak. Hrodgar thanks Beowulf for his willingness to help and tells him in detail how Grendel climbed into his hall and how many knights he killed. Then the king invites Beowulf and his companions to a common feast and offers to refresh themselves with honey. At the command of the king, the bench at the table is immediately cleared for the Gauts, the servants regale them with honey and beer, and the singer delights their ears with a cheerful song.

Seeing with what honor Hrothgar accepts strangers, many of the Danes begin to look at them with envy and discontent. One of them, named Unferth, dares even to turn to Beowulf with impudent speeches. He recalls the reckless competition between Beowulf and Breka, their attempt to overcome the waves of the menacing sea. Then Breka won the competition, which is why it is scary for the life of Beowulf if he stays overnight in the hall. Astonishing with the wisdom of all those present, Beowulf responds to the unreasonable words of Unferth. He explains that the voyage was only meant to protect sea lanes from monsters, and that there was no actual competition. In turn, wanting to test Unferth's courage, Beowulf invites him to stay overnight in the hall and keep the defense from Grendel. Unfert falls silent and no longer dares to bully, and noise and fun again reign in the hall.

The feast would have continued for a long time, but King Hrothgar reminds that the guests will have a night battle, and everyone gets up, saying goodbye to the daredevils. Parting, Hrothgar promises Beowulf that if he saves the Danes from a serious misfortune, he can demand everything he wants, and any desire will be immediately fulfilled. When the people of Hrothgar left, Beowulf orders the doors to be locked with strong bolts. Getting ready for sleep, he takes off his armor and remains completely unarmed, because he knows that no weapon will help in the battle with Grendel and you need to rely only on your own strength. Beowulf is fast asleep. Exactly at midnight, the monstrous Grendel creeps up to the hall, instantly knocks out heavy bolts and greedily pounces on the sleeping Gauts. So he grabbed one of them, tore the body of the unfortunate man and swallows the prey in huge pieces. Having dealt with the first, Grendel is already ready to devour the other warrior. But then a powerful hand grabs him by the paw, so much so that the crunch of bones is heard. Distraught with fear, Grendel wants to run away, but it was not there, the mighty Beowulf jumps from the bench and, without releasing the monster's paw, rushes at him. A terrible battle begins. Everything around cracks and collapses, the awakened warriors are horrified. But Beowulf gains the upper hand, he tightly grabbed Grendel's paw, not allowing him to wriggle out. Finally, the cartilage and veins in the monster’s shoulder can’t stand it and are torn, the monster’s paw remains in Beowulf’s hand, and Grendel breaks out of the hall and runs, bleeding, to die in his swamps.

There is no end to the rejoicing. All the Danish warriors, led by the unfert, are respectfully silent while Beowulf calmly talks about the night battle. All the tables are overturned, the walls are spattered with the monster's blood, and its terrible paw is lying on the floor. The grateful King Hrothgar, a connoisseur of ancient tales, composes a song in memory of this battle. And the feast begins. The king and queen bring rich gifts to Beowulf - gold, precious weapons and horses. Healthy songs rumble, beer and honey flow like water. Finally, having celebrated the victory, everyone calmly settles down for the night in a marvelous hall. And again trouble struck. The monstrous mother of Grendel appears at midnight to avenge her son. She bursts into the hall, all the sleeping ones jump up from their seats, from fright without even having time to get dressed. But Grendel's mother is also frightened by so many people and, grabbing only one warrior, rushes away. In the morning, there is no limit to grief - it turns out that Hrothgar's favorite adviser Esker has died. The king promises to generously reward Beowulf, tearfully begging him to chase the monster into the swamps, where no one had dared to go before. And now the squad, led by Hrodgar and Beowulf, goes to the deadly swamp.

Dismounting, they make their way to the edge of the swamp where the trail of blood is most clearly visible. Nearby, on the shore, lies the head of poor Esker. The water is teeming with sea monsters, one of them is overtaken by an arrow from Beowulf. Turning to Hrodgar, Beowulf asks, if he is destined to die, to send all the gifts to King Hygelak. Then, taking the ancient famous sword, the hero jumps into the pool, and the waves hide him. Beowulf sinks all day, and sea monsters cannot harm him, for he is wearing impenetrable armor. Finally, the hero reaches the bottom, and immediately Grendel's mother pounces on him. Beowulf beats her with a sword, but the thick scales are not inferior to ordinary steel. The monster jumps on Beowulf, crushes him with all his weight, and it would be bad for the knight if he did not remember in time about the huge ancient sword forged by the giants. Deftly emerging from under the monster, he grabs a sword and slashes Grendel's mother with all his might on the neck. One blow decided the matter, the monster falls dead at the feet of Beowulf. As a trophy, Beowulf takes the head of the monster with him, he wants to take the ancient sword, but only the hilt remained of the sword, for it melted as soon as the battle ended.

Beowulf's comrades have already despaired of seeing him alive, but then he appears from the bloody waves. That evening the guests sat noisily and merrily at the table of King Hrothgar, feasted long after midnight, and went to bed, fearing nothing now. The next day, the Gauts began to go home. After generously endowing each, King Hrothgar bid them farewell cordially. Upon Beowulf's return, honor and respect awaited everywhere, songs were composed about his feat, goblets rang in his honor. King Hygelak gave him the best of his swords, lands, and a castle for life.

Many years have passed since then. King Hygelak and his son fell in battle, and Beowulf had to sit on the throne. He wisely and happily ruled his country, suddenly - a new disaster. A winged serpent settled in his domain, which killed people at night and burned houses. Once upon a time, one man, pursued by enemies, buried a huge treasure. The dragon found a cave with treasures and guarded them for three hundred years. Once an unfortunate exile accidentally wandered into a cave, but of all the treasures he took for himself only a small cup to propitiate his implacable master with it. The serpent noticed the loss, but did not find the kidnapper and began to take revenge on all people, devastating the possessions of Beowulf. Hearing about this, Beowulf decides to deal with the dragon and protect his country. He is no longer young and feels that death is near, but nevertheless he goes to the snake, ordering to forge himself a large shield to protect himself from the dragon's flame. The same ill-fated wanderer was taken as guides.

Approaching the cave, Beowulf and his retinue see a huge fiery stream, which is impossible to cross. Then Beowulf begins to loudly call out the dragon to get out. Hearing human voices, the dragon crawls out, spewing jets of terrible heat. His appearance is so terrible that the warriors flee, leaving their master to the will of fate, and only the devoted Wiglaf remains with the king, trying in vain to keep the cowards. Wiglaf draws his sword and joins Beowulf fighting the dragon. The mighty hand of Beowulf, even in old age, is too heavy for the sword; from a blow to the dragon's head, the red-hot sword shatters into pieces. And while Beowulf is trying to get a spare sword, the serpent inflicts a mortal wound on him. Gathering his strength, Beowulf again rushes at the dragon and, with the help of Wiglaf, strikes him. With difficulty leaning against a rock, knowing that he is dying, Beowulf asks Wiglaf to take out the treasures taken from the serpent so that he can admire them before his death. When Wiglaf returns, Beowulf has already fallen into oblivion. Opening his eyes with difficulty, he surveys the treasures.

The last command of Beowulf was this: to bury him on the seashore and pour a large mound over him, visible from afar to sailors. Beowulf bequeathed his armor to Wiglaf and died. Wiglaf summoned the cowardly warriors and reprimanded them. According to the rules, they laid the body of Beowulf on a funeral pyre, and then erected a stately mound on the seashore. And the sailors, directing their ships from afar to this hill, say to each other: "There, high above the surf, you can see the grave of Beowulf. Honor and glory to him!"

T. N. Kotrelev

The prologue tells how the author “put on <…> coarse clothes, as if <…> he was a shepherd”, and went to wander around “the wide world to hear about his miracles”. Weary, he lay down to rest in the Malvern Hills, by the stream, and soon fell asleep. And he had a wonderful dream. He looked to the east and saw a tower on a hill, and below it a valley on which stood a prison. Between them is a beautiful field full of people.

There were people of all sorts here: some did hard work, walking behind a plow, others "gluttonously destroyed what they produced", there were those who indulged in prayer and repentance, and those who cherished their pride. There were merchants, minstrels, jesters, beggars, beggars. The author was particularly indignant at pilgrims and mendicant monks, who fooled their fellow citizens and devastated their wallets with deceit, a false interpretation of the Gospel. With sarcasm, he describes the seller of indulgences, who, showing a bull with the seals of a bishop, absolved all sins, and gullible people gave him rings, gold, brooches. The king came there, whom "the power of the communities put <...> on the kingdom", and after him his adviser - Common Sense. Suddenly a horde of rats and mice appeared. After a discussion about how to neutralize the cat, they heeded the advice of the wise mouse to leave this venture, because if the rats had full will, they could not control themselves.

A beautiful woman appears. She gives an explanation to the author about everything he saw. The tower on a hill is the abode of Truth. The prison in the valley is the castle of Care, Evil lives in it, the father of Lies. A beautiful lady instructs the author, advises him "not to trust the body", not to drink, not to serve gold. After listening to all the useful advice, the author is interested in: who is this lady? And she answers; "Holy Church I". Then he fell on his knees and began to ask to be taught how to save his soul. The answer was laconic: to serve the Truth. For the Truth "is the most tested treasure on earth." Truth, Conscience and Love.

The author listened attentively to the teachings of the Holy Church. And he began to beg her for mercy - to teach him to recognize the Lie. The Lady replied, "Look to your left and see where Lies, Flattery and their many companions stand." And he saw a luxuriously and richly dressed woman named Mead ("Reward, bribe, but also a bribe, bribery, bribery" translated from English). Meade prepares for her wedding with "the offspring of the enemy of the human race." Her fiancé is a lie. Her retinue consists of judges and bailiffs, sheriffs, court couriers and brokers, lawyers and other corrupt people.

Flattery grants the bride and groom the right to be princes out of pride and to despise poverty, "to slander and brag, bear false witness, scoff, scold, etc." The county of greed is covetousness and avarice. And all in the same way. For these gifts, they will give their souls to Satan at the end of the year.

However, Theology was indignant against this marriage. And she insisted that Mead go to London to make sure "whether the law wants to award them to live together." Lies, Flattery and Cunning rush ahead of everyone to misrepresent the matter in London. However, the Truth overtook them and informed Conscience about this matter. And Conscience reported to the king.

The king is angry, he swears that he would order to hang these scoundrels, but "let the right, as the law indicates, fall on them all." Fear overheard this conversation and warned Lie, and he fled to the wandering monks. The merchants gave shelter to deceit, and the Liar found refuge with the merchants of indulgences. And the maiden Mid was brought before the king. The king ordered that every comfort be provided to her, adding that he himself would deal with her case. "And if she acts according to my verdict, <…> I will forgive her this guilt."

Everyone who lived in Westminster came to bow to her: jesters, minstrels, clerks and a confessor dressed as a mendicant monk. Everyone promised her to help her cause - to marry the one she wants, contrary to the "tricks of Conscience." And Mead richly endowed everyone.

The king announced that he was forgiving Mid, and offered another suitor instead of Lies - Conscience. But Conscience refuses such a bride, listing her sins: debauchery, lies, treachery ... Mid began to cry and asked the king to give her the floor for justification. She defended herself ardently, proving that everyone needed her. The king favorably listened to the crafty liar. But Conscience is not deceived by sweet speeches. He explains the difference between a reward for honest work and a bribe, money-grubbing, cites a biblical story about Seoul, who coveted a bribe, for which God's wrath fell on him and his descendants.

The King asks the Conscience to bring Reason to rule the kingdom. Conscience is on its way. The mind, having learned about the invitation, began to quickly gather on the road. He called Cato, his servant, and Tom, and told them:

Reason and Conscience went to the king. He met them affectionately, seated them between himself and his son, and they spoke wisely for a long time.

Peace came and brought a bill on violence, debauchery and robbery of Unrighteousness. The untruth was afraid of accusations and began to ask Wisdom for a lot of money to arrange peace with the World for him. But the king swears by Christ and his crown that Untruth will pay heavily for his deeds. Lies are chained in iron so that for seven years he does not see his feet.

However, Wisdom and the wise ask the king to forgive the Untruth: "It is better that the compensation destroy the damage…" The King is adamant until Reason takes pity on the Untruth, and Submission vouches for him, the Untruth will sit in the stocks. Everyone welcomed this decision, recognized Mead as a great sinner, and Meekness as entitled to rule. The king was determined:

The author, meanwhile, woke up, quietly sat down on the ground and began to read prayers. And again he fell asleep peacefully under his muttering. And again he had a dream. Reason speaks a sermon before the whole kingdom. He explains that

And mortal sin on the day of judgment will destroy all.

With ardent sincere words, he captivated his listeners. He urged people to honestly and conscientiously do their job and seek the Holy Truth. And Pride promised to indulge in humility. Intemperance vowed to "drink only water with a duck, and dine only once," Anger frankly said that he cooked food from evil words. And Repentance said to him: Now repent. Greed, Sloth, Eating - all repented of their great sins and promised to embark on the path of correction. The power of the speech of Reason was so great that thousands of people wished to seek the Truth. "They called out to Christ and his Most Pure Mother to get mercy to go with them to seek the Truth."

But among them there was no person who would know the way to the Truth. And they wandered like wild beasts. And they met a pilgrim who was coming from Sinai from the Holy Sepulcher. And in many places he went to Bethlehem and Babylon.

And the people asked him: "Do you know the holy man whom people call Truth?" And the pilgrim answered: "No, God help me!"

And then Pyotr Pakhar came forward and said: "I know him as closely as a scientist knows his books. Conscience and Common sense led me to his dwelling."

And everyone began to ask Peter to be their guide.

The plowman agreed, but first, he said, I had to plow and sow half an acre of land by the main road.

"What are we going to do all this time?" asked the veiled lady. And Peter Pakhar found a job for everyone. Lady - to sew up a bag, spin wool and linen for wives and widows and teach this craft to their daughters, and for everyone else - to take care of the needy and the naked. "Help actively in the work of the one who earns your living," concluded Peter.

The knight warmly sympathized with Peter's words. Peter promised to work all his life, and the Knight to protect him and the Holy Church from all kinds of evil people. Many helped Piotr Pakhar with his work, but there were also loafers who drank beer and sang songs. Peter the Plowman complained to the Knight. But they did not listen to the Knight's warnings and did not let up. Then Peter called for a Famine. After some time, idlers began to rush to work "like hawks." But only at the request of the Plowman, the Hunger left, and abundance came. Idlers and spendthrifts again began to shirk from work.

Truth hurried to the aid of Pyotr Pakhar, she bought for him and for all those who helped him to plow and sow, indulgence for eternity. And in the indulgence it was written: "And those who did good will go into eternal life. And who is evil - into eternal fire."

The priest, having read the indulgence, did not want to recognize it. The priest and Peter began to argue bitterly. And the author woke up from their cry and began to reflect on his dream, and decided that

The author called all Christians to mercy:

E. V. Morozova

In the spring, in April, when the earth wakes up from its winter hibernation, strings of pilgrims flock from all over England to Canterbury Abbey to venerate the relics of St. Thomas Becket. One day, at the Tabard inn in Sowerk, a rather motley company of pilgrims gathered, who were united by one thing: they were all on their way to Canterbury. There were twenty-nine of them. During dinner, many of the guests managed to get acquainted and talk. The guests were of various ranks and occupations, which, however, did not prevent them from maintaining a casual conversation. Among them was the Knight, known throughout the world for his valor and glorious deeds that he accomplished in numerous battles, and his son, the young Squire, despite his young years, managed to earn the favor of his beloved, gaining fame as a faithful squire on long campaigns. to foreign borders, dressed in a colorful outfit. Yeoman also rode with the knight, wearing a green hooded camisole and armed with a bow with long green-feathered arrows, a good shooter, who, apparently, was a forester. With them was an abbess named Eglantine, who looked after noble novices, meek and tidy. Everyone at the table was pleased to see her clean face and sweet smile. She was talking about something with an important and fat Monk, who was the monastic auditor. A passionate hunter and a merry fellow, he was against strict, reclusive rules, he liked to go on a spree and kept greyhounds. He was wearing a luxurious cloak, and he rode a bay horse. Next to him at the table sat Carmelite, a tax collector who excelled in his art like no one else and knew how to squeeze the last penny even from a beggar, promising him eternal bliss in heaven. In a beaver hat, with a long beard, sat a wealthy Merchant, revered for his ability to save income and deftly calculate the exchange rate. Having interrupted his diligent studies, riding on a tired nag, the Student rode to Canterbury, wise with books and spending the last money on them. Next to him sat the Lawyer, unsurpassed in the knowledge of the laws and in the ability to circumvent them. His wealth and fame quickly multiplied, as did the number of wealthy clients who often turned to the Lawyer for help. Nearby, in an expensive outfit, sat a cheerful Franklin, who was an exemplary sheriff and collected fines. Franklin loved wine and good food, which made him famous in the area. The dyer, the hatter, the carpenter, the upholsterer and the weaver, dressed in solid attire of the guild fraternity, did everything slowly, with a consciousness of their own dignity and wealth. They brought with them the Cook, a jack-of-all-trades, to cook for them on their long journey. Skipper sat at the same table with them. He came from the western county and was dressed in a rough coat of canvas. His appearance betrayed in him an experienced sailor from the Madelena, who knew all the currents and pitfalls encountered on the ship's path. In a crimson and blue cloak, next to him sat a Doctor of Medicine, whom even London doctors could not compare with in the art of healing. He was the smartest man who never dishonored himself by inaccuracy or extravagance. The Weaver of Bath, in a traveling cloak and with a very large hat on her head, chatted with him.

Having survived five husbands and no less number of lovers, she humbly went to the pilgrimage, was talkative and cheerful. Not far away, at a table, an old Priest sat modestly, better than whom he saw the world. He was an exemplary shepherd, he helped the poor, he was meek and merciful in dealing with the poor and ruthlessly fair to rich sinners. His brother. The plowman rode with him. He worked hard in the fields during his life and considered it the duty of a Christian to faithfully obey the commandments and help people who needed it. Opposite, on a bench, Melnik collapsed - a bright-eyed fellow, healthy as a bull, with an impressive red beard and a wart overgrown with stiff bristles on his nose. A fist fighter, a womanizer, a swindler and a reveler, he was known as a desperate liar and thief. The Economist, who was sitting next to him, was successful in all the operations he undertook, and knew how to pretty fool people. Shorn like a priest, in a blue cassock and on a horse in apples, the Majordomo rode from Norfolk to Canterbury. Knowing how to steal and seduce in time, he was richer than his master, was stingy and well versed in his business. The bailiff of the church court was all swollen with fat, and his small eyes looked at everyone extremely cunningly. No amount of acid would have etched away the veil of age-old grime from his beard, or stifled the garlic belch he poured over with wine. He knew how to be useful to sinners if they paid, and instead of a shield he carried with him a huge loaf of rye bread. Slavically devoted to him, the Pardoner rode beside him. Lifeless strands of sparse, matted hair fringed his brow, he sang and lectured in a squeaky voice from the pulpit, and carried with him a box of indulgences, in which he was surprisingly clever at selling.

Now all of the above were cheerfully sitting at a table covered with all sorts of food and reinforcing their strength. When the dinner was over and the guests began to disperse, the Tavern Master got up and, thanking the guests for the honor done, drained his glass. Then, laughing, he remarked that travelers must sometimes be bored, and suggested to the pilgrims the following: during the long journey, everyone would have to tell a fictitious or real story, and whoever told the most interesting of all would be gloriously treated on the way back. The Master offered himself as judge, warning that anyone who shied away from the story would be severely punished. The pilgrims happily agreed, for no one wanted to be bored, and everyone liked the Host, even the most gloomy ones. And so, before setting off on the road, everyone began to draw lots, to whom to tell first. The lot fell to the Knight, and the horsemen, surrounding him, prepared to listen attentively to the story.

Once upon a time, the glorious lord Theseus ruled in Athens. Having glorified himself with many victories, he finally captured Scythia, where the Amazons lived, and married their mistress Hippolyta. As he stood proudly in front of his capital, preparing to enter there to the sound of fanfare, a procession of women dressed in mourning approached him. Theseus asked them what happened, and was quite angry when he learned that they were the wives of eminent Theban warriors, whose bodies rot under the sun, because the new ruler of Thebes, Creon, who had recently captured this city, did not allow them to be buried, leaving them to be torn to pieces by birds. Theseus jumped on a horse and rushed off with his army to take revenge on the cruel Creon, leaving Hippolyta and her beautiful sister Emilia in Athens. The army laid siege to Thebes, the evil Creon fell in battle, slain by Theseus, and justice was restored. Among the fallen soldiers of Theseus found two wounded knights of a noble family. Theseus ordered them to be sent to Athens and imprisoned there in a tower, not agreeing to take a ransom for them. The young men were called Arsita and Palamon. Several years have passed. Once the beautiful Emilia was walking in the garden, spread out next to the tower, where the unfortunate prisoners languished, and sang like a nightingale. At this time, Palamon looked out into the garden from the barred window of the dungeon. Suddenly he saw the beautiful Emilia and almost lost consciousness, for he realized that he was in love. Awakened by this cry, Arsita thought that his brother was ill. Palamon explained to him what his grief was, and Arsita decided to look at Emilia. Approaching the loophole, he saw her walking among the rose bushes, and felt the same as Palamon. Then a terrible strife and fight began between them. One accused the other, each considered it his indisputable right to love Emilia, and it is not known what the matter would have come to if the brothers had not remembered in time about their position. Realizing that, no matter how it all turned around, they still would never get out of prison, Arsita and Palamon decided to rely on fate.

Just at that time, the noble commander Perita, a good friend of Lord Theseus, arrived in Athens to visit. Previously, he was bound by the bonds of holy friendship with the young Arsita, and, having learned that he was languishing in the tower, Perita tearfully begged Theseus to let him go. After hesitating, Theseus finally gave his consent, but with the immutable condition that if Arsita appeared again on Athenian soil, he would answer for this with his head. The unfortunate Arsita was forced to flee to Thebes, cursing his fate and envying Palamon, who remained in prison and could at least sometimes see Emilia. He did not know that at the same time Palamon complained about him, confident that happiness went to his brother, and not to him, the poor prisoner.

So another year flew by. Once, when Arsita fell into a restless sleep, the god Mercury appeared to him and advised him not to despair, but to go and try his luck in Athens. Waking up, Arsita cast aside doubts and fears and decided to dare to enter the capital, disguised as a poor man and taking only one friend with him. The anguish of the heart so distorted his features that no one could recognize him, and he was accepted into the service of the palace, calling himself Philostratus. He was so courteous and smart that the fame of the new servant reached Theseus' ears, he brought Philostratus closer, making him his personal assistant and generously endowing him. Thus Arsita lived at court, while his brother had been languishing in the tower for the seventh year. But somehow, on the night of the third of May, friends helped him to escape, and under the cover of darkness he hid in a grove a few miles from the city. Palamon had nothing to hope for, except to go to Thebes and beg his own to gather an army and go to war against Theseus. He did not know that in the same grove, where he waited out the day, Arsita rode up, going for a walk. Palamon heard how Arsita complained about his fate, extolling Emilia, and, unable to bear it, jumped out into the clearing. Seeing each other, the brothers decided that only one could survive and have the right to the heart of the queen's sister. Then such a fight began that it seemed as if wild animals were grappling in a deadly fight.

The noise of the battle attracted the attention of the glorious Theseus, who was passing by that grove with his retinue. Seeing the bloodied knights, he recognized them as a deceiver, a servant and an escaped prisoner, and decided to punish them with death. After listening to their explanations, he had already given the order to kill the brothers, but, seeing the tears in the eyes of Hippolyta and Emilia, touched by the unfortunate love of two young men, the heart of the magnanimous monarch softened, and he ordered the knights to fight for the right to marry the beautiful Emilia here in a year, bringing with a hundred fighters each. There was no limit to the rejoicing of the two young men and the retinue of the generous Theseus when they heard such a verdict.

Exactly one year later, a huge, richly decorated amphitheater was located next to the grove, where the duel was to take place. On three sides of it rose the temples erected in honor of Mars, Venus and Diana. When the first warriors appeared, the amphitheater was already full. At the head of a hundred knights, Palamon proudly marched along with the great Thracian commander Lycurgus. On the other side came the mighty Arsita. Next to him is the Indian Emetrios, the great ruler, and a little behind - a hundred strong, matched fighters. They offered up prayers to the gods, each to their patron, Arsita to Mars, Palamon to Venus. The beautiful Emilia prayed to Diana to send her the one who loves the most as her husband. With the help of mysterious signs, everyone received confidence that the gods would not leave their wards in trouble. And so the competition began. According to the rules, the battle was to continue as long as both commanders were inside the line that bounded the lists. The defeated were to be taken to the milestones, which meant his defeat. Theseus gave a sign, and crossed swords and spears rang out. Blood flowed like a river, the wounded fell, those who were stronger rose, and no one could win. But here Palamon, who fought like a lion, was immediately surrounded by twenty soldiers, and the ferocious Lycurgus could not help him. Palamon was grabbed by the arms and legs and carried out of the field, to the milestones. Here the battle was stopped ... Arsita emerged victorious, despite the efforts of Venus, the goddess of love patronizing Palamon.

Joyful Arsita galloped towards his beloved, and suddenly a vile fury burst out from under the hooves of his horse from the depths of hell. The horse fell to the ground with all its might, crushing its rider. The horror of the audience knew no bounds, the bloody Arsita with a broken chest was urgently carried to the chambers of Theseus, who tore his hair out of grief.

Weeks pass, Arsita is getting worse and worse. Emilia does not find a place for herself from longing and sadness, crying for days on end. Arsita's chest is full of pus, the wounds are inflamed. Feeling that he was dying, he called his bride and, kissing her, bequeathed to be a faithful wife to his brave brother, whom he forgave everything, for he dearly loved him. After these words, Arsita closed his eyes and his soul flew away.

The whole capital grieved for a long time, mourning the glorious warrior, Palamon and Emilia sobbed inconsolably for a long time, but time, as you know, quickly heals wounds. Arsita was buried in the same grove where they met with Palamon. Theseus, grieving, called on Palamon and said that, apparently, this was the fate that decreed, before which man is powerless. Here they played a magnificent and cheerful wedding of Palamon and Emilia, who lived happily, loving each other passionately and devotedly, honoring the order of the unfortunate Arsita.

With this the Knight ended his story.

Once there lived a carpenter in Oxford. He was a master of all trades and had a well-deserved reputation as a craftsman. He was rich and allowed freeloaders into his house. Among them lived a poor student who was well versed in alchemy, remembered theorems and often surprised everyone with his knowledge. For his kind disposition and friendliness, everyone called him Dushka Nicolae. Plotnikov's wife ordered to live long, and he, grieving, married again to the young black-browed beauty Alison. She was so attractive and sweet that there were no number of people in love with her, and of course our student was among them. Suspecting nothing, the old carpenter was nevertheless very jealous and looked after his young wife. Once, having arranged an innocent fuss with Alison, while the carpenter was not at home. Dushka Nicolae, confessing his feelings to her, begged to give him at least one kiss. Alison, who also liked the cute student, promised to kiss him, but only when the opportunity presented itself. It was then that Dushka Nicholas decided to cheat the old carpenter. Meanwhile, according to Alison, the young church clerk Absalom also suffered. As he walked through the church, swinging the censer, he looked only at Alison and sighed heavily. He was a trickster and a lecher, and Alison did not like at all, all her thoughts were turned to Nicholas.

Once, at night, unable to bear the languor, Absalom took the guitar and decided to go and delight the ears of his beloved with sad verses. Hearing this meow, the carpenter asked his wife what Absalom was doing under their fence, and she, despising the clerk, declared that she was not afraid of such a thief. Dushka Nicholas did much better on the love front. Having agreed with Alison, he took a supply of water and food for several days and, locking himself in his room, did not go anywhere. Two days later, everyone was worried where the student had gone and whether he was sick. The carpenter ordered me to go and ask him, but Nicolae did not tell anyone. At this point, the good carpenter became quite agitated, for he heartily loved Nicholas Dushka, and ordered the door to be knocked down. He saw Nicholas sitting on the bed, who, without moving, gazed intently at the sky. The carpenter began to violently shake him to bring him to his senses, for he refused to eat and did not utter a single word. After such a shake-up, the student, in an ethereal voice, asked to be left alone with the carpenter. When all this was done, Nicholas bent down to the carpenter's ear and, taking from him a terrible oath to remain silent, told that on Monday (and it was Sunday) the world was waiting for a terrible flood, similar to the one that was under Noah. Guided by Divine Providence, he, Nicolae, received a revelation to save only three people - John the Carpenter, his wife Alison and himself. In horror, the carpenter was momentarily speechless. The student ordered him to buy three large barrels or buckets and fix them on the rafters so that when it starts to rain, it would be convenient to float through a previously prepared hole in the roof. Everyone had to climb into the barrels separately, so that at such a terrible hour no one would be tempted by carnal temptation. Frightened to death, the carpenter, having listened to the student and firmly believing in his salvation, rushed off to buy tubs and food for a long voyage, without saying a word to anyone.

And then came the fateful night. The company quietly climbed into the barrels, and the carpenter began to pray earnestly, as was ordered, expecting a terrible downpour, and soon fell into a deep sleep. Then the lovers silently descended to spend the rest of the night in Carpenter's Bedroom. Meanwhile, the clerk Absalom, noticing that the carpenter did not appear all day, and thinking that he was away, wandered off to try his luck under the windows of Alison. Having carefully prepared his speech, Absalom clung to the window and began to beg Alison in a plaintive voice to give him at least one kiss. Then the carpenter's wife, lying in the arms of a student, decided to play a joke on him. Opening the window and turning her back, she put her in front of the clerk, and he, not understanding in the darkness, kissed her, was horrified and, in addition, received a frame on the head. Hearing the sonorous laughter of Dushka Nicholas, Absalom decided to take revenge on the lovers. Wiping his lips along the way, he rushed to the blacksmith, taking from him a red-hot coulter. The blacksmith Gervaise did not dare to refuse his friend, and now Absalom is already at the window again, with a hot coulter in his hand, begging Alison to look out one more time. Here Nicolae decided to joke, leaned out of the window and farted deafeningly right into Absalom's nose. He was just waiting for this, slamming Nicholas's ass with an opener so that the skin peeled off. Dushka Nicolae howled in pain and yelled: “Water, faster water ...” The carpenter who woke up from this cry thought that the flood had already begun, cut the rope on which the barrel hung, and ... crashed down with a deafening crash. The neighbors came running to the noise, Nicolae and Alison came running. Everyone laughed their heads off at the poor old man who was waiting for the end of the world and paid for it with a broken leg. This is how a cunning schoolboy managed to deceive an old carpenter and seduce his wife.

Livia's Titus relates that once upon a time there lived in Rome a noble knight by the name of Virginia, who earned universal love for his generosity. God rewarded him with his only daughter, who was like a goddess in her beauty. When this story happened, the girl was already fifteen years old. She was as beautiful as a flower, wonderfully intelligent and pure in thought. There was no person who would not admire her, but she did not let arrogant gentlemen near her and did not go to the merry feasts that her peers arranged.

One day, daughter Virginia went with her mother to the temple, where the judge of the district of Appius saw the girl and madly desired her. Knowing that he could not approach her, he decided to act by deceit. He summoned a fellow named Claudius, an excellent scoundrel, and generously rewarding him, told him everything. Together they entered into a vile conspiracy, and if everything went according to plan, Claudius was expected to be well rewarded. Anticipating a close victory, Appius was sitting in court a few days later when Claudius entered and said that he wanted to complain about a certain knight named Virginia, who had stolen his slave from him and now passed her off as his daughter. The judge listened to him and said that without the presence of the defendant, the case could not be decided. They called on Virginius, who, having heard a false accusation, was about to lay siege to the liar who claimed to have witnesses, as befits a knight, but the impatient judge did not give him a word and pronounced a sentence, according to which Virginia should give Claudius his "slave". Stunned, Virginia came home and told his daughter everything. Then he decided to kill her in order to avoid shame and abuse. His daughter, all in tears, asked only to give her time to mourn her life, to thank God for delivering her from shame. Then Virginius took his sword, cut off his only daughter's head, and carried this bloody gift to the ward, where the judge and Claudius eagerly awaited him. They wanted to execute him there, but then the people broke into the court and freed Virginia. And the lustful judge was imprisoned, where he committed suicide. His friend, Claudius, was forever banished from Rome.

Once the great god Phoebus, or otherwise Apollo, lived among people. He was a handsome knight, cheerful and brave, any enemy was afraid of his smashing arrows. Phoebus knew how to play the lyre, harp, lute incomparably, and no one in the world possessed such a marvelous voice as his. In beauty and nobility, no one could compare with the great god. Phoebus lived in a spacious house, where in the most beautiful of the rooms stood a golden cage. There lived a crow. There are no such people now, she was dazzlingly white and sang in a sonorous voice, like a nightingale. Phoebus loved her very much, taught her to speak, and soon the crow began to understand everything and exactly imitate human voices. The beautiful wife Phoebe lived in the same horomina. He madly loved her, cherished her like a rare flower, gave her expensive gifts and was jealous of anyone. He did not invite guests to his house, afraid that someone might seduce his wife, and kept him locked up like a bird in a golden cage. But everything is useless - the heart and all the thoughts of his beloved wife belonged to another. Once Phoebus was away for a long time, and the lover is right there. Together with Phoebe's beautiful wife, they quench their passion in a room with a cage. The crow saw all this and, faithful to its master, was offended for him. When Phoebus returned and approached the cage, the crow croaked: "Stole! Stole! Stole! .." Surprised by the strange change in his pet's voice, Phoebus asked her what happened. In rude, ominous words, the crow told him that while he was gone, the scoundrel lover dishonored the bed with his wife here. Phoebus recoiled in horror, rage overwhelmed him, he took his bow and, pulling back the bowstring to failure, killed his beloved wife.

After him, the worm of regrets began to gnaw. He broke musical instruments, broke his bow and arrows, and in a rage attacked the crow, saying to her with contempt: "For your slander, I have forever lost my beloved wife and the delight of my eyes. As punishment for your lies, you will no longer be white like jasmine, but you will become black and ugly, you will no longer sing like a nightingale, but you will croak ominously, foreshadowing bad weather, and they will stop love you people." And the formidable god grabbed the envious bird, stripped off its snow-white feathers and threw a black monastic cassock over it, took away the gift of speech, and then threw it out into the street. Since then, all crows are black as pitch, and croak loudly, complaining about their distant progenitor. It is equally important for people to always weigh their words before saying anything, so as not to share the sad fate of the white crow.

T. N. Kotrelev

King Uther Pendragon of England falls in love with Igraine, the wife of the Duke of Cornwall, with whom he is at war. The famous sorcerer and soothsayer Merlin promises to help the king win Igraine on the condition that he give him their child. The duke dies in a fight, and the barons, wanting to put an end to the strife, convince the king to take Igraine as his wife. When the queen is relieved of her burden, the baby is secretly carried to Merlin, who names him Arthur and gives him up to be raised by Baron Ector.

After the death of King Uther, in order to prevent turmoil, the Archbishop of Canterbury, on the advice of Merlin, calls all the barons to London to elect a new king. When all the estates of the kingdom gather for prayer, a stone miraculously appears in the temple courtyard with an anvil standing on it, under which lies a naked sword. The inscription on the stone says that the king by birthright is the one who pulls the sword from under the anvil. This is only possible for young Arthur, who does not know who his real parents are.

Arthur becomes king, but many consider him unworthy to rule the country, because he is too young and low by birth. Merlin tells Arthur's opponents the secret of his birth, proving to them that the young man is the legitimate son of Uther Pendragon, and yet some barons decide to go to war against the young king. But Arthur defeats all his opponents.

In the city of Carlion, Arthur meets the wife of King Lot of Orkney. Not knowing that she is his sister on the part of his mother Igraine, he shares a bed with her, and she conceives from him. Merlin reveals to the young man the secret of his birth and predicts that Arthur and all his knights will die at the hands of Mordred, the son of Arthur, whom he conceived with his sister.

Instead of the sword that broke in the fight with King Pelinor, Arthur receives from the Lady of the Lake the wonderful sword Excalibur, which means "cut steel". Merlin explains to Arthur that the sheath of this sword will keep him from getting hurt.

Arthur orders all babies born to noble ladies from noble lords on the first day of May to be delivered to him, for Merlin revealed to him that Mordred was born on this day. All the babies are put on the ship and let into the sea, the ship crashes, and only Mordred is saved.

The knight Balin the Fierce kills the Lady of the Lake with an enchanted sword because she killed his mother. Arthur banishes Balin. This sword causes the death of Balin and his brother Balan. Merlin predicts that now no one will be able to take possession of the enchanted sword except Aanselot or his son, Galahad, and that Lancelot will kill Gawain with this sword, who is dearer to him than anyone in the world.

Arthur marries Guinevere, daughter of King Lodegrance, from whom he receives as a gift the Round Table, at which one hundred and fifty knights can sit. The king instructs Merlin to choose another fifty knights, for he already has a hundred. But he found only forty-eight: two places at the table remain unoccupied. Arthur commands his knights to fight only for a just cause and serve as a model of knightly prowess.

Merlin falls in love with Nineveh, one of the maidens of the Lady of the Lake, and so annoys her that she locks him in a magical cave under a heavy stone, where he dies.

Arthur's sister, fairy Morgana, wants to destroy her brother. She replaces his sword, Excalibur, and the king almost dies in a duel with her lover. Fairy Morgana wants him to kill Arthur and become king. However, despite her insidious plans, Arthur remains alive and performs glorious deeds.

Ambassadors from Rome arrive at Arthur's court demanding tribute to Emperor Lucius. Arthur decides to go to war with him. Landing in Normandy, Arthur kills the ogre, and then defeats the Romans. Lucius dies. Arthur invades Allemania and Italy and captures one city after another. Roman senators and cardinals, terrified by his victories, ask Arthur to be crowned, and the pope himself crowns him emperor. Four queens, one of whom is Morgan the fairy, find Lancelot sleeping under a tree. Fairy Morgana casts a spell on him and takes him to her castle so that he himself chooses which of the four ladies will become his lover. But he rejects them, remaining faithful to Queen Guinevere, whom he secretly loves from everyone. The daughter of King Bagdemagus rescues Aanselot from captivity, and he performs many glorious deeds.

A young man arrives at Arthur's court and, without revealing his name, asks him for shelter for a year. He gets the nickname Bomain, which means "Beautiful Hands", and lives in the kitchen with the servants. A year later, rich equipment is brought to him, and Bomain asks the king to let him go to protect the lady who is oppressed by the Red Knight. Lancelot knights Baumain, and he reveals his name to him: he is Gareth of Orkney, son of King Lot and brother of Gawain, who, like Lancelot, is one of the knights of the Round Table. Bomain performs many glorious deeds, defeats the Red Knight and marries Lady Lionesse, the lady who asked him for protection.

Tristram, the son of King Meliodas, who was the ruler of the country of Lyons, wants to poison his stepmother so that all the lands after the death of Meliodas would be owned by her children. But she does not succeed, and the king, having learned about everything, sentences her to be burned. Tristram begs his father to pardon his stepmother, who gives in to his requests, but sends his son to France for seven years.

After returning from France, Tristram lives at the court of his uncle, King Mark of Cornwall, and helps him in the fight against his enemies. King Mark knights him, and Tristram fights the knight Marholt, brother of the Queen of Ireland, to save Cornwall from tribute. He kills Marholt and goes to Ireland, for it was predicted to him that only there he would be able to heal from a dangerous wound received in a duel.

Iseult the Fair, daughter of the Irish King Anguisance, heals him. But soon Tristram is forced to leave Ireland, as the queen learns that it was he who killed her brother Marholt. Saying goodbye to Tristram, Isolde promises him not to marry for seven years, and the knight swears that from now on only she will be the lady of his heart.

After some time, King Mark sends Tristram to Ireland to marry Iseult for him. Tristram and Iseult sail for Cornwall and accidentally drink a love potion that the Queen of Ireland wanted to deliver to King Mark. Even after the wedding of King Mark with Iseult, love meetings between her and Tristram do not stop. King Mark finds out about this and wants to kill Tristram, but he manages to escape. On the advice of Iseult, Tristram goes to Brittany so that the daughter of the king, Iseult the White-handed, heals him from a dangerous wound. Tristram forgets his former lover and marries Iseult Beloruka, but after the wedding he remembers her and is so distressed that he does not touch his wife, and she remains a virgin.

Iseult the Beautiful, having learned about the marriage of Tristram, writes him sorrowful letters and calls to her. On the way to her, he performs glorious deeds and saves Arthur, whom the sorceress Annaura wants to destroy, but does not tell the king her name. Finally, Tristram meets Iseult at the court of King Mark. Having discovered a letter from Kahidin, who is in love with her, he loses his mind from jealousy, wanders through the forests and shares food with the shepherds. King Mark gives shelter to the unfortunate, but only because he does not recognize him. When Isolde the Beautiful recognizes her beloved, his mind returns to him. But King Mark banishes Tristram from the country for ten years, and he wanders, performing glorious deeds.

Tristram and Lancelot fight in a duel without recognizing each other. But when each of them calls his name, they gladly concede victory to each other and return to Arthur's court. King Mark pursues Tristram to take revenge on him, but Arthur forces them to make peace and they depart for Cornwall. Tristram fights the enemies of King Mark and wins, despite the fact that the king harbors a grudge against him and still wants to kill him. Knowing about the deceit and vindictiveness of King Mark, Tristram still does not hide his affection for Iseult and does everything possible to be close to her. Soon, King Mark lures Tristram into a trap and keeps him imprisoned until Percivadi frees him. Fleeing from the treacherous plans of King Mark, Tristram and Iseult set sail for England. Lancelot brings them to his castle "Merry Guard", where they live, happy that they can finally hide their love from anyone.

Lancelot goes in search of adventure and meets King Peles, ruler of the Other Country. The knight learns from him that he, Peles, descends from Joseph of Arimathea, who was a secret disciple of our Lord, Jesus Christ, the King shows Lancelot the Holy Grail - a precious golden cup, and explains to him that when this treasure is lost, the Round The table will fall apart for a long time.

From the prophecy, Peles knows that his daughter Elaina should give birth to a son from Lancelot, Galahad, who will save the Other Land and reach the Holy Grail. Peles asks for help from Bruzena, the great soothsayer, for he knows that Lancelot loves only Guinevere, the wife of King Arthur, and will never change her. Bruzena pours a witch's potion into Lancelot's wine, and the knight spends the night with Elaine, mistaking her for Guinevere. When the spell breaks, Elaine explains to Lancelot that she went to deceit only because she had to obey the prophecy that her father revealed to her. Lancelot forgives her.

Elaine gives birth to a baby, who is named Galahad. When King Arthur arranges a feast to which he invites all the lords and ladies of England, Elaine, accompanied by Bruzena, goes to Kmelot Castle. But Lancelot does not pay attention to her, and then Bruzena promises Elaine to put a spell on him and arrange it so that he will spend the night with her. Queen Guinevere is jealous of Lancelot for the beautiful Elaine and demands that he come to her bedroom at night. But Lancelot, powerless against Bruzena's sorcery, finds himself in Elaina's bed. The queen, not knowing that her lover is bewitched, orders Elaine to leave the court, and accuses Lancelot of deceit and treason. Lancelot loses his mind from grief and wanders in the wild forests for two years, eating whatever he has to.

Knight Bliant recognizes the madman who attacked him in the forest and almost killed him as the famous Lancelot. He brings him to his castle and takes care of him, but keeps him in chains, since Lancelot's sanity has not returned. But after once Lancelot, tearing them, saved Bliant from the hands of his enemies, he removes the shackles from him.

Lancelot leaves Bliant's castle and wanders the world again, he is still insane and does not remember who he is. Chance brings him to Corbenic Castle, where Elaine lives, who recognizes him. King Peles takes the insensible Lancelot to the tower where the sacred chalice of the Holy Grail is kept, and the knight is healed. He asks King Peles for permission to settle in his area, and he gives him an island, which Lancelot calls the Island of Joy. He lives there with Elaine, surrounded by beautiful young ladies and knights, and demands that from now on he be called Cavalier Malphet, which means "Knight who has done an act."

Lancelot arranges a tournament on the island, to which the Knights of the Round Table come. Recognizing Lancelot, they beg him to return to King Arthur's court. Arthur and all the knights are excited about Lancelot's return, and while everyone knows what caused him to go insane, no one talks about it directly.

Lancelot, at the request of a lady who arrived at Arthur's court from King Peles, goes to him and knights Galahad, but he does not know that this is his son. When Galahad arrives at Arthur's castle of Camelot, an inscription appears on an empty seat at the Round Table: "This is the seat of Sir Galahad, the Highborn Prince." And this seat was called the Deadly, for the one who sat on it brought misfortune upon himself.

A miracle was revealed to the Knights of the Round Table: a stone with a sword thrust into it floats along the river. And the inscription on the stone says that only the best of the knights in the world can pull out the sword. Before the eyes of all the knights, Merlin's prophecy is fulfilled: Galahad pulls out of the stone the sword that once belonged to Balin the Fierce. Queen Guinevere, who knows who Galahad's father is, tells her court ladies that the young man comes from the best knightly families in the world: Lancelot, his father, comes from the eighth generation from our Lord Jesus Christ, and Galahad - from the ninth tribe.

On the day of the feast of Pentecost, when everyone gathers for evening prayer, the sacred Grail miraculously appears in the hall, and delicious dishes and drinks are on the table. Gawain takes an oath to go on exploits in the name of the Holy Grail. All knights repeat his oath. Arthur laments, for he has a presentiment that they will never meet again at the Round Table.

In the White Abbey, Galahad gets himself a wonderful shield, which was made in the thirty-second year after the Passion of Christ. He is told that Joseph of Arimathea himself inscribed a red cross on a white shield with his own blood. Galahad, armed with a wonderful sword and shield, performs glorious deeds.

Miraculous things happen to Lancelot in reality and in visions. Finding himself near the old chapel, which he cannot enter, he hears a voice ordering him to withdraw from these holy places. The knight recognizes his sinfulness and repents, realizing that his deeds are not pleasing to God. He confesses to the hermit, and he interprets to him the words that the knight heard. Lancelot promises the hermit to refrain from communicating with Guinevere, and he appoints him repentance.

Percival, who, like the other knights, went in search of the Holy Grail, meets his aunt. She tells him that the Round Table was built by Merlin as a sign of the roundness of the world, and a person elected to the brotherhood of the Knights of the Round Table should consider this the greatest honor. She also conveys to Percival Merlin's prophecy of Galahad who will surpass his father, Lancelot. Percival sets out to look for Galahad and has many wonderful adventures along the way. Struggling with the temptations of the flesh, he cuts his thigh with a sword and takes an oath not to sin again.

Lancelot travels in search of the Holy Grail and goes through many trials. He learns from the hermit that Galahad is his son. The recluse interprets the knight's visions; he is weak in faith, vicious in soul, and pride does not allow him to distinguish the worldly from the divine, therefore now, when he seeks the Grail, God does not please his feats of war.

Gawain was tired of wandering in search of the Grail. The hermit, to whom he and the knight Bore confess their sins, interprets to Gawain his dream: most of the knights of the Round Table are burdened with sins, and their pride does not allow them to approach the shrine, for many went in search of the Grail without even repenting of their sins.

Percival and Bors meet Galahad and together perform glorious deeds in the name of the Holy Grail. Galahad meets his father, Lancelot. They hear a voice that tells them that they will see each other for the last time.

Lancelot finds himself in a wonderful castle. In one of the chambers, he sees a sacred cup surrounded by angels, but a certain voice forbids him to enter. He tries to enter, but he seems to be scorched by a fiery breath, and he lies as if dead for twenty-five days. Lancelot meets King Peles, learns from him that Elaine has died, and returns to Camelot, where he finds Arthur and Guinevere. Many knights returned to court, but more than half perished.

Galahad, Percival and Boré arrive at King Peles at Corbenic Castle. Miracles are revealed to the knights in the castle, and they become the owners of the holy grail and the silver throne. In the city of Sarras, Galahad becomes its king. Joseph of Arimathea appears to him, from whose hands the knight receives Holy Communion, and soon dies. At the moment of his death, a hand reaches out from heaven and takes away the sacred cup. Since then, no one has been honored to see the Holy Grail. Percival goes to the hermits, takes a spiritual rank and dies two years later.

At the court of Arthur, joy reigns over the completion of the feat in the name of the Holy Grail. Aancelot, remembering his promise to the hermit, tries to avoid the company of the queen. She is outraged and orders him to leave the yard. Gawain accuses the Queen of wanting to poison him. Lancelot enters into a duel for her and justifies the queen. At the tournament, Lancelot receives a dangerous wound and goes to the hermit to heal him.

Knight Melegant captures Queen Guinevere, and Lancelot frees her. He spends the night with her, and Melegant accuses her of treason. Lancelot fights Melegant and kills him.

Agravaine, Gawain's brother, and Mordred, Arthur's son, tell Arthur about the amorous rendezvous between Lancelot and the queen, and he orders them to be hunted down and captured. Agravain and twelve knights try to capture Lancelot, but he kills them, Arthur asks Gawain to take the queen to the fire, but he refuses and mourns that she must accept a shameful death. Lancelot, having killed many knights, saves her from execution, takes her to his castle "Merry Guard". Some of Arthur's knights adjoin him. Gawain learns that Lancelot killed two of his brothers and promises to take revenge on the killer. Arthur besieges Lancelot's castle, but the Pope orders them to reconcile. Lancelot returns Queen Arthur and leaves for France. Following the advice of Gawain, who wants to take revenge on Lancelot, Arthur again gathers an army and goes to France.

In Arthur's absence, his son, Mordred, rules all of England. He composes letters that mention the death of his father, is crowned and is about to marry Queen Guinevere, but she manages to escape. Arthur's army arrives at Dover, where Mordred tries to prevent the knights from landing. Gawain dies in the fight, His spirit appears to the king and warns against the battle, but due to an absurd accident, it happens. Mordred dies, and Arthur receives dangerous wounds. Anticipating his imminent death, he orders his sword Excalibur to be thrown into the water, and he himself sits in a barque, where beautiful ladies and three queens are sitting, and sails away with them. The next morning, a fresh gravestone is found in the chapel, and the hermit says that several ladies brought him a dead body and asked him to bury it. Guinevere, upon learning of Arthur's death, takes the veil as a nun. Lancelot arrives in England, but when he finds Guinevere in a monastery, he also takes tonsure. Both of them soon die. The bishop sees in a dream Lancelot surrounded by angels who lift him up to heaven. Constantine, the son of Cador, becomes king of England and rules the kingdom with honor.

V. V. Rynkevich

The choir enters the stage and tells the story of Faust: he was born in the German city of Roda, studied in Wittenberg, received his doctorate.

Faust in his office reflects on the fact that, no matter how he succeeded in the earthly sciences, he is only a man and his power is not unlimited. Faust was disillusioned with philosophy. Medicine is also not omnipotent, it cannot give people immortality, it cannot resurrect the dead. Jurisprudence is full of contradictions, laws are absurd. Even theology does not provide an answer to Faust's tormenting questions. Only magical books attract him.

A kind angel persuades Faust not to read cursed books full of temptations that will bring the wrath of the Lord on Faust. The evil angel, on the contrary, incites Faust to engage in magic and comprehend all the secrets of nature:

Faust dreams of making the spirits serve him and become omnipotent. His friends Cornelius and Valdes promise to initiate him into the secrets of magical science and teach him to conjure spirits. Mephistopheles comes to his call. Faust wants Mephistopheles to serve him and fulfill all his desires, but Mephistopheles is subordinate to Lucifer alone and can only serve Faust on Lucifer's orders. Faust renounces God and recognizes the supreme ruler of Lucifer - the lord of darkness and the master of spirits. Mephistopheles tells Faust the story of Lucifer: once he was an angel, but he showed pride and rebelled against the Lord, for which God cast him down from heaven, and now he is in hell. Those who rebelled against the Lord with him are also condemned to hellish torments. Faust does not understand how Mephistopheles has now left the realm of hell, but Mephistopheles explains:

But Faust is firm in his decision to reject God. He is ready to sell his soul to Lucifer in order to "live, tasting all the blessings" for twenty-four years and have Mephistopheles as his servant. Mephistopheles goes to Lucifer for an answer, while Faust, meanwhile, dreams of power: he longs to become king and subjugate the whole world.

Faust's servant Wagner meets a jester and wants the jester to serve him for seven years. The jester refuses, but Wagner summons the two devils Baliol and Belcher and threatens that if the jester refuses to serve him, the devils will immediately drag him to hell. He promises to teach the jester to turn into a dog, a cat, a mouse or a rat - anything. But the jester, if he really wants to turn into anyone, then into a small frisky flea to jump where he wants and tickle pretty women under skirts.

Faust hesitates. A kind angel persuades him to quit practicing magic, repent and return to God. An evil angel inspires him with thoughts of wealth and glory. Mephistopheles returns and says that Lucifer ordered him to serve Faust to the grave, if Faust writes a will and a deed of gift for his soul and body with his blood. Faust agrees, he plunges the knife into his hand, but his blood freezes in his veins, and he cannot write. Mephistopheles brings a brazier, Faust's blood warms up, and he writes a will, but then the inscription "Homo, fuge" ("Man, save yourself") appears on his hand; Faust ignores her. To entertain Faust, Mephistopheles brings the devils, who give Faust crowns, rich clothes and dance in front of him, then leave. Faust asks Mephistopheles about hell. Mephistopheles explains:

Faust can't believe it: Mephistopheles talks to him, walks the earth - and all this is hell? Faust is not afraid of such hell. He asks Mephistopheles to give him the most beautiful girl in Germany as his wife. Mephistopheles brings to him the devil in a female form. Marriage is not for Faust, Mephistopheles suggests bringing the most beautiful courtesans to him every morning. He hands Faust a book where everything is written: how to get wealth, and how to summon spirits, it describes the location and movement of the planets and lists all the plants and herbs.

Faust curses Mephistopheles for depriving him of heavenly joys. The good angel advises Faust to repent and trust in the mercy of the Lord. The evil angel says that God does not grin at such a great sinner, however, he is sure that Faust will not repent. Faust really does not have the heart to repent, and he starts an argument with Mephistopheles about astrology, but when he asks who created the world, Mephistopheles does not answer and reminds Faust that he is cursed.

 Faust exclaims. Lucifer reproaches Faust for breaking his word and thinking about Christ. Faust vows that this will not happen again. Lucifer shows Faust the seven deadly sins in their true form. Pride, Greed, Fury, Envy, Gluttony, Sloth, Debauchery pass before him. Faust dreams of seeing hell and returning again. Lucifer promises to show him hell, but for now he gives a book for Faust to read and learn to accept any image.

The chorus tells that Faust, wanting to learn the secrets of astronomy and geography, first goes to Rome to see the pope and take part in the celebrations in honor of St. Peter.

Faust and Mephistopheles in Rome. Mephistopheles makes Faust invisible, and Faust amuses himself by being in the refectory, when the pope treats the Cardinal of Lorraine, snatches dishes of food from him and eats them. The holy fathers are at a loss, the pope begins to be baptized, and when he is baptized for the third time, Faust slaps him in the face. The monks curse him.

Robin, the groom of the inn where Faust and Mephistopheles are staying, steals a book from Faust. He and his friend Ralph want to learn how to work miracles on it and first steal the goblet from the innkeeper, but then Mephistopheles intervenes, whose spirit they inadvertently summoned, they return the goblet and promise never to steal magic books again. As punishment for their insolence, Mephistopheles promises to turn one of them into a monkey and the other into a dog.

The chorus tells that, having visited the courts of the monarchs, Faust, after long wanderings through heaven and earth, returned home. The fame of his scholarship reaches the Emperor Charles V, and he invites him to his palace and surrounds him with honor.

The emperor asks Faust to show his art and summon the spirits of great people. He dreams of seeing Alexander the Great and asks Faust to make Alexander and his wife rise from the grave. Faust explains that the bodies of long-dead persons have turned to dust and he cannot show them to the emperor, but he will summon spirits that will take on the images of Alexander the Great and his wife, and the emperor will be able to see them in the prime of life. When the spirits appear, the emperor, in order to verify their authenticity, checks whether Alexander's wife has a mole on her neck, and, having discovered it, he is imbued with even greater respect for Faust. One of the knights doubts Faust's art, as punishment, horns grow on his head, which disappear only when the knight promises to continue to be more respectful with scientists. Faust's time is running out. He returns to Wittenberg.

A horse dealer buys a horse from Faust for forty coins, but Faust warns him not to ride it into the water under any circumstances. The horse dealer thinks that Faust wants to hide from him some rare quality of the horse, and first of all he rides it into a deep pond. As soon as he reached the middle of the pond, the horse dealer discovers that the horse has disappeared, and under him, instead of a horse, there is an armful of hay. Miraculously not drowning, he comes to Faust to demand his money back. Mephistopheles tells the horse-dealer that Faust is fast asleep. The hawker drags Faust by the leg and tears it off. Faust wakes up, screams and sends Mephistopheles for the constable. The hawker asks to let him go and promises to pay another forty coins for it. Faust is pleased: the leg is in place, and the extra forty coins will not hurt him. Faust is invited by the Duke of Anhalt. The duchess asks to get her grapes in the middle of winter, and Faust immediately hands her a ripe bunch. Everyone marvels at his art. The duke generously rewards Faust. Faust frolics with students. At the end of the feast, they ask him to show them Helen of Troy. Faust fulfills their request. As the students leave, the Old Man arrives and tries to get Faust back on the path of salvation, but fails. Faust wants the beautiful Helena to become his lover. By order of Mephistopheles, Elena appears before Faust, he kisses her.

Faust says goodbye to the students: he is on the verge of death and condemned to burn in hell forever. The students advise him to remember God and ask him for mercy, but Faust understands that he has no forgiveness and tells the students how he sold his soul to the devil. The hour of reckoning is near. Faust asks the students to pray for him. The students leave. Faust has only one hour left to live. He dreams that midnight will never come, that time will stop, that eternal day will come, or at least midnight would not come a little longer and he would have time to repent and be saved. But the clock strikes, thunder rumbles, lightning flashes, and the devils take Faust away.

The choir urges the audience to learn a lesson from the tragic fate of Faust and not to seek knowledge of the protected areas of science that seduce a person and teach him to do evil.

O. E. Grinberg

In the prologue, Machiavelli says that everyone considers him dead, but his soul flew over the Alps and he arrived in Britain to friends. He considers religion a toy and claims that there is no sin, but only stupidity, that power is established only by force, and the law, like the Dragon, is strong only with blood. Machiavelli has come to play the tragedy of a Jew who became rich by living his principles, and asks the audience to judge him according to his merits and not judge him too harshly.

Barabbas, a Maltese Jew, sits in his office in front of a pile of gold and waits for the arrival of ships with goods. He thinks aloud that everyone hates him for his luck, but honors him for his wealth:

He sees in Christians only malice, lies and pride, which do not fit with their teaching, and those Christians who have a conscience live in poverty. He rejoices that the Jews have seized more wealth than the Christians. Upon learning that the Turkish fleet has approached the shores of Malta, Barabbas is not worried: neither peace nor war touches him, only his own life, the life of his daughter and the acquired property are important to him. Malta has been paying tribute to the Turks for a long time, and Barabbas assumes that the Turks have increased it so much that the Maltese have nothing to pay, so the Turks are going to capture the city. But Barabbas took precautions and hid his treasures, so that he was not afraid of the coming of the Turks.

The son of the Turkish Sultan Kalimat and the Pasha demand payment of tribute for ten years. The governor of Malta, Farnese, does not know where to get so much money, and confers with those close to him. They ask for a delay in order to collect money from all the inhabitants of Malta. Kalimat gives them a month of respite. Farnese decides to collect tribute from the Jews: each must give half of his property; whoever refuses will be baptized immediately, and whoever refuses to give up half of his possessions and be baptized will lose all his possessions.

Three Jews say that they will willingly give up half of their property, Barabbas is outraged by their humility. He is ready to give away half of his wealth, but only if the decree applies to all residents of Malta, and not only Jews. As punishment for the obstinacy of Barabbas, Farnese gives the order to take away all his goods. Barabbas calls Christians robbers and says that he is forced to steal in order to return the loot. The knights offer the governor to give the house of Barabbas to a convent, and Farnese agrees. Barabbas reproaches them with cruelty and says that they want to take his life away. Farnese says:

Barabbas curses the vile Christians who treated him so inhumanly. Other Jews remind him of Job, but the riches that Job lost cannot be compared with what Barabbas lost. Left alone, Barabbas laughs at the gullible fools: he is a prudent man and has safely hidden his treasures. Barabbas comforts her daughter Abigail, who is offended by the injustice of the Christian authorities. He keeps his wealth in a secret place, and since the house was taken away for a monastery and neither he nor Abigail is allowed to go there anymore, he tells his daughter to ask for a monastery, and at night move the floorboards and get gold and precious stones. Abigail pretends to have quarreled with her father and wants to be a nun. The monks Giacomo and Bernardin ask the abbess to accept Avigaea into the monastery, and the abbess takes her to the house. Barabbas pretends to curse her daughter who converted to Christianity. The nobleman Matthias, in love with Abigail, grieves when he learns that Abigail has gone to a monastery. Farnese's son Lodovico, having heard about the beauty of Abigail, dreams of seeing her. The night is coming. Barabbas does not sleep, waiting for news from Abigail, Finally she appears. She managed to find the hiding place, and she drops bags of treasures down. Barabbas takes them away.

Spanish Vice Admiral Martin del Bosco arrives in Malta. He brought captured Turks, Greeks and Moors and is going to sell them in Malta. Farnese does not agree to this: the Maltese are in alliance with the Turks. But Spain has rights to Malta and can help the Maltese get rid of Turkish rule. Farnese is ready to rebel against the Turks if the Spaniards support him and decides not to pay tribute to the Turks. He authorizes Martin del Bosco to sell slaves.

Aodoviko meets Barabbas and talks to him about the diamond, referring to Abigail. Barabbas aloud promises to give him the diamond, but he wants to take revenge on the governor and destroy Lodovico. Matthias asks Barabbas what he talked about with Lodovico. Barabbas reassures Matthias: about the diamond, not about Avigei. Barabbas buys himself a slave - Ithamor - and asks him about his past life. Ithamor tells how many bad deeds he has done. Barabbas rejoices, having found in him a like-minded person:

Barabbas brings Lodovico to her, asking Abigail to be kinder to him. Avigaea loves Matthias, but Barabbas explains to her that he is not going to captivate her and force her to marry Lodovico, it is just necessary for his plans that she be affectionate with him. He informs Matthias that Farnese has planned to marry Lodovico to Abigail. Young men who were once friends quarrel. Abigail wants to reconcile them, but Barabbas sends two false challenges to a duel: one - to Lodovico on behalf of Matthias, the other - to Matthias on behalf of Lodovico. During the duel, the young men kill each other. Matthias' mother and Lodovico's father, Governor Farnese, swear revenge on the one who quarreled them. Ithamor tells Abigail about her father's intrigues. Abigail, having learned how cruel her father was to her lover, converts to Christianity - this time sincerely - and again goes to the monastery. Upon learning of this, Barabbas is afraid that his daughter will betray him, and decides to poison her. He puts poison in a pot of rice porridge and sends it to the nuns as a gift. Nobody can be trusted, not even his own daughter, only Ithamor is faithful to him, so Barabbas promises to make him his heir. Ithamor takes the pot to the monastery and places it at the secret door.

The month of delay has passed, and the Turkish ambassador arrives in Malta for tribute. Farnese refuses to pay, and the ambassador threatens that Turkish cannons will turn Malta into a desert. Farnese urges the Maltese to load their cannons and prepare for battle. The monks Giacomo and Bernardin tell that the nuns suffered an unknown illness and they are dying. Before her death, Abigail tells Bernardine in confession about the intrigues of Barabbas, but asks him to keep the secret. As soon as she expires, the monk hurries to accuse Barabbas of villainy. Barabbas pretends to repent, says that he wants to be baptized, and promises to give all his wealth to the monastery. Bernardine and Giacomo argue over whose monastic order is better, and each wants to win over Barabbas to his side. As a result, the monks quarrel, insult each other and fight. In the end, Bernardine leaves with Ithamor, while Barabbas stays with Giacomo. At night, Barabbas and Ithamor strangle Bernardine, then lean his corpse against the wall. When Giacomo arrives, he, thinking that Bernardine is standing against the wall to keep him out of the house, hits him with a stick. The corpse falls and Giacomo sees that Bernardine is dead. Ithamor and Barabbas accuse Giacomo of Bernardine's murder. They say that they should not be baptized, since Christian monks are killing each other.

The courtesan Bellamira wants to seize the riches of Barabbas. To do this, she decides to seduce Itamore and writes him a love letter. Ithamor falls in love with Bellamira and is ready to do anything for her. He writes a letter to Barabbas, demanding three hundred crowns from him and threatening that otherwise he will confess to all crimes. Bellamira's servant goes to get the money, but only brings back ten crowns. Furious, Ithamore writes a new message to Barabbas, where he demands five hundred crowns. Barabbas is outraged by Ithamor's irreverence and decides to avenge the betrayal. Barabbas gives money, and changes clothes himself so that he will not be recognized, and follows Bellamira's servant. Ithamore is drinking with Bellamira and her servant. He tells them how he and Barabbas set up a duel between Matthias and Lodovico. Barabbas dressed as a French lute player in a wide-brimmed hat approaches them. Bellamira likes the smell of the flowers on Barabbas's hat, and he removes the bouquet from the hat and presents it to her. But the flowers are poisoned - now Bellamira, and her servant, and Ithamora are waiting for death.

farnese and knights are preparing to defend the city from the Turks. Bellamira comes to them and says that Barabbas is to blame for the death of Matthias and Lodovico and that he poisoned his daughter and the nuns. The guards bring in Barabbas and Ithamor. Ithamor testifies against Barabbas. They are taken to jail. Then the head of the guard returns and announces the death of the courtesan and her servant, as well as Barabbas and Ithamor. The guard carries Barabbas as dead and throws him outside the city wall. When everyone leaves, he wakes up: he did not die, he just drank a magical drink - an infusion of poppy seeds with mandrake - and fell asleep. Kadimat with an army at the walls of Malta. Barabbas shows the Turks the entrance to the city and is ready to serve the Turkish sultan. Kalimat promises to appoint him governor of Malta. Kalimat takes Farnese and the knights prisoner and puts them at the disposal of the new governor - Barabbas, who sends them all to prison. He summons the farnese and asks what reward awaits him if, having taken the Turks by surprise, he will return freedom to Malta and be merciful to the Christians. Farnese promises Barabbas a generous reward and the post of governor. Barabbas releases Farnese, and he goes to collect money to bring them to Barabbas in the evening. Barabbas is going to invite Kalimat to a feast and kill him there. Farnese agrees with the knights and Martin del Bosco that, having heard a shot, they will rush to his aid - the only way they can all be saved from slavery. When Farnese brings him the hundred thousand collected, Barabbas tells that in the monastery, where the Turkish troops will come, cannons and barrels of gunpowder are hidden, which will explode, bringing down a hail of stones on the heads of the Turks. As for Kalimat and his retinue, when they ascend the gallery, Farnese will cut the rope and the floor of the gallery will collapse, and everyone who will be there at that time will fall into the cellars. When Calimat comes to the feast, Barabbas invites him upstairs to the gallery, but before Calimat goes up there, a shot is heard and Farnese cuts the rope - Barabbas falls into the cauldron standing in the underground. Farnese shows Kalimat what a trap has been set for him. Before his death, Barabbas confesses that he wanted to kill everyone; both Christians and pagans. No one feels sorry for Barabbas, and he dies in a boiling cauldron. Farnese takes Kalimata prisoner. Because of Barabbas, the monastery was blown up and all the Turkish soldiers were killed. Farnese intends to keep Kalimat until his father makes amends for all the damage done to Malta. From now on, Malta is free and will not submit to anyone.

O. E. Grinberg

When Richard was born, a hurricane was raging, destroying trees. Foreshadowing timelessness, the owl screamed and the owl cried, the dogs howled, the raven croaked ominously and the magpies chirped. In the most difficult childbirth, a shapeless lump was born, from which her own mother recoiled in horror. The baby was a hunchback, lopsided, with legs of different lengths. But with teeth - to gnaw and torment people, as they will angrily tell him later. He grew up with the stigma of a freak, enduring humiliation and ridicule. The words "blasphemous" and "ugly" were thrown in his face, and the dogs began to bark at his sight. The son of Plantagenet, under his older brothers, he was actually deprived of hopes for the throne and was doomed to be content with the role of a noble jester. However, he turned out to be endowed with a powerful will, ambition, political talent and serpentine cunning. He happened to live in an era of bloody wars, internecine strife, when there was a merciless struggle for the throne between Yorks and Lancasters, and in this element of treachery, betrayal and sophisticated cruelty, he quickly mastered all the subtleties of court intrigues. With the active participation of Richard, his elder brother Edward became King Edward IV, defeating the Lancasters. To achieve this goal, Richard, Duke of Gloucester, killed the nobleman of Warwick along with his brothers, killed the heir to the throne, Prince Edward, and then personally stabbed the captive King Henry in the Tower VI, coolly remarking over his corpse:

King Edward, who exclaimed at the end of the previous chronicle:

- and did not suspect what diabolical plans were ripening in the soul of his own brother.

The action begins three months after Edward's coronation. Richard contemptuously says that the harsh days of the struggle have been replaced by idleness, debauchery and boredom. He calls his "peaceful" age frail, pompous and talkative, and declares that he curses lazy amusements. He decides to turn all the power of his nature to a steady advance towards sole power. "I decided to become a scoundrel ..." The first steps towards this have already been taken. With the help of slander, Richard achieves that the king ceases to trust his brother George, the Duke of Clarence, and sends him to prison - as if for his own safety. Having met Clarence, who is being taken to the Tower under guard, Richard hypocritically sympathizes with him, while he himself rejoices in his soul. From the Lord Chamberlain Hastings, he learns another good news for him: the king is ill and the doctors seriously fear for his life. Edward's craving for pernicious entertainment, which depleted the "royal body", had an effect. So the elimination of both brothers becomes a reality.

Richard, meanwhile, embarks on an almost impossible task: he dreams of marrying Anna Warwick, daughter of Warwick and widow of Prince Edward, whom he himself killed. He meets Anna when she escorts the coffin of King Henry VI in deep mourning, and immediately begins a direct conversation with her. This conversation is striking as an example of the rapid conquest of a woman's heart with the only weapon - the word. At the beginning of the conversation, Anna hates and curses Gloucester, calls him a sorcerer, scoundrel and executioner, spits in his face in response to insinuating speeches. Richard endures all her insults, calls Anna an angel and a saint, and puts forward the only argument in his defense: he committed all the murders only out of love for her. Now with flattery, now with witty evasions, he fends off all her reproaches. She says that even animals feel pity. Richard agrees that he does not know pity, so he is not a beast. She accuses him of killing her husband, who was "gentle, pure and merciful", Richard remarks that in this case it is more fitting for him to be in heaven. As a result, he irrefutably proves to Anna that the cause of her husband's death is her own beauty. Finally, he bares his chest and demands that Anna kill him if she is unwilling to forgive. Anna drops the sword, gradually softens, listens to Richard without the previous shudder and finally accepts the ring from him, thus giving hope for their marriage ...

When Anna leaves, an excited Richard cannot recover from the ease of his victory over her:

And he is once again convinced of his limitless ability to influence people and subordinate them to his will.

Further, Richard, without flinching, carries out his plan to kill Clarence imprisoned in the Tower: he secretly hires two thugs and sends them to prison. At the same time, he inspires simpleton nobles Buckingham, Stanley, Hastings and others that the arrest of Clarence is the machinations of Queen Elizabeth and her relatives, with whom he himself is at enmity. Only before his death, Clarence learns from the killer that the culprit of his death is Gloucester.

The sick King Edward, in anticipation of imminent death, gathers the courtiers and asks the representatives of the two warring camps - the king's entourage and the queen's entourage - to make peace and swear further tolerance for each other. Peers exchange promises and shake hands. The only thing missing is Gloucester. But here he appears. Upon learning of the truce, Richard ardently assures that he hates enmity, that in England he has no more enemies than a newborn baby, that he asks forgiveness from all the noble lords if he accidentally offended someone, and the like. Joyful Elizabeth turns to the king with a request in honor of the solemn day to immediately release Clarence. Richard dryly objects to her: it is impossible to return Clarence, because "everyone knows - the noble duke is dead!"

There comes a moment of general shock. The king is trying to find out who gave the order to kill his brother, but no one can answer him. Edward bitterly laments what happened and hardly gets to the bedroom. Richard quietly draws Buckingham's attention to how pale the native queens have turned, hinting that it was they who were to blame for what happened.

Unable to bear the blow, the king soon dies. Queen Elizabeth, the mother of the king, the Duchess of York, the children of Clarence - they all bitterly mourn the two dead. Richard joins them with mournful words of sympathy. Now, by law, the throne should be inherited by eleven-year-old Edward, the son of Elizabeth and the late king. The nobles send a retinue for him to Ledlo.

In this situation, the native queens - the uncle and half-brothers of the heir - pose a threat to Richard. And he gives the order to intercept them on the way for the prince and take them into custody at Pumphret Castle. The messenger tells this news to the queen, who begins to rush about in mortal fear for the children. The Duchess of York curses the days of unrest, when the victors, having defeated the enemies, immediately enter into battle with each other, "for brother, brother, and blood for blood...".

The courtiers meet with the little prince of Wales. He behaves with the touching dignity of a true monarch. It saddens him that he has not yet seen Elizabeth, his maternal uncle and his eight-year-old brother York. Richard explains to the boy that his mother's relatives are deceitful and harbor poison in their hearts. Gloucester, his guardian, the prince completely trusts and accepts his words with a sigh. He asks his uncle where he will live until the coronation. Richard replies that he would "advise" to temporarily live in the Tower until the prince chooses another pleasant dwelling. The boy shudders, but then dutifully agrees with his uncle's will. Little York arrives - mocking and insightful, who annoys Richard with caustic jokes. Finally both boys are escorted to the Tower.

Richard, Buckingham and their third ally, Catesby, had already secretly agreed to enthrone Gloucester. We must also enlist the support of Lord Hastings. Catesby is sent to him. Waking up Hastings in the middle of the night, he reports that their common enemies - the queen's relatives - will be executed today. This delights the lord. However, the idea of ​​crowning Richard bypassing little Edward revolts Hastings:

The short-sighted nobleman is confident in his own safety, but meanwhile Richard has prepared death for anyone who dares to prevent him on his way to the crown.

In Pamfret, the Queen's relatives are executed. And in the Tower at this time the state council is in session, obliged to appoint the day of the coronation. Richard himself shows up late for the council. He already knows that Hastings has refused to participate in the conspiracy and quickly orders that he be taken into custody and beheaded. He even declares that he will not sit down to dinner until the traitor's head is brought to him. In a late epiphany, Hastings curses "Bloody Richard" and dutifully goes to the block.

After his departure, Richard begins to cry, lamenting because of human infidelity, informs the members of the council that Hastings was the most secretive and crafty traitor, that he was forced to decide on such a drastic measure in the interests of England. The deceitful Buckingham readily echoes these words.

Now it is necessary to finally prepare public opinion, which Buckingham is again doing. At the direction of Gloucester, he spreads rumors that the princes are Edward's illegitimate children, that his marriage to Elizabeth is also illegitimate, brings various other grounds for Richard's accession to the English throne. The crowd of townspeople remains deaf to these speeches, but the mayor of London and other nobles agree that Richard should be asked to become king.

There comes the highest moment of triumph: a delegation of noble citizens comes to the tyrant to pray for his mercy to accept the crown. This episode is directed by Richard with devilish art. He arranges the matter in such a way that the petitioners find him not just anywhere, but in the monastery, where he, surrounded by the holy fathers, is deepened in prayers. Having learned about the delegation, he does not immediately go to it, but, having appeared in the company of two bishops, he plays the role of a simple-hearted and far from the earthly fuss of a person who is afraid of the "yoke of power" more than anything in the world and dreams only of peace. His sanctimonious speeches are delightful in their refined hypocrisy. He persists for a long time, forcing those who come to talk about how kind, gentle at heart, and necessary for the happiness of England. When, finally, the townspeople, desperate to break his unwillingness to become king, leave, he, as it were, reluctantly asks them to return.

he cautions.

obsequious Buckingham hurries to congratulate the new king of England - Richard III.

And after achieving the cherished goal, the bloody chain cannot be broken. On the contrary, according to the terrible logic of things, Richard needs new sacrifices to strengthen the position - for he himself realizes how fragile and illegal it is: "My throne is on fragile crystal." He is freed from Anna Warwick, who was married to him for a short time - unhappy and painful. No wonder Richard himself once remarked that he did not know the feeling of love inherent in all mortals. Now he gives the order to lock up his wife and spread the word about her illness. He himself intends, having exhausted Anna, to marry the daughter of the late King Edward, his brother. However, first he must commit another villainy - the most monstrous.

Richard tests Buckingham by reminding him that little Edward is still alive in the Tower. But even this noble footman turns cold from a terrible hint. Then the king is looking for the greedy courtier Tyrrel, whom he instructs to kill both princes. He hires two bloodthirsty bastards who penetrate Richard's pass to the Tower and strangle sleepy children, and later they themselves cry from what they have done.

Richard receives the news of the death of the princes with grim satisfaction. But she does not bring him the desired peace. Under the rule of a bloody tyrant, unrest begins in the country. On the part of France, the mighty Richmond, Richard's rival in the struggle for the right to own the throne, is advancing with a fleet. Richard is furious, full of rage and ready to fight all enemies. Meanwhile, his most reliable supporters have either been executed - like Hastings, or fallen into disgrace - like Buckingham, or secretly cheated on him - like Stanley, horrified by his terrible essence ...

The last, fifth act begins with another execution - this time by Buckingham. The unfortunate man admits that he believed Richard more than anyone else and is now severely punished for this.

Further scenes unfold directly on the battlefield. Here are the opposing regiments - Richmond and Richard, the Leaders spend the night in their tents. They fall asleep at the same time - and in a dream the spirits of people executed by the tyrant appear to them in turn. Edward, Clarence, Henry VI, Anna Warwick, little princes, native queens, Hastings and Buckingham - each of them turns his curse on Richard before the decisive battle, ending with the same formidable refrain: "Drop the sword, despair and die!" And the same spirits of the innocently executed wish Richmond confidence and victory.

Richmond wakes up, full of strength and vigor. His opponent wakes up in a cold sweat, tormented - it seems for the first time in his life - by the pangs of conscience, against which he breaks out with malicious curses.

An perjurer, a tyrant who has lost count of murders, he is not ready for repentance. He both loves and hates himself, but pride, conviction in his own superiority over everyone overpowers other emotions. In the last episodes, Richard shows himself as a warrior, not a coward. At dawn, he goes out to the troops and addresses them with a brilliant speech full of evil sarcasm. He reminds me that we have to fight

For the first time, he frankly says that it is worth considering only force, and not moral concepts or the law. And in this supreme cynicism, he is perhaps the most terrible and at the same time attractive.

The outcome of the battle is decided by the behavior of Stanley, who at the last moment goes over with his regiments to the side of Richmond. In this difficult, bloody battle, the king himself shows miracles of courage. When a horse is killed below him and Catesby offers to flee, Richard refuses without hesitation. "Slave, I staked my life and I will stand until the game is over." His last remark is full of fighting excitement:

In a duel with Richmond, he dies.

Richmond becomes the new King of England. With his accession, the reign of the Tudor dynasty begins. The War of the White and Scarlet Roses, which has tormented the country for thirty years, is over.

V. A. Sagalova

Coppersmith Christopher Sly falls into a drunken sleep at the threshold of the tavern. The lord returns from the hunt with huntsmen and servants and, finding the sleeping man, decides to play a trick on him. His servants take Sly to a luxurious bed, wash him in fragrant water, and change into an expensive dress. When Sly wakes up, he is told that he is a noble lord who has been overcome with madness and has slept for fifteen years, dreaming that he is a coppersmith. At first, Sly insists that he is "a peddler by birth, a carder by education, a bugbear by vicissitudes of fate, and by his present profession a coppersmith", but gradually allows himself to be convinced that he is really an important person and is married to a charming lady (in fact, he is in disguise lord's page). The lord cordially invites a traveling acting troupe to his castle, initiates its members into a prank plan, and then asks them to play a hilarious comedy, ostensibly to help an imaginary aristocrat get rid of an illness.

Lucentio, the son of the wealthy Pisan Vincentio, arrives in Padua, where he intends to devote himself to philosophy. His trusted servant Tranio believes that with all his devotion to Aristotle, "Ovid cannot be neglected." The rich Padua nobleman Baptista appears on the square, accompanied by his daughters - the eldest, quarrelsome and impudent Katarina, and the youngest - quiet and meek Bianca. Bianchi's two fiancés are also here: Hortensio and the young old man Gremio (both residents of Padua). Baptista announces to them that she will not marry Bianca until she finds a husband for her eldest daughter. He asks for help to find teachers of music and poetry for Bianchi, so that the poor thing does not get bored in forced seclusion. Hortensio and Gremio decide to put aside their rivalry temporarily in order to find a husband for Katarina. This is not an easy task, because "the devil himself will not cope with her, she is so malicious" and "with all the wealth of her father, no one will agree to marry a witch from hell." Lucentio falls in love with the meek beauty at first sight and decides to break into her house under the guise of a teacher. Tranio, in turn, must portray his master and woo Bianca through her father.

Another nobleman arrives in Padua from Verona. This is Petruchio, an old friend of Hortensio. He bluntly admits that he came to Padua "to succeed and to marry profitably." Hortensio jokingly offers him Katarina - after all, she is beautiful and they will give her a rich dowry. Petruchio immediately decides to go to woo. The warnings of a worried friend about the bride's bad temper, her quarrelsomeness and stubbornness do not touch the young Veronese:

Hortensio and Gremio agree to pay Petruchio's expenses related to the matchmaking. Everyone goes to Baptista's house. Hortensio asks a friend to introduce him as a music teacher. Gremio is going to recommend a disguised Lucentio as a poetry teacher, who hypocritically promises to support the recommender's matchmaking. Tranio, dressed as Lucentio, also declares himself a contender for Bianca's hand.

At Baptista's house, Katarina finds fault with her whiny sister and even beats her. Appearing in the company of Hortensio and all the others, Petruchio immediately declares that he longs to see Katharina, who is de "intelligent, modest, affable, beautiful and famous for her kind manners." He introduces Hortensio as Licio's music teacher, while Gremio recommends Lucentio as a young scholar named Cambio. Petruchio assures Baptista that he will win Catarina's love, because "she is obstinate, but he is also stubborn." He is not even intimidated by the fact that Katarina broke the lute on the head of an imaginary teacher in response to an innocent remark. At the first meeting with Katarina, Petruchio harshly and mockingly parries all her antics ... And he receives a slap in the face, which he is forced to endure: a nobleman cannot hit a woman. Yet he says:

Petruchio goes to Venice for wedding gifts, saying goodbye to Katharina with the words: "Kiss me, Kate, without fear! We're getting married this Sunday!" Gremio and Tranio impersonating Lucentio enter into a fight for Bianchi's hand. Baptista decides to give her daughter to someone who will assign her a larger inheritance after his death ("widowhood"). Tranio wins, but Baptista wants the promises to be personally confirmed by Vincentio, Lucentio's father, who is the true owner of the capital.

Under the jealous gaze of Hortensio, Lucentio, in the guise of the scientist Cambio, declares his love for Bianca, allegedly giving a Latin lesson. The girl does not remain indifferent to the lesson. Hortensio tries to explain himself in scales, but his advances are rebuffed. On Sunday, Petruchio arrives embarrassingly late for his wedding. He sits on a hackneyed horse, which has more ailments than hairs in its tail. He is dressed in unimaginable rags, which he does not want to exchange for decent clothes for anything. During the wedding, he behaves like a savage: he kicks the priest, throws wine in the sexton's face, grabs Katharina by the neck and smacks her lips loudly. After the ceremony, despite the requests of his father-in-law, Petruchio does not stay for the wedding feast and immediately takes Katarina away, despite her protests, with the words:

Gremio, Petruchio's servant, comes to his master's country house and informs the rest of the servants that the young ones are about to arrive. He talks about many unpleasant adventures on the way from Padua: Katharina's horse stumbled, the poor thing fell into the mud, and her husband, instead of helping her, rushed to beat the servant - the narrator himself. And he was so zealous that Katarina had to spank through the mud to drag him away. Meanwhile, the horses ran away. Appearing in the house, Petruchio continues to be outrageous: he finds fault with the servants, dumps supposedly burnt meat and all the dishes on the floor, ruins the prepared bed, so that Katharina, exhausted by the journey, is left without dinner and without sleep. Petruchio's insane behavior, however, has its own logic: he likens himself to a falconer who deprives a bird of sleep and food in order to tame it faster.

In Padua, Hortensio witnesses a tender scene between Bianca and Lucentio. He decides to leave Bianca and marry a rich widow who has loved him for a long time.

Lucentio's servants meet an old teacher from Mantua in the street, whom, with the approval of the owner, they decide to introduce Baptista as Vincenzio. They fool the gullible old man, informing him of the outbreak of war and the order of the Duke of Padua to execute all captured Mantuans. Tranio, pretending to be Lucentio, agrees to "save" the frightened teacher by passing him off as his father, who is just about to arrive to confirm the marriage contract.

Meanwhile, poor Katarina is still not allowed to eat or sleep, and even teased at the same time. Petruchio, cursing, kicks out the tailor who has brought a dress that Katarina liked very much. The same happens with the haberdasher who brought a fashionable hat. Slowly, Petruchio tells the artisans that they will be paid for everything. Finally, the young, accompanied by Hortensio, who was staying with them, go to Padua to visit Baptista. On the way, Petruchio continues to be picky: he either declares the sun to be the moon and forces his wife to confirm his words, threatening otherwise to return home right away, then he says that the old man they met on the way is a lovely girl, and invites Katharina to kiss this "maiden". The poor thing no longer has the strength to resist. The elder turns out to be none other than Vincentio, who is on his way to Padua to visit his son. Petruchio hugs him, explains that he is with him in property, because Bianca, his wife's sister, is probably already married to Lucentio, and offers to take him to the right house,

Petruchio, Catarina, Vincentio and servants drive up to Lucentio's house. The old man invites his brother-in-law to come into the house to have a drink together, and knocks on the door. A teacher, already addicted to the role, leans out of the window and chases the "impostor" away with aplomb. An incredible commotion is rising. The servants lie in the most believable and funny way. Upon learning that Tranio is impersonating his son, Vincenzio is horrified: he suspects the servant of the murder of the master and demands that he be imprisoned along with his accomplices. Instead, at the request of Baptista, he is dragged to prison - as a deceiver. The turmoil ends when the real Lucentio and Bianca, who have just been secretly married, enter the square. Lucentio arranges a feast, during which Petruchio bets Lucentio and Hortensio, already married to a widow, that his wife is the most obedient of the three, for a hundred crowns. He is laughed at, however, the once meek Bianca and the widow in love refuse to come at the request of their husbands. Only Katarina comes at the first order of Petruchio. Shocked, Baptista increases Katharina's dowry by twenty thousand crowns - "another daughter - a different dowry!" By order of her husband, Katharina brings obstinate wives and reads to them an instruction:

I. A. Bystrova

The author prefaced his famous tragedy with a prologue, in which he outlined the wandering plot of the Italian Renaissance era he used:

The action of the tragedy covers five days of one week, during which a fateful sequence of events occurs.

The first act begins with a scuffle between the servants, who belong to two warring families - the Montagues and the Capulets. It is not clear what caused the enmity, it is only obvious that it is old and irreconcilable, drawing both young and old into the whirlpool of passions. The nobles of the two houses quickly join the servants, and then their heads themselves. On the square flooded with the July sun, a real battle boils. The townspeople, tired of the strife, hardly manage to separate the fighters. Finally, the supreme ruler of Verona arrives - the prince, who orders an end to the clash on pain of death, and angrily leaves.

Romeo, the son of Montecchi, appears in the square. He already knows about the recent dump, but his thoughts are elsewhere. As befits his age, he is in love and suffers. The subject of his unrequited passion is a certain impregnable beauty Rosalina. In a conversation with a friend Benvolio, he shares his experiences. Benvolio good-naturedly advises to look at other girls and chuckles at the objections of a friend.

At this time, the Capulet is paid a visit by a relative of the prince, Count Paris, who asks for the hand of the only daughter of the owners. Juliet is not yet fourteen, but her father agrees to the proposal. Paris is noble, rich, handsome, and one cannot dream of a better groom. Capulet invites Paris to the annual ball they are giving that evening. The hostess goes to her daughter's chambers to warn Juliet about the matchmaking. The three of them - Juliet, the mother and nurse who raised the girl - they vividly discuss the news. Juliet is still serene and obedient to her parents' will.

A lavish carnival ball at the Capulet's house is infiltrated under masks by several young men from the enemy camp - including Benvolio, Mercutio and Romeo. They are all hot, sharp-tongued and adventurous. Particularly mocking and eloquent is Mercutio, Romeo's closest friend. Romeo himself is seized on the threshold of the Capulet house by a strange anxiety.

In the thick of the ball, among the occasional phrases exchanged by the hosts, guests and servants, the views of Romeo and Juliet intersect for the first time, and, like a dazzling lightning, they are struck by love.

The world for both instantly transforms. For Romeo from this moment there is no past attachment:

When he utters these words, Juliet's cousin Tybalt, who immediately grabs his sword, recognizes him by his voice. The hosts beg him not to make a fuss at the party. They notice that Romeo is known for his nobility and there is no trouble even if he attended the ball. Wounded Tybalt harbors a grudge.

Romeo, meanwhile, manages to exchange a few lines with Juliet. He's in a monk's outfit, and behind the hood she can't see his face. When the girl slips out of the hall at the call of her mother, Romeo learns from the nurse that she is the daughter of the owners. A few minutes later, Juliet makes the same discovery - through the same nurse, she finds out that Romeo is the sons of a sworn enemy!

Benvolio and Mercutio leave the ball without waiting for their friend. Romeo at this time silently climbs over the wall and hides in the dense garden of Caluletti. Intuition leads him to Juliet's balcony, and he freezes when he hears her pronounce his name. Unable to stand it, the young man responds. The conversation of two lovers begins with timid exclamations and questions, and ends with an oath of love and a decision to immediately unite their destinies.

- so says Juliet about the feeling that struck her.

Romeo echoes her.

From that moment on, Romeo and Juliet act with extraordinary firmness, courage and at the same time caution, completely obeying the love that has swallowed them. From their actions childishness involuntarily leaves, they are suddenly transformed into people wise with higher experience.

Their attorneys are the monk brother Lorenzo, Romeo's confessor, and the nurse, Juliet's confidante. Lorenzo agrees to secretly marry them - he hopes that the union of the young Montagues and the Capulets will serve as peace between the two families. In the cell of brother Lorenzo, a marriage ceremony is performed. The lovers are filled with happiness.

But in Verona the summer is still hot, and "the blood boils in the veins from the heat." Especially among those who are already quick-tempered as gunpowder and are looking for a reason to show their courage. Mercutio spends time in the square and argues with Benvolio which of them loves quarrels more. When the bully Tybalt appears with his friends, it becomes clear that a skirmish is indispensable.

The exchange of caustic barbs is interrupted by the arrival of Romeo. “Leave me alone! Here is the person I need,” Tybalt declares and continues: “Romeo, the essence of my feelings for you is all expressible in the word: you are a bastard.” However, the proud Romeo does not grab the sword in response, he only tells Tybalt that he is mistaken. After all, after the wedding with Juliet, he considers Tybalt his relative, almost a brother! But no one knows this yet. And Tybalt continues to bully until the enraged Mercutio intervenes:

They fight with swords. Romeo, horrified by what is happening, rushes between them, and at that moment Tybalt deftly strikes Mercutio from under his hand, and then quickly hides with his accomplices. Mercutio dies in Romeo's arms. The last words he whispers are: "Plague take both of your families!"

Romeo is shocked. He lost his best friend. Moreover, he understands that he died because of him, that Mercutio was betrayed by him, Romeo, when he defended his honor ... "Thanks to you, Juliet, I'm becoming too soft ..." Romeo mutters in a fit of repentance, bitterness and rage. At this moment, Tybalt reappears on the square. Drawing his sword, Romeo attacks him in "fiery-eyed anger". They fight silently and frantically. Seconds later, Tybalt falls dead. Benvolio, in fear, tells Romeo to flee immediately. He says that Tybalt's death in a duel will be regarded as murder and Romeo faces execution. Romeo leaves, depressed by everything that has happened, and the square is filled with indignant citizens. After Benvolio's explanations, the prince pronounces a verdict: from now on, Romeo is condemned to exile - otherwise death awaits him.

Juliet learns about the terrible news from the nurse. Her heart shrinks from mortal anguish. Grieving for the death of her brother, she is nevertheless adamant in justifying Romeo.

Romeo at this moment gloomily listens to the advice of brother Lorenzo. He convinces the young man to hide, obeying the law, until he is granted forgiveness. He promises to send letters to Romeo regularly. Romeo is in despair, exile for him is the same death. He is languishing with longing for Juliet. They manage to spend only a few hours together when he secretly sneaks into her room at night. The trills of the lark at dawn notify lovers that it is time for them to part. They can not tear themselves away from each other, pale, tormented by the upcoming separation and anxious forebodings. Finally, Juliet herself persuades Romeo to leave, fearing for his life.

Lady Caluletti, who enters her daughter's bedroom, finds Juliet in tears and explains this with grief due to the death of Tybalt. The news that the mother reports makes Juliet go cold: Count Paris is in a hurry with the wedding, and the father has already decided on the wedding the next day. The girl begs her parents to wait, but they are adamant. Or an immediate wedding with Paris - or "then I'm no longer your father." The nurse, after the departure of her parents, persuades Juliet not to worry: "Your new marriage will outshine the first with its benefits ..." "Amen!" Juliet says in response. From that moment on, she sees in the nurse no longer a friend, but an enemy. The only person left she can trust is Brother Lorenzo.

"Everything is over! There is no more hope!" Juliet says lifelessly when she is alone with the monk. Unlike the nurse, Aorenzo does not console her - he understands the girl's desperate situation. With all his heart sympathizing with her and Romeo, he offers the only way to salvation. She needs to pretend to obey the will of her father, prepare for the wedding, and in the evening take a miraculous solution. After that, she must plunge into a state resembling death, which will last exactly forty-two hours. During this period, Juliet will be buried in the family crypt. Lorenzo will let Romeo know about everything, he will arrive at the moment of her awakening, and they will be able to disappear until better times ...

 - concludes the monk, not concealing the dangers of this secret plan. "Give me the bottle! Don't talk about fear," Juliet cuts him off. Encouraged by new hope, she leaves with a vial of solution.

In the Capulet house, preparations are being made for the wedding. Parents are happy that the daughter is no longer stubborn. The nurse and mother tenderly say goodbye to her before going to bed. Juliet is alone. Before a decisive act, she is seized by fear. What if the monk had deceived her? Or will the elixir not work? Or will the action be different than he promised? What if she wakes up early? Or even worse - will remain alive, but will lose his mind from fear? And yet, without hesitation, she embroiders the bottle to the bottom.

In the morning, the house resounds with the heart-rending cry of the nurse: "Juliet is dead! She is dead!" The house is filled with confusion and horror. There can be no doubt - Juliet is dead. She lies in bed in a wedding dress, stiff, no blood in her face. Paris, like everyone else, is overwhelmed by the terrible news. The musicians invited to play at the wedding are still treading awkwardly, waiting for orders, but the unfortunate family is already plunged into inconsolable mourning. Lorenzo, who has come, utters words of sympathy to his relatives and reminds that it is time to carry the deceased to the cemetery.

- Romeo, who is hiding in Mantua, does not yet suspect how prophetic this vision will turn out to be. So far, he knows nothing about what happened in Verona, but only, burning with impatience, is waiting for news from the monk. Instead of a messenger, Romeo's servant Baltazar appears. The young man rushes to him with questions and - woe! - finds out the terrible news of Juliet's death. He gives the command to harness the horses and promises: "Juliet, we will be together today." From the local pharmacist, he demands the most terrible and fastest poison, and for fifty ducats he gets a powder -

At this very time, Brother Lorenzo is experiencing no less horror. The monk, whom Lorenzo sent to Mantua with a secret letter, returns to him. It turns out that a fatal accident did not allow the order to be fulfilled: the monk was locked in the house on the occasion of a plague quarantine, since his friend had previously cared for the sick.

The last scene takes place in the tomb of the Caluletti family. Here, next to Tybalt, the dead Juliet had just been laid in the tomb. Paris, lingering at the coffin of the bride, throws flowers at Juliet. Hearing a rustle, he hides. Romeo appears with a servant. He gives Balthazar a letter to his father and sends it, and he opens the crypt with a crowbar. At this point, Paris comes out of hiding. He blocks Romeo's path, threatens him with arrest and execution. Romeo asks him to leave kindly and "not to tempt the insane". Paris insists on arrest. The duel begins. The page of Paris in fear rushes for help. Paris dies from the sword of Romeo and before his death asks to bring him to the crypt to Juliet. Romeo is finally left alone in front of Juliet's coffin. He is amazed that in the coffin she looks as alive and just as beautiful. Cursing the evil forces that carried away this most perfect of earthly creatures, he kisses Juliet for the last time and with the words "I drink to you, love!" drinks poison.

Lorenzo is late for a moment, but he is no longer able to revive the young man. He arrives just in time for Juliet's awakening. Seeing the monk, she immediately asks where her husband is, and assures that she remembers everything perfectly and feels cheerful and healthy. Lorenzo, afraid to tell her the terrible truth, urges her to leave the crypt. Juliet does not hear his words. Seeing the dead Romeo, she only thinks about how to die herself as soon as possible. She is annoyed that Romeo alone drank all the poison. But next to him lies a dagger. It's time. Moreover, the voices of the guards are already heard outside. And the girl plunges a dagger into her chest.

Those who entered the tomb found dead Paris and Romeo, and next to them still warm Juliet. Lorenzo, who gave vent to tears, told the tragic story of lovers. The Montagues and the Capulets, forgetting their old feuds, held out their hands to each other, inconsolably mourning the dead children. It was decided to put a golden statue on their graves.

But, as the prince rightly noted, all the same, the story of Romeo and Juliet will remain the saddest in the world ...

V. A. Sagalova

The action takes place in Athens. The ruler of Athens bears the name of Theseus, one of the most popular heroes of ancient legends about the conquest by the Greeks of the warlike tribe of women - the Amazons. Theseus marries the queen of this tribe, Hippolyta. The play, apparently, was created for a performance on the occasion of the wedding of some high-ranking persons.

Preparations are underway for the wedding of Duke Theseus and Queen of the Amazons Hippolyta, which is to take place on the night of the full moon. Enraged Aegeus, the father of Hermia, comes to the duke's palace and accuses Lysander of having bewitched his daughter and treacherously forced her to love him, while she had already been promised to Demetrius. Hermia confesses her love for Lysander. The duke announces that, according to Athenian law, she must submit to her father's will. He gives the girl a respite, but on the day of the new moon she will have to

The lovers agree to run away from Athens together and meet the next night in a nearby forest. They reveal their plan to Hermia's friend Helena, who was once Demetrius' lover and still loves him passionately. Hoping for his gratitude, she is going to tell Demetrius about the plans of the lovers. Meanwhile, a company of rustic artisans is preparing to stage an sideshow on the occasion of the duke's wedding. The director, carpenter Peter Pigwa, chose a suitable work: "A pitiable comedy and a very cruel death of Pyramus and Thisbe." Weaver Nick Osnova agrees to play the role of Pyramus, as, indeed, most other roles. The bellows repairer Francis Dudka is given the role of Thisbe (in Shakespeare's time, women were not allowed on the stage). The tailor Robin Snarky will be the mother of Thisbe, and the coppersmith Tom Snout will be the father of Pyramus. The role of Leo is entrusted to the carpenter Milyaga: he has "a tight memory for learning", and for this role you only need to growl. Pigwa asks everyone to memorize the roles and come to the forest to the Duke's oak tomorrow evening for a rehearsal.

In a forest near Athens, the king of the fairies and elves, Oberon, and his wife, Queen Titania, are quarreling over a child whom Titania has adopted, and Oberon wants to take for himself to make a page. Titania refuses to submit to her husband's will and leaves with the elves. Oberon asks the mischievous elf Pak (Good Little Robin) to bring him a small flower, on which Cupid's arrow fell after he missed "the Vestal Virgin reigning in the West" (an allusion to Queen Elizabeth). If the eyelids of a sleeping person are smeared with the juice of this flower, then, upon waking up, he will fall in love with the first living creature that he sees. Oberon wants in this way to make Titania fall in love with some wild animal and forget about the boy. Pack flies off in search of a flower, and Oberon becomes an invisible witness to the conversation between Helena and Demetrius, who is looking for Hermia and Lysander in the forest and scornfully rejects his former lover. When Peck returns with a flower, Oberon instructs him to find Demetrius, whom he describes as an "arrogant rake" in Athenian clothes, and lubricate his eyes, but so that during awakening a beauty in love with him will be next to him. Finding the sleeping Titania, Oberon squeezes the flower's juice onto her eyelids. Lysander and Hermia got lost in the forest and also lay down to rest, at the request of Hermia - away from each other, because

Peck, mistaking Lysander for Demetrius, drips juice over his eyes. Helen appears, from whom Demetrius escaped, and stopping to rest, wakes up Lysander, who immediately falls in love with her. Elena believes that he is mocking her and runs away, and Lysander, leaving Hermia, rushes after Elena.

Near the place where Titania sleeps, a company of artisans gathered for a rehearsal. At the suggestion of the Foundation, who is very concerned that, God forbid, not to scare the ladies-spectators, two prologues are written for the play - the first is that Pyramus does not kill himself at all and he is not really Pyramus, but the weaver the second - that Lev is not a lion at all, but the carpenter Milyaga. Naughty Pak, who is watching the rehearsal with interest, enchants the Foundation: now the weaver has a donkey's head. The friends, mistaking the Basis for a werewolf, scatter in fear. At this time, Titania wakes up and, looking at the Foundation, says: "Your image captivates the eye <...> I love you. Follow me!" Titania summons four elves - Mustard Seed, Sweet Pea, Gossamer and Moth - and orders them to serve "their darling". Oberon is delighted to hear Pak's story about how Titania fell in love with a monster, but is very unhappy when he learns that the elf splashed magic juice into Lysander's eyes, not Demetrius. Oberon puts Demetrius to sleep and corrects the mistake of Pack, who, on the orders of his master, lures Helen closer to the sleeping Demetrius. Barely waking up, Demetrius begins to swear his love to the one he recently rejected with contempt. Elena is convinced that both young men, Lysander and Demetrius, are mocking her: "There is no power to listen to empty ridicule!" In addition, she believes that Hermia is at one with them, and bitterly reproaches her friend for deceit. Shocked by Lysander's rude insults, Hermia accuses Helen of being a liar and a thief who stole Lysander's heart from her. Word for word - and she is already trying to scratch out Elena's eyes. Young people - now rivals seeking Elena's love - retire to decide in a duel which of them has more rights. Pack is delighted with all this confusion, but Oberon orders him to lead both duelists deeper into the forest, imitating their voices, and lead them astray, "so that they can't find each other." When Lysander collapses in exhaustion and falls asleep, Peck squeezes the juice of a plant - an antidote to the love flower - onto his eyelids. Helena and Demetrius are also put to sleep not far from each other.

Seeing Titania, who fell asleep next to the Foundation, Oberon, who by this time had already got the child he liked, takes pity on her and touches her eyes with an antidote flower. The fairy queen wakes up with the words:

Peck, on Oberon's orders, returns his own head to the Base. The elf lords fly away. Theseus, Hippolyta and Aegeus, hunting, appear in the forest. They find sleeping young people and wake them up. Already free from the effects of the love potion, but still dazed, Lysander explains that he and Hermia fled into the forest from the severity of Athenian laws, Demetrius confesses that

Theseus announces that two more couples will be married today with them and Hippolyta, after which he leaves with his retinue. The awakened Base goes to Pigva's house, where his friends are impatiently waiting for him. He gives the actors last instructions: "Let Thisbe put on clean linen," and let Leo not take it into his head to cut his nails - they should peek out from under the skin like claws.

Theseus marvels at the strange story of the lovers.

he says. Philostratus, the manager of entertainment, presents him with a list of entertainment. The Duke chooses a play by artisans:

Under the ironic comments of the audience, Pigwa reads the prologue. Snout explains that he is the Wall through which Pyramus and Thisbe talk, and therefore smeared with lime. When the Basis-Pyramus is looking for a gap in the Wall to look at his beloved, Snout helpfully spreads his fingers. Leo appears and explains in verse that he is not real. "What a meek animal," Theseus admires, "and what a reasonable one!" Amateur actors shamelessly distort the text and say a lot of nonsense, which greatly amuse their noble spectators. Finally the play is over. Everyone disperses - it's already midnight, the magic hour for lovers. Pack appears, he and the rest of the elves first sing and dance, and then, by order of Oberon and Titania, they fly around the palace to bless the beds of the newlyweds. Baek addresses the audience:

I. A. Bystrova

The Venetian merchant Antonio is tormented by causeless sadness. His friends, Salarino and Salanio, try to explain her as a concern for the ships with goods or an unhappy love. But Antonio rejects both explanations. Accompanied by Gratiano and Lorenzo, Antonio's relative and closest friend, Bassanio, appears. Salarino and Salanio exit. Joker Gratiano tries to cheer up Antonio, but when this fails (“The world is a stage where everyone has a role,” says Antonio, “mine is sad”), Gratiano leaves with Lorenzo. Alone with his friend Bassanio, he admits that, leading a carefree lifestyle, he was left completely penniless and is forced to again ask Antonio for money in order to go to Belmont, the estate of Portia, a rich heiress, in whose beauty and virtue he is passionately in love and in the success of his matchmaking. which I am sure. Antonio does not have cash, but he invites a friend to find a loan in his, Antonio, name.

Meanwhile, in Belmont, Portia complains to her servant Nerissa ("Black") that, according to her father's will, she can neither choose nor reject the groom herself. Her husband will be the one who guesses, choosing from three caskets - gold, silver and lead, in which her portrait is located. Nerissa begins to list numerous suitors - Portia sarcastically ridicules everyone. Only Bassanio, a scientist and warrior who once visited her father, she remembers with tenderness.

In Venice, Bassanio asks the merchant Shylock to lend him three thousand ducats for three months under the guarantee of Antonio. Shylock knows that the entire fortune of the surety is entrusted to the sea. In a conversation with the appeared Antonio, whom he fiercely hates for his contempt for his people and for his occupation - usury, Shylock recalls the countless insults that Antonio subjected him to. But since Antonio himself lends without interest, Shylock, wishing to gain his friendship, will also give him a loan without interest, only on a comic security - a pound of Antonio's meat, which Shylock can cut as a penalty from any part of the merchant's body. Antonio is delighted with the joke and kindness of the pawnbroker. Bassanio is full of forebodings and asks not to make deals. Shylock assures him that such a pledge would be of no use to him anyway, and Antonio reminds him that his ships will arrive long before the due date.

The Prince of Morocco arrives at Portia's house to choose one of the chests. He gives, as the conditions of the test require, an oath: in case of failure, he will not marry any of the women again.

In Venice, Shylock's servant Lancelot Gobbo, incessantly joking, convinces himself to run away from his master. Having met his blind father, he plays a long prank on him, then dedicates his intention to be hired as a servant to Bassanio, known for his generosity. Bassanio agrees to take Lancelot into service. He also agrees to Gratiano's request to take him with him to Belmont. In the house of Shylock, Lancelot says goodbye to the daughter of the former owner - Jessica. They exchange jokes. Jessica is ashamed of her father. Lancelot undertakes to secretly deliver a letter to her beloved Jessica Aorenzo with a plan to escape from home. Disguised as a page and taking her father's money and jewelry with her, Jessica runs away with Lorenzo with the help of his friends Gratiano and Salarino. Bassanio and Gratiano hasten to set sail with a fair wind for Belmont.

In Belmont, the Moroccan prince chooses a gold box - a precious pearl, in his opinion, cannot be enclosed in a different frame - with the inscription: "With me you will get what many desire." But in it is not a portrait of a beloved, but a skull and edifying verses. The prince is forced to leave.

In Venice, Salarino and Salanio laugh at Shylock's fury when he learns that his daughter has robbed him and run off with a Christian.

groans Shylock. At the same time, they discuss aloud that one of Antonio's ships sank in the English Channel.

Belmont has a new challenger - the Prince of Aragon. He chooses a silver chest with the inscription: "With me you will get what you deserve." It contains an image of a stupid face and mocking verses. The prince leaves. The servant announces the arrival of the young Venetian and the rich gifts he has sent. Nerissa hopes it's Bassanio.

Salarino and Salanio discuss the new losses of Antonio, whose nobility and kindness both admire. When Shylock appears, they first mock his losses, then express their confidence that if Antonio is past due, the moneylender will not demand his meat: what is it good for? Shylock responds:

"He disgraced me, <...> interfered with my affairs, cooled my friends, inflamed my enemies; and what reason did he have for this? The one that I am a Jew. Doesn't a Jew have eyes? <...> don’t we bleed? <…> If we are poisoned, don’t we die? And if we are insulted, shouldn’t we take revenge? <…> You teach us vileness, I will fulfill it ... "

Exeunt Salarino and Salario. The Jew Tubal appears, whom Shylock sent in search of his daughter. But Tubal could not find her. He only recounts the rumors about Jessica's prodigality. Shylock is horrified at the loss. Upon learning that his daughter has exchanged a ring given to him by his late wife for a monkey, Shylock sends a curse to Jessica.

The only thing that consoles him is the rumors about the losses of Antonio, on which he is determined to take out his anger and grief.

In Belmont, Portia persuades Bassanio to delay his choice, she is afraid of losing him in case of a mistake. Bassanio wants to immediately try his luck. Exchanging witty remarks, young people confess their love to each other. They bring chests. Bassanio rejects gold and silver - outward brilliance is deceptive. He chooses a lead chest with the inscription: "With me you will give everything, risking everything you have" - ​​it contains a portrait of Portia and a poetic congratulation. Portia and Bassanio are preparing for the wedding, as are Nerissa and Gratiano, who have fallen in love with each other. Portia gives the groom a ring and takes an oath from him to keep it as a guarantee of mutual love. Nerissa makes the same gift to the betrothed. Lorenzo appears with Jessica and a messenger who brought a letter from Antonio. The merchant reports that all his ships were lost, he is ruined, the moneylender's bill is overdue, Shylock demands payment of a monstrous penalty. Antonio asks his friend not to blame himself for his misfortunes, but to come and see him before he dies. Portia insists that the groom immediately go to the aid of the Friend, offering Shylock any money for his life. Bassanio and Gratiano go to Venice.

In Venice, Shylock revels in the thought of revenge - after all, the law is on his side. Antonio understands that the law cannot be broken, he is ready for inevitable death and only dreams of seeing Bassanio.

In Belmont, Portia entrusts her estate to Lorenzo, and herself, together with a maid, allegedly retires to a monastery for prayer. In fact, she is going to Venice. She sends a servant to Padua to her cousin Bellario, doctor of law, who must supply her with papers and a man's dress. Lancelot makes fun of Jessica and her conversion to Christianity. Lorenzo, Jessica and Lancelot exchange joking remarks, trying to outdo each other in wit.

Shylock enjoys his triumph in court. The doge's appeals for mercy, Bassanio's proposals to pay double the debt - nothing softens his cruelty. In response to reproaches, he refers to the law and, in turn, reproaches Christians for the fact that they have slavery. The Doge asks for the introduction of Dr. Bellario, whom he wants to consult before making a decision. Bassanio and Antonio try to cheer each other up. Everyone is ready to sacrifice themselves. Shylock sharpens a knife. The scribe enters. This is Nerissa in disguise. In the letter she sent, Bellario, referring to ill health, recommends the Doge to conduct the process of his young, but unusually learned colleague, Dr. Balthazar from Rome. The Doctor is, of course, Portia in disguise. She initially tries to appease Shylock, but when she is refused, she admits that the law is on the pawnbroker's side. Shylock extols the wisdom of the young judge. Antonio says goodbye to a friend. Bassanio is in despair. He is ready to sacrifice everything, even his beloved wife, if only it would save Antonio. Gratiano is ready for the same. Shylock condemns the fragility of Christian marriages. He is ready to begin his heinous work. At the last moment, the "judge" stops him, reminding him that he must take only the merchant's meat, without shedding a single drop of blood, moreover, exactly a pound - no more, no less. If these conditions are violated, a cruel punishment awaits him according to the law, Shylock agrees to pay a triple amount of the debt - the judge refuses: there is not a word about this in the bill, the Jew has already refused the money before the court. Shylock agrees to pay only one debt - another refusal. Moreover, according to the Venetian laws, for an attempt on a citizen of the republic, Shylock must give him half of his property, the second goes to the treasury as a fine, while the life of the criminal depends on the grace of the Doge. Shylock refuses to beg for mercy. And yet his life is spared, and the requisition is replaced by a fine. The magnanimous Antonio refuses the half due to him on the condition that after the death of Shylock it will be bequeathed to Lorenzo. However, Shylock must immediately convert to Christianity and bequeath all his property to his daughter and son-in-law. Shylock, in desperation, agrees to everything. As a reward, imaginary judges lure rings from their fooled husbands.

One night in Belmonte, Lorenzo and Jessica, preparing for the return of their owners, order the musicians to play in the garden.

Portia, Nerissa, their husbands, Gratiano, Antonio converge in the night garden. After an exchange of pleasantries, it turns out that the young husbands have lost the gift rings. Wives insist that the pledges of their love were given to women, husbands swear that this is not so, justify themselves with all their might - all in vain. Continuing the prank, the women promise to share the bed with the judge and his scribe in order to return their gifts. Then they report that this has already happened, and show the rings. The husbands are horrified. Portia and Nerissa confess to the prank. Portia gives Antonio a letter that fell into her hands, informing her that all his ships are intact. Nerissa gives Lorenzo and Jessica the deed by which Shylock denies them all his riches. Everyone goes to the house to find out the details of the adventures of Portia and Nerissa.

I. A. Bystrova

In this play, the fat knight Falstaff and some other comic characters of "Henry IV" appear again - the judge Shallow, the pompous fighter Pistol, the mischievous page of Falstaff, the drunkard Bardolph. The action takes place in the city of Windsor and is frankly farcical.

In front of the house of Page, a wealthy citizen of Windsor, Judge Shallow, his foolish and timid nephew Slender, and Sir Hugh Evans, a pastor, a native of Wales, are talking. The judge mangles Latin, and Evans mangles English. Shallow seethes with anger - he was insulted by Sir John Falstaff. The judge wants to complain about the offender to the Royal Council, the pastor persuades him to end the matter amicably and tries to change the subject of the conversation, suggesting that the judge arrange the wedding of his nephew and Page's daughter. “This is the best girl in the world!” he says. “Seven hundred pounds sterling in pure money and a lot of family gold and silver ...” Shallow is ready to go to Page's house for matchmaking, although Sir John is there. Paige invites the gentlemen into the house. He exchanges clumsy pleasantries with the judge and wishes to reconcile the judge with Falstaff. The fat knight himself appears, as always, surrounded by hangers-on. They make fun of the judge and his nephew. The hospitable host invites everyone to dine. His daughter Anna speaks to Slender, but he gets lost and carries a real nonsense. Evans sends Simple, Slender's servant, with a letter to Mrs. Quickly, who lives in the service of a French doctor, Caius. In the letter - a request to put in a word for Anna for Slender.

At the Garter Inn, Sir John complains to the owner about the lack of money. He is forced to disband "his retinue". The owner has an ironic sympathy for the old reveler. He is ready to take Bardolph as a servant, to instruct him to sift and pour wine. Bardolph is very pleased. Pistol and Nim joke with their patron, but refuse to carry out his order. It is indeed highly questionable. Falstaff, with his usual conceit, decided that the wives of two respectable citizens of Windsor, Page and Ford, were in love with him. But he is attracted not by the ladies themselves (both of them are not of their first youth), but by the opportunity, with their help, to put a hand into the wallets of their husbands. "One will be the East Indies for me, the other the West Indies ..." He writes letters to both and orders Pistol and Nim to take them to the addressees. But the accustomers balk.

- Pistol exclaims in his usual pompous manner. Nim also does not want to get involved in a dubious undertaking. Falstaff sends a page with letters and drives out both swindlers. They are offended and decide to hand over Sir John to Page and Ford. And let them deal with it themselves.

At Dr. Caius' house, Simple gives Mrs. Quickly a letter from Evans. A brisk maid assures him that she will definitely help Slender. Suddenly, the doctor himself returns. Simpla is hidden in a closet so as not to anger the quick-tempered Frenchman. However, Simple still comes across. Caius learns about the nature of the task performed by Simple. The doctor, shamelessly mangling the English language, demands paper and quickly writes the pastor a challenge to a duel. He himself has views of Anna. Mrs. Quickly assures the owner that the girl is crazy about him. As Simple and the doctor leave, Mrs. Quickly has another visitor. This is a young nobleman, Fenton, who is in love with Anna. Quickly promises to help him achieve the favor of his beloved and willingly takes the money.

Mrs. Page reads Falstaff's letter. She is so indignant at the debauchery of the old rake that she is ready to introduce a bill for the extermination of the male sex in Parliament. Her indignation increases even more when Mrs. Ford appears and shows the exact same letter, but addressed to her. Girlfriends angrily joke Sir John, his appearance and behavior. They decide to teach the fat red tape a lesson, and to do this, give him some hope and lead him by the nose longer. Meanwhile, Pistol and Nim tell the husbands of worthy ladies of Sir John's plans for their wives and purses. Reasonable Mr. Page completely trusts his girlfriend. But Mr. Ford is jealous and doubtful. The innkeeper appears, accompanied by Judge Shallow. Shallow invites both gentlemen to go see the duel between Dr. Caius and Sir Hugh. The fact is that the cheerful owner of the "Garter" should be her second. He has already appointed a place for the duel - each of the opponents has his own. Ford asks his master to introduce him to Falstaff as Mr. Brooke. "Under the name of Brooke, as if under a mask, I will find out everything from Falstaff himself," he says.

Mrs. Quickley comes to Sir John's hotel with an errand from Mrs. Ford. She informs the windy fat man that Ford will not be at home between ten and eleven that morning, and his wife is waiting for Sir John to visit. When Mrs. Quickly leaves, a new visitor appears to the knight - Mr. Brooke. He treats Sir John with sherry and easily finds out about the appointment. Ford is furious and vows revenge.

Meanwhile, Dr. Caius has been waiting in the field for his opponent for an hour. He is furious and heaps abuse on the absent pastor in horribly mangled English. The owner of the Garter appears and drags the hot medic to the Frog Swamp.

Sir Hugh is waiting for the doctor in the field by the swamp. Finally, he appears, accompanied by the owner and all those invited to the "fun". Opponents shower each other with comical reproaches. The owner admits that he arranged everything to reconcile them. The duelists, who poured out their anger in battle, agree to a world peace. Mr. Ford meets the whole company when she goes to dinner at Anna Page's. Page himself promises to support Slender's matchmaking, but his wife is inclined to marry off her daughter to Caius. Both do not want to hear about Fenton: he is poor, he kept company with the dissolute Prince Harry, he is too noble, finally. Ford invites the doctor, pastor and Page to his place. He wants to expose his wife in front of witnesses.

Falstaff came to see Mrs. Ford, but he did not have to be nice for long: Mrs. Page appeared and, as agreed in advance, warned her neighbor that her husband was coming here "with all the Windsor guards." Frightened, Falstaff agrees to be stuffed into a basket by the women and covered with dirty laundry. Appeared Ford arranges a uniform search at home, but does not find anyone. He is embarrassed. Those around him are full of reproaches. Meanwhile, the servants, as they were ordered in advance by the mistress, take the basket, carry it to the banks of the Thames and dump its contents into a dirty ditch. Mrs. Ford says to her friend: "I myself do not know what is more pleasant for me: to teach my husband a lesson for jealousy or to punish Falstaff for debauchery."

Anna Page speaks tenderly to Fenton. The lovers' conversation is interrupted by the appearance of the judge and his stupid nephew. The latter, as always, is talking nonsense, but Anna still manages to find out that the nice fellow is wooing her only to please her uncle.

Falstaff is in the inn throwing thunder and lightning, but then Mrs. Quickly sends him an invitation from Mrs. Ford to a meeting at eight in the morning, when her husband goes hunting. She leaves, and "Mr. Brook" who appears, finds out everything about the laundry basket and a new date.

Falstaff is again with Mrs. Ford, and again the jealous husband appears at the door. This time he immediately rushes to the basket - there is only dirty laundry. There is no one in the rooms either. Meanwhile, Falstaff is led out, dressed in the dress of an aunt of one of the maids, an old woman whom Ford hates. A hot-tempered jealous man beats an imaginary old woman with a stick. Falstaff flees. The ladies tell their husbands how they played a trick on Sir John.

The whole company decides to once again teach the fat man a lesson and expose him publicly. To do this, he will be assigned a date in the forest at night. Falstaff will have to dress up as the ghost of the hunter Gern, and young people dressed as elves and fairies, led by the pastor, will frighten him and draw out a confession of unworthy behavior of a knight. The role of the queen of the fairies is entrusted to Anna. Her father wants her to wear a white dress - Slender will recognize her from him, kidnap her and get married in secret from Mrs. Page.

Mrs. Page has her own plan - her daughter should put on a green dress and, secretly from her father, marry a doctor. Anna also has a plan, but only Fenton knows about it.

Mrs. Quickly again sends an invitation to Falstaff - this time from both ladies. Sir John, of course, tells "Brook" everything, mocking the "cuckold" Ford. Dressed as Gern, with horns on his head, he comes to the reserved oak. The mockers also appear there, but after a brief exchange of pleasantries, the sound of hunting horns is heard. The ladies act scared and run away. Mummers appear in costumes of elves, fairies, hobgoblins (the English equivalent of a goblin) and satyrs. Everyone makes fun of the frightened Falstaff: they pinch him, burn him with torches, tickle him. In the confusion, Caius runs off with a fairy in green, Slender with a fairy in a white dress, and Fenton ... with Anna Page. Falstaff is unable to escape - both ladies and their husbands block his way. The fat man is showered with ridicule and insults. He himself understands that he was in trouble:

“All right, all right, laugh at me, mock me! Everything is cleared up when Fenton and Anna enter. They are now husband and wife. Reconciled with the inevitable, Anna's parents bless the young. Everyone is invited to the wedding feast, including the ashamed Falstaff.

I. A. Bystrova

The action takes place in the city of Messina in Sicily. The messenger informs the governor of Leonato about the arrival in the city after the victorious end of the war, Don Pedro, Prince of Aragon, with his retinue. Talking about the battle, the messenger mentions the young noble Florentine Claudio, who distinguished himself on the battlefield. The prince brought him closer to him, made him his confidant. The Governor's niece, Beatrice, asks about Signor Benedict of Padua. A wonderful young man, says the messenger, fought heroically in the war, besides, he is a merry fellow, which are few. Beatrice does not believe - a dandy, a heliporter and a talker could distinguish himself only at feasts and fun. Gero, the governor's daughter, asks the guest not to take his cousin's ridicule seriously, Beatrice and Benedict have known each other for a long time, when they meet they always swoop down, they say barbs to each other.

Leonato hosts Don Pedro, his half-brother Don Juan, Claudio and Benedict in his house. The prince thanks them for their hospitality, others perceive such a visit as a burden, and the governor gladly showed his readiness to accept them for a month. Leonato is pleased that don Pedro and don Juan are finally reconciled.

Claudio is fascinated by Hero and confesses this to Benedict. The one who calls himself an enemy of the female sex is perplexed: is Claudio really so eager to tie the knot! In vain Benedict mocks the feelings of a friend, Don Pedro scolds him, the time will come, and he, too, will experience the pangs of love. The prince volunteers to help the lover: at night, at a masquerade, he will open up to the beautiful Hero on his behalf and talk to her father.

The governor's brother Antonio excitedly informs Leonato that one of the servants heard the conversation of Don Pedro and Claudio strolling through the garden - the prince confessed that he was in love with Gero and intended to open up to her this evening during the dance and, having secured her consent, was going to talk to his father.

Don Juan is extremely annoyed. He is not at all inclined to maintain a peaceful relationship with his brother: "It is better to be a thistle by the fence than a rose in his grace's garden. They trust me by wearing a muzzle, and they give me freedom by entangling my legs."

Boracio, don Juan's close associate, returns from a splendid dinner hosted by the governor in honor of don Pedro. He has amazing news: from an overheard conversation, he learned about the upcoming matchmaking of Claudio, Don Pedro's favorite. Don Juan hates the young upstart, he makes plans to annoy him.

In the family circle, Beatrice walks about don Juan - his expression is so sour that heartburn begins to torment. the niece is too sharp-tongued, Leonato complains, it will be difficult for her to find a husband. “But I won’t get married until God creates a man from some other matter than the earth,” the girl retorts. “All men are my brothers in Adam, and I consider it a sin to marry a relative.” Aeonato instructs her daughter how to behave with the prince when he asks her hand.

During the masquerade, Benedict, without revealing his face, dances with Beatrice, and at the same time finds out her opinion about himself and listens to many barbs in his address.

Don Juan, pretending to take Claudio for Benedict, asks to distract Don Pedro from Gero - the prince lost his head, but the girl is no match for him. Borachio confirms that he heard the prince swearing his love for her. Claudio is amazed at the treachery of his friend.

Benedict complains to Don Pedro about the insufferable mocker Beatrice, whose words hurt him like daggers. The prince is surprised that Claudio is gloomy, he is tormented by jealousy, but tries not to show his irritation. The misunderstanding is settled when Leonato brings his daughter to him and agrees to a marriage arranged by his highness. The wedding is scheduled in a week.

Don Pedro likes the inexhaustible wit of Beatrice, she seems to him a suitable wife for the merry Benedict. He decides to promote the marriage of this "linguistic" couple. Claudio, Leonato and Hero volunteer to help him.

Borachio informs don Juan of Claudio's imminent marriage. He wants to prevent this, and both work out an insidious plan. For a year now, Borachio has been favored by Margarita, Gero's maid. He will ask her to look out of the window of her mistress's bedroom at an odd hour, and don Juan will go to his brother and tell him that he dishonors his honor by facilitating the marriage of the glorious Claudio with a dirty whore - evidence can be seen in the garden on the night before the wedding. And all preparations for the wedding will collapse. Don Juan likes the idea: you can deceive the prince, piss off Claudio, kill Hero and kill Leonato. He promises Borachio a reward of a thousand ducats.

Hiding in the gazebo, Benedict overhears the conversation of Don Pedro, Claudio and Leonato, who deliberately loudly discuss Beatrice - she is charming, sweet, virtuous and, moreover, unusually smart, except for the fact that she fell head over heels in love with Benedict. The poor thing does not dare to reveal her feelings to him, because if he finds out, he will ridicule and torment the unfortunate girl. Benedict is greatly moved by what he has heard. This is hardly a hoax, since Leonato participated in the conversation, and knavery cannot be hidden under such a respectable appearance, and they spoke quite seriously. He feels that he is also in love, there are many attractive features in Beatrice, the taunts and jokes that she lets go of him are by no means the main thing.

Gero arranges so that Beatrice, who is in the gazebo, hears her conversation with Margarita. The hostess and maid sympathize with the unfortunate Benedict, who is dying of love for the wayward Beatrice. She is so in love with herself, arrogant, she will slander every man, finding something to complain about. And the poor fellow managed to get carried away by this proud woman, and yet he has no equal in courage, intelligence and beauty. Beatrice realizes how wrong she was and decides to reward Benedict with love for love.

Don Pedro wonders why Benedict is so sad, has he really fallen in love? Is it possible for an anemone and a joker to feel true love? Everyone rejoices that the varmint has taken the bait.

Don Juan comes to Don Pedro and declares that he cherishes the honor of his brother, who arranges Claudio's wedding, and the reputation of his friend, whom they want to deceive. He invites both for evidence at night in the garden. Claudio is stunned: if he sees with his own eyes that Hero is deceiving him, then tomorrow in the very church where the wedding is to take place, he will shame her in front of everyone.

The police officer Kizil and his assistant Bulava instruct the guards on how to guard them: you need to be vigilant, but not too zealous, and not overwork yourself, and do not interfere with the measured flow of life.

Borachio boasts to Conrad how cleverly he managed to concoct a little business. At night, he had a meeting with Margarita, and don Pedro and Claudio, who had taken refuge in the garden, decided that it was Hero. Previously, don Juan managed to slander the governor's daughter, attributing to her a secret love affair, and he only confirmed the slander and earned a thousand ducats on that. "Is it really so expensive to pay for meanness?" Conrad is amazed. "When a rich scoundrel needs a poor man, the poor man can break any price," boasts Borachio. The watchmen become involuntary witnesses to their conversation and, indignant at what unrighteous deeds are going on around, they arrest both.

Gero is preparing for the wedding, she is surprised that Beatrice does not look like herself - dull, silent. Did their plan succeed and she fell in love?

Kizil and Bulava report to the governor that two notorious swindlers have been detained, but on the day of his daughter's wedding, Leonato is not in the mood to do business, let the arrested be interrogated and protocols sent to him.

There is a huge scandal in the church. Claudio refuses to marry Hero, accusing her of dishonesty. Don Pedro believes that he has tarnished his honor by promoting this marriage. At night, they witnessed a secret meeting and were confused by the passionate speeches that sounded there. The slandered Hero faints. Leonato does not know what to think, it is better to die than to experience such a shame. Benedict guesses whose machinations it is. Beatrice is sure that her cousin has been innocently defamed. The monk advises Leonato to declare his daughter dead, to perform a funeral ceremony, to observe ostentatious mourning. The rumor of death will drown out the rumor of girlish dishonor, those who slandered will repent of their deeds. United by the desire to prove Hero's innocence, Benedict and Beatrice confess their love to each other.

Antonio persuades Leonato not to succumb to grief, but he is inconsolable and only dreams of getting even with the offenders. When Don Pedro and Claudio come to say goodbye before leaving, he accuses them of vile lies that brought their daughter to the grave. Antonio is ready to challenge the young man to a duel. Don Pedro does not want to listen to anything - the guilt is proven. They are surprised that Benedict also talks about the slander, calls Claudio a scoundrel and wants to fight him.

Don Pedro sees how the guards lead the arrested Conrad and Borachio, close brother. Borachio confesses that he was in cahoots with don Juan, they slandered Signora Gero, and the scene in the garden was set up. He cannot forgive himself that the girl died without experiencing a false accusation, Claudio is shocked by what he heard. Brother - the embodiment of deceit, don Pedro is indignant, committed meanness and disappeared. How now to make amends before the elder? You have no power to revive your daughter, declares Leonato, so announce in Messina that she died innocent, and honor her gravestone. Since Claudio has not become a son-in-law, let him be a nephew and marry his brother's daughter.

Claudio dutifully agrees to everything. At the grave of Hero, he bitterly regrets that he believed the insidious slander.

When he arrives at Leonato's house, a lady in a mask is brought to him and they demand an oath from him to marry her. Claudio makes such an oath, the lady reveals her face, and the young man becomes stupefied - Hero is in front of him. She was dead while slander lived, the monk explains and begins preparations for the wedding ceremony. Benedict asks to marry him and Beatrice. The messenger informs the prince that the fugitive don Juan has been captured and taken into custody in Messina. But they will deal with it tomorrow. The dancing begins.

A. M. Burmistrova

The source of the plot was several anonymous plays and annals of Holinshed, with which, however, Shakespeare treated very freely. The plays about the reign of Henry IV constitute, as it were, the middle part of the tetralogy, the beginning of which is "Richard II", and the end - "Henry V". All of them are connected by the sequence of historical events and the commonality of some characters. The action of the play takes place in England at the beginning of the XNUMXth century, when the royal power asserted itself in the struggle against the willful feudal lords.

King Henry IV is going to lead a campaign in the Holy Land, which should become penance, church repentance, for the murder of Richard II. But these plans are thwarted when the king learns from the Earl of Westmoreland that the rebellious Welsh commander Owen Glendower defeated a huge English army led by Edmund Mortimer, Earl of March, who was taken prisoner. Henry is also informed that at the battle of Holmdon, the young Harry Percy, nicknamed Hotspur ("Hot Spur", that is, "Daredevil"), defeated the Scots led by Archibold, Earl of Douglas, but refused to hand over the captives to the king. Remembering his own wayward son, Henry allows himself to envy the Earl of Northumberland, Hotspur's father.

Meanwhile, the Prince of Wales, Hel, is having fun in his house with Sir Falstaff - a stout knight, whose penchant for fun and sherry is not tempered by either gray hair or an empty wallet. Ned Poins, one of the prince's dissolute friends, persuades him and Sir Falstaff to rob pilgrims and merchants. Hal resists, but Poins secretly tells him how to make Falstaff look like the coward he is. Left alone, the prince reflects on his behavior. He is going to imitate the sun, which hides in the clouds, to appear later in even greater brilliance.

Relations between the king and the Percy family become even more tense when the Earl of Worcester, brother of Northumberland and uncle of Hotspur, reminds that it is to the house of Percy that Henry owes the crown. Although Hotspur claims that his act with the Scottish prisoners was misinterpreted, he annoys the king by refusing to give them up until the king ransoms his brother-in-law Mortimer, who has recently married the daughter of his conqueror, from captivity.

asks the King, ignoring Hotspur's fiery words in defense of Mortimer. "Rather the prisoners went - or beware!" Henry threatens. With the King gone, Hotspur unleashes his anger. His father and uncle explain to him: the hostility of the king towards Mortimer is explained by the fact that the murdered Richard, shortly before his death, declared Mortimer his heir. When Hotspur finally calms down, Worcester proposes to start a rebellion against the king, enlisting the support of Mortimer, Glendower, Douglas and Richard Scroop, Archbishop of York.

As planned, Falstaff and his cronies rob travelers. The Prince and Poins prudently hide at the same time. Wearing masks, they pounce on the robbers at the moment when they share the booty. Falstaff and his companions flee, leaving the loot. Later, at the Boar's Head Inn, Falstaff and the rest of the thieves join Prince Henry and Poins, who are already roaming there. Falstaff bitterly reproaches the prince for abandoning his friend in a moment of danger, and vividly describes his exploits in an unequal battle, and the number of enemies defeated by him increases with each phrase. As proof of his own prowess, he shows off his torn jacket and pants. The prince exposes lies, but Falstaff is not at all embarrassed - of course he recognized the prince, "but remember the instinct: the lion will not touch the prince of blood either. Instinct is a great thing, and I instinctively became a coward. <...> I showed myself to be a lion, and You've shown yourself to be a pure-blooded prince." When the king sends a courtier to fetch his son, the fat knight offers to rehearse the explanations Hel will give to the angry parent. Playing the role of the king, Falstaff incriminates the prince's friends, with the exception of only one "respectable man, although somewhat burly <...> his name is Falstaff <...> Falstaff is full of virtue. Leave him with you, and drive the rest away ...". When the prince and his friend switch roles, Hel the "king" sternly denounces the "vile, monstrous seducer of the youth - Falstaff." Fadstaff the "prince" speaks very amiably of "dear Jack Falstaff, good Jack Falstaff, faithful Jack Falstaff, brave Jack Falstaff."

The conspirators meet in Bangor (Wales). Hotspur, because of his unbridled temper, comes into conflict with Glendower. Hotspur scoffs at his belief in the omens surrounding his birth and supernatural powers in general. Another point of contention is the division of the country they intend to take over. Mortimer and Worcester scold Hotspur for mocking Glendower. Mortimer says that his father-in-law

They are distracted from disputes by the arrival of ladies: Hotspur's witty wife, Lady Percy, and Mortimer's young wife, a Welsh woman whose inability to speak English does not cool her husband's ardor.

In London, the king reproaches his son for his debauchery. He gives him an example of Hotspur's behavior and his own in his youth. Heinrich recalls that, unlike Richard, who "crouched before the opinion of the crowd," he himself kept aloof from the people, remaining mysterious and attractive in their eyes. In response, the Prince vows to surpass Hotspur's exploits.

Arriving at the Boar's Head tavern, the prince finds Falstaff there, who teases his friends and scolds the mistress. Prince Heinrich announces to the fat man that he has been assigned to the infantry, he sends out the rest of the hawkers with instructions and leaves himself with the words:

Falstaff is delighted with the prince's words and demands breakfast.

In their camp near Shrewsbury, the rebels learn that due to illness, the Earl of Northumberland will not take part in the battle. Worcester considers this a loss to the cause, but Hotspur and Douglas assure that it will not seriously weaken them. The news of the approach of the king's troops and the delay of Glendowre with help for two weeks puzzles Douglas and Worcester, but Hotspur is ready to fight as soon as the king's army reaches Shrewsbury. He is looking forward to a duel with his namesake - Prince Heinrich.

On the road near Coventry, Captain Falstaff inspects his squad. He admits that he recruited a miserable rabble, and freed all those fit for service for bribes. Prince Henry, who has appeared, reproaches his friend for the nasty appearance of his recruits, but the fat knight gets off with jokes and declares that his subordinates are "good enough to pierce them with spears. Cannon fodder, cannon fodder!"

Worcester and Vernon try to persuade Hotspur not to engage the king's army, but to wait for reinforcements. Douglas and Hotspur want to fight immediately. The messenger of the king arrives. Henry IV wants to know what the rebels are dissatisfied with, he is ready to fulfill their desires and grant forgiveness. Hotspur ardently reproaches the monarch for deceit and ingratitude, but does not rule out the possibility of a compromise. Thus the battle is postponed.

In York, the rebellious archbishop, anticipating the defeat of his allies, gives the order to prepare the city for defense.

In his camp near Shrewsbury, the king announces to the rebel parliamentarians Worcester and Vernon that he will pardon the rebels if they refuse to fight. He wants to save the lives of his subjects in both camps. Prince Henry extols Hotspur's prowess, but challenges him to single combat to settle the dispute with little bloodshed.

Worcester and Vernon hide the king's kind offers from Hotspur, as they do not believe the royal promises, but pass on the challenge from the prince. In the ensuing battle, Prince Henry saves the life of his father, who crossed the sword with Douglas, and kills Hotspur in single combat. He delivers a eulogy over the body of a valiant enemy and then notices the defeated Falstaff. The dissolute knight pretended to be dead to avoid danger. The prince grieves for his friend, but after his departure, Falstaff gets up and, noticing the return of Henry and his brave younger brother Prince John of Lancaster, composes a fable that Hotspur woke up after a duel with Henry and was defeated a second time by him, Falstaff. Now that the battle has ended in victory for the king, he awaits rewards and extraordinary favors. The king sentences the captive Worcester and Vernon to death because their lies cost the lives of many knights. Wounded Douglas for his valor at the request of Prince Henry is released without ransom. The troops, by royal order, are divided and set out on a campaign to punish the rest of the rebels.

I. A. Bystrova

After false reports of victory, the Earl of Northumberland finally learns that his son Hotspur has been killed at the Battle of Shrewsbury and that the royal army, led by the king's second son John Lancaster and the Earl of Westmorland, is moving to meet him. The Earl decides to join his forces with those of the rebellious Archbishop of York.

In London, the chief judge, having met Falstaff in the street, shames him for his bad behavior and urges him to come to his senses in old age. The fat man, as always, scoffs, boasts and does not miss the opportunity to remind the judge of the slap he received from Prince Henry, Falstaff's patron.

In York, the Archbishop's associates weigh their chances of victory. They are encouraged by the fact that only a third of the royal troops are moving towards them, led by Prince John and the Earl of Westmorland. The king himself and his eldest son opposed the Welsh of Glendower, another part of the royal army must resist the French. Yet some of the rebellious lords believe that they cannot hold out without the help of the Earl of Northumberland.

In London, Mrs. Quickly ("Fast", "Vostrushka" - English), the owner of the "Boar's Head" inn, seeks the arrest of Falstaff for debts and failure to fulfill his promise to marry. Falstaff quarrels with her, with the policemen and with the chief judge who has appeared in the street, citing the most unexpected and comical arguments in his defense. Finally, he manages to flatter the widow Quickly not only forgiveness of previous debts, but also a new loan, as well as an invitation to dinner. Having returned to London, Prince Henry and Poins, having learned about this dinner, decide to dress up as servants and wait on it in order to see Falstaff "in his real form." The return of the royal army to the capital was caused by the serious illness of Henry IV. His eldest son is deeply saddened by his father's illness, but hides it so as not to be branded as a hypocrite.

In Warkworth, the castle of the Earl of Northumberland, the widowed Lady Percy shames her father-in-law for the death of Hotspur, left without reinforcements, due to his feigned illness. She and the Earl's wife insist that he hide in Scotland instead of coming to the aid of the Archbishop of York.

Falstaff, Mrs. Quickly and Doll Tershit ("Tearing the Sheets" - English), merrily feasting in the tavern, are joined by Bardolph and the pompous Ensign Pistol. The Prince and Poins, dressed in servants' jackets, witness the exciting scene between Falstaff and Doll and hear that, in the opinion of the old reveler, the Prince is "a good fellow, though absurd", Poins is a baboon who belongs on the gallows, and much more. When the indignant Heinrich is about to drag Falstaff by the ears, he recognizes his patron and immediately explains that "he spoke badly about him in front of the fallen creatures, so that these fallen creatures would not think of loving him. <...> I acted as a caring friend and loyal subject." The fun comes to an abrupt end as the prince and Falstaff are called to arms to take on the northern rebels. Falstaff nevertheless manages to sneak away and, returning to the tavern, demands Doll to go to his bedroom.

In the Palace of Westminster, the exhausted king reflects on sleepless nights - the lot of every monarch - and remembers that the murdered Richard II foresaw a gap between him and the house of Percy. In an effort to cheer up the king, the Earl of Warwick belittles the power of the rebels and announces the death of Owen Glendower, the recalcitrant master of Wales.

In Gloucestershire, Falstaff, recruiting, meets a friend of his youth - Judge Shallow ("Empty" - English). After talking with the recruits, he frees those fit for service for a bribe and leaves the unfit - Brain, Shadow and Wart. Falstaff goes on a campaign with the firm intention of robbing an old friend on the way back.

In Yorkshire Woods, the Archbishop of York informs his associates that Northumberland has abandoned them and fled to Scotland without gathering troops. The Earl of Westmoreland tries to reconcile the rebellious lords with the king and convinces them to make peace with Prince John. Lord Mowbray is overcome with forebodings, but the archbishop convinces him that the king longs for peace in the kingdom at any cost. At a meeting with the rebels, the prince promises that all their demands will be met and drinks to their health. The conspirators disband the troops, and the treacherous prince arrests them for treason. He orders to pursue the scattered troops of the rebels and deal with them.

The King is in the Jerusalem Chamber of Westminster. He persuades his younger sons to maintain good relations with Prince Henry, on whose mercy they will depend in the future. He complains about the debauchery of the heir. The Earl of Warwick tries to find excuses for Henry, but they do not convince the king. The Earl of Westmoreland brings word that Prince John has put down the rebellion. The second messenger also reports victory - the Yorkshire sheriff defeated the troops of Northumberland and the Scots. However, from the good news, the king becomes ill. They take him to bed. While the king is sleeping, Prince Henry enters his room. Deciding that his father is already dead, Heinrich puts on the crown and leaves. The awakened king learns that the prince came to him, and, not finding the crown, bitterly accuses his son:

The prince hurries to explain his act. He assures his father that he considered him dead and took the crown only in fulfillment of his duty. Touched by his son's eloquence, the king calls him to his bed. He recalls the detours by which he came to power, and although he considers his son's position more stable, he warns him against strife within the country:

Upon learning that he became ill in the Jerusalem padat, the king recalls the prophecy, according to which he must end his life in Jerusalem. The king always thought that he meant the Holy Land. Now he understands the true meaning of the prediction and asks to take it back to the same chamber: "There, in Jerusalem, I will betray the spirit of heaven."

At Westminster, the young king assures the brothers that they have nothing to worry about their fate during his reign. The chief judge, who once imprisoned Henry for insulting his dignity, is forgiven and brought closer for his firmness and fearlessness. Heinrich says: "My debauchery descended into the coffin with my father."

Falstaff, having learned about the accession of his patron, hurries to London. During the coronation, he becomes prominent. He expects extraordinary honors from an old friend and promises to share them with his relatives, including Shallow, who managed to owe a lot. But Henry, who came out to the people, answered Falstaff's familiar appeal:

The king expels his former friends, promising to give them a livelihood so that "the need for evil does not push you." Falstaff is sure that Henry's severity is feigned, but the supreme judge appears and orders him to be arrested along with his friends and imprisoned. Prince John tells the judge:

The prince is sure that within a year the king "will send fire and sword to France."

I. A. Bystrova

The action of the comedy takes place in a fabulous country for the English of Shakespeare's time - Illyria.

The Duke of Illyria, Orsino, is in love with the young Countess Olivia, but she is in mourning after the death of her brother and does not even accept the duke's messengers. Olivia's indifference only fuels the duke's passion. Orsino recruits a young man named Cesario, whose beauty, devotion and subtlety of feelings he manages to appreciate in just a few days. He sends him to Olivia to tell about his love. In reality, Cesario is a girl named Viola. She sailed on a ship with her beloved twin brother Sebastian and, after a shipwreck, accidentally ended up in Illyria. Viola hopes her brother is also saved. The girl dresses in men's clothes and enters the service of the duke, with whom she immediately falls in love. Behind the Duke, she says:

The protracted mourning of Olivia does not like her uncle at all - Sir Toby Belch, a merry fellow and a reveler. Olivia's chambermaid Maria tells Sir Toby that her mistress is very dissatisfied with her uncle's revelry and drinking bouts, as well as his drinking companion Sir Andrew Aguecheek, a rich and stupid knight, to whom Sir Toby fools his head, promising to marry his niece to him, and meanwhile shamelessly using his wallet. Sir Andrew, offended by Olivia's neglect, wants to leave, but Sir Toby, a flatterer and joker, persuades him to stay for another month.

When Viola appears at the Countess's house, she is admitted with great difficulty to Olivia. Despite her eloquence and wit, she fails to succeed in her mission - Olivia pays tribute to the virtues of the duke (he is "undoubtedly young, noble, rich, loved by the people, generous, learned"), but do not love! his. But the young messenger achieves a completely unexpected result for himself - the countess is fascinated by him and comes up with a trick to make him accept the ring as a gift from her.

Viola's brother Sebastian appears in Illyria, accompanied by Captain Antonio, who saved his life. Sebastian grieves for his sister, who, in his opinion, died. He wants to seek his fortune in the Duke's court. It is painful for the captain to part with the noble young man, to whom he managed to sincerely become attached, but there is nothing to do - it is dangerous for him to appear in Illyria. Yet he secretly follows Sebastian to protect him in case of need.

In Olivia's house, Sir Toby and Sir Andrew, in the company of the jester Feste, drink wine and bawl songs. Maria tries to reason with them in a friendly way. Following her, Olivia's butler appears - the swaggering bore Malvolio. He unsuccessfully tries to stop the revelry. When the butler leaves, Maria in every possible way makes fun of this "puffed up donkey", which "bursts with complacency", and vows to fool him. She is going to write him a love letter on behalf of Olivia and expose him to public ridicule.

In the duke's palace, the jester Feste first sings him a sad song about unrequited love, and then tries to cheer him up with jokes. Orsino revels in his love for Olivia, not discouraged by previous failures. He convinces Viola to go to the countess again. The Duke ridicules the imaginary youth's assertion that some woman could be in love with him as much as he was with Olivia:

He remains deaf to all hints of Viola in love.

Sir Toby and his accomplices are simply bursting with laughter, then with anger, when they overhear how Malvolio talks about the possibility of marriage with his mistress, about how he will rein in Sir Toby, becoming the master in the house. However, the real fun begins when the butler finds a letter written by Maria, who forged Olivia's handwriting. Malvolio quickly convinces himself that he is the "nameless lover" to whom it is addressed. He decides to strictly follow the instructions given in the letter and invented by Maria specifically in order for the enemy of the cheerful company to behave and look the most stupid way. Sir Toby is delighted with Maria's invention, and from herself: "For such a witty little devil, even to Tartarus itself."

In Olivia's garden, Viola and Feste exchange witticisms.

Viola says about the jester. Then Viola speaks with Olivia, who has come out into the garden, who no longer hides her passion for the "young man". Sir Andrew is offended that in his presence the Countess was courting the duke's servant, and Sir Toby convinces him to challenge the impudent youth to a duel. True, Sir Toby is sure that both will not have the courage to fight.

Antonio meets Sebastian on the city street and explains to him that he cannot openly accompany him, since he participated in a naval battle with the duke's galleys and won -

Sebastian wants to wander around the city. He agrees with the captain about a meeting in an hour at the best hotel. In parting, Antonio persuades a friend to accept his wallet in case of unexpected expenses.

Malvolio, smiling stupidly and tastelessly dressed (all according to Mary's plan), playfully quotes Olivia passages from her supposed message. Olivia is convinced that the butler is insane. She instructs Sir Toby to take care of him, which he does, only in his own way: he first taunts the unfortunate arrogant, and then stuffs him into a closet. Then it is taken for Sir Andrew and "Caesario". He quietly tells everyone that his opponent is fierce and skilled in swordsmanship, but it is impossible to avoid a duel. Finally, the “duelists”, pale with fear, draw their swords - and then Antonio, passing by, intervenes. He covers Viola with himself, mistaking her for Sebastian, and begins to fight with Sir Toby, furious that his trick failed. The bailiffs appear. They arrest Antonio on the Duke's orders. He is forced to obey, but asks Viola to return the wallet - now he will need the money. He is outraged that the person for whom he has done so much does not recognize him and does not want to talk about any money, although he thanks him for his intercession. The captain is taken away. Viola, realizing that she was confused with Sebastian, rejoices at the salvation of her brother.

On the street, Sir Andrew pounces on his opponent, whose timidity he recently became convinced of, and slaps him, but ... this is not the meek Viola, but the brave Sebastian. The cowardly knight is badly beaten. Sir Toby tries to intercede for him - Sebastian draws his sword. Olivia appears and stops the fight and chases her uncle away. "Caesario, please don't be angry," she tells Sebastian. She takes him to the house and proposes to be engaged. Sebastian is confused, but agrees, the beauty immediately fascinated him. He would like to consult with Antonio, but he has disappeared somewhere, he is not in the hotel. Meanwhile, the jester, pretending to be a priest, plays a long prank on Malvolio sitting in a dark closet. Finally, taking pity, he agrees to bring him a candle and writing materials.

In front of Olivia's house, the Duke and Viola are waiting to talk to the Countess. At this time, the bailiffs bring Antonio, whom Viola calls the "savior", and Orsino - "the famous pirate". Antonio bitterly reproaches Viola for ingratitude, cunning and hypocrisy. Olivia appears from the house. She rejects the duke, and "Caesario" reproaches him with infidelity. The priest confirms that two hours ago he married the countess to the duke's favorite. Orsino is shocked. In vain Viola says that he became her "life, light", that he is "better than all the women in this world" to her, no one believes the poor thing. Here, beaten sir Toby and sir Andrew appear from the garden with complaints about the ducal courtier Cesario, followed by Sebastian with apologies (the unlucky couple again ran into a man). Sebastian sees Antonio and rushes to him. Both the captain and the duke are shocked by the similarity of the twins. They are completely bewildered. Brother and sister get to know each other. Orsino, realizing that the one who was so dear to him in the form of a young man, is actually a girl in love with him, completely reconciles with the loss of Olivia, whom he is now ready to consider his sister. He can't wait to see Viola in a woman's outfit:

The jester brings a letter to Malvolio. The oddities of the butler get an explanation, but Maria is not punished for a cruel joke - she is now a lady, Sir Toby, in gratitude for her tricks, married her. Offended, Malvolio leaves the house - the only gloomy character leaves the stage. The Duke orders "to catch up with him and persuade him to peace." The play ends with a playfully melancholic song that Feste sings.

I. A. Bystrova

Square in front of the castle in Elsinore, On guard Marcellus and Bernard, Danish officers. They are later joined by Horatio, a learned friend of Hamlet, Prince of Denmark. He came to ascertain the story of a nighttime appearance of a ghost, similar to the Danish king, who had recently died. Horatio is inclined to consider this a fantasy. Midnight. And a formidable ghost in full military garb appears. Horatio is shocked, he tries to talk to him. Horatio, reflecting on what he saw, considers the appearance of a ghost a sign of "some unrest for the state." He decides to tell about the night vision to Prince Hamlet, who interrupted his studies at Wittenberg due to the sudden death of his father. Hamlet's grief is aggravated by the fact that soon after the death of his father, his mother married his brother. She, "not wearing out the shoes in which she walked behind the coffin," threw herself into the arms of an unworthy man, "a dense clot of meat." Hamlet's soul shuddered:

Horatio told Hamlet about the night ghost. Hamlet does not hesitate:

The ghost of Hamlet's father told of a terrible atrocity.

When the king was resting peacefully in the garden, his brother poured deadly henbane juice into his ear.

The ghost asks Hamlet to avenge him. "Farewell, farewell. And remember me" - with these words, the ghost is removed.

The world has turned upside down for Hamlet... He vows to avenge his father. He asks his friends to keep this meeting a secret and not be surprised by the strangeness of his behavior.

Meanwhile, the king's close nobleman Polonius sends his son Laertes to study in Paris. He gives his brotherly instructions to his sister Ophelia, and we learn about the feeling of Hamlet, from which Laertes warns Ophelia:

His words are confirmed by his father - Polonius. He forbids her to spend time with Hamlet. Ophelia tells her father that Prince Hamlet came to her and he seemed to be out of his mind. Taking her by the hand

Polonius decides that Hamlet's strange behavior in the last days is due to the fact that he is "mad with love." He is going to tell the king about it.

The king, whose conscience is weighed down by the murder, is troubled by Hamlet's behavior. What lies behind it - madness? Or what else? He summons Rosencrantz and Guildestern, former friends of Hamlet, and asks them to find out his secret from the prince. For this, he promises "royal mercy." Polonius arrives and suggests that Hamlet's madness is caused by love. In support of his words, he shows Hamlet's letter, which he took from Ophelia. Polonius promises to send his daughter to the gallery, where Hamlet often walks, to ascertain his feelings.

Rosencrantz and Guildestern unsuccessfully try to find out the secret of Prince Hamlet. Hamlet realizes that they were sent by the king.

Hamlet learns that the actors have arrived, the tragedians of the capital, who he liked so much before, and the thought occurs to him: to use the actors in order to make sure that the king is guilty. He agrees with the actors that they will play a play about the death of Priam, and he will insert two or three verses of his composition there. The actors agree. Hamlet asks the first actor to read a monologue about the murder of Priam. The actor reads brilliantly. Hamlet is excited. Entrusting the actors to the cares of Polonius, he thinks alone. He must know exactly about the crime: "The spectacle is a noose to lasso the conscience of the king."

The King questions Rosencrantz and Guildestern about the progress of their mission. They confess that they did not manage to find out anything:

They also report to the king that wandering actors have arrived, and Hamlet invites the king and queen to the performance.

Hamlet walks alone and meditates his famous monologue: "To be or not to be - that is the question..." Why do we cling to life so much? In which "the mockery of the century, the oppression of the strong, the mockery of the proud." And he answers his own question:

Polonius sends Ophelia to Hamlet. Hamlet quickly realizes that their conversation is being overheard and that Ophelia has come at the instigation of the king and father. And he plays the role of a madman, gives her advice to go to the monastery. Straight-hearted Ophelia is killed by Hamlet's speeches:

The king makes sure that love is not the cause of the prince's frustration.

Hamlet asks Horatio to watch the king during the play. The show starts. Hamlet comments on it as the play progresses. He accompanies the poisoning scene with the words:

Now you will see how the murderer earns the love of Gonzaga's wife."

During this scene, the king could not stand it. He got up. A commotion began. Polonius demanded that the game be stopped. Everyone leaves. That leaves Hamlet and Horatio. They are convinced of the crime of the king - he betrayed himself with his head.

Rosencrantz and Guildestern return. They explain how upset the king is and how perplexed the queen is about Hamlet's behavior. Hamlet takes the flute and invites Guildestern to play it. Guildestern refuses: "I do not own this art." Hamlet says with anger: “You see what a worthless thing you are making of me? You are ready to play on me, it seems to you that you know my modes…”

Polonius calls Hamlet to his mother - the queen.

The king is tormented by fear, tormented by an unclean conscience. "Oh, my sin is vile, it stinks to heaven!" But he has already committed a crime, "his chest is blacker than death." He gets on his knees, trying to pray.

At this time, Hamlet passes - he goes to his mother's chambers. But he doesn't want to kill the despicable king while praying. "Back, my sword, find out the girth more terrible."

Polonius hides behind the carpet in the queen's chambers to eavesdrop on Hamlet's conversation with his mother.

Hamlet is full of indignation. The pain that torments his heart makes his tongue bold. The queen is frightened and screams. Polonius finds himself behind the carpet, Hamlet, shouting "Rat, rat", pierces him with a sword, thinking that this is the king. The Queen begs Hamlet for mercy:

A ghost appears ... He demands to spare the queen.

The Queen does not see or hear the ghost, it seems to her that Hamlet is talking to the void. He looks like a madman.

The queen tells the king that in a fit of madness, Hamlet killed Polonius. "He's crying about what he's done." The king decides to immediately send Hamlet to England, accompanied by Rosencrantz and Guildestern, who will be given a secret letter to the Briton about the killing of Hamlet. He decides to secretly bury Polonius to avoid rumors.

Hamlet and his traitorous friends rush to the ship. They meet armed soldiers. Hamlet asks them whose army is going and where. It turns out that this is the army of the Norwegian, which is going to fight with Poland for a piece of land, which "for five ducats" is a pity to rent. Hamlet is amazed that people cannot "settle the dispute about this trifle."

This case for him is an occasion for deep reasoning about what torments him, and what torments him is his own indecision. Prince Fortinbras "for the sake of whim and absurd fame" sends twenty thousand to death, "as to bed," because his honor is offended.

Having learned about the death of his father, secretly, Laertes returns from Paris. Another misfortune awaits him: Ophelia, under the burden of grief - the death of her father at the hands of Hamlet - has gone mad. Laertes wants revenge. Armed, he breaks into the king's chambers. The king calls Hamlet the culprit of all the misfortunes of Aaert. At this time, the messenger brings the king a letter in which Hamlet announces his return. The king is at a loss, he understands that something has happened. But then a new vile plan ripens in him, in which he involves the quick-tempered, narrow-minded Aaert.

He proposes to arrange a duel between Laertes and Hamlet. And in order for the murder to take place for sure, the end of Laertes' sword should be smeared with deadly poison. Laertes agrees.

The queen sadly announces the death of Ophelia. She "tried to hang her wreaths on the branches, the treacherous bough broke, she fell into a sobbing stream."

…Two gravediggers are digging a grave. And they throw jokes around.

Hamlet and Horatio appear. Hamlet talks about the futility of all living things. "Alexander (Macedonsky. - E. Sh.) died, Alexander was buried, Alexander turns into dust; dust is earth; clay is made from earth; and why can't they plug a beer barrel with this clay into which he turned?"

The funeral procession is approaching. King, queen, Laertes, court. Bury Ophelia. Laertes jumps into the grave and asks to be buried with his sister, Hamlet cannot stand a false note. They grapple with Laertes.

- in these famous words of Hamlet there is a genuine, deep feeling.

The king separates them. He is not satisfied with an unpredictable duel. He reminds Laertes:

Horatio and Hamlet are alone. Hamlet tells Horatio that he managed to read the king's letter. It contained a request that Hamlet be executed immediately. Providence protected the prince, and, using his father's seal, he replaced the letter in which he wrote:

"The bearers must be put to death immediately." And with this message, Rosencrantz and Guildestern sail towards their doom. Robbers attacked the ship, Hamlet was captured and was taken to Denmark. Now he is ready for revenge.

Osric appears - close to the king - and reports that the king bet that Hamlet will defeat Laertes in a duel. Hamlet agrees to a duel, but his heart is heavy, it anticipates a trap.

Before the fight, he apologizes to Laertes:

The king prepared another trap for fidelity - he placed a goblet with poisoned wine to give it to Hamlet when he was thirsty. Laertes wounds Hamlet, they exchange rapiers, Hamlet wounds Laertes. The Queen drinks poisoned wine for Hamlet's victory. The king failed to stop her. The queen dies, but manages to say: "Oh, my Hamlet - drink! I have poisoned myself." Laertes admits betrayal to Hamlet: "The king, the king is guilty..."

Hamlet strikes the king with a poisoned blade, And he himself dies. Horatio wants to finish the poisoned wine in order to follow the prince. But the dying Hamlet asks:

Horatio informs Fortinbras and the British ambassadors of the tragedy.

Fortinbras gives the order: "Let Hamlet be raised to the platform, like a warrior ..."

E. S. Shipova

Venice. At the house of Senator Brabantio, the Venetian nobleman Rodrigo, unrequitedly in love with the daughter of the senator Desdemona, reproaches his friend Iago for accepting the rank of lieutenant from Ogello, a noble Moor, a general in the Venetian service. Iago justifies himself: he himself hates the masterful African because he, bypassing Iago, a professional military man, appointed Cassio, a mathematician, who is also years younger than Iago, as his deputy (lieutenant). Iago intends to take revenge on both Ogello and Cassio. Having finished the altercation, the friends raise a cry and wake Brabantio. They inform the old man that his only daughter Desdemona has fled with Ogello. The senator is in despair, he is sure that his child has become a victim of witchcraft. Iago leaves, and Brabantio and Rodrigo go for the guards to arrest the kidnapper with their help.

With false friendliness, Iago hurries to warn Ogello, who has just married Desdemona, that his new father-in-law is furious and is about to show up here. The noble Moor does not want to hide:

Cassio appears: the doge urgently demands the illustrious general. Enter Brabantio, accompanied by guards, he wants to arrest his offender. Ogello stops the skirmish that is about to break out and answers his father-in-law with gentle humor. It turns out that Brabantio must also be present at the emergency council of the head of the republic, the Doge.

There is a commotion in the council chamber. Every now and then there are messengers with conflicting news. One thing is clear: the Turkish fleet is moving towards Cyprus; to master it. When Ogello entered, the Doge announces an urgent appointment: the "brave Moor" is sent to fight against the Turks. However, Brabantio accuses the general of attracting Desdemona by the power of witchcraft, and she rushed

Othello asks to send for Desdemona and listen to her, and in the meantime tells the story of his marriage: being in the house of Brabantio, Othello, at his request, told about his life full of adventures and sorrows. The young daughter of the senator was struck by the fortitude of this already middle-aged and not at all beautiful man, she cried over his stories and was the first to confess her love.

Entering after the servants of the Doge, Desdemona meekly but firmly answers her father's questions:

Brabantio humbles himself and wishes the young people happiness. Desdemona asks to be allowed to follow her husband to Cyprus. The Doge does not object, and Othello entrusts Desdemona with the care of Iago and his wife Emilia. They must sail to Cyprus with her. The young are removed. Rodrigo is in despair, he is going to drown himself. “Just try to do this,” Iago tells him, “and I will be friends with you forever.” With cynicism, not devoid of wit, Iago urges Rodrigo not to succumb to feelings. Everything will change - the Moor and the charming Venetian are not a couple, Rodrigo will still enjoy his beloved, Iago's revenge will take place in this way. "Puff your wallet tighter" - these words are repeated by the treacherous lieutenant many times. The hopeful Rodrigo leaves, and the imaginary friend laughs at him:

"... this fool serves me as a purse and free fun ..." The Moor is also simple-hearted and trusting, so why not whisper to him that Desdemona is too friendly with Cassio, and he is handsome, and his manners are excellent, why not a seducer?

The inhabitants of Cyprus rejoice: the strongest storm smashed the Turkish galleys. But the same storm swept across the sea the Venetian ships coming to the rescue, so that Desdemona goes ashore before her husband. Until his ship has landed, the officers entertain her with chatter. Iago ridicules all women:

And it's also the softest! Desdemona is indignant at his barracks humor, but Cassio stands up for his colleague: Iago is a soldier, "he cuts straight." Othello appears. The meeting of the spouses is unusually tender. Before going to bed, the general instructs Cassio and Iago to check the guards. Iago offers to drink "for black Othello" and, although Cassio does not tolerate wine well and tries to refuse to drink, he still gets him drunk. Now the lieutenant is knee-deep in the sea, and Rodrigo, taught by Iago, easily provokes him into a quarrel. One of the officers tries to separate them, but Cassio grabs his sword and wounds the unlucky peacekeeper. Iago raises the alarm with the help of Rodrigo. Sounds the alarm. Appeared Othello finds out from the "honest Iago" the details of the fight, declares that Iago shields his friend Cassio out of the kindness of his soul, and removes the lieutenant from his post. Cassio sobered up and burned with shame. Iago "from a loving heart" gives him advice: to seek reconciliation with Othello through his wife, because she is so generous. Cassio leaves with thanks. He does not remember who got him drunk, provoked him into a fight and slandered him in front of his comrades. Iago is delighted - now Desdemona, with requests for Cassio, will herself help to denigrate her good name, and he will destroy all his enemies, using their best qualities.

Desdemona promises Cassio her intercession. They are both touched by the kindness of Iago, who so sincerely experiences someone else's misfortune. Meanwhile, the "good man" had already begun to slowly pour poison into the general's ears. At first, Othello does not even understand why he is being persuaded not to be jealous, then he begins to doubt and, finally, asks Iago (“This fellow of crystal honesty ...”) to keep an eye on Desdemona. He is upset, the wife who enters decides that it is a matter of fatigue and a headache. She tries to tie the Moor's head with a handkerchief, but he pulls away and the handkerchief falls to the ground. It is raised by Desdemona's companion Emilia. She wants to please her husband - he has long asked her to steal a handkerchief, a family heirloom that passed to Othello from his mother and presented to Desdemona by him on their wedding day. Iago praises his wife, but does not tell her why he needed a scarf, only tells her to keep quiet.

Exhausted by jealousy, the Moor cannot believe in the betrayal of his beloved wife, but is no longer able to get rid of suspicions. He demands from Iago direct evidence of his misfortune and threatens him with terrible retribution for slander. Iago plays offended honesty, but “out of friendship” he is ready to provide circumstantial evidence: he himself heard how in a dream Cassio blabbed about his intimacy with the general’s wife, saw how he wiped himself with Desdemona’s handkerchief, yes, yes, with that handkerchief. This is enough for the trusting Moor. He takes a vow of vengeance on his knees. Iago also falls to his knees. He vows to help the offended Othello. The general gives him three days to kill Cassio. Iago agrees, but hypocritically asks to spare Desdemona. Othello appoints him as his lieutenant.

Desdemona again asks her husband to forgive Cassio, but he does not listen to anything and demands to show a gift scarf that has magical properties to preserve the beauty of the owner and the love of her chosen one. Realizing that his wife does not have a scarf, he leaves in a rage.

Cassio finds a handkerchief with a beautiful pattern at home and gives it to his girlfriend Bianca to copy the embroidery until the owner is found.

Iago, pretending to calm Othello, manages to make the Moor faint. He then persuades the general to hide and watch his conversation with Cassio. They will talk, of course, about Desdemona. In fact, he asks the young man about Bianca. Cassio laughingly talks about this windy girl, while Othello, in his hiding place, does not hear half of the words and is sure that they are laughing at him and his wife. Unfortunately, Bianca herself appears and throws a precious handkerchief in the face of her lover, because this is probably a gift from some whore! Cassio runs away to calm the jealous charmer, and Iago continues to inflame the feelings of the fooled Moor. He advises strangling the unfaithful in bed. Othello agrees. Suddenly, a Senate envoy arrives. This is a relative of Desdemona Lodovico. He brought an order: the general was recalled from Cyprus, he must transfer power to Cassio. Desdemona cannot contain her joy. But Othello understands it in his own way. He insults his wife and hits her. The people around are amazed.

In a private conversation, Desdemona swears her innocence to her husband, but he only becomes convinced of her falsity. Othello is beside himself with grief. After a dinner in honor of Lodovico, he goes to see off the guest of honor. The Moor orders his wife to let Emilia go and go to bed. She is glad - her husband seems to have become softer, but still Desdemona is tormented by an incomprehensible longing. She always remembers the sad song about the willow she heard in her childhood and the unfortunate girl who sang it before her death. Emilia tries to calm her mistress with her simple worldly wisdom. She believes that it would be better for Desdemona not to meet Othello at all in life. But she loves her husband and could not cheat on him even for "all the treasures of the universe."

At the instigation of Iago, Rodrigo tries to kill Cassio, who returns at night from Bianchi. The shell saves Cassio's life, he even wounds Rodrigo, but Iago, attacking from an ambush, manages to cripple Cassio and finish off Rodrigo. People appear on the street, and Iago tries to direct suspicions to the devoted Bianca, who has come running and laments over Cassio, while he utters a lot of hypocritical maxims.

... Othello kisses the sleeping Desdemona. He knows that he will go crazy by killing his beloved, but he sees no other way out. Desdemona wakes up. "Did you pray before going to bed, Desdemona?" The unfortunate woman is unable to prove her innocence or convince her husband to take pity. He strangles Desdemona, and then, in order to shorten her suffering, stabs her with a dagger. Emilia who ran in (she does not see the body of the hostess at first) informs the general about Cassio's injury. Mortally wounded, Desdemona manages to shout to Emilia that she is dying innocently, but refuses to name the killer. Othello confesses to Emilia himself: Desdemona was killed for infidelity, deceit and deceit, and her betrayal was exposed by Emilia's husband and Othello's friend "faithful Iago". Emilia calls people: "The Moor killed his wife!" She understood everything. In the presence of the officers who entered, as well as Iago himself, she exposes him and explains to Othello the story of the handkerchief. Othello is horrified: "How does the sky tolerate? What an indescribable villain!" - and tries to stab Iago. But Iago kills his wife and runs away. There is no limit to Othello's despair, he calls himself a "low killer", and Desdemona "a girl with an unfortunate star." When the arrested Iago is brought in, Othello wounds him and, after an explanation with Cassio, stabs himself to death. Before his death, he says that "he was ... jealous, but in a storm of feelings he fell into a rage ..." and "he picked up and threw away the pearl with his own hand." Everyone pays tribute to the courage of the general and the greatness of his soul. Cassio remains the ruler of Cyprus. He is ordered to judge Iago and put him to a painful death.

I. A. Bystrova

Location - Britain. Time of action - XI century. The powerful King Lear, sensing the approach of old age, decides to shift the burden of power onto the shoulders of his three daughters: Goneril, Regan and Cordelia, dividing his kingdom between them. The king wants to hear from his daughters how much they love him, "so that we can show our generosity during the division."

Goneril goes first. Spreading flattery, she says she loves her father,

Sweet-tongued Regan echoes her:

And although the falsity of these words hurts the ear, Lear listens favorably to them. The turn of the younger, beloved Cordelia. She is modest and truthful and does not know how to publicly swear her feelings.

Lear does not believe his ears:

 But Cordelia can't express her feelings better:

Lear in a frenzy:

"So young and so callous at heart?" "So young, my lord, and straightforward," replies Cordelia.

In a blind rage, the king gives the entire kingdom to the sisters of Cordelia, leaving her only her straightforwardness as a dowry. He allocates for himself a hundred guards and the right to live for a month with each of his daughters.

Count Kent, a friend and close associate of the king, warns him against such a hasty decision, begs him to cancel it: "Cordelia's love is no less than theirs <...> Only what is empty inside rumbles ..." But Lear has already bitten the bit - Kent contradicts the king, calls him eccentric an old man means he must leave the kingdom. Kent answers with dignity and regret:

One of the applicants for the hand of Cordelia - the Duke of Burgundy - refuses her, who has become a dowry. The second pretender - the king of France - is shocked by the behavior of Lear, and even more so by the Duke of Burgundy. All Cordelia's fault is "in the fearful chastity of feelings, ashamed of publicity."

he says to Cordelia. They are removed. In parting, Cordelia addresses her sisters:

The Earl of Gloucester, who served Lear for many years, is upset and puzzled that Lear "suddenly, under the influence of a moment" made such a responsible decision. He does not even suspect that Edmund, his illegitimate son, is intriguing around him. Edmund planned to denigrate his brother Edgar in the eyes of his father in order to take possession of his part of the inheritance. He, having forged Edgar's handwriting, writes a letter in which Edgar allegedly plots to kill his father, and arranges everything so that his father read this letter. Edgar, in turn, he assures that his father is plotting something unkind against him, Edgar suggests that someone slandered him. Edmund wounds himself easily, but presents the case as if he was trying to detain Edgar, who was attempting on his father. Edmund is pleased - he deftly slandered two honest people:

His intrigues were successful: the Earl of Gloucester, believing Edgar's guilt, ordered to find him and seize him. Edgar is forced to flee.

The first month Lear lives with Goneril. She is only looking for an excuse to show her father who is now the boss. Upon learning that Lear is better than a jester, Goneril decides to "restrain" her father.

Lear, encouraged by the hostess, is openly rude to Goneril's servants. When the king wants to talk to his daughter about it, she avoids meeting her father. The jester bitterly ridicules the king:

Goneril comes, her speech is rude and impudent. She demands that Lear dismiss half of his retinue, leaving a small number of people who will not "forget and rage." Lear is smitten. He thinks that his anger will affect his daughter:

The Duke of Albany, husband of Goneril, tries to intercede for Lear, not finding in his behavior what could cause such a humiliating decision. But neither the anger of the father, nor the intercession of the husband touches the hard-hearted.

Disguised Kent did not leave Lear, he came to be hired into his service. He considers it his duty to be close to the king, who is obviously in trouble. Lear sends Kent with a letter to Regan. But at the same time Goneril sends her messenger to her sister.

Lear still hopes - he has a second daughter. He will find understanding with her, because he gave them everything - "both life and the state." He orders the horses to be saddled and angrily throws to Goneril:

In front of the castle of Gloucester, where Regan and her husband arrived to resolve disputes with the king, two messengers collided: Kent - King Lear, and Oswald - Goneril. In Oswald, Kent recognizes Goneril's courtier, whom he dismissed for disrespecting Lear. Oswald raises a cry. Regan and her husband, the Duke of Cornwall, come out to the noise. They order to put stocks on Kent. Kent is angered by Lear's humiliation:

The Earl of Gloucester tries unsuccessfully to intercede for Kent.

But Regan needs to humiliate her father so that she knows who has the power now. She's from the same mold as her sister. Kent understands this well, he foresees what awaits Lear at Regan's: "You came from the rain and under the drops ..."

Lear finds his ambassador in stocks. Who dare! It's worse than murder. "Your son-in-law and your daughter," Kent says. Lear doesn't want to believe it, but he realizes it's true.

The jester comments on the situation:

Lear wants to talk to his daughter. But she is tired from the road, she cannot accept it. Lear screams, is indignant, rages, wants to break the door...

At last Regan and the Duke of Cornwall come out. The king tries to tell how Goneril kicked him out, but Regan, not listening, invites him to return to his sister and ask her forgiveness. Before Lear had time to recover from a new humiliation, Goneril appears. The sisters vied with each other to slay their father with their cruelty. One proposes to reduce the retinue by half, the other - to twenty-five people, and, finally, both decide: none is needed.

Lear crushed:

His words seem to be able to squeeze tears out of a stone, but not out of the daughters of the king ... And he begins to realize how unfair he was to Cordelia.

A storm is coming. The wind howls. Daughters leave their father to the mercy of the elements. They close the gate, leaving Lear on the street, "... he has a science for the future." These words of Regan Lear can no longer hear.

Steppe. A storm is raging. Streams of water fall from the sky. Kent in the steppe in search of the king runs into a courtier from his retinue. He trusts him and tells that there is "no peace" between the Dukes of Cornwall and Albany, that France is aware of the cruel treatment "of our good old king." Kent asks the courtier to hasten to Cordelia and inform her

and as proof that the messenger can be trusted, he, Kent, gives his ring, which Cordelia recognizes.

Lear wanders with the jester, overcoming the wind. Lear, unable to cope with mental anguish, turns to the elements:

In his declining years, he lost his illusions, their collapse burns his heart.

Kent comes out to meet Lear. He persuades Lear to take refuge in a hut, where poor Tom Edgar is already hiding, pretending to be crazy. Tom engages Lear in conversation. The Earl of Gloucester cannot leave his old master in trouble. The cruelty of the sisters is disgusting to him. He received news that a foreign army was in the country. Until help arrives, Lear must be sheltered. He tells his plans to Edmund. And he decides once again to take advantage of Gloucester's gullibility to get rid of him. He will report it to the duke.

Gloucester, unaware of Edmund's betrayal, seeks out Lear. He comes across a hut where the persecuted have taken refuge. He calls Lear to a haven where there is "fire and food". Lear does not want to part with the impoverished philosopher Tom. Tom follows him to the castle farm where their father hides. Gloucester retreats briefly to the castle. Lear, in a fit of madness, arranges a trial for his daughters, offering Kent, the jester and Edgar to be witnesses, the jury. He demands that Regan open her chest to see if there is a heart of stone ... Finally, Lear manages to lay down to rest. Gloucester returns, he asks the travelers to go to Dover faster, as he "overheard a conspiracy against the king."

The Duke of Cornwall learns about the landing of French troops. He sends with this news to the Duke of Albany Goneril with Edmund. Oswald, who has been spying on Gloucester, reports that he helped the king and his followers escape to Dover. The Duke orders the capture of Gloucester. He is captured, tied up, mocked. Regan asks the earl why he sent the king to Dover against orders.

But he is sure that he will see "how the thunder will incinerate such children." At these words, the Duke of Cornwall rips out the helpless old man's eyes. The count's servant, unable to bear the spectacle of mockery of the old man, draws his sword and mortally wounds the Duke of Cornwall, but he himself is wounded. The servant wants to console Gloucester a little and urges him to look with his remaining eye at how he is avenged. The Duke of Cornwall plucks out his other eye before dying in a fit of rage. Gloucester calls his son Edmund to revenge and learns that it was he who betrayed his father. He understands that Edgar has been slandered. Blinded, heartbroken, Gloucester is pushed out into the street. Regan accompanies him with the words:

Gloucester is escorted by an old servant. The count asks to leave him, so as not to incur wrath. When asked how he would find his way, Gloucester replies bitterly:

Edgar hears this. He volunteers to be the guide of the blind. Gloucester asks to be taken to a cliff "large, hanging steeply over the abyss" in order to take his own life.

Goneril returns to the palace of the Duke of Albany with Edmund, she is surprised that the "peacemaker-husband" did not meet her. Oswald tells of the duke's strange reaction to his story of the landing of troops, the betrayal of Gloucester:

Goneril, calling her husband "a coward and a nonentity" sends Edmund back to Cornwall - to lead the troops. Saying goodbye, they swear to each other in love.

The Duke of Albany, having learned how inhumanly the sisters acted with their royal father, meets Goneril with contempt:

But the one that hides "the face of an animal under the guise of a woman" is deaf to her husband's words: "Enough! Pitiful nonsense!" The Duke of Albany continues to appeal to her conscience:

He is interrupted by a messenger who announces the death of Cornwell at the hands of a servant who came to Gloucester's defense. The Duke is appalled by the new brutality of the sisters and Cornwall. He vows to thank Gloucester for his loyalty to Lear. Goneril is concerned: her sister is a widow, and Edmund stayed with her. This threatens her own plans.

Edgar leads his father. The count, thinking that the edge of a cliff is in front of him, throws himself and falls in the same place. Comes to himself. Edgar convinces him that he jumped off the cliff and miraculously survived. Gloucester henceforth submits to fate, until she herself says: "go away." Oswald appears, he is instructed to remove the old man of Gloucester. Edgar fights him, kills him, and in the pocket of the "flatterer of the servile evil lady" finds Goneril's letter to Edmund, in which she proposes to kill her husband in order to take his place herself.

In the forest, they meet Lear, whimsically decorated with wildflowers. His mind left him. His speech is a mixture of "nonsense and meaning." The courtier who has appeared calls Lear, but Lear runs away.

Cordelia, having learned about the misfortunes of her father, the hardness of her sisters, hurries to his aid. French camp. Lear in bed. The doctors put him into a life-saving sleep. Cordelia prays to the gods "who has fallen into infancy" to restore the mind. Lyra is again dressed in royal vestments in a dream. And so he awakens. Sees Cordelia crying. He kneels before her and says:

Edmund and Regan - at the head of the British troops. Regan asks Edmund if he has an affair with his sister. He swears his love to Regan, The Duke of Albany and Goneril enter with drumming. Goneril, seeing her rival sister next to Edmund, decides to poison her. The Duke proposes to convene a council in order to draw up a plan of attack. Edgar in disguise finds him and hands him a letter from Goneril found at Oswald's. And he asks him: in case of victory, "let the herald <...> Call me to you with a trumpet." The Duke reads the letter and learns of the betrayal.

The French are defeated. Edmund, rushing forward with his army, captures King Lear and Cordelia. Lear is happy to have found Cordelia again. From now on, they are inseparable. Edmund orders them to be taken to prison. Lyra is not afraid of imprisonment:

Edmund gives a secret order to kill them both.

The Duke of Albany enters with an army, he demands that the king and Cordelia be handed over to him in order to dispose of their fate "in accordance with honor and prudence." Edmund tells the duke that Lear and Cordelia have been taken prisoner and sent to prison, but he refuses to give them up. The Duke of Albany, interrupting the sisters' obscene squabble over Edmund, accuses all three of treason. He shows Goneril her letter to Edmund and announces that if no one comes to the call of the trumpet, he himself will fight Edmund. On the third call of the trumpet, Edgar enters the duel. The Duke asks him to reveal his name, but he says that for the time being it is "polluted with slander". The brothers are fighting. Edgar mortally wounds Edmund and reveals to him who the avenger is. Edmund understands:

Edgar tells the Duke of Albany that he shared his wanderings with his father. But before this duel, he opened up to him and asked for his blessing. During his story, a courtier comes and reports that Goneril has stabbed herself, having poisoned her sister before that. Edmund, dying, announces his secret order and asks everyone to hurry. But it was too late, the deed was done. Lear enters carrying the dead Cordelia. He endured a lot of grief, but he cannot come to terms with the loss of Cordelia.

- the final chord is the words of the Duke of Albany.

E. S. Shipova

Location - England and Scotland. Time of action - XI century. In a military camp near Forres, the Scottish king Duncan listens to the good news: the king's kinsman, the brave Macbeth, defeated the troops of the rebel MacDonald, and killed him in single combat. Immediately after the victory, the Scottish army was subjected to a new attack - the king of Norway and his ally, who had changed the Cawdor thane (the title of a major feudal lord in Scotland) to Duncan, moved fresh forces against it. Once again, Macbeth and Banquo, the second royal commander, triumph over their enemies. The Norwegians are forced to pay a huge indemnity, the traitor is taken prisoner. Duncan orders to execute him, and to transfer the title to the brave Macbeth.

In the steppe, under the peals of thunder, three witches brag to each other about perfect abominations. Forres Macbeth and Banquo appear. The messengers were waiting for them. They greet Macbeth three times - as a Glamysian thane (this is his hereditary title), then as a Cawdorian thane, and finally as a future king. Banquo is not afraid of sinister old women, he asks to predict the fate of him. The witches proclaim the praises of Banquo three times - he is not a king, but an ancestor of kings - and disappear. Honest Banquo is not at all embarrassed by the prediction, witches, in his opinion, are just "bubbles of the earth." Royal envoys appear, they rush the generals to appear before Duncan and congratulate Macbeth on his new title - Tan of Cawdor. The witches' predictions are coming true. Banquo advises Macbeth not to attach any importance to this: the spirits of evil lure people into their networks with a semblance of truth. However, Macbeth is already dreaming of the throne, although the thought of the murder of the generous Duncan opening the way to him fills him with disgust and fear.

At Forres, Duncan greets his warlords with tears of joy. He grants his eldest son Malcolm the title of Prince of Cumberland and declares him his successor to the throne. The rest will also be showered with honors. To distinguish Macbeth in particular, the king will stop for the night in his castle. Macbeth is furious - another step has appeared between him and the throne. The ambitious thane is ready to commit a crime.

In Macbeth's castle, his wife reads a letter from her husband. She is delighted with the fate predicted for him. Yes, Macbeth is worthy of any honors and ambition he does not hold, that's just not enough willingness to go to crime for the sake of power. But he does not fear evil itself, but only the necessity of doing it with his own hand. Well, she is ready to inspire her husband with the missing determination! When Macbeth, ahead of the royal cortege, appears at the castle, his wife immediately announces to him: Duncan should be killed on that one night that he will spend visiting them. When the king appears in the castle, she already has a murder plan ready.

Macbeth is ashamed to kill the king who showered him with favors under his roof and is afraid of retribution for such an unheard-of crime, but the thirst for power does not leave him. His wife reproaches him for cowardice. There can be no failure: the king is tired, he will quickly fall asleep, and she will make his bed-keepers drunk with wine and sleeping potion. Duncan should be stabbed to death with a weapon, this will divert suspicion from the true culprits.

The feast is complete. Duncan, showering Macbeth with gifts, retires to the bedroom. Macbeth gets there after him and commits murder, but Lady Macbeth has to cover up his tracks. The tan himself is too shocked. A ruthless woman laughs at her husband's misplaced sensibility, There is a knock at the castle gate. This is Macduff, one of the greatest nobles in Scotland. The king ordered him to come at a little light. Macbeth has already managed to change into a night dress and, with the air of an amiable host, escorts Macduff to the royal chambers. The picture that he sees when he enters is terrible - Duncan is stabbed to death, and drunken servants are smeared with the master's blood. Allegedly, in a fit of righteous anger, Macbeth kills the bed-keepers who did not have time to recover. No one doubts their guilt, except for the sons of the murdered man, Malcolm and Donalbain. The young men decide to run away from this hornet's nest, Macbeth's castle. But the escape makes even the noble Macduff suspect them of involvement in the death of his father. Macbeth is chosen as the new king.

At the royal palace at Forres, Macbeth and Lady Macbeth (both of them wearing royal robes) are making courtesies to Banquo. They're having dinner tonight, and the chief guest is Banquo. It is a pity that he must leave on urgent business, and God forbid, if he has time to return to the feast. As if by chance, Macbeth finds out that Banquo's son will accompany his father on the trip. Banquo leaves. Macbeth realizes that the brave and at the same time reasonable Banquo is the most dangerous person for him. But what is worse is that, according to the witches (and so far their predictions have come true!), the childless Macbeth has stained himself with a heinous crime, because of which he is now hated by himself, so that the grandchildren of Banquo reign after him! No, he will fight fate! Macbeth has already sent for the assassins. These are two desperate losers. The king explains to them that Banquo is the cause of all their misfortunes, and the simpletons are ready to take revenge, even if they have to die. Macbeth demands that they also kill Flins, Banquo's son.

In the park of the palace, the assassins ambushed Banquo and Flins, who were on their way to dinner at Macbeth's. Attacking at the same time, they overcome the commander, but Banquo manages to warn his son. The boy escapes to avenge his father.

Macbeth cordially seated his entourage at the table, now a circular bowl was poured. Suddenly, one of the assassins appears, but his news does not please the king too much. "The snake is dead, but the serpent is alive," says Macbeth and turns back to the guests. But what is it? The king's place at the table is occupied, on it sits a bloodied Banquo! The ghost is visible only to Macbeth, and the guests do not understand to whom their master is addressing with angry speeches. Lady Macbeth hurries to explain her husband's strangeness by illness. Everyone disperses, and the calmed Macbeth tells his wife that he suspects Macduff of treason: he did not appear at the royal feast, moreover, scammers (and the king keeps them in all houses under the guise of servants) report his "cold feelings". The next morning, Macbeth is going to the three witches to look deeper into the future, but no matter what they predict, he will not back down, any means are already good for him.

Macbeth in the Witches' Cave. He demands an answer from higher spirits, which disgusting old women can summon for him. And here the spirits are. The first warns: "Beware of Macduff." The second ghost promises Macbeth that no one born of a woman will defeat him in battle. The third says that Macbeth will not be defeated until he attacks the royal castle of Dunsinan in Birnam Wood. Macbeth is delighted with predictions - he has no one and nothing to fear. But he wants to know if the Banquo family will reign. Music sounds. Eight kings pass in front of Macbeth, the eighth holds a mirror in his hand, which reflects an endless series of crowned kings in a double crown and with a triple scepter (this is an allusion to the king of England, Scotland and Ireland - James I Stuart, whose ancestor was just the semi-legendary Banquo) . Banquo himself comes last and triumphantly points his finger at Macbeth at his great-grandchildren. Suddenly everyone - ghosts, witches - disappear. One of the lords enters the cave and reports that Macduff has fled to England, where Duncan's eldest son has already taken refuge.

In her castle, Lady Macduff learns of her husband's flight. She is confused, but still tries to joke with her son. The boy is smart beyond his years, but the jokes are sad. A commoner who appears unexpectedly warns Lady Macduff that she needs to run away with her children as soon as possible. The poor woman does not have time to take advice - the killers are already at the door. The kid is trying to stand up for the honor of his father and the life of his mother, but the villains casually stab him and rush after Lady Macduff, who is trying to escape.

Meanwhile, in England, Macduff tries to persuade Malcolm to stand against the tyrant Macbeth and save suffering Scotland. But the prince does not agree, because the dominion of Macbeth will seem like a paradise compared to his reign, he is so vicious by nature - voluptuous, greedy, cruel. Macduff is in despair - nothing will now save the unfortunate homeland. Malcolm hurries to comfort him - suspecting a trap, he was testing Macduff. In fact, his qualities are not at all like that, he is ready to oppose the usurper, and the king of England gives him a large army, which will be led by the English commander Siward, the uncle of the prince. Enter Lord Ross, Lady Macduff's brother. He brings terrible news: Scotland has become the grave of her children, tyranny is unbearable. The Scots are ready to rise. Macduff learns about the death of his entire family. Even his servants were slaughtered by Macbeth's henchmen. The noble thane seeks revenge.

Late at night in Dunsinan, a lady of the court talks with a doctor. She is worried about the Queen's strange illness, something like sleepwalking. But then Lady Macbeth herself appears with a candle in her hand. She rubs her hands, as if to wash off the blood from them, which cannot be washed off. The meaning of her speeches is dark and frightening. The doctor admits the impotence of his science - the queen needs a confessor.

English troops are already under Dunsinane. They are joined by the Scottish lords who rebelled against Macbeth.

In Dunsinan, Macbeth listens to the news of the approach of the enemy, but why should he be afraid? Aren't his enemies born of women? Or did Birnam Wood march?

And in Birnam Forest, Prince Malcolm gives an order to his soldiers: let everyone cut down a branch and carry it in front of him. This will hide the number of attackers from the defenders of the castle. The castle is the last stronghold of Macbeth, the country no longer recognizes the tyrant.

Macbeth has already become so hardened in soul that the unexpected news of the death of his wife causes him only annoyance - at the wrong time! But here is a messenger with a strange and terrible news - Birnam Forest moved to the castle. Macbeth is furious - he believed in ambiguous predictions! But if he is destined to die, he will die like a warrior, in battle. Macbeth orders the troops to rally.

In the thick of the ensuing battle, Macbeth meets the young Siward, the son of an English commander. The young man is not afraid of his formidable opponent, boldly enters into a duel with him and dies. Macduff has not yet drawn his sword, he is not going to "cut down the hired peasants", his enemy is only Macbeth himself. And so they meet. Macbeth wants to avoid a fight with Macduff, however, he is not afraid of him, like anyone born of a woman. And then Macbeth learns that Macduff was not born. He was cut out of his mother's womb ahead of time. Macbeth's rage and despair are boundless. But he is not going to give up. Enemies fight to the death.

The troops of Malcolm's rightful heir prevailed. Under unfolded banners, he listens to the reports of his associates. Siward the father finds out about the death of his son, but when he is told that the young man died from a wound in front - in the forehead, he consoles himself. You can't wish for a better death. Macduff enters, carrying Macbeth's head. All after him greet Malcolm with cries of: "Long live the Scottish king!" Trumpets play. The new overlord announces that, specifically to reward his supporters, he introduces the title of earl for the first time in Scotland. Now it is necessary to deal with urgent matters: to return to their homeland those who fled from the tyranny of Macbeth and to roughly punish his minions. But first of all, you should head to Scone Castle to be crowned in it according to the old custom.

I. A. Bystrova

In Alexandria, the triumvir Mark Antony is entangled in the silk nets of the Egyptian queen Cleopatra and indulges in love and revelry. Antony's supporters grumble:

Nevertheless, Antony decides to leave Egypt, having learned that his wife Fulvia, who rebelled against the second triumvir, Octavius ​​Caesar, has died and that Sextus Pompey, the son of Pompey the Great, challenged Caesar. Upon learning of this decision, the queen showers Antony with reproaches and ridicule, but he is unshakable. Then Cleopatra resigns herself:

There are two triumvirs in Rome. Caesar and Lepidus discuss Antony's behavior. Lepidus tries to recall the virtues of the absent co-ruler, but the prudent and cold Caesar finds no excuse for him. He is preoccupied with bad news coming from all over, and wants Antony, "forgetting debauchery and revelry", to remember his former valor.

Abandoned Cleopatra does not find a place for herself in the palace. She scolds the maids, who, in her opinion, do not admire Antony enough, recalls the affectionate nicknames that he gave her. Every day she sends messengers to her beloved and rejoices at every message from him.

Pompey, surrounded by associates, expresses the hope that Antony, fascinated by Cleopatra, will never come to the aid of the allies. However, he is informed that Antony is about to enter Rome. Pompey is distressed: Antony "as a military man <...> twice the size of his two friends."

In the house of Lepidus, Caesar accuses Antony of insulting his messengers and of inciting Fulvia to war with him. Lepidus and those close to both triumvirs try in vain to reconcile them, until Agrippa, Caesar's commander, comes up with a happy thought: to marry the widowed Antony to Caesar's sister Octavia: "Kinship will give you confidence in each other." Anthony agrees.

He, along with Caesar, goes to Octavia. Agrippa and Maecenas ask the close Anthony, the cynical mocker and the famous swordsman Enobarbus about life in Egypt and about the queen of this country. Enobarbus speaks with humor of revelry, which he indulged in with his leader, and speaks admiringly of Cleopatra:

The philanthropist nevertheless finds it necessary to note the merits of Octavia. Agrippa invites Enobarbus while he is in Rome to live in his house.

An Egyptian soothsayer persuades Antony to leave Rome. He feels: his master's guardian demon

Anthony himself understands this:

In Alexandria, Cleopatra indulges in joyful memories of her life with Antony. The messenger enters. Cleopatra, having learned that Antony is healthy, is ready to shower him with pearls, but, having heard about Antony's marriage, she almost kills the herald.

The young Pompey agrees to reconcile with the triumvirs on their terms out of respect for Antony. It was decided to mark the world with feasts. The first is in Pompey's galley. When the leaders leave, Menas, close to Pompey, says to Enobarbus: "Today Pompey will ridicule his happiness." Enobarbus agrees with him. They both believe that Antony's marriage will not lead to a long peace with Caesar and will not be lasting:

everyone would be happy with a wife like Octavia, with a holy, quiet and calm character, but not Antony. "He wants Egyptian food again." And then the one that brings Antony and Caesar closer together will be the culprit of their quarrel.

At the feast, when everyone is already drunk and the fun is in full swing, Menas invites Pompey to slowly go out to sea and cut the throats of his three enemies there. So Pompey will become the ruler of the universe. "You'd better do it yourself without asking," Pompey replies. He could approve the zeal of a close associate, but he will not go to meanness himself. Reasonable teetotaler Caesar wants to stop the feast. At parting, Antony and Enobarbus make everyone dance. Pompey and Antony agree to drink the last cup on the shore.

In Rome, Caesar heartily says goodbye to his sister and Anthony, who are leaving for Athens. The commanders of both triumvirs mockingly comment on the send-off scene.

In Alexandria, Cleopatra asks a messenger about the appearance of Antony's wife. Taught by bitter experience, the messenger in every possible way belittles the dignity of Octavia - and receives praise.

Antony accompanies his wife to Rome. He lists the grievances caused to him by Caesar, and asks Octavia to mediate in reconciliation. Enobarbus and Antony's squire, Eros, discuss the news:

Pompey is killed, Lepidus, whom Caesar used against Pompey, is accused by Caesar of treason and arrested.

Anthony is furious. The war with Caesar is a settled matter.

In Rome, Caesar and his generals contemplate Antony's defiant actions and his responses. Octavia, who appears, tries to justify her husband, but her brother tells her that Antony left her for Cleopatra and is recruiting supporters for the war.

Caesar immediately transfers troops to Greece. Antony, contrary to the advice of Enobarbus, the commander of the land forces of Canidius and even a simple legionnaire, with whom he has a friendly conversation, decides to fight at sea. Cleopatra also participates in the campaign, about which Canidius remarks:

In the midst of a sea battle, Cleopatra's ships turned back and sped away, and

Canidius with the army is forced to surrender.

Anthony in Alexandria. He is depressed and advises those close to go to Caesar and wants to generously give them goodbye. He reproaches Cleopatra for his humiliation. The queen, sobbing, asks for forgiveness - and is forgiven.

To Caesar, who is already in Egypt, Antony sends a teacher of his children - there is no one else. His requests are modest - to allow him to live in Egypt or even "while away his life in Athens." Cleopatra asks to leave the Egyptian crown for her offspring. Caesar refuses Antony's request, and tells Cleopatra that he will meet her halfway if she exiles Antony or executes him. He sends Tyreus to lure the queen to his side with any promises.

Antony, having learned about Caesar's answer, again sends a teacher to him, this time with a challenge to a duel. Hearing this, Enobarbus says:

Tyreus enters. Cleopatra willingly listens to his promises and even gives her hand for a kiss. Antony sees this and in a rage orders the envoy to be flogged. He angrily reproaches Cleopatra for debauchery. How could she give her hand, "sacred <...> like a royal oath", to a rogue! But Cleopatra swears her love, and Antony believes. He is ready to enter into battle with Caesar and win it, but for now he wants to arrange a feast to cheer up despondent supporters. Enobarbus watches with sadness as loved ones and reason leave his boss. He is ready to leave too.

Anthony has a friendly conversation with the servants, thanking them for their loyalty. Sentinels in front of the palace hear the sounds of oboes coming from the ground. This is a bad sign - Antony's patron god Hercules leaves him. Before the battle, Antony learns about the betrayal of Enobarbus. He orders to send him the abandoned property and a letter wishing him good luck. Enobarbus is broken by Antony's own meanness and generosity. He refuses to participate in the battle and by the end of the day he dies with the name of the leader betrayed by him on his lips. The battle goes well for Antony, but on the second day of the battle, the betrayal of the Egyptian fleet wrests victory from his hands. Antony is sure that Cleopatra sold him to a rival. Seeing the queen, he attacks her with furious denunciations and frightens her so much that, on the advice of the servant, Cleopatra locks herself in the tomb and sends Antony to tell that she committed suicide. Now Anthony has nothing to live for. He asks Eros to stab him. But the faithful squire stabs himself. Then Antony throws himself on his sword. The messenger from the queen is late. Mortally wounded, Anthony orders his bodyguards to take him to Cleopatra. He consoles the grief-stricken soldiers. Dying, Antony tells Cleopatra about his love and advises to seek protection from Caesar. The queen is inconsolable and is going, having buried her beloved, to follow his example.

Caesar in his camp learns of Antony's death. His first impulse is to pay tribute to his former comrade-in-arms in sincere and sorrowful words. But with the usual rationality, he immediately turns to business. Caesar's companion Proculeus was sent to Cleopatra with generous assurances and an order to keep the queen from suicide at all costs. But another close associate of Caesar, Dolabella, reveals the true plans of Proculeus to the mourning queen. She will have to participate as a prisoner in the triumph of the winner. Enter Caesar. Cleopatra kneels before him and shows him a list of her treasures. Her treasurer convicts the former sovereign of a lie: the list is far from complete. Caesar feignedly consoles the queen and promises to leave her all the property. Upon his departure, Cleopatra orders the maids to dress her magnificently. She recalls her first meeting with Anthony. Now she is rushing towards him again. By order of the queen, a certain villager is brought into the chambers. He brought a basket of figs, and in the basket two poisonous snakes. Cleopatra kisses the faithful servants and puts the snake to her chest with the words:

She puts another snake to her hand. "Anthony! <…> Why should I delay…" Both servants commit suicide in the same way. Returning Caesar orders to bury the queen next to Antony,

I. A. Bystrova

The action of the play takes place on a secluded island, where all fictional characters are transferred from different countries.

Ship at sea. Storm. Thunder and lightning. The crew of the ship is trying to save him, but noble passengers - the Neapolitan king Alonzo, his brother Sebastian and son Ferdinand, the Duke of Milan Antonio and the nobles accompanying the king distract the sailors from work. The boatswain sends passengers to their cabins in the most unflattering terms. When the virtuous old adviser to the king, Gonzalo, tries to yell at him, the sailor replies: "These roaring billows don't care about kings! March through the cabins!" However, the efforts of the team lead to nothing - under the plaintive cries of some and the curses of others, the ship sinks. This sight breaks the heart of fifteen-year-old Miranda, daughter of the mighty wizard Prospero. She and her father live on an island, on the shores of which an unfortunate ship crashes. Miranda begs her father to use his art and pacify the sea. Prospero reassures his daughter:

An imaginary shipwreck is conjured by a magician to arrange the fate of his beloved daughter. For the first time, he decides to tell Miranda the story of their appearance on the island. Twelve years ago, Prospero, then the Duke of Milan, was deposed from the throne by his brother Antonio with the support of the Neapolitan king Alonzo, to whom the usurper undertook to pay tribute. The villains, however, did not dare to kill Prospero right away: the duke was loved by the people. He, along with his daughter, was put on an unusable ship and thrown into the open sea. They were saved only thanks to Gonzalo - a compassionate nobleman provided them with supplies, and most importantly, says the magician,

These books are the source of Prospero's magical power. After a forced voyage, the duke and his daughter ended up on an island that was already inhabited: the disgusting Caliban, the son of the evil sorceress Sycorax, expelled from Algeria for numerous villainies, and the air spirit Ariel lived on it. The witch tried to force Ariel into her service, but he

For this, Sycorax pinned Ariel in a split pine tree, where he suffered for many years without hope of release, since the old sorceress died. Prospero freed the beautiful and powerful spirit, but obliged him to serve himself in gratitude, promising freedom in the future. Caliban also became a slave to Prospero, doing all the dirty work.

At first, the magician tried to "civilize" the ugly savage, taught him to speak, but could not defeat his base nature. Father puts Miranda into a magical dream. Ariel appears. It was he who defeated the Neapolitan fleet returning from Tunisia, where the king was celebrating the wedding of his daughter with the Tunisian king. It was he who drove the royal ship to the island and played a shipwreck, locked the crew in the hold and put to sleep, and scattered the noble passengers along the shore. Prince Ferdinand is left alone in a deserted place. Prospero orders Ariel to turn into a sea nymph, visible only to the magician himself, and with sweet singing to lure Ferdinand to the cave in which the father and daughter live. Prospero then calls for Caliban. Caliban, who believes that he

and the magician robbed him, is rude to his master, and he in response showers him with reproaches and terrible threats. The evil freak is forced to obey. The invisible Ariel appears, he sings, the spirits echo him. Drawn by magical music, Ariel is followed by Ferdinand. Miranda is delighted

Ferdinand, in turn, seeing Miranda, takes her for a goddess, the daughter of Prospero is so beautiful and sweet. He announces that he is the king of Naples, since his father has just died in the waves, and he wants to make Miranda queen of Naples. Prospero is pleased with the mutual inclination of the young people.

“They,” he says, “are fascinated by each other. But they must

The old man puts on a harshness and accuses the prince of imposture. Despite the touching pleas of his daughter, he defeats the resisting Ferdinand with the help of witchcraft and enslaves him. Ferdinand, however, is pleased:

Miranda consoles him. The magician praises his assistant Ariel and promises him a speedy freedom, while giving new instructions.

On the other side of the island, Alonzo mourns his son. Gonzalo clumsily tries to console the king. Antonio and Sebastian make fun of the elderly courtier. They blame Alonzo for the misfortunes that have occurred. To the sounds of solemn music, the invisible Ariel appears. He casts a magical dream on the king and nobles, but two villains - Sebastian and the usurper Antonio - remain awake. Antonio incites Sebastian to fratricide, he promises him a reward for his help. The swords are already drawn, but Ariel intervenes, as always to the music: he wakes up Gonzalo, and he wakes everyone else. The unscrupulous couple manage to somehow get out.

Caliban meets the jester Trinculo and the royal butler, the drunk Stefano, in the forest. The latter immediately treats the freak with wine from the saved bottle. Caliban is happy, he declares Stefano his god.

Ferdinand, enslaved by Prospero, drags logs. Miranda seeks to help him. Between young people there is a tender explanation. Touched by Prospero, he watches them imperceptibly.

Caliban suggests that Stefano kill Prospero and take possession of the island. The whole company is pouring. Even when they are sober, they are not all that smart, and then Ariel starts to fool them and confuse them.

Before the king and his retinue, to strange music, a set table appears, but when they want to start eating, everything disappears, Ariel appears in the form of a harpy under thunderous peals. He reproaches those present for the crime committed against Prospero and, frightening with terrible torments, calls for repentance. Alonzo, his brother and Antonio go crazy.

Prospero announces to Ferdinand that all his torments are just a test of love, which he passed with honor. Prospero promises his daughter as a wife to the prince, but for now, in order to distract young people from immodest thoughts, he orders Ariel and other spirits to play an allegorical performance in front of them, naturally, with singing and dancing. At the end of the ghostly performance, the named father-in-law says to the prince:

Led by Caliban, Stefano and Trinculo enter. In vain the savage calls them to decisive action - the greedy Europeans prefer to pull off the rope specially for this occasion the bright rags hung by Ariel. Spirits appear in the form of hounds, invisible Prospero and Ariel incite them to unlucky thieves. They run away screaming.

Ariel tells Prospero about the torments of criminal madmen. He feels sorry for them. Prospero is also not a stranger to compassion - he only wanted to bring the villains to repentance:

"Although I am cruelly offended by them,

 / But a noble mind extinguishes anger

 / And mercy is stronger than revenge."

He orders the king and his retinue to be brought to him. Ariel disappears. Left alone, Prospero speaks of his decision to leave magic, break his wand, and drown the magical books. Alonzo and his retinue appear to the solemn music. Prospero performs his last magic - he removes the spell of madness from his offenders and appears before them in all his grandeur and with ducal regalia. Alonzo asks his forgiveness. Sebastian and Antonio Prospero promises to keep silent about their criminal intent against the king. They are frightened by the magician's omniscience. Prospero embraces Gonzalo and praises him. Ariel, not without sadness, is released into the wild and flies away with a cheerful song. Prospero consoles the king, showing him his son - he is alive and well, he and Miranda play chess in a cave and talk tenderly. Miranda, seeing the newcomers, is delighted:

The wedding has been decided. The profound Gonzalo proclaims:

Sailors arrive with the miracle of a rescued ship. He is ready to sail. Ariel brings the disenchanted Caliban, Stefano and Trinculo. Everyone makes fun of them. Prospero forgives the thieves on the condition that they clean up the cave. Kadiban is full of remorse:

Prospero invites everyone to spend the night in his cave in order to sail to Naples in the morning "for the marriage of children." From there he intends to return to Milan "to contemplate death at leisure." He asks Ariel to serve the last service - to conjure a fair wind, and says goodbye to him. In the epilogue, Prospero addresses the audience:

I. A. Bystrova

Vardapet Grigor, a learned monk of the Narek Monastery, a poet and mystic, the author of an interpretation of the biblical "Song of Songs", as well as hymnographic compositions and laudatory words to the Cross, the Virgin Mary and the saints, in the "Book of Sorrowful Hymns" humbly addresses God "...together with the oppressed - and with those who were strengthened, together with those who stumbled - and with those who rose, together with the outcasts - and with those who were accepted. The book has 95 chapters, each of which is characterized as "Word to God from the depths of the heart." Narekatsi dedicates his poetic creation, inspired by the deepest Christian faith, to everyone: "... slaves and slaves, noble and noble, middle and nobles, peasants and gentlemen, men and women."

A poet, a "repentant" and self-scourging "sinner" is a person with high ideals, advocating for the perfection of the individual, bearing the burden of responsibility for the human race, which is characterized by anxiety and many contradictions.

What is the poet mourning for? About his spiritual weakness, about powerlessness before worldly fuss.

He feels himself connected with humanity by a mutual guarantee of guilt and conscience and asks God for forgiveness not for himself alone, but together with himself - for all people.

Turning to God with a prayer and revealing the secrets of his heart to Him, the poet draws inspiration from the aspiration of his soul to its creator and tirelessly asks the Creator for help in writing the book: speaking, so that they become the cause of the purification of all the instruments of the senses distributed in me.

However, Narekatsi is aware that he, with his poetic gift, is only a perfect instrument in the hands of the Creator, the executor of His divine will.

Therefore, his prayers are imbued with humility: “Do not take away from me, the ill-fated one, the graces bestowed by you, do not forbid the breath of your most blessed Spirit, <…> do not deprive me of the art of omnipotence, so that the tongue can say the right thing.”

But the poet's Christian humility does not at all mean for him to belittle his creative abilities and his talent, the source of which is God and the Creator of all things.

In the "Memorial Record", which ends the book, Narekatsi says that he, "priest and monk Grigor, the last among the writers and the youngest among the mentors, <...> laid the foundations, built, erected on them and composed this useful book, combining a constellation of heads into one wondrous creation."

The Lord of all created things is merciful to his creatures: "If they sin, they are all yours, since they are on your lists." Considering himself to be a sinner, Narekatsi does not condemn anyone.

Everything human serves the poet as a reminder of God, even if a person is immersed in the chaos of worldly life and does not think about heaven in worries about earthly things: on the stage of entertainment, as well as in crowded gatherings of the common people, or in dances that are objectionable to your will, O Almighty, you are not forgotten.

Feeling in his soul the endless struggle of opposing aspirations and passions that drag him into the abyss of doubt, sin and despair, the poet does not cease to hope for the healing effect of the grace of God and the mercy of the Creator.

Complaining that his soul, despite the fact that he took the tonsure, has not yet completely died for the world and has not become truly alive for God, Narekatsi resorts to the intercession of the good mother of Jesus and prays for deliverance from spiritual and carnal sorrows.

The poet does not get tired of blaming himself for "opening the arms of love for the world, and not facing You, but turning his back <...> and in the house of prayer he surrounded himself with the cares of earthly life."

Tortured by bodily ailments, which, as he is convinced, are an inevitable and legitimate retribution for spiritual weakness and lack of faith, the poet feels his soul and body as a field of uncompromising struggle.

He describes his darkened and painful state as a fierce battle: "... all the many particles that make up my nature, like enemies entered into battle with each other, they, obsessed with fear of doubt, see a threat everywhere."

However, the very consciousness of one's own sinfulness becomes a source of hope for the sufferer: sincere repentance will not be rejected, all the sins of the penitent will be forgiven by the Lord of goodness, Christ the King, for His mercies "exceed the measure of the possibilities of human thoughts."

Reflecting on the "divine pledge in Nicaea of ​​a certain creed" and condemning the heresy of the Tondrakites, these "new Manicheans", Narekatsi sings of the Church, which is "higher than man, like a victorious rod is higher than the chosen one of Moses."

The Church of Christ, being built by the command of the Creator, will save from perdition "not only a multitude of dumb hosts of animals and a small number of people, but together with the earthly will gather to itself the inhabitants of the highest."

The Church is not a house of earthly matter, but "a heavenly body of the light of God."

Without it, it is impossible for either a monk or a layman to follow the path of perfection. The one who boldly begins to consider it "some kind of material fiction, or human cunning", the Almighty Father "will reject from his face through the word consubstantial with Him."

V. V. Rynkevich

Once in Arabia, the glorious king Rostevan ruled, and he had his only daughter, the beautiful Tinatin. Anticipating the near old age, Rostevan ordered during his lifetime to elevate his daughter to the throne, about which he informed the viziers. They favorably accepted the decision of the wise lord, because "Though the maiden will be the king, the creator created her. <…> A lion cub remains a lion cub, whether it is a female or a male." On the day of Tinatin's accession to the throne, Rostevan and his faithful spaspet (military leader) and pupil Avtandil, who had long been passionately in love with Tinatin, agreed the next morning to organize a hunt and compete in the art of archery.

Having left for the competition (in which, to the delight of Rostevan, his pupil turned out to be the winner), the king noticed in the distance the lonely figure of a horseman dressed in a tiger skin, and sent a messenger after him. But the messenger returned to Rostevan with nothing, the knight did not respond to the call of the glorious king. The enraged Rostevan orders twelve soldiers to take the stranger in full, but, seeing the detachment, the knight, as if waking up, wiped away the tears from his eyes and swept away those who intended to capture his soldiers with a whip. The same fate befell the next detachment sent in pursuit. Then Rostevan himself galloped behind the mysterious stranger with the faithful Avtandil, but, noticing the approach of the sovereign, the stranger whipped his horse and "like a demon disappeared into space" as suddenly as he appeared.

Rostevan retired to his chambers, not wanting to see anyone but his beloved daughter. Tinatin advises his father to send reliable people to look for the knight around the world and find out whether "he is a man or a devil." Messengers flew to the four ends of the world, half the earth came out, but they never met the one who knew the sufferer.

Tinatin, to the delight of Avtandil, calls him to his palaces and orders him to look for a mysterious stranger all over the earth in the name of his love for her, and if he fulfills her order, she will become his wife. Going in search of a knight in a tiger skin, Avtandil in a letter respectfully says goodbye to Rostevan and leaves instead of himself to protect the kingdom of his friend and approximate Shermadin from enemies.

Having failed to catch the trail of the mysterious knight, "going wild in his heart's anguish", Avtandil decided to turn back his horse, when he suddenly saw six tired and wounded travelers who told him that they had met a knight on a hunt, immersed in thoughts and dressed in a tiger skin. The knight put up a worthy resistance to them and "rushed off proudly, like a luminary from luminaries."

Avtandil pursued the knight for two days and two nights, until, finally, he crossed a mountain river, and Avtandil, climbing a tree and hiding in its crown, witnessed how a girl (her name was Asmat) came out of the thicket of the forest towards the knight, and, embracing, they sobbed for a long time over the stream, grieving that they had so far failed to find some beautiful maiden. The next morning, this scene was repeated, and, having said goodbye to Asmat, the knight continued his mournful path.

Avtandil, speaking with Asmat, tries to find out from her the secret of such a strange behavior of the knight. For a long time she does not dare to share her sadness with Avtandil, finally she tells that the mysterious knight's name is Tariel, that she is his slave. At this time, the sound of hooves is heard - this is Tariel returning. Avtandil takes refuge in a cave, and Asmat tells Tariel about an unexpected guest, and Tariel and Avtandil, two mijnurs (that is, lovers, those who have dedicated their lives to serving their beloved), joyfully greet each other and become twin brothers. Avtandil is the first to tell his story of love for Tinatin, the beautiful owner of the Arabian throne, and that it was by her will that he wandered in the desert for three years in search of Tariel. In response, Tariel tells him his story.

... Once upon a time there were seven kings in Hindustan, six of whom revered Farsadan, a generous and wise ruler, as their lord. Tariel's father, glorious Saridan,

But, having achieved honors and glory, he began to languish in loneliness and, of his own free will, gave his possessions to Farsadan. But the noble Farsadan refused the generous gift and left Saridan as the sole ruler of his inheritance, brought him closer to him and revered him like a brother. At the royal court, Tariel himself was brought up in bliss and reverence. Meanwhile, a beautiful daughter, Nestan-Darejan, was born to the royal couple. When Tariel was fifteen years old, Saridan died, and Farsadan and the queen gave him "the rank of his father - the commander of the whole country."

The beautiful Nestan-Darejan, meanwhile, grew up and captivated the heart of the brave Tariel with a burning passion. Once, in the midst of a feast, Nestan-Darejan sent her slave Asmat to Tariel with a message that read:

Nestan offered Tariel to declare war on the Khatavs (it should be noted that the action in the poem takes place both in real and fictional countries), to earn honor and glory in the "bloody clash" - and then she will give Tariel her hand and heart.

Tariel sets out on a campaign against the Khatavs and returns to Farsadan with a victory, having defeated the hordes of the Khatav Khan Ramaz. The next morning, after returning to the hero tormented by love torment, the royal couple comes for advice, who were unaware of the feelings experienced by the young man for their daughter: to whom should they give their only daughter and heir to the throne as a wife? It turned out that the Shah of Khorezm reads his son as Nestan-Darejan's husband, and Farsadan and the queen favorably accept his matchmaking. Asmat comes for Tariel to escort him to the halls of Nestan-Darejan. She reproaches Tariel with a lie, says that she was deceived by calling herself his beloved, because she is given away against her will "for a foreign prince", and he only agrees with her father's decision. But Tariel dissuades Nestan-Darejan, he is sure that he alone is destined to become her husband and ruler of Hindustan. Nestan tells Tariel to kill the unwanted guest, so that their country would never go to the enemy, and to ascend the throne himself.

Having fulfilled the order of his beloved, the hero turns to Farsadan: “Your throne now remains with me according to the charter,” the farsadan is angry, he is sure that it was his sister, the sorceress Davar, who advised the lovers on such an insidious act, and threatens to deal with her. Davar attacked the princess with a great scolding, and at that time "two slaves, looking like kadzhi" (fabulous characters of Georgian folklore) appeared in the chambers, pushed Nestan into the ark and carried him to the sea. Davar in grief stabs himself with a sword. On the same day, Tariel, with fifty warriors, goes in search of his beloved. But in vain - nowhere did he manage to find even traces of the beautiful princess.

Once, in his wanderings, Tariel met the brave Nuradin-Fridon, the sovereign of Mulgazanzar, who was fighting against his uncle, seeking to split the country. The knights, "having entered into a union of the heart", give each other a vow of eternal friendship. Tariel helps Fridon defeat the enemy and restore peace and tranquility in his kingdom. In one of the conversations, Fridon told Tariel that one day, walking along the seashore, he happened to see a strange boat, from which, when it moored to the shore, a maiden of incomparable beauty emerged. Tariel, of course, recognized in her his beloved, told Fridon his sad story, and Fridon immediately sent sailors "through various distant countries" with an order to find the captive. But

Tariel, having said goodbye to his brother and received from him a black horse as a gift, again went in search, but, despairing of finding his beloved, found shelter in a secluded cave, where he met him, dressed in a tiger skin, Avtandil

Avtandil decides to return to Tinatin, tell her about everything, and then rejoin Tariel and help him in his search.

... With great joy they met Avtandil at the court of the wise Rostevan, and Tinatin, "like a paradise aloes over the Euphrates valley <...> waited on a throne richly decorated." Although the new separation from his beloved was difficult for Avtandil, although Rostevan opposed his departure, the word given to a friend drove him away from his relatives, and Avtandil left Arabia for the second time, already secretly, punishing the faithful Shermadin to sacredly fulfill his duties as a military leader . Leaving, Avtandil leaves Rostevan a will, a kind of hymn to love and friendship.

Arriving at the cave he abandoned, in which Tariel was hiding, Avtandil finds only Asmat there - unable to bear the mental anguish, Tariel alone went in search of Nestan-Darejan.

Having overtaken his friend for the second time, Avtandil finds him in an extreme degree of despair, with difficulty he managed to bring Tariel, wounded in a fight with a lion and a tigress, back to life. Friends return to the cave, and Avtandil decides to go to Mulgazanzar to Fridon in order to ask him in more detail about the circumstances under which he happened to see the sun-faced Nestan.

On the seventieth day, Avtandil arrived in the possession of Fridon.

The glorious Avtandil sets off again,

until he met a caravan of merchants from Baghdad, led by the venerable old man Usam. Avtandil helped Usam defeat the sea robbers robbing their caravan, Usam offered him all his goods in gratitude, but Avtandil asked only for a simple dress and the opportunity to hide from prying eyes, "pretending to be a foreman" of a merchant caravan.

So, under the guise of a simple merchant, Avtandil arrived in the marvelous seaside city of Gulansharo, where "the flowers are fragrant and never wither." Avtandil laid out his goods under the trees, and the gardener of the eminent merchant Usen approached him and told him that his master was away today, but

Having learned that an eminent merchant had arrived in their city, moreover, “like a seven-day month, it is more beautiful than a plane tree,” Fatma immediately ordered the merchant to be escorted to the palace. "Middle-aged, but beautiful" Fatma fell in love with Avtandil.

And so, during one of the meetings, when Avtandil and Fatma were "kissing during a joint conversation," the door of the alcove flung open and a formidable warrior appeared on the threshold, promising Fatma a great punishment for her debauchery. "You will kill all your children from fear, like a she-wolf!" - he threw in her face and left. In despair, Fatma burst into tears, bitterly punishing herself, and begged Avtandil to kill Chachnagir (that was the name of the warrior) and remove the ring she had presented from his finger. Avtandil fulfilled Fatma's request, and she told him about her meeting with Nestan-Darejan.

Once, at the feast of Queen Fatma, she went into the gazebo that was erected on a rock, and, opening the window and looking at the sea, she saw how a boat landed on the shore, a girl came out of it, accompanied by two blacks, whose beauty eclipsed the sun. Fatma ordered the slaves to ransom the maiden from the guards, and "if the bargaining does not take place", to kill them. And so it happened. Fatma hid the "sun-eyed Nestan in secret chambers, but the girl continued to shed tears day and night and did not tell anything about herself. Finally, Fatma decided to open up to her husband, who accepted the stranger with great joy, but Nestan remained still silent and" roses, squeezed over pearls." One day, Usen went to a feast to the king, who had a "friend and friend" and, wanting to repay him for his favor, promised his daughter-in-law "a girl similar to a plane tree." Fatma immediately seated Nestan sadness about the fate of a beautiful-faced stranger settled in Fatma's heart. the king's sister Dulardukht began to rule the country, that she was "majestic as a rock" and she had two princes left in her care. This slave was in a detachment of soldiers who traded in which "in the fog, like lightning, sparkled." Recognizing in him a maiden, the soldiers immediately captured her -

On the same day, Fatma sent two slaves to Kajeti with instructions to find Nestan-Darejan. In three days, the slaves returned with the news that Nestan was already engaged to the prince Kajeti, that Dulardukht was going to go overseas to her sister's funeral, and that she was taking sorcerers and sorcerers with her, "for her path is dangerous, and the enemies are ready for battle." But the fortress of the kaji is impregnable, it is located on the top of a sheer cliff, and "ten thousand best guards guard the fortification."

Thus, the location of Nestan was revealed to Avtandil. That night Fatma

languishing for Tinatin. The next morning, Avtandil told Fatma a story about how "dressed in the skin of a tiger suffers abundance" and asked to send one of his sorcerers to Nestan-Darejan. Soon the sorcerer returned with an order from Nestan not to go to Tariel on a campaign against Kajeti, for she "will die a double death if he dies on the day of battle."

Calling the slaves of Fridon to himself and generously endowing them, Avtandil ordered them to go to their master and ask them to gather an army and march on Kajeti, he himself crossed the sea on a passing galley and hurried with the good news to Tariel. There was no limit to the happiness of the knight and his faithful Asmat.

The three of them friends "moved to the edge of Fridon by the deaf steppe" and soon arrived safely at the court of the ruler Mulgazanzar. After conferring, Tariel, Avtandil and Fridon decided immediately, before the return of Dulardukht, to set out on a campaign against the fortress, which "is protected from enemies by a chain of impenetrable rocks." With a detachment of three hundred people, the knights hurried day and night, "not letting the squad sleep."

Overnight, the defenders of the formidable fortress were defeated. Tariel, sweeping away everything in his path, rushed to his beloved, and

Having loaded rich booty on three thousand mules and camels, the knights, together with the beautiful princess, went to Fatma to thank her. They presented everything that was obtained in the Kadzhet battle as a gift to the ruler Gulansharo, who greeted the guests with great honors and also presented them with rich gifts. Then the heroes went to the kingdom of Fridon, "and then a great holiday came in Mulgazanzar. <...> Eight days, playing a wedding, the whole country had fun. <...> They beat tambourines and cymbals, harps sang until dark." At the feast, Tariel volunteered to go with Avtandil to Arabia and be his matchmaker:

- answered Avtandil and reminded Tariel that the time had come to seize the Indian throne for him, and on the day "when these <...> plans come true", he will return to Arabia. But Tariel is adamant in his decision to help the Friend. The valiant Fridon also joins him, and now "the lions, having left the edges of Fridon, walked in unprecedented fun" and on a certain day reached the Arabian side.

Tariel sent a messenger to Rostevan with a message, and Rostevan, with a large retinue, set out to meet the glorious knights and the beautiful Nestan-Darejan.

Tariel asks Rostevan to be merciful to Avtandil, who once left without his blessing in search of a knight in a tiger skin. Rostevan gladly forgives his commander, granting him a daughter as his wife, and with her the Arabian throne. “Pointing to Avtandil, the king said to his retinue: “Here is the king for you. By the will of God, he reigns in my stronghold.” The wedding of Avtandil and Tinatin follows.

Meanwhile, a caravan in black mourning clothes appears on the horizon. After questioning the leader, the heroes learn that the king of the Indians, Farsadan, "having lost his dear daughter," could not bear the grief and died, and the Khatavs approached Hindustan, "surrounded the wild army," and Chaya Ramaz leads them, "that he does not enter with the king of Egypt in an argument."

The sworn brothers, of course, went with him and overnight defeated the innumerable Khatav army. The queen mother joined the hands of Tariel and Nestan-Darejan, and "on the high royal throne Tariel sat down with his wife."

Thus, three valiant twin knights began to rule in their countries: Tariel in Hindustan, Avtandil in Arabia and Fridon in Mulgazanzar, and "their merciful deeds fell everywhere like snow."

D. R. Kondakhsazova

The "Great [battle] of the Bharatas" is an ancient Indian epic, consisting of approximately one hundred thousand couplets-shlokas, divided into 18 books, and including many inserted episodes (myths, legends, parables, teachings, etc.), one way or another connected with main narrative

In the city of Hastinapur, the capital of the country of the Bharatas, the mighty sovereign Pandu reigned. According to the curse of a certain sage who was accidentally hit by his arrow, he could not conceive children, and therefore his first wife, Kunti, who owned a divine spell, summoned the god of justice Dharma one after another - and gave birth to Yudhishthira from him, the god of the wind Vayu - and gave birth to Bhima, or Bhimasena, the king of the gods Indra - and gave birth to Arjuna. Then she passed the spell on to her second wife, Pandu Madri, who gave birth to the twins Nakula and Sahadeva from the heavenly brothers Ashvins (Dioscuri). All five sons were legally considered children of Pandu and were called Pandavas.

Shortly after the birth of his sons, Pandu died, and his blind brother Dhritarashtra became king in Hastinapur. Dhritarashtra and his wife Gandhari had one daughter and one hundred sons, who were called Kauravas after one of their ancestors, and among them the king especially distinguished and loved his first-born Duryodhana.

For a long time, the Pandavas and Kauravas were brought up together at the court of Dhritarashtra and gained great fame for their knowledge of the sciences, arts, and especially military affairs. When they reach adulthood, their mentor Drona organizes military competitions with a large concourse of people, in which both Pandavas and Kauravas show incomparable skill in archery, fights with swords, clubs and spears, controlling war elephants and chariots. Arjuna fights most successfully, and only one of the contestants is not inferior to him in dexterity and strength - an unknown warrior named Karna, who later turns out to be Kunti's son from the sun god Surya, born by her before her marriage to Pandu. The Pandavas, not knowing the origin of Karna, shower him with ridicule, which he will never be able to forgive them, and Duryodhana, on the contrary, makes him his friend and gives him the kingdom of Angu. Soon after this, enmity gradually flared up between the Pandavas and the envying Kauravas, especially since, according to custom, the heir to the kingdom of the Bharatas should not be the Kaurav Duryodhana, who claims to be him, but the eldest of the Pandavas, Yudhishthira.

Duryodhana succeeds in persuading his father to temporarily send the Pandavas to the city of Varanavat, located in the north of the kingdom. There, a tar house is built for the brothers, which Duryodhana orders to set on fire so that they all burn alive. However, the wise Yudhishthira unraveled the villainous plan, and the Pandavas, together with their mother Kunti, get out of the trap in a secret passage, and a beggar woman who accidentally wandered there with her five sons burns in the house. Having discovered their remains and mistaking them for Pandavas, the inhabitants of Varanavat with grief, and Duryodhana and his brothers, to their joy, confirmed the idea that the sons of Pandu had died.

Meanwhile, having got out of the tar house, the Pandavas go into the forest and live there unrecognized under the guise of hermit Brahmins, for they are afraid of Duryodhana's new machinations. At this time, the Pandavas perform many glorious deeds; in particular, the brave Bhima kills the rakshasa-cannibal Hidimba, who encroached on the life of his brothers, as well as another monster, the rakshasa Banu, who demanded daily human sacrifices from the inhabitants of the small city of Ekachakra. One day, the Pandavas learn that the king of the Panchalas, Drupada, has appointed a svayamvara - the choice of the bridegroom by the bride - for his daughter, the beautiful Draupadi. The Pandavas go to the capital of the Panchalas, Kampilya, where many kings and princes have already gathered to argue for the hand of Draupadi. Drupada suggested to the suitors-applicants to send five arrows from the miraculous divine bow at the target, but none of them could even pull his bowstring. And only Arjuna passed the test with honor, after which, according to Kunti, Draupadi became the common wife of all five brothers. The Pandavas revealed their names to Drupada; and the fact that their rivals were alive was immediately known to the Kauravas in Hastinapur. Dhritarashtra, despite the objections of Duryodhana and Karna, invited the Pandavas to Hastinapura and gave them possession of the western part of his kingdom, where they built a new capital for themselves - the city of Indraprastha.

For many years, Yudhishthira and his brothers lived happily, in contentment and honor in Indralrastha. They undertook military campaigns in the north, south, west and east of India and conquered many kingdoms and lands. But along with the growth of their power and fame, the envy and hatred of the Kauravas grew towards them. Duryodhana sends Yudhishthira a challenge to a game of dice, from which, according to the rules of honor, he was not entitled to evade. Duryodhana chooses his uncle Shakuni, the most skilled gambler and no less skillful deceiver, as his opponents. Yudhishthira very quickly loses all his wealth, lands, cattle, warriors, servants and even his own brothers to Shakuni. Then he bets himself - and loses, bets the last thing he has left, the beautiful Draupadi - and loses again. The Kauravas begin to sneer at the brothers, who have become their slaves under the terms of the game, and subject Draupadi to especially shameful humiliation. Here Bhima pronounces a vow of deadly revenge, and when the ominous words of the vow are echoed by the howl of a jackal foreshadowing trouble and other formidable omens are heard, the frightened Dhritarashtra frees Draupadi from slavery and offers her to choose three gifts. Draupadi asks for one thing - freedom for her husbands, but Dhritarashtra, along with freedom, returns to them both the kingdom and everything else that was lost by them.

However, as soon as the Paldavas returned to Indraprastha, Duryodhana again challenges Yudhishthira to the ill-fated game. Under the terms of the new game - and Yudhishthira lost it again - he must go into exile with his brothers for twelve years and, after this period, live unrecognized in any country for another year.

The Pandavas fulfilled all these conditions: twelve years, overcoming poverty and many dangers, they lived in the forest, and the thirteenth year they spent as simple servants in the court of the Matsya king Virata. At the end of this year, the Kauravas attacked the land of the Matsyas. The Matsya army led by Arjuna repelled this raid, the Kauravas recognized Arjuna by the exploits of the commander, but the exile period for the rke had expired, and the Pandavas could no longer hide their names.

The Pandavas suggested that Dhritarashtra return their possessions to them, and he was at first inclined to agree to their demand. But the power-hungry and treacherous Duryodhana managed to convince his father, and now the war between the Pandavas and Kauravas has become inevitable.

Countless hordes of warriors, thousands of chariots, war elephants and horses are drawn to Kurukshetra, or the field of Kuru, where the great battle was destined to take place. On the side of the Kauravas, who are Dhritarashtra's subjects, their great-uncle the wise Bhishma and the mentor of the princes Drona, Duryodhana's friend and ally Karna, the husband of Dhritarashtra's daughter Jayadratha, the son of Drona Ashwatthaman, the kings Shalya, Shakuni, Kritavarman and other mighty and brave warriors fight on the side of the Kauravas, who are the subjects of Dhritarashtra. Kings Drupada and Virata, the son of Drupada Dhrishtadyumna, the son of Arjuna Abhimanyu, take the side of the Pandavas, but the leader of the Yadava family, Krishna, the earthly incarnation of the god Vishnu, who, by vow, himself has no right to fight, plays a particularly important role in the battle, but becomes the main adviser to the Pandavas.

Just before the start of the battle, Arjuna, driving around the troops in a chariot driven by Krishna, sees opponents of his teachers, relatives and friends in the camp and, horrified by the fratricidal battle, drops his weapon, exclaiming: "I will not fight!" Then Krishna pronounces his instruction to him, which received the name "Bhagavad Gita" ("Song of the Divine") and became the sacred text of Hinduism. Resorting to religious, philosophical, ethical and psychological arguments, he convinces Arjuna to fulfill his military duty, declaring that it is not the fruits of the deed - whether they seem bad or good - but only the deed itself, the final meaning of which it is not given to a mortal to judge, should be the only human care. Arjuna recognizes the correctness of the teacher and joins the army of the Pandavas.

The Battle of the Kuru Field lasts eighteen days. In numerous battles and fights, one after another, all the leaders of the Kauravas die: Bhishma, Drona, Karna, and Shalya, all the sons of Dhritarashtra, and on the last day of the battle at the hands of Bhima, the eldest among them is Duryodhana. The victory of the Pandavas seems to be unconditional, only three of the countless Kauravas remain alive: the son of Drona Ashvatthaman, Kripa and Kritavarman. But at night, these three warriors manage to sneak into the sleeping camp of the Pandavas and exterminate all their enemies with the exception of the five Pandava brothers and Krishna. The price of victory was so terrible.

On a field littered with the corpses of warriors, the mother of the Kauravas Gandhari, other mothers, wives and sisters of the dead appear and mourn them bitterly. The Pandavas reconcile with Dhritarashtra, after which the saddened Yudhishthira decides to spend the rest of his life as a hermit in the forest. However, the brothers manage to convince him to fulfill his hereditary duty as a sovereign and be crowned in Hastinapur. After some time, Yudhishthira performs a great royal sacrifice, his army under the leadership of Arjuna conquers the whole earth, and he reigns wisely and justly, establishing peace and harmony everywhere.

Time passes. The aged king Dhritarashtra, Gandhari and the mother of the Pandavas Kunti, who have chosen the fate of hermits, perish in a forest fire. Krishna dies, who was wounded in the heel - the only vulnerable spot on the body of Krishna - by a certain hunter, mistaking him for a deer. Having learned about these new sad events, Yudhishthira finally fulfills his long-standing intention and, having appointed Arjuna's grandson Parikshit as his successor on the throne, leaves the kingdom with his brothers and Draupadi and goes as an ascetic to the Himalayas. One by one, Draupadi, Sahadeva, Nakula, Arjuna and Bhima die. At the sacred mountain Meru, the only survivor, Yudhishthira, is met by the king of the gods Indra and escorted to heaven with honor. However, there Yudhishthira does not see his brothers and, having learned that they are tormented in the underworld, refuses heavenly bliss; he wants to share their fate, and asks to take him to the underworld. The last test of the Pandavas ends in the underworld: the darkness of the underworld dissipates - it turns out to be an illusion-maya, and Yudhishthira, as well as his wife, brothers and other noble and brave warriors, will henceforth have an eternal stay in heaven among the gods and demigods.

"Acts of Rama" - an ancient Indian epic, consisting of 7 books and approximately 24 thousand couplets-slokas; attributed to the legendary sage Valmiki

Once upon a time, the ten-headed Ravana was the lord of the realm of Rahshas demons on the island of Lanka. He received from the god Brahma the gift of invulnerability, thanks to which no one but a man could kill him, and therefore humiliated and persecuted the heavenly gods with impunity. For the sake of destroying Ravana, the god Vishnu decides to be born on earth as a mere mortal. Just at this time, the childless king of Ayodhya, Dasaratha, performs a great sacrifice in order to obtain an heir. Vishnu enters the bosom of his eldest wife Kaushalya, and she gives birth to the earthly incarnation (avatar) of Vishnu - Rama. The second wife of Dasaratha, Kaikeyi, simultaneously gives birth to another son, Bharata, and the third, Sumira, to Lakshmana and Shatrughna.

Already a young man, having gained fame for himself with many military and pious deeds, Rama goes to the country of Videha, whose king, Janaka, invites suitors to compete, claiming the hand of his daughter, the beautiful Sita. At one time, Janaka, plowing a sacred field, found Sita in his furrow, adopted and raised her, and now intends to marry the one who bends the wonderful bow given to him by the god Shiva. Hundreds of kings and princes try in vain to do this, but only Rama manages not only to bend the bow, but to break it in two. Janaka solemnly celebrates the wedding of Rama and Sita, and the couple live in happiness and harmony for many years in Ayodhya in the family of Dasaratha.

But now Dasaratha decides to proclaim Rama as his heir. Upon learning of this, the second wife of Dasaratha Kaikeyi, instigated by her servant - the evil hunchback Manthara, reminds the king that once he vowed to fulfill any two of her desires. Now she expresses these desires: to expel Rama from Ayodhya for fourteen years and anoint her own son Bharata as the heir. In vain, Dasaratha pleads with Kaikeyi to give up her demands. And then Rama, insisting that his father remain true to his word, he himself retires to forest exile, and Sita and his devoted brother Lakshmana voluntarily follow him. Unable to bear the separation from his beloved son, King Dasaratha dies. Bharata should ascend the throne, but the noble prince, believing that the kingdom rightfully belongs not to him, but to Rama, goes to the forest and persistently convinces his brother to return to Ayodhya. Rama rejects the insistence of Bharata, remaining true to his filial duty. Bharata is forced to return to the capital alone, but as a sign that he does not consider himself a full-fledged ruler, he places Rama's sandals on the throne.

Meanwhile, Rama, Lakshmana and Sita settle in a hut they built in the Dandaka forest, where Rama, protecting the peace of the holy hermits, exterminates the monsters and demons that annoy them. One day, Ravana's ugly sister Shurpanakha comes to Rama's hut. Having fallen in love with Rama, out of jealousy she tries to swallow Sita, and the angry Dakshmana cuts off her nose and ears with a sword. In humiliation and rage, Shurpanakha incites a huge army of Rakshasas led by the ferocious Khara to attack the brothers. However, with a shower of irresistible arrows, Rama destroys both Khara and all his warriors. Then Shurpanakha turns to Ravana for help. She urges him not only to avenge Khara, but, seducing him with the beauty of Sita, kidnap her from Rama and take her as his wife. On a magical chariot, Ravana flies from Lanka to the Dandaku forest and orders one of his subjects, the demon Maricha, to turn into a golden deer and distract Rama and Lakshmana away from their homes. When Rama and Lakshmana, at the request of Sita, follow the deer into the forest, Ravana forcibly puts Sita in his chariot and carries her through the air to Lanka. The king of kites Jatayus tries to block his way, but Ravana mortally wounds him, cutting off his wings and legs, In Lanka, Ravana offers Sita wealth, honor and power, if only she agrees to become his wife, and when Sita scornfully rejects all his claims, concludes her into custody and threatens to punish her obstinacy with death.

Not finding Sita in the hut, Rama and Lakshmana go in great sorrow in search of her. From the dying kite Jatayus, they hear who her abductor was, but do not know where he hid with her. Soon they meet the monkey king Sugriva, deprived of the throne by his brother Valin, and the wise adviser of Sugriva, the monkey Hanuman, the son of the wind god Vayu. Sugriva asks Rama to return the kingdom to him, and in return promises help in the search for Sita. After Rama kills Valin and again elevates Sugriva to the throne, he sends his scouts to all parts of the world, instructing them to find traces of Sita. Monkeys sent to the south, led by Hanuman, manage to do this. From the kite Sampati, the brother of the deceased Jatayus, Hanuman learns that Sita is in captivity in Lanka. Pushing off from Mount Mahendra, Hanuman gets to the island, and there, having decreased to the size of a cat and running around the entire capital of Ravana, he finally finds Sita in a grove, among the ashoka trees, guarded by ferocious Rakshasa women. Hanuman manages to secretly meet with Sita, convey the message of Rama and console her with the hope of a speedy release. Hanuman then returns to Rama and tells him about his adventures.

With a vast army of monkeys and their bear allies, Rama sets out on a campaign against Lanka. Having heard about this, Ravana gathers a military council in his palace, at which Ravana's brother Vibhishana demands to return Sita to Rama in order to avoid the death of the Rakshasa kingdom. Ravana rejects his demand, and then Vibhishana goes over to the side of Rama, whose army has already set up camp on the ocean opposite Lanka.

According to the instructions of Nala, the son of the heavenly builder Vishvakarman, the monkeys are building a bridge across the ocean. They fill the ocean with rocks, trees, stones, along which Rama's army is transported to the island. There, at the walls of the capital of Ravana, a fierce battle begins. Rama and his faithful associates Lakshmana, Hanuman, Sugriva's nephew Angada, the king of bears Jambavan and other brave warriors are confronted by hordes of Rakshasas with Ravana's commanders Vajradamshtra, Akampana, Prahasta, Kumbhakarna. Among them, the son of Ravana, Indrajit, who is well-versed in the art of magic, turns out to be especially dangerous. So, he succeeds, becoming invisible, mortally wounding Rama and Lakshmana with his snake arrows. However, on the advice of Jambavan, Hanuman flies far to the north and brings to the battlefield the top of Mount Kailash, overgrown with healing herbs, with which he heals the royal brothers. One by one the Rakshasa chiefs fall dead; At the hands of Lakshmana, Indrajit, who seemed invulnerable, perishes. And then Ravana himself appears on the battlefield, who enters into a decisive duel with Rama. In the course of this duel, Rama cuts off all ten heads of Ravana in turn, but each time they grow again. And only when Rama hits Ravana in the heart with an arrow given to him by Brahma, Ravana dies.

The death of Ravana means the end of the battle and the complete defeat of the Rakshasas. Rama proclaims the virtuous Vibhishana king of Lanka and then orders Sita to be brought. And then, in the presence of thousands of witnesses, monkeys, bears and rakshasas, he expresses his suspicion of adultery and refuses to accept her again as a wife. Sita resorts to divine judgment: she asks Lakshmana to build a funeral pyre for her, enters its flame, but the flame spares her, and the god of fire Agni, who has risen from the fire, confirms her innocence. Rama explains that he himself did not doubt Sita, but only wanted to convince his warriors of the impeccability of her behavior. After reconciling with Sita, Rama solemnly returns to Ayodhya, where Bharata happily gives him his place on the throne.

However, the misadventures of Rama and Sita did not end there. One day, Rama is informed that his subjects do not believe in Sita's good nature and grumble, seeing in her a corrupting example for their own wives. Rama, no matter how hard it is for him, is forced to obey the will of the people and orders Lakshmana to take Sita to the forest to hermits. Sita, with deep bitterness, but steadfastly, accepts a new blow of fate, and the sage-ascetic Valmiki takes her under his protection.

In his abode, Sita gives birth to two sons from Rama - Kush and Lava. Valmiki educates them, and when they grow up, teaches them a poem composed by him about the deeds of Rama, the same "Ramayana", which later became famous. During one of the royal sacrifices, Kusha and Lava recite this poem in the presence of Rama. By many signs, Rama recognizes his sons, asks where their mother is, and sends for Valmiki and Sita. Valmiki, in turn, confirms the innocence of Sita, but Rama once again wants Sita to prove her purity of her life to all the people. And then Sita, as the last evidence, asks the Earth to enclose her in her mother's arms. The earth opens before her and takes her into her bosom. According to the god Brahma, now only in heaven is Rama and Sita destined to find each other again.

"Rod Hari" is an ancient Indian epic poem in 3 books, considered an appendix to the Mahabharata. The first and third books of the poem set out the most important Hindu myths about creation, the origin of gods and demons, the legendary kings of the Solar and Lunar dynasties, earthly incarnations for the salvation of the world (avatars) of the god Vishnu, or Hari (lit. "Brown", possibly "Deliverer"), in the guise of a boar, a lion-man and a dwarf, etc., and the second book tells about the most revered incarnation of Vishnu-Hari as Krishna.

In the city of Mathura, the cruel demon-asura Kansa reigns. He was predicted to die at the hands of the eighth son of his cousin Devaki, the wife of the king of the Yadavas Vasudeva, and therefore he puts Devaki and Vasudeva in prison, and kills their first six sons as soon as they were born. The seventh son, Balarama, was saved by the goddess of sleep, Nidra, who, even before his birth, transferred the conceived fetus to the womb of another wife of Vasudeva, Rohini, and the eighth, Krishna, immediately after birth was secretly given up for education to the shepherd Nanda and his wife Yashoda. Soon Balarama also falls into the family of Nanda, and both brothers grow up among the shepherds and shepherdesses in the sunny forest of Vrindavan on the banks of the full-flowing Yamuna River.

Already in his youth, Krishna performs unprecedented feats. He forces the snake king Kaliya, who poisons the waters of the Yamuna, to leave the river; kills the asura Dhenduka, who is pursuing and intimidating the shepherds; pierces the evil bull demon Arishta with his own horn; during a thunderstorm sent down by the god Indra, he uproots Mount Govardhana from the earth and for seven days holds it in the form of an umbrella over the shepherds and their herds of cows.

Krishna's exploits, and even more his beauty, cheerful disposition, skill in dancing and playing the flute, attract the hearts of young cowherd boys to him, and their joyful exclamations are heard every now and then in the forest of Vrindavan when Krishna starts all kinds of games with them and leads round dances, one hears their passionate confessions when he makes love to them, and their sorrowful lamentations when he leaves them.

Learning about the deeds and exploits of Krishna, Kansa understands that the son of Devaki is still alive, and invites Krishna and Balarama to a fisticuffs in Mathura. Against the brothers, he sets up powerful asura demons as opponents, but Krishna and Balarama easily defeat them all, throwing them to the ground with crushing blows. When the annoyed Kansa orders to expel Krishna and all the shepherds from his kingdom, Krishna, like an angry lion, rushes to Kansa, drags him into the arena and kills him. His father-in-law Jarasandha tries to avenge Kansa's death. He gathers an innumerable army, which besieges Mathura, but soon finds himself utterly defeated by the Yadava army led by Krishna.

Soon word comes to Mathura that King Bhishmaka of Vidarbha is about to marry his daughter Rukmini to the Chedi king Shishu-palu. Meanwhile, Krishna and Rukmini have long secretly loved each other, and on the wedding day appointed by Bhishmaka, Krishna takes the bride away in a chariot. Shishupala, Jarasandha, Rukmini's brother Rukman pursue Krishna in an attempt to bring Rukmini back, but Krishna and Balarama put them to flight. The wedding of Krishna and Rukmini is celebrated in the new capital of the Yadavas, Dvaraka, recently built by Krishna. From Rukmini, Krishna has ten sons, and later sixteen thousand other wives give birth to him many thousands more children. :

For many years, Krishna happily lives in Dvaraka and continues to exterminate the asura demons, thereby fulfilling his divine mission on earth. Among the demons he killed, the Naraka were the most powerful. who stole earrings from the mother of the gods Aditi, and Nikumbha, who possessed the magical gift of reincarnation. Krishna is also ready to destroy the thousand-armed king of the asuras, Banu, but he is patronized by the god Shiva, who comes to the aid of Bana and himself enters into a duel with Krishna. The duel is stopped by the supreme god Brahma, he appears on the battlefield and reveals the great truth that Shiva and Krishna, the incarnation of Vishnu, are ultimately consubstantial.

A poem in 28 songs, of which only the first thirteen and a half have survived from the Sanskrit original, and the rest have come down in Tibetan and Chinese transcriptions.

King Shuddhodana of the Shakya family, who lives in the city of Kapilavastu in the foothills of the Himalayas, has a son, Siddhartha. His birth is unusual: in order not to cause torment to his mother Maya, he appears from her right side, and his body is decorated with happy signs, according to which the sages predict that he will become the savior of the world and the founder of a new law of life and death. Serenely, in unclouded well-being, Siddhartha's childhood and youth flow in the royal palace. In due time, he marries the beautiful Yashodhara, by whom he has a beloved son, Rahula. But one day, Siddhartha leaves the palace in a chariot and meets first a decrepit old man, then a sick man bloated with dropsy, and finally a dead man who is being carried to the cemetery. The spectacle of death and suffering overturns the whole worldview of the prince. The beauty surrounding him seems to him an ugliness, power, strength, wealth appear as decay. He thinks about the meaning of life, and the search for the ultimate truth of existence becomes his only goal. Siddhartha leaves Kapilavastu and goes on a long journey. He meets with the Brahmins, who expound their faith and teachings to him; spends six years in the forest with ascetics, exhausting themselves with asceticism; King Bimbisara of Magadha offers him his kingdom so that he can embody the ideal of justice on earth - but neither traditional sophistication, nor mortification of the flesh, nor unlimited power seem to him able to solve the riddle of the meaninglessness of life. In the vicinity of the city of Gaya, under the Bodhi tree, Siddhartha is immersed in deep meditation. The demon-tempter Mara unsuccessfully tries to confuse him with carnal temptations, the army of Mara throws stones, spears, darts, arrows at him, but Siddhartha does not even notice them, remaining motionless and impassive in his contemplation. And here, under the Bodhi tree, enlightenment descends on him: from a Bodhisattva, a person who is destined to be a Buddha, he becomes one - a Buddha, or an Awakened, Enlightened One.

Buddha goes to Benares and there delivers his first sermon, in which he teaches that there is suffering, there is a cause of suffering - life is the way to end suffering - renunciation of desire, deliverance from desires and passions, liberation from worldly bonds - the path of detachment and spiritual balance. Wandering through the cities and towns of India, the Buddha repeats this teaching again and again, attracting many disciples to himself, uniting thousands of people in his community. Buddha's enemy Devadatta tries to destroy him: he throws a huge stone on him from the mountain, but it splits and does not touch his body; sets a wild, angry elephant on him, but he humbly and devotedly falls at the feet of the Buddha. Buddha rises to heaven and converts even the gods to his faith, and then, having completed his mission, sets the limit of his life - three months. He comes to the city of Kushinagar in the far north of India, pronounces his last instruction there and, forever interrupting the endless chain of births and deaths for himself, plunges into nirvana - a state of complete rest, incorporeal contemplative being. The bones of the Buddha, left after the funeral pyre, are divided into eight parts by his disciples. Seven are carried away by kings who have come from the far ends of the earth, and the eighth in a golden jug is forever kept in Kushinagar in the temple erected in honor of the Buddha.

King Udayana, the lord of the country of Watsu, was defeated in battle and lost half of his kingdom. His wise minister Yaugandharayana understands that the lost can only be returned with the help of the mighty king of Magadha Darshaka. To do this, Udayana needs to enter into a family union with him - to marry the sister of King Darshaka Padmavati. But Udayana loves her wife Vasavadatta so much that she will never agree to a new marriage. And then Yaugandharayana resorts to a trick: he sets fire to the women's quarters of the Udayana palace, spreads a rumor about Vasavadatta's death in a fire, and, having disguised himself, hides with her in Magadha.

There, when Princess Padmavati visits the forest hermitage of hermits, Yaugandharayana introduces Vasavadatta to her under the name of Avantika as her sister, whose husband has gone to a foreign land, and asks Padmavati to take her under his protection for a while. When, shortly thereafter, Udayana arrives in Rajagriha, the capital of Magadha, as a royal guest, Vasavadatta-Avantika has already become Padmavati's favorite maid and friend. Conquered by the virtues of Udayana, King Darshaka offers him Padmavati as his wife. And although Udayana still mourns inconsolably for Vasavadatta, by the will of circumstances he is forced to agree to this marriage.

No matter how attached Vasavadatga is to Padmavati, she is tormented by a feeling of impotent jealousy. But one day she and Padmavati accidentally overhear Udayana's conversation with his friend, the brahmin Vasantaka, in the palace park. Udayana admits to Vasantaka that he is "entirely devoted to Padmavati for her beauty, for her mind, for her tenderness <...> but not with her heart! It, as before, belongs to Vasavadatta." For Vasavadatta, these words serve as a consolation and at least some kind of reward for suffering, and Padmavati, although at first bitter to hear them, pays tribute to the nobility of Udayana and his loyalty to the memory of the deceased wife. A few days later, while looking for Padmavati, Vasavadatga finds Udayana sleeping in one of the pavilions of the park. Mistaking him for Padmavati in the darkness, she sits down on his bed, and suddenly Udayana, half asleep, speaks to her, stretches out his hands to her, asks to forgive him. Vasavadatga quickly leaves, and Udayana remains in the dark, whether he had a dream, and then "it would be happiness not to wake up," or he dreamed while awake, and then "let such a dream last forever!"

In alliance with Darshaka, Udayana defeats his enemies and regains his kingdom. The envoys of Vasavadatta's father and mother arrive at the solemn celebration of victory. Vasavadatta's nurse gives the king her portrait as a memento of her, and then, to his surprise, Padmavati recognizes his servant Avantika in this portrait. Suddenly, a disguised Yaugandharayana appears and asks Padmavati to return his sister, who was previously left in her care, to him. Already having a presentiment of who her maid will turn out to be, Padmavati herself volunteers to bring her, and when she comes, first the nurse, and then, in disbelief, Udayana recognize the miraculously resurrected Vasavadatta in the imaginary Avantika. Yaugandharayana has to tell the audience why he conceived and how he carried out his cunning plan. He asks for forgiveness from Udayana, receives it and predicts his sovereign a long reign in love and harmony with two beautiful queen spouses - Vasavadatta and Padmavati.

The Pentateuch is a world famous collection of Indian tales, fables, stories and parables. The inserted stories of the "Panchatantra" (about 100 in different versions), which have penetrated into the literature and folklore of many peoples, are united by frame stories that have one or another didactic setting.

King Amarashakti had three stupid and lazy sons. To awaken their mind, the king called the sage Vishnusharman, and he undertook to teach the princes the science of correct behavior for six months. To this end, he composed five books, which he told his students in turn.

A certain merchant leaves the dying bull Sanjivaka in the forest. From spring water and lush grass, the bull gradually got stronger, and soon his mighty roar begins to frighten the king of the forest animals, the lion Pingalaka. The advisers of Pingalaka, the jackals Damanaka and Karataka, seek out the bull and conclude an alliance between him and the lion. Over time, the friendship between Sanjivaka and Pingalaki becomes so strong and close that the king begins to neglect his former surroundings. Then the remaining out of work jackals quarrel them. They slander the lion against the bull, accusing Sanjivaka of having planned to seize the royal power, and the bull, in turn, is warned that Pingalaka wants to feast on its meat. Deceived by the jackals, Pingalaka and Sanjivaka attack each other and the lion kills the bull.

The doves fall into the net set by the hunter, but they manage to take off with the net and fly to the Hiranya mouse hole, which gnaws the net and frees the doves. The raven Laghupa-tanaka sees all this and, admiring the mind and dexterity of the mouse, enters into friendship with it. In the meantime, a drought sets in in the country, and the raven, having put Hiranya on his back, flies with her to the lake, where the friend of the mouse, the turtle Mantharaka, lives. Soon, having run away from the hunter, Chitrang's doe joins them, and all four, sincerely attached to each other, get food together and spend time in wise conversations. One day, however, the deer got entangled in the snares, and when Hiranya freed her, a sluggish turtle fell into the hands of the hunter, who did not have time to hide with his friends. Then the doe pretends to be dead, the raven, so that the hunter has no doubts about her death, pretends to peck out her eyes, but as soon as he, leaving the turtle, hurries for easy prey, the four friends run away and henceforth live peacefully and happily.

Ravens live on a large banyan tree, and countless owls live in a mountain cave-fortress nearby. Stronger and more cruel owls constantly kill ravens, and they gather for a council, at which one of the ministers of the crow king named Sthirajivin suggests resorting to military cunning. He depicts a quarrel with his king, after which the ravens, smearing him with blood, throw him at the foot of a tree. Owls accept Sthirajivin, allegedly wounded by his relatives, as a defector and settle in a nest at the entrance to the cave. Sthirajivin slowly fills his nest with tree branches, and then notifies the ravens that they can fly in and set fire to the nest along with the cave. They do so and thus deal with their enemies, who perish in the fire.

A palm tree grows near the sea, on which the Raktamukha monkey lives. She meets the dolphin Vikaralamukha, who swims up to the tree every day and has a friendly conversation with the monkey. This makes the dolphin's wife jealous, and she demands that her husband bring her a monkey's heart for dinner. No matter how hard it is for the dolphin, due to weakness of character he is forced to obey the demand of his wife. To get the heart of a monkey, Vikaralamukha invites her to his home and swims with her on her back through the bottomless sea. Realizing that the monkey now has nowhere to go, he confesses his plan to her. Keeping his presence of mind, Raktamukha exclaims: "Why didn't you tell me before? Then I would not have left my heart in the hollow of a tree." The stupid dolphin returns to the shore, the monkey jumps on the palm tree and thereby saves his life.

A certain hermit gives four lamps to four poor Brahmins and promises that if they go to the Himalayan mountains, each of them will find a treasure where his lamp falls. At the first Brahmin, the lamp falls on the treasure of copper, at the second - on the treasure of silver, at the third - on the treasure of gold, and he invites the fourth to stay with him and share this gold equally. But he, in the hope that he will probably get diamonds more expensive than gold, goes further and soon meets a man on whose head a sharp wheel is spinning, staining him with blood. This wheel immediately leaps onto the head of the fourth brahmin, and now, as the stranger who has got rid of suffering explains, it will remain on the brahmin until another overly greedy seeker of wealth comes.

A certain yaksha, a demigod from the retinue of the god of wealth and the lord of the northern mountains of Kubera, exiled by his master for some offense far to the south, at the end of summer, when everyone who was outside the house, especially yearn for their loved ones, sees a lonely cloud in the sultry sky . He decides to convey with him a message of love and consolation to his wife, who is waiting for him in the capital of Kubera - Alaka. Turning to the cloud with a request to become its messenger, the yaksha describes the path by which it can reach Alaki, and in every picture he draws of the landscape, mountains, rivers and cities of India, the love, longing and hopes of the yaksha himself are somehow reflected. According to the exile, a cloud (in Sanskrit this is a masculine word) in the country of Dasharna will have to "drink in a kiss" the waters of the Vetravati River, "resembling a frowning maiden"; in the mountains of Vindhya, "hearing his thunder, in fear cling to the chest of the weary spouses" of their wives; the cloud will give fresh, life-giving moisture to drink the river Nirvindhya, "thin from the heat, like a woman in separation"; in the city of Ujjayini, with a flash of lightning, it will illuminate the path of girls hurrying in the darkness of the night to rendezvous with their beloved; in the country of Malve it will be reflected, like a smile, in the flashing of white fish on the surface of the river Gambhira; enjoy the sight of Ganga, which, flowing over the head of the god Shiva and caressing his hair with waves, makes Shiva's wife Parvati suffer from jealousy.

At the end of the path, the cloud will reach Mount Kailash in the Himalayas and see Alaka "lying on the slope of this mountain, like a virgin in the arms of a lover." The beauties of Alaki, according to the yaksha, with the radiance of their faces compete with the lightning with which the cloud shines, their decorations are like a rainbow encircling the cloud, the singing of the inhabitants and the ringing of their tambourines are like thunder, and the towers and upper terraces of the city, like a cloud, soar high in air. There, not far from Kubera's palace, the cloud will notice the house of the yaksha himself, but for all its beauty now, without a master, it will seem as gloomy as daytime lotuses withered at sunset. Yaksha asks the cloud to look into the house with a cautious flash of lightning and find his beloved there, faded, right, like a creeper in a rainy autumn, mourning, like a lonely chakravaka duck separated from her husband. If she sleeps, let the cloud moderate its rumbling at least for part of the night: perhaps she is dreaming of the sweet moment of rendezvous with her husband. And only in the morning, refreshing with a gentle breeze and life-giving raindrops, the cloud should convey to her the message of the yaksha.

In the message itself, the yaksha informs his wife that he is alive, complains that everywhere he sees the image of his beloved: “her camp is in flexible lianas, her gaze is in the eyes of a fearful doe, the beauty of her face is in the moon, her hair, decorated with flowers, is in bright tails of peacocks, eyebrows in the waves of the river, "but he does not find its full likeness anywhere. Having poured out her anguish and sadness, remembering the happy days of their closeness, the yaksha encourages her wife with her confidence that they will soon meet, for the term of Kubera's curse is expiring. Hoping that his message will serve as a consolation for his beloved, he begs the cloud, passing it on, to return as soon as possible and bring with him the news of his wife, with whom he mentally never parted, just as the cloud does not part from his friend - lightning.

The mighty demon Taraka, to whom Brahma once granted irresistible strength for his ascetic deeds, frightens and humiliates the heavenly gods, so that even their king Indra is forced to pay tribute to him. The gods pray to Brahma for help, but he cannot alleviate their plight in any way and only predicts that Shiva will soon have a son who is the only one capable of crushing Taraka. However, Shiva still does not have a wife, and the gods assign him the daughter of the king of the mountains Himalaya Parvati as his wife, at the birth of which the earth was showered with flower rain, foreshadowing the good of the whole world, illuminating with her face all directions of the world, combining everything that is beautiful on earth and in the sky.

To win the love of Shiva, Parvati goes to his abode on Mount Kailash, where Shiva indulges in severe asceticism. Seeking his favor, Parvati devotedly takes care of him, but, immersed in deep self-contemplation, Shiva does not even notice her efforts, is impassive and indifferent to her beauty and helpfulness. Then the god of love Kama comes to her aid, armed with a bow with flower arrows. With his arrival, spring blossoms in the snow-covered mountains, and only the abode of Shiva is alien to the exultation of nature, and God himself still remains motionless, silent, deaf both to the spring charm and to the words of love addressed to him. Kama tries to pierce Shiva's heart with his arrow and melt his cold. But Shiva instantly burns him with the flame of his third eye. Beloved Kama Rati weeps bitterly over a handful of ashes left from her husband. She is ready to commit suicide by lighting a funeral pyre, and only a voice from heaven, announcing to her that Kama will be reborn as soon as Shiva finds the happiness of love, keeps her from fulfilling her intention.

After the burning of Kama, dejected by the failure of her efforts, Parvati returns to her father's house. Complaining about the impotence of her beauty, she hopes that only the mortification of the flesh will help her achieve her goal. Dressed in a rough dress of bast, eating only the rays of the moon and rainwater, she indulges, like Shiva, in cruel austerity. After some time, a young hermit comes to her and tries to dissuade her from debilitating asceticism, which, according to him, is unworthy of the cruel, repulsive Shiva with his indifference and ugliness. Parvati indignantly responds with passionate praise to Shiva, the only one who owns her heart and thoughts. The stranger disappears, and in his place appears Shiva himself, the great god, who took the form of a young hermit in order to experience the depth of Parvati's feelings. Convinced of her devotion, Shiva is now ready to become her loving husband and servant.

He sends matchmakers to the father of Parvati Himalai seven divine sages - rishis. He appoints the wedding on the fourth day after their arrival, and the bride and groom happily prepare for it. Brahma, Vishnu, Indra, the sun god Surya take part in the wedding ceremony, it is announced with wonderful singing by celestial singers - gandharvas, and celestial maidens - apsaras adorn it with a charming dance. Shiva and Parvati ascend the golden throne, the goddess of happiness and beauty Lakshmi overshadows them with a heavenly lotus, the goddess of wisdom and eloquence Saraswati pronounces a skillfully composed blessing.

Parvati and Shiva spend their honeymoon in the palace of the king of Himalaya, then go to Mount Kailash and, finally, retire to the wonderful forest of Gandhamadhan. Patiently and gently, Shiva teaches the shy Parvati the art of lovemaking, and in lovemaking for them, one hundred and fifty seasons, or twenty-five years, pass like a single night. The fruit of their great love should be the birth of Kumara, the god of war, also known as Skanda and Karttikeya.

The mighty king Dushyanta finds himself hunting in a peaceful forest abode of hermits and meets three young girls there, watering flowers and trees. In one of them, Shakuntala, he falls in love at first sight. Posing as a royal servant, Dushyanta asks who she is, for she fears that, being of a different origin than he, she, according to the law of caste, will not be able to belong to him. However, from Shakuntala's friends, he learns that she is also the daughter of King Vishwamitra and the divine maiden Menaka, who left her in the care of the head of the abode of the sage Kanva. In turn, when the rakshasa demons attack the monastery and Dushyanta has to defend it, it turns out that he is not a royal servant, but a great king himself.

Shakuntala is captivated by the courage, nobility and courteous behavior of Dushyanta no less than he is by her beauty and modesty. But for some time, the lovers do not dare to open their feelings to each other. And only once, when the king accidentally overhears a conversation between Shakuntala and his girlfriends, in which she admits that passionate love for Dushyanta burns her day and night, the king makes her a confession in return and swears that, although there are many beauties in his palace, "only two will be the glory of his family: the land girded by the seas and Shakuntala.

The foster father of Shakuntala Kanva was not at the monastery at that time: he had gone on a distant pilgrimage. Therefore, Dushyanta and his beloved enter into a marriage union according to the Gandharva rite, which does not require the consent of the parents and the wedding ceremony. Shortly thereafter, called by urgent royal affairs, Dushyanta, as he hopes, leaves for a short time to his capital. And just in his absence, the sage Durvasas visits the monastery. Immersed in thoughts of Dushyanta, Shakuntala does not notice him, and the angry sage curses her for involuntary inhospitality, dooming her to the fact that the one she loves will not remember her, "like a drunkard does not remember the previously spoken words." The girlfriends ask Durvasas to soften his curse, which Shakuntala, fortunately, did not even hear, and, propitiated by them, he promises that the curse will lose its power when the king sees the ring he gave Shakuntala.

Meanwhile, Father Kanva returns to the monastery. He blesses the marriage of his adopted daughter, who, according to him, is already expecting a child who brings good to the whole world, and, having given her wise instructions, sends her with two of his disciples to her husband-king. Shakuntala arrives at the majestic royal palace, striking in its splendor, so unlike her modest abode. And here Dushyanta, bewitched by the curse of Durvasas, does not recognize her and sends her away. Shakuntala tries to show him the ring he gave him, but discovers that there is no ring - she lost it on the road, and the king finally rejects her. In desperation, Shakuntala begs the earth to open up and devour her, and then, in a flash of lightning, her mother Menaka descends from heaven and takes her away with her.

Some time later, the palace guards bring in a fisherman suspected of stealing a precious ring. It turns out that this ring is the ring of Shakuntala, which the fisherman found in the belly of the fish he caught. As soon as Dushyanta saw the ring, his memory returned. Love, remorse, grief of separation torment him: "My heart was sleeping when the gazelle knocked on it, and now it has awakened to taste the pangs of repentance!" All efforts of the courtiers to console or entertain the king are in vain, and only the arrival of Matali, the charioteer of the king of the gods Indra, awakens Dushyanta from hopeless sadness.

Matali calls on Dushyanta to help the celestials in their fight against the mighty asura demons. The king rises into the sky together with Matali, performs many military feats, and after defeating the demons, having earned the gratitude of Indra, he descends on an air chariot to the top of Mount Hemakuta to the abode of the progenitor of the gods, the holy sage Kashyapa. Near the monastery Dushyanta meets a boy playing with a lion cub. By his behavior and appearance, the king guesses that in front of him is his own son. And then Shakuntala appears, who, as it turns out, has been living in the monastery of Kashyapa all this time and there she gave birth to a prince. Dushyanta falls at Shakuntala's feet, begs for her forgiveness and receives it. Kashyapa tells the loving spouses about the curse that made them suffer innocently, blesses their son Bharata and predicts his power over the whole world. On Indra's chariot, Dushyanta, Shakuntala and Bharata return to the capital of the kingdom.

Late in the evening on the street of the city of Ujjayini, Samsthanaka, the ignorant, rude and cowardly brother-in-law of King Palaka, pursues the rich hetaera, the beautiful Vasantasena. Taking advantage of the darkness, Vasantasena slips away from him through an unlocked gate into the courtyard of one of the houses. By chance, it turned out that this was the house of the noble brahmin Charudatta, with whom Vasantasena fell in love, having met the god Kama shortly before in the temple. Because of his generosity and generosity, Charudatta became a poor man, and Vasantasena, wanting to help him, leaves him his jewels for safekeeping, which are allegedly encroached on by Samsthanaka.

The next day, Vasantasena confesses her love for Charudatta to her maid Madanika. During their conversation, Charudatta's former masseur, who became a player after his master's ruin, bursts into the house. He is chased by the owner of a gambling house, to whom the massage therapist owes ten gold. Vasantasena pays this debt for him, and the grateful massage therapist decides to quit the game and become a Buddhist monk.

Meanwhile, Charudatta entrusts the care of Vasantasena's jewel box to his friend, the brahmin Maitreya. But Maitreya falls asleep at night, and the thief Sharvilaka, following all the rules of the art of thieves, digs under the house and steals the box. Charudatta is in despair that he has deceived the trust of Vasantasena, with whom he also fell in love, and then Charudatta's wife Dhuta gives him her pearl necklace so that he can pay off the hetero. As embarrassed as Charudatta is, he is forced to take the necklace and sends Maitreya with it to Vasantasena's house. But even before him, Sharvilaka comes there and brings a stolen jewelry box in order to redeem his beloved, Madanika, from Vasantasena. Vasantasena releases Madanika without any ransom, and when Sharvilaka learns from her that, without knowing it, he robbed the noble Charudatta, he, repentant, abandons his craft, leaves the casket with the hetaera, and himself joins the conspirators, dissatisfied with the tyrannical rule of King Palaki .

Following Sharvilaka, Maitreya comes to the house of Vasantasena and brings Dhuta's pearl necklace in exchange for the missing jewels. Touched, Vasantasena hurries to Charudatta and, referring to the fact that she lost the necklace in bones, again hands him the jewelry box. Under the pretext of bad weather, she stays at Charudatta's house for the night, and in the morning returns the necklace to Dhuteya. She refuses to accept him, and then Vasantasena pours her jewelry into the clay cart of Charudatta's son - his only unpretentious toy.

Soon there are new misunderstandings. Leaving for a date with Charudatta in the city park, Vasantasena mistakenly gets into Samsthanaka's cart; the nephew of King Palaka Aryaka, who escaped from the prison in which Palaka imprisoned him, is hiding in her wagon. As a result of such a confusion, instead of Vasantasena, Charudatta meets Aryaka and frees him from the shackles, and Samsthanaka finds Vasantasena in his cart and again pesters her with his harassment. Contemptuously rejected by Vasantasena, Samsthanaka strangles her and, considering her dead, hides her under a bunch of leaves. However, a masseur passing by, who has become a Buddhist monk, finds Vasantasena, brings him to his senses and hides with her for a while.

Between dem Samsthanaka accuses Charudatta in the trial of killing Vasantasena. A coincidence of circumstances is also against him: Vasantasena's mother reports that her daughter went on a date with him, and Maitreya, Charudatta's friend, is looking for jewelry belonging to the hetaera. And although no one believes in the guilt of Charudatta, cowardly judges, at the request of King Palaka, sentence him to be impaled. However, when the executioners are ready to begin the execution, the living Vasantasena comes and tells what really happened. Sharvilaka appears after her and announces that Palaka has been killed and the noble Aryaka has been enthroned. Aryaka appoints Charudatta to a high government position and allows Vasantasena to become his second wife. The runaway Samsthanaka was brought, but the generous Charudatta lets him go free and gives thanks to fate, which, "although it plays with people indiscriminately," in the end rewards virtue and piety.

During the stay of the Pandava brothers in a twelve-year forest exile, their common wife Draupadi once reproached the eldest among the brothers, Yudhishthira, for inaction, indecision, indulgence of the Kaurava offenders and urged them to immediately attack them. The second brother, Bhima, agreed with Draupadi, but Yudhishthira rejects their reproaches and insists - in the name of virtue and fidelity to this word - on observing the agreement with the Kauravas. The sage Dvaipayana, who came to visit the Pandavas, supports Yudhishthira, but warns that when the period of exile expires, not peace awaits the Pandavas, but a battle, and you need to prepare for it in advance. He advises the third of the brothers - Arjuna to become an ascetic in order to enlist the help of the king of the gods Indra and receive an irresistible weapon from him.

A certain yaksha, a demigod mountain spirit, takes Arjuna to the Himalayas and points him to Mount Indrakila, shining like gold, where Arjuna begins to perform his ascetic feat. Indra is pleased with Arjuna's selflessness, but decides to put him to an additional test. He sends heavenly singers to Indrakila - Gandharvas, divine maidens - Apsaras, goddesses of the six seasons of the year, who have taken the form of beautiful women. Exciting, sweet-sounding music constantly sounds around Arjuna, naked apsaras bathe in the stream before his eyes, shower him with fragrant flowers, try to confuse him with passionate appeals and caresses. But Arjuna does not succumb to temptations and maintains equanimity. Then Indra resorts to another trick. Disguised as an old hermit, he appears before Arjuna and, praising him for his firmness of spirit, convinces him to remain an ascetic and abandon plans of revenge on his enemies. Arjuna replies that he thinks about revenge not for the sake of revenge and not for the sake of himself and his resentment, but only for the sake of fulfilling the duty assigned to him to eradicate evil in this world, Indra is pleased with Arjuna's answer, approves of his intentions and now advises to propitiate the formidable ascetic god with asceticism Shiva.

Arjuna indulges in asceticism even more earnestly. It is so frightening for the demons living nearby that one of them, Muka, disguised as a boar, tries to interrupt it by attacking Arjuna. Arjuna shoots an arrow from a bow at Muka, and at the same time directs another deadly arrow at the demon Shiva, who appeared there in the guise of a kirat - a highlander hunter. A quarrel breaks out between Arjuna and Shiva over the right to the killed boar. The Ganas, the retinue of Shiva, also disguised as hunters, rush at Arjuna from all sides, but Arjuna disperses them with his arrows. Then Shiva himself challenges Arjuna to a duel. Arjuna throws spears, darts, arrows at Shiva, but they fly by; tries to hit him with a sword, but Shiva splits the sword in two; throws stones and trees at him; enters into hand-to-hand combat with him, but cannot defeat his divine opponent in any way. And only when Shiva rises into the air, and Arjuna grabs his leg, thereby involuntarily finding himself in the role of a petitioner falling to his feet, the great god stops the duel and, satisfied with Arjuna's courage, reveals his true name to him.

Arjuna pronounces a laudatory hymn in honor of Shiva and asks for the means to defeat his enemies. In response, Shiva gives him his magic bow, teaches him how to use it, and then the other gods, led by Indra, give Arjuna their weapons. Having blessed Arjuna for the upcoming military exploits, Shiva leaves along with the rest of the gods, and Arjuna returns to his brothers and Draupadi.

The storm wrecked the ship on which the daughter of the king of Lanka (Ceylon) Ratnavali was sailing, destined to be the wife of the king of the wats Udayana. Grabbing the board, Ratnavali escaped, and, found on the shore, she was given under the name Sagariki (from the Sanskrit "sagar" - "ocean") to the care of the first wife of Udayana, Queen Vasavadatta.

At a solemn celebration in honor of the god of love Kama, which takes place at the court of Udayana, Sagarika meets the king for the first time and falls in love with him, seeing in him the true incarnation of Kama. Secluded in a banana grove, she draws a portrait of her beloved, and her friend, the servant of Queen Susamgata, finds her doing this. Susamgata immediately guesses about Sagariki's feelings and, next to Udayana's portrait, draws her own portrait on a drawing board. At this time, a commotion rises in the palace due to an angry monkey that has escaped from the cage, and the friends hide in the grove, forgetting the drawing board in fright. She is found by Udayana and his buffoon Brahmin Vasantaka. The king cannot restrain his admiration, admiring the portrait of Sagariki, and when the girlfriends return to pick up the drawing, he passionately declares his love to Sagarika and, to his great joy, hears from her a response confession.

As soon as Sagarika leaves, Vasavadatta appears and in turn finds the drawing board dropped by Vasantaka. The Brahmin clumsily tries to explain the resemblance of the portraits to Udayana and Sagarika as mere chance, but the queen guesses what has happened and leaves, seized with jealousy. She establishes constant surveillance of Udayana and Sagarika, so that Vasantaka and Susamgata have to excel in every possible way in order to arrange a new date for lovers. So that the servants do not suspect anything, they decide to dress Sagarika in Vasavadatta's dress. However, the queen finds out about this in time and is the first to go on a date. Mistaking his wife for a disguised Sagarika, the king addresses her with words of love, and Vasavadatta, having caught him of treason and showered him with angry reproaches, quickly leaves. After some time, however, she begins to repent that she treated Udayana too harshly, and returns to make peace with him. However, this time she finds her husband hugging Sagarika: he had just taken her out of the noose, as she wanted to end her life after learning about the wrath of Vasavadatta. Now Vasavadatta does not even want to think about reconciliation; offended, she orders Sagarika to be taken into custody.

Meanwhile, an ambassador from the king of Lanka arrives at the court of Udayana and informs Udayana that his master sent his daughter Ratnavali, who disappeared after a shipwreck, to the king of the Watts. At the same time, an invited great magician gives a performance in the palace. He creates the illusion of the appearance in the palace hall of the gods Shiva, Vishnu, Brahma and Indra, the demigods - gandharvas and siddhas. Suddenly a fire breaks out. Udayana rushes into the inner chambers of the palace and carries Sagarika out in her arms. It turns out that a sudden fire is also an illusion of the magician, but, to everyone's surprise, the ambassador from Lanka recognizes his princess, Ratnavali, in Sagarika, taken out of the fire. The wise minister of Udayana, Yaugandharayana, explains to those present that the events that have taken place: the disappearance of Ratnavali, her appearance in the palace under the name Sagariki, the passionate attraction that arose in Udayana and Sagariki-Ratnavali for each other - all these are the fruits of his plan to conclude a marriage between the king of Vats and the princess of Lanka love - a marriage that, according to the prediction of the holy sages, will provide Udayana with power over the whole world. Now there are no obstacles left for such a marriage.

A girl from the caste of untouchables (Chandals) comes to King Shudraka and gives him a talking parrot. At the request of Shudraka, the parrot tells that, being a chick, he barely escaped from the highlanders-hunters and found refuge in the abode of the sage-seer Jambadi. Jambali told the parrot about his past births, for the sins of which he suffers in bird form.

Once in the city of Ujjayini, King Tarapida ruled, who had no children for a long time. Once he saw in a dream how a full moon enters the mouth of his wife Vilasavati, and when, after this miraculous sign, his son was born, he named him Chandrapida ("crowned with the moon"). At the same time, the minister Tarapida Shukanasa also has a son, Vaishampayana, and from early childhood he becomes Chandrapida's closest friend. When Chandrapida grew up, Tarapida anointed him as the heir to the kingdom, and Chandrapida, together with Vaishampayana, at the head of a mighty army, set off on a campaign to conquer the world. After the successful completion of the campaign, on the way back to Ujjayini, Chandrapida, breaking away from his retinue, got lost in the forest and, not far from Mount Kailash, on the shore of Lake Acchoda, he saw a grieving girl engaged in severe asceticism. This girl named Mahashveta, the daughter of one of the Gandharva demigod kings, says that one day while walking she met two young hermits: Pundarika, the son of the goddess Lakshmi and the sage Svetaketa, and his friend Kapinjala. Mahashveta and Pundarika fell in love with each other at first sight, fell in love so much that when Mahashveta had to return to his palace, Pundarika died, unable to bear even a brief separation from her. Mahashveta, in desperation, tries to commit suicide, but a certain divine husband descends from the sky, consoles her with the promise of an upcoming meeting with her lover, and takes the body of Pundarika with him to heaven. Following Pundarika and his kidnapper, Kapinjala rushes into the sky; Mahashveta remains to live as a hermit on the banks of the Achchhoda.

Mahashveta introduces Chandrapida to his friend, also a Gandharva princess, Kadambari. Chandrapida and Kadambari fall in love with each other no less passionately than Pundarika and Mahashveta. Soon they also have to part, because Chandralida, at the request of her father, must return to Ujjayini for a while. He leaves, leaving Vaishampayana at the head of the army, and he lingers for several days at Achchhoda, where he meets Mahashveta, for whom he feels an irresistible attraction. Yearning for Pundarika and enraged by Vaishampayana's persistent persecution, Mahashveta curses him, predicting that in his future birth he will become a parrot. And then, as soon as she uttered a curse, the young man dies.

When Chandrapida returns to Acchoda and learns of the sad fate of his friend, he himself falls lifeless to the ground. Kadambari seeks death in desperation, but again a divine voice suddenly sounds, which commands her to abandon her intention and remain at the body of Chandralida until his upcoming resurrection. Soon, Kapinjala descends from the sky to Kadambari and Mahashveta. He learned that Pundarika's body had been taken to heaven by none other than the moon god Chandra. Chandra told him that with his rays he once delivered Pundarika, who was already suffering because of love for Mahashveta, new torments, and he cursed him for heartlessness: doomed him to an earthly birth, in which the moon god must experience the same love as Pundarika. flour. Chandra responded to the curse with a curse, according to which Pundarika in a new birth will share his suffering with the god of the moon. Through mutual curses, Chandra was born on earth as Chandrapida and then as Shudraka; Pundarika, first as Vaishampayana, and then in the form of a parrot, who told King Shudraka the story of his past births.

Thanks to the asceticism of Pundarika's father Svetaketu, the term of the curses pronounced by Chandra, Pundarika and Mahashveta is coming to an end. One day Kadambari, on a sudden impulse, embraces the body of Chandrapida. The touch of the beloved brings the prince back to life; Immediately, Pundarika descends from heaven and falls into the arms of Mahashveta. The next day, Chandrapida and Kadambari, Pundarika and Mahashveta celebrate their weddings in the capital of the Gandharvas. Since then, the lovers have not been separated, but Chandra-Chandrapida spends part of his life (the bright half of the lunar months) in heaven as the god of the moon, and the other part (their dark half) on earth as King Ujjayini.

The renowned expert in the art of politics, Chanakya, or Kaugilya, overthrew the last king of the Nanda dynasty in Pataliputra, the capital of the country of Magadha, and after his assassination enthroned his disciple Chandragupta Maurya. However, the faithful minister of Nanda, Rakshasa, managed to escape, made an alliance with the powerful ruler of the Mountain Country Malayaketu and several other kings, and laid siege to Pataliputra with an army far superior to Chandragupta's. Under these conditions, Chanakya begins to implement a cunning plan, the purpose of which is not only to defeat the enemies, but also to attract Rakshasa, known for his wisdom and honesty, to his side.

Chanakya learns that the wife and son of Rakshasa are hiding in Pataliputra, in the house of the merchant Chandanadasa, and orders the arrest of Chandanadasa. At the same time, the ring of Rakshasa falls into his hands, with which Chanakya seals the forged letter he composed. With this letter, among his other supporters, allegedly pursued by him and therefore defected to Rakshasa, he sends his servant Siddharthaka to the camp of the enemy. At the same time, Chanakya plays a quarrel with Chandragupta, not fulfilling his wishes and orders, and Chandragupta publicly removes him from his post, taking over the reign of the kingdom.

When word of this reaches Rakshasa, he advises Malayaket and other kings to immediately attack Chandragupta, who has lost his chief minister. But there are several events that are foreseen by Chanakya. The mendicant monk Jivasiddhi, sent by him as a scout, deceives Malayaketa, claiming that his father Parvataka was killed not by Chanakya, but by Raksha-sa, and sows in his soul the first seeds of distrust for his adviser. And then Siddharthaka allows himself to be detained by the guards of Malayaketu, and they find a letter in which Rakshasa offers his services to Chandragupta and promises the help of five kings - allies of Malayaketu, who allegedly conspired with him. Convinced of the authenticity of the letter, since it is sealed with a Rakshasa signet ring, Malayaketu decides that Rakshasa wants to run across to Chandragupta, hoping to take the place of the disgraced Chanakya, expels him from the camp, and orders the traitor kings to be executed. Frightened by this order, his other associates immediately leave Malayaketa, and it is not difficult for Chanakya to defeat the enemy troops left by his commanders, and to capture Malayaketa himself.

Rakshasa, having been defeated, nevertheless returns to Pataliputra in order to save his family and his friend Chandanadasa, who was sentenced to death, even at the cost of his own life. Arriving at the place of execution, he gives himself into the hands of the executioners instead of Chandanadasa. However, Chanakya soon comes there, stops the execution and reveals to Rakshasa his whole plan of victory over the enemies of Chandragupta, so brilliantly implemented by him. Rakshasa admires the wisdom and insight of Chanakya, and Chanakya admires the nobility and fidelity to the duty of Rakshasa. Rakshasa asks Chanakya to save Malayaketa's life and return his hereditary possessions. Chakanya readily agrees, and at his suggestion, Rakshasa enters the service of Chandragupta. Now that Chanakya and Rakshasa join forces, the success and prosperity of the kingdom of Chandragupta and his descendants in Magadha is assured for a long time.

Prince Kandarpaketu, the son of King Chintamani, sees an unfamiliar girl in a dream and falls passionately in love with her. Together with his friend Makaranda, he goes in search of her. One night, while in the vicinity of the Vindhya mountains, he accidentally overhears a conversation between two birds. One of them, a myna, reproaches the other, her beloved parrot, for a long absence and expresses the suspicion that he cheated on her with another myna, with whom he has now returned to the forest. In justification, the parrot says that he visited the city of Pataliputra, where King Shringarashekhara, wanting to marry his daughter Vasavadatta, arranged for her a swayamvara - a wedding ceremony for choosing a groom as a bride. Many royal aspirants gathered for swayamvara, but Vasavadatta rejected them all. The fact is that on the eve of swayamvara she also saw in a dream a beautiful prince, whom she immediately fell in love with and only decided to marry him. When she learned that the name of this prince was Kandarpaketu, she sent her home Tamalika to search for him. Wanting to help Tamalika in her difficult task, the parrot flew with her to the Vindhya mountains.

Hearing the story of the parrot, Kandarpaketu intervenes in the conversation of the birds, gets acquainted with Tamalika, and she gives him a verbal message from Vasavadatta, in which the princess asks him to see her as soon as possible. Kandarpaketu and Makaranda go to Pataliputra and infiltrate Vasavadatta's palace. There they learn that King Shringarashekhara, regardless of the desire of his daughter, certainly wants to marry her off as the king of the spirits of the air - Vidyadharas. Then Kandarpaketu decides to run away with Vasavadatta, and the magical horse Manojiva carries them from Pataliputra back to the Vindhya mountains, where the lovers spend the night.

Waking up at dawn, Kandarpaketu discovers, to his horror, that Vasavadatta has disappeared. After a long fruitless search, Kandarpaketu comes to the ocean and, in desperation, wants to throw himself into its waters. At the last moment, he is kept from suicide by a divine voice, promising him an early meeting with his beloved. For several months, Kandarpaketu roams the coastal forests, supporting life with fruits and roots alone, until one day in early autumn he comes across a stone statue that looks like his beloved. In love longing, Kandarpaketu touches the statue with his hand, and it becomes a living Vasavadatta.

When asked by Kandarpaket, Vasavadatta says that on the morning of their separation, she went to collect fruits from the trees for them to eat. Deepening into the forest, she unexpectedly met with the encamped army, and its leader chased after her. But immediately another army appeared - the mountaineers-kirats, and its leader also pursued the herds of Vasavadatta. Both commanders, and after them their soldiers, for the sake of possessing Vasavadatta, entered the battle and completely exterminated each other. However, even in the course of the battle, they ruthlessly devastated the monastery of hermits, located nearby, and the holy head of this monastery, considering Vasavadatta the culprit of what happened, cursed her, turning her into a stone statue. The term of the curse was supposed to end - as it actually happened - when the future spouse of the princess touches the statue.

After a long-awaited and happy meeting, Kandarpaketu and Vasavadatta head to the capital of the kingdom, Kandarpaketu. Makaranda is already waiting for them there, and both king-fathers, Chintamani and Shringarashekhara, solemnly celebrate the wedding of their son and daughter, now forever freed from all anxieties and disasters.

In Dvaraka, the capital of the Yadava clan, the divine sage Narada appears and conveys to Krishna, the leader of the Yadavas and the earthly incarnation of the god Vishnu, a message from the king of the gods Indra with a request to deal with the king of the Chedi country, Shishupala, who threatens the gods and people with his evil deeds and plans. Krishna's brother, the ardent Badarama, proposes to immediately attack Shishupala. But the wise adviser of the Yadavas, Uddhava, an expert in the art of politics, advises Krishna to be restrained and wait for a suitable occasion to start a war. Such an occasion finally presents itself when Krishna receives an invitation to visit the newly built Pandava capital of Indraprastha, where the coronation of Yudhishthira, the eldest among the Pandava brothers, is to take place.

At the head of a large army, Krishna sets out from Dvaraka to Indraprastha. He is accompanied by vassal kings and queens, reclining in luxurious palanquins, courtiers on horses and donkeys, many getters, dancers, musicians and ordinary citizens. The army passes along the shore of the ocean, caressing the waves of the beautiful Dvaraka, like its bride, and at the foot of Mount Raivataka, on one side of which the sun sets, and on the other the moon rises, making it look like an elephant, from whose back two brilliant bells hang down, stops at relaxation. And when the sun plunges into the ocean, warriors and courtiers, noble women and common people, as if imitating him, take an evening bath. The night comes, which has become for all those who were in the camp of the Yadavas, the night of love pleasures and refined passionate pleasures.

The next morning, the army crosses the river Yamuna, and soon the streets of Indralrastha are filled with an enthusiastic crowd of women who have come out to admire the beauty and majesty of Krishna. In the palace, he is respectfully greeted by the Pandavas, and then the time comes for the solemn coronation of Yudhishthira, at which kings from all over the earth are present, including King Shishupala. After the coronation, each of the guests is supposed to present an honorary gift. The first and best gift of the grandfather of the pandals - the just and wise Bhishma offers to offer to Krishna. However, it is precisely this gift that Shishupala arrogantly claims. He accuses Krishna of a thousand sins and crimes, among which he names, in particular, the kidnapping of his bride Rukmini by Krishna, heaps impudent insults on the leader of the Yadavas, and, finally, sends him and his army a challenge to battle. Now Krishna gets the moral right to fulfill the request of Indra: not he, but Shishupala turned out to be the instigator of the quarrel. In the subsequent battle, the Yadavas defeat the Chedi army, and Krishna, at the end of the battle, blows off the head of Shishupala with his war disc.

Bhurivasu, the minister of the king of the city of Padmavati, and Devarata, the minister of the country of Vidarbha, as soon as Bhurivasu's daughter Malati was born, and Devarata's son Madhava, they agreed to betroth them. But King Padmavati firmly decided to marry Malati to his favorite - the courtier Nandana. An old friend of Bhurivasu and Devarat, the wise Buddhist nun Kamandaki, undertakes to prevent this marriage. She invites Madhava to Padmavati and during the spring festival arranges a meeting between Malati and Madhava, during which they fall in love and exchange their portraits and vows of eternal fidelity. In addition, Kamandaki attracts Nandana's sister Madayantika to the side of the lovers to carry out her plans. Madayantika is attacked by a tiger escaping from its cage, but Madhava's friend Makaranda saves her and wins her heart with his courage.

Ignoring the requests of Bhurivasu, Malati and Madayantika, the king announces the engagement of Malati and Nandana. In desperation, Madhava goes to the graveyard, ready to enlist the help of the graveyard demons in order to upset the impending marriage. But just when he appears at the cemetery, the yoginl Kapalakundada arrives there with Malati kidnapped by her, so that the teacher of the yogini, the sorcerer Aghoraghanta, sacrifices the most beautiful girl in the city to the bloody goddess Chamdunda, or Durga, and gains irresistible magical power. Madhava rushes to the defense of Malati, kills Aghoraghanta, and Kapalakundala in impotent rage swears revenge on him and his beloved.

Meanwhile, preparations are underway for the wedding of Malati and Nandana. During the wedding procession, Malati enters the temple to pray to the gods, and here Kamandaki changes her clothes, puts her wedding dress on Makaranda, who during the further ceremony replaces the bride. Kamandaki herself shelters Madhava and Malati in her abode. When Nandana, left alone with the imaginary Malati, tries to take possession of her, he unexpectedly encounters a decisive rebuff and, annoyed and humiliated, refuses the disobedient bride. Having successfully completed his mission, Makaranda, together with Madayantika, who took part in the deception, flee to the abode of Kamandaki and join Malati and Madhava.

However, the trials for lovers are not yet over. Madhava and Makaranda have to fight the city guards who are chasing the fugitives. And during the fight, Kapalakundada arrives and kidnaps Malati, intending to put her to a cruel death in revenge for the death of Aghoraghanta. Madhava, having learned about the kidnapping of Malati, in desperation is ready to throw himself into the river. Intend to commit suicide and all his friends and even Kamandaki, whose plan was suddenly upset. But then a student and friend of Kamandaki Saudamini appears, who owns the great secrets of yoga. With her art, she delivers Malati from captivity and death and returns her to Madhava. At the same time, she announces the message of the king, in which he, with the consent of Nandana, allows Malati and Madhava, Madayantika and Makaranda to marry. Joyful jubilation replaces recent fear and despondency among the participants in the events.

Having freed Sita from imprisonment in Lanka and killed her kidnapper, the demon king Ravana, Rama and his wife return to Ayodhya, where the days of their lives now pass serenely and happily. On one of these days, Sita and Rama visit the art gallery, many of whose canvases depict their former fate. The sad events of the past alternate in the paintings with joyful ones, the tears in the eyes of the spouses are replaced by a smile, until Sita, tired of the re-experienced unrest, falls asleep in the hands of the touched Rama. And just at that moment, the royal servant Durmukha appears, who reports discontent among the people, blaming Rama for taking back his wife, who has stained her honor by staying in the house of the king of demons. The duty of a loving spouse, confident in the purity and fidelity of Sita, requires Rama to scorn false suspicions, but the duty of a sovereign, whose ideal is Rama, commands him to expel Sita, who aroused the murmur of his subjects. And Rama - no matter how bitter he is - is forced to order his brother Lakshmana to take Sita to the forest.

Twelve years pass. From the story of the forest nymph Vasanti, we learn that Sita went into exile pregnant and soon gave birth to two twins Kusha and Lava, who were raised in his monastery by the sage Valmiki; that she was taken under the protection of the goddess of the Earth and the river Ganges, and the river and forest nymphs became her friends; and that for all that, she is constantly tormented by both resentment towards Rama and longing for him. Meanwhile, in the forest of Dandaku, where Sita lives, in order to punish a certain apostate, who could serve as a bad example for others, Rama comes. The surroundings of Dandaka are familiar to him from his long exile in the forest with Sita and awaken painful memories in him. The distant mountains seem to Rama the same as before, from which, as then, the cries of parrots are heard; all the same hills overgrown with bushes, where frisky fallow deer gallop; just as affectionately they whisper something with the rustling of the reeds of the river bank. But earlier, Sita was next to him, and the king sadly notices that not only his life has faded - the passage of time has already dried up the riverbed, the lush crowns of trees have thinned out, birds and animals look shy and wary. Rama pours out his grief in bitter lamentations, which Sita, invisible to him, hears, bending over Rama. She is convinced that Rama, like her, suffers severely, only by touching her hand twice saves him from a deep faint, and gradually her indignation is replaced by pity, resentment by love. Even before her forthcoming reconciliation with Rama, she admits to herself that the "sting of shameful exile" is torn from her heart.

Some time later, Sita's father Janaka and Rama's mother Kaushalya, who live as hermits in the forest, meet a boy who looks remarkably like Sita. This boy is indeed one of the sons of Sita and Rama - Lava. Following Lava, the son of Lakshmana Chandraketu appears, accompanying the sacred horse, which, according to the custom of royal sacrifice - ashvamedhi, must roam where it pleases for a year, marking the boundaries of royal possessions. Lava boldly tries to block the horse's path, and Chandraketu, although he has an unaccountable kindred sympathy for the stranger, enters into a duel with him. The duel is interrupted by Rama, who happened to be nearby. In excitement, Rama peers into the features of Lava, reminding him of Sita and himself in his youth. He asks him who he is, where he came from and who his mother is, and Lava takes Rama to Valmiki's abode to answer all his questions.

Valmiki invites Rama, as well as Lakshmana, Rama's relatives and his subjects to see a play composed by him about the life of Rama. The roles in it are played by gods and demigods, and in the course of the play, in which the past is always intertwined with the present, Sita's innocence and purity, Rama's fidelity to royal and conjugal duty, the depth and inviolability of their mutual love are firmly affirmed. Convinced by the divine idea, the people enthusiastically glorify Sita, and finally her complete and final reconciliation with Rama takes place.

In the blossoming springtime in the forest of Vrindavan on the banks of the Yamuna, Krishna's beloved Radha languishes in separation from her beloved. A friend says that Krishna leads merry round dances with lovely cowherd boys, "embraces one, kisses another, smiles at a third, pursues a timid one, charms a charming one." Radha complains about Krishna's betrayal and about her fate: she is bitter to look at the flowering shoots of ashoka, listen to the melodic buzz of bees in the foliage of mango trees, even a light breeze from the river gives her only torment. She asks her friend to help her meet Krishna, to extinguish the heat of passion that gnaws at her.

Meanwhile, Krishna leaves the beautiful cowherd girls and, remembering Radha, is tormented by remorse. He mentally draws for himself the features of her beautiful appearance and longs to taste her love again. Radha's friend comes and describes to Krishna her jealousy and torment: Radha finds the scent of sandalwood bitter, poison is the sweet wind from the Malay mountains, she is burned by the cool rays of the month, and, unable to endure loneliness, she thinks only of Krishna. Krishna asks his friend to bring Radha to him. She, persuading her to go, assures her that Krishna is as sad as she is: either he lets out heavy sighs, or he looks for her, looking hopefully around, then in despair he falls on a flower bed, then he loses his breath for a long time. However, Radha is so exhausted from the pangs of jealousy and passion that she simply cannot go to Krishna. And the friend returns to Krishna to tell him about Radha's powerlessness to control herself.

Night falls, and, not having met Krishna, Radha yearns even more. She imagines that the deceitful and ruthless Krishna is still indulging in pleasures with the shepherdesses, and she prays the wind from the Malay mountains to take away her life, the god of love Kama to swallow her breath, the waters of the Yamuna River to accept her body burned by passion. The next morning, however, Radha suddenly sees Krishna in front of her, affectionately bending over her. She is still full of indignation and drives him away, reproaching that his eyes are inflamed from a sleepless night of love with shepherdesses, his lips are darkened from antimony from their eyes, his body is covered with scratches left by their sharp nails during passionate joys. Krishna leaves, pretending to be offended, and the girlfriend persuades Radha to forgive him, for a date with Krishna is the highest happiness in this world. And when, at the end of the day, Krishna reappears and assures Radha that she is the only ornament of his life, his treasure in the ocean of being, praises her beauty and asks for compassion, she, submissive to love, yields to his prayers and forgives him.

Wearing the best jewelry, jingling bracelets on her arms and legs, with anxiety and bliss in her heart, Radha enters the arbor of vines, where Krishna, full of joy and impatiently longing for sweet embraces, awaits her. He invites Radha to go through all the stages of love with him, and she gladly responds to his bolder and bolder caresses. Happy, he drinks the nectar of her indistinctly murmuring lips, which are bathed in the gleam of pearl teeth, presses her high, hardened breasts to his mighty chest, loosens the belt on her heavy hips. And when the passion of the lovers is quenched, Radha cannot refrain from enthusiastic praises of Krishna - the center of all earthly pleasures, the keeper of gods and people, whose greatness and glory extend to all ends of the universe.

In the middle of India, in the Vindhya mountains, is the country of Nishadha, and its lord was the noble and generous king Nala. Not far from Nishadha was another country - Vidarbha, and there the king Bhima had a daughter, Damayanti, a beauty that was not equal among either the gods or mortals. Around Nala, the courtiers often praised the beauty of Damayanti, surrounded by Damayanti just as often praised the virtues of Nala, and the young people, before they met, fell in love with each other. Once in the royal garden, Nala manages to catch a golden-feathered goose, who promises, if Nala releases him, fly to Vidarbha and tell Damayanti about his love. Nala releases the goose, and the goose, having fulfilled his promise, flies back to Nishadha and, to Nala's great joy, notifies him of Damayanti's reciprocal love.

When Damayanti entered the time of blooming youth, King Bhima, at her request, appoints a swayamvara for her - the free choice of the bridegroom by the bride. Not only kings from all over the earth, but also many celestials rush to Damayanti's swayamvara, attracted by the rumor of her beauty and charm. On the way to Vidarbha, the king of the gods Indra, the god of fire Agni, the lord of the waters of Varuna and the god of death Yama meet Nala and ask him to be their messenger, who would offer Damayanti to choose one of the four of them as husbands. No matter how bitter Nala is to accept such an assignment, out of a sense of reverence for the gods, he conscientiously fulfills it. However, Damayanti, having listened to the Nishadhite, consoles him with the confession that he is dearer to her than any god and she will choose only him as her suitor. Having penetrated into the intentions of Damayanti, Indra, Agni, Varuna and Yama with divine vision, each takes the form of Nala on svayamvara, and Damayanti, since the king of Nishadhi himself stands next to the gods, one has to choose between five Nalas. Her heart tells her the right decision: she distinguishes the gods by their unblinking eyes, by unfading flower wreaths, by dust-free feet that do not touch the ground, and decisively points to the true Nala - in a withered wreath, covered with dust and sweat. All applicants for the hand of Damayanti, both gods and kings, recognize her choice, praise the depth of her feelings, present rich gifts to the bride and groom; and only the evil spirit Kali, who also appeared on the swayamvara, is imbued with hatred for Nala and vows to take revenge on him. However, the story of Kali's revenge: his infusion into Nala's soul, Nala's loss of the kingdom and everything that belongs to him during a game of dice, his madness and wanderings through the forest, separation from Damayanti and reunion with her only after many disasters and suffering - the story told in detail in the Mahabharata remains outside the scope of Sriharshi's poem. It, unlike the Mahabharata, ends with a description of the solemn wedding of Nala and Damayanti and their happy love.

The Tribes of the Goddess Danu lived on the northern islands, who comprehended magic, charms and secret knowledge. They possessed the four greatest treasures: the spear of Lugh, the sword of Nuadu, the cauldron of the Dagda, and the stone of Lia Fal, which screamed under everyone who was destined to rule Ireland. The Tribes of the Goddess sailed on many ships and burned them as soon as they set foot on the ground. Burn and smoke enveloped the whole sky then - that is why it is believed that the Tribes of the Goddess appeared from smoky clouds. In the first battle of Mag Tuired they fought the tribes of the Fir Bolg and put them to flight.

In this battle, Nuada's hand was cut off, and the healer Dian Cecht put a hand of silver on him. The crippled Nuadu could not rule Ireland, so discord began - and after much debate, it was decided to give the royal power to Bres.

Bres was the son of Elata, the ruler of the Fomorians.

Once Eri, a woman from the Tribes of the Goddess, went to the sea and suddenly saw a silver ship, and on its deck stood a warrior with golden hair and in a golden robe.

He connected with Eri and said that she would have a son named Eochaid Bres, Eochaid the Beautiful - all that is beautiful in Ireland will be compared with this boy.

Before disappearing, Elata removed the golden ring from his finger, ordering him not to give or sell it to anyone, except for someone who would fit it.

When Bres assumed kingship, three Fomorian rulers - Indeh, Elata and Tetra - imposed tribute on Ireland. Even great men served: Oghma carried firewood, and Dagda built fortresses. Many then began to grumble, for their knives were no longer covered with grease, and their mouths no longer smelled of intoxication.

One day, a filid of the Tribes of the Goddess Korpre came to Bres and uttered the first song of reproach in Ireland - from that day the king lost his strength.

The tribes of the Goddess decided to transfer the kingdom to another, but Bres asked for a delay of seven years. He did this in order to gather husbands from the Fomorian Sid and subjugate Ireland by force, Eri took Bres to the hill from which she had once seen a silver ship. She took out a gold ring, which fit the king's middle finger.

Then the mother and son went to the Fomorians. Elata sent Bres to Balor and Indeh, who led the host. A string of ships stretched from the Foreign Isles to Ireland itself - it was a formidable and terrible army.

And the Tribes of the Goddess again elected Nuada with the Silver Hand as king. Once a warrior named Samildanakh ("Skilled in all crafts") came to the gates of Tara - such was Luga's nickname. Nuada ordered that he be admitted in order to be tested.

Convinced of the skillfulness of the warrior, the Tribes of the Goddess decided that he would help them get rid of the bondage of the Fomorians, and Nuadu switched places with him. Lug conferred with Dagda and Ogma, as well as with the brothers Nuadu - Goibniu and Dian Kekht. Druids and healers, blacksmiths and charioteers promised them help. The Dagda united with a woman named Morrigan, and she vowed to crush Indeh: to dry up the blood in his heart and take away the kidneys of valor. Before the battle, the greatest of the Tribe of the Goddess gathered at the Meadow. The blacksmith Goibniu said that not a single tip he forged would miss the target, and the pierced skin would not grow together forever. Dian Cecht said he would heal any wounded Irishman. Oghma said he would kill a third of the enemy. Korpre said that he would blaspheme and defame the Fomorians in order to weaken their stamina. The Dagda said that he would use a miraculous club that would kill nine at one end and restore life at the other end.

When the battle of Mag Tuired began, the kings and chieftains did not immediately join the battle. The Fomorians saw that their dead did not return, and among the Tribes of the Goddess, those slain to death again enter the battle thanks to the art of Dian Kekht.

The blunted and cracked weapons of the Fomorians disappeared without a trace, and the blacksmith Goibniu tirelessly renewed spears, swords and darts. The Fomorians did not like this, and they sent Ruadan, the son of Bres and Brig, the daughter of Dagda, to find out about the intrigues of the Tribes of the Goddess. Ruadan tried to kill Goibniu, but he himself fell at the hands of a blacksmith. Then Brig stepped forward - wept and screamed over the body of her son, and this was the first funeral lament in Ireland.

Finally, the kings and leaders entered the fray. The Irish did not want to let Lug into the battle, but he eluded the guards and stood at the head of the Tribes of the Goddess. Streams of blood poured over the white bodies of brave warriors. Terrible was the noise of the fight, terrible were the cries of the heroes when they collided with bodies, swords, spears and shields.

Balor with the Ruinous Eye slew Nuada with the Silver Hand, and then Lugh himself came against him. Balor's eye was evil: it opened only on the battlefield, when four warriors lifted the eyelid with a smooth stick passing through it. Lug hurled a stone from his sling and knocked out the eye over his head, so that the army of Balor himself saw him, and three times nine Fomorians fell in rows. Morrigan began to encourage the warriors of the Goddess Tribes, urging them to fight fiercely and mercilessly. Many chiefs and royal sons fell in battle, and ordinary and humble warriors died without counting. The battle ended with the flight of the Fomorians - they were driven to the very sea. Lug captured Bres, who begged for mercy. Then Lug asked how to plow the Irish, how to sow and how to reap, - Bres said that you should plow on Tuesday, sow the fields on Tuesday, reap on Tuesday. With this answer, Bres saved his life. And the Morrigan announced a glorious victory to the greatest peaks of Ireland, fairy hills, estuaries and mighty waters.

E. D. Murashkintseva

Under this name, three sagas known from the "Book of the Brown Cow" and the "Yellow Book of Lekan" (XIV century) have been preserved.

In the old days, Ireland was ruled by a king from the Tribes of the Goddess named Eochaid Ollothar (Eochaid "Father of All"). He was also called Dagda, for he knew how to work miracles and had power over the harvest. Wishing closeness to the wife of Elkmar, the ruler of Brug, Dagda united with her when her husband went to visit. The Dagda dispelled the darkness of the night, making the journey so long that nine months passed like one day, and before the return of Elkmar, the woman gave birth to a son named Angus.

The Dagda took the boy to be brought up in the house of Midir. Angus excelled all youths in his charming appearance and dexterity in games. He was also called Mak Ok ("Young"), for his mother said that he is truly young who was conceived at dawn and born before sunset. Angus thought that Midir was the son and did not suspect his relationship with Dagda. But one day they called him a stepson who did not know his father and mother, and he came to Midir in tears. Then Midir brought the young man to Eochaid, so that his own father would recognize his son. Eochaid taught him how to take possession from Elkmar, and Mac Oc became the ruler of Brug.

A year later, Midir visited his pupil. The boys were playing on the field. Suddenly a dispute flared up between them, and one of them accidentally gouged out Midir's eye with a holly rod, but at the request of Angus, the healer god Dian Cecht healed him.

Then Midir wanted intimacy with the most beautiful girl in Ireland, it was Etain Ehride, the daughter of the ruler of the northeastern kingdom. Mac Ok came to him and offered a bride price. The king demanded that twelve valleys be cleared of the forest - and by the will of the Dagda, this happened in one night. Then the king ordered twelve rivers to be diverted to the sea - and by the will of Dagda, rivers appeared in one night, which no one had heard of before. Then the king said that enough had been done for the good of the land and he wanted to get his share - as much gold and silver as the girl herself weighs. This was done, and Mac Ock took Etain away. Midir was very pleased with his adopted son.

A year passed, and Midir began to gather home, where his wife was waiting for him. Mac Ok warned the named father that the power and cunning of the insidious woman are great - Fuamnakh is well-versed in the secret knowledge of the Tribes of the Goddess Danu. When Midir brought the king's daughter, Fuamnach greeted them both with kind words and invited them to her chambers. Etain sat down on the couch, and Fuamnach hit her with a rod of red rowan, turning it into a large puddle. The heat from the hearth pulled the water away, and a worm crawled out, which then became a red fly. There was no more beautiful than this fly in the world, and her voice was sweeter than the songs of bagpipes and horns. Any disease was healed by drops that flew from her wings, thirst and hunger disappeared from anyone who saw her radiance and felt the aroma. When Midir went around his possessions, a fly accompanied him everywhere and protected him from evil intentions. Then Fuamnah raised a mighty wind that carried away Etain.

For seven years the fly did not know peace - completely exhausted, it took refuge on the chest of Mak Oka. Mak Ok dressed her in a purple robe, settled her in a glass sunny chamber and began to look after her until she regained her former beauty. Having learned about Mac Oc's love for Etain, fuamnakh sent a whirlwind again, which brought the fly to the house where people were feasting. Etain fell into the golden cup that stood in front of Etar's wife, and the woman swallowed it with her drink. Thus was Etain conceived for the second time.

They began to call her the daughter of Etara - after her first conception, a thousand and twelve years had passed. And Fuamnakh fell at the hands of Mac Oc, for he did not forgive the disappearance of the fly.

Eochaid Airem then ruled Ireland, and all five kingdoms of the country submitted to him. But Eochaid had no wife, so the Irish did not want to go to his feast. Eochaid ordered to find the most beautiful girl who had not yet been touched by a man, and they found one for him - Etain, daughter of Etar. Eochaid's brother Ailil was inflamed with passion for her and, not daring to confess to anyone, fell ill with anguish. He was near death when Eochaid decided to go around his domain.

The king left his wife with his dying brother to see to it that the funeral rites were properly performed. Etain came to Ailil every day, and he felt better. She soon realized that the cause of his illness was love. Etain promised to heal Ailil, but, not wanting to disgrace the king in his house, she made an appointment on the hill.

There came a man who resembled Ailil in every way, and Etain consoled him. The next morning, Ailil began to lament that he overslept the meeting, and Etain again invited him to the hill. This was repeated three times:

Ailil tried in vain to fight sleep, and Etain consoled the one who was similar in appearance to him. Finally, she demanded an explanation, and the stranger said that his name was Midir - he was her husband when she was called Etain Echraide, but they had to part because of the charms of Faumnah. Etain replied that she would go with him if Eochaid's consent was obtained. When she returned to the royal chambers, Ailill told her that he was completely healed of both illness and love. But Eochaid rejoiced when he found his brother alive and well.

On a clear summer day, Eochaid Airem climbed the walls of Tara. Suddenly, an unfamiliar warrior with golden hair and blue eyes, in a purple cloak, with a five-pointed spear and a precious shield, appeared before him. The warrior said that his name was Midir and he came to test the king in the game of fidhell. Midir took out a board of pure silver with golden figures - in each corner of it a precious stone shone. Midir pledged fifty magnificent horses, and Eochaid won them.

The next day, Midir wagered fifty three-year-old pigs, fifty golden-handled swords, and fifty red-eared cows. Eochaid won this wager too. Then Midir suggested that they play whatever they wished. Eochaid agreed, but on that day Midir won and said that he wanted to kiss Etain. Eochaid gathered in the palace the best warriors and the bravest men - they surrounded the king with Etain when Midir appeared. He hugged Etain and took her with him through a hole in the roof, and then everyone saw two swans in the sky above Tara.

By order of the king, the Irish began to crush the magic hills, but the Sids who lived there said that they did not kidnap Eochaid's wife - in order to return her, blind puppies and kittens must be thrown out every day. Eochaid did just that: Midir was furious, but could not do anything and promised to return Etain. Fifty women were brought before the king, resembling Etain in face and dress. Eochaid chose among them for a long time, and at last it seemed to him that he recognized his wife. The Irish rejoiced, but Midir said that this was his daughter by Etain. So Eochaid lost his wife forever, and then was killed by Sigmal, the grandson of Midir.

E. D. Murashkintseva

Once upon a time, birds of an unknown breed flew into the land of the Ulads and began to devour all the fruits, cereals, grass, all greenery to the very root. Then, in order to save their livelihood, the Ulads decide to equip nine chariots and go hunting for birds. The ruler of the Ulads, Conchobar, and his sister Dekhtire also go hunting. Soon they overtake the birds. They fly in a huge flock led by the most beautiful bird in the world. There are only nine twenty of them, and they are divided into pairs, each of which is connected by a gold chain. Suddenly, all the birds, except for three, disappear, and it is precisely after them that the Ulads rush, but then the night overtakes them, so these three birds also hide. Then the Ulads unharnessed the chariots and sent several people to look for some shelter for the night. The sent ones quickly find a new house standing alone, covered with white bird feathers. Inside it is not finished in any way and is not cleaned with anything, and there are not even blankets and blankets in it. Two hosts, a husband and wife, sitting in the house, affectionately greet those who enter. Despite the lack of food and the small size of the house, the Ulads decide to head there. They enter it all as they were, along with horses and chariots, and it turns out that all this takes up very little space in the house. They find plenty of food and blankets there. After they settle down for the night, a most beautiful young man of unusually tall stature appears at the door. He says that it's time for dinner, and what the Ulads ate before was only a snack. And then they are served various foods and drinks, according to the taste and desire of everyone, after which they, having had their fill and drunk, begin to have fun. Then the husband asks Dekhtira to help his wife, who is giving birth at that moment in the next room. Dekhtire enters the woman in labor. Soon she gives birth to a boy. When the Ulads wake up in the morning, there is no longer a house, no owners, no birds. They return home, taking with them a newborn boy.

He is brought up under Dekhtir until he grows up. At a young age, he becomes seriously ill and dies. Dekhtire is very sad about the death of his adopted son. For three days she does not eat or drink anything, and then a strong thirst seizes her. Dekhtira is served a cup of drink, and when she raises it to her lips, it seems to her that some tiny animal wants to jump from the cup into her mouth. The rest do not notice any animal. The cup is again brought to her, and while she is drinking, the animal slips into her mouth and makes his way inside her. Immediately Dekhtire falls into a sleep that lasts until the next day. In a dream, she sees a certain husband and announces that now she has conceived from him. He also says that it was he who created the birds, created the house where the ulads spent the night, and created the woman who was tormented by childbirth. He himself took the form of a boy who was born there and whom Dekhtire raised and recently mourned. Now he has returned in the form of a small animal that has entered her body. Then he gave his name - Lug Longarm, son of Ethlen - and said that from him a son would be born to Dekhtire named Setanta. After that, Dekhtire became pregnant. No one among the Ulads can understand from whom she conceived, and they even begin to say that the culprit is her brother Conchobar. After that, Sualtam, the son of Roig, wooed Dekhtira. And Conchobar gives him his sister as a wife. She is very ashamed to step on his bed, being already pregnant, and begins to beat herself on the back and thighs, until - as it seemed to her - she is freed from the fetus. At this point, she regains her virginity. After that, she rises to the bed of Sualtam and gives birth to a son the size of a three-year-old child. He is called Setanta, and Kulan the blacksmith becomes his adoptive father. The boy bears the name Setanta until he kills Kulan's dog and serves him for it. From that time on, they began to call him Cuchulainn.

Once a year, all the Ulads gathered for the Samhain holiday, and while this holiday lasted (for seven whole days), there was nothing there but games, festivities, feasts and treats. The favorite thing of the assembled warriors was to boast of their victories and exploits. Once, for such a holiday, all the Ulads gathered, except for Konal the Victorious and Fergus, the son of Roig. Cuchulainn decides not to start without them, as Fergus is his foster father and Conal is his foster brother. While the audience is playing chess and listening to songs, a flock of birds flock to the nearby lake, the most beautiful of which no one has seen in all of Ireland. Women are seized by the desire to get them, and they argue whose husband will be more dexterous in catching these birds.

One of the women, on behalf of everyone, asks Cuchulain to get the birds, and when he begins to swear, she reproaches him for being the culprit of the strabismus of many Ulad women in love with him, for he himself grimaces in one eye with rage during the battle, and women do it is to be like him. Then Cuchulainn makes such a raid on the birds that all their paws and wings fall into the water. Cuchulainn, with the help of his charioteer Loig, captures all the birds and divides them among the women. Each receives two birds, and only Inguba, Cuchulain's beloved, is left without a gift. He promises her next time to catch the most beautiful birds.

Soon, two birds appear above the lake, connected by a golden chain. They sing so sweetly that everyone falls asleep, and Cuchulainn rushes at them. Loig and Inguba warn him that a secret power is hidden in the birds and it is better not to touch them, but Cuchulain cannot keep his word. He throws stones at the birds twice, but misses twice, and then pierces the wing of one of them with his spear. The birds immediately disappear, and Cuchulainn goes to a high stone and falls asleep. In a dream, two women in green and purple cloaks appear to him and beat him almost to death with whips. When Cuchulain wakes up, he can only ask to be transferred to the bed in the house. There he lies without saying a word for a whole year.

Exactly one year later, on the same day of Samhain, while Cuchulainn is still in bed, surrounded by several households, a man suddenly enters the house and sits directly opposite Cuchulainn's bed. He says that Cuchulainn will be cured by the daughters of Ayd Abrat - Liban and Fand, who is in love with him, if he helps their father deal with the enemies. After that, the husband suddenly disappears, and Cuchulainn gets up from the bed and tells the Ulads about everything that happened to him. On the advice of Conchobar, the leader of the Ulads, he goes to the very stone where the disease overtook him a year ago, and meets a woman in a green cloak there. She turns out to be the daughter of Hades Abrat named Liban and says that she came to ask him for help and friendship at the request of her sister Fand, who loves Cuchulain and will connect her life with him if he helps Liban's spouse Labride fight against his enemies. However, Cuchulainn is unable to go with her immediately and decides to first send Loig to find out everything about the country from which Liban came. Loig goes with Liban, meets Fand and Labride, but if Fand is very kind to Loig and impresses him with her beauty, then Labride is unhappy because a difficult battle awaits him with a huge army. Labride asks Loig to hurry after Cuchulainn, and he returns. He tells Cuchulain that he saw many beautiful women and Fand, surpassing the beauty of all others, while Cuchulain, during the story of his charioteer, feels that his mind is clearing up and strength is coming. He asks Loig to call his wife Emer. Emer, having learned what is happening with her husband, first blames the inaction of the ulads, who are not looking for a way to help him, and then calls Cuchulain to overcome himself and get out of bed. Cuchulainn shakes off his weakness and stupor and again goes to the stone, which he had a vision of. There he meets Liban and goes with her to Labride.

Together they go to look at the enemy army, and it seems to them innumerable. Cuchulain asks Labride to leave, and early in the morning kills the leader of their enemies - Eochaid Iul - when he goes to the stream to wash. A battle ensues, and soon the enemies are on the run. But Cuchulainn cannot control his fury. On the advice of Loig, Labride prepares three vats of cold water to cool the ardor of the hero. After that, Cuchulain shares a bed with Fand and spends a whole month near her, and then returns home.

Shortly after his return, he again calls Fand on a love date. But Emer finds out about this, takes a knife and, accompanied by fifty women, goes to the appointed place to kill the girl. Cuchulain, seeing Emer, stops her and forbids approaching Fand. From this, Emer falls into great sorrow, and the amazed Cuchulain promises never to part with her. Now is the time to grieve Fand - she is abandoned and must return to her place. However, Fand's husband, Manannan, who left her when she fell in love with Cuchulain, learns of what is happening and hurries to Fand. Having met her husband, she decides to return to him. But when Cuchulainn sees that Fand is leaving with Manannan, he falls into great sorrow and goes to the mountains, where he lives without food or drink. Only the sorcerers, druids and singers sent by Conchobar manage to bind Cuchulain, intoxicate him with the drink of oblivion and bring him home. Emer is given the same drink, and Manannan shakes his cloak between Fand and Cuchulainn so that they never meet.

Cuchulainn is about to go to battle, but fifty women of the royal family block his way, so as not to let him go on new exploits. With the help of three vats of cold water, they manage to cool his ardor and keep him from going to battle that day. But other women reproach Cuchulain for inaction and call for the defense of their country. Cuchulainn equips himself and goes to his horse, but he turns his left side three times, which portends a great misfortune. On the night before the campaign, the goddess of war, Morrigan, smashes Cuchulainn's chariot, for she knows that he will not return home. Nevertheless, Cuchulainn is on his way. On the way, he visits his wet nurse, and then meets three crooked old women frying dog meat. On Cuchulain lay a vow - not to refuse food from any hearth, but not to eat the meat of a dog. He tries to bypass the old women, but they notice him and invite him to try their food, Cuchulainn eats dog meat with his left hand and puts the bones under his left thigh, from which they lose their former strength. Cuchulainn then arrives at the scene of the battle with his charioteer Loig.

Meanwhile, the leader of his enemies, Erk, comes up with such a trick: all their troops move into a single wall and put up a couple of the strongest warriors and an exorcist on each corner, who will have to ask Cuchulain to lend him a spear that can hit the king. Approaching the enemy army, Cuchulain immediately gets involved in the battle and works with spear and sword so that the plain becomes gray with the brains of those he killed. Suddenly, Cuchulainn sees on the edge of the army two warriors fighting each other and an exorcist who calls on him to separate the fighting. Cuchulainn gives each one such a blow that the brain protrudes through their nose and ears and they fall dead. Then the caster asks him for a spear, Cuchulainn refuses to give it up, but under the threat of being dishonored for his stinginess, he agrees. One of the enemy warriors - Lugaid - throws a spear at Cuchulain and kills his charioteer Loig. Cuchulainn goes to the other flank of the army and again sees two fighting. He separates them, throwing them in different directions with such force that they fall dead at the foot of a nearby cliff. The spellcaster standing next to them again asks him for a spear, Cuchulain again refuses, but under the threat of dishonoring all the Ulads, he gives him up. Then Erk throws a spear at Cuchulain, but hits his horse named Gray of Macha. The mortally wounded horse flees into the Gray Lake, from where Cuchulainn once got him, carrying half of the drawbar on his neck. Cuchulainn, on the other hand, rests his foot on the remaining half of the drawbar and once again passes through the enemy army from end to end. Again he notices two fighters fighting with each other, separates them in the same way as the previous ones, and again meets the caster, who asks him for a spear. This time Cuchulainn had to hand him over, under the threat of dishonoring his family with avarice. Then Lugaid takes this spear, throws it, and hits Cuchulain directly, and even so that his insides fall out on the pillow of the chariot. The mortally wounded Cuchulain asks the enemies surrounding him for permission to swim in the Black Lake, and they allow him. He hardly reaches the lake, bathes, and then returns to the enemies and ties himself to a high stone, not wanting to die lying or sitting. At that moment, the Gray of Macha appears to protect him while he still has a soul and a beam of light comes from his forehead. With his teeth he kills fifty, and with each of his hooves thirty warriors. For a long time the warriors do not dare to approach Cuchulain, thinking that he is alive, and only when the birds land on his shoulders does Lugaid cut off his head.

Then his army goes south, and he remains to bathe and eat the fish he has caught.

At this time, Conal the Victorious learns about Cuchulain's death. Once they made a pact: the one who dies first will be avenged on the others. Conal sets off in the footsteps of the enemy troops and soon notices Lugaid. They agree on a duel and arrive at the appointed place by different roads. There, Conal immediately wounds Lugaid with a spear. Nevertheless, their battle continues for a day, and only when Konal's horse - Red Dew - pulls out a piece of meat from Lugaid's body, Konal manages to cut off his head. Upon returning home, the Ulads do not arrange any celebration, believing that all honors belong to Cuchulain. He appeared to the women who kept him from going to battle: his chariot swept through the air, and Cuchulain himself, standing on it, sings.

A. R. Kurilkin

Salbjarg, daughter of Kari, becomes the wife of Ulf, nicknamed Kveldulf ("Evening wolf"). They have two sons - Thorolf and Grim.

Harald, nicknamed Shaggy, defeats the neighboring kings and becomes the sovereign king of Norway. At his insistence, Kveldulf sends his son Thorolf to him; Kveldulf himself believes that Harald will do much harm to his family, but Thorolf can act in his own way. And Thorolf leaves.

A man named Bjargolf has a son named Brynjolf. In his old age, Bjargolf takes a woman named Hildirid and plays an incomplete wedding with her, because her father is a humble person. Bjargolf and Hildirid have two sons, Harek and Hrerek. Bjargolf dies, and as soon as he is carried out of the house, Brynjolf tells Hildirid and his sons to go away. Brynjolf has a son named Bard, he and the sons of Hildirid are almost the same age. Bard marries Sigrid, daughter of Sigurd.

In autumn, Bard and Thorolf, the son of Kveldulf, come to King Harald and receive them well. They become the warriors of the king.

In winter, Brynjolf dies, and Bard receives all the inheritance. In the same winter, King Harald gives the last battle and takes possession of the whole country. Thorolf and Bard fight bravely and receive many wounds. But Thorolf's wounds begin to heal, while Bard's wounds become life-threatening. And he entrusts Thorolf with his wife and son, and gives all his possessions. After his death, Thorolf takes charge of Bard's patrimony and proposes to Sigrid, Bard's wife. Having received consent, Thorolf arranges a big wedding feast, and everyone sees that Thorolf is a noble and generous man.

The sons of Hildirid come to Thorolf and demand that they be given the property that used to belong to Bjargolf. Thorolf answers that Bard did not consider them legitimate sons, because violence was committed against their mother and she was brought into the house as a prisoner, Bard did not recognize them, and he does not recognize them. That's where the conversation ends.

In winter, Thorolf with a large retinue goes to the Lapps. He collects tribute from them and at the same time trades with them. Thorolf gets a lot of good and becomes a powerful man.

In the summer, Thorolf invites the king to his feast. The king sits in a place of honor, looks at the numerous guests and is silent. Everyone can see that he is angry.

On the day of departure, Thorolf calls the king to the shore and there he gives him a ship with a dragon's head. The king and Thorolf part as good friends.

The sons of Hildirid also invite the king to their feast. After the feast, Harek slanders the king about Thorolf - as if he wants to kill the king. The king believes the words of Harek. Then the king goes his own way, and the sons of Hildirid think up a business for themselves and go to the same place where the king goes, meet him here and there, and he always listens to them with attention. And now the people of the king begin to plunder the ships of Thorolf and oppress his people, and Thorolf in response kills the people of the king.

Grim, the son of Kveldulf, marries Beru, the daughter of Ingvar. Grim is twenty-five years old, but he is already bald, and he is nicknamed Skallagrim ("Bald Grim").

Once Thorolf was feasting with his retinue, and the king treacherously attacked him: he surrounded his house and set it on fire. But Thorolf's men break through the wall and go out. A battle breaks out, and in it Thorolf dies, He is buried with due honors.

Kveldulv learns about the death of his son, is sad, goes to bed, then equips the ship, sails to Iceland and dies on the way. Skallagrim settles in Iceland.

Skallagrim and Bera have a son, Thorolf, who is similar to Thorolf, the son of Kveldulf. Thorolf is very cheerful and everyone loves him.

Another son will be born to Skallagrim, and they give him the name Egil. He grows up, and it is clear that he will be ugly and black-haired, like his father.

A man named Bjarn marries Thora, Thorir's sister, against her brother's wishes. The king drives Bjorn out of Norway. He goes to Iceland and is nailed to Skallogrim. Their daughter Asgerd is born there.

Thorolf becomes attached to Bjarn. Skallagrim sends messengers to Thorir, and he, having obeyed their persuasion, forgives Bjarn. Bjarne returns to Norway, and his daughter Asgerd remains in the upbringing of Skallagrim.

In the spring, Thorolf and Bjarn equip ships and set off on a campaign. In autumn they return with rich prey.

King Harald is getting old. His son Eirik, nicknamed the Bloody Ax, is brought up by Thorir, and is very disposed towards him.

Bjarn and Thorolf go to visit Thorir. There Thorolf gives the king's son a ship, and he promises him his friendship.

Eirik and Thorolf become friends. Eirik marries Gunnhild, she is beautiful, smart and knows how to conjure.

In his fiefdom, Skallagrim arranges a contest of strength and games. Seven-year-old Egil loses to a twelve-year-old boy, grabs an ax and hacks the unwitting offender, and then says a visu (a poetic phrase).

At the age of twelve, Egil leaves with Thorolf.

Arriving in Norway, Thorolf and his brother go to Bjarn to give him his daughter Asgerd. Thorir also has a son named Arinbjorn. Egil is friends with him, but there is no friendship between the brothers.

Soon Thorolf asks Asgerd, the daughter of Byarn, to be his wife. Having received consent, he goes to gather everyone for the wedding feast. But Egil falls ill and cannot go. And Thorolf leaves without him.

Egil, having recovered, goes after him. On the way, he kills the king's man. Upon learning of this, the king orders Egil to be killed. Thorir asks the king for forgiveness for Egil, and Egil is expelled from the state.

Thorolf and Egil equip a large warship and make several campaigns. Then they enter the service of the English king Adadstein. Adalstein is cunning, he breaks the kings who opposed him. But in these battles, Thorolf dies. Egil buries his brother with full honors. King Adelstein gives Egil a golden wrist and two chests of silver. Egil cheers up and says to the visa.

In the spring, Egil goes to Norway, where he learns that Thorir has died, and his inheritance has passed to Arinbjorn. At Arinbjorn, Egil spends the winter.

Upon learning of the death of Thorolf, Asgerd is very sad. Egil wooed her, and Asgerd agreed. After the wedding feast, on the advice of Arinbjorn, Egil sails to Iceland to Skallagrim. Egil lives with Skallagrim and takes care of the household with him. He becomes as bald as his father.

One day, the news reaches Egil that Bjarn has died, and his lands have passed to his son-in-law Berganund, who is very favored by King Eirik and his wife Gunnhild. Egil decides to regain these lands, and Asgerd goes with him to Norway.

Egil takes the case to the Thing, where he proves that his wife Asgerd is the heiress of Bjarne. Berganund proves otherwise. In response, Egil speaks to the visa. The king is angry, and Egil leaves the Thing empty-handed.

Egil goes to the lands of Berganund, kills him and one of the sons of the king. The property that he cannot take away, he puts on fire, and then speaks to the visa and sends a curse of spirits on Eirik and his wife Gunnhild. Then Egil returns to Iceland, where he takes care of the household, for Skallagrim is already old and weak. Soon Skallagrim dies, and all his goodness goes to Egil.

Arinbjorn brings up the children of the king and is always near him. Egil comes to him, and Arinbjorn advises him to come to the king and confess. Egil is guilty and composes a song of praise in honor of the king. The king likes the song, and he allows Egil to leave him safe and sound, Egil goes to Arinbjorn, and then they say goodbye and part as friends.

In autumn, King Hakon begins to rule in Norway. Egil decides to obtain the return of his property, which, after Berganund, is owned by his brother Atli the Short. He comes to King Hakon and asks to give his wife Asgerd the property that Bjarn once owned. Hakon welcomes Egil favorably.

Egil comes to Atli the Short and calls him to the Thing. At the Thing, Egil demands the return of Bjorn's property to him and offers to settle the lawsuit by a duel. In single combat, Egil kills Atli and speaks to the visa.

Egil goes home to Iceland. He brings a lot of good from a foreign land, becomes a very rich man and lives in this country without harming anyone. And in the summer, Egil and Arinbjorn go on a campaign, where they get a lot of goods and livestock. Arinbjorn and Egil part on friendly terms.

Egil spends the winter at home. Budward, Egil's young son, drowns in the bay. Upon learning of what had happened, Egil digs up Skallagrim's grave mound and places Budward's body there. Then he composes a memorial song for Budward. Egil had another son, Gunnar, but he also died. Egil celebrates feast for both sons.

Egil lives in Iceland, where he grows old. And the sons of Eirik come to Norway and fight with King Hakon. Arinbjorn becomes an adviser to Harald, Eirik's son, and he showers him with honors. Egil composes a song of praise in honor of Arinbjorn.

Gradually, Egil, the son of Skallagrim, becomes very old, his hearing weakens, and his legs do not obey well. He sits by the fire and says visa. With the onset of autumn, he falls ill, and the disease brings him to the grave. He is buried along with his weapons and attire.

E. V. Morozova

The saga tells the story of eight generations of one Icelandic family. The central place is given to the seventh generation: the events associated with it took place at the end of the XNUMXth - beginning of the XNUMXth century.

Ketil Flat-nosed held a high position in Norway. When King Harald the Fair-Haired reached his highest power, Ketil gathered his relatives for advice. Everyone agreed that it was necessary to leave the country Ketil's sons Bjarn and Helgi decided to settle in Iceland, about which they had heard a lot of tempting things. Ketil said that in his advanced years it was better to go west, across the sea. He knew these places well. With Ketil went his daughter Unn the Wise. In Scotland, he was well received by noble people: he and his relatives were offered to settle where they wanted. The son of Unn Wise Thorstein was a successful warrior and took possession of half of Scotland. He became a king, but the Scots violated the agreement and treacherously attacked him. After the death of his father and the death of his son, Unn Wise secretly ordered a ship to be built in the forest, equipped it and set off. All the surviving relatives went with her. There was no other case of a woman escaping from a formidable danger with so many companions and with such wealth! She was accompanied by many worthy people, but they were all outnumbered by a noble named Koll of the Dales.

Thorstein the Red had six daughters and one son, whose name was Olav feilan. Unn married all her granddaughters, and each of them gave rise to an illustrious family. In Iceland, Unn first of all visited the brothers, and then occupied the vast lands around the Breidfjord. In the spring, Koll married Thorgerd, the daughter of Thorstein the Red, - Unn gave her the whole valley of Laxdal as a dowry for her. She declared Olaf Feilan her heir. On the day of her grandson's wedding, Unn suddenly left the party. The next morning, Olaf went into her room and saw that she was sitting on the bed, dead. People admired the fact that Unn managed to maintain dignity and greatness until the day of death.

When Koll of the Dales fell ill and died, his son Haskuld was in his youth. But Thorgerd, daughter of Thorstein, mother of Haskuld, was still a young and very beautiful woman. After Koll's death, she told her son that she did not feel happy in Iceland. Haskuld bought her half a ship, and she sailed with great wealth to Norway, where she soon married and gave birth to a son. The boy was given the name Khrut. He was very handsome - as before his grandfather Thorstein and great-great-grandfather Ketil Flat-nosed. After the death of her second husband, Thorgerd was drawn back to Iceland. She loved Haskuld more than other children. When Thorgerd died, Haskuld got all her goods, although Hrut was supposed to get half.

A man named Bjarne had a daughter, Jorunn, a beautiful, haughty girl. Haskuld wooed her and received consent. The wedding was magnificent - all the guests left with rich gifts. Haskuld was in no way inferior to his father Koll. She and Jorunn had several children: sons named Thorlaik and Bard, daughters Hallgerd and Turid. They all promised to become outstanding people. Haskuld considered it humiliating for himself that his house was built worse than he would have liked. He bought a ship and went to Norway for timber. The relatives living there met him with open arms. King Hakon was very merciful to him: he allocated a forest, presented a golden wrist and a sword. Haskuld bought a beautiful slave girl in Norway, although the merchant warned him that she was mute. Haskuld shared a bed with her, but upon his return to Iceland he stopped paying attention to her. And Jorunn said that she would not start a quarrel with a concubine, but it was better for everyone that she was deaf and dumb. At the end of winter, a woman gave birth to an unusually beautiful boy. Haskuld ordered to call him Olaf, since his uncle Olaf Feilan had died shortly before. Olaf stood out among other children, and Haskuld loved him very much. One day Haskuld heard Olaf's mother talking to her son. Approaching them, he asked the woman not to hide her name anymore. She said that her name was Melkorka and that she was the daughter of Myrkjartan, king of Ireland. Haskuld replied that it was in vain that she had concealed her high origin for so long. Jorunn did not change her attitude towards Melkork. Once Melkorka took off her shoes Jorunn, and she hit her in the face with her stockings. Melkorka got angry and broke Jorunn's nose until it bled. Haskuld separated the women and settled Melkorka separately. It soon became clear that her son Olaf would be more handsome and courteous than other people. Haskuld helped a man named Thord Goddi, and in gratitude he took Olaf to his upbringing. Melkorka considered such an adoption humiliating, but Haskuld explained that she was short-sighted: Tord had no children, and after his death Olaf would inherit the property. Olaf grew up, became tall and strong. Haskuld called Olaoa Peacock, and this nickname remained with him.

Hrut, Haskuld's brother, was a warrior of King Harald. King Gunnhild's mother valued him so highly that she did not want to compare anyone with him. Hrut was going to receive a large inheritance in Iceland, and the king gave him a ship. Gunnhild was very upset by his departure. When Khrut came to Haskuld, he said that his mother was not a beggar when she got married in Norway. For three years, Hrut demanded his property at the Things, and many believed that he was right in this dispute. Then Hrut stole twenty heads of cattle from Haskuld and killed two servants. Haskuld was furious, but Jorunn advised him to make peace with his brother. Haskuld then gave Hrut part of the inheritance, and Hrut compensated for the damage caused to them. Since then, they began to get along, as befits relatives.

Melkorka wanted Olaf to go to Ireland and find his noble relatives. Wanting to help her son, she married Thorbjarn the Frail, and he gave Olaf a lot of goods. Haskuld didn't like it all that much, but he didn't object. Olaf went to sea and soon reached Norway. King Harald received him very cordially. Gunnhild also paid him great attention because of his uncle, but people said that she would be glad to talk to him even if he was not Hruth's nephew. Olaf then went to Ireland. His mother taught him her language and gave him the gold ring that his father had given her. King Myrkjartan recognized Olaf as his grandson and offered to make him his heir, but Olaf refused, not wanting to wage war with the royal sons in the future. In parting, Myrkjartan presented Olaf with a spear with a golden tip and a sword of skillful work. When Olaf returned to Norway, the king presented him with a ship with timber and a robe of purple cloth. Olaf's journey brought him great fame, because everyone learned about his noble origin and about the honor with which he was received in Norway and Ireland.

A year later, Haskuld started a conversation that it was time for Olaf to marry, and said that he wanted to marry him Thorgerd, Egil's daughter. Olaf replied that he trusted his father's choice, but it would be very unpleasant for him to receive a refusal. Haskuld went to Egil and asked for the hand of Thorgerd for Olaf. Egil accepted the marriage favorably, but Thorgerd declared that she would never marry the son of a maid. Having learned about this, Haskuld and Olaf again came to Egil's tent. Olaf was wearing a purple robe given by King Harald, and in his hands he held the sword of King Myrkjartan. Seeing a beautiful, well-dressed girl, Olav realized that this was Thorgerd. He sat next to her on the bench, and they talked all day. After that, Thorgerd said that she would not oppose her father's decision. The wedding feast took place in Haskuld's house. There were many guests, and all left with rich gifts. Olaf then presented his father-in-law with the precious sword Myrkjartan, and Egil's eyes sparkled with joy. Olaf and Thorgerd fell deeply in love with each other. Olaf's household was the richest in Laksdal. He built himself a new courtyard and gave it the name Hjardarholt ("Hill where the flock gathers"). Everyone loved Olaf very much, because he always settled disputes fairly. Olaf was considered the most noble of the sons of Haskuld. When Haskuld fell ill in his old age, he sent for his sons. Thorleik and Bard, born of wedlock, were supposed to share the inheritance, but Haskuld asked to give the third part to Olaf. Thorleik objected that Olaf already had a lot of good things. Then Haskuld presented Olaf with a golden wrist and a sword received from King Hakon. Then Haskuld died, and the brothers decided to arrange a magnificent feast for him. Bard and Olaf got along well with each other, while Olaf and Thorleik were at enmity. Summer came, people began to prepare for the Thing, and it was clear that Olaf would be given more honor than his brothers. When Olaf climbed the Rock of the Law and invited everyone to a feast in honor of Haskuld, Thorlaik and Bard expressed dissatisfaction - it seemed to them that Olaf had gone too far. Trizna was magnificent and brought great fame to the brothers, but Olaf was still the first among them. Wanting to make peace with Thorleik, Olaf offered to take his three-year-old son Bolli to be raised. Thorleik agreed, so Bolli grew up in Hjardarholt. Olaf and Thorgerd loved him no less than their children. Olaf named his eldest son Kjartan in honor of King Myrkjartan. Kjartan was the most handsome man ever born in Iceland. He was as tall and strong as Egil, his maternal grandfather. Kjartan achieved perfection in everything, and people admired him. He was an excellent warrior and swimmer, distinguished by a cheerful and kind disposition. Olaf loved him more than other children. And Bolli was the first after Kjartan in dexterity and strength. He was tall and handsome, always dressed richly. The named brothers loved each other very much.

The famous Norwegian Viking Geirmund wooed Turid, Olaf's daughter. Olaf did not like this marriage, but Thorgerd considered it profitable. The joint life of Geirmund and Turid was not happy due to the fault of both parties. Three winters later, Turid left Geirmund and stole his sword by deceit - this blade was called Fotbit ("Knife Cutter") and never rusted. Geirmund told Turid that Footbit would take the life of that husband whose death would be the greatest loss to the family and the cause of the greatest misfortune. Returning home, Turid presented the sword to Bolli, who has not parted with it since.

In Laugar there lived a man named Osvivr. He had five sons and a daughter named Gudrun. She was the first among the women of Iceland in beauty and intelligence. Once Gudrun met her cousin Gest, who had the gift of providence. She told him four of her dreams, and Gest interpreted them as follows: Gudrun will have four husbands - the first she will not love at all and leave him, the second she will love strongly, but he will drown, the third will be no more dear to her than the second, and the fourth will hold her in fear and submission. After that, Gest stopped by to visit Olaf. Olaf asked which of the youth would become the most outstanding person, and Gest said that Kjartan would be more famous than the others. Then Gest went to his son. He asked why he had tears in his eyes. Gest replied that the hour would come when Kjartan, defeated by him, would lie at the feet of Bolli, and then death would befall Bolli himself.

Osvivr betrothed his daughter to Torvald, a rich man, but not a brave one. Nobody asked Gudrun's opinion, and she did not hide her displeasure. They lived together for two winters. Then Gudrun left her husband. A man named Thord often visited their house: people said that there was a love affair between him and Gudrun. Gudrun demanded that Thord divorce his wife Aud. He did so, and then married Gudrun in Laugar. Their life together was happy, but soon Tord's ship crashed on pitfalls. Gudrun was greatly saddened by the death of Tord.

Olaf and Osvivr were very friendly at that time. Kjartan liked talking to Gudrun because she was smart and eloquent. People said that Kjartan and Gudrun fit together. Once Olaf said that he appreciated Gudrun very much, but his heart sank every time when Kjartan went to Laugar. Kjartan replied that bad premonitions don't always come true. He continued to visit Gudrun as before, and Bolli always accompanied him. A year later, Kjartan wanted to travel. Gudrun was very annoyed by this decision. Kjartan asked her to wait for him for three years. In Norway, Kjartan with Bolli and their companions, at the insistence of King Olaf, adopted a new faith.

King Ingibjarg's sister was considered the most beautiful woman in the country. She really enjoyed talking to Kjartan, and people noticed it. In the summer, the king sent people to Iceland to preach the new faith. He kept Kjartan to himself, and Bolli decided to return home. So named brothers parted for the first time.

Bolli met with Gudrun and answered all her questions about Kjartan, mentioning the great friendship between him and the king's sister. Gud-run said that this was good news, but she blushed, and people realized that she was not as happy for Kjartan as she would like to show. After some time, Bolli wooed Gudrun. She said that she would not marry anyone as long as Kjartan lived. However, Osvivr desired this marriage, and Gudrun did not dare to argue with her father. They played a wedding with great splendor. Bolli spent the winter in Aaugar. His life with his wife was not particularly happy due to Gudrun's fault.

In the summer, Kjartan asked King Olaf to let him go to Iceland, since all the people there had already converted to Christianity. The king said that he would not break his word, although Kjartan could have taken the highest position in Norway. In parting, Ingibjarg gave Kjartan a white headscarf embroidered with gold and said that it was a wedding present for Gudrun, Osvivr's daughter. When Kjartan boarded the ship, King Olaf looked after him for a long time, and then said that it was not easy to avert evil fate - great misfortunes threatened Kjartan and his family.

Olaf and Osvivr still had the habit of inviting each other to visit. Kjartan went to Laugar with great reluctance and kept a low profile. Bolli wanted to give him horses, but Kjartan said that he did not like horses. The named brothers parted coldly, and Olaf was very upset by this. Then Kjartan wooed Hrevna, Kalf's daughter. It was a very beautiful girl. For the wedding, Kjartan gave his wife a headscarf embroidered with gold - no one in Iceland has ever seen such an expensive thing. Kjartan and Hrevna became very attached to each other.

Soon Osvivr came to Olaf's feast. Gudrun asked Khrevna to show her handkerchief and looked at it for a long time. When the guests were about to leave, Kjartan discovered that his sword was missing - a gift from the king. It turned out that Thorolf, one of the sons of Osvivr, stole it. Kjartan was very hurt by this, but Olaf forbade him to start a feud with his relatives. After some time, people from Laksdal went to Laugar. Kjartan wanted to stay at home, but gave in to his father's requests. They were received very well. In the morning the women began to dress, and Khrevna saw that her headscarf had disappeared. Kjartan told Bolli what he thought about it. In response, Gudrun noted that Kjartan should not stir up the dead coals, and the handkerchief did not belong to Khrevna, but to other people. Mutual invitations have since ceased. Between people from Laksdal and Laugar there was an open enmity.

Soon Kjartan gathered sixty people and came to Laugar. He ordered to guard the doors and did not let anyone out for three days, so everyone had to relieve themselves right in the house. The sons of Osvivr went berserk; they thought that Kjartan would do them less harm if he killed one or two servants. Gudrun said little, but it was evident that she was more offended than the others. On Easter it so happened that Kjartan was driving past Laugar with only one escort. Gud-run set her brothers and her husband to attack him. Kjartan defended himself bravely and inflicted great damage on the sons of Osvivr. Bolli at first did not take part in the battle, but then rushed at Kjartan with a sword. Gudrun was glad, because Khrevna would not go to bed laughing tonight. Olaf was very upset by the death of Kjartan, but forbade his sons to touch Bolli. Not daring to disobey their father, they killed only those who were with Bolli and the sons of Osvivr. Khrevna never remarried and died very soon, because her heart was broken from suffering.

Olaf turned to his relatives for help, and at the Thing all the sons of Osvivr were outlawed. From Bolli Olav demanded only viru, and he willingly paid. After the death of Olaf, Thorgerd began to incite her sons to take revenge on Bolli. The sons of Olaf gathered the people, attacked Bolli and killed him. Gudrun was then pregnant. Soon she gave birth to a son and named him Bolli. Her eldest son, Thor Lake, was four years old when his father was killed. A few years later, a man named Thorgils began to woo Gudrun. Gudrun said that Bolli must be avenged first. Thorgils, together with the sons of Gud-run, killed one of the perpetrators of Bolli's death. Despite this, Gud-run refused to marry, and Thorgils was very dissatisfied. Soon he was killed right on the Thing, and Gudrun married a mighty hawding named Thorkel. He obtained from the sons of Olaf vira for the death of Bolli and began to expel them from Laxdal. Gudrun regained her high position. But one day Thorkel's ship got into a storm and sank. Gudrun courageously endured this death. After all that she had experienced, she became very devout and was the first woman in Iceland to memorize the Psalter. One day Bolli, Bolli's son, asked which of her husbands she loved the most. Gudrun said that Thorkel was the most powerful, Bolli the most daring, Thord the most intelligent, and she did not want to say anything about Thorvald. Bolli was not satisfied with this answer, and Gudrun said that she loved most of all the one to whom she had brought the greatest grief. She died at a ripe old age and became blind before her death. Many remarkable things are told about her descendants in other sagas.

E. D. Murashkintseva

The main events described in the saga are considered historically reliable, they date back to 962-978; vises (poetic stanzas) attributed to Gisli were most likely composed much later.

Thorbjorn marries Thor, and they have children: daughter Thordis, eldest son Thorkel and middle Gisli. Nearby lives a man named Bard, who wants to get Thorbjorn's daughter Thordis, and Gisli resists and pierces him with a sword. Thorkel goes to Skeggi the Brawler, Bard's kinsman, and incites him to avenge the Bard and take Thordis as his wife. Gisli cuts off Skeggi's leg, and this duel multiplies the glory of Gisli.

Skeggi's sons drive up to Thorbjorn's house at night and set it on fire. And where Thorbjorn slept, and Thordis, and his sons, there stood two jars of sour milk. Here Gisli and those who were with him seize goatskins, dip them in milk and put out the fire with them. Then they break through the wall and run into the mountains. Twelve people burn in the house, and those who set it on fire think that they all burned down. And Gisli, Thorkel and their people go to the Skeggi farm and kill everyone there.

Thorbjörn, nicknamed Sour because he escaped with the help of an acid serum, dies, and his wife follows. A barrow is built over them, and the sons of Sour build a good court in Hawk Valley and live there together. They give their sister Thordis in marriage to Thorgrim, and they settle nearby. Gisli marries Aud, the sister of the merchant-navigator Vestein.

Here are the men from Hawk Valley to the Thing and stick together there. And everyone is wondering how long they will last. Then Gisli invites Thorgrim, Thorkel and Vestein to take a vow of brotherhood. But Thorgrim refuses to shake hands with Vestein, and Gisli refuses to shake hands with Thorgrim. And everyone leaves the Thing.

Thorkel does nothing about the household, and Gisli works day and night. One day Thorkel is sitting at home and hears his wife Asger and his wife Gisli Oud chatting. And it turns out that Asgerd knew Vesteyn. At night, in the matrimonial bed, Asgerd settles the matter with Torkel. Only Gisli, to whom Aud tells about this, becomes gloomy and says that you cannot escape fate.

Thorkel offers his brother to divide the household, because he wants to manage with Thorgrim, and Gisli agrees, because there is no harm to him from this.

And now Gisli makes a feast at his place, and Thorkel and Thorgrim also feast. Thorkel and Thorgrim invite the sorcerer Thor-grim, nicknamed Nose, to their place, and he makes them a spear.

Vestein is staying with Gisli at this time. One night it rains heavily and the roof starts to leak. Everyone leaves the room, while Vestein is asleep because he is not dripping. Then someone sneaks into the house and stabs Vestein right in the chest with a spear; he falls dead by the shop. Gisli enters, sees what has happened, and draws the spear from the wound himself. Vestein is properly buried, and Gisli utters bitter whiskers.

In autumn, Thorgrim throws a feast and invites many neighbors. Everyone drinks drunk and goes to bed. In the night Gisli takes the spear with which Vestein was killed, goes to Thorgrim and kills him. And since all the guests are drunk, no one sees anything, Burke, brother of Thorgrim, removes the spear. Everyone is celebrating the feast according to Thorgrim. When the news is brought to Gisli, he speaks to the Vis.

Burke moves in with Thordis and takes her as his wife. Thordis deciphers the meaning of Gisli's visa and tells her husband that Gisli killed his brother. Thorkel warns Gisli about this, but refuses to help him, for his son-in-law, companion and friend Thorgrim was dear to him.

Burke accuses Gisli of killing Thorgrim at the Thing. Gisli sells his land and takes a lot of silver for it. Then he goes to Torkel and asks if he agrees to shelter him. Torkel answers as before: he is ready to give him what is required, but he will not hide.

Gisli is outlawed. He utters a mournful visu.

Gisli lives outside the law for six winters, hiding in different places. One day, when he is hiding with his wife Aud, he has a dream. Two women come to him in a dream, one kind, the other bad. And then he enters a house where seven fires are burning, and a kind woman says that these lights mean that he has seven years left to live. Waking up, Gisli says visa.

Burke hired a man named Eyolf and promised him a big reward if he hunted down and killed Gisli. Upon learning that Gisli is hiding in the forest, Eyolf goes looking for him, but does not find him. Upon Eyolf's return, only ridicule awaits.

Gisli goes to Thorkel and again asks him for help, Torkel again refuses to hide his brother, only gives him the requested silver. Gisli goes to Thorgerd. This woman often hides the outlaws, and she has a dungeon with two exits. Gisli spends the winter in it.

In the spring, Gisli returns to his beloved wife Aud and tells her sad vises. In the autumn he comes to Torkel and asks him for the last time to help him. Thorkel answers the same as before. Gisli takes the boat from him, and then says that Thorkel will be the first of them to be killed. That's where they part.

Gisli goes to the island to his cousin Ingjald. Near the island, he overturns the boat, as if it was he who drowned, and he himself goes to Ingjald and lives with him. Eyolf hears rumors that Gisli has not drowned, but is hiding on the island. He tells Burke about this, he equips fifteen people, and they swim to the island.

Gisli fools Burke's men and goes into the rocks. Burke is chasing him. Gisli cuts one of the pursuers with his sword, but Burke stabs Gisli in the leg with a spear, and he loses his strength. Nearby lives a man named Rev. He and his wife shelter Gisli from pursuers.

This trip is shameful for Burke and strengthens the glory of Gisli. "And they say the truth that a man so skillful as Gisli, and so fearless, has not yet been born. But he was not happy."

Burke goes to the Thing, and Thorkel, son of Sour, too. There, two boys approach Torkel, and the elder asks to show him the sword. Having received the sword, he cuts off Torkel's head, and then they run away, and they are not found. People say they were the sons of Vestein. The death of Thorkel turns into shame and disgrace for Burke.

Gisli is sitting in the basement near Aud, and Eyolf comes to her and promises a mountain of silver because she will show him where Gisli is. Aud hurls the silver right into Eyolf's nose, and he walks away in disgrace.

The Gisli begin to have bad dreams. So, he dreams that Eyolf came to him with many other people, and Eyolf has a wolf's head. And Gisli fights with them all. And Gisli pronounces sad visas, where it is about death.

The last night of the summer comes, and Eyolf comes to the refuge of Gisli, and with him fourteen more people. Together with Aud, Gisli climbs a rock and calls Eyolf to him, for he has a greater account with Gisli than his people. But Eyolf keeps aloof, while Aud beats his people with a club, and Gisli cuts with a sword and an ax. Then two of Eyolf's kinsmen rush into battle, they smash Gisli with spears, and his insides fall out. Having tied them up, Gisli says his last visu, and then cuts off the head of Eyolf's kinsman, falls on him lifeless and dies.

Thordis, having learned about the death of his brother, tries to kill Eyolf and divorces Burke. Eyolf, displeased, returns home. Aud travels to Denmark, where he is baptized and goes on a pilgrimage to Rome.

Gisli hid for thirteen years.

E. V. Morozova

The saga begins with a story about the parents of the main characters. Thorstein, son of Egil and grandson of Skallagrim, lived in the Settlement. He was a smart and worthy man, everyone loved him. Once he took in a Norwegian. He was very interested in dreams. Thorstein dreamed that a beautiful swan was sitting on the roof of his house, to which two eagles flew - one from the mountains, and the other from the south. The eagles began to fight among themselves and fell dead, and then a falcon flying from the west took the saddened swan with him. The Norwegian interpreted the dream as follows: the pregnant wife of Thorstein Jofrid will give birth to a girl of extraordinary beauty, and two noble people will woo her from the sides from which the eagles flew: both will love her very much and will fight each other to death, and then a third person will woo her, and she will marry him. Thorstein was upset by this prediction and, leaving for the Thing, ordered his wife to leave the boy and throw the girl out. Jofrid gave birth to a very beautiful girl and ordered the shepherd to take her to Thorgerd, the daughter of Egil. When Thorstein returned, Yofrid said that the girl had been thrown out, as he had ordered. Six years passed, and Thorstein went to visit Olaf Pavlin, his son-in-law. Sister Thorgerd showed him Helga, asking for forgiveness for the deceit. The girl was beautiful, Thorstein liked her, and he took her away with him. Helga Beauty grew up with her mother and father, and everyone loved her dearly.

Illugi the Black lived on the White River in Krutoyar. He was second in nobility in the Gorodishchensky Fjord after Thorstein, the son of Egil. Illugi had many children, but the saga speaks of only two - Hermund and Gunnlaug. It is said of Gunnlaug that he matured early, was tall, strong and good-looking. He loved to compose stinging poetry, and for this he was nicknamed Serpent Tongue. Hermund was more loved than Gunnlaug. At the age of twelve, Gunnlaug quarreled with his father, and Thorstein invited him to live in Gorodishe. Gunnlaug learned the law from Thorstein and earned universal respect. He and Helga became very attached to each other. Helga was so beautiful that, according to knowledgeable people, there were no women in Iceland more beautiful than her. Once Gunnlaug asked Thorstein to show how a girl is engaged, and performed the ceremony with Helga, but Thorstein warned that it would be only for show.

On Mossy Mountain lived a man named Onund. He had three sons, and they all showed great promise, but Hrafn stood out among them - he was a tall, strong, handsome young man who knew how to compose good poetry. Onund had many kinsmen, and they were the most respected people in the south.

For six years, Gunnlaug Serpent-Tongue lived alternately in the Settlement near Thorstein, then at home in Krutoyar. He was already eighteen years old, and now they got along well with his father. Gunnlaug asked Illugi to let him travel, and he bought him half a ship. While the ship was being equipped, Gunnlaug stayed at the Settlement and spent a lot of time with Helga. When he began to woo, Thorstein replied that he must either go overseas or get married - Helga is not a couple who does not know what he wants. But Thorstein could not refuse Illugi the Black and promised that Helga would wait for Gunnlaug for three years, and if he did not return on time, Thorstein would give her for another.

Gunnlaug went to Norway, but he had to leave because he angered Jarl Eirik with his arrogance. He sailed to England and composed a song of praise for King Adalrad - for this, the king presented him with a purple cloak with fur trimmed with gold. Then he killed a famous Viking in a duel: this feat brought him great fame in England and abroad. King Sigtrygg of Dublin presented him with an expensive cloak and a gold wrist weighing one mark for his song of praise. Jarl Sigurd then ruled in Gautland. Once the Gauts argued with the Norwegians, whose jarl is better. Gunnlaug, who was chosen as arbitrator, spoke to the vis, in which he praised both Jarl Sigurd and Jarl Eirik. The Norwegians were very pleased, and Yard Eirik, having learned about this, forgot about his offense. In Sweden, Gunnlaug met Hrafn, son of Onund, and befriended him. But at the feast at the king Olaf Gunnlaug wanted to be the first to say a song of praise. Hrafn called her pompous and harsh, like Gunnlaug himself. Gunnlaug called Hrafn's song beautiful and insignificant, like Hrafn himself. Before leaving for Iceland, Hrafn said that the former friendship was over and someday he too would shame Gunnlaug. He replied that he was not afraid of threats.

Hrafn spent the whole winter with his father, and in the summer he wooed Helga. Thorstein refused him, citing a promise he had made to Gunnlaug. The next summer, the noble relatives of Hrafn began to woo Helga very persistently, saying that the period of three years had already passed. Then Thorstein went to Illugi the Black. He said that he did not know the exact intentions of his son Gunnlaug. It was decided that a wedding would take place in Gorodishe at the beginning of winter if Gunnlaug did not return and demand that the promise be kept. Helga was very unhappy with the whole arrangement.

Gunnlaug from Sweden went to England, and King Adalrad received him very well. The Danes then threatened with war, so the king did not want to let his warrior go. Half a month before the start of winter, Gunnlaug landed in Lava Bay, and there he was challenged to a fistfight by Thord, the son of a bond from the plain. Gunnlaug won, but sprained his leg - and arrived in Krutoyar on the very Saturday when they were sitting at the wedding feast in Gorodishche. People say that the bride was very sad. When Helga found out that Gunnlaug had returned, she became cold towards her husband. At the end of winter, she and Gunnlaug met during a festival, and the skald presented her with a cloak received from King Adalrad. In the summer everyone went to the Thing: there Gunnlaug challenged Hrafn to a duel, but when Hrafn broke his sword, his relatives stood between them. The next day, a law was passed that all duels in Iceland are now prohibited.

Hrafn came to Krutoyar and offered Gunnlaug to finish the fight in Norway. He told his relatives that he had no joy from Helga and that one of them must die at the hands of the other. When Jarl Eirik forbade them to fight in his realm, they met at a place called Livangr. Gunnlaug killed Hrafn's companions, and Hrafn killed Gunnlaug's companions. Then they began to fight two:

Gunnlaug cut off Hrafn's leg, and he asked for a drink. Gunnlaug brought water in his helmet, and Hrafn gave him a dishonorable blow to the head, because he did not want to give in to Helga the Beauty. Gunnlaug killed Hrafn and three days later he himself died of his wound. At this time, Illugi the Black had a dream that the bloody Gunnlaug came to him and told the visa about his death. And Hrafn appeared in a dream to Onund.

In the summer at the Althing, Illugi demanded a viru from Onund because Hrafn had meanly dealt with Gunnlaug. Onund said that he would not pay, but he would not demand vira for Hrafn either. Then Illugi killed two of his relatives, and Hermund, who lost his peace after the death of his brother, pierced one of his nephews with a spear. No one demanded vira for the murder, and this ended the feud between Illuga the Black and Onund of Mossy Mountain.

Thorstein, the son of Egil, after some time married his daughter Helga to a worthy and rich man named Thorkel. But she had little affection for him, because she could not forget Gunnlaug. The greatest joy for her was to spread and look for a long time at the cloak he had presented. One day, a serious illness came to Thorkel's house, and Helga also fell ill. She ordered Gunnlaug's cloak to be brought and looked at him intently, and then leaned into her husband's arms and died. Everyone was very sorry about her death.

E. L Murashkintseva

Once the gods return from hunting with prey and start a feast, and they lack a cauldron. And now the god Tyr, in friendship with Thor, Odin's son, gives good advice: "He lives in the east ... Hymir the wise" and he keeps "a great cauldron, a mile deep."

And so Tyr and Thor set off on their journey and, having arrived at the place, they put their goats in a stall, and they themselves go to the chambers.

Here Humir appears in the chambers, and the guests go out to meet him. Hymir breaks the beam, the boilers from it - by eight - fall, and only one remains intact. Then three bulls with strong horns are served on the table, and Thor eats two whole.

The next morning Thor goes to sea with Humir, taking his rods. Thor the winner puts a bull's head on a hook, throws it into the water, and the snake that the human world girded opens its mouth and swallows the bait. Thor drags him boldly and begins to beat him, which is why the snake roars and goes to the bottom again. Hymir, on the other hand, caught two whales, these boars of the surf, and now they rule towards the shore. On the shore, wanting to test Thor's strength, Humir orders him to bring the whales to the court.

Thor delivers whales. But even this is not enough for Humir to test the strength of Thor. He asks him to break the goblet, and Thor throws the goblet with force into the stone pillar, "... the stone was crushed by the goblet into pieces, but without cracks the goblet returned to Hyumir." Here Thor recalls the advice: it is necessary to throw a goblet at the head of Hymir, the giant jotun, because his skull is stronger than stone. Indeed, a goblet breaks on Hymir's head. Here the giant agrees to give up his cauldron, but sets the condition that the searchers for the cauldron themselves, without anyone's help, take it away. Tyr cannot even move the cauldron, while Thor takes hold of the rim of the cauldron, puts it on his head and goes, jangling his cauldron rings on his heels.

They drive off not far, when, turning around, they see that together with Hymir, "a mighty army of many heads" is following them. Then Thor, dropping the cauldron, raises his hammer Mjollnir and kills everyone.

Thor returns to the aces-gods with a cauldron, "and the aces now every winter drank beer to their fill."

Thor from sleep gets up furious and sees that the hammer Mjollnir has disappeared from him. Loki, the cunning god, he tells about the loss of his own, and then they go to Freya's house and ask her outfit from feathers to find the hammer. Freya gives an outfit, and makes noise with Loki's feathers, flying away from the land of aces-gods to the land where the giant jotuns live.

The hold-giant sits on the mound and weaves a collar "for dogs" out of gold. He sees Loki and asks him why he arrived in Jotunheim. He will give him up only when they give him beautiful Freya as his wife.

Loki flies back and Toru says everything. Then they both go to Freya, asking them to put on a wedding outfit and go with them to Jotunheim. But Freya flatly refuses.

Then the gods-aces gather for the Thing - they think how to return the hammer of Thor to them. And they decide to put on a wedding dress for Thor: to cover his head with a magnificent dress, and decorate his chest with a necklace of Brising-dwarfs. Loki agrees to go to Jotunheim as Thor's maid.

Seeing them, Thrym says that the tables should be covered for a feast. At the feast, Hold wants to kiss the bride, but, throwing back the veil, he sees that her eyes are sparkling and "a fierce flame is burning out of them." The sensible maid answers that "Freya was without sleep for eight nights", so she was in a hurry to come to the land of the giants. And impatiently, Thrym, the king of the jotuns, orders Mjollnir to be carried and placed on the bride’s knees in order to conclude an alliance with her as soon as possible. Hlorridi-Thor joyfully seizes the mighty hammer and destroys the whole kind of giants, together with Hold. "So Thor took possession of the hammer again."

There lived a king named Nidud, He had two sons and a daughter, Bedwild.

Three brothers lived - the sons of the king of the Finns: Slagfrid, Egil and Völund. Early in the morning they see three women on the shore - they were Valkyries. The brothers take them as wives, and Völund the Wonderful gets it. They live for seven winters, and then the Valkyries rush to battle and do not return back. The brothers go to look for them, only Völund sits at home.

Nidud learns that Völund is left alone, and sends warriors to him in shiny chain mail. Warriors enter inside the dwelling and see: rings are hung on the bast, seven hundred in number. They take off the rings and string them again, only one ring is hidden. Völund comes from hunting, counts the rings and sees that there is not one. He decides that the young Valkyrie has returned and has taken the ring. He sits for a long time, and then falls asleep; waking up, he sees that he is tightly tied with ropes. King Nidud takes his sword, and the golden ring that was taken, he gives to his daughter Bedvild. And then the king gives the order; Cut the sinews of Völund the blacksmith, take him to a distant island and leave him there.

Völund, sitting on the island, cherishes revenge. One day, two of Nidud's sons come to him - to look at the treasures that were on the island. And as soon as the brothers bowed to the casket, as Völund cuts off their heads Away to both. Silver-rimmed bowls of skulls makes them and Nidudu sends them; "Yakhonty eyes" sends him to his wife; He takes the teeth of both and makes breast buckles for Bedwild.

Bedwild goes to him with a request: fix the damaged ring. Völund waters the beer and the ring and takes away her maiden honor. And then, having received the magic ring back, it rises into the air and heads towards Nidudu.

Nidud sits and mourns for his sons. Völund tells him that in his smithy he can find the skin from the heads of his sons, and under the furs of his feet. Bedwild is now pregnant by him. And Völund, laughing, takes off into the air again, "Nidud was left alone in the mountain."

King Sigmund's son is called Helga, Hagal is his tutor.

One warlike king Hunding is called, and he has many sons. Enmity reigns between Sigmund and Hunding.

King Hunding sends people to Hagal to find Helgi. But Helgi cannot hide herself except as a slave; and he begins to grind the grain. Hunding's people look for Helga everywhere, but they don't find it. Then Blind the Malicious notices that the eyes of the slave girl are flashing too menacingly and the millstone in her hands is cracking. Khagalzhe replies that the diva is not here, for the king's daughter turns the millstones; before she rushed under the clouds and could fight like brave Vikings, now Helgi took her prisoner.

Helgi escaped and went to the warship. He slew King Hunding, and from that time on he was called the Killer of Hunding.

King Hogni has a daughter, Sigrun the Valkyrie, who rushes through the air. Sigrun is betrothed to Hodbrodd, son of King Granmar. Helgi the mighty at this time fights with the sons of Hunding and kills them. And then rests under the Eagle Stone. Sig-run flies to him there, hugs him and kisses him. And she fell in love with Helgi, and the maiden had loved him for a long time, even before she met him.

Helgi is not afraid of the wrath of King Hogni and King Granmar, but goes to war against them and kills all the sons of Granmar, as well as King Hogni. So by the will of fate, Sigrun the Valkyrie becomes the cause of discord among relatives.

Helgi marries Sigrun and they have sons. But Helga's long life is not destined. Dag, the son of Högni, sacrifices to Odin the God to help him avenge his father. Gives Odin Dag a spear, and with that spear pierces Dag Helgi. Then Doug goes to the mountains and tells Sigrun what happened.

Sigrun calls a curse on his brother's head, while Dag wants to pay her for her husband. Sigrun refuses and the hill is built on the tomb of the mighty prince Helgi.

Helgi goes straight to Valhalla, and there Odin offers him to rule along with him.

And then one day the maid Sigrun sees how dead Helgi with his people is going to the mound. It seems wonderful to the maid, and she asks Helgi if the end of the world has come. And he replies that no, because although he spurs the horse, he is not destined to return home. At home, the maid Sigrun tells what she saw.

Sigrun goes to the mound to Helgi: she is very glad to see her husband, even if he is dead. Helgi the dead reproaches her, they say, she is guilty of his death. And he says that "from now on, in the mound with me, killed, the noble maiden will stay together!"

Sigrun spends the night in the arms of the dead, and in the morning Helgi and his people jump away, and Sigrun and his maid return home. Sigrun mourns for Helgi, and soon takes death to her.

"In ancient times it was believed that people were born again, but now it is considered a woman's fairy tales. It is said that Helgi and Sigrun were born again."

Gripir rules the lands, he is the wisest among people. Siturd, the son of Sigmund, comes to his chambers to find out what is destined for him in life. Gripir, who is Sigurd's mother's brother, Kindly receives his kinsman.

And Gripir says to Sigurd that he will be great: first he will avenge his father and defeat King Hunding in battle. Then he will strike Regina the dwarf with the Fafnir-serpent and, having found Fafnir's lair, he will load his Horse named Grani with "gold cargo" and go to King Gyuki. On the mountain he will see a sleeping maiden in armor. With a sharp blade, Sigurd will cut the armor, the maiden will wake up from sleep and teach Sigmund's son the wise runes. Gripir cannot see further than Sigurd's youth.

Sigurd feels that a sad lot awaits him, and therefore Gripir does not want to tell his fate further. And now Sigurd starts persuading, and Gripir speaks again.

"Heimir has a maiden, beautiful in face," Brynhild is her name, and she will deprive Sigurd of rest, for he will love her. But as soon as Sigurd spends the night with Gjuki, he immediately forgets the fair maiden. Through the machinations of Grimhild the treacherous, fair-haired Gudrun, the daughter of Grimhild and Gunnar, will be given to him as a wife. And for Gunnar he will woo Brynhild, changing his guise with Gunnar. But although he will look like Gunnar, his soul will remain the same. And the noble Sigurd will lie next to the maiden, but there will be a sword between them. And the people of Sigurd will be condemned for such a deceit of a worthy maiden.

Then the princes will return and two weddings will play in the chambers of Gyuki: Gunnar with Brynhild and Sigurda with Gudrun. By that time, Gunnar and Sigurd will return to their guises, but their souls will remain the same.

Sigurd and Gudrun will live happily, but Brynhild "marriage will seem bitter, she will seek revenge for deceit." She will tell Gunnar that Sigurd did not keep his oaths, "when the noble king Gunnar, Gyuki's heir" believed him. And the noble wife Gudrun will be angry; out of grief, she will deal cruelly with Sigurd: her brothers will become the murderers of Sigurd.

Grimhild the treacherous one will be to blame for this.

And Gripir says to the sad Sigurd: "In that consolation, prince, you will find that you are destined for a lot of happiness: here on earth, under the sun, there will be no hero equal to Sigurd!"

Sigurd answers him: "Let's say goodbye happily! You can't argue with fate! You, Gripir, kindly fulfilled the request; you would predict more luck and happiness in my life, if you could!"

E. V. Morozova

Ruy Diaz de Bivar, nicknamed Cid, lost the favor of his lord, King Alfonso of Castile, and was sent into exile by him. In order to leave the Castilian borders, Cid was given nine days, after which the royal squad received the right to kill him.

Having gathered vassals and relatives, a total of sixty warriors, Sid went first to Burgos, but, no matter how much the inhabitants of the city loved the brave baron, out of fear of Alphonse, they did not dare to give him shelter. Only the brave Martin Antolines sent bread and wine to the Bivarians, and then he himself joined Sid's squad.

Even a small squad needs to be fed, but Sid had no money. Then he went to the trick: he ordered to make two chests, upholstered them with leather, provide reliable locks and fill them with sand. With these chests, which allegedly contained the gold stolen by Sid, He sent Antolines to the Burgos usurers Judas and Rachel, so that they took the lari as a pledge and provided the squad with hard currency.

The Jews believed Antolines and forfeited as many as six hundred marks.

Cid entrusted his wife, Dona Ximena, and both daughters to the abbot Don Sancho, abbot of the monastery of San Pedro, and after praying and tenderly saying goodbye to his family, he set off on his journey. In the meantime, the news spread throughout Castile that Cid was leaving for the Moorish lands, and many brave warriors, eager for adventure and easy prey, rushed after him. At the Arlanson bridge, as many as one hundred and fifteen knights joined Sid's squad, whom he joyfully greeted and promised that many feats and untold riches would fall to their lot.

On the way of the exiles lay the Moorish city of Castejon. Cid's relative, Alvar Fañez Minaya, offered the master to take the city, while he himself volunteered to rob the district. With a daring raid, Sid took Kastehon, and soon Minaya arrived there with booty. The booty was so great that during the division, each horseman got a hundred marks, and fifty marks on foot. The captives were sold cheaply to neighboring towns so as not to burden themselves with their maintenance. Sid liked Kastehon, but it was impossible to stay here for a long time, because the local Moors were tributaries of King Alphonse, and sooner or later he would besiege the city and the townspeople would have to be bad, because there was no water in the fortress.

Sid pitched his next camp near the city of Alcocer, and from there he raided the surrounding villages. The city itself was well fortified, and in order to take it, Sid went to a ruse. He pretended to leave the parking lot and retreat. The Alcocerans rushed after him, leaving the city defenseless, but then Cid turned his knights, overwhelmed his pursuers and broke into Alcocer.

In fear of Sid, the inhabitants of nearby cities asked for help from the king of Valencia, Tamina, and he sent three thousand Saracens to the battle with Alcocer. After waiting a little, Sid with his retinue went beyond the city walls and in a fierce battle put the enemies to flight. Thanking the Lord for the victory, the Christians began to share the untold riches taken in the camp of the infidels.

The booty was unseen. Cid summoned Alvar Minaya to him and ordered him to go to Castile in order to present thirty horses in a rich harness as a gift to Alphonse, and, in addition, report on the glorious victories of the exiles. The king accepted Cid's gift, but told Minaya that the time had not yet come to forgive the vassal; but he allowed everyone who wanted it to join Sid's squad with impunity.

Sid, meanwhile, sold Alcocer to the Moors for three thousand marks and went on, plundering and taxing the surrounding regions. When the Sid's squad devastated one of the possessions of the Count of Barcelona Raymond, he opposed him on a campaign with a large army of Christians and Moors. Sid's warriors again prevailed, Sid, having defeated Raymond himself in a duel, took him prisoner. In his generosity, he released the prisoner without ransom, taking from him only the precious sword, Colada.

Sid spent three years in relentless raids. In the squad he did not have a single warrior left who could not call himself rich, but this was not enough for him. Sid conceived the idea of ​​taking possession of Valencia itself. He surrounded the city with a tight ring and led the siege for nine months. On the tenth, the Valencians could not stand it and surrendered. Cid's share (and he took a fifth of any booty) in Valencia was thirty thousand marks.

The king of Seville, angry that the pride of the infidels - Valencia is in the hands of Christians, sent an army of thirty thousand Saracens against Sid, but it was also defeated by the Castilians, who now numbered thirty-six hundred. In the tents of the fleeing Saracens, Sid's warriors took three times more booty than even in Valencia.

Having grown rich, some knights began to think about returning home, but Sid issued a wise order, according to which anyone who left the city without his permission was deprived of all the property acquired during the campaign.

Once again summoning Alvar Minaya to him, Cid again sent him to Castile to King Alphonse, this time with a hundred horses. In exchange for this gift, Cid asked his master to allow Dona Jimena and her daughters, Elvira and Sol, to follow him to Valencia, where Cid wisely ruled and even founded a diocese headed by Bishop Jerome.

When Minaya appeared before the king with a rich gift, Alphonse graciously agreed to let the ladies go and promised that they would be guarded by his own knightly detachment to the border of Castile. Satisfied that he had fulfilled his master's order with honor, Minaya went to the monastery of San Pedro, where he pleased Dona Ximena and his daughters with the news of the imminent reunion with her husband and father, and generously paid the abbot Don Sancho for the trouble. And to Judas and Rachel, who, despite the ban, looked into the chests left by Sid, found sand there and now bitterly mourned their ruin, the messenger of Sid promised to fully compensate for the loss.

The Carrion Infantes, the sons of Cid's old enemy, Count Don Garcia, were tempted by the untold riches of the ruler of Valencia. Although the Infantes believed that the Diases were no match for them, the ancient counts, they nevertheless decided to ask the daughters of Sid to be their wife. Minaya promised to convey their request to his master.

On the border of Castile, the ladies were met by a detachment of Christians from Valencia and two hundred Moors led by Abengalbon, ruler of Molina and friend of Sid. With great honor, they escorted the ladies to Valencia to Sid, who had not been so cheerful and joyful for a long time, as when meeting with his family.

Meanwhile, the Moroccan king Yusuf gathered fifty thousand brave warriors, crossed the sea and landed near Valencia. To the alarmed women, who watched from the roof of the alcazar how the African Moors set up a huge camp, Sid said that the Lord never forgot about him and now he was sending a dowry for his daughters into his hands.

Bishop Jerome celebrated mass, put on armor, and in the forefront of the Christians rushed to the Moors. In a fierce battle, Sid, as always, took over and, along with new fame, acquired another rich booty. He intended the luxurious tent of King Yusuf as a gift to Alphonse. In this battle, Bishop Jerome distinguished himself so much that Sid gave the glorious cleric half of the pyatina that was due to him.

From his share, Cid added two hundred horses to the tent and sent Alphonse in gratitude for letting his wife and daughters leave Castile. Alphonse very graciously accepted the gifts and announced that the hour of his reconciliation with Sid was at hand. Then the Infantes Carrion, Diego and Fernando approached the king with a request to woo the daughters of Cid Diaz for them. Returning to Valencia, Minaya told Cid about the king's proposal to meet with him for reconciliation on the banks of the Tajo, and also that Alphonse asked him to give his daughters to the Infantes of Carrion as his wife. Sid accepted the will of his sovereign. Having met Alphonse at the appointed place, Sid "prostrated himself prostrated before him, but the king demanded that he immediately get up, for it was not fitting for such a glorious warrior to kiss the feet" even of the greatest of Christian rulers. Then King Alphonse publicly solemnly proclaimed forgiveness to the hero and declared the infantes betrothed to his daughters. Sid, thanking the king, invited everyone to Valencia for the wedding, promising that none of the guests would leave the feast without rich gifts.

For two weeks the guests spent time at feasts and military amusements; on the third they asked to go home.

Two years have passed in peace and joy. The sons-in-law lived with Sid in the Valencian alcazar, not knowing troubles and surrounded by honor. But once a misfortune befell - a lion escaped from the menagerie. The court knights immediately rushed to Sid, who at that time was sleeping and could not defend himself. The Infantes, out of fright, disgraced themselves: Fernando hid under a bench, and Diego took refuge in the palace winepress, where he was smeared with mud from head to toe. Sid, having risen from the bed, went unarmed to the lion, grabbed him by the mane and put him back in the cage. After this incident, the knights of Sid began to openly mock the Infantes.

Some time later, the Moroccan army reappeared near Valencia. Just at this time, Diego and Fernando wanted to return to Castile with their wives, but Sid forestalled the fulfillment of his sons-in-law's intention, inviting them to go into the field the next day and fight the Saracens. They could not refuse, but in battle they showed themselves to be cowards, which, fortunately for them, the father-in-law did not find out. In this battle, Sid accomplished many feats, and at the end of it, on his Babyek, which formerly belonged to the king of Valencia, he chased King Bukar and wanted to offer him peace and friendship, but the Moroccan, relying on his horse, rejected the offer. Sid caught up with him and cut the Colada in half. From the dead Boukar he took a sword, called Tisona, and no less precious than Colada. In the midst of the joyful celebration that followed the victory, the sons-in-law approached Sid and asked to go home. Sid let them go, giving one Colada, another Tison, and, moreover, providing them with countless treasures. But the ungrateful Carrionians conceived evil: greedy for gold, they did not forget that by the birth of their wife they are much lower than them and therefore unworthy of becoming ladies in Carrion. Once, after spending the night in the forest, the infantes ordered their companions to move forward, because they supposedly want to be left alone in order to enjoy love pleasures with their wives. Left alone with Dona Elvira and Dona Sol, the perfidious infantes told them that they would be thrown here to be devoured by animals and reviled by people. No matter how the noble ladies appealed to the mercy of the villains, they undressed them, beat them half to death, and then, as if nothing had happened, continued on their way. Fortunately, among the companions of the Infantes was Sid's nephew, Felez Munoz. He was worried about the fate of his cousins, returned to the place of spending the night and found them there, lying unconscious.

The Infantes, returning to the Castilian borders, shamelessly boasted of the insult that the glorious Cid had suffered from them. The king, having learned about what had happened, grieved with all his soul. When the sad news reached Valencia, the angry Sid sent an ambassador to Alphonse. The ambassador conveyed to the king the words of Sil that since it was he who had betrothed Dona Elvira and Dona Sol for the unworthy Carrionians, he now had to convene the Cortes to resolve the dispute between Cid and his offenders.

King Alphonse recognized that Sid was right in his demand, and soon the counts, barons and other nobles called by him appeared in Toledo. No matter how afraid the infantes were to meet face to face with Sid, they were forced to arrive at the Cortes. With them was their father, the cunning and treacherous Count Garcia.

Sid presented the circumstances of the case before the assembly and, to the delight of the Carrionians, demanded only that the priceless swords be returned to him. Relieved, the Infantas were handed over to Alphonse Colada and Tison. But the judges had already recognized the guilt of the brothers, and then Sid also demanded the return of those riches that he endowed unworthy sons-in-law. Willy-nilly, the Carrionians had to fulfill this requirement as well. But in vain did they hope that, having received back their good, Sid would calm down. Then, at his request, Pedro Bermudez, Martin Antolines and Muño Gustios stepped forward and demanded that the Carrónians, in duels with them, wash away the shame caused to the daughters of Cid with blood. This was what the Infantes feared most of all, but no excuses helped them. A duel was scheduled according to all the rules. The noble Don Pedro almost killed Fernando, but he pleaded defeated; don Martin did not have time to move in with Diego, as he fled from the stadium in fear; the third fighter from Carrion, Azur Gonzalez, wounded, surrendered to don Muño. So God's judgment determined the right and punished the guilty.

Meanwhile, ambassadors from Aragon and Navarre arrived at Alphonse with a request to marry the daughters of the hero Cid to the infantes of these kingdoms. The second marriages of Sid's daughters were incomparably happier. The Spanish kings still honor the memory of Cid, their great ancestor.

D. V. Borisov

In a certain La Mancha village there lived a hidalgo, whose property consisted of a family spear, an ancient shield, a skinny nag and a greyhound dog, his surname was either Kehana or Quesada, it is not known exactly, and it does not matter. He was about fifty years old, he was lean in body, thin in face, and read chivalric novels for days on end, which made his mind completely disordered, and he decided to become a knight-errant. He polished the armor that belonged to his ancestors, attached a cardboard visor to the shishak, gave his old horse the sonorous name Rocinante, and renamed himself Don Quixote of La Mancha. Since a knight-errant must necessarily be in love, the hidalgo, on reflection, chose a lady of his heart: Aldonsa Lorenzo and named her Dulcinea of ​​Toboso, for she was from Toboso.

Dressed in his armor, Don Quixote set off, imagining himself the hero of a chivalric romance. After driving all day, he got tired and went to the inn, mistaking it for a castle. The unsightly appearance of the hidalgo and his lofty speeches made everyone laugh, but the good-natured host fed and watered him, although it was not easy: Don Quixote would never take off his helmet, which prevented him from eating and drinking. Don Quixote asked the owner of the castle, that is, the inn, to knight him, and before that he decided to spend the night in vigil over weapons, putting them on a drinking trough. The owner asked if Don Quixote had money, but Don Quixote never read about money in any novel and took it with him. The owner explained to him that although such simple and necessary things as money or clean shirts are not mentioned in the novels, this does not mean at all that the knights did not have either. At night, one driver wanted to water the mules and removed Don Quixote's armor from the watering trough, for which he received a blow with a spear, so the owner, who considered Don Quixote crazy, decided to knight him as soon as possible in order to get rid of such an uncomfortable guest. He assured him that the initiation rite consisted of a slap on the back of the head and a blow with a sword on the back, and after the departure of Don Quixote, he delivered a joyful speech no less pompous (though not so lengthy) than the newly minted knight. Don Quixote turned back home to fill up with money and shirts.

On the way, he saw a hefty villager beating a shepherd boy, the Knight stood up for the shepherd boy, and the villager promised not to offend the boy and pay him everything he owes. Don Quixote, delighted with his beneficence, rode on, and the villager, as soon as the defender of the offended disappeared from his eyes, beat the shepherd boy to a pulp. The oncoming merchants, whom Don Quixote forced to recognize Dulcinea of ​​Toboso as the most beautiful lady in the world, began to mock him, and when he rushed at them with a spear, they bludgeoned him so that he arrived home beaten and exhausted.

The priest and the barber, fellow villagers of Don Quixote, with whom he often argued about chivalric romances, decided to burn the pernicious books, from which he was damaged in his mind. They looked through the library of Don Quixote and left almost nothing of it, except for "Amadis of Gaul" and a few other books. Don Quixote offered one farmer - Sancho Panse - to become his squire and told him so much and promised that he agreed. And then one night, Don Quixote mounted Rocinante, Sancho, who dreamed of becoming the governor of the island, mounted a donkey, and they secretly left the village.

On the way, they met windmills, which Don Quixote mistook for giants. When he rushed to the mill with a spear, the wing turned and smashed the spear to pieces, and Don Quixote was thrown to the ground. At the inn where they stopped to spend the night, the maid began to make her way in the dark to the driver, with whom she agreed to meet, but by mistake she stumbled upon Don Quixote, who decided that this was the daughter of the owner of the castle in love with him. A commotion arose, a fight ensued, and Don Quixote, and especially the innocent Sancho Panza, got it great. When Don Quixote, and Sancho after him, refused to pay for the lodging, several people who happened to be there pulled Sancho off the donkey and began tossing him up on a blanket, like a dog during a carnival.

When Don Quixote and Sancho rode on, the knight mistook a flock of sheep for an enemy army and began to crush the enemies to the right and left, and only a hail of stones that the shepherds brought down on him stopped him. Looking at the sad face of Don Quixote, Sancho came up with a nickname for him: the Knight of the Sorrowful Image. One night, Don Quixote and Sancho heard a loud knocking - when dawn broke, it turned out that these were fulling hammers. The knight was embarrassed, and his thirst for exploits remained this time unsatisfied. Don Quixote mistook the barber, who put a copper basin on his head in the rain, for a knight in the helmet of Mambrina, and since Don Quixote took an oath to take possession of this helmet, he took away the basin from the barber and was very proud of his feat. Then he freed the convicts, who were led to the galleys, and demanded that they go to Dulcinea and give her greetings from her faithful knight, but the convicts did not want to, and when Don Quixote began to insist, they stoned him.

In the Sierra Morena, one of the convicts - Gines de Pasamonte - stole Sancho's donkey, and Don Quixote promised to give Sancho three of the five donkeys that he had on the estate. In the mountains they found a suitcase containing some linen and a bunch of gold coins, and also a book of poetry. Don Quixote gave the money to Sancho and took the book for himself. The owner of the suitcase turned out to be Cardeno, a mad youth who began to tell Don Quixote the story of his unhappy love, but did not tell it because they quarreled because Cardeno spoke ill of Queen Madasima in passing.

Don Quixote wrote a love letter to Dulcinea and a note to his niece, where he asked her to give the "bearer of the first donkey bill" three donkeys, and, having gone mad for decency, that is, taking off his pants and turning somersaults several times, sent Sancho to take the letters. Left alone, Don Quixote surrendered to repentance. He began to think about what better to imitate: the violent insanity of Roland or the melancholy insanity of Amadis. Deciding that Amadis was closer to him, he began to compose poems dedicated to the beautiful Dulcinea.

On the way home, Sancho Panza met a priest and a barber - his fellow villagers, and they asked him to show them Don Quixote's letter to Dulcinea. But it turned out that the knight forgot to give him the letters, and Sancho began to quote the letter by heart, twisting the text so that instead of "impassionate señora" he got "failsafe señora", etc. The priest and the barber began to think how to lure Don Quixote out of Poor Stremnina, where he indulged in repentance, and delivered to his native village to cure him of insanity there. They asked Sancho to tell Don Quixote that Dulcinea had ordered him to come to her immediately, and they assured Sancho that this whole undertaking would help Don Quixote become, if not emperor, then at least king. And Sancho, in anticipation of favors, willingly agreed to help them.

Sancho went to Don Quixote, and the priest and the barber remained waiting for him in the forest, but suddenly they heard verses - it was Cardeno, who told them his sad story from beginning to end: the treacherous friend Fernando kidnapped his beloved Lucinda and married her. When Cardeno finished the story, a sad voice was heard and a beautiful girl appeared, dressed in a man's dress. It turned out to be Dorothea, seduced by Fernando, who promised to marry her, but left her for Lucinda. Dorothea said that Lucinda, after being engaged to Fernando, was going to commit suicide, because she considers herself Cardeno's wife and agreed to marry Fernando only at the insistence of her parents. Dorothea, learning that he did not marry Lucinda, had the hope of returning him, but she could not find him anywhere. Cardeno revealed to Dorothea that he was Lucinda's true husband, and they decided to work together to seek the return of "what is rightfully theirs." Cardeno promised Dorothea that if Fernando did not return to her, he would challenge him to a duel.

Sancho told Don Quixote that Dulcinea was calling him to her, but he replied that he would not appear before her until he performed feats, "worthy of her mercy." Dorothea volunteered to help lure Don Quixote out of the forest and, calling herself the Princess of Micomicon, said that she had come from a distant country, which had heard a rumor about the glorious knight Don Quixote, in order to ask for his intercession. Don Quixote could not refuse the lady and went to Mikomikon. They met a traveler on a donkey - it was Gines de Pasamonte, a convict who was freed by Don Quixote and who stole an ass from Sancho. Sancho took the donkey for himself, and everyone congratulated him on his good fortune. At the source they saw a boy - the same shepherd boy, for whom Don Quixote had recently stood up. The shepherd boy said that the intercession of the hidalgo had gone sideways to him, and cursed all the knights-errant on what the light stands, which infuriated Don Quixote.

Having reached the same inn where Sancho was tossed up on a blanket, the travelers stopped for the night. At night, a frightened Sancho Panza ran out of the closet where Don Quixote was resting - Don Quixote fought enemies in a dream and brandished his sword in all directions. Wineskins of wine hung over his head, and he, mistaking them for giants, flogged them and poured wine over everything, which Sancho, with fright, mistook for blood.

Another company drove up to the inn: a lady in a mask and several men. The curious priest tried to ask the servant about who these people were, but the servant himself did not know, he only said that the lady, judging by her clothes, was a nun or was going to a monastery, but apparently not of her own free will, for she sighed and cried all the way. It turned out that this was Lucinda, who decided to retire to the monastery, since she could not connect with her husband Cardeno, but Fernando kidnapped her from there. Seeing Don Fernando, Dorothea threw herself at his feet and begged him to return to her. He heeded her prayers. Lucinda, on the other hand, rejoiced at being reunited with Cardeno, and only Sancho was upset, for he considered Dorothea the princess of Micomicon and hoped that she would shower his master with favors and also give him something. Don Quixote believed that everything was settled thanks to the fact that he defeated the giant, and when he was told about the perforated wineskin, he called it the spell of an evil wizard.

The priest and the barber told everyone about Don Quixote's insanity, and Dorothea and Fernando decided not to leave him, but to take him to the village, which was no more than two days away. Dorothea told Don Quixote that she owed her happiness to him, and continued to play the part she had begun.

A man and a Moorish woman drove up to the inn. The man turned out to be an infantry captain who was captured during the Battle of Lepanto. A beautiful Moorish woman helped him escape and wanted to be baptized and become his wife. Following them, the judge appeared with his daughter, who turned out to be the captain's brother and was incredibly happy that the captain, from whom there had been no news for a long time, was alive. The captain was robbed on the way by the French, but the judge was not at all embarrassed by his deplorable appearance. At night, Dorothea heard the mule driver's song and woke up the judge's daughter Clara so that the girl would also listen to her, but it turned out that the singer was not a mule driver at all, but a disguised son of noble and wealthy parents named Louis, in love with Clara. She is not of very noble birth, so the lovers were afraid that his father would not give consent to their marriage.

But then a new group of horsemen appeared at the inn: it was Louis' father who set out to chase his son. Luis, whom his father's servants wanted to escort home, refused to go with them and asked for Clara's hand in marriage.

Another barber arrived at the inn, the same one from whom Don Quixote took away the "helmet of Mambrina", and began to demand the return of his pelvis. A skirmish began, and the priest quietly gave him eight reais for the pelvis in order to stop it. Meanwhile, one of the guards who happened to be at the inn recognized Don Quixote by signs, for he was wanted as a criminal because he freed the convicts, and the priest had to work hard to convince the guards not to arrest Don Quixote, since he was damaged in mind. The priest and the barber made something like a comfortable cage out of sticks and agreed with a man who rode past on oxen that he would take Don Quixote to his native village. But then they released Don Quixote from the cage on parole, and he tried to take away the statue of the immaculate virgin from the worshipers, considering her a noble lady in need of protection.

Finally, Don Quixote arrived home, where the housekeeper and niece put him to bed and began to look after him, and Sancho went to his wife, whom he promised that next time he would certainly return as a count or governor of the island, and not some seedy, but the best best wishes.

After the housekeeper and niece nursed Don Quixote for a month, the priest and the barber decided to visit him. His speeches were reasonable, and they thought that his insanity had passed, but as soon as the conversation remotely touched on chivalry, it became clear that Don Quixote was terminally ill. Sancho also visited Don Quixote and told him that the son of their neighbor, the bachelor Samson Carrasco, had returned from Salamanca, who said that the story of Don Quixote, written by Cid Ahmet Ben-inhali, was published, which describes all the adventures of him and Sancho Panza. Don Quixote invited Samson Carrasco to his place and asked him about the book. The bachelor enumerated all her advantages and disadvantages and said that everyone, young and old, was read by her, especially the servants loved her.

Don Quixote and Sancho Panza decided to start a new journey, and a few days later they secretly left the village. Samson saw them off and asked Don Quixote to report all his successes and failures. Don Quixote, on the advice of Samson, went to Zaragoza, where a jousting tournament was to take place, but first decided to call in Toboso to receive Dulcinea's blessing. Arriving with Toboso, Don Quixote asked Sancho where Dulcinea's palace was, but Sancho could not find it in the dark. He thought that Don Quixote knew this himself, but Don Quixote explained to him that he had never seen not only the palace of Dulcinea, but also her, because he had fallen in love with her according to rumors. Sancho replied that he had seen her and brought back an answer to Don Quixote's letter. To prevent the deception from being revealed, Sancho tried to take his master away from Toboso as soon as possible and persuaded him to wait in the forest while he, Sancho, went to the city to talk with Dulcinea. He realized that since Don Quixote had never seen Dulcinea, then any woman could be passed off as her, and, seeing three peasant women on donkeys, he told Don Quixote that Dulcinea was coming to him with the ladies of the court. Don Quixote and Sancho fell on their knees before one of the peasant women, while the peasant woman shouted rudely at them. Don Quixote saw in this whole story the witchcraft of an evil wizard and was very saddened that instead of a beautiful señora he saw an ugly peasant woman.

In the forest, Don Quixote and Sancho met the Knight of Mirrors, who was in love with Casildea Vandal, who boasted that he had defeated Don Quixote himself. Don Quixote was indignant and challenged the Knight of Mirrors to a duel, according to which the defeated had to surrender to the mercy of the winner. Before the Knight of Mirrors had time to prepare for battle, Don Quixote had already attacked him and almost killed him, but the Knight of Mirrors' squire yelled that his master was none other than Samson Carrasco, who hoped in such a cunning way to bring Don Quixote home. But, alas, Samson was defeated, and Don Quixote, confident that the evil wizards had replaced the appearance of the Knight of Mirrors with the appearance of Samson Carrasco, again moved along the road to Zaragoza.

On the way, Diego de Miranda overtook them, and the two hidalgos set off together. A wagon carrying lions rode towards them. Don Quixote demanded that the cage with the huge lion be opened, and he was about to chop the lion to pieces. The frightened watchman opened the cage, but the lion did not come out of it, but the fearless Don Quixote from now on began to call himself the Knight of Lions. After staying with Don Diego, Don Quixote continued on his way and arrived at the village, where they celebrated the wedding of Kiteria the Beautiful and Camacho the Rich.

Before the wedding, Quiteria was approached by Basillo the Poor, Quiteria's neighbor, who had been in love with her since childhood, and in front of everyone, he pierced his chest with a sword. He agreed to confess before his death only if the priest married him to Kiteria and he died as her husband. Everyone persuaded Kiteria to take pity on the sufferer - after all, he was about to give up his spirit, and Kiteria, having become a widow, would be able to marry Camacho. Kiteria gave Basillo her hand, but as soon as they were married, Basillo jumped to his feet alive and well - he arranged all this in order to marry his beloved, and she seemed to be in cahoots with him. Camacho, on sound reflection, considered it best not to be offended: why does he need a wife who loves another? After spending three days with the newlyweds, Don Quixote and Sancho moved on.

Don Quixote decided to go down to the cave of Montesinos. Sancho and the student guide tied him with a rope, and he began to descend. When all one hundred braces of the rope were unwound, they waited for half an hour and began to pull the rope, which turned out to be so easy, as if there were no weight on it, and only the last twenty braces were hard to pull. When they removed Don Quixote, his eyes were closed, and with difficulty they succeeded in pushing him aside. Don Quixote said that he saw many miracles in the cave, saw the heroes of the old romances of Montesinos and Durandart, as well as the bewitched Dulcinea, who even asked him for a loan of six reals. This time his story seemed implausible even to Sancho, who knew well what kind of magician had bewitched Dulcinea, but Don Quixote stood his ground.

When they reached the inn, which Don Quixote, contrary to his custom, did not consider a castle, Maese Pedro appeared there with a soothsayer monkey and a district. The monkey recognized Don Quixote and Sancho Panza and told everything about them, and when the performance began, Don Quixote, taking pity on the noble heroes, rushed with a sword at their pursuers and killed all the puppets. True, he then generously paid Pedro for the ruined raek, so that he was not offended. In fact, it was Gines de Pasamonte, who was hiding from the authorities and took up the craft of a Raeshnik - therefore he knew everything about Don Quixote and Sancho; usually, before entering the village, he asked around about its inhabitants and, for a small fee, "guessed" the past.

One day, leaving at sunset on a green meadow, Don Quixote saw a crowd of people - it was the falconry of the duke and duchess. The Duchess had read a book about Don Quixote and was full of respect for him. She and the duke invited him to their castle and received him as an honored guest. They and their servants played many jokes with Don Quixote and Sancho and did not cease to marvel at the prudence and madness of Don Quixote, as well as the ingenuity and innocence of Sancho, who in the end believed that Dulcinea was bewitched, although he himself acted as a sorcerer and did all this himself. rigged.

The magician Merlin arrived in a chariot to Don Quixote and announced that in order to disenchant Dulcinea, Sancho must voluntarily whip himself on his bare buttocks three thousand three hundred times. Sancho objected, but the duke promised him an island, and Sancho agreed, especially since the period of scourging was not limited and it could be done gradually. Countess Trifaldi, also known as Gorevana, arrived at the castle, the duenna of Princess Metonymia. The Evil Stench wizard turned the princess and her husband Trenbregno into statues, and the duenna Gorevan and twelve other duennas began to grow beards. Only the valiant knight Don Quixote could disenchant them all. Evilsteam promised to send a horse for Don Quixote, who would quickly drive him and Sancho to the kingdom of Kandaya, where the valiant knight would fight with Evilsteam. Don Quixote, determined to rid the duennas of their beards, sat down with Sancho blindfolded on a wooden horse and thought that they were flying through the air, while the duke's servants blew air from furs on them. "Flying" back to the Duke's garden, they found a message from Evil Flesh, where he wrote that Don Quixote had disenchanted everyone just by venturing into this adventure. Sancho was impatient to look at the faces of the beardless duennas, but the entire band of duennas had already disappeared. Sancho began to prepare for the management of the promised island, and Don Quixote gave him so many reasonable instructions that he struck the duke and duchess - in everything that did not concern chivalry, he "showed a clear and extensive mind."

The duke sent Sancho with a large retinue to a town that was supposed to pass for an island, for Sancho did not know that islands exist only in the sea and not on land. There he was solemnly handed the keys to the city and declared the life governor of the island of Barataria. To begin with, he had to resolve a lawsuit between a peasant and a tailor. The peasant brought the cloth to the tailor and asked if it would make a cap. Hearing that it would come out, he asked if two caps would come out, and when he heard that two would come out, he wanted to get three, then four, and settled on five. When he came to receive caps, they were just on his finger. He became angry and refused to pay the tailor for the work, and in addition began to demand back the cloth or money for it. Sancho thought about it and passed a sentence: do not pay the tailor for the work, do not return the cloth to the peasant, and donate the caps to the prisoners. Sancho showed the same wisdom in other cases, and everyone marveled at the justice of his sentence.

When Sancho sat down at a table laden with food, he did not manage to eat anything: as soon as he stretched out his hand to some dish, Dr. Pedro Intolerable de Nauca ordered it to be removed, saying that it was unhealthy. Sancho wrote a letter to his wife Teresa, to which the duchess added a letter from herself and a string of corals, and the duke's page delivered letters and gifts to Teresa, alarming the whole village. Teresa was delighted and wrote very sensible answers, and also sent half a measure of the best acorns and cheese to the Duchess.

The enemy attacked Barataria, and Sancho had to defend the "island" with weapons in his hands. They brought him two shields and tied one in front and the other behind so tightly that he could not move. As soon as he tried to move, he fell and remained lying, sandwiched between two shields. They ran around him, he heard the sound of weapons, they were furiously hacked at his shield with a sword, and finally there were shouts: "Victory! The enemy is defeated!" Everyone began to congratulate Sancho on his victory, but as soon as he was raised, he saddled the donkey and rode to Don Quixote, saying that ten days of governorship was enough for him, that he was not born either for battles or for wealth and did not want to obey any impudent doctor, no one else. Don Quixote began to be weary of the idle life that he led with the duke, and together with Sancho left the castle.

At the inn where they stopped for the night, they met don Juan and don Horonimo, who were reading the anonymous second part of Don Quixote, which Don Quixote and Sancho Panza considered a slander on themselves. It said that Don Quixote fell out of love with Dulcinea, while he loved her as before, the name of Sancho's wife was distorted and full of other inconsistencies. Learning that this book describes a tournament in Zaragoza with the participation of Don Quixote, full of all sorts of nonsense, Don Quixote decided to go not to Zaragoza, but to Barcelona, ​​so that everyone could see that Don Quixote, depicted in the anonymous second part, is not at all the one who described by Sid Ahmed Ben-inkhali. In Barcelona, ​​Don Quixote fought the Knight of the White Moon and was defeated. The Knight of the White Moon, who was none other than Samson Carrasco, demanded that Don Quixote return to his village and not leave for a whole year, hoping that during this time his mind would return to him.

On the way home, Don Quixote and Sancho had to revisit the ducal castle, for its owners were as obsessed with jokes and pranks as Don Quixote was with chivalric romances. In the castle stood a hearse with the body of the maid Altisidora, who allegedly died of unrequited love for Don Quixote. To resurrect her, Sancho had to endure twenty-four taps on his nose, twelve pinches, and six pin pricks. Sancho was very displeased:

for some reason, in order to disenchant Dulcinea, and in order to revive Altisidora, it was he who had to suffer, who had nothing to do with them. But everyone persuaded him so much that he finally agreed and endured the torture. Seeing how Altisidora came to life, Don Quixote began to hasten Sancho with self-flagellation in order to dispel Dulcinea. When he promised Sancho to pay generously for each blow, he willingly began to whip himself with a whip, but quickly realizing that it was night and they were in the forest, he began to whip the trees. At the same time, he moaned so plaintively that Don Quixote allowed him to stop and continue the scourging the next night.

At the inn they met Alvaro Tarfe, bred in the second part of the false Don Quixote. Alvaro Tarfe admitted that he had never seen either Don Quixote or Sancho Panza who stood before him, but he had seen another Don Quixote and another Sancho Panza who were not at all like them. Returning to his native village, Don Quixote decided to become a shepherd for a year and invited the priest, the bachelor and Sancho Panza to follow his example. They approved of his idea and agreed to join him. Don Quixote had already begun to remake their names in a pastoral way, but soon fell ill. Before his death, his mind cleared up and he no longer called himself Don Quixote, but Alonso Quijano. He cursed the vile romances of chivalry that clouded his mind, and died calmly and in a Christian way, as no knight-errant died.

O. E. Grinnberg

Halfway through life, I - Dante - got lost in a dense forest. It's scary, wild animals are all around - allegories of vices; nowhere to go. And then a ghost appears, which turned out to be the shadow of my favorite ancient Roman poet Virgil. I ask him for help. He promises to take me from here to the afterlife so that I can see Hell, Purgatory and Paradise. I am ready to follow him.

Yes, but can I make such a trip? I am timid and hesitated. Virgil reproached me, telling me that Beatrice herself (my dearly beloved) had descended from Heaven to Hell and asked me to be my guide on wandering in the dead. If so, then you can not hesitate, you need determination. Lead me, my teacher and mentor!

Above the entrance to Hell is an inscription that takes away all hope from those who enter. We entered. Here, right behind the entrance, the pitiful souls of those who did not create either good or evil during their lifetime groan. Further on, the Acheron River, through which the ferocious Charon transports the dead on a boat. We are with them. "But you're not dead!" Charon shouts angrily at me. Virgil subdued him. We swam. From a distance a roar is heard, the wind blows, a flame flashed. I lost my senses...

The first circle of Hell is Limbo. Here the souls of unbaptized babies and glorious pagans languish - warriors, sages, poets (including Virgil). They do not suffer, but only grieve that they, as non-Christians, have no place in Paradise. Virgil and I joined the great poets of antiquity, the first of which was Homer. Gradually walked and talked about the unearthly.

At the descent into the second circle of the underworld, the demon Minos determines which sinner to which place in Hell should be cast down. He reacted to me in the same way as Charon, and Virgil pacified him in the same way. We saw the souls of voluptuaries (Cleopatra, Elena the Beautiful, etc.) carried away by the infernal whirlwind. Francesca is among them, and here she is inseparable from her lover. Immeasurable mutual passion led them to a tragic death. Deeply sympathizing with them, I again fainted.

In the third circle, the bestial dog Cerberus rages. He barked at us, but Virgil subdued him too. Here, lying in the mud, under a heavy downpour, are the souls of those who have sinned with gluttony. Among them is my countryman, the Florentine Chacko. We talked about the fate of our native city. Chacko asked me to remind living people of him when I return to earth.

The demon guarding the fourth circle, where spendthrifts and misers are executed (among the latter there are many clerics - popes, cardinals), is Plutos. Virgil also had to besiege him to get rid of.

From the fourth they descended into the fifth circle, where the angry and lazy are tormented, mired in the swamps of the Stygian lowland. We approached a tower.

This is a whole fortress, around it is a vast pond, in the canoe - a rower, the demon Phlegius. After another squabble sat down to him, we swim. Some sinner tried to cling to the side, I scolded him, and Virgil pushed him away. Before us is the hellish city of Dit. Any dead evil spirits prevents us from entering it. Virgil, leaving me (oh, it's scary to be alone!), went to find out what was the matter, returned worried, but reassured.

And then the infernal furies appeared before us, threatening. A heavenly messenger suddenly appeared and curbed their anger. We entered Dit. Everywhere are tombs engulfed in flames, from which the groans of heretics are heard. On a narrow road we make our way between the tombs.

From one of the tombs, a mighty figure suddenly emerged. This is Farinata, my ancestors were his political opponents. In me, having heard my conversation with Virgil, he guessed from the dialect of the countryman. Proud, he seemed to despise the whole abyss of Hell, We argued with him, and then another head popped out of a nearby tomb: yes, this is the father of my friend Guido! It seemed to him that I was a dead man and that his son had also died, and he fell on his face in despair. Farinata, calm him down; Guido lives!

Near the descent from the sixth circle to the seventh, over the grave of the pan-heretic Anastasius, Virgil explained to me the structure of the remaining three circles of Hell, tapering downwards (towards the center of the earth), and what sins are punished in which zone of which circle.

The seventh circle is compressed by mountains and guarded by the half-bull demon Minotaur, who roared menacingly at us. Virgil yelled at him, and we hurried to move away. We saw a blood-boiling stream in which tyrants and robbers boil, and from the shore centaurs shoot at them with bows. Centaur Ness became our guide, told about the executed rapists and helped to ford the boiling river.

Around thorny thickets without greenery. I broke some branch, and black blood flowed from it, and the trunk groaned. It turns out that these bushes are the souls of suicides (rapists over their own flesh). They are pecked by the infernal birds of the Harpy, trampled by the running dead, causing them unbearable pain. One trampled bush asked me to collect the broken branches and return them to him. It turned out that the unfortunate man was my countryman. I complied with his request and we moved on. We see - sand, flakes of fire fly down on it, scorching the sinners, who scream and groan - all except one: he lies silently. Who is this? King of Kapanei, a proud and gloomy atheist, slain by the gods for his obstinacy. Even now he is true to himself: either he is silent, or he loudly curses the gods. "You're your own tormentor!" Virgil yelled at him...

But towards us, tormented by fire, the souls of new sinners are moving. Among them, I hardly recognized my highly esteemed teacher Brunetto Latini. He is among those who are guilty of a tendency to same-sex love. We started talking. Brunetto predicted that glory awaits me in the world of the living, but there will also be many hardships that must be resisted. The teacher bequeathed to me to take care of his main work, in which he lives, - "Treasure".

And three more sinners (the sin is the same) are dancing in the fire. All Florentines, former respected citizens. I talked to them about the misfortunes of our hometown. They asked me to tell the living countrymen that I saw them. Then Virgil led me to a deep pit in the eighth circle. An infernal beast will bring us down there. He is already climbing to us from there.

This is a motley tailed Geryon. While he prepares for his descent, there is still time to look at the last martyrs of the seventh circle - usurers, toiling in a whirlwind of flaming dust. Hanging from their necks are multi-colored purses with different coats of arms. I didn't talk to them. Let's hit the road! We sit down with Virgil astride Geryon and - oh horror! - we are smoothly flying into failure, to new torments. Went down. Gerion immediately flew away.

The eighth circle is divided into ten ditches, called Angry Sinuses. Pimps and seducers of women are executed in the first ditch, and flatterers are executed in the second. Procurers are brutally scourged by horned demons, flatterers sit in a liquid mass of stinking feces - the stench is unbearable. By the way, one whore is punished here not because she fornicated, but because she flattered her lover, saying that she was fine with him.

The next ditch (the third bosom) is lined with stone, full of round holes, from which stick out the burning legs of high-ranking clergy who traded in church positions. Their heads and torsos are clamped by holes in the stone wall. Their successors, when they die, will also jerk their flaming legs in their place, completely squeezing their predecessors into stone. This is how Papa Orsini explained it to me, at first mistaking me for his successor.

In the fourth sinus, soothsayers, astrologers, sorceresses are tormented. Their necks are twisted in such a way that, when weeping, they irrigate their backs with tears, not their chests. I myself wept when I saw such a mockery of people, and Virgil shamed me; it's a sin to pity sinners! But he also told me with sympathy about his fellow countrywoman, the soothsayer Manto, whose name was given to Mantua - the birthplace of my glorious mentor.

The fifth ditch is filled with boiling tar, into which the evil-handed devils, black, winged, throw bribe-takers and make sure that they do not stick out, otherwise they will hook the sinner with hooks and finish him off in the most cruel way. The devils have nicknames: Evil-tail, Cross-winged, etc. We will have to go part of the further path in their terrible company. They grimacing, sticking out their tongues, their boss made a deafening obscene sound from behind. I have never heard of such a thing! We walk with them along the ditch, the sinners dive into the tar - they hide, and one hesitated, and they immediately pulled him out with hooks, intending to torment him, but first they allowed us to talk with him. The poor cunning lulled the vigilance of the Zlokhvatov and dived back - they did not have time to catch him. Irritated devils fought among themselves, two fell into the tar. In the confusion, we hurried to leave, but no such luck! They fly after us. Virgil, picking me up, barely managed to run across to the sixth bosom, where they are not masters. Here hypocrites languish under the weight of leaden gilded robes. And here is the crucified (nailed to the ground with stakes) Jewish high priest, who insisted on the execution of Christ. He is trampled underfoot by lead-heavy hypocrites.

The transition was difficult: by a rocky path - into the seventh bosom. Thieves live here, bitten by monstrous poisonous snakes. From these bites, they crumble to dust, but are immediately restored to their appearance. Among them is Vanni Fucci, who robbed the sacristy and blamed someone else. A rude and blaspheming man: he sent God "to hell", holding up two figs. Immediately snakes attacked him (I love them for this). Then I watched how a certain snake merged with one of the thieves, after which it took on its form and stood up, and the thief crawled away, becoming a reptile reptile. Miracles! You will not find such metamorphoses in Ovid,

Rejoice, Florence: these thieves are your offspring! It's a shame ... And in the eighth ditch live insidious advisers. Among them is Ulysses (Odysseus), his soul imprisoned in a flame that can speak! So, we heard the story of Ulysses about his death: thirsty to know the unknown, he sailed with a handful of daredevils to the other side of the world, suffered a shipwreck and, together with his friends, drowned away from the world inhabited by people,

Another talking flame, in which the soul of a crafty adviser who did not name himself, was hidden, told me about his sin: this adviser helped the Pope in one unrighteous deed - counting on the fact that the pope would forgive him his sin. Heaven is more tolerant of the simple-hearted sinner than of those who hope to be saved by repentance. We crossed into the ninth ditch, where the sowers of unrest are executed.

Here they are, the instigators of bloody strife and religious unrest. The devil will maim them with a heavy sword, cut off their noses and ears, crush their skulls. Here is Mohammed, and Curio, who encouraged Caesar to civil war, and the beheaded troubadour warrior Bertrand de Born (he carries his head in his hand like a lantern, and she exclaims: "Woe!").

Next, I met my relative, angry with me because his violent death remained unavenged. Then we moved on to the tenth ditch, where the alchemists itch forever. One of them was burned because he jokingly boasted that he could fly - he became a victim of a denunciation. He ended up in Hell not for this, but as an alchemist. Here, those who pretended to be other people, counterfeiters and liars in general are executed. Two of them fought among themselves and then quarreled for a long time (master Adam, who mixed copper into gold coins, and the ancient Greek Sinon, who deceived the Trojans). Virgil rebuked me for the curiosity with which I listened to them.

Our journey through the Spitefuls is coming to an end. We came to the well leading from the eighth circle of Hell to the ninth. There are ancient giants, titans. Among them are Nimrod, who angrily shouted something to us in an incomprehensible language, and Antaeus, who, at the request of Virgil, lowered us to the bottom of the well on his huge palm, and he immediately straightened up.

So, we are at the bottom of the universe, near the center of the globe. Before us is an icy lake, those who betrayed their relatives froze into it. I accidentally kicked one of them on the head, he yelled, but refused to name himself. Then I grabbed his hair, and then someone called his name. Scoundrel, now I know who you are, and I will tell people about you! And he: "Lie whatever you want, about me and about others!" And here is the ice pit, in which one dead man gnaws the skull of another. I ask: for what? Looking up from his victim, he answered me. He, Count Ugolino, takes revenge on his former associate, Archbishop Ruggieri, who betrayed him, who starved him and his children, imprisoning them in the Leaning Tower of Pisa. Their suffering was unbearable, the children were dying in front of their father, he was the last to die. Shame on Pisa! We go further. And who is in front of us? Alberigo? But he, as far as I know, did not die, so how did he end up in Hell? It also happens: the body of the villain is still alive, but the soul is already in the underworld.

In the center of the earth, the ruler of Hell, Lucifer, frozen into ice, cast down from heaven and hollowed out the abyss of hell in his fall, disfigured, three-faced. Judas sticks out of his first mouth, Brutus from the second, Cassius from the third, He chews them and torments them with claws. Worst of all is the most vile traitor - Judas. A well stretches from Lucifer, leading to the surface of the opposite earth hemisphere. We squeezed into it, rose to the surface and saw the stars.

May the Muses help me to sing the second kingdom! His guard Elder Cato met us unfriendly: who are they? how dare you come here? Virgil explained and, wishing to propitiate Cato, spoke warmly about his wife Marcia. Why is Marcia here? Go to the seashore, you need to wash! We are going. Here it is, the sea distance. And in the coastal grasses - abundant dew. With it Virgil washed away the soot of abandoned Hell from my face.

A boat controlled by an angel is sailing towards us from the sea distance. It contains the souls of the dead, who were lucky enough not to go to Hell. They moored, went ashore, and the angel swam away. The shadows of the arrivals crowded around us, and in one I recognized my friend, the singer Cosella. I wanted to hug him, but the shadow is incorporeal - I hugged myself. Cosella, at my request, sang about love, everyone listened, but then Cato appeared, shouted at everyone (they didn’t do business!), And we hurried to the Mount of Purgatory.

Virgil was dissatisfied with himself: he gave a reason to shout at himself ... Now we need to scout the upcoming road. Let's see where the arriving shadows go. And they themselves have just noticed that I am not a shadow: I do not let light pass through me. Surprised. Virgil explained everything to them. "Come with us," they invited.

So, we hasten to the foot of the purgatory mountain. But is everyone in a hurry, is everyone really impatient? There, near a large stone, there is a group of people who are not in a hurry to climb up: they say, they will have time; climb the one who itchs. Among these sloths I recognized my friend Belacqua. It is pleasant to see that he, and in life the enemy of any haste, is true to himself.

In the foothills of Purgatory, I had the opportunity to communicate with the shadows of the victims of violent death. Many of them were fair sinners, but, saying goodbye to life, they managed to sincerely repent and therefore did not go to Hell. Such a vexation for the devil, who has lost his prey! However, he found how to win back: not having gained power over the soul of a repentant dead sinner, he outraged his murdered body.

Not far from all this, we saw the regal and majestic shadow of Sordello. He and Virgil, recognizing each other as fellow countryman poets (Mantuans), embraced brotherly. Here is an example for you, Italy, a dirty brothel, where the bonds of brotherhood are completely broken! Especially you, my Florence, are good, you won’t say anything ... Wake up, look at yourself ...

Sordello agrees to be our guide to Purgatory. It is a great honor for him to help the highly esteemed Virgil. Conversing sedately, we approached a flowering fragrant valley, where, preparing for an overnight stay, the shadows of high-ranking persons - European sovereigns - settled down. We watched them from afar, listening to their consonant singing.

The evening hour has come, when desires draw those who have sailed back to their loved ones, and you remember the bitter moment of farewell; when sadness dominates the pilgrim and he hears how the distant chime weeps sobbingly about the day of irretrievable... An insidious serpent of temptation crawled into the valley of rest of the earthly rulers, but the angels who arrived expelled it.

I lay down on the grass, fell asleep, and in my dream was carried to the gates of Purgatory. The angel guarding them inscribed on my forehead seven times the same letter - the first in the word "sin" (seven deadly sins; these letters will be erased from my forehead in turn as we ascend the mountain of purgatory). We entered the second realm of the afterlife, the gates closed behind us.

The ascent has begun. We are in the first circle of Purgatory, where the proud atone for their sin. To shame pride, statues were erected here, embodying the idea of ​​a high feat - humility. And here are the shadows of the arrogant being cleansed: unbending during life, here, as a punishment for their sin, they bend under the weight of the stone blocks heaped on them.

"Our Father ..." - this prayer was sung by bent proud people. Among them is the miniaturist Oderiz, who during his lifetime boasted of his loud fame. Now, he says, he realized that there is nothing to boast about: everyone is equal in the face of death - both the decrepit old man and the baby who murmured “yum-yum”, and glory comes and goes. The sooner you understand this and find the strength in yourself to curb your pride, to humble yourself, the better.

Under our feet are bas-reliefs depicting scenes of punished pride: Lucifer and Briares cast down from heaven, King Saul, Holofernes and others. Our stay in the first round is coming to an end. The angel who appeared erased one of the seven letters from my forehead - as a sign that I had overcome the sin of pride. Virgil smiled at me

We went up to the second round. There are envious people here, they are temporarily blinded, their former "envious" eyes do not see anything. Here is a woman who, out of envy, wished harm to her countrymen and rejoiced in their failures ... In this circle, after death, I will not be cleansed for long, because I rarely and few people envied. But in the past circle of proud people - probably for a long time.

Here they are, blinded sinners whose blood once burned with envy. In the silence, the words of the first envious person, Cain, sounded thunderous: "The one who meets me will kill me!" In fear, I clung to Virgil, and the wise leader told me bitter words that the highest eternal light is inaccessible to envious people who are carried away by earthly lures.

Passed the second round. Again an angel appeared to us, and now only five letters remained on my forehead, which I have to get rid of in the future. We are in the third round. A cruel vision of human fury flashed before our eyes (the crowd stoned a meek youth with stones). In this circle, those possessed by anger are purified.

Even in the darkness of Hell there was no such black haze as in this circle, where the fury of the angry is subdued. One of them, the Lombard Marco, talked to me and expressed the idea that everything that happens in the world cannot be understood as a consequence of the activity of higher heavenly powers: this would mean denying the freedom of human will and removing from a person responsibility for what he has done.

Reader, have you ever wandered in the mountains on a foggy evening, when the sun is almost invisible? That's how we are... I felt the touch of an angel's wing on my forehead - another letter was erased. We climbed into the fourth circle, illuminated by the last ray of sunset. Here the lazy ones are cleansed, whose love for the good was slow.

Sloths here must run swiftly, not allowing any indulgence in their lifetime sin. Let them be inspired by the examples of the Blessed Virgin Mary, who, as you know, had to hurry, or Caesar with his amazing quickness. They ran past us and disappeared. I want to sleep. I sleep and dream...

I dreamed of a disgusting woman, who turned into a beauty before my eyes, who was immediately put to shame and turned into an even worse ugly woman (here she is, the imaginary attractiveness of vice!). Another letter has disappeared from my forehead: I, therefore, have conquered such a vice as laziness. We rise to the fifth circle - to the misers and spenders.

Avarice, greed, greed for gold are disgusting vices. Molten gold was once poured down the throat of one obsessed with greed: drink to your health! I don't feel comfortable being surrounded by misers, and then there was an earthquake. From what? Due to my ignorance, I don't know...

It turned out that the shaking of the mountain was caused by jubilation over the fact that one of the souls was cleansed and ready for ascent: this is the Roman poet Statius, an admirer of Virgil, who was delighted that from now on he will accompany us on the path to the purgatory peak.

Another letter, denoting the sin of avarice, was erased from my forehead. By the way, was Statius, languishing in the fifth round, stingy? On the contrary, it is wasteful, but these two extremes are punished jointly. Now we are in the sixth circle, where gluttons are cleansed. Here it would not be bad to remember that gluttony was not characteristic of Christian ascetics.

Former gluttons are destined to the pangs of hunger: emaciated, skin and bones. Among them I found my late friend and countryman Forese. They talked about their own, scolded Florence, Forese condemningly spoke about the dissolute ladies of this city. I told my friend about Virgil and my hopes of seeing my beloved Beatrice in the afterlife.

With one of the gluttons, a former poet of the old school, I had a conversation about literature. He admitted that my associates, supporters of the "new sweet style", achieved much more in love poetry than he himself and the masters close to him. Meanwhile, the penultimate letter has been erased from my forehead, and the path to the highest, seventh circle of Purgatory is open to me.

And I still remember the thin, hungry gluttons: how did they become so emaciated? After all, these are shadows, not bodies, and they would not have to starve. Virgil explained that the shadows, although incorporeal, exactly repeat the outlines of the implied bodies (which would lose weight without food). Here, in the seventh circle, the voluptuaries scorched by fire are cleansed. They burn, sing and praise examples of temperance and chastity.

The voluptuaries engulfed in flames were divided into two groups: those who indulged in same-sex love and those who did not know the limits in bisexual intercourse. Among the latter are the poets Guido Guinicelli and the Provençal Arnald, who greeted us exquisitely in his dialect.

And now we ourselves have to go through the wall of fire. I was scared, but my mentor said that this is the path to Beatrice (to the Earthly Paradise, located on the top of the mountain of purgatory). And so the three of us (Statius with us) go, scorched by the flames. We passed, we move on, it is getting dark, we stopped to rest, I slept; and when I woke up, Virgil turned to me with the last word of parting words and approval, Everything, from now on he will be silent ...

We are in the Earthly Paradise, in a blooming grove resounding with the chirping of birds. I saw a beautiful donna singing and picking flowers. She said that there was a golden age here, innocence shone, but then, among these flowers and fruits, the happiness of the first people was destroyed in sin. When I heard this, I looked at Virgil and Statius: they were both smiling blissfully.

Oh Eve! It was so good here, you ruined everything with your daring! Live fires float past us, righteous elders in snow-white robes, crowned with roses and lilies, march under them, wonderful beauties dance. I couldn't get enough of this amazing picture. And suddenly I saw her - the one I love. Shocked, I made an involuntary movement, as if trying to cling to Virgil. But he disappeared, my father and savior! I sobbed. "Dante, Virgil will not return. But you will not have to cry for him. Look at me, it's me, Beatrice! And how did you get here?" she asked angrily. Then a voice asked her why she was so hard on me. She answered that I, seduced by the lure of pleasures, had been unfaithful to her after her death. Do I plead guilty? Oh yes, tears of shame and remorse choke me, I lowered my head. "Raise your beard!" she said sharply, not ordering her to take her eyes off her. I lost my senses, and woke up immersed in Oblivion - a river that bestows oblivion of committed sins. Beatrice, look now at the one who is so devoted to you and so eager for you. After a ten-year separation, I looked into her eyes, and my vision was temporarily dimmed by their dazzling brilliance. Having regained my sight, I saw a lot of beauty in the Earthly Paradise, but suddenly all this was replaced by cruel visions: monsters, desecration of the shrine, debauchery.

Beatrice grieved deeply, realizing how much evil lies in these visions shown to us, but expressed her confidence that the forces of good will ultimately defeat evil. We approached the river Evnoe, drinking from which you strengthen the memory of the good you have done. Statius and I bathed in this river. A sip of her sweetest water poured new strength into me. Now I am pure and worthy to climb the stars.

From the Earthly Paradise, Beatrice and I will fly together to the Heavenly, to heights inaccessible to the comprehension of mortals. I did not notice how they took off, looking at the sun. Am I, staying alive, capable of this? However, Beatrice was not surprised by this: a purified person is spiritual, and a spirit not burdened with sins is lighter than ether.

Friends, let's part here - do not read further: you will be lost in the vastness of the incomprehensible! But if you are insatiably hungry for spiritual food - then go ahead, follow me! We are in the first sky of Paradise - in the sky of the Moon, which Beatrice called the first star; plunged into its bowels, although it is difficult to imagine a force capable of containing one closed body (which I am) into another closed body (the Moon).

In the bowels of the moon, we met the souls of nuns kidnapped from monasteries and forcibly married. Through no fault of their own, they did not keep the vow of virginity given during the tonsure, and therefore the higher heavens are inaccessible to them. Do they regret it? Oh no! To regret would mean not to agree with the highest righteous will.

But I still wonder: why are they to blame for submitting to violence? Why should they not rise above the sphere of the moon? Blame is not a victim, but a rapist! But Beatrice explained that the victim also has a certain responsibility for the violence that was perpetrated upon her, if, resisting, she did not show heroic resilience.

Failure to fulfill a vow, Beatrice argues, is almost irreparable by good deeds (there is too much to do to atone for guilt). We flew to the second heaven of Paradise - to Mercury. The souls of the ambitious righteous dwell here. These are no longer shadows, unlike the previous inhabitants of the afterlife, but lights: they shine and radiate. One of them flared up especially brightly, rejoicing in communication with me. It turned out that this was the Roman emperor, legislator Justinian. He is aware that being in the sphere of Mercury (and not higher) is the limit for him, for the ambitious, doing good deeds for their own glory (that is, loving themselves first of all), missed the ray of true love for the deity.

The light of Justinian merged with a dance of lights - other righteous souls. I thought, and the course of my thoughts led me to the question: why did God the Father sacrifice a son? It was possible just like that, by the supreme will, to forgive people the sin of Adam! Beatrice explained: the highest justice demanded that humanity itself atone for its guilt. It is incapable of this, and it was necessary to impregnate an earthly woman so that the son (Christ), combining the human with the divine, could do this.

We flew to the third heaven - to Venus, where the souls of the loving ones bliss, shining in the fiery depths of this star. One of these spirit-lights is the Hungarian king Charles Martel, who, speaking to me, expressed the idea that a person can realize his abilities only by acting in a field that meets the needs of his nature: it’s bad if a born warrior becomes a priest ...

Sweet is the radiance of other loving souls. How much blessed light, heavenly laughter is here! And below (in Hell) the shadows thickened gloomily and gloomily ... One of the lights spoke to me (troubadour Folco) - he condemned the church authorities, self-serving popes and cardinals. Florence is the city of the devil. But nothing, he believes, it will get better soon.

The fourth star is the Sun, the abode of the sages. Here shines the spirit of the great theologian Thomas Aquinas. He joyfully greeted me, showed me other sages. Their consonant singing reminded me of church evangelism.

Thomas told me about Francis of Assisi - the second (after Christ) wife of Poverty. Following his example, the monks, including his closest students, began to walk barefoot. He lived a holy life and died - a naked man on bare earth - in the bosom of Poverty.

Not only I, but also the lights - the spirits of the sages - listened to the speech of Thomas, stopping singing and dancing. Then the Franciscan Bonaventure took the floor. In response to the praise given to his teacher by the Dominican Thomas, he glorified Thomas' teacher, Dominic, a farmer and servant of Christ. Who now continued his work? There are none worthy.

And again Thomas took the floor. He talks about the great virtues of King Solomon: he asked God for wisdom, wisdom - not to solve theological issues, but to reasonably rule the people, that is, royal wisdom, which was granted to him. People, do not judge each other hastily! This one is busy with a good deed, that one with an evil one, but what if the first falls and the second rises?

What will happen to the inhabitants of the Sun on the Day of Judgment, when the spirits become flesh? They are so bright and spiritual that it is difficult to imagine them materialized. Our stay here is over, we flew to the fifth heaven - to Mars, where the sparkling spirits of warriors for the faith settled down in the shape of a cross and a sweet hymn sounds.

One of the lights that form this marvelous cross, without going beyond its limits, moved downwards, closer to me. This is the spirit of my valiant great-great-grandfather, the warrior Kachchagvida. He greeted me and praised the glorious time in which he lived on earth and which - alas! - passed, replaced by the worst time.

I am proud of my ancestor, my origin (it turns out that not only on a vain earth you can experience such a feeling, but also in Paradise!). Cacchagvida told me about himself and about his ancestors, born in Florence, whose coat of arms - a white lily - is now stained with blood.

I want to learn from him, a clairvoyant, about my future fate. What lies ahead for me? He replied that I would be expelled from Florence, that in my joyless wanderings I would know the bitterness of someone else's bread and the steepness of someone else's stairs. To my credit, I will not associate with impure political factions, but I will become my own party. In the end, my adversaries will be put to shame, and triumph awaits me.

Cacchagvida and Beatrice encouraged me. Ended up on Mars. Now - from the fifth heaven to the sixth, from the red Mars to the white Jupiter, where the souls of the righteous hover. Their lights are formed into letters, into letters - first into a call for justice, and then into the figure of an eagle, a symbol of just imperial power, an unknown, sinful, suffering earth, but established in heaven.

This majestic eagle entered into a conversation with me. He calls himself "I", but I hear "we" (a just power is collegial!). He understands what I myself cannot understand: why is Paradise open only to Christians? What is wrong with a virtuous Hindu who does not know Christ at all? So I don't understand. And it’s true, the eagle admits, that a bad Christian is worse than a glorious Persian or Ethiopian,

The eagle personifies the idea of ​​justice, and its main thing is not claws or a beak, but an all-seeing eye, made up of the most worthy light-spirits. The pupil is the soul of the king and the psalmist David, the souls of the pre-Christian righteous shine in the eyelashes (and I just blunderedly talked about Paradise "only for Christians"? That's how to give vent to doubts!).

We ascended to the seventh heaven - to Saturn. This is the abode of contemplators. Beatrice has become even more beautiful and brighter. She did not smile at me - otherwise she would have completely incinerated me and blinded me. The blessed spirits of the contemplators were silent, did not sing - otherwise they would have deafened me. The sacred light, the theologian Pietro Damiano, told me about this.

The spirit of Benedict, after whom one of the monastic orders is named, angrily condemned the modern self-serving monks. After listening to him, we rushed to the eighth heaven, to the constellation of Gemini, under which I was born, saw the sun for the first time and breathed in the air of Tuscany. From its height, I looked down, and my gaze, passing through the seven heavenly spheres we visited, fell on a ridiculously small earthly ball, this handful of dust with all its rivers and mountain steeps.

Thousands of lights are burning in the eighth sky - these are the triumphant spirits of the great righteous. Intoxicated by them, my vision has increased, and now even Beatrice's smile will not blind me. She smiled wonderfully at me and again prompted me to turn my eyes to the radiant spirits who sang a hymn to the queen of heaven - the holy virgin Mary.

Beatrice asked the apostles to talk to me. To what extent have I penetrated the mysteries of sacred truths? The Apostle Peter asked me about the essence of faith. My answer: faith is an argument in favor of the invisible; mortals cannot see with their own eyes what is revealed here in Paradise - but let them believe in a miracle, having no visual evidence of its truth. Peter was satisfied with my answer.

Will I, the author of the sacred poem, see my homeland? Will I be crowned with laurels where I was baptized? The apostle James asked me about the essence of hope. My answer is: hope is the expectation of a future well-deserved and God-given glory. Delighted, Jacob lit up.

Next up is the question of love. The apostle John gave it to me. Answering, I did not forget to say that love turns us to God, to the word of truth. Everyone rejoiced. The exam (what is Faith, Hope, Love?) was successfully completed. I saw the radiant soul of our forefather Adam, who lived for a short time in the Earthly Paradise, expelled from there to earth; after the death of long languishing in Limbo; then moved here.

Four lights blaze before me: the three apostles and Adam. Suddenly Peter turned purple and exclaimed: "My earthly throne has been seized, my throne, my throne!" Peter hates his successor - the pope. And it is time for us to part with the eighth heaven and ascend to the ninth, supreme and crystal. With unearthly joy, laughing, Beatrice threw me into a rapidly spinning sphere and ascended herself.

The first thing I saw in the sphere of the ninth heaven was a dazzling dot, the symbol of a deity. Lights revolve around her - nine concentric angelic circles. The closest to the deity and therefore smaller are the seraphim and cherubim, the most distant and extensive are the archangels and just angels. People on earth are accustomed to think that the great is greater than the small, but here, as you can see, the opposite is true.

Angels, Beatrice told me, are the same age as the universe. Their rapid rotation is the source of all the movement that takes place in the Universe. Those who hurried to fall away from their host were cast down to Hell, and those who remained are still rapturously circling in Paradise, and they do not need to think, want, remember: they are completely satisfied!

Ascension to the Empyrean - the highest region of the Universe - is the last. I again looked at her, whose beauty, growing in Paradise, raised me from heights to heights. We are surrounded by pure light. Everywhere sparks and flowers are angels and blissful souls. They merge into a kind of radiant river, and then take the form of a huge heavenly rose.

Contemplating the rose and comprehending the general plan of Paradise, I wanted to ask Beatrice something, but I saw not her, but a clear-eyed old man in white. He pointed up. I look - she glows in an inaccessible height, and I called out to her: "Oh donna, who left a mark in Hell, granting me help! In everything that I see, I am aware of your good. I followed you from slavery to freedom. Keep me in the future so that my spirit, worthy of you, may be freed from the flesh!" She looked at me with a smile and turned to the eternal shrine. All.

The old man in white is Saint Bernard. From now on, he is my mentor. We continue to contemplate the Empyrean rose with him. The souls of immaculate babies also shine in it. This is understandable, but why were the souls of babies in some places in Hell - they can't be vicious, unlike these? God knows better what potentials - good or bad - are laid in what infant soul. So Bernard explained and began to pray.

Bernard prayed to the Virgin Mary for me - to help me. Then he gave me a sign to look up. Looking up, I see the supreme and brightest light. At the same time, he was not blind, but he gained the highest truth. I contemplate the deity in his radiant trinity. And love draws me to him, which moves both the sun and the stars.

A. A. Ilyushin

This is a love story told by a heroine named Fiametta, addressed primarily to women in love, from whom the young lady seeks sympathy and understanding.

The beautiful Fiametta, whose beauty captivated everyone, spent her life in continuous celebration; a loving spouse, wealth, honor and respect - all this was bestowed on her by fate. Once, on the eve of a big celebration, Fiametta had a terrible dream, as if she was walking on a fine sunny day in a meadow, weaving wreaths, and suddenly a poisonous snake sting under her left breast; immediately the light fades, thunder is heard - and awakening comes. In horror, our heroine clutches at the bitten place, but, finding him unharmed, calms down. On this day in the temple during the festive service, Fiametta truly falls in love for the first time, and her chosen one Panfilo reciprocates her suddenly flared feeling. It's time for bliss and pleasure. "Soon the whole world became nothing to me, it seemed that my head was reaching the sky," Fiametta admits.

The idyll is broken by unexpected news received from Father Panfilo. The widowed elder asks his son to come to Florence and become a support and consolation at the end of his life, since all the Panfilo brothers died and the unfortunate father was left alone. Fiametta, inconsolable in her grief, tries to restrain her lover, appealing to his pity: "Really, preferring pity for the old father to legitimate pity for me, will you be the cause of my death?" But the young man does not want to incur cruel reproaches and dishonor, so he sets off, promising to return in three or four months. At parting, Fiametta faints, and half-dead from grief, the maid tries to console her with her story about how Panfilo sobbed and kissed the mistress's face with tears and begged to help his beloved.

Fiametta, the most faithful of women in love, awaits the return of her beloved with humble faith, but at the same time, jealousy creeps into her heart. It is known that Florence is famous for its charming women who know how to lure people into their networks. What if Panfilo has already been caught in them? Fiametta, suffering, drives away these thoughts. Every morning she goes up to the tower at home and watches the sun from there, and the higher it is, the closer it seems to her that Panfilo will return. Fiametta constantly mentally talks with her lover, rereads his letters, sorts through his belongings, and sometimes calls the maid and talks to her about him. Daytime comforts are replaced by nighttime ones. Who would have believed that love could teach astrology? From the position of the moon, Fiametta could definitely tell how much of the night had passed, and it was not clear which was more gratifying: watching time pass, or, being busy with other things, to see that it had already passed. When the deadline for the return promised by Panfilo approached, the lover decided that she should have some fun so that her beauty, somewhat erased by grief, would return. Luxurious outfits and precious jewelry are prepared - this is how a knight prepares the armor he needs for the future battle.

But there is no beloved. Fiametta comes up with excuses: maybe his father begged him to stay longer. Or something happened along the way. But most of all, Fiametta was tormented by jealousy. "No worldly phenomenon lasts forever. The new is always more pleasing than the seen, and always a person desires more what he does not have than what he possesses." So a month passed in hope and despair. Once, during a meeting with the nuns, Fiametta met a Florentine merchant. One of the nuns, young, beautiful, of noble birth, asked the merchant if he knew Panfilo. Having received an affirmative answer, she began to ask in more detail, and then Fiametta learned that Panfilo had married. Moreover, the nun blushed at this news, lowered her eyes, and it was clear that she was barely holding back her tears. The shocked Fiametta still does not lose hope, she wants to believe that it was her father who forced Panfilo to marry, but he continues to love her alone. But she no longer wants to look at the sky, as she is no longer sure of the return of her beloved. In a fit of anger, letters were burned and many of his belongings were damaged. The once-beautiful face of Fiametta has turned pale, the marvelous beauty has faded, and this brings despondency to the whole house, gives rise to various rumors.

The husband, anxiously watching the changes taking place with Fiametta, offers her a trip to the waters, healing from all sorts of ailments. In addition, those places are famous for their cheerful pastime and refined society. Fiametta is ready to fulfill the will of her husband, and they set off. But there is no escape from love fever, especially since it is in these places that Fiametta has been with Panfilo more than once, so the surging memories only stir up the wound. Fiametta takes part in various amusements, watches loving couples with feigned tenderness, but this only serves as a source of new torment. Doctors and husband, seeing her pallor, considered the disease incurable and recommended that she return to the city, which she did.

Our heroine happens to sit in a circle of women who are talking about love, and, eagerly listening to these stories, she understands that there was not and is not such a fiery, such a secret, such a bitter love as hers. She turns to Fate with entreaties and requests to help her, to protect her from blows: "Cruel, have pity on me; look, I have come to the point that I have become a byword where my beauty used to be praised."

A year has passed since Panfilo left Fiametta. Unexpectedly, Fiametta's servant returns from Florence, who says that he married not Panfilo at all, but his father, Panfiloje fell in love with one of the Florentine beauties. Fiametta, unable to bear the betrayal, tries to commit suicide. Fortunately, the old nurse guesses the intention of her pet and stops her in time when she tries to throw herself from the tower. From hopeless grief, Fiametta falls seriously ill. They explain to the husband that his wife's despair is caused by the death of her beloved brother.

At some point, a glimmer of hope appears: the nurse reports that she met a Florentine young man on the embankment, who supposedly knows Panfilo and assures that he should be back any minute. Hope resurrects Fiametta, but the joy is in vain. It soon turns out that the information is false, the nurse was mistaken. Fiametta falls into the old melancholy. Sometimes she tries to find consolation in comparing her love torments with the torments of the famous jealous women of antiquity, like Phaedra, Hecuba, Cleopatra, Jocasta and others, but finds that her torments are a hundred times worse.

N. B. Vinogradova

At the center of the poetic narrative is the touching love story of the shepherd and hunter Afriko and the nymph Menzola.

We learn that in ancient times in Fiesole, women especially honored the goddess Diana, who patronized chastity. Many parents, after the birth of children, some by vow, and some in gratitude, gave them to Diana. The goddess willingly accepted everyone into her forests and groves. On the hills of Fiesola, a virgin community was formed,

The goddess often gathers the nymphs by a bright stream or in the forest shade and talks with them for a long time about the sacred virgin vow, about hunting, catching - their favorite pastimes. Diana was a wise support of the virgins, but she could not always be near them, as she had many different worries -

Therefore, when she left, she left her viceroy with the nymphs, to whom they implicitly obeyed.

One day in May, the goddess comes to hold council among her military camp. She once again reminds the nymphs that there should not be men next to them and each is obliged to observe herself,

The girls are shocked by Diana's threats, but even more shocked is the young man Africa, an accidental witness to this council. His gaze is riveted to one of the nymphs, he admires her beauty and feels the fire of love in his heart. But it's time for Diana to go, the nymphs follow her, and their sudden disappearance dooms the lover to suffering. The only thing he manages to find out is the name of his beloved - Menzola. At night, in a dream, Venus appears to the young man and blesses him in search of a beautiful nymph, promising him her help and support. Encouraged by a dream, in love, barely dawn, goes to the mountains. But the day passes in vain, Menzola is gone, and a distressed Afriko returns home. The father, guessing the cause of his son's sadness, tells him a family tradition. It turns out that the young man's grandfather died at the hands of Diana. The virgin goddess found him on the bank of the river with one of her nymphs and, furious, pierced the hearts of both with an arrow, and their blood turned into a wonderful source that merges with the river. The father is trying to free Afriko from the spell of the beautiful nymph, but it's too late: the young man is passionately in love and is not inclined to retreat. He spends all his time at the Fiesolan hills, hoping for a long-awaited meeting, and soon his dream will come true. But Menzola is severe: as soon as she sees the young man, she throws a spear at him, which, fortunately, pierces into a strong oak. The nymph suddenly hides in the forest thicket. Afriko unsuccessfully tries to find her. He spends his days in suffering, nothing pleases him, he refuses food, a youthful blush disappears from his handsome face. One day, the sad Afriko was tending his herd and, bending over the stream, was talking to his own reflection. He cursed his fate, and tears flowed from his eyes like a river:

But suddenly the young man remembers Venus, who promised to help him, and decides to honor the goddess with a sacrifice, believing in her favor. He divides one sheep from the herd into two parts (one part for himself, the other for Menzola) and lays it on the fire. Then he kneels and prays to the goddess of love - he asks Menzola to reciprocate his feeling. His words were heard, for the sheep rose up in the fire "and part one with the other was united." The miracle seen inspires hope in the young man, and he, cheered up and calmed down, falls into a dream. Venus, again appearing to him in a dream, advises Afriko to change into a woman's dress and fraudulently enter the nymphs.

The next morning, remembering that her mother has a beautiful outfit, Afriko changes into it and sets off. He manages, under the guise of a girl, to gain confidence in the nymphs, he talks affectionately with them, and then they all go together to the stream. The nymphs undress and enter the water, while Afriko, after much hesitation, also follows their example. There is a desperate squeal, and the girls rush in all directions. And Afriko, triumphant, squeezes Menzola, sobbing with horror, in her arms. Her girlhood is stolen against her will, and the unfortunate woman calls for death, not wanting to accept it at the hands of Diana. Afriko, without ceasing to console and caress her beloved, tells her about his love, promises a happy life together and persuades her not to be afraid of Diana's wrath. Sorrow quietly floats away from Menzola's heart, and love comes to replace it. The lovers agree to meet at the same stream every evening, because they can no longer imagine life without each other. But the nymph, barely left alone, again recalls her shame and spends the whole night in tears. Afriko waits impatiently for her in the evening by the stream, but her beloved does not come. Imagination draws different pictures for him, he is tormented, grieves and decides to wait until the next evening. But a day, a week, a month pass, and Afriko does not see the dear face of his beloved. The second month comes, the lover is driven to despair and, having arrived at the place of the promised meeting, he turns to the river with a request to bear his name from now on, and plunges a spear into his chest. Since then, people in memory of the young man who died of love began to call the river Afriko.

What about Menzola? She, knowing how to be hypocritical, was able to convince her friends that she had struck down the young man with an arrow and saved her honor. And every day she became calmer and stronger. But from the wise nymph Sinedekchia, Menzola learns that she has conceived, and decides to settle separately from everyone in the cave, hoping for the support of Sinedekchia. Meanwhile, Diana arrives in Fiesole, she asks the nymphs where her favorite Menzola is, and hears that she has not been seen in the mountains for a long time and maybe she is sick. The goddess, accompanied by three nymphs, descends to the cave. Menzola has already had a son, and she plays with him by the river. Diana, in anger, turns Menzola into a river, which is named after her, and allows her son to be given to Afriko's parents. They do not have a soul in it, they raise a baby with love and care.

Eighteen years pass. Pruneo (as the baby's grandson was named) becomes a wonderful young man. In those days, Atlanta appeared in Europe and founded the city of Fiesole. He invited all the surrounding residents to his new city. Pruneo was elected ruler for his exceptional abilities and mind, the people fell in love with him, and he

Atlas found a bride for him, and the Africo family continued in the ten sons of Pruneo. But trouble comes to the city. The Romans destroy the fiesole, all the inhabitants leave it, with the exception of the descendants of Africo, who built houses for themselves there and took refuge in them. Soon peace comes and a new city arises - Florence. Rod Afriko arrived there and was warmly received by the local population. He was surrounded by love, honor and respect, members of the family became related to famous Florentines and turned into indigenous people.

The final stanzas of the poem, in the form of a traditional appeal to the almighty lord Amur, sounded like a real hymn of love that transforms life and man,

N. B. Vinogradova

"in the course of which, after the author reports on what occasion they gathered and what the persons who will act further spoke among themselves, those gathered on the day of the reign of Pampinea talk about what is more to their liking"

In 1348 Florence was “visited by a destructive plague”, one hundred thousand people died, although before that no one had imagined that there were so many inhabitants in the city. Family and friendship ties fell apart, the servants refused to serve the masters, the dead were not buried, but dumped into pits dug in church cemeteries.

And in the midst of trouble, when the city was almost deserted, in the church of Santa Maria Novella, after the divine liturgy, seven young women from eighteen to twenty-eight years old met, "bound by friendship, neighborhood, kinship", "reasonable, well-born, beautiful, well-behaved , captivating in their modesty", all in mourning clothes appropriate to the "gloomy hour". Without giving their true names in order to avoid misunderstandings, the artist calls them Pampinea, Fiametta, Philomena, Emilia, Lauretta, Neyfila and Elissa - in accordance with their spiritual qualities.

Recalling how many young men and women were swept away by the terrible plague, Pampinea suggests "retiring in a decent manner to country estates and filling leisure with all kinds of entertainment." Leaving the city, where people, in anticipation of their death hour, indulged in lust and depravity, they will protect themselves from unpleasant experiences, while they themselves will behave morally and with dignity. Nothing keeps them in Florence: all their loved ones died.

The ladies approve of Pampinea's idea, and Philomena suggests inviting men with her, because it is difficult for a woman to live by her own mind and the advice of a man is extremely necessary for her. Elissa objects to her: they say, at this time it is difficult to find reliable companions - some of the relatives have died, some have gone in all directions, and it is indecent to address strangers. She suggests looking for another way to salvation.

During this conversation, three young people enter the church - Panfilo, Filostrato and Dioneo, all pretty and well-bred, the youngest of whom is at least twenty-five years old. Among the ladies who found themselves in the church there are also their beloved ones, the rest are related to them. Pampinea immediately offers to invite them.

Neifila, blushing with embarrassment, expresses herself in the sense that the young men are good and smart, but are in love with some of the ladies present, and this can cast a shadow on their society. Philomena, on the other hand, objects that the main thing is to live honestly, and the rest will follow.

Young people are glad to be invited; having agreed on everything, the girls and boys, accompanied by maids and servants, leave the city the next morning. They arrive in a picturesque area where there is a beautiful palace, and settle down there. The word is taken by Dioneo, the most cheerful and witty, offering to have fun as anyone wants. He is supported by Pampinea, who suggests that someone should be in charge of them and think about the arrangement of their life and amusements. And so that everyone knows both the worries and joys associated with headship, and that no one is envious, this honorable burden should be placed on each one in turn. They will all choose the first "ruler" together, and each time before Vespers, the next ones will be appointed by the one who was the ruler that day. All unanimously elect Pampinea, and Philomena places a laurel wreath on her head, which during the following days serves as a sign of "headship and royalty."

After giving the necessary orders to the servants and asking everyone to refrain from reporting unpleasant news, Pampinea allows everyone to disperse; after an exquisitely served breakfast, everyone begins to sing, dance and play musical instruments, and then lie down to rest. At three o'clock, having risen from sleep, everyone gathers in a shady corner of the garden, and Pampinea suggests devoting time to stories, "for one storyteller is able to occupy all listeners," allowing on the first day to tell "what everyone likes more." Dioneo asks for the right to tell the story of his choice every time in order to amuse a society tired of excessive reasoning, and he receives this right.

Often, not daring to turn directly to God, people turn to the holy intercessors, who during their lifetime observed the divine will and abide in heaven with the Almighty. However, sometimes it happens that people, deceived by rumors, choose for themselves such an intercessor in the face of the Almighty, who is condemned by Him to eternal torment. About such "intercessor" and is told in the short story.

The protagonist is Messer Cepparello from Prato, a notary. The rich and eminent merchant Muschiatto Francesi, having received the nobility, moves from Paris to Tuscany, together with the brother of the French king Charles Landless, whom Boniface has fallen there. He needs a man to collect a debt from the Burgundians, famous for intractability, malevolence and dishonesty, who could counter their treachery with his own, and his choice falls on Messer Cepparello, who in France is called Chaleleto. He trades in the manufacture of false documents and bears false witness; he is a squabbler, a brawler, a murderer, a blasphemer, a drunkard, a sodomite, a thief, a robber, a gambler and a malicious dice player. "A worse person than he, perhaps, was not born." In gratitude for the service, Muschiatto promises to put in a good word for Shapeleto in the palace and give out a fair part of the amount that he will exact.

Since Shapeleto has no business, the funds run out, and the patron leaves him, he "out of necessity" agrees - he goes to Burgundy, where no one knows him, and settles with immigrants from Florence, usurer brothers.

Suddenly he falls ill, and the brothers, feeling that his end is near, discuss what to do. It is impossible to drive a sick old man out into the street, but meanwhile he can refuse confession, and then it will not be possible to bury him in a Christian way. If he confesses, then such sins will be revealed that no priest will forgive, and the result will be the same. This can greatly embitter the locals, who do not approve of their fishing, and lead to a pogrom.

Messer Shapeleto hears the conversation of the brothers and promises to arrange both them and his affairs in the best possible way.

An old man famous for his "holy life" is brought to the dying man, and Shapeleto proceeds to confession. When asked when he last confessed, Shapeleto, who has never confessed, says that he does it every week and every time he repents of all the sins committed from birth. This time, too, he insists on a general confession. The elder asks if he has sinned with women, and Shapeleto replies: "I am just the same virgin as I came out of my mother's womb." Regarding gluttony, the notary confesses: his sin consisted in the fact that during fasting he drank water with the same pleasure as a drunkard wine, and ate meatless food with appetite. Speaking about the sin of the love of money, Shapeleto declares that he donated a significant part of his rich inheritance to the poor, and then, being engaged in trade, he constantly divided it with the poor. He admits that he often became angry, watching how people "perform obscenities every day, not keeping the commandments of the Lord, and they are not afraid of the judgment of God." He repents that he slandered, speaking of a neighbor who kept beating his wife; once he did not immediately count the money received for the goods, but it turned out that there were more of them than necessary; unable to find their owner, he used the surplus for charitable causes.

Shapeleto uses two more minor sins as an excuse to read the instructions to the holy father, and then begins to cry and reports that he once scolded his mother. Seeing his sincere repentance, the monk believes him, forgives all sins and recognizes him as a saint, offering to bury him in his monastery.

Listening to the confession of Shapeleto from behind the wall, the brothers choke with laughter, concluding that "nothing is able to correct his vicious disposition:" he lived his whole life as a villain, and dies as a villain.

The coffin with the body of the deceased is transferred to the monastery church, where the confessor paints his holiness to the parishioners, and when he is buried in the crypt, pilgrims rush there from all sides. They call him Saint Shaleleto and "they say that the Lord through him has already shown many miracles and continues to show them daily to everyone who with faith resorts to him."

A wealthy merchant, Giannotto di Civigni, lives in Paris, a kind, honest and just man who communicates with a Jewish merchant named Abram and is very distressed that the soul of such a worthy person will perish due to wrong faith. He begins to persuade Abram to convert to Christianity, arguing that the Christian faith, by virtue of its holiness, is flourishing and spreading more and more, while his, Abram's, faith is impoverishing and coming to naught. At first, Abram does not agree, but then, heeding his friend's exhortations, he promises to become a Christian, but only after he visits Rome and observes the life of God's vicar on earth and his cardinals.

Such a decision plunges Giannotto, who is familiar with the mores of the papal court, into despondency, and he tries to dissuade Abram from the trip, but he insists on his own. In Rome, he is convinced that open debauchery, greed, gluttony, greed, envy, pride and even worse vices flourish in the papal court. Returning to Paris, he announces his intention to be baptized, citing the following argument: the pope, all the cardinals, prelates and courtiers "are striving to wipe the Christian faith off the face of the earth, and they do this with extraordinary diligence, <...> cunningly and <...> skillfully", meanwhile, this faith is spreading more and more, which means that it is faithfully supported by the Holy Spirit. Giannotto becomes his godfather and gives him the name Giovanni.

The story should serve as an illustration of the thought "that stupidity often leads people out of a blissful state and plunges them into the abyss of evil, while reason rescues the wise from the abyss of disasters and gives him perfect and inviolable peace."

The action takes place at the court of Saladin, the Sultan of Babylon, famous for his victories over the Christian and Saracen kings, whose treasury was exhausted by frequent wars and excessive luxury. In an attempt to get money, he decides to resort to the help of the Jew Melchizedek, a usurer, and by cunning to get the necessary amount from him.

Calling the Jew, he asks which law he considers to be true: Jewish, Saracen or Christian. A wise Jew, in order not to get into trouble, tells a parable.

One man possessed an expensive ring and, wanting to keep it in the family, ordered that one of the sons who received the ring be considered his heir, and the rest would revere him as the eldest in the family. That's what happened in that family. Finally, the ring went to a man who loved all three of his sons equally and could not give preference to anyone. In order not to offend anyone, he ordered two copies of the ring, and before his death, secretly from the others, he handed each son a ring. After the death of their father, all three claimed inheritance and honor, presenting a ring as proof, but no one could determine which ring was genuine, and the question of inheritance remained open. The same can be said about the three laws that God the Father gave to the three peoples: each of them considers himself the heir, owner and executor of the true law, but who actually owns it is an open question.

Realizing that the Jew escaped the trap with honor, Saladin openly asks him for help, and then, having fully returned the amount taken, brings him closer and grants him a high and honorable post.

"On the day of the reign of Philomena, stories are brought to attention about how for people who were subjected to many different trials, in the end, beyond all expectations, everything ended well"

Moral: "Often who tries to mock others, especially sacred objects, laughs to his own detriment and is himself ridiculed."

After his death, a German from Treviso named Arrigo is recognized as a saint, and the crippled, blind and sick are brought to his relics, transferred to the cathedral, for healing. At this time, three actors come to Treviso from Florence: Stecchi, Martellino and Marchese, and they want to look at the relics of the saint.

To break through the crowd, Martellino pretends to be a cripple, whom friends lead to the relics. In the cathedral they lay him on the relics, and he pretends to be healed - he unbends his twisted arms and legs - but suddenly he is recognized by a certain Florentine who reveals his deceit to everyone. They begin to beat him mercilessly, and then Marchese, in order to save his friend, announces to the guards that he allegedly cut off his wallet. Martellino is seized and taken to the mayor, where some of those present in the cathedral slander him that he cut off their wallets too. A stern and cruel judge takes over the case. Under torture, Martellino agrees to confess, but on the condition that each of the complainants indicate where and when his wallet was cut off. Everyone says a different time, while Martellino has just arrived in this city. He tries to build his defense on this, but the judge does not want to hear anything and is going to hang him on the gallows.

Meanwhile, Martellino's friends seek intercession from a man who enjoys the trust of the mayor. Calling Martellino to him and laughing at this adventure, the mayor lets all three go home.

"On the day of the reign of Neifila, stories are offered about how people, thanks to their cunning, achieved what they passionately dreamed of, or regained what was lost"

The wife of a wealthy peasant Ferondo loves a certain abbot. He promises her to save her husband from jealousy, and as a reward he asks permission to possess her, assuring her that "holiness is not diminished by this, for it dwells in the soul," and he is going to commit a sin of the flesh. The woman agrees.

The abbot gives Ferondo sleeping powder to drink, and he supposedly dies. He is buried in a crypt, from where the abbot and one trusted monk carry him to the dungeon. Ferondo, who believes that he has fallen into purgatory, is flogged daily, allegedly for jealousy manifested during his lifetime, while the abbot, meanwhile, has fun with his wife. So ten months pass, and suddenly the abbot finds out that his mistress is pregnant. Then he decides to release her husband. The monk informs Ferondo that he will soon be resurrected and become the father of a child. After putting him to sleep again, the abbot and the monk return him to the crypt, where he wakes up and begins to call for help. Everyone admits that he has risen, which is why faith in the sanctity of the abbot increases, and Ferondo is cured of jealousy.

"On the day of the reign of Filostrato, stories of unhappy love are offered to attention"

Gismonda, daughter of Prince Tancred of Salerno, becomes a widow early and, returning to her father's house, is in no hurry to get married, but looks after herself a worthy lover. Her choice falls on Guiscardo, a young man of low birth, but noble behavior, a servant in his father's house. Dreaming of a secret date, Gismond gives him a note in which she makes an appointment in an abandoned cave and explains how to get there. She herself goes there along the old secret staircase. Having met in a cave, the lovers go to her bedroom, where they spend time. So they meet several times.

One day, Tancred visits her daughter when she is walking in the garden, and, while waiting for her, accidentally falls asleep. Without noticing him, Gismond is brought to Guiscardo's room, and Tancred becomes a witness to their amorous pleasures. Imperceptibly getting out of the room, he tells the servants to grab Guiscardo and imprison him in one of the rooms of the palace.

The next day, he goes to his daughter and, accusing her of having given herself to a youngster of "the darkest origin", invites her to say something in her defense. A proud woman, she decides not to ask her father for anything, but to end her life, for she is sure that her beloved is no longer alive. She sincerely confesses her love, explaining it by the virtues of Guiscardo and the demands of the flesh, and accuses her father of being in the power of prejudice, he reproaches her not so much for the fall, but for having an ignoble person. She argues that true nobility is not in origin, but in deeds, and even poverty indicates only a lack of funds, but not nobility. Taking all the blame on herself, she asks her father to do with her the same way he did with Guiscardo, otherwise he promises to lay hands on himself.

Tancred does not believe that his daughter is capable of carrying out the threat, and, taking out the heart from the chest of the murdered Guiscardo, sends it to Gismonda in a golden goblet. Gismonda addresses the heart of her beloved with the words that the enemy gave him a tomb worthy of his valor. Washing her heart with tears and pressing it to her chest, she pours poison into a goblet and drinks the poison to the drop. The repentant Tancred fulfills his daughter's last will and buries the lovers in the same tomb.

"On the day of the reign of Fiametta, stories are offered about how lovers, after ordeals and misfortunes, finally smiled at happiness"

Guidotto from Cremona is raising his adopted daughter Agnes; after death, he entrusts her to the care of his friend, Giacomino from Pavia, who moves with the girl to Faenza. There two young men woo her; Giannole di Severino and Mingino di Mingole. They are refused, and they decide to kidnap the girl by force, for which they collude with the servants of Giacomino. One day Giacomino leaves home in the evening. The young men make their way there, and a fight breaks out between them. The guards come running to the noise and take them to the prison.

The next morning, relatives ask Giacomino not to file a complaint against the reckless youngsters. He agrees, stating that the girl is a native of Faenza, but he does not know whose daughter she is. He only knows in which house the girl was found during the sacking of the city by the troops of Emperor Frederick. From the scar above his left ear, Father Giannole Bernabuccio recognizes Agnes as his daughter. The ruler of the city releases both young men from prison, reconciles them among themselves and gives Agnes in marriage to Mingino.

"In the day of Elissa's reign, stories are brought to attention about how people, stung by someone's joke, paid the same or averted loss, danger and dishonor with quick and resourceful answers"

One day, the noble Florentine Donna Oretta, wife of Jeri Spina, was walking on her estate with ladies and men invited to dinner with her, and since it was far from the place where they were going to walk, one of her companions suggested: “Excuse me, Donna Oretta , to tell you a fascinating story, and you will not notice how you get there, as if you were riding a horse almost all the time. However, the narrator was so incompetent and so hopelessly spoiled the story that Donna Oretta experienced physical discomfort from this. "Messer! Your horse is very much stumbling. Be kind enough to let me down," the lady said with a charming smile. The companion "immediately caught the hint, turned it into a joke, the first one himself laughed and hurried to move on to other topics," without finishing the story he had begun.

"On the day of the reign of Dioneo, stories are offered about those things that, in the name of love or for the sake of their salvation, wives did with their quick-witted and slow-witted husbands"

A young resident of Paris, Lodovico, the son of a Florentine nobleman who got rich in trade, serves at the court of the French king and once, from the knights who visited the holy places, he hears about the beauty of Donna Beatrice, the wife of Egano de Galuzzi from Bologna. Having fallen in love with her in absentia, he asks his father to let him go on a pilgrimage, and he himself secretly comes to Bologna. Seeing Donna Beatrice, he falls in love with her at first sight and decides to stay in Bologna until he achieves reciprocity, for which, under the name Anikino, he enters the service of Egano and soon enters into his trust.

One day, when Egano goes hunting, Anikino reveals his feelings to Beatrice. Beatrice reciprocates and invites him to enter her room at night. Since he knows which side of the bed she sleeps on, she offers to touch her if she sleeps, and then all his dreams will come true.

At night, feeling Anikino's touch, Beatrice grabs his hand and starts tossing and turning in bed so that Egano wakes up. Anikino, fearing a trap, tries to break free, but Beatrice holds him tight, meanwhile telling her husband that his supposedly most faithful servant, Anikino, has made a date for her at midnight in the garden.

Inviting her husband to test the faithfulness of the servant, she makes him dress up in her dress and go out into the garden, which he does.

Having fully enjoyed her lover, Beatrice sends him into the garden with a huge club so that he warms up Egano properly. Anikino falls upon the owner with the words: "So you came here imagining that I was going and going to deceive my master?"

Forcefully escaping, Egano runs to his wife and tells that Anikino, it turns out, was going to test her. "He is so devoted to you that it is impossible not to love and respect him," says the wife. So Egano is convinced of what a devoted servant and wife he has, and thanks to this occasion, Beatrice and Anikino indulge in love pleasures many more times.

"On the day of Lauretta's reign, stories are offered of what things are done daily by a woman with a man, a man with a woman and a man with a man"

In Palermo, as in other port cities, there is a procedure by which merchants who come to the city deposit their goods in a warehouse called customs. Customs officers allocate a special room for the goods and enter the goods with an indication of value in the customs book, thanks to which women of dishonest behavior easily find out about the means of the merchant, in order to then lure him into love networks and rob him to the skin.

Once, on behalf of the owners, a Florentine named Niccolò da Cignano, nicknamed Salabaetto, arrives in Palermo with a large amount of fabrics. Having handed over the goods to the warehouse, he goes for a walk around the city, and a certain Donna Jancofiore, who is aware of his financial situation, pays attention to him. Through a matchmaker, she appoints a date for the young man and, when he arrives, pleases him in every possible way. They meet several times, she gives him gifts without demanding anything in return, and finally learns that he sold the goods. Then she receives him even more affectionately, then leaves the room and returns in tears, telling that her brother demands that a thousand florins be sent immediately, otherwise his head will be cut off. Believing that before him is a rich and decent woman who will repay the debt, he gives her five hundred florins obtained for the fabrics. Having received the money, Jancofiore immediately loses interest in him, and Salabaetto realizes that he was deceived.

To hide from the persecution of the owners demanding money, he leaves for Naples, where he tells everything to the treasurer of the Empress of Constantinople and a friend of his family, Pietro dello Canigiano, who offers him a plan of action.

After packing a lot of bales and buying twenty barrels of olive oil, Salabaetto returns to Palermo, where he delivers the goods to the warehouse, announcing to the customs officers that he will not touch this batch until the next one arrives. Having sniffed out that the goods that have arrived are worth at least two thousand florins, and the expected one is more than three, Jancofiore sends for the merchant.

Salabaetto pretends to be glad to be invited and confirms the rumors about the value of his goods. To win the young man's trust, she returns the debt to him, and he enjoys spending time with her.

Once he comes to her dejected and says that he must pay off the corsairs who have seized the second batch of goods, otherwise the goods will be taken to Monaco. Jancofiore suggests that he borrow money from a loan shark friend at high interest, and Salabaetto realizes that she is going to lend him her own money. He agrees, promising to secure the payment of the debt with goods in the warehouse, which he will immediately transfer to the name of the lender. The next day, the trusted broker Jancofiore gives Salabaetto a thousand florins, and he, having paid off his debts, departs for Ferrara.

After making sure that Salabaetto is not in Palermo, Jancofiore tells the broker to break into the warehouse - sea water is found in barrels, and tow is in bales. Left in the cold, she understands that "as it comes around, it will respond."

"On the day of the reign of Emilia, everyone talks about anything and what he likes best"

The aunt leaves the painter Kalandrino as an inheritance of two hundred lire, and he is going to buy the estate, as if he does not understand that "the land bought for this amount is only enough to sculpt balls from it." His friends Bruno and Buffalmacco want to spend this money together and send Nello to him, who tells Calandrino that he looks bad. The same is confirmed by Buffalmacco and Bruno, who happened to be right there. On their advice, Calandrino goes to bed and sends urine to the doctor for analysis. Dr. Simone, whom his friends managed to warn, informs Calandrino that he has become pregnant. Not embarrassed by the doctor, Calandrino yells at his wife: "It's all because you certainly want to be on top!" The doctor promises the frightened Calandrino to save him from pregnancy for six well-fed capons and five lire in change. Friends feast heartily, and three days later the doctor tells Calandrino that he is healthy. Calandrino extols the virtues of Dr. Simone, and only his wife guesses that all this was rigged.

"On the day of Panfilo's reign, stories about people who showed generosity and magnanimity both in hearty and in other matters are offered to attention"

The young Gualtieri, the eldest in the family of the Marquises of Salutsky, is persuaded by his subjects to marry in order to continue the family, and even offer to find him a bride, but he agrees to marry only of his choice. He marries a poor peasant girl named Griselda, warning her that she will have to please him in everything; she must not be angry with him for anything and must obey him in everything. The girl turns out to be charming and courteous, she is obedient and considerate to her husband, affectionate with her subjects, and everyone loves her, recognizing her high virtues.

Meanwhile, Gualtieri decides to test Griselda's patience and reproaches her for having given birth not to a son, but to a daughter, which greatly outraged the courtiers, who were already allegedly dissatisfied with her low origin. A few days later, he sends a servant to her, who announces that he has an order to kill her daughter. The servant brings the girl Gualtieri, and he sends her to be raised by a relative in Bologna, asking no one to reveal whose daughter it is.

After some time, Griselda gives birth to a son, whom her husband also takes from her, and then tells her that, at the insistence of his subjects, he is forced to marry another, and expel her. She resignedly gives her son, who is sent to be raised in the same place as her daughter.

Some time later, Gualtieri shows everyone fake letters in which the pope allegedly allows him to part with Griselda and marry another, and Griselda meekly, in one shirt, returns to her parents' house. Gualtieri, on the other hand, spreads rumors that he is marrying the daughter of Count Panago, and sends for Griselda, so that she, as a servant, will put things in order in the house for the arrival of guests. When the "bride" arrives - and Gualtieri decided to marry his own daughter - Griselda welcomes her cordially,

Convinced that Griselda's patience is inexhaustible, moved by the fact that she speaks only good things about the girl who should replace her in the marital bed, he admits that he simply arranged for Griselda to check, and announces that his imaginary bride and her brother are their own children. He brings Griselda's father, the farmer Giannukole, who has been living in his house ever since, as befits the Marquis's father-in-law, closer to himself. Daughter Gualtieri is looking for an enviable match, and his wife Griselda honors his wife unusually highly and lives happily ever after with her. "Hence the consequence that celestial creatures live in wretched huts, but in the royal halls there are creatures who would be more suitable to herd pigs than to command people."

E. B. Tueva

The title of the work is symbolic: a raven is a bird that pecks out the eyes and the brain, that is, blinding and depriving the mind. We learn about such love from the story of the protagonist.

So, the rejected lover has a dream. He finds himself alone in a gloomy valley at night and meets a spirit there who warns him that the entrance to this valley is open to everyone who is attracted here by voluptuousness and recklessness, but leaving here is not easy, this will require both reason and courage. Our hero is interested in the name of such an unusual place in which he found himself, and hears in response: there are several options for the name of this valley - the Labyrinth of Love, the Enchanted Valley, the Pigsty of Venus; and the inhabitants of these places are the unfortunate ones who once belonged to the Court of Love, but were rejected by her and exiled here in exile. The spirit promises to help the lover get out of the labyrinth if he is frank with him and tells the story of his love. We learn the following.

A few months before the events described, our hero, a forty-year-old philosopher, a fine connoisseur and connoisseur of poetry, was talking with his friend. We are talking about outstanding women. At first, the heroines of antiquity were mentioned, then the interlocutors moved on to contemporaries. The friend began to praise a lady he knew, enumerating her virtues, and while he ranted, our narrator thought to himself: "Happy is he to whom favorable Fortune will give the love of such a perfect lady." Having secretly decided to try his luck in this field, he began to ask what her name was, what rank she was, where she lives, and he received exhaustive answers to all questions. After parting with a friend, the hero immediately goes to where he hopes to meet her. Blinded by the beauty of the one about which he had only heard before, the philosopher realizes that he has fallen into the net of love, and decides to confess his feeling. He writes a letter and receives a reply note, the essence and form of which leave no doubt that his friend, who so ardently praised the natural mind and exquisite eloquence of a stranger, is either deceived by them himself, or wants to deceive our hero. However, the flame that raged in the lover’s chest did not go out at all from this, he understands that the purpose of the note is to push him to new letters, which he immediately writes. But the answer - neither written nor oral - never received.

The surprised spirit interrupts the narrator: "If things didn't go any further, why did you burst into tears yesterday and call for death with such deep sorrow?" The unfortunate man replies that two reasons brought him to the brink of despair. Firstly, he realized how stupidly he behaved, believing right away that a woman could have such high virtues, and, entangled in the nets of love, gave her freedom and subjugated her mind, and without this his soul became a slave. Secondly, the deceived lover was disappointed in his beloved when he learned that she revealed his love to others, and for this he considered her the most cruel and insidious of women. She showed one of her many lovers the letters of our hero, mocking him as a cuckold. The lover spread gossip throughout Florence, and soon the unfortunate philosopher became the laughing stock of the city. The Spirit listened attentively and in response presented his point of view. “I understood well,” he said, “how and with whom you fell in love and what led you to such despair. And now I will name two circumstances that can be reproached with you: your age and your occupation. teach you caution and warn against love temptations. You should know that love dries up the soul, leads the mind astray, takes away the memory, destroys the abilities. " I have experienced it all myself,” he continued. - My second wife, having mastered the art of deceit well, entered my house under the guise of a meek dove, but soon turned into a snake. Ruthlessly oppressing my relatives, running almost all my affairs and seizing income, she brought into the house not peace and tranquility, but discord and misfortune. One day, unexpectedly, I saw her lover in our house and realized that, alas, he was not the only one. Every day I had to endure more and more from this whore, who did not care for my reproaches, and so much torment and torment accumulated in my heart that it could not stand it. This treacherous woman rejoiced at my death; she settled near the church to hide away from prying eyes, and gave vent to her insatiable lust. Here is a portrait of the one you were in love with. It so happened that I visited your world just the night after you wrote your first letter to your lady. It was after midnight when I went into the bedroom and saw her having fun with her lover. She read the letter aloud, mocking your every word. That's how this wise lady made fun of you with her half-witted lover. But you must understand that this woman is no exception among others. All of them are full of deceit, a passionate desire to rule overwhelms them, no one can be compared in spite and suspicion with the female sex. And now I want you to take revenge on this unworthy woman for the offense, which will benefit both you and her."

The shocked hero tries to find out why the spirit of this particular person, whom he never knew during his lifetime, responded to his suffering. The spirit answers this question: “The guilt for which I was ordered to condemn you for your own good lies partly on me, since this woman was once mine, and no one could know all her ins and outs and tell you about it in such a way, like me. That's why I came to cure you of your illness."

The hero woke up, began to think about what he saw and heard, and decided to part forever with destructive love.

N. B. Vinogradova

In the preface to his book, the author admits that he wrote it following "the example of the excellent Florentine poet, Messer Giovanni Boccaccio." “I, the Florentine Franco Sacchetti, an ignorant and rude person, set out to write the book offered to you, collecting in it stories about all those extraordinary cases that, whether in the old days or now, have taken place, as well as some of those that I myself observed and witnessed, and even of some in which he himself participated. In the short stories, both real-life and fictional persons act, often this is another embodiment of some kind of "wandering plot" or a moralizing story.

In the short story the fourth Messer Barnabo, the ruler of Milan, a cruel man, but not without a sense of justice, once became angry with the abbot, who did not adequately support the two setter dogs entrusted to his care. Messer Barnabo demanded the payment of four thousand florins, but when the abbot begged for mercy, he agreed to forgive him the debt, on the condition that he answer the following four questions: how far is it to heaven; how much water is in the sea; what is done in hell and how much is he himself, Messer Barnabo. The abbot, in order to buy time, asked for a respite, and Messer Barnabo, taking from him a promise to return, let him go until the next day. On the way, the abbot meets the miller, who, seeing how upset he is, asks what is the matter. After listening to the story of the abbot, the miller decides to help him, for which he changes clothes with him, and, having shaved off his beard, comes to Messer Barnabo. The disguised miller claims that there are 36 million 854 thousand 72,5 miles and 22 steps to the sky, and when asked how he will prove it, he recommends checking it, and if he is mistaken, let him be hanged. The waters in the sea are 25 million horses[982], 1 barrels, 7 mugs and 12 glasses, at least according to his calculations. In hell, according to the miller, "they cut, quarter, grab with hooks and hang," just like on earth. At the same time, the miller refers to Dante and offers to contact him for verification. The miller determines the price of Messer Barnabo at 2 denarii, and Barnabo, enraged at the meagerness of the amount, explains that this is one piece of silver less than Jesus Christ was valued. Guessing that it was not the abbot in front of him, Messer Barnabo finds out the truth. After listening to the miller's story, he orders him to continue to remain abbot, and appoints the abbot as miller.

The hero of the sixth story, the Marquis Aldobrandino, ruler of Ferrara, wants to have some rare bird to keep in a cage. With this request, he turns to a certain Florentine Basso de la Penna, who kept a hotel in Ferrara. Basso de la Penna is old, of small stature, and has a reputation as an outstanding and great joker. Basso promises the marquis to fulfill his request. Returning to the hotel, he calls the carpenter and orders him a cage, large and strong, "so that it is suitable for a donkey," if Basso suddenly comes to mind to put him there. Once the cage is ready, Basso enters it and tells the porter to carry himself to the marquis. The Marquis, seeing Basso in a cage, asks what this should mean. Basso replies that, thinking about the request of the Marquis, he realized how rare he himself was, and decided to present himself to the Marquis as the most unusual bird in the world. The marquis tells the servants to put the cage on a wide windowsill and swing it. Basso exclaims: "Marquis, I came here to sing, and you want me to cry." The marquis, having kept Basso all day at the window, releases him in the evening, and he returns to his hotel. Since then, the Marquis has been imbued with sympathy for Basso, often invites him to his table, often orders him to sing in a cage and jokes with him.

Dante Alighieri acts in the eighth short story. It is to him that a certain very learned, but very thin and undersized Genoese, who specially came to Ravenna for this, turns for advice. His request is as follows: he is in love with a lady who has never even honored him with a look. Dante could offer him only one way out: wait until the lady he loves becomes pregnant, since it is known that in this state women have various quirks, and perhaps she will have a penchant for her timid and ugly admirer. The Genoese was hurt, but realized that his question did not deserve another answer. Dante and the Genoese become friends. The Genoese is an intelligent man, but not a philosopher, otherwise, mentally looking at himself, he could understand "that a beautiful woman, even the most decent one, wants the one she loves to have the appearance of a man, and not a bat."

In the eighty-fourth short story, Sacchetti depicts a love triangle: the wife of the Sienese painter Mino takes a lover and takes him home, taking advantage of her husband's absence. Mino unexpectedly returns, as one of his relatives told him about the shame that his wife covers.

Hearing a knock on the door and seeing her husband, the wife hides her lover in the workshop. Mino mainly painted crucifixes, mostly carved ones, so the unfaithful wife advises her lover to lie down on one of the flat crucifixes, arms outstretched, and cover it with canvas so that in the dark it would be indistinguishable from other carved crucifixes. Mino searches unsuccessfully for a lover. Early in the morning he comes to the workshop and, noticing two toes sticking out from under the canvas, he guesses that this is where the person lies. Mino chooses from the tools he uses when carving crucifixes, a hatchet and approaches his lover in order to "cut off from him the main thing that brought him to the house." The young man, realizing Mino's intentions, jumps out of his seat and runs away, shouting, "Don't mess with the axe!" The woman easily manages to smuggle clothes to her lover, and when Mino wants to beat her, she herself cracks down on him so that he has to tell his neighbors that a crucifix fell on him. Mino puts up with his wife, but thinks to himself: "If the wife wants to be bad, then all the people in the world will not be able to make her good."

In the short story one hundred and thirty-six, a dispute flares up between several Florentine artists during a meal, who is the best painter after Giotto. Each of the artists calls some name, but all together agree that this skill "has fallen and is falling every day." They are objected to by maestro Alberto, who skillfully carved marble. Never before, says Alberto, "has human art been at such a height as it is today, especially in painting, and even more so in making images from a living human body." The interlocutors meet Alberto’s speech with laughter, and he explains in detail what he means: “I believe that our Lord God was the best master who ever wrote and created, but it seems to me that many saw great shortcomings in the figures he created and are currently correcting them. Who are these modern artists involved in correcting? These are Florentine women, "And further Alberto explains that only women (no artist can do it) can make a swarthy girl, plastering here and there, make" whiter than a swan ". And if a woman is pale and yellow, use paint to turn her into a rose. ("No painter, not excluding Giotto, could have applied paint better than they did.") or those that existed in the world, for it is quite clear that they are completing what nature has left unfinished. When Alberto addresses the audience, wanting to know their opinion, everyone exclaims with one voice: "Long live Messer, who judged so well!"

In the short story two hundred and sixteen, another maestro Alberto, "originally from Germany," acts. Once this worthy and holy man, passing through the Lombard regions, stops in a village on the Po River, with a certain poor man who kept an inn.

Entering the house to have dinner and spend the night, Maestro Alberto sees many fishing nets and many girls. After questioning the owner, Alberto learns that these are his daughters, and he earns his livelihood by fishing.

The next day, before leaving the hotel, maestro Alberto makes a fish out of wood and gives it to the owner. Maestro Alberto orders to tie her to the nets for the time of fishing, so that the catch is big. Indeed, the grateful owner soon becomes convinced that Maestro Alberto's gift brings him a huge amount of fish in the net. He soon becomes a rich man. But one day the rope breaks and the water carries the fish down the river. The owner unsuccessfully searches for wooden fish, then tries to catch without it, but the catch turns out to be negligible. He decides to get to Germany, find maestro Alberto and ask him to make the same fish again. Once at his place, the owner of the inn kneels before him and begs, out of pity for him and his daughters, to make another fish, "so that the mercy that he bestowed on him earlier would return to him."

But Maestro Alberto, looking at him with sadness, answers: “My son, I would gladly do what you ask me to do, but I cannot do this, because I must explain to you that when I made the fish I then gave you , the sky and all the planets were located at that hour in such a way as to communicate this power to her ... "And such a minute, according to Maestro Alberto, can now happen no sooner than in thirty-six thousand years.

The owner of the hotel bursts into tears and regrets that he did not tie the fish with iron wire - then it would not have been lost. Maestro Alberto consoles him: “My dear son, calm down, because you are not the first to fail to keep the happiness that God sent you; there were many such people, and they not only failed to manage and take advantage of the short time that you took advantage of, but they couldn't even catch the minute she introduced herself to them."

After much talk and consolation, the innkeeper returns to his difficult life, but often glances down the Po River in the hope of seeing the lost fish.

"This is how fate does: it often seems cheerful to the gaze of the one who knows how to catch it, and often the one who deftly knows how to grab it remains in one shirt." Others seize her, but can only hold her for a short time, like our innkeeper. And hardly anyone manages to regain happiness, unless he can wait thirty-six thousand years, as Maestro Alberto said. And this is quite consistent with what has already been noted by some philosophers, namely, "that in thirty-six thousand years the light will return to the position in which it is at present."

V. S. Kulagina-Yartseva

The action takes place in Florence. The tie is Kallimako's conversation with his servant Shiro, addressed, in fact, to the audience. The young man explains why he returned to his hometown from Paris, where he was taken away at the age of ten. In a friendly company, the French and Italians started a dispute over whose women are more beautiful. And one Florentine declared that the Madonna Lucrezia, the wife of Messer Nic Calfucci, overshadows all the ladies with her charm. Wanting to check this, Callimaco went to Florence and found that the fellow countryman didn’t cheat at all - Lucrezia turned out to be even more beautiful than he expected. But now Kallimako is experiencing unheard-of torments: having fallen in love to the point of madness, he is doomed to languish with unquenched passion, since it is impossible to seduce the virtuous Lucretia. There is only one hope left: the cunning Ligurio, the one who always appears at dinner and constantly begs for money, has taken up the matter.

Ligurio is eager to please Callimaco. After talking with Lucretia's husband, he is convinced of two things: firstly, Messer Nicha is unusually stupid, and secondly, he really wants to have children, whom God still does not give. Nicha has already consulted with many doctors - everyone unanimously recommends going to the waters with his wife, which Nicha's homebody doesn't like at all. Lucretia herself made a vow to defend forty early dinners, but only twenty - some fat priest began to pester her, and since then her character has deteriorated greatly. Ligurio promises to introduce Nich to the most famous doctor who has recently arrived in Florence from Paris - under the patronage of Ligurio, he may agree to help.

Kallimako, as a doctor, makes an indelible impression on Messer Nitsch: he speaks excellently in Latin and, unlike other doctors, demonstrates a professional approach to business: he demands to bring the urine of a woman in order to find out if she is able to have children. To Nich's great joy, the verdict is favorable: his wife will certainly suffer if she drinks mandrake tincture. This is the surest remedy used by the French kings and dukes, but it has one drawback - the first night is deadly for a man. Ligurio suggests a way out: you need to grab some tramp on the street and put him in bed with Lucrezia - then the harmful effect of the mandrake will affect him. Nicha sighs sadly: no, the wife will never agree, because this pious fool had to be persuaded even in order to get urine. However, Ligurio is sure of success: Lucrezia Sostrata's mother and her confessor Fra Timoteo are simply obliged to help in this holy cause. Sostrata enthusiastically persuades her daughter - for the sake of the child, you can endure, and we are talking about a mere trifle. Lucrezia is horrified: to spend the night with a stranger who will have to pay for it with his life - how can you decide on this? In any case, she will not agree to this without the consent of the holy father.

Then Nicha and Ligurio go to Fra Timoteo. To begin with, Ligurio launches a trial balloon: a nun, a relative of Messer Calfucci, became pregnant by chance - is it possible to give the poor thing such a decoction that she will throw it away? Fra Timoteo willingly agrees to help a rich man - according to him, the Lord approves of everything that benefits people. After leaving for a moment, Ligurio returns with the news that the need for the decoction has disappeared, because the girl threw it away herself - however, there is an opportunity to do another good deed, making Messer Nitsch and his wife happy. Fra Timoteo quickly figures out what the idea promises him, thanks to which one can expect a generous reward from both her lover and her husband - and both will be grateful to him for life. It remains only to persuade Lucretia. And Fra Timoteo copes with his task without much difficulty. Lucrezia is kind and simple-hearted: the monk assures her that the tramp may not die, but since such a danger exists, you need to take care of your husband. And this “sacrament” cannot be called adultery, for it will be performed for the good of the family and at the order of the spouse, whom one must obey. It is not the flesh that sins, but the will - in the name of procreation, the daughters of Lot once copulated with their own father, and no one condemned them for this. Lucretia is not too willing to agree with the arguments of the confessor, and Sostrata promises her son-in-law that she herself will put her daughter to bed.

Ligurio hurries with joyful news to Kallimako, and he orders Ciro to take to Messer Nicha the notorious mandrake tincture - sweet wine with spices. But here a difficulty arises: Kallimako is obliged to grab the first ragamuffin that comes across in front of her stupid husband - there is no way to evade, because Nicha may suspect something was amiss. The cunning parasite instantly finds a way out: Fra Timoteo will act as Callimaco, and the young man himself, putting on a false nose and twisting his mouth to the side, will walk near the house of Lucrezia. Everything happens in full accordance with the plan: when he sees a disguised monk, Nicha admires Kallimako's ability to change appearance and voice - Ligurio advises putting a wax ball in his mouth, but first he gives dung. While Nicha is spitting, Kallimako comes out into the street in a torn cloak and with a lute in his hands - the conspirators, armed with the password "Holy Horn", pounce on him and drag him into the house to the joyful exclamations of her husband.

The next day, Fra Timoteo, who is eager to know how the case ended, learns that everyone is happy. Nicha proudly narrates his foresight: he personally undressed and examined the ugly tramp, who turned out to be perfectly healthy and surprisingly well built. After making sure that his wife and "deputy" did not shirk their duties, he talked all night with Sostrata about the future child - of course, it would be a boy. And the ragamuffin almost had to be kicked out of bed; but, in general, the doomed young man is kind of sorry. For her part, Callimaco tells Ligurio that Lucrezia understood perfectly the difference between an old husband and a young lover. He confessed everything to her, and she saw God's sign in this - such a thing could happen only by the permission of heaven, therefore, what had been started should certainly be continued. The conversation is interrupted by the appearance of Messer Nitsch: he is scattered in gratitude to the great doctor, and then both of them, together with Lucretia and Sostrata, go to Fra Timoteo, the benefactor of the family. The husband "acquaints" his half with Kallimako and orders to surround this man with all sorts of attention as the best friend of the house. Submissive to the will of her husband, Lucretia declares that Kallimako will be their godfather, because without his help she would never have carried a child. And the satisfied monk invites the whole honest company to pray for the successful completion of a good deed.

E. D. Murashkintseva

The bishop of the small town of Aodi, after the death of a relative, the Milanese Duke Francesco Sforza, becomes one of the contenders for the ducal throne. However, the vicissitudes of turbulent times and the hatred of enemies force him to leave Milan and settle in his episcopal residence in Lodi; but even there, near Milan, rival relatives do not leave the bishop alone. Then he, along with his daughter, the beautiful young widow Lucrezia Gonzaga, departs for Venice. Here, on the island of Murano, a father and daughter rent a magnificent palazzo; in this palazzo, around Signora Lucrezia, the most refined society soon gathers: beautiful, educated, pleasant girls and gentlemen who are in no way inferior to them.

The grandiose Venetian carnival is in full swing. In order to make the pastime even more enjoyable, the beautiful Lucrezia suggests the following: every evening after dancing, five girls, determined by lot, tell the guests entertaining stories and tales, accompanying them with ingenious riddles.

The girls who surrounded Lucretia turned out to be extremely lively and capable storytellers, and therefore were able to give the listeners great pleasure with their stories, equally fascinating and instructive. Here are just a few of them.

There once lived in Genoa a nobleman named Rainaldo Scaglia. Seeing that his life was drawing to a close, Rainaldo called on his only son, Salardo, and ordered him to forever keep the three instructions in his memory and never deviate from them for anything. The instructions were as follows: no matter how strong love Salardo had for his wife, he should in no way reveal to her any of his secrets; not under any circumstances bring up as his son and make heir to the state of a child not born of him; in no case should you give yourself into the power of a sovereign who rules the country as an autocrat.

Less than a year after the death of his father, Salardo married Theodora, the daughter of one of the first Genoese nobles. No matter how much the spouses loved each other, God did not bless them with offspring, and therefore they decided to raise the son of a poor widow, nicknamed Postumio, as their own child. After a certain time, Salardo left Genoa and settled in Monferrato, where he very quickly succeeded and became the closest friend of the local marquis. Amid the joys and luxury of court life, Salardo came to the conclusion that his father, in his old age, had simply gone out of his mind: after all, having violated his father’s instructions, he not only lost nothing, but, on the contrary, gained a lot. Mocking the memory of his father, the wicked son decided to violate the third instruction, and at the same time to assure himself of Theodora's devotion.

Salardo stole the marquis' favorite hunting falcon, took it to his friend François and asked him to hide it for the time being. Returning home, he killed one of his own falcons and told his wife to cook him for supper; he told her that it was the falcon of the marquis he had killed. The submissive Theodora obeyed her husband's orders, but at the table she refused to touch the bird, for which Salardo rewarded her with a good slap. The next morning, rising early in the morning, all in tears from the insult she had suffered, Theodora hurried to the palace and told the Marquis about the atrocity of her husband. The marquis was inflamed with anger and ordered Salardo to be hanged immediately, and his property to be divided into three parts: one for the widow, the second for the son, and the third for the executioner. The resourceful Postumio volunteered to hang his father with his own hands, so that all the property would remain in the family;

Theodora liked his cleverness. Salardo, who bitterly and sincerely repented of his filial irreverence, was already standing on the scaffold with a noose around his neck, when François delivered irrefutable proof of his friend's innocence to the Marquis. The marquis forgave Salardo and ordered Postumio to be hanged instead of him, but Salardo persuaded the gentleman to let the villain go on all four sides, and in return for the property he wanted to take possession of, he handed over the noose that was almost tightened around his neck. No one else heard anything about Postumio, Theodora took refuge in a monastery and soon died there, and Salardo returned to Genoa, where he lived serenely for many more years, distributing most of his fortune to pleasing God.

Another story took place in Venice. There lived in this glorious city a merchant named Dimitrio. He kept his young wife Polisena in a luxury unprecedented for their class, and all because he loved her very much. Dimitrio often went away from home for a long time on business, while the cute and spoiled wench in his absence began to get confused with one priest. Who knows how long their tricks would have continued if not for Manusso, godfather and friend Dimitrio. Manusso's house stood directly opposite the house of the unlucky merchant, and one fine evening he saw the priest stealthily slip through the door and how he and the hostess were busy with what is inconvenient to call words.

When Dimitrio returned to Venice, Manusso told him what he knew. Dimitrio doubted the veracity of his friend's words, but he suggested to him a way to make sure of everything himself. And then one day Dimitrio told Polisena that he was leaving for Cyprus, while he himself secretly made his way from the harbor to Manusso's house. Later in the evening, he dressed up as a beggar, smeared his face with mud, and knocked on the door of his own house, begging him not to let him freeze on a rainy night. A compassionate maid let the beggar go and gave him a room for the night, adjacent to Polisena's bedroom. There was no trace of Dimitrio's doubts, and early in the morning he slipped out of the house, unnoticed by anyone.

After washing and changing clothes, he again knocked on the door of his own house, in response to his wife's bewilderment, explaining that, they say, bad weather forced him to return from the road. Polisena barely had time to hide the priest in a chest of dresses, where he hid, trembling with fear. Dimitrio sent a maid to call the Polisena brothers to dinner, but he himself did not go anywhere from home. The brother-in-law gladly accepted Dimitrio's invitation. After dinner, the owner began to describe in what luxury and contentment he kept their sister, and as proof he ordered Polisena to show the brothers all his countless jewelry and outfits. She, not herself, opened the chests one by one, until finally, together with the dresses, the priest was brought into the light of day. The Polisena brothers wanted to stab him, but Dimitrio convinced them that it was not good to kill a spiritual person, and besides, when she was in her underwear, it was not good. He ordered his brother-in-law to take his wife away. On the way home, they could not contain their righteous anger. They beat the poor thing to death.

Upon learning of the death of his wife, Dimitrio thought about the maid - she was beautiful, kind and plump. She became his adored wife and owner of the clothes and jewels of the late Polisena.

Having finished the story of Dimitrio and Polisen, Ariadne, as agreed, made a riddle:

How could this be? This is not the most ingenious of those riddles that the storytellers offered to the audience, but she also baffled them. And the answer is this: just one of the friends was called Everyone.

But what happened somehow on the island of Capraia. On this island, not far from the royal palace, lived a poor widow with a son named Pietro, and nicknamed the Fool. Pietro was a fisherman, but a poor fisherman, and therefore he and his mother were always hungry. Once the Fool was lucky and he pulled a large tuna out of the water, which suddenly pleaded with a human voice, they say, let me go, Pietro, you will be more useful from a living me than from a fried one. Pietro took pity and was immediately rewarded - he caught as many fish as he had never seen in his life. When he returned home with booty, the royal daughter, Luciana, as usual, began to make fun of him angrily. The Fool could not stand it, ran ashore, called the tuna and ordered to make Luciana pregnant. The due date passed, and the girl, who was barely twelve years old, gave birth to a charming baby. They started an investigation: under pain of death, all male islanders over thirteen years old were gathered in the palace. To everyone's surprise, the baby recognized Pietro the Fool as the father.

The king could not bear such a shame. He ordered to put Luciana, Pietro and the baby in a tarred barrel and throw it into the sea. The fool was not at all afraid and, sitting in a barrel, told Luciana about the magic tuna and where the baby came from. Then he called the tuna and ordered to obey Lucian as himself. She first ordered the tuna to throw the barrel ashore. Coming out of the barrel and looking around, Luciana wished that the most luxurious palace in the world would be erected on the shore, and Pietro from being dirty and a fool turned into the most beautiful and wisest man in the world. All her wishes were fulfilled in the blink of an eye.

The king and queen, meanwhile, could not forgive themselves for treating their daughter and grandson so cruelly, and, in order to alleviate mental anguish, went to Jerusalem. On the way, they saw a beautiful palace on the island and ordered the shipbuilders to land on the shore. Great was their joy when they found their grandson and daughter alive and unharmed, who told them the whole wonderful story that had happened to her and Pietro. They all then lived happily ever after, and when the king died, Pietro began to rule his kingdom.

In Bohemia, the next storyteller began her story, there lived a poor widow. Dying, she left only sourdough, a breadboard and a cat as a legacy to her three sons. The cat went to the youngest - Konstantin the Lucky. Courageous Constantino: what good is a cat when the belly sticks to the back from hunger? But then the cat said that she would take care of food herself. The cat ran into the field, caught the hare and went to the royal palace with the prey. In the palace, she was led to the king, to whom she presented the hare on behalf of her master Constantino, the kindest, most beautiful and most powerful man in the world. Out of respect for the glorious Mr. Constantina, the king invited the guest to the table, and she, having sated herself, deftly secretly stuffed a full bag of dishes for the host.

Then the cat went to the palace more than once with various offerings, but soon she got bored with it, and she asked the owner to completely trust her, promising that in a short time she would make him rich. And then one fine day she brought Constantino to the bank of the river to the royal palace itself, stripped him naked, pushed him into the water and shouted that Messer Constantino was drowning. The courtiers ran to the cry, pulled Constantino out of the water, gave beautiful clothes and took him to the king. The cat told him a story about how her master was heading to the palace with rich gifts, but the robbers, having learned about this, robbed and nearly killed him. The king treated the guest in every possible way and even married his daughter Elisetta to him. After the wedding, a rich caravan with a dowry was equipped and, under reliable guard, was sent to the newlywed's house. Of course, there was no house at all, but the cat arranged everything and took care of everything. She ran forward and whoever she met along the way, ordered everyone, under pain of death, to answer that everything around belonged to Messer Konstantin the Happy. Having reached the magnificent castle and found there a small garrison, the cat told the soldiers that at any moment they were to be attacked by an innumerable army, and that they could save their lives in the only way - to call Messer Constantine their master. And so they did. The young people settled comfortably in the castle, the real owner of which, as it soon became known, died in a foreign land, leaving no offspring. When Elisetta's father died, Constantino, as the son-in-law of the deceased, rightfully took the Bohemian throne.

Many more fairy tales and stories were told in the palace of the beautiful Lucrezia on the island of Murano during thirteen carnival nights. At the end of the thirteenth night, a bell ringing was heard over Venice, which announced the end of the carnival and the beginning of Great Lent, urging pious Christians to leave amusement for the sake of prayer and repentance.

D. A. Karelsky

The action of the first "learned" comedy in Italy takes place on the island of Metellino, in indefinite "ancient" times. In the verse prologue, it is declared that modern authors can compete with the ancients in skill, although the Italian language is still inferior in euphony to Greek and Latin.

The play begins with the fact that the young man Erophilo orders his slaves to go to Filostrato and is indignant at the stubbornness of Nebbia, who clearly does not want to leave the house. The reasons for this conflict are revealed in the dialogue of the servants. Nebbia tells Janda that the pimp Lucrano, who lives next door, has two lovely girls: Erophilo fell head over heels in love with one of them, and the son of the local bassam (ruler) Karidoro with the other. The merchant jacked up the price in the hope of hitting a big jackpot with rich young people, but they are entirely dependent on their fathers. But old Crisobolo left for a few days, entrusting the protection of property to a faithful steward, and Erophilo took the opportunity: he sent away all the slaves for a while, except for the fraudster Volpino, his henchman, took away the key by using a stick. Now the youth in love will put his hand into his father's good, and then he will shift the blame on the ill-fated Nebbya. In response to these complaints, Janda advises not to argue with the master's son, the legitimate heir to wealth and slaves.

In the next scene, Eulalia and Koriska meet Erophilo and Karidoro. The girls shower the young men with reproaches - they are generous with oaths and sighs, but do nothing to rescue their beloved from bondage. Young people complain about the stinginess of their fathers, but promise to act decisively. Karidoro encourages Erophilo: if his father were away even for a day, he would have cleaned out the pantries long ago. Erophilo declares that for the sake of Eulalia he is ready for anything and will release her today with the help of Volpino. The lovers disperse when they see Aukrano. The human dealer is considering how to get more money for the girls. By the way, a ship turned up, which is sailing for Syria tomorrow or the day after tomorrow. Lucrano, in front of witnesses, agreed with the captain to take him on board with all the household and good - after learning about this, Erophilo will fork out.

Further, the main role belongs to Volpino and Fulcio - the servants of young lovers. Volpino outlines his plan: Erophilo must steal a chest decorated with gold from his father's room and immediately report the loss of the bassam. Meanwhile, Volpino's friend, disguised as a merchant, will hand over this expensive little thing to the pimp as a pledge for Eulalia. When the guards come, Lucrano will deny it, but who will believe him? For any girl, the red price is fifty ducats, but a chest is worth at least a thousand. The procurer would certainly be put in jail, and then hanged or even quartered - to everyone's pleasure. After some hesitation, Erophilo agrees, and another servant enters the scene - Trappola. He is dressed up in the clothes of Crisobolo, handed a chest and sent to Lucrano. The deal is quickly made, and Tralpola leads Eulalia away from the pimp's house.

At this time, a tipsy company is walking along the street: the slaves of Erophilo really liked it in the house of Filostrato, where they feed hearty and generously drink. Only Nebbya continues to grumble, foreseeing that the matter will not end well and all the troubles will fall on his head. Seeing Eulalia from Trappol and realizing that the pimp has sold her, everyone unanimously decides to serve the young master and easily recapture the girl, instructing Trappol to bruise. Volpino is in despair: the bail was left with the pimp, and Eulalia was kidnapped by unknown robbers. Volpino asks Erophilo first of all to rescue the chest, but all in vain - the inconsolable young man, forgetting about everything, rushes in search of his beloved. Lucrano, on the other hand, triumphs: for an insignificant girl, they gave him a chest of filigree work, and besides, stuffed with golden brocade! Previously, the pimp was preparing to leave just for show, but now this trick will come in handy for him - at dawn he will leave Metellino forever, leaving the stupid merchant with his nose.

Volpino falls into a trap. The cunning plan turned against him, and on top of all the misfortunes, Crisobolo returns home. The old man is in alarm, rightly believing that nothing good can be expected from a prodigal son and swindling servants. Volpino confirms his worst suspicions: the donkey Nebbia overlooked the master's room, and from there they took out a chest with brocade. But the matter can still be corrected, since the theft, apparently, was committed by a neighbor pimp. Crisobolo immediately sends a servant to the bassam Critone, his best friend. The search brings brilliant results: a chest was found in Lucrano's house. Volpino is already ready to take a breath, but a new misfortune awaits him: he completely forgot that Trappola is still sitting in the house in the master's caftan. The old man recognizes his dress at a glance. Trappol is seized like a thief. Volpino recognizes him - this is the well-known mute, who can only be explained by signs. The quick-witted Trappola begins to wave his arms, and Volpino translates: Crisobolo's clothes were presented to the unfortunate one of the servants - tall, lean, with a big nose and a gray head. Nebbia fits this description perfectly, but then Crisobolo recalls how a pimp who was caught red-handed shouted that a certain merchant in rich clothes handed him the chest. Under the threat of the gallows, Trappola finds the gift of speech and admits that he gave the chest as a pledge for the girl on the orders of Erophilo and the instigation of Volpino. Enraged, Crisobolo orders Volpino to be shackled, and threatens his son with a father's curse.

Now Fulcio takes up the cause, who is eager to prove that in cunning he will not yield to anyone - even Volpino. To begin with, Karidoro's servant hurries to Lucrano with friendly advice to get away as soon as possible - the stolen chest was found with witnesses, and the basses have already ordered to hang up the thief. Having caught fear on the pimp, Fulcho goes to Erophilo with a story about what happened next. Lucrano began to beg for salvation, and Fulcho, breaking down for a while, took the poor fellow to Karidoro. He did not immediately succumb to persuasion, and Fulcho whispered to the pimp that Koriska should be sent for - in her presence, the Bassama son would become more accommodating. Everything went well: it remains to help Volpino out of trouble and get money for Lucrano, who wants to run away, but cannot, because he was left without a penny. Fulcio goes to Crisobolo with the news that Erophilo is embroiled in an extremely unpleasant story, but the Bassam Critone is ready to turn a blind eye to this matter out of friendship if Lucrano does not file a complaint. appeasing the pimp is simple - you just need to pay him for the girl Eulalia, because of which the fuss flared up. The old miser, reluctantly, parted with a tidy sum and agrees that Volpino should participate in the negotiations with the pimp - alas, there is no other such cunning man in the house, and any fool will fool any son around his finger!

At the end of the play, Fulcho rightly calls himself a triumphant commander: the enemies are defeated and shamed without any bloodshed. Released from punishment, Volpino warmly thanks his comrade-in-arms. Erophilo rejoices: thanks to Fulcho, he received not only Eulalia, but also the money for her maintenance. And the hero of the day invites the audience to go home - Lukrano is going to flee, and he does not need witnesses at all.

E. D. Murashkintseva

This is an unusual poem - a continuation poem. It begins almost half a word, picking up someone else's plot. The beginning of it was written by the poet Matteo Boiardo - no less than sixty-nine songs under the title "Roland in Love". Ariosto added another forty-seven of his own to them, and in the end he thought about how to continue further. There are countless heroes in it, everyone has their own adventures, the plot threads are woven into a real web, and Ariosto, with particular pleasure, breaks off each story at the most tense moment to say: now let's see what such and such is doing ...

The protagonist of the poem, Roland, has been familiar to the European reader for four or five hundred years. During this time, the legends about him have changed a lot.

First, the background has changed. In the "Song of Roland" the event was a small war in the Pyrenees between Charlemagne and his Spanish neighbor - for Boiardo and Ariosto this is a worldwide war between the Christian and Muslim worlds, where the emperor of Africa Agramant goes against Charlemagne, and with him the kings of both the Spanish and Tatar, and Circassian, and countless others, and in their millionth army - two heroes that the world has not seen: the huge and wild Rhodomont and the noble chivalrous Ruggier, about whom we will talk later. By the time Ariosto's poem begins, the Basurmans are overpowering, and their horde is already standing right under Paris.

Secondly, the hero has become different. In "The Song of Roland" he is a knight like a knight, only the strongest, honest and valiant. In Boiardo and Ariosto, in addition to this, on the one hand, a giant of unheard of strength, capable of tearing a bull in half with his bare hands, and on the other hand, a passionate lover, capable of losing his mind in the literal sense of the word from love - that is why the poem is called "Furious Roland ", The object of his love is Angelica, a princess from Cathay (China), beautiful and frivolous, turning the head of all chivalry in the world; at Boiardo, because of her, a war was raging all over Asia, at Ariosto, she had just escaped from the captivity of Charlemagne, and Roland fell into such despair from this that he left the sovereign and friends in besieged Paris and went around the world to look for Angelica.

Thirdly, the hero's companions have become different. Chief among them are his two cousins: the daring Astolf, a kind and frivolous adventurer, and the noble Rinald, Karl's faithful paladin, the embodiment of all knightly virtues. Rinald is also in love, and also with Angelica, but his love is ill-fated. There are two magical springs in the Ardennes forest in northern France - the key of Love and the key of Lovelessness; who drinks from the first will feel love, who from the second will feel disgust. And Rinald and Angelica drank from both, only not in harmony: at first, Angelica pursued Rinald with her love, and he ran away from her, then Rinald began to chase Angelica, and she escaped from him. But he serves Charlemagne faithfully, and Charles from Paris sends him to neighboring England for help.

This Rinald has a sister, Bradamante - also a beauty, also a warrior, and such that when she is in armor, no one will think that she is a woman and not a man. Of course, she is also in love, and this love in the poem is the main one. She is in love with an adversary, in that same Ruggier, who is the best of the Saracen knights. Their marriage is predetermined by fate, because from the descendants of Ruggier and Bradamante will come a noble family of princes of Este, who will rule in Ferrara, in the homeland of Ariosto, and to whom he will dedicate his poem. Ruggier and Bradamante met once in battle, fought for a long time, marveling at each other's strength and courage, and when they got tired, stopped and took off their helmets, they fell in love with each other at first sight. But there are many obstacles on the way to their connection.

Ruggier is the son of a secret marriage between a Christian knight and a Saracen princess. He is brought up in Africa by the wizard and warlock Atlas. Atlas knows that his pet will be baptized, will give birth to glorious descendants, but then he will die, and therefore he tries not to let his pet go to Christians. He has a castle in the mountains full of ghosts: when a knight drives up to the castle, Atlas shows him the ghost of his beloved, he rushes through the gates to meet her and remains in captivity for a long time, vainly looking for his lady in empty chambers and passages. But Bradamante has a magic ring, and these charms do not work on her. Then Atlas puts Ruggier on his winged horse - the hippogriff, and he takes him to the other side of the world, to another sorceress-warlock - Alcina. She meets him in the guise of a young beauty, and Ruggier falls into a temptation: for many months he lives on her wonderful island in luxury and bliss, enjoying her love, and only the intervention of a wise fairy who cares about the future kind of Este returns him to the path of virtue. The spell breaks, the beautiful Alcina appears in the true image of vice, vile and ugly, and the repentant Ruggier flies back to the west on the same hippogriff. In vain, here again loving Atlas lies in wait for him and lures him into his ghostly castle. And the captive Ruggier rushes through its halls in search of Bradamante, and nearby the captive Bradamante rushes through the same halls in search of Ruggier, but they do not see each other.

While Bradamante and Atlas fight for the fate of Ruggier; while Rinald sails for help to and from England, and on the way he saves the lady Guinevere, falsely accused of dishonor; while Roland prowls in search of Angelica, and on the way he saves the lady Isabella, captured by robbers, and the lady Olympia, abandoned by a treacherous lover on a desert island, and then crucified on a rock as a sacrifice to a sea monster, - meanwhile King Agramant with his hordes surrounds Paris and prepares to the attack, and the pious Emperor Charles cries out for help to the Lord. And the Lord orders the Archangel Michael: "Fly down, find the Silence and find the Strife: let the Silence give Rinaldo and the English to suddenly attack the Saracens from the rear and let the Strife attack the Saracen camp and sow discord and confusion there, and the enemies of the right faith will be weakened!" The archangel flies, looking, but not where he was looking for them: Dispute with Sloth, Greed and Envy - among monks in monasteries, and Silence - between robbers, traitors and secret murderers. And the attack has already struck, the scolding is already bubbling around all the walls, the flames are blazing, Rodomonte has already burst into the city and one crushes everyone, cutting through from gate to gate, blood is pouring, arms, shoulders, heads fly into the air. But Silence leads Rinald to Paris with help - and the attack is repulsed, and only the night saves the Saracens from defeat. And the Strife, Rodomont barely made his way from the city to his own, whispers to him a rumor that his kind lady Doralisa cheated on him with the second most powerful Saracen hero Mandricard - and Rodomont instantly abandons his own and rushes to look for the offender, cursing the female gender, heinous, treacherous and treacherous.

There was a young warrior named Medor in the Saracen camp. His king fell in battle; and when night fell on the battlefield, Medor went out with a comrade to find his body under the moon among the corpses and bury it with honor. They were noticed, rushed in pursuit, Medora was wounded, his comrade was killed, and Medora would have bled to death in the thicket of the forest, had not the unexpected savior appeared. This is the one with which the war began - Angelica, who made her way to her distant Katai by secret paths. A miracle happened: conceited, frivolous, abhorring kings and the best knights, she took pity on Medora, fell in love with him, took him to a village hut, and until his wound was healed, they lived there, loving each other, like a shepherd with a shepherdess. And Medora, not believing his luck, carved with a knife on the bark of trees their names and words of gratitude to heaven for their love. When Medora got stronger, they continue their journey to Cathay, disappearing beyond the horizon of the poem, but the inscriptions carved on the trees remain. It was they who became fatal: we are in the very middle of the poem - the fury of Roland begins.

Roland, having traveled half of Europe in search of Angelica, finds himself in this very grove, reads these very letters on the trees and sees that Angelica has fallen in love with another. At first he does not believe his eyes, then his thoughts, then he grows numb, then he sobs, then he grabs his sword, he cuts down trees with inscriptions, he cuts rocks on the sides, - "and that very fury that has not been seen has come, and it is not more terrible to see." He throws away his weapon, tears off his shell, tears his dress; naked, shaggy, he runs through the forests, tearing out oaks with his bare hands, satisfying his hunger with raw bear meat, tearing those he meets in half by the legs, single-handedly crushing entire regiments. So - in France, so - in Spain, so - across the strait, so - in Africa; and a terrible rumor about his fate is already reaching the Karpov yard. And it’s not easy for Karl, even though the Discord sowed discord in the Saracen camp, even though Rodomon quarreled with Mandricard, and with another, and with the third hero, the Basurman army is still near Paris, and the infidels have new invincible warriors. Firstly, this is Ruggier, who arrived in time from nowhere - although he loves Bradamant, his lord is an African Agramant, and he must serve his vassal service. Secondly, this is the hero Marfiza, the thunderstorm of the entire East, who never takes off her shell and swore an oath to beat the three strongest kings in the world. Without Roland, the Christians cannot cope with them; how to find him, how to restore his sanity?

It is here that the cheerful adventurer Astolf appears, who does not care about anything. He is lucky: he has a magic spear that knocks everyone off the saddle itself, he has a magic horn that turns everyone he meets into a stampede; he even has a thick book with an alphabetical index on how to deal with what powers and spells. Once he was brought to the end of the world to the seductress Alcina, and then Ruggier rescued him. From there he rode home through all of Asia. On the way, he defeated the miracle giant, which no matter how you cut it, it will grow back together: Astolf cut off his head and galloped away, plucking hair after hair on it, and the headless body ran, waving his fists, after him; when he plucked out that hair in which there was a giant's life, the body collapsed and the villain died. On the way, he made friends with the dashing Marfiza; visited the banks of the Amazons, where every newcomer must beat ten people in a tournament in one day and one night, and satisfy ten in bed; rescued glorious Christian knights from their captivity. On the way, he even got to Atlant's castle, but even that did not stand against his wonderful horn: the walls dispelled, Atlant died, the captives escaped, and Ruggier and Bradamante (remember?) finally saw each other, threw themselves into their arms, swore allegiance and parted : she - to the castle to her brother Rinald, and he - to the Saracen camp, to finish his service to Agramant, and then to be baptized and marry a sweetheart. Astolf took the hippogriff, the winged Atlantean horse, and flew over the world, looking down.

This careless eccentric happened to save Roland, and for this, first to go to hell and heaven. From under the clouds, he sees the Ethiopian kingdom, and in it the king, who is starved, snatching food, predatory harpies - exactly like in the ancient myth of the Argonauts. With his magic horn, he drives the harpies away, drives them into a dark hell, and on occasion listens to the story of a beauty there who was merciless to her fans and is now tormented in hell. The grateful Ethiopian king shows Astolf a high mountain above his kingdom: there is an earthly paradise, and the apostle John sits in it and, according to the word of God, awaits the second coming. Astolf takes off there, the apostle joyfully greets him, tells him about the future destinies, and about the princes of Este, and about the poets who will glorify them, and about how others offend poets with their stinginess, - “but I don’t care, I’m the writer himself, wrote the Gospel and Revelation. As for Roland's reason, it is on the Moon: there, as on Earth, there are mountains and valleys, and in one of the valleys - everything that is lost in the world by people, "whether from misfortune, from old age, or from stupidity" . There is the vain glory of monarchs, there are the fruitless prayers of lovers, the flattery of flatterers, the short-lived mercy of princes, the beauty of beauties and the mind of prisoners. the mind is a light thing, like steam, and therefore it is closed in vessels, and on them it is written which is whose. There they find a vessel with the inscription "the mind of Roland", and another, smaller one - "the mind of Astolf"; Astolf was surprised, breathed in his mind and felt that he had become smart, but he was not very. And, having glorified the beneficent apostle, not forgetting to take Roland's mind with him, the knight riding a hippogriff rushes back to Earth.

A lot has already changed on Earth.

Firstly, the knights liberated by Astolf on his eastern paths, already rode to Paris, joined Rinald, with their help he hit the Saracens (thunder to the sky, blood streams, heads - from the shoulders, arms and legs, chopped off, - in bulk ), repulsed them from Paris, and the victory began to tilt again towards the Christian side. True, Rinald fights at half strength, because his soul is possessed by the former unrequited passion for Angelica. He is already starting to look for her - but then the allegory begins. In the Ardennes forest, the monster Jealousy attacks him: a thousand eyes, a thousand ears, a snake's mouth, a body with rings. And the knight Contempt rises to help him: a bright helmet, a fiery club, and behind his back is the key of Lovelessness, healing from unreasonable passions. Rinald drinks, forgets the love madness and is again ready for a righteous fight.

Secondly, Bradamante, hearing that her Ruggier is fighting among the Saracens next to a certain warrior named Marfisa, catches fire with jealousy and gallops to fight both with him and with her. In a dark forest near an unknown grave, Bradamante and Marfiza begin to cut down, one more courageous than the other, and Ruggier vainly separates them. And then suddenly a voice is heard from the grave - the voice of the dead wizard Atlanta: "Away with jealousy! Ruggier and Marfiza, you are brother and sister, your father is a Christian knight; while I was alive, I kept you from the faith of Christ, but now, surely, the end my labors." Everything clears up, Ruggier's sister and Ruggier's girlfriend embrace each other, Marfiza accepts holy baptism and calls Ruggier to the same, but he hesitates - he still has the last debt to King Argamant. He, desperate to win the battle, wants to decide the outcome of the war by a duel: the strongest against the strongest, Ruggier against Rinald. The place is cleared, oaths are taken, the battle begins, Bradamant's heart is torn between brother and lover, but then, as once in the Iliad and Aeneid, someone's blow breaks the truce, a general slaughter begins, Christians overcome, and Agramant with with a few of his henchmen, he escapes onto ships to sail to his overseas capital - Bizerte, near Tunisia. He does not know that his most terrible enemy awaits near Bizerte.

Astolf, having flown down from the heavenly mountain, gathers an army and hurries by land and sea to strike from the rear at Agramant's Bizerte; with him are other paladins who escaped from Agramant's captivity - and to meet them, the mad Roland, wild, naked - you won’t come up, you won’t grab. Five of them piled on, threw on a lasso, stretched it, tied it up, carried it to the sea, washed it, and Astolf brought a vessel with Roland's mind to his nose. As soon as he breathed, his eyes and speech cleared up, and he is already the former Roland, and is already free from malicious love. Charles ships are sailing, Christians are attacking Bizerte, the city is taken - mountains of corpses and flames to heaven. Agramant and two friends escape by sea, Roland and two friends pursue them; on a small Mediterranean island, the last triple duel takes place, Agramant dies, Roland is the winner, the war is over.

But the poem is not over yet. Ruggier received holy baptism, he comes to the Charles Court, he asks for the hand of Bradamante. But the old father of Bradamante is against it: Ruggier has a glorious name, but no stake or court, and he would rather marry Bradamante to Prince Leon, heir to the Greek Empire. In mortal grief, Ruggier rides away - to measure his strength with an opponent. On the Danube, Prince Leon is at war with the Bulgars; Ruggier comes to the aid of the Bulgars, performs miracles of feats of arms, Leon himself admires an unknown hero on the battlefield. The Greeks by cunning lure Ruggier into captivity, hand him over to the emperor, throw him into an underground dungeon - the noble Leon saves him from certain death, pays him honor and secretly keeps him with him. "I owe you my life," says the shocked Ruggier, "and I will give it for you at any moment."

These are not empty words. Bradamanta announces that she will marry only the one who will master her in a duel. Leon is sad: he will not stand against Bradamante. And then he turns to Ruggier: "Ride with me, go out into the field in my armor, defeat Bradamante for me." And Ruggier does not give himself away, he says: "Yes." On a large field, in front of Karl and all the paladins, the marriage battle lasts a long day: Bradamante is eager to hit the hated groom, showering him with a thousand blows. Ruggier aptly beats off every single one, but does not inflict a single one himself, so as not to even inadvertently injure his beloved. The audience marvels, Carl declares the guest the winner, Leon hugs Ruggier in a secret tent. "I owe you happiness," he says, "and I will give you everything you want at any moment."

But life is not sweet for Ruggier: he gives both his horse and armor, and he himself goes into the forest bowl to die of grief. He would have died if the good fairy, who cares about the future home of Este, had not intervened. Aeon finds Ruggier, Ruggier reveals himself to Aeon, nobility competes with nobility, Leon renounces Bradamante, truth and love triumph, Charles and his knights applaud. Ambassadors come from the Bulgars: they ask their savior for their kingdom; now even Father Bradamanta will not say that Ruggier has no stake or yard. A wedding, a feast, feasts, tournaments are coping, the wedding tent is embroidered with paintings to the glory of the future Este, but this is not yet the denouement.

On the last day, the one we almost forgot about appears: Rodomonte. By vow, he did not take up arms for a year and a day, and now he rode to challenge his former comrade-in-arms Ruggier: "You are a traitor to your king, you are a Christian, you are not worthy to be called a knight." The final duel begins. Equestrian battle - poles in chips, chips to the clouds. A foot battle - blood through armor, swords to smithereens, the fighters clenched their iron hands, both froze, and now Rhodomont falls to the ground, and Ruggier's dagger is in his visor. And, as in the "Aeneid", "his soul, once so proud and arrogant, flies off to the shores of hell with blasphemy."

M. L. Gasparov

In the prologue, the Foreigner asks the Nobleman who composed the comedy that is about to be played: several names are named (among others Alamanni, Ariosto, Bembo, Tasso), and then the Nobleman announces that Pietro Aretino wrote the play. It tells of two tricks committed in Rome - and this city lives in a different manner than Athens - so the comic style of the ancient authors is not completely observed.

Messer Mako and his servant immediately appear on the stage. From the first words it becomes clear: the Sienese youth is so stupid that only the lazy will not deceive him. He immediately informs the artist Andrea about his cherished goal of becoming a cardinal and agreeing with the king of France (with the pope, the more practical servant clarifies). Andrea advises first to turn into a courtier, because Messer Mako is clearly doing honor to his fatherland (the natives of Siena were considered stupid). Encouraged, Mako orders to buy a book about courtiers from a street peddler (a servant brings an essay about the Turks) and looks at the beauty in the window: it’s the Duchess of Rome otherwise - you need to do it when court manners are mastered.

The servants of Parabolano appear - this noble signor is languishing in love, and it is he who is destined to become a victim of the second trick. The aspiring Rosso heartily honors his master for his stinginess, complacency and hypocrisy. Valerio and Flamminio censure the owner for his trust in the rogue Rosso. Rosso immediately demonstrates his qualities: having agreed to sell lampreys, he informs the clerk of St. Peter's Cathedral that demons have moved into the fisherman - not having time to rejoice at how cleverly he cheated the buyer, the poor fellow falls into the clutches of the churchmen.

Master Andrea begins training Mako. it is not easy to learn court manners: you need to be able to use foul language, be envious and depraved, slanderous and ungrateful. The first act ends with the cries of a fisherman who was almost killed while exorcising demons: the unfortunate man curses Rome, as well as all who live in it, who love it and who believe in it.

In the next three acts, the intrigue develops in the alternation of scenes from Roman life. Master Andrea explains to Mako that Rome is a real mess, flamminio shares his pain with the old man Sempronio: in the old days it was a pleasure to serve, because a worthy reward was due for this, and now everyone is ready to devour each other. In response, Sempronio remarks that it is better to be in hell now than in court.

Overhearing how Parabolano repeats the name of Livia in a dream, Rosso hurries to Alwija, a procuress ready to seduce chastity itself. Alvija is in sorrow: her mentor, a harmless old woman, was sentenced to be burned, who is only to blame for poisoning her godfather, drowning a baby in a river and twisting her stag's neck, but on Christmas Eve she always behaved impeccably, and on Lent she did not allow herself anything . Expressing sympathy for this grievous loss, Rosso offers to get down to business: Alvija may well impersonate Livia's nurse and assure the owner that the beauty dries for him. Valerio also wants to help Parabolano and advises sending a tender message to the subject of passion: today's women let lovers right in the door, almost with the knowledge of their husband - morals in Italy have fallen so much that even siblings mate with each other without a twinge of conscience.

Master Andrea has his own joys: Messer Mako fell in love with a noble lady - Camilla and writes hilarious poems. The Sienese fool is sure to have unheard of success at court, for he is not just a blockhead, but a twenty-four-carat blockhead. Having agreed with a friend of Zoppino, the artist assures Mako that Camilla is exhausted from passion for him, but agrees to accept him only in the clothes of a porter. Mako willingly exchanges clothes with a servant, and Zoppino, dressed up as a Spaniard, shouts that the city has announced a search for the spy Mako, who arrived from Siena without a passport - the governor ordered this scoundrel to be castrated. To the laughter of pranksters, Mako runs away at full speed.

Rosso leads to the owner Alviju. The bawd easily extorts a necklace from a lover and paints how Livia yearns for it - the poor thing is looking forward to the night, because she firmly decided to either stop suffering or die. The conversation is interrupted by the appearance of Mako in the clothes of a porter: having learned about his misadventures, Parabolano vows to take revenge on the idler Andrea. Alvija is amazed at the gullibility of the noble signor, and Rosso explains that this narcissistic donkey sincerely believes that any woman should run after him. Alvija decides to give him instead of Livia the baker's wife Arcolano - a tasty morsel, you'll lick your fingers! Rosso assures that gentlemen have less taste than the dead - everyone swallows with joy!

Honest servants Valerio and Flamminio have a bitter conversation about modern morals. Flamminio declares that he has decided to leave Rome - a den of dishonor and depravity. You need to live in Venice - this is a holy city, a real earthly paradise, a refuge of reason, nobility and talent. No wonder only there they appreciated the divine Pietro Aretino and the magician Titian according to their merits.

Rosso informs Parabolano that everything is ready for a date, but the shy Livia begs to work with her in the dark - a well-known case, all women break down at first, and then they are ready to give themselves even in St. Peter's Square. On the eve of a stormy night, Alvija hurries to see the confessor and finds out, to her great joy, that the mentor also managed to save her soul: if the old woman is indeed burned, she will be Alvija a good intercessor in the next world, as she was in this one.

Master Andrea explains that Mako made a fool of himself by running away at the most inopportune moment - after all, the lovely Camille was looking forward to it! Tired of too long training, Mako asks to be melted into a courtier as soon as possible, and Andrea readily leads the ward to the master Mercurio. The scammers feed the Sienese laxative pills and put him in a cauldron.

Rosso asks Alvija for a small favor - to play a dirty trick on Valerio. The matchmaker complains to Parabolano that the scoundrel Valerio warned Livia's brother, a desperate thug who had already managed to kill four dozen guards and five bailiffs. But for the sake of such a noble signor, she is ready for anything - let Livia's brother finish her off, at least it will be possible to forget about poverty! Parabolano immediately hands Alvide the diamond, and kicks the astonished Valerio out of the house. Alvija, meanwhile, conspires with Tonya. The baker rejoices at the opportunity to annoy her drunken husband, and Arcolano, sensing something was wrong, decides to follow the zealous wife.

In anticipation of news from the matchmaker, Rosso does not waste time: faced with a Jewish junk dealer, he asks the price of a satin waistcoat and immediately fuses the unlucky merchant into the hands of the guards. Then the efficient servant informs Parabolano that at seven and a quarter they are waiting for him in the house of the virtuous Madonna Alvigi - the matter was settled to everyone's pleasure.

Messer Mako almost turns inside out from the pills, but he is so pleased with the operation that he wants to break the boiler - for fear that others would not take advantage. When a concave mirror is brought to him, he is horrified - and calms down only by looking into an ordinary mirror. Declaring that he wants to become not only a cardinal, but also a pope, Messer Mako begins to break into the house of a beauty he likes, who, of course, will not dare to refuse a court gentleman.

In the fifth act, all the storylines converge. The inconsolable Valerio curses the manners of the capital: as soon as the owner showed disfavor, the servants showed their true colors - everyone vied with each other trying to insult and humiliate. Tonya, dressed in her husband's clothes, indulges in bitter thoughts about the female lot: how much you have to endure from useless and jealous husbands! Master Andrea and Zoppino, wanting to teach Mako a little lesson, break into the beauty's house under the guise of Spanish soldiers - the poor Sienese jumps out of the window in his underwear and once again flees. Arcolano, having lost his pants, puts on his wife's dress with curses and ambushes him at the bridge.

Alvija invites Parabolano to his dove - the poor thing is so afraid of her brother that she appeared in men's clothes. Parabolano rushes to his beloved, and Rosso and Alvija wash his bones with pleasure. Then Rosso begins to complain about the meager life in Rome - it is a pity that the Spaniards did not wipe this vile city from the face of the earth! Hearing the cries of Parabolano, who finally saw his beloved, the pimp and the swindler rush to their heels. Alvija is the first to be grabbed, she blames everything on Rosso, and Tonya insists that she was dragged here by force. Faithful Valerio invites the owner to tell about this clever trick himself - then they will laugh at him less. Cured of love, Parabolano follows sound advice and, for a start, calms down the enraged Arcolano, who is eager to deal with his unfaithful wife. Following the deceived baker, Messer Mako rushes onto the stage in his underwear, and behind him runs the master Andrea with clothes in his hands. The artist swears that he is not a Spaniard at all - on the contrary, he managed to kill the robbers and take away the stolen goods. Immediately Rosso appears, followed by a fisherman and a Jew. The servant begs forgiveness from Parabolano, and he declares that a beautiful comedy should not have a tragic end: therefore, Messer Mako must make peace with Andrea, and the baker must recognize Tonya as a faithful and virtuous wife. Rosso deserves mercy for his extraordinary cunning, but he must pay off the fisherman and the Jew. The restless Alvija promises to get such a cutie for the good signor, which Livia is no match for. Parabolano laughingly rejects the services of a matchmaker and invites the whole company to dinner to enjoy this unparalleled farce together.

E. D. Murashkintseva

In the prologue, the author reports that he saw in a dream both a fable about Andreuccio, a Perugine (a character in the fifth short story of the second day in Boccaccio's Decameron - Aretino jokingly awarded his hero with his name), and the story of a false philosopher who decided to show off his horns, but was punished for neglecting the feminine floor, Two gossips have already entered the stage - it is time to check whether the dream has turned into reality.

Both storylines develop in the play in parallel and are in no way connected with each other. The first begins with female chatter: Betta says that she rented a room to a gemstone dealer from Perugia, his name is Bocaccio, and his chickens do not peck at money. In response, Mea exclaims that this is her former owner, a very nice person - she grew up in his house!

The second storyline opens with a dispute between Polidoro and Radicchio: the master talks about the heavenly face of his desired one, while the lackey extols healthy, ruddy maids - if it were his will, he would have made all of them countesses. Seeing the philosopher, Polidoro hastens to leave. Plataristotle shares with Salvadallo thoughts about female nature: these stupid creatures exude vileness and malice - truly a sage should not have married. The servant, giggling into his fist, objects that his master has nothing to be ashamed of, since his wife serves him only as a heating pad. The mother-in-law of the philosopher, Mona Papa, is talking with a friend about the atrocities of men: there is no more foul tribe on earth - they would be covered with pestilence, rot from a fistula, fall into the hands of an executioner, fall into hellish hell!

Mea ingenuously lays out to the harlot Tullia everything she knows about her fellow countryman: about his wife Santa, son Renzo and father, who has an illegitimate child in Rome from the beautiful Berta - father Boccaccio handed her half a coin of papal coinage, and gave the other to his son. Tullia, having decided to profit from the money of a rich Peruginian, immediately sends the maid Lisa to Betta with an order to lure Boccaccio to visit.

The philosopher's wife Tessa instructs the maid Nepitella to invite Polidoro, her lover, to the evening. Nepitella willingly fulfills the order, for there is nothing to stand on ceremony with negligent husbands. Radicchio, taking this opportunity, flirts with the maid: while the gentlemen are having fun, they could create a nice salad, because her name means "mint", and his - "chicory".

Lisa praises Bocaccio the charms of her mistress. Tullia, as soon as she sees her "brother", bursts into burning tears, shows a keen interest in her daughter-in-law Santa and nephew Renzo, and then promises to present half of the coin - it's a pity that the good broadsword has already left this world!

Plataristotle discusses with Salvalallo the problem of primordial essence, primary intelligence and primary ideas, but the scientific dispute is interrupted by the appearance of a furious Tessa.

Softened Boccaccio remains to spend the night with the "sister". The guards hired by Tullia try to capture him on a false charge of murder. A Peruginian in one shirt jumps out the window and falls into the latrine. Tullia responds to pleas to open the door with a contemptuous refusal, and the pimp Cacchadiavoli threatens to tear Bocaccio's head off. Only two thieves show compassion for the unfortunate and call with them to work - it would be nice to rob one dead person, but first you need to wash off the shit. Bocaccio is lowered on a rope into the well, and at that moment out of breath guards appear. The appearance of the evaporated fugitive confuses them, and they scatter screaming.

Plataristotle breaks away from thinking about the erogenous nature of the planets. Overhearing what the maid and his wife were whispering about, he learned that Tessa was confused with Polidoro. The philosopher wants to set a trap for his lovers in order to reason with his amusement, who always and in everything protects her beloved daughter, and stigmatizes her son-in-law.

Hidden thieves help Bocaccio to get out of the well. Then the friendly company goes to the church of St. Anfisa, where the bishop is buried in a precious robe. Raising the slab, the thieves demand that a newcomer climb into the grave - when he hands them a robe with a staff, they knock out a support. Boccaccio yells in a wild voice, and the accomplices are already looking forward to how the brave Peruginian will be pulled up when the guards come running to the screams, Radicchio, lying in wait for Nepitella, hears the joyful muttering of Plataristotle, who managed to lure Polidoro into his office and hurries to please Mona Palu with this news. The servant immediately warns Tessa. The prudent wife has a second key: she orders Nepitella to release her lover, and instead bring a donkey. The released Polidoro vows not to miss a single matins from now on, and to go on dates only with a lamp. Meanwhile, the triumphant Plataristotle, raising his mother-in-law from the bed, leads her to his house. Salvalallo obsequiously assents to every word of the owner, calling him the beacon of wisdom, but Mona Papa does not go into her pocket for a word, calling her son-in-law a donkey. Tessa intrepidly goes out to her husband's call, and Polidoro, as if by chance, appears in the alley, humming a song about love. Tessa resolutely unlocks the door of the study: at the sight of the donkey, Plataristotle turns pale, and Mona Papa curses her evil fate - what a scoundrel she had to intermarry with! Tessa announces that she will not linger for a second in the house where she had to endure so many humiliations: out of shame, she concealed her misfortune from her relatives, but now she can confess everything - this murderer, who imagines himself a philosopher, does not want to properly fulfill marital duties! Mother and daughter proudly leave, and Plataristotle can only curse his bad luck. Seeing home Polidoro, who can barely stand on his feet, Radicchio didactically says that you can’t get away with trouble from noble ladies - the love of maids is much better and more reliable.

Another trinity of robbers is sent to the tomb of the bishop - this time in cassocks. Fate favors them: the church gates are open, and a support is lying near the grave. Encouraging each other, the burglars get down to business, but then a ghost rises from under the stove, and they rush in all directions. Boccaccio praises the heavens and vows to immediately give thrust from this city. Luckily for him, Betta and Mea pass by; he tells them how, by the grace of Tullia, he almost died three deaths - first among dung beetles, then among fish, and finally among worms. The gossips take Boccaccio to bathe, and this is where the story of the ill-fated Peruginian ends.

Plataristotle comes to a sound conclusion that humility is worthy of a thinker: in the end, desire is generated by the nature of women, and not by the lustfulness of their thoughts - let Salvalallo persuade Tessa to return home. The mother and daughter soften when they hear that Plataristotle repents and admits his guilt. the philosopher compares Tessa with Plato's "Feast" and Aristotle's "Politics", and then announces that tonight he will begin to conceive an heir. Mona Papa cries with emotion, Tessa sobs with joy, family members receive an invitation to a new wedding. Nature triumphs in everything: left alone with the servant of the Mona of the Pope, Salvalallo goes on the assault on girlish virtue.

E. D. Murashkintseva

The memoirs of Benvenuto Cellini are written in the first person. According to the famous jeweler and sculptor, every person who has done something valiant is obliged to tell the world about himself - but this good deed should be started only after forty years. Benvenuto took up his pen in the fifty-ninth year of his life, and firmly decided to tell only about what was relevant to himself. (The reader of the notes should remember that Benvenuto had a rare ability to mangle both proper names and place names.)

The first book is devoted to the period from 1500 to 1539. Benvenuto reports that he was born into a simple but noble family. In ancient times, under the command of Julius Caesar, a brave military leader named Fiorino of Cellino served. When a city was founded on the Arno River,

Caesar decided to call it Florence, wanting to honor the comrade-in-arms, whom he singled out among all the others. The Cellini family had many properties, and even a castle in Ravenna. The ancestors of Benvenuto himself lived in Val d'Ambra like nobles. Once they had to send the young man Cristofano to Florence, because he started a feud with his neighbors. His son Andrea became very versed in architecture and taught this craft to children. Giovanni, Benvenuto's father, was especially successful in it. Giovanni could have chosen a girl with a rich dowry, but he married for love - Madonna Elisabetta Granacci. For eighteen years they had no children, and then a girl was born. The good Giovanni was no longer expecting a son, and when the Madonna Elisabetta was born with a male baby, the happy father named him "Desired" (Benvenuto). Signs foretold that the boy had a great future ahead of him. He was only three years old when he caught a huge scorpion and miraculously survived. At the age of five, he saw a lizard-like animal in the flames of the hearth, and his father explained that it was a salamander, which, in his memory, had not yet appeared to anyone alive. And by the age of fifteen, he accomplished so many amazing deeds that, for lack of space, it is better to keep silent about them.

Giovanni Cellini was famous for many arts, but most of all he loved to play the flute and tried to get his eldest son to like this. Benvenuto, on the other hand, hated cursed music and took up the instrument, just so as not to upset his good father. Having entered the training of the goldsmith Antonio di Sandro, he surpassed all other young men in the workshop and began to earn good money with his labors. It so happened that the sisters offended him by secretly giving the new camisole and cloak to their younger brother, and Benvenuto left Florence for Pisa out of annoyance, but continued to work hard there. Then he moved to Rome in order to study antiquities, and made some very beautiful gizmos, trying in everything to follow the canons of the divine Michelangelo Buonarroti, from which he never deviated. Returning at the urgent request of his father to Florence, he amazed everyone with his art, but there were envious people who began to slander him in every possible way. Benvenuto could not restrain himself: he hit one of them with his fist in the temple, and since he still did not let up and climbed into the fray, he brushed him off with a dagger, without causing much harm. The relatives of this Gerardo immediately ran to complain to the Council of Eight - Benvenuto was innocently sentenced to exile, and had to go back to Rome. One noble lady ordered him a setting for a diamond lily. And his comrade Lucagnolo - a capable jeweler, but a low and vile kind - carved a vase at that time and boasted that he would receive a lot of gold coins. However, Benvenuto was ahead of the arrogant redneck in everything: he was paid much more generously for a trifle than for a big thing, and when he himself undertook to make a vase for one bishop, he surpassed Lucagnolo in this art as well. Pala Clement, as soon as he saw the vase, burned with great love for Benvenuto. Even greater fame was brought to him by silver jugs, which he forged for the famous surgeon Jacomo da Carpi: showing them, he told stories that they were the work of ancient masters. This little business brought Benvenuto great fame, although he did not gain much in money.

After a terrible pestilence, the survivors began to love each other - this is how the commonwealth of sculptors, painters, and jewelers was formed in Rome. And the great Michelangelo from Siena publicly praised Benvenuto for his talent - he especially liked the medal, which depicted Hercules tearing the mouth of a lion. But then the war began, and the Commonwealth broke up. The Spaniards, under the leadership of Bourbon, approached Rome. Pala Clement fled in fear to the Castel Sant'Angelo, and Benvenuto followed him. During the siege, he was assigned to the cannons and accomplished many feats: he killed Bourbon with one well-aimed shot, and wounded the Prince of Orange with the second. It so happened that during the return a barrel of stones fell down and nearly hit Cardinal Farnese, Benvenuto hardly managed to prove his innocence, although it would have been much better if he had got rid of this cardinal at the same time. Pala Clement so trusted his jeweler that he commissioned the gold tiaras to be melted down in order to save them from the greed of the Spaniards. When Benvenuto finally arrived in Florence, there was a plague there too, and his father ordered him to flee to Mantua. Upon his return, he learned that all his relatives had died - only the younger brother and one of the sisters remained. The brother, who became a great warrior, served with the Duke of Lessandro of Florence. In an accidental skirmish, he was hit by an arquebus bullet and died in the arms of Benvenuto, who tracked down the killer and duly avenged himself.

The pope, meanwhile, moved to Florence by war, and friends persuaded Benvenuto to leave the city so as not to quarrel with his Holiness. At first everything went well, and Benvenuto was granted the post of mace-bearer, bringing two hundred skudos a year. But when he asked for a position of seven hundred crowns, envious people intervened, the Milanese Pompeo was especially zealous, trying to interrupt the cup ordered by the pope from Benvenuto. Enemies slipped dad a worthless jeweler Tobbia, and he was instructed to prepare a gift for the French king. Once Benvenuto accidentally killed his friend, and Pompeo immediately ran to the pope with the news that Tobbia had been killed. The enraged palas ordered Benvenuto to be seized and hanged, so he had to hide in Naples until everything was cleared up. Clement repented of his injustice, but still fell ill and soon died, and Cardinal Farnese was elected pope. Benvenuto quite by chance met with Pompeo, whom he did not want to kill at all, but it just so happened. The slanderers tried to set the new pope on him, but he said that such artists, the only ones of their kind, are not subject to the court of laws. However, Benvenuto considered it best to retire to Florence for a while, where Duke Lessandro did not want to let him go, threatening even death, but he himself fell victim to the killer, and Cosimo, the son of the great Giovanni de Medici, became the new duke. Returning to Rome, Benvenuto found that the envious had achieved their goal - the pope, although he granted him a pardon for the murder of Pompeo, turned away from him in his heart. Meanwhile, Benvenuto was already so famous that he was called to his service by the French king.

Together with his faithful students, Benvenuto went to Paris, where he received an audience with the monarch. That, however, was the end of the matter: the wickedness of the enemies and hostilities made it impossible to stay in France. Benvenuto returned to Rome and received many commissions. He had to drive away a worker from Perugia for idleness, and he planned to take revenge: he whispered to the pope that Benvenuto had stolen precious stones during the siege of the Castel Sant'Angelo and now has a fortune of eighty thousand ducats. The greed of Pagolo da Farnese and his son Pier Luigi knew no bounds: they ordered Benvenuto to be imprisoned, and when the accusation crumbled, they planned to kill him without fail. King Francis, having learned about this injustice, began to petition through the Cardinal of Ferrara, so that Benvenuto would be released to his service. The castellan of the castle, a noble and kind man, treated the prisoner with the greatest concern: he gave him the opportunity to freely walk around the castle and practice his favorite art. One monk was kept in the casemate. Taking advantage of Benvenuto's oversight, he stole the wax from him in order to make keys and escape. Benvenuto swore by all the saints that he was not guilty of the wickedness of the monk, but the castellan was so angry that he almost lost his mind. Benvenuto began to prepare for his escape and, having arranged everything in the best possible way, went downstairs on a rope woven from sheets. Unfortunately, the wall around the castle turned out to be too high, and he, breaking loose, broke his leg. The widow of Duke Lessandro, remembering his great labors, agreed to give him shelter, but the insidious enemies did not back down and again escorted Benvenuto to prison, despite the promise of the pope to spare him. Castellan, completely out of his mind, subjected him to such unheard-of torments that he was already saying goodbye to life, but then the Cardinal of Ferrara obtained from the pope consent to release the innocently condemned. In prison, Benvenuto wrote a poem about his sufferings - with this "capitolo" the first book of memoirs ends.

In the second book, Benvenuto tells about his stay at the court of Francis I and the Florentine Duke Cosimo. Having rested a little after the hardships of imprisonment, Benvenuto went to the Cardinal of Ferrara, taking with him his beloved students - Ascanio, Pagolo-Roman and Pagolo-Florentine. On the way, one postal keeper decided to start a quarrel, and Benvenuto only pointed a squeak at him as a warning, but a bullet that ricocheted off killed the insolent one on the spot, and his sons, trying to take revenge, slightly wounded the Pagolo-Roman. Upon learning of this, the Cardinal of Ferrara thanked heaven, for he promised the French king to bring Benvenuto by all means. They reached Paris without incident.

The king received Benvenuto extremely graciously, and this aroused the envy of the cardinal, who began to surreptitiously plot intrigues. He told Benvenuto that the king wanted to give him a salary of three hundred crowns, although for such money it was not worth leaving Rome. Deceived in his expectations, Benvenuto said goodbye to the students, and they cried and asked him not to leave them, but he firmly decided to return to his homeland. However, a messenger was sent after him, and the cardinal announced that he would be paid seven hundred crowns a year - the same as the painter Leonardo da Vinci received. Having seen the king, Benvenuto spoke out a hundred skudos to each of the students, and also asked to give him the castle of Little Nel for the workshop. The king willingly agreed, because the people who lived in the castle ate their bread for nothing. Benvenuto had to drive these idlers away, but the workshop turned out to be a success, and it was possible to immediately take on the royal order - a statue of silver Jupiter.

Soon the king with his court came to see the work, and everyone marveled at the wonderful art of Benvenuto. And Benvenuto also planned to make for the king a salt shaker of amazing beauty and a magnificent carved door, the most beautiful of which these Frenchmen have not seen. Unfortunately, it did not occur to him to win the favor of Madame de Tampes, who had a great influence on the monarch, and she harbored a grudge against him. And the people whom he expelled from the castle brought a lawsuit against him and annoyed him so much that he lay in wait for them with a dagger and taught them wisdom, but did not kill anyone. On top of all the troubles, Pagolo Miccheri, a Florentine student, entered into fornication with the model Katerina, they had to beat the slut to bruises, although she was still needed for work. Traitor Pagolo Benvenuto forced to marry this French whore, and then every day he called her to his place to draw and sculpt, and at the same time indulged in carnal pleasures with her in revenge on her cuckold husband. Meanwhile, the Cardinal of Ferrara persuaded the king not to pay money to Benvenuto; the good king could not resist the temptation, because the emperor was moving with his army to Paris and the treasury was empty. Madame de Tampa also continued to intrigue, and Benvenuto, with pain in his heart, decided to temporarily leave for Italy, leaving the workshop for Ascanio and Pagolo-Roman. The king was whispered that he had taken three precious vases with him, which was impossible to do, since the law forbids this, so Benvenuto, at the first request, gave these vases to the traitor Ascanio.

In 1545, Benvenuto came to Florence - solely to help his sister and her six daughters. The duke began to lavish caresses, begging him to stay and promising unheard-of favors. Benvenuto agreed and bitterly regretted it. For the workshop, they gave him a miserable little house, which he had to patch up on the go. The court sculptor Bandinello praised his virtues in every possible way, although his bad crafts could only cause a smile, but Benvenuto surpassed himself by casting a statue of Perseus from bronze. It was a creation so beautiful that people did not get tired of marveling at it, and Benvenuto asked the duke ten thousand crowns for the work, and he gave only three with great creaking. Many times Benvenuto recalled the magnanimous and generous king, with whom he parted so frivolously, but nothing could be corrected, for the insidious students did everything so that he could not return. The duchess, who at first defended Benvenuto in front of her husband, was terribly angry when the duke, on his advice, refused to give money for the pearls she liked - Benvenuto suffered solely for his honesty, because he could not conceal from the duke that these stones should not be bought. As a result, the mediocre Bandinello received a new large order, who was given marble for the statue of Neptune. Troubles rained down on Benvenuto from all sides: a man nicknamed Zbietta deceived him in a contract for the sale of a manor, and the wife of this Zbietta poured sublimate into his gravy, so that he barely survived, although he did not manage to expose the villains. The French queen, visiting her native Florence, wanted to invite him to Paris to sculpt a tombstone for her late husband, but the duke prevented this. A pestilence began, from which the prince died - the best of all the Medicis. Only when the tears had dried did Benvenuto go to Pisa. (The second book of memoirs ends at this phrase.)

E. D. Murashkintseva

The Lord Almighty from his heavenly throne turned his all-seeing gaze to Syria, where the crusader army was encamped. For the sixth year the warriors of Christ fought in the East, many cities and kingdoms submitted to them, but the Holy City of Jerusalem was still a stronghold of the infidels. Reading in human hearts as in an open book, He saw that of the many glorious leaders, only the great Gottfried of Bouillon is fully worthy of leading the crusaders to the sacred feat of liberating the Holy Sepulcher. Archangel Gabriel carried this message to Gottfried, and he reverently accepted God's will.

When Gottfried called the leaders of the Franks and said that God had chosen him to be the head of them all, a murmur arose in the assembly, for many leaders were not inferior to Gottfried either in the nobility of the family or in exploits on the battlefield. But then Peter the Hermit raised his voice in support, and everyone to the last heeded the words of the inspirer and honored adviser of the soldiers, and the next morning the mighty army, in which under the banner of Gottfried of Bouillon rallied the color of chivalry throughout Europe, set out on a campaign. The East trembled.

And now the Crusaders have set up camp in Emmaus, in view of the Jerusalem walls. Here, the ambassadors of the king of Egypt appeared in their tents and offered to retreat from the Holy City for a rich ransom. Having heard a decisive refusal from Gottfried, one of them went home, while the second, the Circassian knight Argant, eager to quickly draw his sword against the enemies of the Prophet, galloped to Jerusalem.

Jerusalem at that time was ruled by King Aladin, a vassal of the Egyptian king and an evil oppressor of Christians. When the crusaders went on the attack, Aladin's army met them at the city walls, and a fierce battle ensued, in which non-Christians fell without number, but many brave knights also died. The crusaders suffered especially heavy damage from the mighty Argant and the great warrior maiden Clorinda, who arrived from Persia to help Aladin. The incomparable Tancred met Clorinda in battle and blew her helmet with a blow of a spear, but, seeing a beautiful face and golden braids, struck down by love, he lowered his sword.

The bravest and most beautiful of the knights of Europe, the son of Italy, Rinald, was already on the city wall when Gottfried ordered the army to return to the camp, for the time had not yet come for the Holy City to fall.

Seeing that the stronghold of the enemies of the Lord almost fell, the king of the underworld summoned his countless servants - demons, furies, chimeras, pagan gods - and ordered all the dark power to fall on the crusaders. The servant of the devil, among others, was the magician Idraot, king of Damascus. He ordered his daughter Armida, who eclipsed the beauty of all the virgins of the East, to go to the camp of Gottfried and, using all the female art, bring discord into the ranks of the soldiers of Christ.

Armida appeared in the camp of the Franks, and none of them, except Gottfried and Tancred, could not resist the spell of her beauty. Calling herself the princess of Damascus, deprived of the throne by force and deceit, Armida begged the leader of the crusaders to give her a small detachment of selected knights in order to overthrow the usurper with them; in exchange, she promised Gottfried the alliance of Damascus and all kinds of help. In the end, Gottfried ordered ten brave men to be chosen by lot, but as soon as there was talk of who would lead the detachment, the leader of the Norwegians, Gernand, at the instigation of the demon, started a quarrel with Rinald and fell from his sword; the incomparable Rinald was forced into exile.

Disarmed by love, Armida led the knights not to Damascus, but to a gloomy castle that stood on the shores of the Dead Sea, in whose waters neither iron nor stone sinks. Within the walls of the castle, Armida revealed her true face, offering the captives either to renounce Christ and oppose the Franks, or to perish; only one of the knights, the despicable Rambald, chose life. She sent the rest in shackles and under reliable protection to the king of Egypt.

The crusaders, meanwhile, conducted a regular siege, surrounded Jerusalem with a rampart, built machines for the assault, and the inhabitants of the city strengthened the walls. Bored with idleness, the proud son of the Caucasus, Argant, went out into the field, ready to fight with anyone who would accept his challenge. The brave Otgon was the first to rush to Argant, but was soon defeated by the infidels,

Then it was Tancred's turn. Two heroes came together, as once Ajax and Hector at the walls of Ilion. The fierce battle lasted until the very night, without revealing the winner, and when the heralds interrupted the duel, the wounded fighters agreed at dawn to continue it.

Erminia, the daughter of the king of Antioch, watched the duel from the city walls with bated breath. Once she was a prisoner of Tancred, but the noble Tancred gave the princess freedom, Erminia unwanted, for she burned with irresistible love for her captor. Skillful in medicine, Erminia set out to penetrate the camp of the crusaders in order to heal the wounds of the knight. To do this, she cut off her marvelous hair and put on the armor of Clorinda, but on the outskirts of the camp she was found by the guards and rushed after her. Tancred, thinking that it was a warrior dear to his heart, who because of him endangered her life, and wanting to save her from her pursuers, also set off after Herminia. He did not catch up with her and, having gone astray, was lured by deceit into the enchanted castle of Armida, where he became her prisoner.

Meanwhile, morning came and no one went out to meet Argant. The Circassian knight began to revile the cowardice of the Franks, but not one of them dared to accept the challenge, until at last Raymond, the Toulouse count, rode forward. When the victory was already almost in the hands of Raymond, the king of darkness seduced the best Saracen archer to shoot an arrow at the knight and himself directed its flight. The arrow pierced into the joint of the armor, but the guardian angel saved Raymond from certain death.

Seeing how insidiously the laws of duel were violated, the crusaders rushed at the infidels. Their fury was so great that they almost crushed the enemy and broke into Jerusalem. But this day was not determined by the Lord for the capture of the Holy City, therefore He allowed the infernal army to come to the aid of the infidels and hold back the onslaught of Christians.

The dark forces did not abandon their plan to crush the Crusaders. Inspired by the fury Alecto, Sultan Soliman, with an army of nomadic Arabs, suddenly attacked the camp of the Franks at night. And he would have won if the Lord had not sent the archangel Michael to deprive the infidels of the help of hell. The crusaders perked up, closed their ranks, and then the knights, freed by Rinald from Armidian captivity, arrived quite in time. The Arabs fled, and the mighty Soliman also fled, in the battle he killed many Christian soldiers.

The day came, and Peter the Hermit blessed Gottfried to attack. After serving a prayer service, the crusaders, under the cover of siege engines, surrounded the walls of Jerusalem, the infidels fiercely resisted, Clorinda sowed death in the ranks of Christians with her arrows, one of which Gottfried himself was wounded in the leg. The angel of God healed the leader, and he again went out onto the battlefield, but the darkness of the night forced him to give the order to retreat.

At night, Argant and Clorinda made a sortie to the camp of the Franks and set fire to the siege engines with a mixture prepared by the magician Ismen. As they retreated, pursued by the crusaders, the city's defenders slammed the gates shut in the darkness, not noticing that Clorinda had remained outside. Here Tancred entered into battle with her, but the warrior was in armor unfamiliar to him, and the knight recognized his beloved only by inflicting a mortal blow on her. Brought up in the Muslim faith, Clorinda knew, however, that her parents were the Christian rulers of Ethiopia and that, according to the will of her mother, she should have been baptized in infancy. Mortally wounded, she asked her killer to perform this sacrament over her and she gave up her spirit as a Christian.

So that the Crusaders could not build new machines, Ismen let a host of demons into the only forest in the area. None of the knights dared to enter the enchanted thicket, with the exception of Tancred, but even he could not dispel the sinister spell of the magician.

Despondency reigned in the camp of the crusading host, when Gottfried in a dream revealed that only Rinald would overcome witchcraft and that only before him would the defenders of Jerusalem finally tremble. At one time, Armida vowed to take cruel revenge on Rinald, who had recaptured the captured knights from her, but as soon as she saw him, she was inflamed with irresistible love. Her beauty also struck the young man to the very heart, and Armida was transported with her lover to the distant enchanted Happy Isles. It was to these islands that two knights went after Rinald: the Dane Karl and Ubald. With the help of a kind wizard, they managed to get across the ocean, the waters of which had previously been plied only by Ulysses. Having overcome many dangers and temptations, Gottfried's ambassadors found Rinald forgotten about everything in the midst of the joys of love. But as soon as Rinald saw the battle armor, he remembered his sacred duty and followed Charles and Ubald without hesitation. Enraged, Armida rushed to the camp of the king of Egypt, who, with an army recruited throughout the East, went to the aid of Aladin. Inspiring the eastern knights, Armida promised to become the wife of the one who would defeat Rinald in battle.

And now Gottfried gives the order for the last attack. In a bloody battle, the Christians crushed the infidels, of whom the most terrible - the invincible Argant - fell at the hands of Tancred. The crusaders entered the Holy City, and Aladin with the remnants of the army took refuge in the Tower of David, when clouds of dust rose on the horizon - then the Egyptian army went to Jerusalem.

And the battle began again, fierce, for the army of the infidels was strong. In one of the most difficult moments for Christians, Aladin led soldiers from the Tower of David to help her, but everything was in vain. With God's help, the crusaders took over, the non-Christs fled. The king of Egypt became a prisoner of Gottfried, but he let him go, not wanting to hear about a rich ransom, for he did not come to trade with the East, but to fight.

Scattering the army of the infidels, Gottfried with his companions entered the liberated city and, without even taking off his blood-stained armor, knelt before the Holy Sepulcher.

D. A. Karelsky

Dan, the heir to the throne of the kingdom of Yan, lived as a hostage in the country of Qin. The local prince sneered at him, did not let him go home. Offended, Dan decided to take revenge on the offender. Finally escaping from captivity, he began to summon the bravest warriors to march against Lord Qin. But the plans of the heir Danya were opposed by his mentor. He advised not to attack Qin alone, but to attract allies.

"The heart can't wait!" exclaimed the heir. Then the mentor introduced to his master the famous sage Tian Guang, who was received at the court with all possible honor. For three months, the sage thought about how to help Dan, and then advised him to choose a certain Jing Ke from all the brave men of the kingdom, capable of accomplishing a great deed of revenge. The heir accepted the advice, and asked the sage to keep everything a secret. He, offended by distrust, committed suicide - swallowed his tongue and died.

When Jing Ke learned what he was called to do, he developed a special plan: to present the head of his enemy and a drawing of the land he had not yet conquered to the ruler of Qin, and then kill the villain. With that, he went to Qin.

His plan almost succeeded. When he had already raised the dagger to punish the Qin prince, and listed all his faults, he humbly asked permission to listen to the zither before his death. The concubine began to sing, the prince broke free and rushed away. Jing Ke threw a dagger, but missed. But the prince drew his sword and cut off both hands of the attacker. As they say, he did not avenge his master, and did not accomplish a feat.

Somehow, a soothsayer prophesied a great fate for the future wife of the Han emperor. She really gave birth to a son who became Sovereign U-di.

From childhood, the boy was distinguished by a clear mind, he knew how to attract hearts to himself. At first, the son of the concubine Li was considered the heir, but his mother-in-law, the emperor's sister, acted on the side of Wudi, and soon he was declared the successor of the reigning sovereign, and at the age of fourteen he sat on the throne.

Emperor Wudi was passionately interested in the doctrine of immortality, magic and sorcery. From all sides, magicians and sorcerers flocked to the court. He also loved secret travels around the country. At the same time, he got into history more than once: either the robbers attacked, or the old man, the owner of the road courtyard, planned the attack, and only the noble concubine saved the emperor, for which she was awarded the highest award. The first dignitary of the sovereign even had to commit suicide in order to discourage U-di from such adventures.

The sovereign was very inquisitive and collected rare books, wonderful animals and other curiosities, and court poets sang all this in verse. And the emperor himself did not disdain poetry. He also loved to welcome the most worthy people at court. True, he executed them for the slightest offense. Ji An tried to reason with the sovereign, but he did not heed the advice. Ji An died of grief.

Dreaming of prolonging his days, U-di met with the goddess of the West Sivanmu, in whose gardens peaches of longevity grew. In addition, on the advice of magicians, he kept thousands of concubines in the palace, for he believed that merging with a woman would grant immortality.

Once, while traveling around his possessions, the sovereign saw a beauty who, in due time, gave birth to his heir and soon died. A wonderful aroma flowed from her coffin - the concubine was not an earthly woman.

But no matter how hard U-di tried to achieve immortality, he died in due time and was buried. It is said that even after his death he visited his concubines and shared a bed with them. For a long time there were all sorts of evangelistic signs. It is true that the late emperor became a celestial.

I heard this story from one of its participants, the princely grandson Yin, and I remembered it almost verbatim.

Inya had a relative, a husband. his cousin. His name was Zheng. He was very fond of wine and women.

Once friends went to a feast. Zheng suddenly remembered an urgent matter and set off on a donkey to the southern quarter of the capital, promising to catch up with a friend soon. Along the way, he met three women, one of whom turned out to be a real beauty. An acquaintance began, and after a while, Zheng was already feasting with a new girlfriend at her house. After a stormy night, he looked into the nearest tavern and found out that he confessed to a fox that lures men. However, love turned out to be stronger than fear, and Zheng was looking for a new meeting with the beauty. Finally, he got them to live together. It was then that Yin became interested in a friend's new concubine. Shocked by her beauty, he coveted her love, but she did not give in. Yin helped a friend and his beloved with money, provisions, and the beauty often arranged his heart affairs. Using her advice, Zheng also managed to get rich.

One day, Zheng needed to go to distant lands on business. He dreamed of taking Ren with him. No matter how she resisted, he still insisted on his own. On the way, she proudly pranced on horseback. As they passed by the river bank, a pack of dogs jumped out of the thickets. Ren fell to the ground, turned into a fox and ran away. The dogs overtook the fox and tore it to pieces. Zheng and his friend Yin were inconsolable. It is a pity that Zheng, a narrow-minded man, was little interested in the character of his wife - he would have learned about the laws of reincarnation and about miracles!

Fen Chunyu became famous as a brave warrior. He was generous, hospitable, but obstinate. And he didn't shy away from wine. Therefore, he was demoted from the post of deputy commander of the troops of the Huainan region. But he doesn’t care: he settled in his own house, which is near the old, old ash tree, and drank more than ever.

Once he was very drunk, two friends put him to sleep on the veranda. It was then that Chunyu dreamed that messengers had come to call him to the ruler of the Huainan country.

They met him there with unprecedented honor. The first adviser came out to meet him and escorted him to the master. He offered Chunyu his daughter as a wife. Soon the wedding was played. Among the numerous servants were two old friends of Chunyu, and the ruler in a conversation once mentioned his father, who disappeared many years ago in the lands of the northern barbarians. It turned out that he was among the subjects of the ruler of the Huainan country. You can't see him, but you can write a letter. The father did not hesitate to respond. He was interested in everything and promised his son a meeting in the future, even called the exact year.

One way or another, Chunyu became the ruler of the Nanke region, and his two friends became the chief assistants to the ruler. For twenty years he ruled the region, his people prospered. But then there was a war with the Tanlo country. The army was led by a brave friend of Chanyu, but was defeated, fell ill and died. Then death overtook Chanyu's wife, with whom he had five children. The second friend remained to manage in Nanke, and Chunyu took the body of his wife to the capital, where they performed the funeral ceremony. For many more years, Chunyu continued to faithfully serve the lord, but he suddenly suspected that his son-in-law was a danger to the country of Huainan. And then a certain dignitary demanded to move the capital to another place in order to avoid trouble. Then Lord Chunyu ordered to go home, visit his relatives, and explained to his surprised son-in-law that it was time for him to return to the mortal world.

Chunyu woke up on the veranda of his own house and realized that it was all just a dream. And he told his friends about what had happened. Then he led them to an old ash tree. Behind the hollow, a wide passage was discovered, in which mountains of the earth were visible - exactly like city fortifications and palaces, where countless ants scurried about. Among them are two large ones, which were served by crumb ants. The hill where Chunyu's wife was buried was also found. In a word, everything coincided with the dream.

And at night a storm came up, and in the morning there were no ants in the hollow. That's right, indeed they moved their capital to another place.

He found out about his friends who helped him in Nanke. One died of illness in a neighboring village, the other was dying. Struck by everything that happened, Chunyu refused women and wine, and became carried away by the wisdom of hermits. And he died exactly in the year in which the meeting was appointed for him by his father.

In ancient times, a certain Taoist monk, the elder Lu, who comprehended the secret of immortality, met a young man named Lu at an inn. They began to talk, and the young man began to complain about his unfortunate fate: he had studied for so many years, but everything vegetated without a great field. Then he began to be overcome by sleep, and the elder offered him his headboard made of green jade with holes on the sides. No sooner had the young man bowed his head than, illumined by light, the holes began to widen, and, going inside, the young man found himself near his own house.

Soon he got married, began to get richer day by day, and then he succeeded in his official career. The emperor himself nominated him. Ruling the Shen region, Lu favored the local farmers with an irrigation canal. He later rose to the rank of governor of the metropolitan area.

There was a military turmoil in the country. However, on the battlefield, Lu was lucky and defeated the enemy. The emperor generously rewarded him with ranks and titles. However, the envious did not doze off. The sovereign was informed that Lu had planned treason, and by the highest command he was ordered to be imprisoned. Then Lu bitterly regretted his youthful desire for service!

More than once the vicissitudes of his career lay in wait for him, but each time he rose again until he became decrepit. He himself decided to ask the sovereign for his resignation, only he refused. Lou died there.

... And at the same moment a young man woke up on a magical headboard. Now he knew the futility of his dreams, and riches, losses and fortunes. The young man thanked the elder and with a bow left.

Not so long ago, there lived a student named Zhang, a young man of rare virtues, with a refined soul. He was already thirty-three years old, and he had not yet had a lover. When friends marveled at his modesty, he said in response that he simply had not yet met the one who would respond to his feelings.

Once in the city of Pu, he accidentally met his distant relative. It turned out that she, with her son and daughter, fled from the soldiers' riot that happened in their area, and took refuge in Pu. Zhang managed through friends to make sure that guards were posted near the house of the unfortunate fugitives - his relatives were afraid to lose their property. In gratitude, the aunt gave Zhang a reception where she introduced her children.

The girl was only seventeen springs. She was so extraordinarily good, good-natured, that even in modest clothes, without a magnificent hairstyle, she wounded the heart of a young man. Zhang thought for a long time how to reveal his feelings to her, and decided to trust the servant Hong-nyan, but she became embarrassed and only babbled something about matchmaking.

And Zhang, at the thought of how long the matchmaking would last, was downright crazy. Then, on the advice of the maid, he wrote poems to the girl. Soon the answer came, which seemed to the lover an invitation to a date. At night, he crept into the girl's room, but met with a sharp rebuff from her side.

For several days he walked like a dead man. But one night, Ying-ying (such was the girl's nickname) herself came to him, and from that time they indulged in secret love. Ying-ying, although she was perfection itself, kept herself modest, rarely said a word, and was even ashamed to play the zither,

It's time for Zhang to go to the capital. Ying-ying did not reproach her lover, only for the first time she took a zither with him and played a mournful melody, and then burst into tears and ran away.

Zhang failed at the exams in the capital, but decided not to return home. He wrote a letter to his beloved and received an answer. Ying-ying wrote about her eternal love and great shame. She did not hope for a meeting and sent Zhang a jasper bracelet in memory of herself, for jasper is hard and pure, and the bracelet has neither beginning nor end;

a bamboo mortar, which kept traces of her tears, and a skein of tangled silk - a sign of her confused feelings.

Ying-ying's letter became known to some of Zhang's friends. They questioned him about what had happened, and he explained that women had been the source of disasters from time immemorial. He, they say, would not have had enough virtue to overcome the destructive spell, so he overcame his feeling.

Ying-ying was given in marriage, Zhang also married. The last greeting from her was in verse and ended with the lines:

The young rake and spendthrift, having abandoned the affairs of the family, did not know how to hold back in reckless spending. He let all his wealth go to the wind, and none of his relatives wanted to shelter him. Hungry, he wandered around the city, complaining and groaning.

Suddenly, an unknown old man appeared before him and offered as much money as he needed for a comfortable life. The embarrassed Du Zichun (as our rake was called) named a small amount, but the elder insisted on three million. They were enough for a two-year revelry, and then Du again went around the world.

And again the old man appeared before him and again gave money - now ten million. All good intentions to change life immediately disappeared, temptations overcame the reveler, and two years later the money was gone.

For the third time, the dissolute rake gave the old man a terrible oath not to waste money in vain and received twenty million. The benefactor made an appointment for him in a year. He really settled down, arranged family affairs, gave gifts to poor relatives, married brothers, married sisters. So the year flew by.

Du met with the old man. Together they went to the halls that could not belong to mere mortals. A pill of immortality was being prepared in a huge cauldron. The elder, throwing off worldly robes, found himself in the yellow clothes of a clergyman. Then he took three white stone pills, dissolved them in wine, and gave them to Du Zichun to drink. He seated him on a tiger skin and warned that, no matter how terrible the pictures were opened to his eyes, he did not dare to utter a word, because all this would be only an obsession, a haze.

As soon as the old man disappeared, hundreds of warriors with drawn blades attacked Zichun, who, under threat of death, demanded that he give his name. It was scary, but Zichun remained silent.

Ferocious tigers, lions, vipers and scorpions appeared, threatening to devour him, sting him, but Zichun remained silent. Then a downpour poured, thunder boomed, lightning flashed. It seemed that the sky would collapse, but Zichun did not flinch. Then he was surrounded by servants of hell - demons with evil muzzles, and began to frighten him by placing a boiling cauldron in front of Zichun. Then they took up his wife, who begged her husband for mercy. Du Zichun remained silent. She was cut into pieces. Silence. Then Zichun was also killed.

He was thrown into the underworld and again subjected to horrific torture. But, remembering the words of the Taoist, Zichun remained silent even here. The lord of the underworld commanded him to be born again, but not a man, but a woman.

Zichun was born a girl who grew into a rare beauty. But no one heard a single word from her. She got married and gave birth to a son. The husband did not believe that his wife was mute. He planned to make her speak. But she was silent. Then, in a rage, he grabbed the child and hit his head on a stone. Forgetting about the ban, the mother, beside herself, screamed with a desperate cry.

The cry had not yet died away, when Zichun was sitting again on the tiger skin, and the old Taoist stood in front of him. He sadly admitted that his ward managed to renounce everything earthly, except for love, which means that he will not be immortal, but will have to continue to live as a person.

Zichun returned to the people, but he was very sorry about the broken oath. However, the Taoist elder never met him again.

In ancient times, a son grew up in the family of a noble dignitary, a young man of extraordinary talents. Father was proud of him.

It's time to go to the state exams in the capital. The young man entered Chang'an through the gates of the entertainment district and immediately spotted a beauty near one of the houses. It seems that she also noted the young man. From people, our hero learned that the maiden Li is greedy and insidious, but nevertheless made acquaintance with her. And she bewitched him right away. They settled together. The young man abandoned his friends, classes, you know, from theatrical performances and walked around the revels. First the money ran out. Then I had to sell the horses, the carriage, and then the servants' turn came.

The beauty, seeing that her lover was impoverished, conceived a cunning plan. She lured him into the house of allegedly her aunt, and she herself slipped away under the pretext of a sudden illness of her mother. The young man searched for her, but to no avail. I realized that he was simply cheated. He began to wither from grief, and people, seeing how close he was to death, took him to a funeral home.

However, due to the concerns of the funeral home employees, the unfortunate man gradually came to his senses and began to help the owner. He especially succeeded in singing funeral laments, became known in the city. Soon, even a rival funeral home lured him, and when a competition was held between the competitors, it was the young man who brought victory to the new owner with his singing.

Unfortunately, the father, who happened to be in the capital on business, recognized his own son in the performer of funeral hymns and, in anger, beat him with whips to a pulp. Comrades tried to nurse him, but despaired: a barely alive young man wandered around the city, asking for alms. He accidentally came across the house of his beloved. Horrified by what she had done, the beauty began to nurse him and succeeded. Then she conceived the idea of ​​making the young man more interested in the sciences again. For two years, day after day, she forced him to study before his former knowledge returned. It took another year to bring them to a shine. The young man passed the exams so that the fame of him thundered throughout the country. But the beautiful Li did not calm down. She made her lover work even harder. Finally, at the capital's examinations, he turned out to be the best and received a high state post.

Going with the beautiful Lee to a new place of service, he met his own father, who, admiring the success of his son, forgave him all his sins. Moreover, having learned about the role his beloved played in the life of a young man, his father insisted on their speedy marriage. The beauty became a truly exemplary wife, and among their descendants we meet in many worthy scientists and statesmen.

A girl named Yang was orphaned early. The reigning emperor Xuanzong honored with his favor, elevated to the title of "guifei" ("precious concubine") and generously bestowed. A rain of mercy poured down on the entire Yang family, sisters and brothers acquired unprecedented power.

Gradually, the emperor stopped visiting other palace concubines. He spent days and nights with Yang Guifei, pleasing her with performances of skilled dancers, musicians, jugglers, magicians, tightrope walkers. The affection of the emperor grew stronger, and the influence of the Yang family grew, no one could compete with them anymore, There were no number of gifts.

Several times the emperor tried to alienate Yang Guifei from himself for various faults, but he missed her so much that he immediately returned her to the palace.

The years of great love flowed serenely, until one of the imperial commanders, An Lushan, rebelled. It was then that it became clear how the people hated the Yang family, equal in power and wealth to the sovereign himself. There was discontent among the troops. Soldiers loyal to the emperor first dealt with the minister from the Yang family, killing his son and other relatives at the same time. Then they demanded the life of Yang Guifei from the emperor. Only when the rebels saw the dead body of the hated concubine did they calm down.

The rest of the days the emperor inconsolably yearned for his beloved. Everything in the palace reminded me of her. At his behest, the Taoist sorcerer went to the afterlife, where he met with Yang Guifei. He promised her a quick meeting with the emperor. And in fact, the sovereign soon died and in his new life he was forever united with his precious girlfriend.

Even in ancient times, people noticed that life is full of vicissitudes and every act can lead to the most unexpected consequences. So, a certain scientist, who succeeded in the capital's exams, reporting this in a letter to his wife, thoughtlessly joked that, they say, he was bored alone and took a concubine. The wife joked back: she got bored and got married. Their letters fell into the wrong hands, everything was taken seriously, it reached the emperor - and the scientist lost his high post. Here's a joke for you! But our story is about something else.

A certain Liu was not favored by fate. Every day his affairs were getting worse: he was completely impoverished. He had no children by his first wife, Ms. Wang. Even before he was completely ruined, he took a second wife into the house. All three lived in love and harmony and hoped for better times.

Once at the birthday party of the father-in-law, the father of the first wife, they started talking about the plight of the family. The father-in-law lent fifteen bundles of coins to his son-in-law, so that he opened a trade, and ordered his daughter to stay in her parents' house until her husband's business improved. Liu took the money and went to his second wife, who guarded the house.

On the way, I turned to a friend for advice on how best to manage my money, and drank too much. He came home drunk, and when asked by his second wife, take it and blurt out: they say, he sold you to one person, so he received a deposit. He said and fell asleep. And the second wife decided to go to her parents to wait for the buyer there. But at night one is afraid to go, so she spent the night with an old neighbor, and in the morning set off.

In the meantime, a certain player who lost to dust wandered into the house of a sleeping husband. He dreamed of stealing something, and here is such a pile of money. But the husband woke up, wanted to raise a cry, only the thief grabbed an ax and killed the unfortunate one.

The body was found. The second wife was suspected of the murder, who was seized on the way to her parents. Unfortunately, her random companion, who sold the silk, found exactly fifteen bundles of coins in a knapsack. The judge did not want to delve into the case, everything testified against the suspects. They were executed.

Meanwhile, the first wife wore mourning for a year, and then decided to move to her father's house. On the way, she fell into the clutches of robbers and, in order to avoid reprisal, agreed to become the wife of their leader. They lived happily, the wife persuaded her husband to quit the terrible craft and engage in trade. He agreed. And once he confessed to his wife in murder. From his story, the woman realized that it was he who killed her first husband. She hurried to the city to the judge and revealed everything to him. The robber was captured. He confessed to everything. When his head rolled off his shoulders at the frontal place, the widow sacrificed it to her first husband, his second wife and her innocent companion.

Such are the disasters caused by an accidental joke!

One powerful man, nicknamed Li-langzhong, once bought a thirteen-year-old slave girl on occasion. It turned out that she was not inclined to music or housework, so he decided to return her to her former mistress. The girl begged not to do this, promised to thank her, and over time, she not only learned to sing and dance, but also became an extraordinary beauty.

Soon a passionate love arose between them.

Somehow, in the middle of the night, the beauty imperceptibly disappeared right from the bedchamber. Lee became angry, suspecting a secret love rendezvous. When the girl appeared in the morning, he attacked her with reproaches. I had to admit that she was not from the world of people, but not evil spirits either. On the last day of each moon, she must appear before the messenger of the god of the earth. Li didn't believe it and the next time he detained the maiden. She slipped away anyway, but, returning, showed him her cut back - she was punished for being late. Since then, Li has not been angry anymore.

It soon became clear that the maiden was a skilled healer and soothsayer. When Lee was about to leave one day for a year on business, she predicted the death of his wife, strife with officials, and resignation. He persuaded her to go together, but she explained that she had no right to leave these places.

Everything happened as the beauty predicted. Lee returned and they began to live together. Once Xiaolian told that in her last birth she defiled herself with vile slander, cunning, slander, killed her mistress, seduced her master and was doomed to turn into a fox as a punishment. Today she has repented and begs Li, after her imminent death, to go outside the gate, meet the fox hunter and buy from him the one with long purple hair in her ears. This fox must be buried according to the human rite.

Everything happened as Xiaolian said. But Lee kept his promise. Since then, the place where he buried his beloved has been called Fox Mountain.

Once upon a time, a young man named Wang Xie, from a wealthy family that traded in maritime trade, equipped a ship and sailed with goods to distant lands. We had been sailing for about a month when a fierce storm broke out. The ship soon split in two. Only Wang Xie managed to escape from the whole team.

For three days he was carried by the sea, until he was nailed to the ground. I climbed ashore, and towards me was an old man and an old woman, dressed in all black. To Van's surprise, they recognized him as their master and lord, asked him about what had happened, fed him, warmed him up.

A month later, he was presented to the local sovereign.

More time passed, and Wang Xie married a beauty, the daughter of an old man with an old woman. They lived together. He learned from his wife that the local country is called the Kingdom of Black Clothes, but why his parents call Wang Xie the master, the wife did not tell him - they say, he will find out about everything.

Wang Xie noticed that his wife was becoming sadder every day, predicting their imminent separation. And indeed - the sovereign's command came about the return of the guest home. In parting, the inconsolable wife gave him a magic potion capable of reviving the dead, and the sovereign sent a felt blanket made of bird down.

Wang Xie wrapped himself in a felt bag. They ordered him to close his eyelids and not to open his eyes until he reached the house, so as not to fall into the depths of the sea. Then they sprinkled it with water from the local lake, and only the whistle of the wind and the roar of the water shafts reached Wang Xie's ears.

Then everything was quiet. He was at home.

He looked, and on the eaves two swallows whistled sadly. It was then that I realized that I lived in the land of swallows. The family came up with questions. He told them everything. He noticed that his beloved son was nowhere to be seen. It turned out that he died half a month ago. Then he ordered Wang Xie to open the coffin, applied a magic pill - a gift from his wife-swallow. The boy suddenly came to life.

Autumn has come. The swallows gathered to fly away. Wang Xie tied a letter to the tail of one of them, and in the spring received an answer in the same way. But more swallows never flew.

This story has become known. Even the place where Wang Xie lived was called Swallow Alley.

Zhang Hao came from a rich and noble family, and he himself was of extraordinary learning. An enviable groom! Only he did not think about the wedding. He arranged a marvelous garden in his estate, met with friends.

Once in the spring I saw an extraordinary beauty. It turned out to be a young lady from the estate of neighbors, the Lee family. They started talking. They soon felt a mutual inclination. But the girl did not agree to a secret meeting - only to the wedding. She asked the young man for something to remember. I received verses, which he immediately inscribed with his own hand, praising their meeting.

The matchmaker started negotiations, but things did not go well. A year has passed. The lovers are exhausted without each other. It so happened that the Li family was about to leave. The young lady said she was ill, stayed at home, and at night the lovers secretly met in the garden.

A few months later, the girl's father suddenly received a new assignment to serve in distant lands. The beauty asked her lover to wait for her return. There was no news for two years. And then uncle Zhang Hao returned, who, as he found out that his nephew was still not married, immediately started a wedding agreement with a girl from the noble family of Sun. Zhang Hao did not dare to contradict.

Unexpectedly, the Lee family returned. The young lady found out about the engagement of her betrothed and in her hearts reproached her father and mother for their past intractability. And soon disappeared. They searched everywhere, but found at the bottom of the well. Barely went out. And they immediately sent a matchmaker to Zhang Hao, but he was already bound by a word.

Then the young lady went to the council and told about everything. They began to figure it out - it seems that he had previously connected himself with the girl Lee with a word. And she presented his own handwritten poems. So they decided to cancel the engagement with Sun, and marry the young lady Li.

They lived happily up to a hundred years and gave birth to two talented sons.

One day, a certain Zhang Yu happened to pass by Mount Lishan. He remembered the story of Emperor Xuanzong, the beautiful Yang Taizhen and the commander An Lushan. His poems formed by themselves,

Spent the night in the yard. It was somehow vague in my heart. I had barely dozed off when two messengers in yellow appeared at the bedside. They came to his soul. One took out a silver hook and pierced the sleeping man's chest. Zhang Yu felt no pain. A moment - and Zhang Yu split up: one lay lifeless on the bed, the other followed the messengers.

To Zhang Yu's persistent questions, he was told that he was invited to the first lady of the land of immortals on the island of Penglai - Yang Taizhen, and that the reason was in his poems, written while contemplating Mount Lishan.

The palace where they arrived was truly beautiful. But even more beautiful was the maiden herself. Together they took a bath in the Warm Spring, and then began to feast and talk. Zhang asked the maiden about ancient times, about Emperor Xuanzong, commander An Lushan. It turned out that the sovereign became a heavenly righteous man and now lives on earth in the form of a righteous Taoist.

Zhang Yu could not take his eyes off the maiden, his passion flared up from the wine. But no matter how much he tried to get closer to the heavenly maiden, nothing came of it - as if thousands of ropes held him in place. As they say, no luck! The beauty, feeling his grief, promised him a new meeting in two centuries. As a sign of location, she presented a box with a hundred incense.

The lad-servant led the guest out of the palace. As soon as he passed the gate, he pushed Zhang Yu with such force that he fell to the ground - and seemed to wake up. Everything that happened seemed like a dream. But next to it lay a box of incense. The aroma was divine.

The next day at the Warm Spring post station, Zhang Yu wrote poems about his extraordinary journey on the wall. After a while, in a deserted field, a shepherd boy handed him a letter from a divine maiden. I read it and got even more sad. Such is the story.

At the age of eight, Tan Ge was orphaned. Undertook to educate her Zhang Wen, an artisan. Pity the orphan. The beauty of the girl delighted the manager of the fun establishment, singer Ding Wanqing. He began to court the craftsman, promising money. Send gifts. He gave in.

In tears, Tan Ge moved to a cheerful house. But Ding Wanqing caressed her, so that her fears receded. The girl was not only beautiful, but also smart and extraordinarily talented. She knew how to say poetry to the point, to continue the stanza witty. People from all over came to look at her.

Somehow, even the viceroy honored Tan Ge with a walk together. They wrote poetry. The girl conquered the prince. He began to ask, she told everything about herself, and then she dared to ask the governor to order her to be deleted from the class of singers - she really wanted to get married. The governor generously agreed.

Then Tan Ge began to look for a husband. She liked Zhang Zheng from the tea department. They lived together. Two years later, Zhang received a new job assignment. Parting, he swore allegiance to his friend. And meanwhile she was on the loose.

After the departure of her beloved, Tan Ge lived as a recluse. Even the neighbors rarely saw her. Wrote Zhang about her longing. He doesn't come back. Another year has passed - I wrote again. The son has already grown up.

Zhang read the letters and became sad. But he could not go against the will of older relatives. A year later, they conspired to him a certain girl Sun. Soon the wedding was played. Zhang grieved, shed tears, but he did not gather himself to write to Tan Ge. And she, having learned about his marriage, wrote another letter: that the boy is growing, that she works tirelessly, that she still loves him, but humbles herself before fate.

Three years have passed. Zhang's wife fell ill and died. There was a visitor traveling south on business. Zhang asked him about Tan Ge, and he began to praise her to the skies, and honor a certain Zhang as an insidious seducer. Zhang felt ashamed, confessed everything to the guest, tried to justify himself. Then I decided to go to that city. He arrived, and Tan Ge slammed the door in front of his nose. Zhang began to repent, told about his wife's death and about his eternal love. Tan Ge softened. She set only one condition: send a matchmaker and arrange a wedding. Zhang did everything. They returned to the capital together, and a year later their second son was born. Until the end of their days they lived in harmony. It happens!

Student Dou Tianzhang, who devoted himself to learning from childhood, having overcome many books, nevertheless did not achieve either rank or glory. It has been four years since his wife died and he left a young daughter in his arms. And then poverty set in. I had to borrow twenty liang of silver from the moneylender's widow Aunt Cai. Now you need to return forty. There is no money, but the aunt began to send matchmakers, she wants to marry her son. The student will agree - forgive him the debt. In addition, the time came for him to go to the capital to take state exams for a bureaucratic position. We have to give the grieving daughter to Aunt Cai's house.

Thirteen years have passed. Over the years, the student's daughter, now called Dou E, managed to get married and widowed. Now she lives with her mother-in-law. Once, when Aunt Cai went to collect debts, one of the debtors, the doctor Sailu, lured her to an abandoned village and tried to strangle her. Suddenly old Zhang and his son named Zhang the Donkey appear. Caught at the scene of the crime, the doctor flees. The Saviors, having learned that they saved a widow living with a widowed daughter-in-law, offer themselves as husbands. Otherwise, they threaten to complete the killing. Auntie is forced to agree, but Dou E resolutely refuses. The donkey is furious. He promises to get his way soon.

The doctor Sailu repents of his deed, but is afraid of the new appearance of the creditor. Then the Donkey appears and demands to sell him the poison with which he planned to poison Aunt Cai, believing that then Dou E will become more accommodating. The doctor refuses, but the attacker threatens to take him to a judge and charge him with attempted murder. Frightened, Sailu sells the poison and hurriedly leaves the city.

Meanwhile, my aunt fell ill. At her request, Dou E prepares lamb intestine soup for the sick person. The colt furtively pours a poisonous drug into the soup. Unexpectedly, the aunt refuses to eat, and the soup goes to the old peasant, Oslenok's father. The old man is dying. Donkey strongly blames Doe E for the murder. According to him, only by marrying him can she escape punishment. Dou E refuses.

The case is considered by the ruler of the region, Tao Wu. He is known for his extortion. On his orders, despite the truthful story of Dou E, she is beaten with sticks, but even then she does not slander herself. Then they are going to whip the old woman Tsai. And then Dou E takes the blame. Now her fate is sealed: the poisoner will be beheaded in the market square.

On the way to her execution, Dou E begs the executioner to lead her through the backyard so as not to disturb her mother-in-law in vain. But the meeting cannot be avoided. Before Dou E dies, he tells the old woman how things really were. During the execution, confirming the words of the unfortunate woman about her innocence, it snows in the summer, no blood is shed on the ground, and a drought is established in the district for three years.

After some time, an important official arrives in the district, whose duties include interviewing prisoners, checking court cases, searching for embezzlers and bribe takers. This is Dou Tianzhang, the father of the executed. The first case he checks turns out to be the case of Dou E, but the official believes that we are talking about the namesake. However, in a dream, the spirit of his daughter appears to him, and the father learns about the circumstances of the innocent death of his own child. However, even a true story does not immediately convince Dou Tianzhang that an injustice has been committed: as an incorruptible official, he wants to maintain impartiality even in his daughter's case. He demands to call the healer Sayla, Zhang-Oslenok and the old woman Tsai. The doctor is nowhere to be found.

The donkey denies everything. Dou E's spirit throws accusations of killing his father in his face, but he insists on the doctor's testimony, hoping that he will never be found. But the doctor is brought, and he confirms the Oslenok's guilt. The old woman Tsai also supports him. The criminal is sentenced to a terrible execution: nailed to a "wooden donkey", and then cut into one hundred and twenty pieces. Both the former ruler Tao Wu and his henchman are punished. Dou E is completely whitewashed.

The leader of the northern nomads led a hundred thousand warriors to the Great Wall to call himself a tributary of the Chinese sovereign, to whom he sent an ambassador with rich gifts. The ambassador must also ask the nomadic ruler to marry a Chinese princess.

Meanwhile, the cunning and treacherous dignitary Mao Yanshou ingratiated himself with the elderly emperor. He believes his flattering speeches and listens to advice. Everyone is afraid of Mao. He, fearing outside influence on the lord, tries, by alienating pundits from him, to surround him with beauties. Therefore, he recommends gathering the most beautiful girls of the empire in the palace. The Emperor happily agrees. He instructs Mao Yanshou to travel around the country and look after the most worthy, and so that the ruler can evaluate the choice of his messenger, a portrait should be painted from each girl and sent to the palace.

Fulfilling the order, the dignitary shamelessly robs the families of applicants, demanding generous offerings for himself. Everyone is afraid of the sovereign's ambassador. Nobody dares to refuse him. In one of the counties, Mao Yanshou finds a rare beauty named Wang Zhaojun. She comes from a peasant family, but there is no one more beautiful than her in the whole world. The dignitary demands gold from the poor Wang family. Then the daughter will excel at court. But the beauty is so confident in her irresistibility that she rejects harassment. In retaliation, Mao depicts her in the portrait with a crooked eye: such people are sent to the most remote palace chambers. That's how it all happened. The emperor did not honor Zhaojun with an audience. She yearns for loneliness.

The emperor plans to go around his palace and look at the girls whom he still has not had time to honor with his attention. He hears: someone masterfully plays the lute. Sends to fetch the lute player. Wang Zhaojun appears before the sovereign. He is stunned by her beauty, wonders about her origins, and regrets that he has not yet met her. Zhaojun tells about the deceit of Mao Yanshou, who is guilty of her imprisonment. The enraged ruler orders to seize the villain and cut off his head. The sovereign in love bestows on the beauty the name Mingfei - "beloved concubine".

At the same time, the leader of the nomads learns that the emperor refused to accept the princess as his wife, saying that she is still too young. He is terribly offended, because everyone knows how many beauties surround the sovereign. It was then that Mao Yanshou, who had fled from the imperial wrath, appeared before the offended nomad. He talks about the striking beauty of Wang Zhaojun and shows a portrait - this time he portrayed the girl without any distortion, and her beauty takes the leader's breath away. The insidious traitor advises asking her for a wife, and in case of refusal to move the army of nomads to Chinese lands.

The emperor completely lost his mind from love. He left his business, spending days and nights in Mingfei's chambers. But the minister cannot but report to him about the arrival of the ambassador with a demand to give Wang Zhaojun as a wife to the nomadic leader. The minister warns that a huge army is ready for an attack, and there is no way to defend against it: the soldiers are poorly trained, there are no brave generals ready to fight. It is required to save the country from enemy invasion. The emperor dreams of getting advice from his officials on how to keep the peace without betraying his beloved. But no one can help him.

Wang Zhaojun is ready to prevent a war at the cost of her own life. She persuades the sovereign to put the interests of the state above their mutual love. The emperor has to agree, but he decides to accompany Mingfei himself to the Balingqiao bridge and drink a farewell cup of wine with her. The Sovereign and Mingfei look at each other with sorrow. Finally, they part forever.

At the border, the leader of the nomads joyfully meets Wang Zhaojun. He is proud that the Chinese emperor did not dare to neglect the alliance with him. The beauty asks permission for the last time to look into the southern distances and drink a cup of wine. She drinks wine and throws herself into the waters of the border river. No one has time to come to her aid. On the site of her burial, a Green Hill is erected - grass is always green on it. The leader of the nomads blames the villain Mao Yanshou for everything. He orders to seize him and take him to the emperor for the right court.

For a hundred days the emperor has not given audiences. And now, in the autumn sometimes, he is sad lonely in the palace. I barely dozed off - Zhaojun appears in a dream, but the Xiongnu again take her away. The farewell cries of flying geese give rise to even greater sadness, and even more painful memories of short happiness. The dignitary reports that the traitor Mao Yanshou has been delivered. The emperor orders to cut off his head. A memorial prayer for Mingfei is immediately arranged.

While the Buddha was preaching, one of the holy arhats indulged in vain dreams. Hellish torments were supposed for this, but the Buddha mercifully sent the offender to earth so that he would be reborn in human form. Now his name is Liu Junzuo, he is unstable in faith, he can deviate from the righteous path. In order to instruct him, the Buddha Mile was sent in the form of a Monk with a sack. In addition, another religious teacher in the guise of a man named Liu the Ninth was sent to induce Liu Junzuo to go to the monastery, accept the teachings of the Great Chariot, and renounce wine, lust, greed and anger. Then the time of his probation will be fulfilled.

Liu Junzuo is the richest man in the city, but he is extremely stingy. On a cold snowy day, a hungry poor man freezes at the gate of his house. Usually not compassionate rich man, to his own surprise, is imbued with pity for the unfortunate, invites him into the house, warms and asks. It is discovered that the stranger also bears the surname Ayu and is also from Luoyang. Liu Junzuo invites the poor man to fraternize and trusts the management of his mortgage shop.

Six months pass. Adopted into the family of a rich man by his younger brother, Liu Junzuo regularly replaces the owner in the mortgage shop: he lends money, collects debts. On the birthday of the benefactor, he decides to invite him to a feast, but, knowing the stinginess of the named brother, he assures that all the food and wine are presented by relatives, friends and neighbors. Liu Junzuo gladly agrees to the gift festival.

At this time, a Monk appears with a bag. He tries to convince Liu Junzuo of his own holiness, but he does not believe. Then the Monk draws on his palm the hieroglyph "patience". This is one of the commandments of Buddhism, turning away from worldly thoughts. However, patience is not one of Liu's virtues. When the holy teacher in the guise of a beggar Liu the Ninth asks him for money, he beats him, and he dies. The rich man is horrified that he has become a murderer. The younger brother promises to take the blame. Here comes the Monk. He promises to bring the dead man back to life if Liu Junzuo, who has not kept the patience prescribed for him, goes to the monastery.

Liu agrees, but then asks for permission to live as a monk in a hut in the garden behind his house - he is sorry to leave his wife and children. He entrusts all household chores to his brother. He himself eats fasting three times a day and reads prayers. One day, from his own child, he learns that in his absence, his wife drinks wine every day and has mercy on her brother. The recluse is angered. He decides to take revenge, secretly enters the house, but instead of the expected lover, he finds a Monk with a bag behind the canopy. The monk tells Liu to endure and demands that he go with him to the monastery, because he could not live at home as a monk.

In the monastery, he listens to instructions, but his thoughts constantly return home: he misses his wife and children, worries about the wealth left behind. The abbot - the poor monk Dinghuai - inspires that patience is above all. It is necessary to cleanse the heart, get rid of desire and pray. But his sermon does not reach the novice. By the will of the mentor, Junzuo's wife and children come to Junzuo. On each of them he sees the sign "patience". Then he notices a monk with two women and two children. The abbot assures that these are the teacher's first and second wives.

Liu Junzuo leaves the monastery in anger. He believes that he was deceived: they talked about holiness, while they themselves live quietly with their wives.

He goes home, and on the way he turns to the cemetery to visit the graves of his ancestors. The cemetery looks unusually overgrown. From a conversation with an old man whom he meets near the family graves, it turns out that Liu was absent not for three months, but for a hundred years. The old man is his grandson. Liu himself has not aged at all, and this is the merit of the Buddha. Then a monk appears, from whom Junzuo learns that in a previous birth he was an arhat from holy heaven, cast down to earth for sins. All his relatives are also saints. The monk admits that he is also not a simple monk, but Buddha Mile. With a cry of prayer on his lips, Liu prostrates himself before him.

Only two of his soulmates, two scoundrels, Liu Longqing and Hu Zizhuan, should come to the birthday of the merchant Sun Rong. The wife, who laid the festive table, bitterly reproaches her husband for not inviting her younger brother, Sun Chong'er. On the slander of two rogues, he was excommunicated from home, he lives in an abandoned pottery.

Sun Jr. has no money for a gift. But he cannot help but congratulate his older brother, and he has to go empty-handed. For this, he first meets him with reproaches, and then beats him.

Tomorrow is a holiday - the day of remembrance. The Sun family is going to visit the family cemetery. For the company, Sun Rong invites his cronies as well. Without waiting for his younger brother, he performs a sacrificial ceremony. His wife is very unhappy that her husband violates traditions, prefers strangers to close relatives. When the younger Sun comes, the elder again begins to scold him for how much in vain. Friends know they are inciting him. And again he beats his brother.

Sun Rong continues to drink with two scoundrels. He's already pretty drunk. Friends whisper that the youngest, to his death, performs a witchcraft rite. Sun Rong bursts into rude abuse, and drinking companions take him home from the cemetery.

The next day, the trinity continues to drink, but already in the tavern. Sun gets drunk and is dragged out into the street, where he collapses to the ground and falls asleep. The blizzard starts. Dwarfs are afraid of the night watch, and generally do not want to mess with a drunk. They decide to leave him in the cold, before leaving they search and take away the five bars of silver that were with him.

At this time, the younger Sun, who was trying to earn a few coins by correspondence of papers, returns to his pottery along the night street. He bumps into his sleeping brother. He immediately understands that he was drinking with his friends, who simply left him. He puts the elder on his back and carries him home. The brother's wife, who is disposed towards him, feeds him and promises to protect him from her husband's attacks. Sun Rong comes to his senses, discovers the loss of money and immediately begins to blame Sun Jr., and then kicks him out of the house, forcing him to kneel in the yard. My brother almost freezes.

The next day, crooked friends appear at Sun's house as if nothing had happened. They assure that they brought the tipsy patron to the very house and only then entrusted the cares of the younger brother, who only had to bring him into the house and put him to bed. Sun Rong trusts them implicitly.

His wife, Yang Meixiang, who has been trying in vain to bring the two crooks to clean water, conceives a cunning plan. She buys a dog from a neighbor, kills it, then pulls clothes on it, puts on a hat and leaves it at the back gate. Meanwhile, the trinity, again properly drunk, returns home. At the gate, Sun says goodbye to his friends. Those leave. The main gate is locked, and at the back he stumbles upon a corpse. Drunk, deciding that this is the murdered man, he rushes to his wife for advice. If you do not secretly bury the body, the neighbors will certainly report it to the council, and there they will start torturing ...

The wife prompts to seek help from faithful friends. As she suggests, those, having learned what the matter is, are locked in fear at home. But Sun Jr. agrees, although after all the insults and beatings he could have refused. He carries away the corpse, wondering why the dead man smells like a dog. Sun Rong is subdued by the nobility of his brother.

Sun Jr. is assigned to look after the mortgage shop. The scoundrel friends, who realized that friendship is now apart and you can’t drink more wine for free, blackmail Sun Rong, accusing him of murder and demanding money for silence. He is ready to give in to the scoundrels, but the younger dissuades him. He takes the blame on himself, and is ready to justify himself from the false accusation before the court. However, the judge willingly believes the slanderers. Zhenya has to unearth and present the dead dog to the court. The villains are exposed. They are sentenced to ninety blows with sticks each. Sun Rong, thanks to the virtues of his wife, escapes punishment for the oppression of his younger brother, who is now appointed county official.

In ancient times, a certain Li Qing, the head of a vast family, a rich man and the owner of several dye houses, should have been seventy years old. Children and household members prepared gifts for him, but the old man asked everyone to give him a piece of strong rope. No one knew what the old man was up to, but on the appointed day, a mountain of ropes grew in front of the house. It turned out that Li Qing was going to descend in a special basket into the abyss of the Cloud Gate Mountain in order to get to the celestials. A rope was woven from the ropes, a gate was built, and the old man, under the lamentations of his relatives, plunged into the abyss.

Since he disappeared without a trace, everyone assumed that he was dead. Meanwhile, Li Qing, after much torment, reached the palace of the lord of the immortals. At first they did not want to leave him in the palace, but then they had mercy. However, he himself sometimes wanted to return to earth in order to tell his relatives about what he saw,

Once, when there was a festival in the country of celestials, Li Qing violated the order - he looked through the forbidden window and saw his native city: all his property was completely neglected, although he was absent for only a few days. As punishment, the lord of the immortals ordered him to go home, and gave him a book with him and said a mysterious spell: “Looking at the stones, go.

On the way back, he got lost and found his way only thanks to the first line of the spell. He did not recognize his hometown. And the faces of passers-by were unfamiliar to him. I realized that decades had passed during his absence. It turned out that all his relatives died in the wars. This was told to him by a blind storyteller from things with a tablet - exactly as the spell promised. So he was left on earth alone, like a finger, and even without a penny.

I looked into the book of the lord of the immortals, it turned out to be a medical book. Li Qing realized that he was destined to become a doctor. And he decided to settle near the medicinal shop of a certain Jin - after all, the spell said: "Live near gold", and the name "Jin" just meant "gold".

Very soon Lee the healer became known throughout the district. He treated the kids, so much so that he didn’t even need to look at the patient: he measured out the measure of the drug - and the disease was gone.

Years passed. Li Qing is one hundred and forty years old. Then the emperor decided to call all the immortals of his country to the court. The Taoists-celestials, close to the throne, informed the sovereign that there were only three of them now. For each equipped with a special messenger. A dignitary named Pei Ping went to Li Qing. Having learned about this, the elder remembered the fourth line of the spell: "Pei will appear - go away" - and decided to disappear. That's what it meant. He gathered the disciples and said that his death hour was approaching and it was necessary, when breathing stopped, to put the body in the coffin and nail the lid. He only regretted that his neighbor Jin, whom they had known for seventy years, was missing.

The students did everything as instructed by the teacher. And just then the dignitary Pei Ping arrived and was very upset when he learned about the death of Li Qing. True, since he died, it means that he is not immortal at all. Still, he ordered to collect information about the life of Li Qing, but little was known about him: after all, he had no peers left at all. Did old man Jin have something to say. Soon he himself appeared and was very surprised by the news of the death of a neighbor. It turned out that yesterday they met at the southern gate and he went to the mountain of the Cloudy Gates. Moreover, he ordered the dignitary Pei to hand over a letter and some object.

The listeners could not be surprised. And Jin gave Pei a letter for the sovereign and a jasper staff as a gift. It was then that he decided that it was necessary to open the coffin and find out the truth. We hurried to the doctor's shop, lifted the lid, and there was only a pair of shoes and a bamboo staff and blue smoke swirling. Suddenly - a miracle! - the coffin soared up and disappeared into the sky.

The following year, an ulcer epidemic swept the country. Only the city of Li Qing she bypassed, apparently, the power of his healing was still preserved. And the inhabitants of the city to this day worship the spirits on the mountain of the Cloudy Gates.

In ancient times, a certain Shi Chun was known for his incalculable wealth. He got it by chance: he helped the old river dragon defeat the young one. For this, he received countless treasures as a reward. Only he boasted about them in vain. The sovereign's relative envied him, and even desired his wife. At the slander of the envious, the rich man was beheaded, and his wife, in order not to get to the villain, threw herself from a high tower.

And our story is about another rich man who tried to live modestly, but still ended badly. His surname was Zhang, but for his unprecedented stinginess they called him the Greedy Maw. Once his clerks gave a beggar a couple of coppers. So the owner rushed after him and took away the alms. A certain thief named Song the Fourth planned to punish the greedy man and robbed Zhang at night. Neither evil dogs, nor guards, nor cunning constipation and traps - nothing stopped him. Moreover, he left his signature on the wall of the treasury. The detectives rushed after him in pursuit, only he outwitted them: he painfully deftly changed guises.

At the inn he met his apprentice thief Zhao Zheng. He was going to fish in the capital and, as a proof of his skill, managed to pull the bundle with prey right from under the head of the teacher. Sun was angry, but the rogue managed to repeat his trick and robbed the teacher a second time. Sun had to acknowledge the student's dexterity and even provide him with a letter of recommendation to an acquaintance in the capital. But he advised not to greet the student, but to exterminate him as soon as possible.

The cunning Zhao Zheng read the letter furtively, but did not back down. The family of Sun's acquaintances made a living by selling human meat pies. Murder was not unusual for them. Only Zhao managed to put their own child in bed instead of himself. His dad killed him himself. He rushed in pursuit of Zhao, and a fight ensued between them. That's why Sun the Fourth found them.

They decided to hunt together and even involve in the case a certain Wang Xu, nicknamed the Ailing Cat. The three of them robbed the house of Prince Qian, taking away the greatest jewel - a belt of white jade. Detective Ma Han was sent to search for the loss. But the impudent Zhao Zheng not only swindled the detective, but managed to transfer the paper with mocking verses into the hands of the ruler of the region, and even cut off the pendants from his belt.

And the scammers decided to do one more thing. The jade belt, stolen from the prince, was handed over to the unsuspecting Zhang - the Greedy Maw, as if as a pledge. He easily fell for the bait at the sight of the jewel. And the prince was given to know where to look for the loss. Zhadina was seized and brutally tortured. He promised in three days to indicate the one who brought him the belt.

Then the thieves told Zhang that his own valuables could be found in the homes of detectives Ma and Wang Zun. They went there with a search and found the loot. The detectives were thrown into a dungeon and tortured, but this did not lead to anything.

Since the belt was never found, the angry ruler ordered the Greedy Maw to compensate the prince for losses. He could not bear the terrible waste and strangled himself. The detectives soon died in prison. And the scammers got away with it. True, this continued until Bao, nicknamed the Dragon Seal, was appointed the ruler of the region. But we will talk about this elsewhere.

During the Southern Song Dynasty, many were honored with royal favors. But it happened more than once that worthy men never met with a happy fate.

Rich man Wang Shizhong was put on trial for murder, but somehow got out. He had a younger brother, Wang Xinzhi. Once the elder brother allowed himself a cruel joke, the younger brother got offended and left the house without a penny in his pocket. He settled in the town of Madipo - Hemp slope, founded a smelting business and succeeded so much that he soon crushed the entire district under him. Even officials were afraid of him.

Just at this time, two brothers - Chen-Bars and Chen-Tiger lost their service and were looking for where to apply their knowledge of martial arts. We turned to Master Hong Gong for help. He advised them to go to Wang Xinzhi and even provided them with a letter of recommendation.

For several months, the brothers taught Wang Xinzhi's son, Wang Shixun, how to fight, and when they intended to leave the Wang estate, the owner, who was going to the capital, asked them to stay longer, to reveal the secrets of martial arts to the young man. Another year passed, and the brothers firmly decided to leave. But the owner has not yet returned, and the son barely scraped together the brothers for travel expenses, promising to pay the rest of the tuition fees after his father's return.

The brothers held a grudge. The son did not notice anything and handed over a letter, once written by his father in response to the message of Master Hong Gong, but never sent.

Hong Gong also failed to adequately meet them. His wife was quarrelsome and stingy. The resentment of the brothers grew even stronger. They planned to slander Wang Xinzhi by accusing him of rebellious intent. They did so, and they also referred to Wang's letter as evidence: they say that he promises Hong Gong to fulfill everything as agreed. The authorities decided to check the denunciation, but a certain He Neng got scared and, not reaching Wang's estate, returned and confirmed the fact of rebellious preparations.

Upon learning of the slander, Wang Xinzhi realized that he could not justify himself before the authorities. He planned with a detachment of brave men to capture the official He Neng and force him to confess to deceit. But his plan failed, but now he has truly become a rebel. I had to hide in the river and lake floodplains. But he ordered his son and faithful servant to go with confession. Soon he himself surrendered to the authorities, presenting evidence that he had been slandered. The judge considered the case, and although Wang Xinzhi was sentenced to death, his offenders also received theirs. The main thing is that the son, Wang Shixun, escaped with a short exile and was soon free.

The family of the deceased brother was sheltered by Wang Shizhong. He raised the fallen economy of Hemp Slope, and then transferred the estate to his nephew. Over time, the body of Wang Xinzhi was buried with honor, and his son and grandchildren achieved fame and high ranks.

In a long, long time, the Taoist sage Zhuangzi and a certain Mo Guang, a wealthy peasant of venerable age, lived not far from each other. And in the village there was an orphan who found shelter with strangers. His name was Foundling. He grew up ignorant, but the Taoist drew attention to him and ordered him to repeat the Taoist spell daily in order to find joy in a dream.

The foundling repeated the mysterious words a hundred times, and he had a dream. As if he is an educated nobleman and is called not the Foundling, but the Blossoming One. And he was called to the court, and wrote a report, highly appreciated by the sovereign. Rides a proud horse with a retinue. But then he woke up, and the vision disappeared.

Just at this time, rich Mo needed a shepherd. He hired the Foundling. He moved to a new dwelling and again before going to bed he repeated the Taoist spell. And again he had the same dream, exactly from the place where he had interrupted the previous morning.

And so the life of the guy flowed: during the day he herded the oxen, and at night he became an important nobleman, even intermarried with the royal daughter. Once in a dream he met a learned scribe and arrogantly boasted to him of his happy fate. I woke up, and in reality a misfortune happened to the herd: the oxen died.

Decided the Foundling; if there is joy in a dream, in life there are only sorrows - and he stopped reading the spell. But immediately, even in a dream, happiness turned away from him, and in reality the failures continued: the master's donkey fell ill. The shepherd went to the mountains to collect healing herbs for her and found a treasure under a bush. He shared his wealth with his master, and he took him into the house and adopted him.

Now everything has changed: during the day the young man prospered, but in his sleep he was tormented by nightmares. The rich man Mo even called the doctor to him. It turned out to be the same Taoist who taught the young man the spell. He explained that in this way he wanted to instill in him the concept of the imperfection of life.

And then a real insight came to Priemysh. He decided to give up his wealth and leave with the Taoist. They both disappeared like clouds in the sky. It is true that the young man became a celestial.

They say that once a concubine named Han Yuqiao came to the palace to the sovereign. But in the heart of the lord, the beautiful Anfei reigned supreme. So Yuqiao began to fall ill. Then, in order for the girl to strengthen her health, they decided to give her to the house of the official Yang Jian, who recommended her to the court.

The guest was warmly received, but she still did not get better. Together with the owner's wife, they decided to offer prayers to the local deities, among whom the god Erlan was especially revered. We went to the temple, and while the monks uttered the proper words, Lady Han secretly looked behind the canopy where the god sat. He was so beautiful that the girl immediately dreamed of having him as her husband.

At home, she continued to pray to Erlan in a secluded place. As if heeding her prayers, God appeared before her. He said that she was patronized by heavenly forces, that she was marked by Heaven and if she didn’t want to, she might not return to the palace.

When the god disappeared, the beauty dreamed of a new date. Overcoming shyness, she offered her love to God, and Erlan, together with the girl, went up to the bed, where they indulged in caresses.

In order not to return to the palace, Yuqiao continued to pretend to be sick. So she explained to the court messenger, who brought gifts from the sovereign. Erlan found out about the gifts and asked to give him a jasper belt. The lady happily agreed. And then they fell in love again.

In the meantime, something was wrong in the house. Yuqiao seemed to be strictly guarded, but voices were heard from her wing at night, and she herself suddenly became much prettier. They scouted - indeed, her guest visits, looks like a spirit, but a mortal would not be able to penetrate through all the locks. Yang Jian, the owner, decided to call the caster in order to protect the sovereign's maiden from damage. His wife Yuqiao warned him about everything.

At night, Erlan came, and the fortune teller Wang was already at the ready. He immediately approached Lady Han's wing with spells and curses, but the god fired a crossbow only once, and Wang fell unconscious to the ground.

We decided to invite another soothsayer, Taoist Pan. He promised to catch the uninvited guest. Erlan arrived in the evening. Then the Taoist ordered the maid to go to Lady Han and steal a crossbow from her visitor. God at that time was drinking with the beauty, so he did not notice anything. The Taoist boldly entered the chambers of the beauty. God grabbed the crossbow, but the weapon and the trace caught a cold. He rushed to the window, and the Taoist managed to hit him with a club. God disappeared, but at the same time he lost his solid black leather boot.

Jan decided that the night guest was not a god at all, but a man, but familiar with the witchcraft. They decided to catch him, for which they called the best detectives, among whom Zhan Gui was famous. He examined the boot and found, behind the lining, a piece of paper bearing the shoemaker's name. They brought in an artisan. He recognized his work, and for whom he made a boot, they found out from a book in his workshop. Read and sighed. It turned out that the boots were ordered for one of the highest sovereign dignitaries, the main mentor Tsui!

Trembling with fear, they went to Tsuyu - the matter was in the sovereign's concubine. The dignitary examined the boot, called the servants, and they remembered that the dignitary himself gave these boots, among other things, to his beloved student, who was leaving for the post of head of the county.

Find this student. He said that he fell ill on the way to the place of service, and having recovered, he went to thank the god Erlan. In the temple, I noticed that God's shoes were not good enough. I decided to give him a pair of boots as a gift.

Then the detective Zhan Gui planned to sniff around the temple. He walked under the guise of a traveling merchant. Suddenly, a woman offered him a good thing to buy. I looked - the boots are exactly in a pair of the first! He bought it, compared it with what was kept in the council, and that's right - a couple. Then they found out that the woman who sold the boot was the mistress of the abbot of the temple of the god Erlan, and this abbot knows the art of witchcraft. They prepared a potion for witchcraft - and a temple. Splashed with a potion and twisted the villain.

Under torture, the abbot confessed to everything. I even returned the jasper belt. For defiling the sovereign's wife, he was quartered. Lady Han was expelled from the palace. She, however, was just what she needed. She soon married a merchant.

Thus ended the story of the fornicator.

Wan was a tea merchant, and Tao, nicknamed the Iron Monk, helped him. He stole from the owner famously. Once Van caught him counting the stolen money and kicked him out. Throughout the city, the former servant was denounced by a thief, so no one took the Iron Monk to serve.

He was already starving to the last extreme, tired of cursing the former owner, when he accidentally heard that his daughter Vanya, having become a widow, was returning home with all her belongings and a young brother. Tao decided to meet her first, maybe to help with something, maybe just ask for intercession.

On the road, a stranger called Tao. After learning about the affairs of the Iron Monk, he called him with him. So Tao ended up in a bandit gang. Having refreshed himself, he went on reconnaissance and soon reported to his new friends that Wan Xiongyan with his brother and servant would be there by the evening, and they had noble luggage.

In the dark forest, the robbers attacked the travelers, killed the servant and the boy, and Wan Xiongyan took the leader as his wife.

Once a woman asked about the name of her new husband, and he admitted that his name was Miao Zhong, and his nickname was Ten Dragons. His henchman, nicknamed Marked, was dissatisfied with such frankness, he suspected that the woman could inform, and planned to kill her. The leader had to take her to a safe place, to his acquaintance, and leave her there. This acquaintance declared unfortunate that Miao Zhong had sold her to him.

A few days later, Wan Xiongyang got out of the house at night. She decided to commit suicide: she could not bear the shame. She had just adjusted the noose when a tall man appeared. He promised to save her.

It was Yin Zong, known for his respectfulness, who lived with his old mother. Yin Zong wanted to bring Wan Xiongyang home to his father. They set off on their way. When the city remained quite a bit, it began to rain. Fleeing from the rain, the travelers poked at the first door they came across ... and ended up in the house of the Marked One. Miao Zhong - Ten Dragons was also there.

The robbers grappled with Yin Zong. He would have defeated everyone, but there were two of them. It was all over soon. Poor Wan Xiongyan was put under lock and key.

Meanwhile, old Wan, having learned about the robbery attack, that his son and servant had been killed, and his daughter had disappeared, appointed a reward to the one who would help punish the villains. An old man who lived in the neighborhood sent his son He-ga just in those days to buy toys made of clay for sale. It so happened that he came for shopping in that village and in the house where Marked lived. While he was choosing toys, he heard the familiar voice of Wan Xiongyan, who begged him for help. The young man set off with all his might into the city, told Vanya about everything. He wrote a petition to the council, and armed guards captured the entire band of robbers. They would not have succeeded if a bloodied man of enormous stature had not stood in the way of the villains - Yin Zong, who was killed by bandits!

All the villains were executed, and in honor of Yin Zong, the grateful Wan erected a joss-house.

Beauty Mo miscalculated (Sister Mo, having escaped, miscalculated twice, but then she was legally married to Yang the Second) - From the collections of stories of the Ming era (XIV-XVII centuries)

A certain official clerk was married to a frivolous woman, prone to love affairs. Even after the birth of her son, she did not take care of the child, but only had fun. Once the husband left on business, the wife started tricks, ran away with her lover from the house, taking her son with her. On the way, a three-year-old baby began to cry, a negligent mother put the child in the grass and went on with her friend.

The child was picked up by the craftsman Third Li. He was childless, the little boy was very fond of his relatives.

In the meantime, the clerk returned home. Empty. No wife, no son. Nobody knows anything. One day, passing by the house of the Third Li, he noticed a child playing and recognized him as his son. Li refused to give up the boy, insisting that he had found it in the grass and now the child was his. Let's go to court. The judge did not believe the Third Lee and ordered to beat him with batogs. He stood his ground. But when the torture intensified, he slandered himself: they say, he had looked after a woman with a child for a long time, he killed her and threw her into the river, and took the child into the house. They immediately put a heavy block on Third Li and put him on his knees. All that was left was to announce the verdict.

All of a sudden everything went dark. Lightning flashed, thunder rumbled. The judge collapsed to the ground and expired, the hats were torn off the officials, the authorities trembled with fear. Moreover, an inscription appeared on the back of the deceased judge: "The third Lee was convicted unfairly!"

I had to continue the inquiry. Soon Lee was acquitted, and there they found the negligent mother.

Such cases in life are not uncommon. So the beauty Mo got herself a lover - Jan the Second. Only the husband, having learned, did not want to put up with this and strictly warned his wife. Then the lovers decided to escape.

In the meantime, Mo yearned alone. I decided to ask my husband for permission to go on a pilgrimage. He allowed. I must say that they had a relative - the varmint Yu Sheng, who had been following Mo for a long time. Now I decided not to miss the opportunity. After the pilgrimage, he lured me to his house, gave him wine to drink, and reached his goal. Beauty did not really resist. She even blabbed drunk about running away with her lover.

She called Yu Sheng Yang several times, then ordered the boat to be ready by the agreed day and hour.

Yu Sheng drove the boat to Mo's house on the right day. She almost forgot about the booze, but she remembered about the escape. Hastily she packed her things into the boat. Set sail. It was only then that I noticed that I was running with the wrong one. But it's too late to return.

The husband returned home - did not find his wife. Decided that her lover had kidnapped her. Went to Jan. He denied it, and when the cases were transferred to the detective council, he admitted that they were plotting an escape with Mo and that he did not know what happened to the woman later. They beat him, beat him, but he did not build slanders on himself.

And the fugitives settled together, indulged in love pleasures. True, Mo always remembered Jan the Second. Yu realized that there would be no harmony between them, and decided to sell the woman to a local fun place. He lured her there by deceit, having previously agreed with the hostess, and left her. Mo found out that her boyfriend had sold her, but it was too late.

Once a man from her native places happened in those parts. Mo began to ask about her husband, at the same time she learned everything about Jan the Second. Mo told him her story. The guest promised to tell her husband the news.

And so he did. Together they went to the detective order. There they opened a case of malicious sale of a person. Yu Sheng was captured and thrown into a dungeon. He couldn't deny anything. Jan the Second filed a petition for release for lack of guilt. The judge ordered to deliver the beauty Mo. A thorough inquiry began.

Yu Sheng was beaten with batogs and ordered to return the money he received from selling his girlfriend. Jan was found not guilty, although he committed adultery. Here the deceived husband came forward and declared that he renounced his dissolute wife. Then the neighbors suggested that the husband give his wife to Jan II. He agreed. We made the necessary papers, and everything, to the delight of the beauty Mo, went off in the best possible way.

The lovers learned a lesson from their misfortunes and lived together with dignity until their death.

The custom of admiring the lanterns is very ancient.

A certain student, having become a widow, indulged in melancholy and did not go to the festival. Just standing at the gate. I noticed a maid with a lantern in the form of a pair of peonies and a beauty of rare beauty. His tail trailed after them.

The beauty turned to the student with a word of greeting, and he invited him to his house. She told about herself that she had lost all her relatives, an orphan, wandering in a foreign land with the maid Jinlian, Love began between them.

The old neighbor suspected something was wrong. I spied: the powdered one and the student were sitting side by side under a lantern. Approached the student with questions, he denied. But, frightened that he was living with a werewolf demon, he took the advice of the old man and went to look for the home of the beauty and the maid.

In the evening he wandered into the temple. There was a coffin. From the lid hung the inscription: "The coffin with the body of Lady Li, the daughter of the Judge of Fynhua County." Nearby is a lantern in the form of two peony flowers and a statue of a maid. Horror seized the student.

He rushed for help to the wise Taoist. He gave him magic spells and told him not to go to that temple. Since then, no one has come to see him.

Once, drunk at a party, the student nevertheless wandered into the temple. The girl was already waiting for him. She took her by the hand, led her to the coffin, the lid lifted, and the student and her lover stepped into the coffin. There he died.

The neighbor missed the student. I found that temple and saw a piece of a student's dress peeking out from under the coffin lid. They opened the coffin, and there is a dead student in the arms of his dead girlfriend. So they were buried together at the Western Gate.

Since then, on foggy evenings, late passers-by happened to meet the whole trinity: a student with a beauty and a maid with a peony lantern. Such unfortunates began to be overcome by an illness, many he brought to the grave. Everyone was in fear. We turned to the Taoist. He sent them to an immortal hermit.

The hermit summoned the heavenly host and ordered them to take up arms against evil spirits. Werewolves were captured and punished with whips. The trio repented. The Taoist hermit thought for a long time over the verdict and ordered: burn the lantern emitting double light, take all three into custody and send them to the most terrible prison of the lower, ninth, hell. He shook off the dust from his sleeves and disappeared. People didn't even have time to thank him.

Zhao Yuan buried his parents. While he was still unmarried, he decided to go wandering and comprehend science. Settled near Lake Xihu.

Accidentally met a girl dressed in green clothes. Mutual love immediately broke out. Only the beauty refused to give her name, but asked for her majesty the Virgin in green.

Once, drunk, Yuan joked about the green dress of his beloved. She was offended, she thought, he was hinting at her contemptible position as a concubine - legal wives dressed in yellow. I had to tell this story.

In a past life, both Yuan and the maiden served in a rich household. They passionately fell in love with each other, but on denunciation they were punished with death. Yuan was reborn in the world of people, and she was entered in the Book of Restless Souls. Now Yuan understood that the threads of their destinies were connected in a previous birth, and he began to treat his beloved much more tenderly. And you delighted him with stories and taught him to play chess - she was a great master in this matter.

Time has passed. It's time for the girl to leave. She fell ill, and when Yuan was about to call the doctor, she explained that, according to the tablets of fate, their marital love had ended and it was useless to resist it. The maiden lay down on the couch, turned to the wall and died. In great sorrow, Yuan performed the funeral rites. Only now the coffin seemed too light. They opened it - and there was only a green dress, hairpins and earrings. So they buried the empty coffin.

And Yuan took the tonsure.

Wealthy neighbors conspired with their young children, and a gold hairpin in the form of a phoenix was presented to the future bride as a gift.

Soon the groom's father was transferred to serve in a distant land, and for fifteen years not a word came from them.

The girl without a betrothed became homesick, fell ill and died. In deep grief, the parents put their daughter's body in a coffin, and stuck a golden hairpin in her hair - a memory of the groom.

Two months later, the groom himself, young master Cui, showed up. Over the years, he became an orphan, and the inconsolable parents of the bride offered him shelter and food. Once, the younger sister of the deceased dropped a golden hairpin from her palanquin. Cui wanted to return the loss, but could not enter the women's quarter of the house. Suddenly, late at night, the younger sister herself appeared - as if for a hairpin, and began to seduce the young man. He resisted, but gave up.

Realizing that they would not be able to hide love meetings for a long time, they decided to run away from home to the old faithful servant of Father Cui. So they did. A year has passed. The fugitives decided to return home, fall at the feet of their parents and beg for forgiveness. Cui was supposed to go first, and as proof, present the phoenix hairpin that his beloved gave him.

The adoptive father met him as if nothing had happened. He could not understand the excuses, for his youngest daughter had been taken ill for a year and was not even able to turn around on her own. Here Cui showed the hairpin. It was recognized as the decoration of the deceased elder sister, which was placed with her in the coffin.

And suddenly the youngest daughter appeared. She explained that the thread of fate that connected the older sister with the groom had not yet broken, and she, the youngest, must marry, otherwise her life would fade away. The voice of the youngest daughter surprisingly resembled the voice of the deceased. The parents were horrified.

The father began to reproach his daughter who had returned from the other world. She explained that the chief of darkness considered her innocent and allowed her to live out the year of the worldly life allotted to her. And she dropped dead to the ground. They sprinkled the body with a healing decoction, and the girl came to life. As promised by the eldest, the ailments and ailments of the younger one disappeared, and she did not remember the past events, as if she woke up from a heavy sleep.

Soon they played a wedding. The young gentleman sold the golden hairpin, bought with the proceeds everything that was needed for the thanksgiving service, and instructed the Taoist monk to perform the ceremony. After that, in a dream, the deceased appeared to him with words of love and good wishes. Strange, isn't it?

A young official named Ying went by water to the duty station. The boatman coveted their good, threw Ying into the river, killed the servants, and decided to marry the widow, Mrs. Wang, to his son.

The young mistress, having lulled the vigilance of the robber with obedience, ran away after a short time and reached the convent, where she found shelter.

She was good-natured, and besides, she owned a brush remarkably.

Somehow, a random guest who received an overnight stay in the monastery, in gratitude, donated to the abbess a picturesque scroll depicting lotus flowers, which she hung on an unpainted screen. Lady Wang immediately recognized her husband's hand. I asked the abbess about the donor, she named a certain Gu Asyu, a boatman.

The widow wrote a poem on the scroll in memory of her husband. Soon, a casual connoisseur, admiring the scroll and the poetic inscription, bought it along with the screen and then presented it to an important dignitary in the city of Suzhou.

Once a merchant came to the same dignitary and offered to buy four cursive scrolls, which he allegedly made with his own hands. The dignitary became interested in an unusual trader-artist. It turned out that this is the same Ying, who did not drown in the river, swam ashore, where he found shelter with coastal people. She earns her living by drawing and calligraphy.

Then Ying spotted a scroll with lotuses and recognized his thing and his wife's hand. The dignitary promised to catch the robber, but for now he settled Ina in his house.

An investigation began, and soon the name of the person who donated the scroll to the monastery, and the name of the nun who made the inscription, were revealed. The dignitary decided to invite the nun to his place, ostensibly to read the sutras. His wife questioned the guest. She really turned out to be Ina's wife. The boatman was placed under surveillance, then seized, having discovered with him all the possessions of Ying. The robber was executed, the stolen property was returned to the victim. Ying was happy.

But it was time to return to work. The dignitary offered Yi to marry before a long journey. He refused - he still loved his wife and hoped to meet. The touched host decided to give the guest a magnificent send-off. When everyone had gathered, he invited the nun. Ying recognized his wife, she - her husband, they hugged and burst into tears.

All their lives they remained together and always thanked fate and the people who united them after separation.

It happened in those years when peace and tranquility reigned in the Celestial Empire. Among others, the heir's retinue included two scientists of outstanding talent - Prince Tang and Prince Wen. It was their custom to gather at the banquet table during leisure hours, and even wander around the neighborhood, visiting abandoned temples and monasteries.

Once they decided to visit the grave hills - the tombs of the sovereigns of former dynasties. Wuma Qi Ren, a local government official, volunteered to accompany them. Halfway through, the horse under Qi Ren limped, and Qi Ren had to fall behind. Lowering the reins, he trusted his horse. It got dark imperceptibly. The area around was deserted. The traveler began to be overcome by fear. Suddenly ahead, as if a light flickered in the darkness. Qi Ren drove up - a simple hut, the doors were wide open, the lamp in the hut was about to go out.

The servant called the owners. A young man appeared, and then his wife - an extraordinary beauty, even though in a simple dress, without rouge and whitewash. They set the table. The utensils are not rich, but very elegant. Food and drink are excellent.

When the wine was finished, the hostess confessed to the guest that she and her husband were people of the Tang Dynasty and had been living here for about seven hundred years. It is rare that someone wanders into their house, and therefore they would like to tell something to the guest.

It turned out that in ancient times they lived in the capital city of Chang'an. They kept a pancake shop, although both came from the same class. Just in a troubled time, they decided to bury themselves in obscurity. Unfortunately, a powerful nobleman who lived in the neighborhood fell in love with a beautiful pancake maker and took her by force to his estate. However, she swore to remain faithful to her husband, did not utter a word in the prince's chambers, did not succumb to promises, maintaining firmness. This went on for a month. The prince did not know what to do, and the woman only begged to let her go home.

Word of what had happened spread throughout the city. The scoffers claimed that the pancake maker voluntarily gave his wife to the prince. It reached the officials who were in charge of the weather records of the capital's events. Those, without checking, wrote everything down and added something from themselves, And various hacks tried: they composed all sorts of slander. But in fact, only the insistent requests of her husband forced the prince to let the woman go home.

The story startled Qi Ren. He was surprised that such an example of high fidelity passed by the attention of poets and writers. He was also struck by how vividly the unfortunate people inflicted on them are still experiencing the insult. Meanwhile, the offended husband began to remember those who had slandered him: they were all petty people who violated duty and ritual. And the prince himself did not even know about virtue.

The wine was finished, the lamp burned out. The hosts presented their compositions to the guest, laid him down on a couch in the eastern office. Soon the dawn broke, a bell struck in a distant temple. Qi Ren opened his eyes. Looked around. Around empty, no buildings. His dress was covered with thick grass and got wet. The horse slowly chews the grass.

He returned home and showed his works to his friends. Those admired - the authentic style of the Tang era! They ordered to print it so that it would be preserved for centuries.

Xuanzang was ordained a monk from an early age, and he had only one desire: to comprehend the great teachings of the Buddha. The most merciful goddess Guanyin, at the behest of the Buddha, has long been looking for a person who could go for sacred books and bring them to China. Such a person turned out to be the virtuous Tang monk Xuanzang, who, by the will of the goddess and with the permission of the emperor, went to the West, to distant India.

On the way, the monk met the monkey Sun Wukong. Five hundred years ago, he made a debauchery in the Heavenly Palace, and the only way to get rid of the punishment was for him to pilgrimage for the sacred books and help Xuanzang on his difficult path.

Travelers encountered many obstacles. Once they encountered a terrible werewolf, completely covered with black bristles, with a pig snout and huge ears. A fight was brewing between Sun Wukong and the werewolf, but, having learned about the purpose of the pilgrimage, he calmed down and volunteered to accompany the travelers. Xuanzang named him Zhu Bajie.

The Tang monk and his disciples, overcoming the machinations of evil forces, moved to the West, until the River of Flowing Sands blocked their path. As soon as the pilgrims approached, the river began to seethe and a monster jumped out of the water, ugly and ferocious in appearance. The monkey and the boar entered into battle with him, but could not overcome him in any way. I had to ask for help from the goddess Guanyin herself. When the travelers, at the instigation of the goddess, called the werewolf his monastic name, he immediately calmed down and volunteered to accompany them to India. They named him Shasen.

Day and night the pilgrims walked almost without respite. They had to avoid many terrible demonic wiles. One day, a tall mountain blocked their path, the abode of ferocious monsters that devoured travelers. Sun Wukong went on reconnaissance and found out: two demon lords live in the Lotus Cave, catching wandering monks with the help of secret signs.

Meanwhile, the werewolf demons did not doze off. They found out about our travelers and even stocked up on their images so as not to accidentally eat anyone else. They first came across Zhu Bajie. A fierce battle ensued. Opponents clashed twenty times, but not one overcame. Zhu fought not for life, but for death. The werewolf called for help. The demons swooped down and dragged the boar into the cave.

But the demons were more interested in the Tang Monk. They moved in search and encountered Sun Wukong. He looked so formidable that the demons were frightened and decided to act by cunning. One of them turned into a wandering Taoist monk and began to call for help. Xuanzang fell for the bait. Upon learning that the Taoist had injured his leg, he ordered Sun Wukong to put him on his back and take him to the monastery.

The monkey figured out the demonic trick, but the werewolf instantly cast a spell, and three heavy mountains pressed Sun to the ground, while the Demon grabbed the monk. Shasen rushed to the rescue. The battle broke out. Here Shasen also fell into the clutches of a werewolf, who dragged his prey into a cave. It remained to catch the monkey.

But Sun Wukong, meanwhile, managed to free himself from the mountains that crushed him and took on the appearance of an immortal Taoist. He told the demons who were looking for him that he himself was looking for a malicious monkey. He so confused their heads with his tricks that they voluntarily gave him a magic pumpkin, with whose help they were going to catch him. Fearing punishment, the demons returned to the cave, and Sun, turning into a fly, followed them and found out all their secrets.

It turned out that the main talisman - a golden cord - is kept by an old witch, the mother of one of the demons. Messengers were immediately dispatched behind him. Only Sun Wukong outwitted everyone: he killed the messengers, dealt with the sorceress, and then, taking her appearance, entered the cave to the demons.

While the imaginary sorceress was talking with the owners of the cave, the werewolves got wind of the deception. A demon named Silverhorn put on armor and entered into battle with Sun Wukong. The monkey had a golden cord stolen from the sorceress, but she did not know the secret spell led by the demon. So he managed to twist the Monkey King and tie him to the ceiling beam. As soon as Sun, pulling out his own hair, breathed on it, and it turned into a file, with which he sawed his shackles. And then he released the Tang monk with his companions.

But this did not end the trials that befell the pilgrims. Evil forces took up arms against the supporters of the true doctrine in order to prevent them from getting the sacred books.

One day the travelers saw a huge mountain. It seemed that she eclipsed the sun and rests against the vault of heaven. Suddenly, a red cloud burst out of the gorge, shot up into the sky, and a fire blazed in the sky. The king of the monkeys realized that an evil spirit was waiting for them. And in fact, the local werewolf had been waiting for the Tang monk for a long time, intending to devour him and become immortal. But he realized that the teacher was guarded by brave students and he could not do without cunning. He pretended to be an abandoned child and began to cry for help. However, Sun Wukong knew how to recognize evil spirits and warned Xuanzang. Then the werewolf raised a furious hurricane. The Tang monk could not sit still on horseback, fell off his horse and immediately fell into the clutches of the villain, who instantly rushed off with precious booty. Sun Wukong, although he recognized the intrigues of evil spirits, did not have time to do anything.

I had to start searching. The monkey king found out that the werewolf's name was the Red Baby and he lived in the Cave of Fire Clouds. They went there together with Shasen and challenged the kidnapper to a fight. Rivals converged twenty times, fought on the ground, soared into the skies. Finally, the werewolf took off running, but, once in his cave, he cast a spell, and immediately everything around was on fire with a terrible flame.

Sun Wukong, riding a cloud, had to rush to the eastern sea for help. The dragon brothers there caused a downpour, but the fire was not simple, but sacred, and from the water it flared up more and more. The werewolf breathed smoke on Sun Wukong, and he had to flee from the battlefield, and in order to escape from the ring of fire, the Monkey King rushed into a mountain stream. With difficulty, his faithful companions - Shaseng and Zhu Bajie - fished him out of there. It was possible to defeat the terrible werewolf only with the help of the goddess Guanyin. Since Sun Wukong felt sick, Zhu Bajie went to the goddess, but the werewolf lured him into his cave by cunning, stuffed him into a bag and hung him to a beam, intending to feed him to his children.

When Sun Wukong guessed what had happened, he rushed to the rescue. He entered the cave by deceit and, turning into a fly, sat down on a beam not far from the sack with Zhu Bajie. Meanwhile, the werewolf was about to have a feast. He decided to devour the Tang monk. It was necessary to hurry to the goddess Guanyin for help.

Together with the goddess, the Monkey King returned to the Fire Cave and challenged the werewolf to battle. No matter how he boasted, this time he had a hard time. The goddess pierced his body with a thousand swords, and then turned them into hooks so that the villain would not pull them out of himself. Then the Red Baby begged for mercy. Sun Wukong and Shaseng rushed into the cave, killed every single werewolf and freed the teacher and Zhu Bajie.

After resting for a while, the travelers continued on their way. Spring and summer passed, autumn came. Pilgrims spent the night under the open sky, endured thirst and hunger. One day, a river blocked their path, very deep and so wide that the opposite bank was not visible. I had to ask the locals for help. They said that they live in contentment, they have plenty of everything, but they are tormented by a terrible villain werewolf who manages heavenly moisture. In exchange for blessed rains, he demands that the peasants sacrifice children to him - each time one boy and one girl. Our scares had just appeared in the village on the eve of another sacrifice, and the family that sheltered them for the night was supposed to bring it.

Sun Wukong and Zhu Bajie volunteered to help the trouble, they took the form of a boy and a girl and in this form appeared before the cannibal. But as soon as he approached, they pounced on him and began to walk around with a pitchfork and a staff. The werewolf barely managed to escape into the waters of the river.

In the underwater palace, he convened a council, planning to catch the Tang monk - the only way to get rid of his powerful companions. They decided to cover the river with ice, and when the pilgrims start crossing, the ice will crack and Xuanzang will be at the bottom. So they did. Having learned that the river had become, the travelers rejoiced - it greatly facilitated the crossing. But everything happened the way the werewolf and his henchmen planned. A Tang monk fell through the ice, was seized and stuffed into a box to be eaten later.

However, Xuanzang's assistants did not doze off. Sun Wukong rushed to the goddess Guanyin, and she again came to the aid of the pilgrims. She threw the basket on her golden belt into the river and caught a golden fish. It turned out that the fish is the werewolf-eater. Meanwhile, Zhu Bajie and Shaseng were looking for a teacher while making their way through the water. All the werewolf fish lay dead. Finally, they opened the box and rescued Xuanzang. And a huge turtle carried them across the river.

New challenges lay ahead of them. What evil forces did not come up with to lead the Tang monk astray! Once they were blocked by impenetrable thorny thickets. Zhu Bajie spoke a spell, grew almost to the sky and began to clear the passage. Master followed, and the others helped Zhu. It seemed that there would be no end to the thickets. Suddenly, an old temple appeared before them, the gates opened, and the venerable abbot appeared on the threshold. Before Xuanzang could return the greeting, a gust of wind came up and blew him away. And the abbot and the trace caught a cold. The four werewolf elders who lured the teacher to them looked quite pious. They even invited the Tang monk to read poetry to each other. Soon their friend Apricot Fairy appeared and began to seduce Xuanzang. Then the werewolves all unanimously began to persuade the monk to abandon the journey and marry a fairy. Then they began to threaten him. The teacher had to call for help from the students, who had been trying to find him for a long time and arrived just in time. The elders and the fairy disappeared somewhere. Sun Wukong was the first to guess everything and pointed to the old trees growing nearby.

Zhu Bajie, without hesitation, hit them with a pitchfork, and then undermined their roots with his snout. There was blood on the roots. These werewolves needed to be exterminated. Otherwise, taking on a new look in the future, they could oh how annoy people.

So, Xuanzang escaped the temptation and, together with his companions, continued on his way to the West. Summer has come again. Once, when, languishing from the heat, the travelers were moving along a road lined with willows, a woman appeared before them, saying that ahead was a state whose ruler was destroying Buddhist monks. The monkey king immediately recognized the goddess Guanyin in the woman. Then, turning into a butterfly, he flew to a nearby city for reconnaissance. Soon, at the inn, he saw how the merchants, going to bed, took off their clothes. Sun Wukong decided that travelers would infiltrate the city under the guise of merchants, and quietly stole the clothes.

The disguised pilgrims, posing as horse dealers, settled into a hotel to stay. True, they were afraid of other people's views and demanded a separate room from the hostess. There was nothing better than a huge chest. I had to settle in for the night.

The hotel servants were in cahoots with the robbers. At night, they let the intruders into the hotel yard, and they, not finding a better meal, decided that the chest was full of good, and set out to steal it. The city guards gave chase. The robbers threw their booty in fear and fled. The chest was delivered to the city government, sealed, intending to make an inquiry in the morning.

Sun Wukong pulled out a piece of hair, turned it into a drill, drilled a hole in the chest, turned into an ant and got out. He assumed his true form and entered the palace. There he tore out all the wool from his left shoulder, and turned each hair into an exact likeness of himself. He uttered a spell, and instead of a staff, a darkness, a darkness of sharp razors appeared. Countless doubles of Sun Wukong, having grabbed razors, went around the city and to the palace, where they shaved everyone, starting with the ruler.

In the morning, a commotion began in the palace: its inhabitants suddenly turned out to be monks. The ruler immediately realized that this was his punishment for the ruined monastic life. I had to take a solemn oath never to kill the monks again. It was then that they reported about the chest found at night. But now the ruler received the pilgrims with great honor, and they continued on their way without hindrance.

And once there were wanderers visiting the ruler of the county of Jasper Flowers in the country of Heavenly Bamboo. The sons of the ruler dreamed of learning martial arts from the companions of the Tang monk, for which a magic weapon was ordered from the gunsmith. The samples were: a staff with a golden hoop of Sun Wukong, a pitchfork with nine teeth of Zhu Bajie and a staff of Shaseng, which smashes evil spirits. These magical items were stolen directly from the weapons workshop by a werewolf from Leopard Mountain from the Tiger's Mouth cave,

As always, Sun Wukong went to investigate. On the way to Barsova Gora, he met two werewolves. From the overheard conversation, the Monkey King understood that the werewolves were sent to buy provisions for a feast in honor of the acquired weapons. Sun blew his magic breath on them, and they froze in place, unable to move. Sun Wukong and Zhu Bajie took on the guise of werewolves bewitched by Sun, and Shasen pretended to be a cattle dealer, with whom they allegedly did not have enough money to pay for the purchase. So they came to Barsova Gora, driving pigs and bulls in front of them for a feast.

The chief werewolf believed in the deception, and our tricksters managed to get hold of the stolen weapons. already here they spared no one, but rattled the entire demonic nest. It turned out that all these were werewolves of different animals - tigers, wolves, foxes, and the leader is a werewolf of a yellow lion. He managed to escape and rushed for help to his grandfather, also a werewolf lion. He gathered his army of werewolf lions and went to battle.

Under the walls of the city, Xuanzang's companions and werewolf lions of all stripes met face to face. The fight went on all day. By evening, Zhu Bajie weakened, and the werewolves grabbed him.

The next day, one of the werewolves kidnapped the Tang monk, the governor of the county, and his sons from the city. And when Sun and Shasen went to look for him, an old werewolf attacked them, and at once he grew eight heads with huge toothy mouths. Each clung to our fighters, and they were captured.

At night, Sun Wukong, freed from the bonds, rushed for help. He managed to find the one who was once the lord of the old lion - the lord of Taiya, who lived in the palace of the Mysterious Rocks at the Eastern edge of the sky. He, having learned that the Great Sage accompanies the Tang monk to the West, without hesitation agreed to go to earth to pacify the Nine-Headed Lion.

When they arrived at the cave, Sun lured the werewolf out of there, and Lord Tai's servant began to beat him with all his might. Then the lord saddled the lion, jumped onto the cloud and returned home. Sun Wukong rescued the captives, and they all returned together to the city, where a magnificent feast was given in their honor.

Soon the travelers got ready for the journey. They still had to go and go, although the end of their journey was not far off.

And then the day came when the pilgrims finally reached their destination. In front of them towered the abode of the Buddha - the Miraculous Mountain with an ancient monastery and a temple of thunder. Four travelers, approaching the throne of the Buddha, fell on their faces, hit their foreheads on the ground several times, and only after that they told that they had arrived at the behest of the lord of the great Tang state, located in the eastern lands, for books of sacred teaching in order to spread it for the benefit of all living beings .

The Buddha immediately ordered his attendants to lead the travelers to the Pearl Tower and open the Precious Chamber with books for them. There, the pilgrims began to select what they needed - in total they received five thousand forty-eight notebooks - as many as the days they spent on the road. It was a complete set of Buddhist teachings. They carefully folded them, loaded them onto the horse, and there were still books left on one yoke. The Tang monk went to thank the Buddha for the generous gift, and the pilgrims set off on their return journey.

New challenges lay ahead of them. Before they had time to approach the Heavenly River, a whirlwind came up, the sky darkened, lightning flashed, sand and stones swirled, a terrible storm broke out, which subsided only in the morning. Sun Wukong was the first to guess that it was the Earth and Heaven that could not come to terms with the success of the pilgrimage, the deities and spirits were jealous, dreaming of stealing the precious luggage. But nothing could stop our heroes.

It should be said that the Tang Emperor, having sent Xuanzang to the West, ordered to build a "Tower for waiting for sacred books" near the capital, and every year he climbed it. He ascended the tower on the day of the return of the pilgrims. First, a radiance arose in the west, then a divine fragrance flowed, and travelers descended from heaven.

Xuanzang told the emperor that it was so far from the capital to the abode of the Buddha that during this time fourteen times the winter cold was replaced by summer heat. The path was blocked by mountain steeps, turbulent rivers, dense forests. Then the monk introduced his faithful companions to the sovereign, and a great feast began.

But that is not all. The pilgrims were to receive rewards from the Buddha himself. In an instant they were brought back to his palace. Everyone was given what they deserved. The Tang monk became the Sandalwood Buddha of Virtuous Merits, Sun Wukong received the title of the Victorious Buddha, Zhu Bajie the Messenger, Purifier of the Altars, and Shaseng became the Golden-bodied Arhat.

This ends the story of the pilgrimage of the Tang monk and his three disciples to the West. Many trials fell to their lot, but they defeated evil, and good triumphed!

The Angevin king dies on the battlefield. According to ancient custom, the throne passes to the eldest son. But he graciously offers his younger brother Gamuret to share the inheritance equally. Gamuret renounces wealth and goes to foreign lands to glorify the name of the king with chivalrous exploits. Gamuret offers his help to the ruler of Baghdad, Baruk, and wins victory after victory. After many adventures, the waves of the sea bring Gamuret's ship to the shores of the Moorish kingdom called Zazamanka. Everywhere the young man sees traces of military defeat. The black queen of Zazamanka - the beauty of Belakan - asks him for help. The knight valiantly fights against the enemies of the Moors, wins, achieves the love of Belakana and becomes the king of Zazamanka. But soon the thirst for military exploits awakens in him again, and he secretly leaves his wife. In his absence, Belakana's son Feyrefits is born, whose body is half black, half white. Gamuret arrives in Spain. Queen Herzeloyd, wanting to choose a worthy spouse, attends a jousting tournament. Gamuret wins. After long and painful hesitation, he agrees to marry Herzeloy on the condition that she does not keep him in the kingdom. He goes on another trip and dies.

The queen has a son, Parzival. Together with him and several subjects, the inconsolable Herzeloyd leaves the kingdom and retires to the forest. Trying to save Parzival from his father's fate, she forbids the servants to mention the name of his father and everything connected with his origin, wars and knightly exploits. The boy grows up in the bosom of nature, spending time in innocent amusements. Years pass unnoticed. One day while hunting, Parzival meets three horsemen in the forest. Fascinated by the magnificent equipment of the knights, the young man takes them for gods and falls to his knees. They ridicule him and hide. Soon another knight appears before Parzival; he is so beautiful that the young man takes him for a deity. Count Ulterek tells Parzival that he is after three intruders. They kidnapped the girl and, despising knightly honor, fled. The young man points out to him in which direction the riders galloped. The count captivates the simple-hearted young man with stories about knightly exploits and about life at the court of King Arthur and says that Parzival can also enter the king's service. The young man comes to his mother and demands a horse and armor in order to go to Nantes, to King Arthur. The alarmed Herzeloida chooses for her son an old horse and a jester's outfit in the hope that in this form the stubborn and uncouth boy will not be allowed to enter the court. In parting, she gives him an order: to help the good, not to know the bad, and if he really loves the girl, then let him take the ring from her. And he must also remember the name of their bitter enemy, the villain Leelyn, who ravaged her kingdom. Delighted, Parzival leaves, and the inconsolable mother soon dies of grief.

In the forest, the young man sees a tent, and in it - a beautiful sleeping girl. Without thinking twice, he takes off her ring and kisses her on the lips. She wakes up in horror and drives the impudent youth away. Soon her husband returns - Orilus, sees the traces of a stranger and in anger accuses her of treason. Meanwhile, Parzival hurries on. He meets a girl weeping over her murdered fiancé and vows to deal with the murderer, Duke Orilus. From the story of Parzival, the girl guesses who he is, and reveals to him the secret of his origin. It turns out that she is his cousin, Shiguna. The young man sets off again and meets Iter the Red, King Arthur's cousin-nephew. He tells him that the king deprived him of his possessions; Iter, on the other hand, took the golden goblet of the king as a pledge and will give it back only on one condition: he will fight with any knight from the king's retinue in order to regain the right to his lands. The young man promises the knight to convey his request to King Arthur.

Appearing before the king in his jester's attire, Parzival demands to be accepted into the royal retinue, naively considering himself ready for knightly service. He tells about the meeting with Iter the Red and conveys to the king that he longs for fair combat. To get rid of the annoying eccentric, the king's adviser suggests that he send him to a duel. Fearing for his life and at the same time not wanting to offend the ambitious Parzival, the king reluctantly agrees. The young man enters into a duel and miraculously wins. Putting on the armor of the slain knight, the young man goes on.

Parzival arrives in the city, where he is warmly received by Prince Gurnemanz. After learning his story, he decides to teach the inexperienced young man the rules of knightly behavior. He explains to Parzival that a knight must not indulge in stupid antics and endlessly ask useless questions. having learned these useful tips, Parzival goes on. He drives up to the besieged city, which is ruled by Gurnemanz's niece, Queen Kondviramur. Parzival defeats her enemies and grants them life on the condition that they will henceforth serve King Arthur. Having achieved the love of the queen, Parzival marries her. Having become king, he lives in happiness and prosperity, but longing for his mother makes him set off again.

Finding himself in the forest, on the shore of the lake, Parzival sees a man in a royal embroidered robe surrounded by fishermen, and he invites him to spend the night in his castle. To Parzival's astonishment, the inhabitants greet him with joyful cries. In the luxurious rear, he sees the owner of the castle, Anfortas. From his appearance, Parzival guesses that he is seriously ill. Suddenly, inexplicable things begin to happen. A squire with a bloodied spear runs into the hall, and everyone begins to moan and cry. Then beautiful maidens appear with lamps, and behind them is the queen, who brings in the sacred stone Grail, from which a wonderful radiance emanates. When she puts it in front of Anfortas, delicious dishes suddenly appear on the tables. Parzival is shocked by everything that is happening, but he does not dare to ask questions, remembering the teachings of Gurnemanz. The next morning, he finds that the castle is empty and drives on.

In the forest, he meets a girl and recognizes her as his cousin Shiguna. Hearing that he visited Muncalves - that is the name of the castle - and seeing all the miracles did not ask the king a single question, she showers Parzival with curses. It turns out that with one of his questions, he could heal Anfortas and return the former prosperity to the kingdom. In desperation, Parzival continues on his way and meets the very beauty from whose hand he once boldly removed the ring. A jealous husband cursed her, and she wanders the world, poor and dressed in rags. Parzival returns the ring and proves the girl's innocence.

Meanwhile, King Arthur goes on a campaign and along the way asks everyone about the valiant knight Parzival to rank him among the heroes of the Round Table. When Parzival is brought before the king by Arthur's nephew Gavan, the sorceress Kundry suddenly appears. She tells everyone about Parzival not taking the opportunity to heal Anfortas. Now there is only one way left for Parzival to save Anfortas: to atone for his guilt by deeds. Kundry tells about the castle of Shatel Marvey, where four hundred beautiful maidens are languishing, who were captured by Anfortas's enemy, the villain Klingsor.

Ashamed and saddened, Parzival leaves King Arthur. On the way to Muncalves, he meets pilgrims. On this holy day - Good Friday - they call on a young knight to join them. But he refuses, having lost faith in God after so many misadventures and failures. But soon he repents and confesses his sins to the hermit Treuricent. It turns out that this hermit is the brother of Anfortas and Herzeloid. He tells Parzival the story of Anfortas. Having inherited the wonderful Grail stone, he longed for even greater glory, but in a duel he received a wound that has not healed since. Once, an inscription appeared on the holy stone: Anfortas can be healed by a knight who, filled with compassion, will ask him a question about the cause of his torment. Parzival learns that after the healing of Anfortas, the Grail keeper will be the one whose name appears on the stone.

Meanwhile, Gavan, after many adventures, arrives at Châtel Marvey Castle. The sorceress Kundry told the knights about this castle. Having passed all the tests that the owner of Klingsor Castle arranges for him, he frees the captive beauties. Now Havana will have to fight with his old enemy Gramoflanze. He mistakes his friend Parzival for him, and they fight. Parzival begins to overcome a knight unfamiliar to him, but suddenly finds out that this is his friend Gavan. Tomorrow Gavan must fight Gramoflanz, but he is exhausted by the duel with Parzival. Under the guise of Havana, Parzival secretly fights with Gramoflanz and wins.

Parzival is on his way again. In foreign lands, he enters into single combat with the ruler of the Moors Feyrefits. Unaware that this is his half-brother, the son of Gamuret, Parzival fights with him not for life, but for death. But the forces of the opponents are equal. Learning that they are brothers, they throw themselves into each other's arms and go together to King Arthur. There, Parzival again sees the sorceress Kundry, and she solemnly announces to everyone that the young knight has passed all the tests and atoned for his guilt. His name appeared on the Grail stone. Heaven has chosen Parzival: henceforth he becomes the guardian of the Grail. Parzival and Feyrefitz arrive in Muncalves, and Parzival finally asks Anfortas the question everyone has been waiting for. Anfortas is healed. At this time, Parsifal's wife, Kondviramur, arrives at the castle with her two sons. Feirefits receives holy baptism and marries the sister of Anfortas. Everyone in the castle is celebrating the deliverance from the disasters that once befell the kingdom.

A. V. Vigilyanskaya

The Nibelung was the name of one of the two kings killed by Siegfried. Then this name passed to the Dutch knight himself and his fabulous subjects - the keepers of the treasure. Beginning with the twenty-fifth adventure, the Burgundians are called Nibelungs.

In the wonderful tales of bygone days, it is said that a girl named Kriemhilda lived in the land of the Burgundians - so beautiful and sweet that all the knights of the earth dreamed of her. The cause of many disasters was this extraordinary beauty.

Kriemhild grew up in the capital city of Worms under the protection of three brother-kings, brave and noble knights. Gunther, Gernot and the young Giselcher ruled Burgundy, relying on a brave squad and loyal vassals - the most powerful of them was Hagen, the ruler of Tronier. One could talk for hours about this brilliant court, about the exploits of the Burgundian heroes, about their tournaments, feasts and fun.

One day, Kriemhild had a dream that a falcon flew into her room and two eagles pecked at it before her eyes. Uta's mother told her daughter that the falcon is her future husband, who is destined to die at the hands of the killers. Then the girl decided not to marry, so as not to mourn her beloved later. Many wooed the lovely princess, but were refused. She enjoyed peace until the glorious knight led her to the crown. For his death, Kriemhilda terribly avenged her family.

The king of the Netherlands Sigmund had a son Siegfried - the beauty and pride of his native country. The young warrior was so bold and good-looking that all the ladies sighed for him. Having heard about the marvelous Burgundian maiden, Siegfried set out to achieve her hand. Alarmed parents begged their son not to get involved with the arrogant and warlike Burgundians. But Siegfried insisted on his own and set off on a long journey, taking only twelve people with him. The court saw off the prince in despondency and longing - many hearts told that this idea would not lead to good.

When foreign knights appeared in Worms, Hagen immediately recognized Siegfried and advised Gunther to honor the illustrious hero, who in a fair duel won the huge treasure of the Nibelungs, the Balmung sword and the invisibility cloak. In addition, this knight is invulnerable: having killed a terrible dragon and bathed in blood, he became horny so that no weapon could take him. Siegfried immediately offered Gunther a duel in a mortgage on possession. All the Burgundians were enraged by this arrogant challenge, but Hagen, to everyone's surprise, said nothing. The king calmed the ardent knight with kind words, and Siegfried, fearing to lose Kriemhild, accepted the invitation to stay in Worms. The year passed in tournaments and competitions: Siegfried invariably prevailed, but he never managed to see Kriemhild, although the girl secretly watched him from the window. Suddenly, the Saxons and Danes declared war on Gunther. The Burgundians were taken by surprise, and the king, following the advice of Hagen, told Siegfried everything. The hero promised to repel the threat with his Dutchmen and asked only a squad of fighters from Tronier to help him. The arrogant Saxons and Danes were given a crushing rebuff - Siegfried personally captured their leaders, who swore an oath never to attack the Burgundians again. As a reward, Gunther allowed Siegfried to meet his sister at the feast.

Gunter dreamed of marrying Brynhilda, Queen of Iceland, a mighty warrior maiden. Siegfried agreed to help his friend, but in return he demanded the hand of Kriemhild. It was decided that four people would go on a dangerous journey - both kings and Hagen with his younger brother Danquart. Brynhild immediately singled out Siegfried and greeted him first, but the Dutch hero said that he was just a vassal of the Burgundian king. Gunther had to defeat Brynhild in three contests: to throw a spear harder and to throw a stone further, and then to jump over it in full armor. The defeated knight, as well as all his companions, faced inevitable death. Using the invisibility cloak, Siegfried defeated Brynhild, and the proud maiden had to accept: she agreed to the marriage, and announced to her Icelanders that from now on they are subjects of Gunther. To cut off her retreat, Siegfried went for his Nibelung vassals.

When the heroes returned triumphantly to Worms, Siegfried reminded Gunther of their agreement. Two weddings took place on the same day. Brynhild considered that the king had humiliated her sister, who became the wife of a simple vassal. Gunter's explanations did not satisfy her, and she threatened that she would not let him go to bed until she knew the truth. The king tried to take his wife by force, but the hero tied him up and hung him on a hook in the bedroom. Gunther turned to Siegfried again. He appeared under the cover of an invisibility cloak and pacified Brynhild, removing her belt and ring. He later gave these things to Kriemhild, a fatal nonchalance for which he paid dearly. And Gunther took possession of the heroic maiden, and from that moment she became equal in strength to all women. Both couples were happily married. Siegfried returned with his young wife to the Netherlands, where he was greeted with jubilation by vassals and relatives. The aged Sigmund gladly gave up the throne to his son. Ten years later, Krimhilda gave birth to an heir, who was named Gunther in honor of his uncle. Brynhild also had a son, and he was given the name Siegfried.

Brynhilde often wondered: why did the sister-in-law boast so much, because she got a vassal, though noble, as her husband? The queen began to ask Gunther to invite Siegfried and his wife to visit. He yielded with great reluctance and sent messengers to the Netherlands. On the contrary, Siegfried was glad to see his Wormsian relatives, and even old Sigmund agreed to accompany him. Ten days passed quickly in festivities and amusements, and on the eleventh the queens started a dispute about whose husband was more valiant. At first, Kriemhilda said that Siegfried could easily take possession of Gunther's kingdom. Brynhild objected to this that Siegfried was her husband's servant. Kriemhild was furious; her brothers would never marry her to a vassal, and to prove the absurdity of these statements, she will be the first to enter the cathedral. At the gates of the cathedral, Brynhilde arrogantly ordered to give way to her - the wife of a lazy man should not argue with her mistress. Kriemhilde said that her husband's concubine had better keep quiet. Brynhild looked forward to the end of the service, eager to refute the terrible accusation. Then Kriemhild presented the belt and ring that Siegfried had inadvertently given her. Brynhild burst into tears, and Gunther called Siegfried to account. He swore he never told his wife. The honor of the Burgundian king was threatened, and Hagen began to persuade him to take revenge.

After much hesitation, Gunther agreed. A trick was invented to find out the secret of the invulnerable Siegfried: false messengers came to Worms with the news that the Saxons and Danes were again at war with the Burgundians. The enraged Siegfried was eager to fight the traitors, and Kriemhild was exhausted from fear for her husband - it was at that moment that the cunning Hagen appeared to her. Hoping to protect her husband, she opened up to her relative: when Siegfried was bathing in the blood of a dragon, a linden leaf fell on his back - and in this place the hero became vulnerable. Hagen asked to sew a tiny cross on Siegfried's caftan - supposedly in order to better protect the Dutchman in battle. After that, it was announced that the Danes with the Saxons shamefully retreated, and Gunther invited his brother-in-law to have fun hunting. When the heated and unarmed Siegfried bent over the spring to pour, Hagen dealt him a treacherous blow. The dead knight was laid on the threshold of Kriemhild; in the morning servants stumbled upon him, and the unfortunate woman immediately realized what grief had befallen her. The Nibelungs and Sigmund were ready to immediately settle accounts with an unknown enemy, and the Burgundians kept saying that Siegfried had been killed in the forest by unknown robbers. Only Kriemhilde had no doubt that Hagen had carried out revenge at the instigation of Brynhilde and with the knowledge of Gunther. The inconsolable widow wanted to leave for the Netherlands, but her relatives managed to dissuade her: she would be a stranger and hated by everyone there because of her relationship with the Burgundians. To Sigmund's indignation, Kriemhild remained in Worms, and then Hagen carried out his long-standing plan: he took away the treasure of the Nibelungs from the widow - her husband's wedding gift. With the consent of the kings, the ruler of Tronier drowned countless treasures in the Rhine, and all four swore an oath not to reveal where the treasure was hidden while at least one of them was alive.

Thirteen years have passed. Kriemhild lived in sorrow and loneliness, mourning her husband. The powerful lord of the Huns, Etzel, having lost his wife Helha, began to think about a new marriage. Those close to him told him that the beautiful Kriemhild, the widow of the incomparable Siegfried, lives on the Rhine. The Margrave of Behlaren Rüdeger, a devoted vassal of Etzel, went to Worms. The king brothers greeted the matchmaking favorably, but Hagen vehemently objected to this marriage. But Gunther wanted to reconcile with his sister and somehow make amends for his guilt before her. It remained to convince Kriemhild, and Rüdeger swore to protect her from all enemies. The widow, thinking only of revenge, agreed. Farewell to relatives was cold - Krimhilda regretted only about her mother and young Giselher.

The young woman had a long journey ahead of her. Everywhere she was received with the greatest honor, for Etzel surpassed in power all the kings of the earth. Soon Kriemhild won the hearts of the Huns with her generosity and beauty. To the great happiness of her husband and subjects, she gave birth to a son - Ortlib was to inherit twelve crowns. No longer doubting the affection of the Huns, Krimhilda, thirteen years after the wedding, approached her husband with a request - to invite the brothers to visit, so that people would not call her rootless. Egzel, rejoicing at the opportunity to please his beloved wife, immediately sent messengers to the Rhine. Having secretly met with them before leaving, Kriemhild taught them how to ensure that her sworn enemy also came with her brothers. Despite the furious objections of Hagen, the Burgundian kings agreed to go to their son-in-law - the owner of Tronier relented when Gernot dared to reproach him for cowardice.

The Nibelungs went on a campaign - there were nine hundred knights and nine thousand servants. The prophetic mermaids warned Hagen that all of them, except for the chaplain, would die in a foreign land. The owner of Tronier, having killed the quick-tempered carrier, personally transported the army across the Danube. Wanting to check the prediction, Hagen pushed the chaplain overboard and tried to drown with a pole, but the old priest managed to get to the opposite shore. Then Hagen smashed the ship to pieces and ordered his comrades-in-arms to prepare for inevitable death. Here the Bavarians attacked the Nibelungs, furious with the murder of the carrier, but their onslaught was repulsed. But in Bechlaren the Burgundians were greeted cordially, for Rüdeger did not suspect Kriemhild's plans. Young Giselher became engaged to the margrave's daughter, Gernot received a sword from him, and Hagen a shield. The Behlaren squad happily went to Etzel - none of the Rüdeger knights knew that they were saying goodbye to their relatives forever.

The Huns were looking forward to their dear guests. Everyone especially wanted to look at the one who killed Siegfried. Kriemhild also trembled with impatience - seeing Hagen, she realized that the hour of revenge had struck. The queen, going out to meet her relatives, kissed only one Giselher. Hagen did not fail to point out this sarcastically, which infuriated Kriemhild even more. And the Nibelungs were warned of the threat looming over them by Dietrich of Bern, a mighty knight who lost his kingdom and found shelter with Etzel. Many exiles gathered at the Hunnic court: they were all devoted to Etzel and paid dearly for their loyalty.

Of all his comrades-in-arms, Hagen singled out the brave Volker, who was nicknamed the spierman for his excellent violin playing. Going out into the yard, both friends sat down on a bench, and Kriemhilda noticed them from the window. She decided to take advantage of the opportunity and gathered a lot of Huns in order to finally get even with her offender. The arrogant Hagen did not want to stand before the queen and paraded the Badmung sword he had taken from the dead Siegfried. Krimhilda wept with anger and humiliation, but the Huns did not dare to attack the brave knights. And Hagen ordered the Burgundians not to take off their weapons even in the church. Amazed, Etzel asked who dared to offend the guests. Hagen replied that no one insulted them, it was just that in Burgundy it was customary to feast in full armor for three days. Kriemhilda remembered the customs of her native country, but kept silent for fear of angering her husband. Then she persuaded Bledel, Etzel's brother, to deal with the Burgundian servants, who feasted separately under the supervision of Danquart. Obsessed with anger, the woman also ordered that little Ortlib be brought to the celebration.

Bledel attacked the almost unarmed servants. The Burgundian braves fought with unprecedented courage, but only Dankwart managed to escape from this massacre alive. Cutting his way with his sword, he burst into the main hall with the news of an unheard-of treason. In response, Hagen blew Ortlib's head from his shoulders, and a fierce battle immediately broke out. The Burgundians allowed only their friends to leave - Dietrich with his Amelungs and Rüdeger with the Behlaren squad. The ruler of Bern saved Etzel and Kriemhild from inevitable death. The Nibelungs, having killed seven thousand Huns, threw the corpses onto the stairs. Then the Danes with the Saxons rushed into the bloody battle - the Nibelungs killed them too. The day was approaching evening, and the Burgundians asked to transfer the battle to the courtyard. But the vengeful Kriemhild demanded Hagen's head - and even Giselher failed to soften her. Etzel ordered the hall to be set on fire, but the heroes began to extinguish the flames with blood.

The next morning, Etzel again sent the remnants of his squad into battle. Rüdeger tried to appeal to Dietrich, but he said that the Burgundians could no longer be saved - the king would never forgive them for the death of his son. Kriemhild demanded that Rüdeger fulfill his vow. In vain, the unfortunate margrave begged not to destroy his soul: Etzel, in response, insisted on a vassal debt. The most terrible fight began - friends entered the battle. Rüdeger gave Hagen his shield: the touched ruler Tronier swore not to raise his sword against him, but the margrave fell at the hands of Gernot, mortally wounded by him. The Bekhlarens perished, one and all.

The Amelungs, having learned about this, sobbed bitterly and asked the Burgundians to hand over the body of the margrave. The old squire of Dietrich, Hildebrand, tried to restrain the ardent youth, but a squabble broke out, followed by a battle. In this last battle, all the Amelungs fell, and only two survived among the Burgundians - Gunther and Hagen. The shocked Dietrich, who suddenly lost his squad, offered them to surrender, promising to save their lives, but this led Hagen to insane anger. The Burgundians were already exhausted by the fight. In a desperate duel, the ruler of Bern captured both and handed over to Kriemhild, begging to spare them. Kriemhilda came to Hagen's dungeon demanding the return of the treasure. The ruler of Tronier replied to this that he swore not to reveal the secret while at least one of the kings was alive. Kriemhilda ordered the death of Gunther and brought Hagen a severed head. For the owner of Tronier, a moment of triumph came: he announced to the "witch" that now she would never get the treasure. Kriemhild cut off his head with her own hands, and Etzel could not restrain his sobs - the bravest of the knights was killed by a woman's hand. Old Hildebrand in indignation slew the "she-devil" with his sword. So the Nibelungs perished - the most worthy and best are always waiting for an untimely death.

E. D. Murashkintseva

Stupidity says: let rude mortals talk about her as they please, but she dares to assert that her divine presence, it alone, amuses gods and people. And therefore, the laudable word of Stupidity will now be uttered.

Who, if not Stupidity, should become the trumpeter of his own glory? After all, lazy and ungrateful mortals, zealously revering her and willingly taking advantage of her beneficence, for so many centuries did not bother to praise Stupidity in a thankful speech. And here she is, Stupidity, a generous giver of all blessings, which the Latins call Stultitia, and the Greeks Moria, personally appears before everyone in all her glory.

So, since not everyone knows what kind it comes from, then, having called for the help of the Muses, first of all, Stupidity sets out its genealogy. Her father is Plutus, who, not in anger will be told to Homer, Hesiod and even Jupiter himself, is the only and true father of gods and people. To whom he favors, he does not care about Jupiter with its thunders. And Stupidity was born, to use the words of Homer, not in the bonds of a dull marriage, but from the lust of free love. And at that time his father was dexterous and cheerful, intoxicated from youth, and even more from the nectar, which he pretty much drank at the feast of the gods.

Stupidity is born on those Happy Islands, where they do not sow, do not plow, but gather in granaries. There is neither old age nor disease on these islands, and you will not see there in the fields either thistles, or beans, or similar rubbish, but only lotuses, roses, violets and hyacinths. And two charming nymphs fed the child with their nipples - Mete-Intoxication and Apedia-Bad manners. Now they are in the retinue of companions and confidantes of Stupidity, and with them Kolakia-Flattery, and Leta-Oblivion, and Misoponia-Laziness, and Gedone-Delight, and Anoia-Madness, and Tryphe-Gluttony. And here are two more gods who got mixed up in a girlish round dance: Komos-Razgul and Negretos Hypnos-A deep sleep. With the help of these faithful servants, Stupidity subjugates the entire human race and gives orders to the emperors themselves.

Having learned what kind, what is education and what is the retinue of Stupidity, prick up your ears and listen to what blessings it bestows on gods and people and how wide its divine power extends.

First of all, what could be sweeter and more precious than life itself? But to whom, if not to Stupidity, should the sage appeal, if he suddenly desires to become a father? After all, honestly tell me, what kind of husband would agree to put on the bridle of marriage if, according to the custom of the sages, he first weighed all the hardships of married life? And what woman would admit a husband to her if she thought and pondered the dangers and pains of childbirth and the difficulties of raising children? And so, only thanks to the drunken and cheerful play of Stupidity are born into the world and gloomy philosophers, and porphyry-bearing sovereigns, and thrice pure high priests, and even the whole numerous swarm of poetic gods.

Moreover, everything that is pleasant in life is also a gift of Stupidity, and now this will be proven. What would earthly life be like if it were deprived of pleasures? The Stoics themselves do not turn away from pleasures. After all, what will remain in life, except for sadness, boredom and hardships, if you don’t add a little bit of pleasure to it, in other words, if you don’t spice it up with stupidity?

The first years are the most pleasant and cheerful age in a person's life. How can we explain our love for children, if not by the fact that wisdom has wrapped babies in an attractive cloak of stupidity, which, enchanting parents, rewards them for their labors, and gives babies the love and care they need.

Childhood is followed by youth, What is the source of the charm of youth, if not in Stupidity? The less clever the boy is by the grace of Stupidity, the more pleasant he is to everyone and everyone. And the more a person moves away from Stupidity, the less time remains for him to live, until finally painful old age sets in. None of the mortals would have endured old age if Stupidity had not taken pity on the unfortunate and hastened to their aid. By her grace, the elders can be considered good drinking companions, pleasant friends, and even take part in a cheerful conversation.

And what scrawny, gloomy people who devote themselves to the study of philosophy! Before they could become young men, they were already old, persistent reflections dried up their vital juices. And the fools, on the contrary, are smooth, white, with a well-groomed skin, real Acarna pigs, they will never experience the hardships of old age, unless they become infected with it, communicating with smart people. It is not for nothing that the popular proverb teaches that only stupidity is capable of holding back the rapidly fleeing youth and putting off the hateful old age.

And after all, neither fun nor happiness can be found on earth that would not be gifts of Stupidity. Men who are born for the affairs of government and therefore have received a few extra drops of reason are married to a woman, a slow-witted and stupid brute, but at the same time amusing and sweet, so that her stupidity and sweeten the dreary importance of the male mind. It is known that a woman will always be a woman, in other words, a fool, but how do they attract men to themselves, if not by Stupidity? In the Stupidity of a woman is the highest bliss of a man.

However, many men find their highest bliss in drinking. But is it possible to imagine a merry feast without the seasoning of Stupidity? Is it worth burdening the womb with food and delicacies, if at the same time the eyes, ears and spirit are not delighted with laughter, games and jokes? Namely Stupidity started all this for the benefit of the human race.

But, perhaps, there are people who find joy only in communicating with friends? But even here it will not do without stupidity and frivolity. Yes, what is there to interpret! Cupid himself, the originator and parent of all rapprochement between people, is he not blind, and does not the ugly seem beautiful to him? Immortal God, how many divorces or something else worse would be everywhere, if husbands and wives did not brighten up and make home life easier with the help of flattery, jokes, frivolity, delusion, pretense and other companions of Stupidity!

In a word, without Stupidity, no connection would be pleasant and lasting: the people could not endure their sovereign for a long time, the master - the slave, the maid - the mistress, the teacher - the student, the wife - the husband, the lodger - the householder, if they did not regale each other honey of stupidity.

Let the wise man to the feast - and he will immediately embarrass everyone with gloomy silence or inappropriate questions. Ask him to dance - he will dance like a camel. Take him with you to some spectacle - his very appearance will spoil all the pleasure of the public. If a sage intervenes in a conversation, he will scare everyone no worse than a wolf.

But let us turn to the sciences and arts. There is no doubt that any thing has two faces, and these faces are by no means similar to one another: under beauty - ugliness, under learning - ignorance, under fun - sadness, under benefit - harm. Eliminating lies means spoiling the whole performance, because it is acting and pretense that attracts the eyes of the audience. But all human life is nothing but a kind of comedy in which people, wearing masks, each play their own role. And everyone loves and pampers fools. And as for the sovereigns, they love their fools, no doubt, more than the gloomy wise men, for the latter have two languages, of which one speaks the truth, and the other speaks according to time and circumstances. Truth itself has an irresistible attractive force, if only nothing offensive is mixed with it, but only fools have been granted by the gods the ability to tell the truth without offending anyone.

The happiest of all is the one who is the craziest of all. From this dough are baked people who love stories about false signs and wonders and can never get enough of fables about ghosts, lemurs, people from the other world and the like; and the more these fables diverge from the truth, the more readily they are believed. However, one must also remember those who, reading seven verses from the sacred Psalter every day, promise themselves eternal bliss for that. Well, can you be dumber?

But do people ask the saints for something that has nothing to do with Stupidity? Take a look at the thanksgiving offerings with which the walls of other temples are decorated right up to the very roof - will you see among them at least one donation for getting rid of stupidity, for the fact that the bearer has become a little smarter than a log? It is so sweet not to think about anything, that people will refuse everything, but not Morya.

Not only the majority of people are infected with stupidity, but entire nations. And so, in self-delusion, the British make exclusive claims to bodily beauty, musical art and a good table. The French only ascribe pleasant courtesy to themselves. The Italians have appropriated to themselves the primacy in fine literature and eloquence, and therefore they are in such sweet seduction that, of all mortals, they alone do not consider themselves barbarians. The Spaniards do not agree to give up their military glory to anyone. The Germans boast of their height and knowledge of magic. Hand in hand with self-delusion goes flattery. It is thanks to her that everyone becomes more pleasant and sweeter to himself, and yet this is the highest happiness. Flattery is honey and seasoning in all communication between people.

It is said that to err is a misfortune; on the contrary, not to err - that is the greatest of misfortunes! Happiness does not depend on the things themselves, but on our opinion of things, and knowledge often takes away the joy of life. If the wife is ugly to the extreme, but seems to her husband a worthy rival of Venus, then is it all the same, as if she were truly beautiful?

So, either there is no difference between wise men and fools, or the position of fools is uncommonly more advantageous. Firstly, their happiness, based on deceit or self-deception, gets them much cheaper, and secondly, they can share their happiness with most other people.

Many people owe everything to Stupidity. There are among them grammarians, rhetoricians, jurists, philosophers, poets, orators, and especially those who smear the paper with various nonsense, for whoever writes in a learned way is more worthy of pity than envy. Look how such people suffer: they add, change, delete, then, about nine years later, they print, still dissatisfied with their own work. Add to this disordered health, faded beauty, myopia, early old age, and you can’t list everything. And our wise man imagines himself rewarded if two or three such blind learned men praise him. On the contrary, how happy is the writer, obedient to the suggestions of Stupidity: he will not pore at night, but writes down everything that comes into his mind, risking nothing, except for a few pennies spent on paper, and knowing in advance that the more nonsense will be in his writings, the more surely it will please the majority, that is, all fools and ignoramuses. But the most amusing thing is when fools begin to praise fools, ignoramuses - ignoramuses, when they mutually glorify each other in flattering epistles and verses. As for theologians, would it not be better not to touch this poisonous plant, although they are in great debt to Stupidity.

However, no one should forget the measure and the limit, and therefore Stupidity says: "Be healthy, applaud, live, drink, glorious partakers of the mysteries of Morya."

E. V. Morozova

They say that once in the morning, the valiant Tus and Giv, famous in battles, accompanied by hundreds of warriors with greyhounds and falcons, galloped to the Dagui plain to amuse themselves with hunting. Having shot game in the steppe, they went to the forest. A girl appeared in the distance. The hunters hurried to her. An unprecedented beauty appeared before them, slender as a cypress. When Tus asked who she was, the girl admitted that she had left home because of her father, who threatened to kill her while drunk. In a conversation with her, it turned out that she was from the clan of Shah Feridun. With an expensive crown on her head, she left the house on horseback. But the horse fell on the way, exhausted, and she herself was stunned and robbed by robbers.

The girl fell in love with both young men, and a furious dispute flared up between them, who would get her. They decided to bring him to the court of the ruler of Iran, Kay Kavus, and he said that such a beauty is worthy only of a ruler. The girl was seated on the throne and crowned. When the time came, the young queen gave birth to a son of extraordinary beauty. They named him Siavush.

The baby grew up among palace luxury. One day the mighty Rostem came from Zabul. Noticing a frisky prince at court, he asked the shah to entrust him with the upbringing of a lion cub. The Shah saw no reason to refuse. Rostem took Siavush to Zabul, where, under the supervision of the famous knight, he was introduced to palace life, received the education necessary for that time, and surpassed all his peers in military affairs.

The time has come for the pupil of Rostem to return to his native hearth. The messengers brought good news to Kay Kavus, the prince's father. The Shah ordered his commanders Tus and Giv to gallop towards the heir. The ruler of Iran was proud of his son and prayed to heaven for him. A magnificent feast was arranged on the occasion of the return of the prince.

Unexpectedly, trouble crept up to Siavush: his beloved mother died. A little time passed, as the other wife of her father, Sudabe, fell in love at first sight with a young handsome man. Endless persecution began. Sudabe repeatedly lured the young man to her palace, but in vain. Sudabe decided to take a very risky step - she complained to her husband about the alleged heartlessness and inattention of her stepson, who ignores not only her, but also his sisters and, despite repeated invitations, never honored them with his visit. Kay Kavus, not suspecting anything, advised his son to be attentive to his stepmother and her daughters, Siavush, fearing to become a victim of Sudabe's intrigues, asked his father to allow him to seek the company of famous warriors. The father insisted on his own and for the second time ordered Siavush to visit the sisters. The old servant Khirbed led Siavush to the women's quarters. In the palace, the young prince saw an unprecedented luxury: the path was covered with Chinese gold brocade, the throne of pure gold was decorated with precious stones. On the throne, shining with unearthly beauty, sat Sudabe. The queen stepped down from her throne, bowed low and hugged Siavush. He was embarrassed. The warm embrace of his stepmother seemed indecent to him. He approached his sisters and spent considerable time with them.

It seemed to Sudaba that she was already close to the goal, and when she met her husband, she praised Siavush. The Shah offered to pick up a bride for his son and arrange a wedding. Sudabe decided to marry one of her daughters to the prince. She invited Siavush to her chambers for the second time. As at the first meeting, she greeted him with a deep bow, seated him on the throne and, as if by chance, pointed to the girls who were sitting nearby, and asked which of them he liked best, whom he would choose as his wife. Siavush was not attracted by such an idea. He said nothing. This cheered up his companion. She, not embarrassed, revealed her secret plan, saying: "Yes, the moon does not attract near the sun; take advantage of my favor, catch happiness. Cherish me until the end of my years, I do not melt my love, from now on I am your soul and body!" Forgetting about shame, she hugged the prince tightly and kissed him passionately.

Siavush was afraid to offend her with harshness and embarrassedly said that he was ready to become her son-in-law, and only a sovereign was worthy as beautiful as she, and adding: “I am ready to honor you like a dear mother,” he left the Shah’s harem.

Some time passed, Sudaba again ordered to call Siavush to her and again began to talk about her passion, about how she languishes and languishes from love for him. Feeling indifference to herself on the part of Siavush, the queen turned to threats, declaring: "If you do not submit, you do not want to revive me with young love, I will avenge you, deprive you of the throne." Such insolence pissed off the young man. He answered in his hearts: "That will not happen. Honor is dear to me, I will not deceive my father" - and he intended to leave, but the queen instantly scratched her cheeks, tore her clothes and began to cry for help. Hearing the cry of his wife, the shah hurried to the harem. The half-naked queen, looking into the angry eyes of her crowned husband, shouted furiously: "Your son, enraged with passion, tore my clothes, whispering that he is full of love fire."

After listening to his wife, the shah showed prudence. He decided to calmly investigate what had happened and questioned Siavush. He told him what really happened. The Shah took Siavush by the hands, pulled him to him and sniffed the curls and clothes of his son, and then, repeating the same thing with Sudabe, he realized that there was no trace of the criminal embrace that the queen spoke about. She blasphemed the innocent Siavush. However, the shah was afraid to punish his wife, fearing a war with her relatives.

Unable to deceive her husband, Sudabe again began to weave cunning intrigues. She called on the sorceress, who was carrying a child in herself, gave her a drug so that she would have a miscarriage, and she was going to pass off the fetus as her own, accusing Siavush of killing her child. The sorceress agreed and, having drunk the potion, gave birth to dead twins, whom the queen ordered to be put in a golden tub, and she herself uttered a piercing cry. The ruler, having learned about the misfortune that befell the queen, was furious, but did not betray his anger in any way. The next morning he came to his wife's chambers and saw anxious servants and stillborn children. Sudabe shed tears, saying: "I told you about the deeds of the villain."

Doubts crept into the Shah's soul. He turned to the astrologers with a request to fairly judge the accusations of the queen. The astrologers worked for a week, and then they said that it was not he and the queen who were the parents of these children. The queen again began to shed tears and ask the shah for justice. Then Vladyka gave the order to find the real mother of these children. The guard soon followed the trail of the sorceress and brought her to the Shah, threatening her with a noose and a sword. The same one repeated to them in response: “I don’t know my guilt, no!” Stargazers again confirmed their decision. Sudabe said that Siavush forbade them to tell the truth. In order to drive away suspicions from himself, the prince decides to pass the test by fire, as ordered by the great Zarathushtra. A huge fire was lit. The flames raged to the screams of the assembled people. Everyone felt sorry for the blooming young man.

Siavush appeared and said: "Let the heavenly sentence be done! If I am right, the rescuer will save me." Here the black horse carried Siavush through the fire. Neither the rider nor the horse was visible. Everyone froze and after a moment shouted joyfully: "The young ruler passed through the fire." Justice has been restored. The Shah decided to execute the liar, but Siavush persuaded him to pardon his wife and not torturing himself. Kay Kavus became even more attached to his son.

Meanwhile, Shah Afrasyab was preparing for new battles with Iran. Siavush asked his father to allow him to lead the army, saying that he was capable of crushing Afrasyab and plunging the heads of the enemy into dust. The Shah agreed and sent a messenger for Rostem, asking him to protect Siavush in the coming war.

To the thunder of the timpani, Tus lined up an army in front of the palace. The Shah handed Siavush the keys to the treasures of the palace and military equipment and placed under his command an army of twelve thousand fighters. After that, the shah delivered a parting speech to the army.

Soon Siavush occupied Balkh and sent this good news to his father.

Afrasyab had a terrible dream, as if a whirlwind had flown into his army, knocked over his royal banner and tore off the cover from the tents.

Death mowed down the warriors, bodies piled up like a bloody mountain. One hundred thousand warriors in armor flew in, and their leader, like a whirlwind on a horse, Afrasyab was tied up, rushed faster than fire and thrown at the feet of Kay Kavus. In a rage, he plunged a dagger into the chest of Afrasyab, and then he was awakened by his own cry.

Mobed deciphered his dream: "Mighty lord, get ready to see the formidable army of the Iranians in reality. Your state will be destroyed, your native country will be flooded with blood. Siavush will drive you away, and if you defeat Siavush, then the Iranians, avenging him, will burn the country."

Wanting to prevent a war, Afrasyab sends a caravan with rich gifts, a herd of horses and many slaves with Garsivaz. When Garsivaz entered the palace, the prince showed courtesy to him and seated him at the throne, Garsivaz stated his master's request to end the war.

The young commander Siavush, after consulting with Rostem, decided to accept the proposed peace. The messenger informed Afrasyab about this and added that Siavush demanded a hundred hostages. The condition was accepted, and Rostem went to Kay Kavus with the news of the conclusion of peace.

However, Siavush's message stung the Shah. He was not at all pleased with the decision of Siavush, and he ordered the army to be transferred under the command of Tus, and Siavush himself immediately return home, calling him "unworthy of the title of warrior." This offended the wisest commander Rostem, who, in the presence of the Shah, flared up with anger and left the court.

Siavush poured out his grief to two heroes close to him - Zeng and Bahram - and admitted that he got involved in the war because of the intrigues of his stepmother, but managed to return the two richest regions to the country - Sogd and Balkh, and instead of gratitude he was humiliated. Siavush, in anger, returned to Afrasyab all the hostages and gifts that the Turanians had sent him on the day of victory, entrusted the army to Bahram, and he himself decided not to return to his father's house. Soon his envoy Zenge arrived in Turan to Afrasyab, who gave him a magnificent reception. Upon learning of Siavush's decision, Afrasyab was shocked. He consulted with the sage Piran, who spoke very flatteringly about the Iranian prince and suggested that the ruler of Turan accept Siavush as his own son, surround him with honor and give him his daughter as his wife, performing the prescribed ceremony.

Afrasyab reasoned as follows: Siavush's coming to him is the end of wars; Kay Kavus has become decrepit, his end is fast, the two thrones will unite, and he will become the ruler of a vast country. The will of the ruler of Turan was carried out immediately. A messenger was urgently sent to Siavush with a friendly proposal on behalf of Afrasyab. The prince arrived at the camp of the lord of Turan with three hundred fighters and part of the treasury. Kay Kavus was smitten by this news.

The wise Piran met Siavush at the border with great honor, named him his son, and they went to the capital of Turan. The ruler of Turan, Afrasyab, gave the same cordial welcome to the Iranian prince. Having met the guest with open arms and warm kisses, he was delighted and subdued by Siavush and promised that from now on Turan would faithfully serve him.

Siavush was brought into the palace, seated on a shining throne, a grand feast was held in his honor, and the next morning, as soon as he woke up, they presented him with the rich gifts of Afrasyab. So that the dear guest would not be bored, the courtiers arranged all kinds of games and fun in his honor. By order of the ruler, seven of the most skillful horsemen were selected for the game, but the guest easily defeated them. The palm went to him both in archery and in hunting, where everyone went, led by Afrasyab himself.

Elder Piran took care of the family well-being of Siavush and offered him to intermarry with one of the most noble families of the country. The prince, full of love, said in response: "I want to intermarry with your family." A magnificent wedding was played. Piran's daughter Jerir became the first wife of the knight. Near his dear wife Siavush for a while he forgot about his stern father Kay Kavus.

A little more time passed, and once the perspicacious Piran said to Siavush: "Although my daughter became your wife, you were born for a different share. You should be related to the lord himself. His daughter Ferengiz is a diamond cherished by her father." Siavush submitted, saying: "If this is the command of the creator, then you should not resist his will." Piran acted as an intermediary. He stated the desire of the prince to decorate his palace and name the incomparable daughter of the lord Ferengiz as his wife.

Shah thought. It seemed to him that Piran was too zealous in tending the lion cub. In addition, he remembered the prediction of the priests, who told him that his grandson would bring him a lot of suffering and trouble. Piran managed to calm the lord and get consent to the marriage of Siavush to his daughter.

Ferengiz dressed up, decorated her curls with flowers and brought to the palace of Siavush. For seven days the fun lasted and music and songs sounded. Seven days later, Afrasyab presented his son-in-law with jewels and gave in addition the land to the Chin-Sea, on which rich cities were built. The Shah also ordered that the throne and the golden crown be handed over to him.

After a year, Afrasyab suggested that Siavush travel around his region to Chin and choose a capital where he could settle. Siavush discovered a piece of paradise for himself: green plains, forests full of game. Here, in the center of the glorious city, he decided to erect the first palace.

Once, going around the district, Siavush turned to the astrologer: "Tell me, will I be happy in this brilliant city or will grief strike me?" The head of the astrologers said in response: "There is no grace for you in this city."

Piran was brought the order of the lord Turan, in which he ordered to collect tribute from all the lands subject to him. Piran, having said goodbye to Siavush, went to carry out the high order.

Meanwhile, rumors spread about the beautiful city - the pearl of the country, which was named Siavushkert. Returning from a campaign, Piran visited this city. He was delighted, marveling at his beauty, and, praising Siavush, he presented Ferengiz with a crown and a necklace that dazzled her eyes. Then he went to Khoten to see the Shah. Having reported to him about his mission, he, among other things, told about the greatness and beauty of the city that Siavush built.

Some time later, Afrasyab sent his brother Garsivaz to see the construction and congratulate Siavush on his success. Siavush went out to meet his retinue, hugged the eminent hero and asked about the Shah's health.

The next morning, the messenger reported the joyful news: a son was born to Siavush. They named him Farid. Piran rejoiced, but Garsivaz thought: "Give it time - and Siavush will rise above the country. After all, he owns almost everything: the army, the throne, and the shah's treasury." Garsivaz was greatly alarmed. Returning to the capital, he reported to the shah about how Siavush ascended, how the envoys of Iran, Chin and Rum were coming to him, and warned his brother about the possible danger for him. The Shah hesitated; do you believe all this? - and ordered Garsivaz to go again to Siavush and tell him to immediately come to the court.

Siavush was glad to meet with the lord, but Garsivaz slandered Afrasyab and presented the matter in such a way that, as a result of the intrigues of the evil spirit, he became hostile to the hero and blazed with fierce hatred towards him. Siavush, remembering the kindness of the lord, nevertheless intended to go to him, but Garsivaz brought more and more new arguments. Finally, calling on the scribe, he wrote a letter to Afrasyab, in which he praised him and said that Ferengiz was weighed down with a burden and Siavush was chained to her headboard.

The Shah's brother hurried to Afrasyab to tell another lie that Siavush supposedly did not accept the letter, did not go out to meet Garsivaz and was generally hostile towards Turan and was waiting for Iranian envoys. Afrasyab, believing in the intrigues of his brother, set out to lead the troops and put an end to the alleged turmoil.

Meanwhile, fearing for his life, Siavush decides to go with his retinue to Iran, but on the way he is overtaken by the lord of Turan. Sensing trouble, the Siavush squad was ready to fight, but the commander said that he would not stain his family with war. Garsivaz, more and more insistently, urged Afrasyab to start the battle. Afrasyab gave the order to destroy the army of Siavush.

True to his oath, Siavush touched neither sword nor spear. Thousands of Iranian fighters died. Here the warrior of Afrasyab Garui threw a lasso and pulled the neck of Siavush with a noose.

Hearing the bad news, Siavush's wife Ferengiz threw herself at her father's feet, begging for mercy.

But the shah did not heed her prayers and drove her away, ordering her to be locked in a dungeon. The killer Garui seized Siavush, dragged him along the ground, and then with a blow of a dagger plunged him into dust. Garsivaz ordered the Shah's daughter to be taken out of the dungeon and beaten with batogs.

This is how the villainy happened. And as a sign of this, a whirlwind rose above the earth and eclipsed the heavens.

H. G. Korogly

Once Rostem, waking up at dawn, filled his quiver with arrows, saddled his mighty horse Rekhsh and rushed off to Turan. On the way, he smashed an onager with a mace, roasted it on a skewer from a tree trunk, ate the whole carcass and, having washed it down with water from a spring, fell into a heroic sleep. Waking up, he called out to the horse, but that was gone. I had to trudge on foot in armor, with weapons.

And so the hero entered Semengan. The ruler of the city invited him to be a guest, spend the night over a cup of wine and not worry about Rehsha, because he is known to the whole world and will soon be found. To meet with Rostem, the tsar called on the city and military nobility.

The cooks brought dishes to the banquet table, and the kravchs poured wine. The singer's voice merged with the mellifluous ore. The fluttering beauties of the dancers dispersed Rostem's sadness. Drunk and feeling tired, he went to the bed prepared for him.

It was already past midnight when a whisper was heard, the door quietly opened and a slave girl entered with a candle in her hands, followed by a beauty as slender as a cypress, like the sun. The hero's lion's heart trembled. He said to her: "Say your name. Why did you come at midnight?" The beauty replied that her name was Tehmine and that among the kings she did not find an equal to him. "The omnipotent passion has overshadowed my mind to give birth to a son from you, so that he would be equal to you in height, strength and courage," the beauty said and promised to find the frisky Rekhsh.

Rostem, admiring her beauty, calls the mobed and orders him to go as a matchmaker to the lord father. The king, observing the law and custom of his ancestors, gives his beautiful daughter for a hero. All the nobility were invited to the feast in honor of the marriage union.

Left alone with his sweet wife, Rostem gives her his amulet, about which the whole world has heard. Handing it to his girlfriend, the hero said: "If fate sends you a daughter, attach the amulet for happiness to her scythe, and if you have a son, put it on his hand. Let him grow up to be a mighty daring man who knows no fear."

Rostem spent the whole night with his moon-faced girlfriend, and when the sun rose, saying goodbye, he pressed her to his heart, kissed her passionately on the lips, eyes and forehead. The sadness of parting clouded her eyes, and since then grief has become her constant companion.

In the morning, the Semengan ruler came to ask if the giant was sleeping well, and announced the good news: "Your Rekhsh has finally been found."

Rostem went to Zabul. Nine moons passed, and a baby was born, shining like a moon. Tekhmina named him Sohrab. Posture in Rostem, heroic growth, by the age of ten he became the strongest in the region. Rostem, having learned about the birth of his son, sent Takhmina a letter and gifts. She told her son about them and warned him: "O my son, the enemy of your father Afrasyab, the ruler of Turan, should not know about this." The time came, and Sohrab made a decision: to gather an army, overthrow the Shah of Iran, Kay Kavus, and find his father. He said to his mother: "I need a good horse." They quickly found a horse born from Rekhsh. The rich man rejoiced. Driven by impatience, he immediately saddled him and set off at the head of a huge army.

Soon the lord of Turan Afrasyab learns about Sohrab's campaign that has begun. He sends two of his heroes, Human and Barman, to meet him with parting words to resort to cunning, to push Rostem and Sohrab on the battlefield, but so that they do not recognize each other. Afrasyab planned with the help of Sohrab to achieve two goals: to eliminate the invincible enemy of Turan Rostem and to defeat Kay Kavus. To lull the vigilance of the young hero, Afrasyab generously endowed him, sending him a dozen horses and mules, a turquoise throne with a foot of sparkling white ivory, a royal crown burning with rubies and a flattering letter: "When you ascend the Iranian throne, peace and happiness will reign on earth Get the crown of the ruler in the struggle. I am sending you twelve thousand fighters to help you.

Sohrab, together with his grandfather, hurried to honor the approaching army and, seeing a large army, was very happy. He gathered an army and led him to the White Fortress - the stronghold of Iran. The ruler of the region and the fortress was the gray-haired Gozhdekhem from a glorious Iranian family. His beautiful daughter Gordaferid became famous as a fearless and daring rider. Seeing the approaching army, the daring Khedzhir, who led the defense of the city, rode out to meet him. Sohrab, striking him with a spear, threw him to the ground to cut off his head, but Khedzhir, raising his hand, begged for mercy. Then they tied his hands and took him prisoner. The day has faded for the Iranians.

Then the daughter of Gozhdekhem put on battle armor, hid her braids under her helmet and rushed at the enemy, smashing him with a cloud of arrows. Seeing that his fighters were falling in rows, Sohrab galloped towards the enemy. The warrior, changing her bow for a spear, aimed it at Sohrab's chest with a running start. The enraged hero threw the rider to the ground, but she managed to jump on the horse again, suddenly the braid of the girl slipped over the chain mail. A young beauty appeared before the hero. The hero was surprised: since the maiden is so brave, what kind of husbands do they have ?! He threw up the lasso and instantly covered the beauty's camp with it.

Gordaferid offered him peace, wealth and a castle, saying: "You have achieved your goal! Now we are yours." Sohrab released her, and they went to the fortress. Gozhdekhem with an army was waiting for his daughter outside the city wall, and as soon as she entered the gate, they closed, and Sohrab remained outside the gate. Climbing the tower, the brave Gordaferid called out to Sohrab: "Hey, valiant knight! Forget about the siege and invasion!" Sohrab swore to take the fortress and punish the impudent one. It was decided to start the battle in the morning. Meanwhile, Gozhdekhem sent a messenger to the shah with a letter in which he told about what had happened, described in detail the appearance and military merits of Sohrab. He also reported that they were forced to leave the city and retreat deep into the region.

As soon as the sun rose, the Turanians closed the ranks of the troops, following their knight, burst into the fortress like a tornado. The fortified city was empty. Gozhdekhem led the soldiers through an underground passage, which the Turanians did not know about until now. The inhabitants of the region appeared before Sohrab, asking for mercy, and swore obedience to him. But Sohrab did not heed their words. He began to look for Gordaferid, who stole his heart, flashing like a peri and disappearing forever. Day and night, the bogatyr grieves, burned by a secret fire. Afrasyab's envoy Khuman, noticing what was happening with Sohrab, tried to turn his thoughts to the war. He told him: "In the old days, none of the rulers fought in captivity of passion. If you do not cool the heat of your heart, expect an inglorious defeat." Sohrab understood that Human was right.

Meanwhile, Kay Kavus, having received a message from Gozhdekhem, became very alarmed and decided to call on Rostem for help. He sent the noble Giva to the knight with a message. Rostem did not doubt his victory in the upcoming battle and continued to feast. Only on the fourth day did he come to his senses and gave a sign to the army to assemble. Rakhsh was immediately saddled. Everyone moved to the palace, rode up and bowed their heads before the shah. Kay Kavus did not return their greeting. He was outraged by the daring act of Rostem and ordered in his hearts to execute him. The hero looked menacingly at the shah and covered him with abuse, whipped the horse and rushed away. The nobility intervened in the matter, persuading the Shah to return Rostem, remembering his merits, that Rostem had repeatedly saved his life. The Shah ordered the commander to be returned, calmed down and appeased. He publicly promised Rostem his royal blessing. In the joy of reconciliation, a feast was arranged, and the next day it was decided to speak.

As soon as the sun rose, Kay Kavus ordered to beat the timpani loudly. The troops were led by Giv and Tus. One hundred thousand selected fighters, dressed in armor, left the city on horseback and camped in front of the White Fortress. Sohrab, ready for battle, rode out on his frisky horse, but first he asked the captive Khedzhir to show him the famous Iranian commanders, including the mighty Rostem, for the sake of meeting with whom he started the war. But the insidious Khedzhir deceived him, saying that Rostem was not in the camp of the Iranians. The disappointed Sohrab had no choice but to take the fight. He jumped on his horse and rushed furiously into battle. In front of the Shah's tent, prancing on a frisky horse, he challenged the enemy. The Shah's commanders did not even dare to look at the hero. The posture of the hero, the deadly sword in his strong hands plunged them into despondency; stricken with confusion, the army broke up. They began to whisper: "This hero is stronger than the tiger!" Then Sohrab began to call the shah himself, mocking him.

Crowned Kay Kavus appealed to the soldiers to hastily help Rostem to put on armor and dress the horse. Here he is already on a horse and with a war cry rushes to meet Sohrab. The heroic appearance of the enemy delighted the highly experienced warrior. Sohrab's heart also trembled; hoping to see his father in him, he exclaimed: "Name your name and tell me whose origin you are, I think that you are Rostem, to whom the great Neirem is great-grandfather." alas, he was disappointed. Rostem hid his name, calling himself a humble warrior.

The battle began with short spears, but fragments soon remained of them. Then the swords crossed. In a hot battle, swords broke, clubs bent, chain mail crackled on the shoulders of opponents. The forces were exhausted, but no one got the victory. They decided to disperse, stopping the fight. Each was surprised by the strength of the other.

The horses have already rested, the rivals again met in battle. This time they fired arrows, but they failed to break Sohrab's armor, and the skin of the leopard on Rostem remained intact. Hand-to-hand combat began. Rostem grabbed Sohrab by the belt, but the daredevil in the saddle did not flinch. The fight lasted a long time, the forces were exhausted, and the opponents again dispersed in order to gain strength and rush into battle.

Anxiety and doubt did not leave Sohrab. The thought of his father oppressed him, and most importantly, an inexplicable force pulled him to Rostem, with whom he fought a mortal battle. Before a new fight, Sohrab again turned to the giant: "What was your dream and your awakening? Isn't it better to suppress anger in yourself and throw the blade? Isn't it better for us to feast together? No need to hide your name, maybe you are the leader of Zabulistan Rostem? "

But Rostem did not think about friendship with the young man, whose milk had not yet dried up on his lips and did not see his son in Sohrab. Again there was a war cry, and the enemies converged on the battlefield. Rostem grabbed Sohrab by the neck, drew his sword and cut through his chest. Sohrab fell to the ground, dripping with blood, and fell silent with the name of Rostem on his lips. Rostem froze, the white light faded before his eyes. Recovering himself, he asked: "Where is the sign from Rostem?" The young man whispered: "So, it means you?.. I called you, but your heart did not flinch. Unfasten the chain mail on my chest and you will find my amulet under it."

Seeing the amulet, Rostem clung to the dying young man: "Oh, my dear son, oh valiant knight, have you really been ruined by me?" Sokhrab whispered with bloodied lips: "Do not shed tears in vain. Your tears are harder than death torments for me. What is the use of killing yourself now? Apparently, fate wanted it that way." Rostem jumped on Rekhsh and, sobbing, appeared before his army. He told them what a villainy he had committed, and added: "It is impossible to go to war against the Turans, it is enough evil for them that I have caused." He grabbed a sword and wanted to cut his chest, but the soldiers stopped him. Then he asked Goderz to gallop to the shah and tell him about his grief and ask him to send a healing potion, which is stored in his fortress. However, Kay Kavus decided otherwise: "If he saves his son, my kingdom will crumble to dust." Goderz returned with nothing. Wrapping Sohrab in a cloak of brocade, Rostem was about to go to the Shah, but, barely putting his foot in the stirrup, he heard Sohrab utter his last breath,

Tears welled up from Rostem's eyes. There is no greater sorrow than to become a son-killer in your old age.

"What will I say if the mother asks about the young man?" he thought sadly. By the will of his father, the body of Sohrab was covered with purple, like a ruler. At the request of Rostem, Kay Kavus promised to end the bloody war with the Turanians. Grief-stricken, Rostem remained where he was, waiting for his brother, who was supposed to see the Turans off and protect him from various troubles on the way.

At dawn, Rostem and his retinue went to Zabulistan. People met him in deep sadness. The nobility sprinkled ashes on her head. The coffin was carried under the vaults of the chamber and with loud sobs lowered into the grave. There was no end to the grief of the mother who lost her only son, and after only a year she went to the grave after him.

X. G. Korogly

The poem opens with a dedication to King Sebastian, after which the author proceeds directly to the story of the expedition of Vasco da Gama, as a result of which the sea route to India was discovered. Luz squads - in the Middle Ages it was believed that the Roman name of Portugal Lusitania came from the name of a certain Luz - set sail from their native shores. While the heroes are fighting the elements of the sea, the gods gather on Olympus to decide the fate of the Lusitanians. Bacchus, who considers himself the ruler of India, is afraid of losing his power and influence in these parts and inclines the gods to doom the Lusitanians to death for insolence, but the patronage of Jupiter, Mars and Venus saves the brave.

Meanwhile, travelers reach the coast of Africa, where boats with natives sail up to their ships. From them the Lusitanians learn that the island near which they anchored is called Mozambique, and that its indigenous population is devoted to Islam, although under the rule of Christians. The natives offer travelers their helmsman, who will help them reach the shores of India. The next day, the ruler of the island comes to the Lusitanians. After listening to the story of strangers about their native places, about the purpose of their journey, he is imbued with acute envy towards them and decides to capture their ships. Bacchus, who, despite the decision of the council of the gods, did not leave the plan to destroy the travelers, takes on the guise of a sage, whose opinion is considered by the whole of Mozambique, and comes to the ruler of the island to encourage him in his decision to destroy the travelers. When they leave the ship ashore in the morning to replenish fresh water supplies, armed natives are waiting for them. A fierce battle ensues, from which the Portuguese emerge victorious. Then the ruler of Mozambique sends a messenger to them with an apology and a helmsman, who is ordered to lead the travelers astray.

After some time, the Lusitans sail to the island of Kiloa, famous for its wealth, but the goddess Cythera, who patronizes them, disturbs the calm of the elements, and because of the strong wind, the sailors cannot land on the island, where a hostile reception would await them. Then the insidious helmsman announces that there is another island nearby, Mombasa, where Christians live, although in fact it is inhabited by irreconcilable and warlike Muslims. Having sailed to Mombasa, the Portuguese drop anchor. Soon the Moors appear and invite the Portuguese to the shore, but Vasco da Gama first sends only two sailors with them to make sure that Christians really live on the island. Bacchus, vigilantly watching the travelers, this time assumes the guise of a Christian priest and misleads the envoys. But when the next day the armada is heading for the island, Venus and the nymphs obedient to her, raising a terrible commotion at sea, block her way, Vasco da Gama, realizing that Providence saved his ships, praises heaven, and Venus asks Jupiter to protect the people who she patronizes, from the intrigues of Bacchus. Touched by her prayers, Jupiter reveals to her that the ships of Vasco da Gama are destined to sail to the shores of India and that Mozambique, Diu, Goa will subsequently bow to the Portuguese.

The next island that travelers meet on their way is Malindi, about the sincerity and honesty of the ruler of which the Portuguese have already heard a lot. The envoy of Vasco da Gama tells the king of Malindi about the misfortunes of the travelers, and the next day, full of friendliness, the ruler of the island himself comes to Vasco da Gama's ship to pay his respects to him. The Portuguese warmly welcome the king and his retinue, cordially show him the whole ship. The amazed ruler of Malindi is interested in the country where the travelers came from, its history. Vasco da Gama tells about the past of his homeland, about its heroes, their deeds, about the change of kings, about the courage of the Portuguese, their conquests, about how he himself decided on such an enterprise. Shocked, the ruler of Malindi arranges a magnificent celebration in honor of the travelers, after which they set off again.

Meanwhile, Bacchus, never tired of putting up obstacles to the Portuguese, descends into the underwater possessions of Neptune and calls on him to take revenge on the Lusitanians for their daring desire to conquer new lands and seas, thereby encroaching on the power of Neptune. Bacchus does not hide from the lord of the sea - he himself fears the Portuguese to such an extent that he is ready to violate the will of Jupiter and the decision of the council of the gods. Outraged, Neptune agrees to punish the sailors. Meanwhile, night falls and sleep overcomes travelers. In order not to doze off, one of them decides to remember the exploits of the twelve Portuguese cavaliers, who, during the time of Juan I, went to England to defend the honor of twelve English ladies. The story is interrupted by the news of the approach of a violent storm; she was sent by Neptune to the death of the sailors. Although the Lusitans courageously and selflessly fight against the elements, their ships are ready to sink, and then Vasco da Gama turns to Providence with a request for help. His prayer is heard - the wind subsides.

Finally, travelers reach the shores of India. Among the crowd that surrounded the envoy of Vasco da Gama on the shore, there is an Arab who knows Spanish. He boards Vasco da Gama's ship and tells him about this land, its people, their beliefs and customs. Then Vasco da Gama goes to the ruler of these lands and invites him to conclude an agreement on friendship and trade. While the ruler is gathering a council to decide what answer to give to the Portuguese, they invite Catuala, one of the rulers of these lands, to their ship. Showing him the portraits of their illustrious ancestors hanging everywhere, travelers once again recall their history.

Bacchus makes another attempt to prevent the Lusitanians: he appears in a dream to one of the Indian Muslims and warns him against strangers. Waking up, this man gathers fellow believers, and together they go to the ruler, before whom they accuse the Portuguese of bad thoughts and robberies. This makes the ruler think. He calls Vasco da Gama and throws the accusations he heard from his subjects in his face, but the brave Portuguese proves his innocence and receives permission to return to the ship. Having learned from one of the Moors that the Muslims are waiting for the merchant fleet from Mecca, hoping to use it to deal with the Portuguese, Vasco da Gama decides to immediately set off on the return journey, especially since the weather is favorable for the journey. However, he greatly laments that he could not establish himself in India and conclude an alliance beneficial for Portugal with her ruler. Nevertheless, the goal has been achieved - the path to the distant desired land has been explored.

Venus continues to take care of the sailors and, in order to give them rest, sends a beautiful vision on their way - the island of Love, where nymphs and Nereids joyfully greet the heroes live. Here travelers will find the joy of love, happiness, peace. In parting, one of the nymphs reveals the future to the Lusitanians: they will find out how the Portuguese will establish themselves in the lands they meet along the way and, most importantly, in India, what will happen in their homeland, which will always glorify its brave heroes. With this sublime doxology in honor of the participants in the campaign, the poem ends.

N. A. Matyash

Bayindir Khan, according to a tradition long established among the Oguzes, arranged a feast for the beks. At the same time, he ordered to put up white tents for those who have sons, red ones for those who have no sons, but have a daughter, and black tents for childless beks. In order to further humiliate the latter, he ordered that they be served food from the meat of a black ram and put them on black felt.

This was done with the prominent bek Dirse Khan, who arrived with his retinue for the ceremony. In anger, he left the headquarters of Bayyndyr Khan. At home, on the advice of his wife, Dirse Khan arranged a feast, fed the hungry, distributed generous alms, thus begging God for a son. He had a son, who was brought up in the way that was customary among the nobility. At the age of fifteen, while playing with his peers, he suddenly saw a fierce khan's bull, which was being led to the square. His comrades abandoned the game and hid. But the brave young man with a blow of his fist forced the angry bull that rushed at him to retreat, and then cut off his head. With the stormy enthusiasm of the Oguz beks, Korkut named him Bugach (Bull). According to the Oguz tradition, the father gave his son an inheritance and gave him a bekdom.

However, Dirse Khan's warriors, envious of the young man's courage and the power he had achieved, began to weave intrigues around him. It ended with Dirse Khan mortally wounding his Bugach while hunting. The mother awaited with trepidation the return of her son from his first hunting trip; she even prepared, according to the custom of the Oghuz, to arrange a feast on this occasion. Having met only one husband, she rushed to him with questions and reproaches. Receiving no answer, she took her forty warrior girls and went to look for her son,

The young man was lying in blood, barely driving away the vultures. Khyzyr appeared and warned him that the juice of mountain flowers mixed with mother's milk could be a cure for wounds, and immediately disappeared. The mother came, took her son away, cured her, but she kept all this a secret from her husband. The young man finally recovered. Meanwhile, Dirse's forty combatants decided to put an end to the khan himself: they agreed to tie him up and hand him over to the hands of the enemies. Upon learning of this, the Khan's wife turned to her son, told him about what had happened and asked him to help his father out. Bugach went alone to meet the intruders and overtook them in the parking lot. Dirse Khan did not recognize his son, asked the traitors for permission to fight the young man, so that in case of victory they would release him. They agreed. But the young man entered into battle with forty traitors, killed some of them, took some prisoners, and freed his father. Bugach-khan received bekdom from Bayyndyr-khan, and Korkut composed an oguzname poem about him.

Seeing the sons of the beks serving at the reception of Bayyndyr Khan, Kam-Bura-bek became very sad: after all, he did not have a son. Those present at the feast prayed to God to send him a son. Immediately another bek said about his desire to have a daughter. Becky prayed for him too. At the same time, both beks agreed to marry their future children. And so a son was born to Kam-Bur, who was named Bamsy-Beyrek.

The boy quickly grew and matured. At the age of fifteen, he became a hero. One day, with his peers, he went hunting. Merchants approached him with a complaint about the robbers. The young man defeated the band of robbers and returned the goods to the merchants.

It is noteworthy in this episode that the young man, having shown heroism, gained the right to initiation according to the ancient custom of the Oghuz.

Hunting another time, Bamsy-Beyrek noticed tents in the steppe that belonged to a friend of his age who was engaged to him. Dede Korkut was sent as a matchmaker. They played a wedding, but on the very wedding night, the ruler of the Baiburd fortress attacked the young man's headquarters and took him prisoner. Bamsy-Beyrek spent seventeen years in prison. In the meantime, a rumor was spread about his death, and his wife was forced to agree to a marriage with another young bek. Having agreed, she, however, sent merchants in search of her husband. The latter were able to inform Bamsy-Beirek about what had happened. Bamsy-Beirek managed to escape. Not far from the dungeon, he found his horse and set off. On the way I met a singer who was going to the wedding, having exchanged his horse for a musical instrument, he came to the wedding, pretending to be a holy fool. Beirek began to amuse people with his antics, and then he took part in archery competitions and emerged victorious. Kazan liked his antics. The latter appointed Beyrek as the back of the wedding. Taking advantage of this, Beirek went to the women's quarters and demanded that the bride dance for him. Seeing his ring on her finger, he opened up to his wife. The wedding was upset. In the finale, Beyrek attacks the Bayburd fortress and frees thirty-nine of his comrades-in-arms.

A certain Delyu Dumrul, the son of the Spirit-koji, built a bridge over a waterless river bed and charged thirty-three money from those who crossed the bridge, and forty - from those who did not pass through it. He boasted that there was not and never was a person equal to him in strength. One day, a nomad camp stopped at the bridge. And there was a sick horseman among the newcomers, who soon died. There was a cry for him. Ride up to Delyu Dumrul's nomad camp and asked who the killer of the horseman was. Learning that the young man was killed by the "red-winged Azrael", he asked about him and demanded that God send Azrael to him to measure strength with him. He wanted to punish him so that he would no longer dare to take young people's lives.

God did not like the audacity of Delyu Dumrul, and he ordered Azrael to take Delyu's life. Once Delyu Dumrul was sitting with his forty horsemen and drinking wine. Azrael suddenly appeared. Beside himself with rage, the bek yelled at him, asking how he, so ugly, had come to him without warning. Upon learning that Azrael was in front of him, Del Dumrul ordered the doors to be locked and rushed at him with a sword. Azrael, turning into a dove, fluttered out the window. This inflamed Dela Dumrul even more. He took his eagle and rode after Azrael. After killing a couple of pigeons, he returned home. And here Azrael appeared before him again. The frightened horse knocked down his rider. Immediately, Azrael sat on Del's chest and was ready to take his life. At the plea of ​​Delyu Dumrul to spare him, Azrael replied that he was just a messenger of the almighty God, only God grants and takes away life. And it was a revelation for Delyu Dumrul. He asked God to spare his life for having submitted. God told Azrael to let him live, but in return demanded the life of someone else. Delyu Dumrul went to his elderly parents with a request that one of them sacrifice themselves for him. The parents did not agree. Then Delyu Dumrul asked Azrael to fulfill his last wish: to go with him to his wife to give orders before his death. Saying goodbye to his wife, Delyu Dumrul told her to get married so that the children would not grow up without a father. His wife was ready to give her life for him. God, however, did not accept her soul, but ordered Azrael to take the life of Delyu Dumrul's parents, and promised the faithful spouses one hundred and forty years of life.

In the age of the Oghuz there lived a wise man named Kangly-koja. He planned to marry his son Kan-Turaly, and he made unusual demands on the bride: she must get out of bed earlier than her husband, saddle a horse and mount it earlier than her husband, and before her husband attacks the infidels, she must attack them and bring their heads. Kangly-koja suggested that his son look for a bride himself. The young man traveled all over the Oguz world, but in vain: he did not find a bride to his liking. Then his father went in search, along with the elders, and also to no avail. And so the old people decided to go to Trebizond, the ruler of which had a beautiful daughter of a heroic build, capable of pulling a double bow. The girl's father announced that he would marry his daughter to someone who could defeat three animals: a lion, a black bull and a black camel.

Having heard about such terrible conditions, Kangly-koja decided to tell all this to his son. “If he finds enough courage in himself, then let him lay claim to the hand of a girl, if not, then let him be satisfied with a girl from the Oghuz,” he thought.

The Kan-Turals were not afraid of these conditions. Accompanied by forty companions, he went to Trebizond and was received with honors. The young man defeated the beasts. They played a wedding, but the groom decided to immediately return home and play a wedding according to his own customs, and only then unite with his beloved.

On the way home, Kan-Turaly decided to rest. We chose the right place. The young man fell asleep. Seljan-khatun, the bride of Kan-Turala, fearing treachery from her father, put on armor and began to watch the road while the groom was sleeping. Her fears were justified. The ruler of Trebizond decided to return his daughter back and sent a large detachment after Kan-Turaly. Seljan-Khatun quickly woke her fiancé, and they entered into battle, during which she lost sight of Kan-Turaly. The girl found him on foot and wounded in the eye. Dried blood blinded him. Together they rushed to the giaours and exterminated them all. At the end of the battle, Seljan-Khatun put the wounded groom on a horse and set off on a further journey. On the way to Kan-Turaly, fearing to disgrace himself by the fact that he escaped thanks to the help of a woman, he decided to deal with Seljan-Khatun. She, offended by the groom's attack, took the fight and almost killed him. Then there was a reconciliation. Kan-Turaly realized that he had found the girl he wanted. They got married again.

One day the enemy attacked the Oghuz. The station has disappeared. In the confusion, the baby Aruz-koji was dropped. The lioness picked him up and nursed him. After some time, the Oghuz returned to their camp. The herdsman said that every day a creature appears from the reeds, which walks like a man, strikes horses and sucks blood. Aruz recognized him as his missing son, took him home, but he kept going to the lion's den. Finally, Dede Korkut inspired him that he was a man and he should be with people, ride horses, and gave him the name Basat.

Another time, when the Oguzes migrated away for the summer season, the shepherd Aruza met several peris at the source, caught one of them, met with her, after which the peri flew away, informing the shepherd to come and take his "pledge" from her in a year. A year later, when the Oguzes again migrated for summer, the shepherd found a bright, shiny heap near that source. The peri flew in, called the shepherd, gave him his "pledge" and added: "You brought death on the Oghuz."

The shepherd began to throw stones at the pile. But with each stroke, she grew. The Oguz beks led by Bayindyr Khan appeared at the source. The jigits began to beat on the heap. But she kept growing. Finally, Aruz-koja touched it with spurs, it burst, and a boy came out of it with one eye on his head. Aruz took this boy and brought him home. They invited several nurses, but he ruined them all: “Once he pulled his breast, he took all the milk, to the drop; another time he pulled, he took all the blood from her;

the third time he pulled, he took her soul. "Then they began to feed him with sheep's milk. He grew up quickly and began to attack children. No matter how Aruz punished him, nothing helped. Finally they kicked Depeguez out of the house.

Mother-peri appeared, put a ring on his finger. Depegez left the Oguz camp, climbed a high mountain and became a robber. He attacked herds, people and devoured everyone. Nobody could compare to him. All the prominent Oguz beks, including the all-powerful Kazan, were defeated by him. Then they decided to send Dede-Korkut to him for negotiations. Depeguez demanded sixty people daily to be eaten. They agreed that the Oguzes would give him two men and five hundred rams a day and assign two cooks to him who would prepare food for him. The Oghuz selected people in turn from each family. One old woman had two sons. One was taken, but when the turn came to the second, she pleaded. They advised her to turn to Basat, the son of Aruz-koji, who was famous as a hero. Basat agreed to engage in single combat with the cannibal, but at the first attempt to fight him he was captured, imprisoned in a cave and handed over to the cooks. When the ogre slept, the cooks pointed to his only weak spot - the eye. Basat heated the spit and blinded Depeguez with it. An enraged ogre, in order to catch and punish the enemy, stood at the entrance of the cave; releasing the rams, he checked each of them, but Basat managed to get out of the cave in the skin of a ram. Depeguez tried three more times to overcome the enemy (by means of a magic ring, an enchanted dome in which he placed Basat, and a magic sword), but in vain. Finally, Basat killed the ogre with his own magical sword.

X.G. Korogly

The ruler of Rum, Faylakus, returning home from a long campaign, noticed a newly born baby on the road. The baby's mother died in childbirth. Faylakus ordered her to be buried, but he took the newborn with him, adopted him and designated him as his heir, naming him Iskander. Time passed, and Faylakus called the famous scientist and philosopher Nikumachis to be the educator of the heir. Nikumachis and his son Aristotle made friends with the young man and remained faithful to this friendship for life.

Failakus is dead. Iskander arranged a magnificent funeral and with great honors saw him off on his last journey.

By this time, Iskander had already managed to show his talent in many areas. He excelled in the sciences, philosophy, gained fame as a truth-lover. In his actions he was guided only by justice, he was sensitive to the people around him. Knowing all these qualities of his, after the death of Faylakus, the people unanimously recognized him worthy of the throne of his father. Iskander was embarrassed and at the same time alarmed: would he be able to replace such a famous king and justify the trust of the people. He expressed his doubts publicly: after thanking everyone, he refused to take the throne of his father. However, after much persuasion, he had no choice but to submit to the will of fate.

Iskander's first good undertaking was the abolition of all taxes from the population for two years. He established moderate prices for vital goods, streamlined trade, established units of measure and weight, introduced rules for the use of housing, in a word, put things in order in the administration of the country.

Failakus, having been defeated in the war with Iran, was forced to pay tribute to him in the amount of a thousand golden eggs a year. Having become the ruler of the country, Iskander stopped paying tribute to Iran. Three years later, the Shah of Iran, Darius, sent a message to Iskander demanding that he immediately send him a tribute for three years. The message was left unanswered, and the atmosphere became even more tense. The lords of two powerful powers clashed - Darius and Iskander.

The first battle did not reveal a winner. Meanwhile, Iskander became aware of a plot against Darius. Two of his commanders set out to secretly end their master. Iskander was terribly indignant at this news. Nevertheless, the next morning in battle, the conspirators mortally wounded Darius and, leaving him on the battlefield, fled. Iranian soldiers fled in confusion. Iskander ordered to immediately transfer the Iranian Shah to his camp. Darius managed to express his dying prayer: to find and punish the killers, to show mercy to his relatives and friends who were not involved in the war and did not fight against Iskander's troops. Finally, the dying Darius asked Iskander to intermarry with him - to marry his daughter Ravshanak. In this way, he would unite the two kingdoms - Iran and Rum.

Iskander, in turn, explained that he was not involved in the death of Darius, buried the Shah of Iran with honors befitting the lord and fulfilled all his orders.

In the initial period of his reign, Iskander took possession of the Maghreb country. He gathered the nobility to consult on the candidacy of the new ruler, presenting his demands: the future ruler must be fair. He was pointed to the prince, who refused to reign and moved to the cemetery, where he eked out a beggarly existence. Iskander ordered to deliver it. They brought him an almost naked man with two bones in his hand. The ruler asked what was the meaning of his behavior, what these bones meant to him. The beggar said: "Walking between the graves, I found these two bones, but I could not determine which of them belonged to the king, and which to the beggar, I could not."

After listening to him, Iskander offered him the rule of the country. In response, the beggar put forward the following conditions: to live in such a way that old age does not crowd out youth, so that wealth does not turn into poverty, and joy does not turn into grief. Hearing these words, Iskander sadly admitted that this beggar was morally superior to the ruler.

During the march to Kashmir, Iskander was in for a big surprise. Near the city, a wide passage between the mountains was closed by iron gates erected by Kashmiri sorcerers. Iskander convened a council of scientists who were to reveal the secret of this miracle. After much squabbling, scientists came to a consensus: the iron gate should be blown up. But how? One of the participants in the meeting suggested filling balloons with explosives and bombing the city with them. As the balls fell, they were supposed to explode and raise columns of smoke that would break the spell and open the passage. So they did. The way to the city was open.

After that, the conqueror of the world sent his army to the west, to the country of Adan.

Iskander's next trip was to China. Upon learning of this, the Chinese autocrat went out to meet him at the head of a huge army. But Iskander did not think about attacking him and shedding blood, and disappeared. This act aroused Hakan's bewilderment and determination to unravel this mystery. The next morning, dressed in the clothes of an ambassador, Khakan arrived at the camp of Iskander and, having greeted him, presented him with expensive gifts, among which were two mirrors. One of them reflected only the face of the Chinese representative among the large number of participants in the reception. The second mirror correctly reflected people only while they were eating, drinking and having fun. As soon as they were drunk, distorted figures of inhuman appearance appeared in the mirror.

Iskander was delighted with what he saw and ordered his scientists, so as not to disgrace themselves before the Chinese, to create something better. Scientists had to work all winter, and from an alloy of copper and steel, they created two mirrors. Their special property was that one reflected everything that was happening on earth, and the other - the entire nine-tiered universe. Iskander was overly pleased with the work of scientists, rewarded them with merit and entrusted them with the rule of Greece.

Iskander made his next trip to the north. On the whole route, he was served by a Chinese beauty, presented to him by Hakan. When they reached the country of Kirvon, the locals appealed to Iskander with a complaint about the terrible, bestial disposition of the Yajujas and asked him to rid them of them. The Yajuji lived between the mountain and the valley of darkness. Twice a year they left their dwelling and destroyed everything that came in their way, including the people they ate alive.

Iskander demanded to bring noble masters from Rus', from Syria and Rum. They dug large ditches and filled them with an alloy of copper, tin, bronze, iron and lead. The next morning, Iskander sent his army to Yajuja and destroyed a considerable number of them, but Iskander's army also got it. After this bloody battle, the master builders, on the orders of Iskander, began to build a wall ten thousand cubits long and five hundred cubits high. During the construction of the wall, the same metals and stone were used. It was built within six months, and thus the path of the Yajujas was blocked. The army climbed the wall and threw stones at them. Many of them were killed, and the rest fled.

After this campaign, Iskander returned to Rum. After spending some time there and resting, he began to prepare for a sea voyage. Stockpiles of weapons and food were made for eight years. The caravan of ships set sail towards the center of the ocean, where Iskander and his men dropped anchor. To study the bottom of the ocean, he ordered to build something similar to a chest from glass, plunged into it, reached the bottom and for a hundred days monitored the inhabitants of the water space, correcting and clarifying everything that was known to science. This work ended with the fact that Iskander reached the holiness of the prophet.

It took a year of sailing for the prophet, as Iskander was called, to anchor in his homeland. The long journey did not go unnoticed. He was exhausted, the great world power broke up into small kingdoms, ruled by his many generals.

Feeling the approach of death, Iskander writes a letter to his mother, full of filial tenderness, grief and sadness, repenting that he could not properly protect her. The letter ended with an order not to give him a magnificent send-off and crying over his death. He asked to be buried in the city he built - Alexandria, and also asked not to hammer the coffin with nails, so that everyone could see his hands and understand the disinterestedness of his conquests: after all, having left the world, he did not take anything with him.

X. G. Korogly

The sovereign emperor of the Franks, the great Charles (the same Charles, from whose name the very word "king" comes) has been fighting the Moors for seven long years in beautiful Spain. He has already conquered many Spanish castles from the wicked. His faithful army smashed all the towers and conquered all the cities. Only the ruler of Saragossa, King Marsilius, the godless servant of Mohammed, does not want to recognize the domination of Charles. But soon the proud lord Marsilius will fall and Zaragoza will bow his head before the glorious emperor.

King Marsilius convenes his faithful Saracens and asks them for advice on how to avoid the reprisal of Charles, the ruler of beautiful France. The wisest of the Moors remain silent, and only one of them, the castellan of Val Fond, did not remain silent. Blankandrin (that was the name of the Moor) advises to achieve peace with Charles by deceit. Marsilius must send messengers with great gifts and with an oath of friendship, he promises Charles on behalf of his sovereign loyalty. The ambassador will deliver to the emperor seven hundred camels, four hundred mules loaded with Arab gold and silver, so that Charles can reward his vassals with rich gifts and pay the mercenaries. When Charles, with great gifts, sets off on his return journey, let Marsilius swear to follow Charles in a short time and on the day of St. Michael to accept Christianity in Aachen, the patronal city of Charles. The children of the noblest Saracens will be sent as hostages to Charles, although it is clear that they are destined to die when the treachery of Marsilius is revealed. The French will go home, and only in the Aachen Cathedral Powerful Charles on the great day of St. Michael will understand that he has been deceived by the Moors, but it will be too late to take revenge. Let the hostages die, but the throne will not be lost to King Marsilius.

Marsilius agrees with Blancandrin's advice and equips envoys to Charles, promising them rich estates as a reward for their faithful service. The ambassadors take an olive branch in their hands as a sign of friendship for the king and set off on their journey.

Meanwhile, the mighty Charles is celebrating his victory over Cordoba in a fruitful garden. Vassals sit around him, playing dice and chess.

Arriving in the camp of the Franks, the Moors see Charles on a golden throne, the king's face is proud and beautiful, his beard is whiter than snow, and curls fall in waves on his shoulders. The ambassadors greet the emperor. They state all that Marsilius, king of the Moors, ordered them to convey. Carl attentively listens to the messengers and, drooping his brow, is immersed in thought.

The sun shines brightly over the camp of the Franks, when Charles convenes his close associates. Charles wants to know what the barons think, whether it is possible to believe the words of Marsilius, who promises to obey the Franks in everything. The barons, tired of long campaigns and heavy battles, wish a speedy return to their native lands, where their beautiful wives are waiting. But no one can advise this to Charles, since each of them knows about the deceit of Marsilius. And everyone is silent. Only one, the king's nephew, the young Count Roland, having stepped out of the ranks of those close to him, begins to persuade Charles not to believe the words of the deceitful king of the Moors. Roland reminds the king of the recent betrayal of Marsilius, when he also promised to faithfully serve the Franks, but he himself broke his promise and betrayed Charles by killing his ambassadors, the glorious counts of Basan and Basil. Roland begs his master to go to the walls of the recalcitrant Zaragoza as soon as possible and take revenge on Marsilius for the death of glorious warriors. Karl droops his brow, there is an ominous silence. Not all barons are happy with young Roland's proposal. Count Gwenelon steps forward and addresses the audience with a speech. He convinces everyone that Charles's army is already tired, and so much has been won that one can proudly strive back to the borders of beautiful France. There is no reason not to believe the Moors, they have no choice but to obey Charles. Another baron, Nemon of Bavaria, one of the best vassals of the king, advises Charles to listen to the speeches of Gwenelon and heed the entreaties of Marsilius. The count claims that it is a Christian duty to forgive the infidels and turn them to God, and there is no doubt that the Moors will come to Aachen on the day of St. Michael. Karl turns to the barons with the question of whom to send to Zaragoza with an answer. Count Roland is ready to go to the Moors, although his advice is rejected by the master. Karl refuses to let go of his beloved nephew, to whom he owes many victories. Then Nemon of Bavaria willingly offers to take the message, but Karl does not want to let him go either. Many barons, in order to prove their loyalty, want to go on a journey, only Count Gwenelon is silent. Then Roland shouts advice to Karl: "Let Gwenelon go." Count Gwenelon rises in fright and looks at the audience, but everyone nods their heads in agreement. The mad earl threatens Roland with a long-standing hatred of him, since he is Roland's stepfather. Roland, says Gwenelon, has long wanted to destroy him, and now, taking advantage of the opportunity, he sends him to certain death. Gwenelon begs Charles not to forget his wife and children when the Moors will certainly deal with him. Gwenelon laments that he will no longer see his native France. Charles is enraged by the count's indecision and orders him to set off immediately. The emperor holds out his glove to Gwenelon as a sign of ambassadorial authority, but he drops it on the ground. The French understand that they decided to send the insidious Gwenelon with an embassy to the enemies only on their own, this mistake will bring them great grief, but no one can change their fate.

Count Gwenelon retires to his tent and selects his battle armor as he prepares to leave. Not far from the camp of the Franks, Gwenelon catches up with the returning embassy of the infidels, whom the cunning Blancandrin detained at Charles for as long as possible in order to meet the emperor's envoy along the way. A long conversation ensues between Gwenelon and Blancandrin, from which the Moor learns of the enmity between Gwenelon and Karl's favorite Roland. Blankandrin asks the count in surprise why all the Franks love Roland so much. Then Gwenelon reveals to him the secret of the great victories of Charles in Spain: the fact is that the valiant Roland leads the troops of Charles in all battles. Gwenelon raises many falsehoods against Roland, and when the embassy's path reaches the middle, the treacherous Gwenelon and the cunning Blankandrin swear to each other to destroy the mighty Roland.

A day passes, and Gwenelon is already at the walls of Zaragoza, he is led to the king of the Moors Marsilius. Bowing to the king, Gwenelon gives him the message of Charles. Charles agrees with the world to go within his own borders, but on the day of St. Michael he is waiting for Marsilius in the patronal Aachen, and if the Saracen dares to disobey, he will be taken in chains to Aachen and put to shameful death there. Marsilius, not expecting such a sharp answer, grabs a spear, wanting to strike the count, but Gwenelon dodges the blow and steps aside. Then Blancandrin turns to Marsilius with a request to listen to the ambassador of the Franks. Gwenelon again approaches the lord of the infidels and continues his speech. He says that the anger of the king is in vain, Charles only wants Marsilius to accept the law of Christ, then he will give him half of Spain. But Charles will give the other half, the traitor continues, to his nephew, the arrogant Count Roland. Roland will be a bad neighbor to the Moors, he will seize neighboring lands and oppress Marsilius in every possible way. All the troubles of Spain are from Roland alone, and if Marsilius wants peace in his country, then he must not only obey Charles, but also destroy his nephew, Roland, by cunning or deceit. Marsilius is happy with this plan, but he does not know how to deal with Roland and asks Gwenelon to come up with a remedy. If they manage to destroy Roland, Marsilius promises the count rich gifts and castles of beautiful Spain for his faithful service.

Gwenelon has a plan ready for a long time, he knows for sure that Karl will want to leave someone in Spain to ensure peace in the conquered land. Charles will undoubtedly ask Roland to stay on guard, there will be a very small detachment with him, and in the gorge (the king will already be far away) Marsilius will break Roland, depriving Charles of the best vassal. Marsilius likes this plan, he calls Gwenelo-on to his chambers and orders to bring there expensive gifts, the best furs and jewelry, which the new royal friend will take to his wife in distant France. Soon Gwenelon is escorted on his way back, as if agreeing on the fulfillment of his plan. Every noble Moor swears friendship to a traitor Frank and sends his children to Charles as hostages with him.

Count Gwenelon at dawn drives up to the camp of the Franks and immediately passes to Charles. He brought many gifts to the ruler and brought hostages, but most importantly, Marsilius handed over the keys to Zaragoza. The Franks rejoice, Karl ordered everyone to gather to announce: "The end of the cruel war. We are going home." But Karl does not want to leave Spain without protection. Otherwise, he will not have time to reach France, when the infidels will raise their heads again, then there will be an end to everything that the Franks have achieved in seven long years of war. Count Gwenelon prompts the emperor to leave Roland on guard in the gorge with a detachment of brave warriors, they will stand up for the honor of the Franks if anyone dares to go against the will of Charles. Roland, having heard that Gwenelon advises Karl to choose him, hurries to the ruler and addresses him with a speech. He thanks the emperor for the commission and says that he is glad of such an appointment and is not afraid, unlike Gwenelon, to die for France and Charles, even if the master wants to put him alone on guard in the gorge. Karl droops his brow and, covering his face with his hands, suddenly begins to sob. He does not want to part with Roland, a bitter presentiment gnaws at the emperor. But Roland is already gathering friends who will stay with him when Karl withdraws the troops. With him will be the valiant Gauthier, Odon, Jerin, Archbishop Turpin and the glorious knight Olivier.

Carl leaves Spain in tears and gives Roland his bow as a farewell. He knows that they are never destined to meet again. The traitor Gwenelon is guilty of troubles that will befall the Franks and their emperor, Roland, having gathered his army, descends into the gorge. He hears the thunder of drums and follows the eyes of those leaving for their homeland. Time passes, Karl is already far away, Roland and Count Olivier climb a high hill and see hordes of Saracens. Olivier reproaches Gwenelon for betrayal and begs Roland to blow his horn. Karl can still hear the call and turn the troops. But the proud Roland does not want help and asks the soldiers to fearlessly go into battle and win: "God bless you, the French!"

Again Olivier climbs the hill and sees already quite close the Moors, the hordes of which are all arriving. He again begs Roland to blow his trumpet so that Karl hears their call and turns back. Roland again refuses shameful madness. Time passes, and the third time Olivier, at the sight of the troops of Marsilius, falls on his knees in front of Roland and asks not to destroy people in vain, because they cannot cope with the hordes of Saracens. Roland does not want to hear anything, builds up an army and, with the cry of "Monjoy", rushes into battle. In a fierce battle, the French and the troops of the cunning Marsilius met.

An hour passes, the French cut down the infidels, only screams and the sound of weapons are heard over a deaf gorge. Count Olivier rushes across the field with a fragment of a spear, he strikes the Moor Malzaron, followed by Turgis, Estorgot. Count Olivier has already slain seven hundred infidels. The battle is getting hotter ... Fierce blows strike both the Franks and the Saracens, but the Franks have no fresh strength, and the pressure of the enemies does not weaken.

Marsilius rushes from Zaragoza with a huge army, he is eager to meet Charles' nephew, Count Roland. Roland sees Marsilius approaching and only now finally understands the vile betrayal of his stepfather.

The battle is terrible, Roland sees how the young Franks are dying, and in repentance rushes to Olivier, he wants to blow the horn. But Olivier only says that it’s too late to call for Charles’s help, now the emperor will not help, he is rapidly rushing into the battle. Roland trumpets... Roland's mouth is covered with bloody foam, the veins at the temples are opened, and a long drawn-out sound is carried far away.

Having reached the border of France, Karl hears the horn of Roland, he understands that his forebodings were not in vain. The emperor deploys troops and rushes to the aid of his nephew. Carl is getting closer and closer to the place of the bloody battle, but he can no longer find anyone alive.

Roland looks at the mountains and plains... Death and blood are everywhere, the French lie everywhere, the knight falls to the ground in bitter sobs.

Time passes, Roland returned to the battlefield, he hits the shoulder, dissected Faldron, many noble Moors, Roland's terrible revenge for the death of soldiers and for the betrayal of Gwenelon. On the battlefield, he collides with Marsilius, the king of all Zaragoza, and cut off his hand, the prince and son of Marsilius fell off his horse with a damask sword and stabbed him with a spear. Marsilius, frightened, takes to flight, but this will not help him anymore: Charles's troops are too close.

Twilight has come. One caliph on a horse flies up to Olivier and strikes him in the back with a damask spear. Roland looks at Count Olivier and realizes that his friend has been killed. He looks for the archbishop, but there is no one around, the army is defeated, the day has come to an end, bringing death to the valiant Franks.

Roland walks alone across the battlefield, he feels that his strength has left him, his face is covered with blood, his beautiful eyes have faded, he does not see anything. The hero falls on the grass, closes his eyes, and for the last time he sees the image of beautiful France. Time passes, and a Spanish Moor crept up to him in the darkness and dishonorably struck him. A mighty knight is killed, and no one will ever raise the beautiful Durendal (that was the name of Roland's sword), no one will replace the incomparable warrior for the Franks. Roland lies facing the enemies under the canopy of a spruce. Here, at dawn, Charles's army finds him. The emperor, sobbing, falls on his knees before the body of his nephew and promises to avenge him.

The troops hurry on their way to catch up with the Moors and give the last battle to the filthy.

The wounded Marsilius is saved from the wrath of the emperor in the capital, in Zaragoza. He hears the triumphant cry of the French who have entered the city. Marsilius asks the neighbors for help, but everyone turned away from him in fear, only Baligant is ready to help. His troops converged with the troops of Charles, but the Franks quickly defeated them, leaving the Saracens to lie on the battlefield. Karl returns to his homeland to piously bury the bodies of the heroes and carry out a fair trial over the traitors.

All France mourns the great warriors, there is no more glorious Roland, and without him there is no happiness among the Franks. Everyone demands the execution of the traitor Gwenelon and all his relatives. But Karl does not want to execute the vassal without giving him a word in his defense. The day of the great judgment has come, Karl calls the traitor to him. Then one of the famous Franks, Tiedry, asks Charles to arrange a duel between him and Gwenelon's relative, Pinabel. If Tiedry wins, Gwenelon will be executed, if not, he will live.

The mighty Thiedri and the invincible Pinabel met on the battlefield, raising their swords and rushing into battle. The heroes fight for a long time, but neither one nor the other is given victory. Fate, however, decreed that when the wounded Thiedri raised his sword for the last time over Pinabel's head, he, struck, fell dead to the ground and no longer woke up. The emperor's judgment is over, the soldiers tie Gwenelon to the horses by the arms and legs and drive them to the water. The traitor Gwenelon experienced terrible torment. But what death will atone for the death of the beautiful Roland ... Bitterly Karl mourns his beloved vassal.

A. N. Kotreleva

The queen, the wife of Meliaduk, king of Loonua, was relieved of her burden as a boy and died, barely having time to kiss her son and name him Tristan (in the translation from French - sad), for he was born in sorrow. The king entrusted the baby to Guvernal, and he himself soon remarried. The boy grew up strong and handsome, like Lancelot, but his stepmother disliked him, and therefore, fearing for the life of his pet, Guvernal took him to Gaul, to the court of King Pharamon. There Tristan received a knightly upbringing, and at the age of twelve he went to Cornwall to serve his uncle King Mark.

Cornwall at that time had to pay a heavy tribute to Ireland every year: a hundred girls, a hundred boys and a hundred thoroughbred horses. And now the mighty Morhult, brother of the Irish queen, once again came to Mark for tribute, but then, to everyone's surprise, young Tristan challenged him to a duel. King Mark knighted Tristan, and appointed the island of St. Samson as the place of the duel. Having come together, Tristan and Morhult wounded each other with spears; Morhult's spear was poisoned, but before the poison had time to act, Tristan hit the enemy with such force that he split his helmet, and a piece of his sword stuck in Morhult's head. The Irishman fled and soon died, while Cornwall was freed from tribute.

Tristan suffered greatly from the wound, and no one could help him, until one lady advised him to seek healing in other lands. He listened to her advice and alone, without companions, got into the boat; she was carried on the sea for two weeks and finally washed up on the Irish coast near the castle in which King Angen and the queen, who was the sister of Morhult, lived. Hiding his true name and calling himself Tantris, Tristan asked if there was a skilled doctor in the castle, the king replied that his daughter, Isolde the Blonde, was very knowledgeable in the art of medicine. While Isolde nursed the wounded knight, he managed to notice that she was very beautiful.

When Tristan had already recovered from his wound, a terrible serpent appeared in the kingdom of Angena, who daily repaired robbery and devastation in the vicinity of the castle. To the one who kills the snake, Angen promised to give half of the kingdom and his daughter Isolde as a wife. Tristan killed the serpent, and the wedding day was already set, but then one of the Irish knights announced that Tristan's sword had a gap that coincided in shape with the piece of steel that was removed from the head of the deceased Morhult. Having learned who almost became related to her, the queen wanted to cut Tristan to death with his own sword, but the noble young man asked for the right to appear before the court of the king. The king did not execute Tristan, but ordered him to immediately leave the borders of his country. In Cornwall, King Mark exalted Tristan, making him the head and steward of the castle and possessions, but soon inflamed with hatred for him. For a long time he thought about how to get rid of Tristan, and finally announced that he had decided to marry. The valiant Tristan publicly promised to deliver the bride, and when the king said that his chosen one was Iseult of Ireland, he could no longer take back this word and had to sail to Ireland to certain death. The ship, on which Tristan, Guvernal and forty other knights set off, fell into a storm and was thrown ashore at the castle of King Arthur. In the same region, it happened at that time to be King Angen, instead of whom Tristan went to battle with the giant Bloamor and defeated him. Angen forgave Tristan for the death of Morhult and took him to Ireland, promising to fulfill any of his requests. Tristan asked the king for Isolde, but not for himself, but for his uncle and master King Mark.

King Angen granted Tristan's request; Iseult was sent on her way, and the queen gave her daughter's maid, Brangien, a pitcher of love potion, which Mark and Iseult were to drink when they entered the marital bed. On the way back, it became hot, and Tristan ordered to bring him cold wine with Iseult. Through an oversight, the young man and the girl were given a jug of love drink, they tasted it, and immediately their hearts began to beat in a different way. From now on, they could not think of anything but each other ...

King Mark was struck to the very heart by the beauty of Iseult, so the wedding was played immediately upon the arrival of the bride in Cornwall. So that the king would not notice Isolde's fault, Guvernal and Brangien decided to make sure that he spent the first night with Brangien, who was a virgin. When King Mark entered the bedchamber, Iseult blew out the candles, explaining this by an old Irish custom, and in the darkness gave way to a maid. The king was pleased.

Time passed, and Mark's hatred for his nephew boiled up with renewed vigor, for the glances that Tristan exchanged with the queen left no doubt that both of them were filled with irresistible mutual attraction. Mark appointed a trusted servant named Audre to oversee the queen, but a long time passed before he learned that Tristan and Iseult were seen alone in the garden. Odre told his master about this, and the king, armed with a bow, sat down in the crown of a laurel tree to see for himself everything. However, the lovers noticed the spy in time and started a conversation intended for his ears: Tristan allegedly wondered why Mark hated him so selflessly, who so selflessly loved his king and so sincerely bowed to the queen, and asked Isolde if there was a way to overcome this hatred.

The king succumbed to the cunning of lovers; Audre fell into disgrace for slander, and Tristan is again surrounded by honor. Audre, however, did not leave the thought of betraying Tristan into the hands of the king. Once he scattered sharp braids in the queen's bedroom, and Tristan cut himself on them in the dark without noticing it. Isolde felt that the sheets had become wet and sticky with blood, understood everything, sent her lover away, and then deliberately injured her leg and screamed that an attempt had been made on her. Either Audre or Tristan could be guilty of this, but the latter insisted so ardently on a duel in which he could prove his innocence that the king stopped the proceedings for fear of losing such a faithful servant as Audre.

On another occasion, Audre gathered twenty knights who had a grudge against Tristan, hid them in the room next to the bedroom, but Tristan was warned by Brangien and without armor, with one sword, rushed at the enemies. Those fled in disgrace, but Odre partly got his way:

Mark imprisoned Iseult in a high tower, which no man could penetrate. Separation from his beloved caused Tristan such suffering that he fell ill and almost died, but the devoted Brangien, giving him a woman's dress, nevertheless led the young man to Isolde. For three days, Tristan and Iseult enjoyed love, until finally Audre found out about everything and sent fifty knights to the tower, who caught Tristan sleeping.

The enraged Mark ordered Tristan to be sent to the stake, and Isolde to be given to the lepers. However, Tristan, on the way to the place of execution, managed to escape from the hands of the guards, while Guvernal recaptured Isolde from the lepers. Reunited, the lovers took refuge in the Castle of the Wise Maiden in the forest of Morua. But their serene life did not last long: King Mark found out where they were hiding, and in the absence of Tristan, he raided the castle and took Isolde by force, and Tristan could not help her, because that day he was treacherously wounded by a poisoned arrow. Brangiena told Tristan that only the daughter of King Hoel, White-armed Isolde, could heal him from such a wound. Tristan went to Brittany, and there the royal daughter, who liked the young man very much, really cured him. Before Tristan had time to recover from his wound, a certain Count Agrippa laid siege to the castle of Hoel with a large army. Having led the sortie, Tristan defeated the enemies of Hoel, and the king decided to marry his daughter to him as a reward.

Played a wedding. When the young people lay down on the bed, Tristan suddenly remembered another, Blonde Iseult, and therefore did not go further than hugs and kisses. Not knowing that there were other pleasures, the young woman was quite happy. Queen Isolde, having learned about the marriage of Tristan, almost died of grief. He, too, could not bear the separation from his beloved for a long time. In the guise of a madman, Tristan arrived in Cornwall and, having amused Mark's speeches, was left in the castle. Here he found a way to open up to Isolde, and for two whole months the lovers saw each other every time the king happened to leave the castle. When the time came to say goodbye, Isolde wept bitterly, foreseeing that she was no longer destined to see Tristan. Once Tristan was again wounded, and the doctors again could not help him. Feeling worse and worse, he sent for Isolde, ordering the shipbuilder to sail under white sails if Isolde was with him on the ship, and under black if not.

By cunning, the shipbuilder was able to take Isolde away from Mark and was already bringing his ship under white sails into the harbor, when another Isolde, who learned about the meaning of the color of the sails, hurried to Tristan and said that the sails were black. This Tristan could not bear, and the soul departed from his torn heart.

Going ashore and finding her beloved dead, Isolde embraced the lifeless body and also died. By the will of Tristan, his body, along with the body of Iseult, was taken to Cornwall. Before his death, he tied a message to King Mark to his sword, which spoke of an inadvertently drunk love drink. After reading the message, the king regretted that he had not learned about everything earlier, because then he would not have pursued lovers who were powerless to resist passion.

By order of King Mark, Tristan and Iseult were buried in the same chapel. Soon a beautiful thorn bush rose from Tristan's grave and, spreading over the chapel, grew into Iseult's grave. Thrice ordered the king to cut this bush, but each time he appeared the next day, just as beautiful as before.

D. V. Borisov

On Trinity, in the chambers of the noble and kind King Arthur, the brilliant nobility feasts. The knights have a pleasant conversation with the ladies. As everyone knows, in those blessed times, ardent tenderness and courtesy were valued above all else - now morals have become much rougher, no one thinks about purity, genuine feeling has been defeated by deceit, lovers have been blinded by vice.

One amusing story follows another, and now honest Kalogrenan takes the floor: he wants to tell his friends what he has been hiding until now. Seven years ago, the knight had a chance to get into the dense forest of Broseliadr. After wandering all day, he saw a small cozy castle, where he was greeted very cordially. The next day he came across a shaggy fanged shepherd in the thicket, and he said that there was a spring in the forest, near which there was a small chapel and a marvelous pine tree towered. A ladle is suspended between the branches on a chain, and if you pour it on a semi-precious stone, a terrible storm will rise - whoever returns from there alive can consider himself invincible. Kalogrenan immediately galloped to the source, found a pine tree with a ladle and caused a storm, which he now regrets very much. As soon as the sky cleared up, such a terrible roar was heard, as if ten knights were rushing at once. But only one appeared - a gigantic appearance and a ferocious disposition. Kalogrenan suffered a crushing defeat and with difficulty dragged himself to the hospitable castle - the kind hosts pretended not to notice his shame.

The story of Calogrenan leaves everyone in amazement. Messer Yvane vows to avenge his cousin's dishonor, but the evil-tongued Seneschal Kay remarks that it's easy to brag after a good meal and heavy drinking. The queen cuts off the mocker, and the king announces his decision to go to the miraculous spring and invites all the barons to accompany him. Touched to the quick, Yvain hurries to get ahead of the other knights: that same evening, he secretly leaves the palace and gallops in search of the Broceliander Forest. After a long wandering, Yvain finds a hospitable castle, then a bestial shepherd, and finally a spring. Further, everything happens in full accordance with the words of Kalogrenan: a terrible storm rises, then an angry giant appears and rushes at the stranger with abuse. In a desperate fight, Yvain defeats his opponent: the dying knight turns his horse, and Yvain rushes after him. He breaks into an unfamiliar fortress, and then a secret ax door collapses on him. The iron slides along Yvane's back, cutting the horse in half; he himself remains unharmed, but falls into a trap. He is rescued by a beautiful maiden, whom Yvain once welcomed at Arthur's court. Wishing to return good for good, she puts a magic ring on his finger so that the vassals of the mortally wounded owner of the castle would not find it.

The maiden leads the knight into the upper room, orders him to sit on the bed and not move. Everywhere squires and pages are prowling: they found the cut horse instantly, but the rider seemed to have evaporated. Frozen on the bed, Yvain looks with delight at the lady of amazing beauty who entered the room. The coffin is brought in, and the lady begins to sob, calling out to her late husband. Blood appears on the forehead of the dead man - a clear sign that the killer is hiding very close. The vassals rush about the room, and the lady curses the invisible enemy, calling him a vile coward, a miserable slave and a devilish offspring. When the funeral ceremony is completed, the coffin is carried into the courtyard. A frightened girl runs in, who was very worried about Yvain. The knight keeps looking out the window. Yvain fell victim to love - he burns with passion for his hater. Beauty always mortally wounds, and there is no shield from this sweet misfortune - it strikes sharper than any blade.

At first, the knight in love reproaches himself for his folly, but then decides to win over the lovely lady who pierced his heart. The sensible maiden, guessing about Yvain's passionate feelings, starts a conversation about him with her mistress: there is no need to grieve over the dead - perhaps the Lord will send her a better husband who will be able to protect the source. The lady angrily cuts off her confidante, but curiosity turns out to be stronger, and she asks what family the warrior who defeated her husband belongs to. The girl who brightened Yvayn's imprisonment arranges everything in the best possible way: the beautiful Lodina agrees to marry a noble knight, the son of King Urien. The vassals unanimously approve of her choice: she needs a reliable defender - the glory of Yvain thunders throughout the land, and he proved his strength by defeating the powerful Esclados. The knight is at the pinnacle of bliss - from now on he is the lawful and beloved husband of the golden-haired beauty.

The next morning, the news comes that the king is approaching the spring with all his retinue. The evil-speaking Kay shames the absent Yvain and declares that he himself will fight the knight who humiliated Kalogrenan. In a short battle, Yvain, to the delight of the court, knocks the scoffer out of the saddle, and then invites the king to his castle, to his beautiful wife. Happy and proud Lodina welcomes the monarch. Noticing the intelligent girl who saved Yvain, Gawain expresses a desire to become a knight of the dark-haired Lunette.

The feast lasts seven days, but every festival comes to an end, and now the king is already preparing to return. Gawain begins to persuade his friend to military life: you need to harden yourself in tournaments in order to be worthy of your beautiful wife. Yvain turns to his wife for permission: Lodina reluctantly lets her husband go, but orders him to return exactly one year later. Yvain sadly leaves his beautiful lady.

The year passes unnoticed; Gawain entertains his friend in every possible way, starting battles and tournaments. August comes: King Arthur calls the knights to a feast, and Yvain suddenly remembers his vow. There is no limit to his despair, and then the messenger of Lodina appears at the court: having loudly accused the knight of treason, she tears off the ring from his finger and conveys the order of the mistress not to show herself to her again. Yvain loses his mind from grief: having torn his clothes, he rushes into the forest, where he gradually runs wild. Once a sleeping madman is found by a noble lady. Madame de Nurisson decides to help the unfortunate: she rubs Morgana's fairy balm from head to toe and puts rich clothes nearby. Awakening, the healed Yvain hastily covers his nakedness. Suddenly, he hears the desperate lingering roar of a lion, whose tail is seized by a fierce snake. Yvain cuts the reptile into pieces, and the lion, with a sigh of relief, kneels before the knight, recognizing him as his master. The mighty beast becomes Yvain's faithful companion and squire.

After two weeks of wandering, the knight again finds himself at a miraculous source and loses his senses from grief; the lion, considering him dead, tries to commit suicide. Waking up, Yvain sees Lunetta in the chapel - slandered and sentenced to death at the stake. There is no one to protect her, for Messer Yvain has disappeared, and Messer Gawain has gone in search of the queen, kidnapped by vile enemies. The knight with a lion promises to stand up for the girl - he will have to fight with three opponents at once. In front of the crowd gathered in anticipation of the execution, Yvain defeats the villains. The royal Lodina invites the wounded hero to the castle, but the knight says that he must wander until he redeems himself from the beautiful lady - not recognizing her husband, Lodina complains about the cruelty of his beloved. Yvain finds shelter in the castle of Mr. de Chaporoz - the father of two lovely daughters.

Soon, news of the exploits of the mysterious Knight with a Lion spreads throughout the country: he defeated the evil giant, saved Gawain's relatives from death and protected the possessions of Madame de Nurisson. Meanwhile, Monsieur de Chaporose dies, and the older sister denies the younger sister the right to inherit. The insidious girl hurries to enlist support, and she manages to persuade Gawain, who has already returned to court, to her side. King Arthur, dissatisfied with such greed, can do nothing - the invincible Gawain has no rivals. The younger sister now relies only on the Knight with the Lion and sends her friend to look for him. The girl finds a protector of the weak and oppressed: having learned about the intrigues of the greedy heiress, Yvain willingly agrees to help. On the way to the royal palace, the Knight with the Lion performs another feat: he frees three hundred maidens, captivated by two satanel demons in the castle of Misfortune.

The younger sister, meanwhile, is already completely exhausted from sorrow and despair. The day of judgment comes: the older sister demands to decide the case in her favor, since she has a defender, and no one wanted to intercede for the younger one. Suddenly, an unfamiliar knight appears and, to the great delight of King Arthur, challenges Gawain to a fight. A fight begins - a terrible battle in which the best friends meet, without knowing it. They fight to the death: Yvain wants to slay Gawain, Gawain wants to kill Yvain, However, the forces of the opponents are equal - they cannot win, but they do not want to give in either. In vain, the king and queen try to appeal to the conscience of their elder sister - the stubborn and greedy girl does not want to listen to anything. But with the onset of night, the duel is still interrupted. Opponents enter into a conversation and finally get to know each other. Both are horrified: Yvain insists that he is defeated by Gawain, Gawain begs to recognize Yvain as the winner. The king pronounces the verdict: the sisters must reconcile and fairly share the inheritance. Suddenly, a huge beast runs out of the forest with a loud roar, and it becomes clear to everyone who the rumor dubbed the Knight with a Lion.

The court greets Yvain with jubilation, but he is still consumed by longing - he cannot live without the beautiful Lodina, and no longer hopes for forgiveness. Yvain decides to return to the source and re-call the storm. Hearing thunder, Lodina trembles with fear. Vassals grumble at her - there was no life in the castle. The sensible Lunette reminds the mistress of the Knight with the Lion, and the lady vows to accept him as her protector. The girl immediately goes to the spring and finds Yvain there. The knight prostrates himself before his wife. Having learned the guilty husband, Lodina comes into a terrible anger: it is better to endure the daily storms than to love the one who boldly neglected her. Filled with admiration, Yvain says that he is ready to die in separation if the heart of his beloved is so adamant. Lodina retorts that the oath has already been sworn: Yvain will have to be forgiven so as not to destroy the soul. The happy knight embraces his wife. His wanderings are over - love has triumphed.

E. D. Murashkintseva

One day, a villan, a peasant, speaking Russian, went with his wife to Mass on Sunday. The priest reads a sermon, they say, the Lord will reward a hundredfold for every gift from a pure heart. A man and a woman go home, and he says that, they say, our Burenka is not so much milk that we give, what if we take her as a gift to God, then ?! And the woman agreed, why not give. The peasant took Burenka out of the barn and by the rope - to the priest: accept, they say, a sacrifice, the richer you are, the more you are happy, I swear, there is nothing more to give, nothing more. Father Kon-stan says, rejoicing to himself: "Go in peace, the Lord will reward you, your wealth will increase. If everyone were so careful, then I would have a whole herd from the parish cattle." Willan goes home, and the greedy priest commands his own, so that, he says, Burenka gets used to our meadow, tie her up with our Belyanka. They tied the cows with one rope. Which is its own, so it would only be to pinch the grass, but someone else's pulls home, and drags it with all its might, and through the field, through the forest, through the village and other meadow - back to her home, so she dragged the priestly Belyanka. A man to a woman: “Look, the father said that he is rewarded a hundredfold! It’s already coming out twice! What is the moral of this story? A clever man, if he hopes in God, will be sent twice and more. And the last will be taken away from the fool. The main thing is that it goes into the hand. There pop: if he knew where he would fall, he would have thrashed straws! ..

By the way, if a person knows how to make good money and at the same time wants to live widely, he can’t get away from slanderers and envious people. Take a closer look at who and how he walks at his table - out of ten, six will denigrate him at every opportunity, and nine - ready to go crazy with envy. And in front of people, they bend their backs and fawn.

I mean, there was a priest in a rich village. He was an excellent hoarder, saved up everything that was possible, and had a lot of money, and from clothes, and so on. He was not shy about money and, say, he could always hold grain until a better time, when a good price was established. The main thing, however, was his wonderful donkey. For twenty years he served the priest in good conscience. I do not rule out that all the wealth came from that. And when he died, pop him and buried him in the cemetery.

But the bishop there was of a completely different disposition. He was not a greedy man, but even a tomboyish one. And kind to a good person. If someone comes to him or stops by - so the most favorite pastime for a bishop is to talk and have a bite with a kind guest, but if he is ill - then he is the best medicine.

One day, at the bishop's table, one of the well-wishers of our priest happened to be fed, with him more than once with complete pleasure and sincere gratitude. There was talk about the miserliness and bribery of the clergy. Here this guest brings up in a timely manner: so and so, if, therefore, we lead the matter wisely, then our priest can be of great benefit. What's happened? And the fact that he put the donkey in the sacred ground, like a good Christian, is a dumb animal. The bishop boiled over from such a desecration of the law: "Smite him with thunder, deliver him to me immediately! We will fine him!" Pop came. The bishop attacked him: how dare he, they say, but for such a crime, according to the church rule, I will put you in prison. Batiushka asks for a day to think. And he doesn’t get particularly twitchy, because he has unshakable hope for the purse. He goes to the lord in the morning and takes with him a full-weight twenty livres. The bishop again at him - more than yesterday, And he told you, I tell you, now everything is in good conscience, just step aside, your Eminence, a little to the side so that there is a confidential conversation. And he himself understands that the time has come not to take, but to give, what to give now is more profitable. And he begins: that, they say, I had a donkey. Such a hard worker - and mind you, he speaks the truth - that I earned twenty sous a day on him. And a clever one, to the point that, you see, he bequeathed you twenty livres for eternal remembrance, in order to save himself from the fire of hell. The bishop, of course, says that the Lord will reward humble labor and forgive the sins of the dog.

So the bishop found justice for the rich priest. And Rutbeuf, who told how the case had been, drew an admonition from everything: whoever goes to the judge with a bribe may not be afraid of reprisals, for money they will even baptize a donkey.

If you haven't read it yourself, here's what, by the way, is written in Scripture. One villan died on Friday, early in the morning. He died and lies, and the soul has already left the body. But for some unknown reason, neither the devil nor the angel follow her to torture her. The soul immediately grew bolder. I looked around. In the sky, the Archangel Michael is someone's soul and heaven carries. And the villa is a new soul behind them. Saint Peter received that soul. And soon he will return to the gate. Looks - here Pillanova's soul. Where are you from, who brought you, why without an escort, he asks, And he says: we have no place in paradise for boors. And villan to him: you yourself are a boor, also noble to me, this, he says, you betrayed the Lord three times, as it is said in the Gospel, and for which God chose you as an apostle! You yourself in paradise, says Villan, have nothing to do! Peter to him: they say, go away, unfaithful. And he himself was ashamed, and went to the Apostle Thomas. Thomas got angry and tells Villan that paradise belongs to the saints and saints of light, and there is no place for you, the unfaithful one. Willan, however, defiantly responds; this is who, they say, is unfaithful, if that’s what they called you, because all the apostles of the Risen One saw and believed, only you didn’t give them faith and say that I won’t believe until I feel the wounds myself. So, asks Villan, which of the two of us will be unfaithful? Foma seemed to be tired of cursing and went to Pavel. Pavel was running to the gate, chasing the peasant. Like, where and how did you fast and humble yourself, and so on. Get up, you wretch! And the peasant is for his own: we know you, bald, you yourself are the first tyrant, because of you the Jews stoned St. Stephen with stones. despondent in spirit and Paul. On the way, Thomas and Peter are conferring on the road, and the three of them decide to go to God, he will be judged and reasoned. The Lord hastened to the soul. Why, he asks, are you alone here and vilify my apostles, how can you stay here without a sentence?! And the man’s soul answers the All-Good: since Your apostles are here, then I’ll stay here, I never denied you, I always believed in Your fleshly bright resurrection and didn’t sentence people to torment. They didn’t close paradise for this, so let it open to me! While I was alive, I welcomed the poor, gave a corner to everyone, fed and watered the wanderers, warmed them by the fire, when they died, I saw off the ashes to the church. Is it a sin? I did not confess falsely and humbly communed your Flesh and Blood. I got here without hindrance, and you should not violate your own law, according to which whoever went to heaven will forever abide in it! Christ praised Villan that he had won the verbal debate, evidently he was saying that he was a good student.

The lesson from this case is this: you need to stand up for yourself firmly, because cunning has distorted the truth, forgery has perverted nature, falsehood triumphs in all ways and dexterity is now more necessary for a person than strength.

T. N. Kotrelev

Author of the 1st part of the poem (c.1230 - 1240)

Author of the 2nd part of the poem (c.1275 -1280)

The poet sees in a dream how, on an early May morning, walking, he goes outside the city to listen to the singing of a nightingale and a lark, and finds himself in front of impregnable walls that surround a mysterious garden. On the walls, he sees images of various figures that symbolize Hatred, Treason, Covetousness, Avarice, Envy, Despondency, Old Age, Time, Hypocrisy and Poverty. They block his way to the garden, but Carelessness, Joy's friend, lets him in through a narrow door.

Entering the garden, he sees a round dance led by Fun, and among the dancers he recognizes Beauty, Wealth, Generosity, Generosity, Courtesy and Youth. He is enchanted: he is surrounded by beautiful flowers and trees, fabulous birds announce the garden of love with sweet-sounding singing, joy and carefree fun reign everywhere. Walking in the garden, he comes to the source of Narcissus, in which he sees a mirror image of the whole garden and beautiful roses. Stopping in front of an unblown rose, he plunges into contemplation. At this time, Cupid, armed with a bow and arrows, who has been following the young man all this time, wherever he goes, wounds him with five arrows, whose names are Beauty, Simplicity, Courtesy, Hospitality and Pretty.

Pierced by the arrows of Cupid, the young man, burning with tender passion, declares himself a vassal of Love. Cupid teaches him how he should behave in order to achieve the favor of his beloved: he needs to renounce everything vile, completely surrender to the service of the lady of the heart, show loyalty and generosity, and also monitor his appearance and manners. Then Cupid unlocks the young man's heart with his key and introduces him to the messengers of love: troubles and blessings. The blessings of love are Hope, Sweet Thought, Sweet Speech, Sweet Look.

Encouraged by the Favorable Reception, the lover approaches the Rose, but he is too ardent, and his rash behavior leads to the appearance of the guardians of the Rose: Resistance, Fear and Shame, which block his path. Blinded by passion, the young man stubbornly tries to achieve the reciprocity of his beloved, not obeying the advice of Reason, which, watching him from his high tower, calls for moderation and abstinence. A friend tells the lover how to calm the guards, and Cupid sends Generosity and Pity to help him. But when the guards are pacified and the Resistance is finally broken, Chastity stands in the way of the young man. Then Venus intervenes in the matter, and thanks to her assistance, the lover manages to kiss the Rose. This arouses the wrath of the guards: Evil-tongue calls Jealousy, they awaken Resistance and build an impregnable castle around the Rose, within the walls of which they enclose a Favorable Reception. The young man complains about the inconstancy of Cupid and Fortune and laments his bitter fate.

Reason takes the word: it condemns the ardent young man for having succumbed to love passion, warns him against the deceit and deceit of women. Only because of his youth and inexperience is the lover forgiven for his frivolous behavior. Reason explains to him that love, by its very nature, serves the purpose of preserving and reproducing the human race, and the sensual joys that accompany it should not become an end in itself. However, in this fallen world, subject to vices and passions, it is not love itself, but only love pleasures that attract the majority of men and women. It is necessary to strive for the highest love, and this is love for one's neighbor.

The lover is disappointed by the speeches of Reason and does not heed its advice. He turns to Wealth for help and asks him to release him from captivity Favorable Reception. But Wealth indignantly refuses, for Favorable Reception has never paid attention to him.

Then Love herself decides to attack the walls of the castle. Among her attendants are Stealth and Pretense, who enjoy great influence in the court of Love. Pretense tells Love about how to achieve the goal, acting only by deceit and flattery. The friend also convinces the young man that Stealth and Pretense are the best allies of Love, and he agrees with him.

Meanwhile, Cupid is gathering an army to take the castle by storm. Wanting to enlist the support of his mother, Venus, he sends Generosity and Sweet Look to her. In an air chariot drawn by a flock of doves, Venus rushes to the rescue. She is outraged that Chastity prevents the young man from approaching Rosa, and promises that from now on she will not tolerate women so zealously keeping chastity.

Under the leadership of Pretense, Cupid's army captures the castle: Evil-speaking is defeated, Favorable Reception is freed from captivity. But when the lover is about to pluck the Rose, again Resistance, Shame and Fear hinder him.

All this time, Nature, in tireless concern for the preservation of life, has been working in her forge. In confession to the Genius, Nature says that everything in this world is subject to its laws. Only people in pursuit of transient carnal joys often neglect one of its most important commandments: be fruitful and multiply. Genius goes to the army of Love and conveys to everyone the complaints of Nature. Cupid dresses Genius in priestly clothes, gives him a ring, a staff and a miter, and Venus gives him a lit candle. The entire army, before going on the assault, sends curses of Chastity. Finally, the hour of battle comes: the Genius throws a lit candle on the fortress wall, Venus throws her torch on it. Shame and Fear are defeated and take flight. A favorable Reception allows the young man to approach the beautiful Rose, he plucks it and wakes up.

V. V. Rynkevich

The king of beasts, the lion Noble, hosts a reception on the occasion of the Ascension Day. All animals are invited. Only the rogue Fox dared not come to the royal feast. The wolf Isengrin complains to the lion about the Fox, his old enemy: the swindler raped the wolf's wife Gryzenta. Noble arranges a trial. He decides to give the Fox a chance to improve and, instead of cruel punishment, orders Isengrin to conclude a peace treaty with the Fox.

At this moment, the animals see a funeral procession: a rooster and chickens carry a chicken torn to pieces by the Fox on a stretcher. They fall at Noble's feet, begging him to punish the villain. The angry lion orders the bear Biryuk to find the Fox and deliver it to the palace. But the cunning rogue manages to fool him too: he lures the honey lover to the beehive, and the clumsy Biryuk gets stuck in the hollow of the oak. The forester, seeing the bear, convenes people. Barely alive, beaten with sticks, the poor fellow returns to Noble. The lion is angry. He instructs the cat Tiber to deliver the villain. Not daring to disobey the order of the lord, he goes to the Fox. He decides to lure the criminal into the palace with cunning and flattering speeches. But this time, too, the dexterous rogue inflates the royal envoy. He invites him to go hunting together - to the priest's barn, where there are many mice, and to the chicken coop. The cat is trapped.

The enraged lion decides to go to war against the criminal. The animals go on a hike. Approaching the fortress where the Fox hid, they realize that it is not so easy to overcome the stone walls. But, seized with a thirst for revenge, the animals still set up camp around the castle. They storm the fortress for days on end, but all their efforts are in vain.

The animals, having lost all hope of taking the fortress, go to bed. Meanwhile, the fox, slowly getting out of the castle, decides to take revenge on the enemies. He ties the tails and paws of the sleeping ones to the trunks of trees and lies down at the side of the queen. Waking up, the frightened lioness raises a cry. The animals, seeing the Fox, try to get up, but cannot move. Slug Slow, deciding to free everyone, hastily cuts their tails and paws. The fox is already ready to run away, but at the last moment Medliv manages to grab the scoundrel. Finally the Fox is captured.

Noble issues a cruel but fair sentence - to execute a liar and a villain. The wife and sons of the Fox, having learned that he is in danger of imminent death, beg the lord to pardon the criminal, offering a rich ransom in return. In the end, the lion agrees to forgive the Fox, but on the condition that he leave his daring antics. The delighted Fox hides as soon as the rope is removed from his neck. But it turns out that in the crowd and confusion, the Fox committed another crime - he crushed the mouse. And he's already gone. Noble orders everyone who sees the criminal, without waiting for the trial, to deal with him on the spot.

Hard times have come for the Fox, He is forced to wander, hiding from everyone. It was not so easy to get food for yourself. But cunning and ingenuity still help him out. Either he manages to lure a piece of cheese from a raven with flattering speeches, or he cheats fishermen who are returning home with a rich catch. This time, the Fox pretends to be dead, and the simpletons put him in the wagon. In the meantime, the rogue fills his belly to the full, and even takes part of the prey with him. That was the joy of his household!

Meanwhile, Isengrin, prowling in search of food, approaches the Fox's house. Smelling the smell of fried fish, he, forgetting about the mortal enmity with the Fox and all his crimes, asks to feed him. But the sly one tells the wolf that the supper is for the monks, and they accept anyone who wants to join their community. Starving, Isengrin expresses a desire to join the Order of Tyrone. The fox assures the wolf that for this it is necessary to cut off the tonsure. He tells him to stick his head through the crack in the door and pour boiling water over it. When the wolf, exhausted by these tortures, reminds him that he promised to feed him, the Fox invites Isengrin to catch fish for himself. He takes him to a frozen pond, ties a bucket to his tail and tells him to lower it into the hole. When the ice freezes and the wolf is no longer able to move, people gather to the pond. Seeing a wolf, they attack him with sticks. Left without a tail, Isengrin barely takes his legs.

The Beast King Noble suddenly falls ill with a serious illness. Renowned healers flock to him from all over the world, but none of them can help the lion. Badger Greenber, who is Fox's cousin, convinces him that the only way to earn forgiveness and win the favor of the king is to heal him. Having collected healing herbs in a wonderful garden and robbed a sleeping pilgrim, he appears before Noble. The king is angry that the insolent Fox dared to appear before his eyes; but he explains to Noble the purpose of his visit. He says that the skin of a wolf, antlers of a deer and hair of a cat will be required to heal the sick. The king orders the servants to fulfill his request. The fox rejoices: Isengrin, the deer and the cat Tiber - his old enemies and offenders - are now disgraced forever. With the help of potions prepared by the Fox, the king recovers. The trickster finally wins the love of the king.

The lion goes to war with the pagans. He instructs the Fox to guard the palace and appoints him as his viceroy. Taking advantage of Noble's absence, he seduces his wife and lives without denying himself anything. Soon, an insidious plan matures in him: he persuades the messenger to announce to the animals that the lion died on the battlefield. The messenger reads to the animals the will of the king, concocted by the fraudster Fox: after the death of the lion, the throne should go to the Fox, and Noble's widow will become the wife of the newly-made king. Sorrow for the deceased sovereign is replaced by joy: no one wants to quarrel with the new king.

Soon the lion returns home with a victory. He storms the castle and takes the traitor prisoner. Chauntecleer the rooster pounces on the impostor, but he pretends to be dead and is thrown into a ditch. Crows flock to the carrion, but they fail to eat: the Fox tears off one of their paws and runs away. The ravens complain to the king, and he sends the badger Greenber to the Fox. Wanting to help out his cousin, Greenber returns and tells Noble that this time the Fox actually died, although he was unharmed. The animals rejoice, only the lion is disappointed and saddened by the unexpected death of the enemy.

A. V. Vigilyanskaya

Once the steward of a famous church, whose name was Theophilus, was famous in the district for his wealth, high position and kindness. But life treated him cruelly, he lost everything and fell out of favor with the cardinal. And then one day Theophilus, sitting at home, bitterly recalled with what zeal he used to pray for his patron, the cardinal, who was so unfair to him. The housekeeper was a proud man and decided to take revenge on the offender at all costs. It was impossible to do this on his own, and, after hesitating, Theophilus decided to go to the powerful wizard Saladin, who knew how to conjure the devil. Saladin welcomed Theophilus with open arms. Having learned about the misfortunes that befell a friend, the wizard promised to help and ordered to come the next day. On the way home, the pious Theophilus was afraid that eternal torment would befall him as punishment for a deal with the enemy of the human race, but, remembering his troubles, he nevertheless decided on a date with the unclean. Saladin summoned the devil with terrible spells and persuaded him to help Theophilus.

The next day, the steward came to Saladin even ahead of time, and he sent him to the devil, strictly punishing him not to say Christian prayers on the way. Appearing before the unclean, Theophilus complained about his fate, and the adversary replied that he was ready to return both honor and wealth to him, if Theophilus would give him his soul and become his servant for this. Theophilus agreed and wrote a receipt, which the devil left with him, ordering the steward to be cruel to people from that time on and forget all mercy. And the cardinal, ashamed of his injustice towards Theophilus, decided to restore him to his post and sent his servant Zadir to find the exiled steward. Having scolded the Bully with the last words, Theophilus decided, however, to go to the cardinal.

And now Theophilus sees the complete repentance of the cardinal, but speaks with his master angrily and rudely, although he agrees to accept the position and money back, Theophilus goes out into the street and sees his friends Peter and Thomas. He also treats them harshly and, cursing and insulting them, goes his own way. But he is tormented by remorse. After long torment comes repentance for the deed. Grieving, Theophilus wandered into the chapel of the Blessed Virgin. Falling on his knees, he began to fervently pray for the salvation of his soul, shedding tears. Taking pity on the unfortunate housekeeper, Madonna appeared before his eyes and promised to take away the accursed receipt from the devil. Then the Most Pure One went to the enemy of the human race and, under the threat of reprisal, took away the paper from him. Again appearing before Theophilus, the Madonna ordered him to give this receipt to the cardinal, so that he would read it to all the parishioners in the church as a warning, so that they would know how easy it is for a soul to perish. Theophilus came to the cardinal and, having told how everything had happened, handed him the vile treaty. Vladyka, rejoicing at the servant's salvation, called the believers to the temple and read them a paper containing the boast of the unclean, sealed with Theophilus' blood. Hearing about such a miracle, all those present in the temple stood up and exclaimed with one voice: "We praise You, God!" So the crafty demon was put to shame, tempting the souls of people with easy wealth and glory.

T. N. Kotrelev

So, the story begins: a girl on a mule appears at the court of the legendary King Arthur, where brave and noble knights gather. The beauty rides "without a bridle at all" and weeps bitterly. Noble ladies and knights send Seneschal Kay to find out what's wrong. Soon Kay returns and reports: the girl is sad that her mule does not have a bridle, and she is looking for a brave knight who will agree to find this bridle and return it to her. And if there is one and will fulfill her request, she is ready to become his obedient wife.

Fascinated by the beauty of the lady, Kay asks to be allowed to perform this feat. Ready to go for a bridle even to the ends of the world, Kei wants to receive a kiss from a lady before the road. However, she refuses him: first a bridle, and then a kiss. Without wasting more precious time, Kay sits on a mule, and he confidently trots along the familiar road. Soon the mule turns into a forest full of lions, leopards and tigers; with a loud roar, the beast rushes "to where the knight walked the path." Cursing everything in the world, the unlucky seneschal thinks only of how to get his feet out of here as soon as possible. Out of respect for the mistress of the mule, the predators, after seeing the rider, retreat into the thicket.

The forest ended, the mule rode out onto the plain, and Kay perked up. However, he does not rejoice for long: the mule enters the gorge, where "snakes, tarantulas and spiders" swarm at the bottom, whose stinking, fetid breath, swirling like black smoke, frightens Kay so much that he is terrified ready to return to the forest to wild animals. Finally, this obstacle is over, now Kay is waiting for a turbulent stream, which can only be crossed over by a bridge. The Seneschal can't stand it and turns back; thanks to the mule, he passes unharmed all reptiles and beasts, and finally drives up to Arthur's palace.

Upon learning that he did not bring the bridle, the maiden vomits in grief. own hair. Touched by her sorrow, the knight Gauwen asks to be allowed to bring her a bridle. Hearing his words, the girl joyfully kisses the knight: her heart tells her that he will bring the bridle. Meanwhile, Seneschal Kay, "sorrowful in soul," leaves the court; not having fulfilled the knightly feat he has undertaken, he does not dare to appear before King Arthur.

The mule takes Gowen along the same trails as Kay. Seeing the familiar mule and its rider, the brave Gauvin, the animals run out to meet them. Gauwen guesses that, frightened by the beast, Kay broke his word given to the lady. Goven himself fearlessly rides on and with a smile on his lips passes the gorge of horror, and the stench, at the bottom of which reptiles swirl.

On a narrow plank, the knight fearlessly crosses the seething stream and drives up to the castle, which is spinning like a mill wheel. The castle is surrounded by a deep moat with water, around the moat rises a palisade decorated with human heads; one pole of this terrible fence is still free. But the knight is not shy in soul. Having entered the bridge, Gauvin bravely rushes forward and penetrates the castle at the cost of only half of the mule's tail, which "left hanging in the gate." The surroundings are empty and quiet. In the courtyard he is met by a silent dwarf; following him, Gauwen encounters a huge, hairy villan with an ax around his neck. Willan warns the knight that it will not be easy to get to the cherished bridle; but this warning only kindles the courage of the hero. Then the villan fusses about the knight, takes him into the house, serves dinner, makes a bed, and before going to bed he offers a game: first Govin will cut off his head, and then he will cut off Govin. The knight agrees, cuts off the villan's head, he takes it under his arm and leaves, promising to come tomorrow for Gauvin's head.

In the morning, true to his word, Gowen lays his head on the chopping block. But it turns out that the shaggy giant only wanted to scare him. A fearsome-looking villan becomes a faithful servant of the knight and equips him for a fight with ferocious lions. Seven shields are broken by predators, but still the knight defeats them. Gowen is ready to receive the bridle, but this is only the first test. When the knight has rested and changed his armor, Villan leads him to the hall where the wounded knight lies. According to custom, this knight fights with everyone who comes to the castle for a bridle. The knight defeats the stranger, cuts off his head and puts it on a stake near the moat. If the alien defeats the knight, then he will have to cut off his head and take his place himself. Gauwen, of course, defeats the knight of the castle, but generously keeps his head on his shoulders. Now the shaggy villan will bring him a bridle, Gauvin thinks. But a new test awaits Arthur's knight: Villan brings two fire-breathing snakes to him. With a mighty blow, Gauwen cuts off both reptiles' heads.

Then the former dwarf comes to Govin and, on behalf of his mistress, invites the knight to share a meal with her. Gauwen accepts the invitation, but, not trusting the dwarf, demands that he be accompanied by a faithful villan. Following his guides, the knight comes to a beautiful lady. Admiring his courage, the lady invites Gauvin to the table. Willan and the dwarf serve them, the lady cordially treats the hero. When the meal is over and the servants have taken away the water for washing their hands, Gauvin asks the lady to give him the bridle. In response, she declares that he fought for her sister, and therefore she is ready to give him all of herself so that he becomes the master of both her and her fifty castles. But the knight politely replies that he must “bring the news to the king as soon as possible” about what happened, and therefore he must immediately set off on his return journey. Then the lady points to a silver nail where a precious bridle hangs. Gauvin takes off the bridle, says goodbye to the lady, and Villan brings him a mule. The lady asks the villan to stop the rotation of the castle so that the knight can easily leave its walls, and he willingly fulfills her request,

Passing by the gate, Gauvin looks with surprise at the jubilant crowd: when he entered the castle, there was not a soul in it. Villan explains to him: before, all these people hid in a cave because they were afraid of wild animals. Only those who are braver sometimes went to work. Now, when Gowen has killed all the predators, they rejoice in the light, and there is no limit to their joy. Villan's speeches are a great joy for Gauvin.

Here the mule again runs across the narrow board, turns into a stinking gorge, enters a dense forest, where all the animals again jump out to meet him - to kneel before the valiant knight. But Gauvin has no time - he hurries to Arthur's castle.

Gauwen drives into the meadow in front of the castle, the queen and her retinue notice him from the windows. Everyone rushes to meet the brave knight, and the visiting lady rejoices most of all: she knows that Gowen brought her a bridle. Having rewarded the knight with a kiss, she thanks him for his feat. “And then Gauvin told her his adventures without embarrassment”: about the forest, about the furious stream, about the wonderful palace, about the dwarf and about the villan, about how the lions were killed, how the famous knight was defeated, how two snakes were struck at once, about the meal and a conversation with her sister, about the rejoicing of the people in the castle.

After listening to Gauvin's story, the lady asks to be allowed to leave, although everyone, including the king himself, persuades her to stay and choose her master among the knights of the Round Table. But the lady stands her ground: she is not free to stay, no matter how much she wants to. Sitting on a mule, she, refusing to be accompanied, gallops back into the forest. On this story "about a girl on a mule, who suddenly left the palace, finds its end here."

E. V. Morozova

Lawyer Patlen complains to Guillemette, his wife, that no one needs his services anymore. In the old days, there was no end to clients, but now he sits for weeks without work. Previously, they did not deny themselves anything, but now they are forced to walk in rags and eat dry bread crusts. We can no longer live like this, something must be done. You never know the simpletons in the world, which Patlen - a dodger and a cunning one - does not cost anything to circle around his finger!

The lawyer goes to the clothier, known to everyone for his stinginess. Patlen praises the generosity and kindness of his late father, whom he himself never saw, although, according to rumors, the old man was as miserly as his son. The lawyer casually mentions that the cloth maker's father never refused him a loan. With flattering speeches, Patlen wins over the gloomy and distrustful clothier and wins his sympathy. In a conversation with him, he casually mentions that he became very rich and all his cellars are full of gold. He would gladly buy cloth, but he did not take any money with him.

The lawyer promises to give three times the price for the cloth, but only in the evening, when the clothier comes to dine with him.

Patlin returns home with the cloth and tells Guillemette about how cleverly he cheated the clothier. The wife is unhappy: she is afraid that her husband will not do well when the deceit is revealed. But cunning Pat-len has already figured out how to avoid retribution. When the miser comes to his house in the evening, anticipating a free treat and rejoicing that he sold his goods so dearly, the lawyer's wife assures the clothier that her husband is dying and has not left the house for several weeks. Apparently, someone else came for the cloth and called himself the name of her husband. However, the cloth maker does not believe her and demands money. Finally Guillemette, sobbing, leads the stubborn merchant into the room of Patlen, who deftly plays the role of a dying man in front of him. Tom has no choice but to leave unsalted slurping.

Returning home, the clothier meets a negligent and roguish servant who tends his sheep, and takes out his anger on him. Now let the servant answer before the court where the sheep disappear: for some reason they get sick with sheep pox too often.

The servant is alarmed, because in fact it was he who stole the master's sheep. He comes to Patlen for help and asks to be his defender in court. The lawyer agrees, but for a high fee. The cunning man persuades the servant to bleat like a sheep to all his questions, without saying a single word.

Clothmaker, his servant and lawyer are in court. Seeing Patlen, alive and well, the miser guesses that he has deceived him, and demands the return of the cloth or money. Having completely lost his head with anger, he immediately attacks the servant who steals his sheep. The cloth maker is so furious that the judge does not understand who and what he is accusing. The lawyer tells the judge that the merchant is probably out of his mind. But since the clothier demands an investigation, the lawyer begins his duties. He starts asking questions to the servant, but he only bleats like a sheep. Everything is clear to the judge: there are two insane people in front of him and there can be no question of any trial.

Satisfied with this outcome, the servant, in response to Patlen's demand to pay him the promised amount, bleats like a sheep. The frustrated lawyer is forced to admit that this time he himself was left in the cold.

Lawyer Pierre Patlin, a rogue and swindler, known to everyone for his clever and daring antics, is again looking for another simpleton to profit at his expense. In the marketplace he sees a furrier and decides to deceive him in the old, tried and tested way, as he had already tricked a clothier once. Having learned the name of the merchant, the lawyer pretends to be a close friend of his late father and recalls that either the furrier himself or his own sister was baptized by Patlen's father. The simple-hearted merchant sincerely rejoices at an unexpected meeting. Patlen is asking for furs to buy for his distant relative, a priest, but he has no money with him. So he suggests going to a priest, with whom the furrier can make a good deal. The lawyer, supposedly to help the merchant, takes on a bale of furs.

Patlen approaches the priest, who is sitting in the confessional, and asks him to forgive the sins of his friend, who really wants to confess. He explains to him that he is rich, and is ready to donate a large amount to the church. Unfortunately, he is not completely healthy, often talks and raves, but let this not embarrass the holy father. The priest, anticipating a generous reward, promises Patlen to listen to his suffering friend.

The lawyer informs the merchant that the deal has been concluded and the furrier only needs to receive money from the priest: he must wait in line and go to the confessional, while Patlen himself will order dinner at the nearest tavern to celebrate the meeting and the profitable sale of the entire batch of goods. When the gullible merchant enters the confessional, Patlen takes the bale of furs and leaves, laughing at the stupidity of the imaginary relative.

Finally, the furrier approaches the priest and demands money from him. He, remembering the lawyer's warning, proceeds to confession, but the merchant does not even think of repenting of his sins and insistently asks the priest to pay him off for the purchased furs. After a while, both the priest and the merchant realize that the cunning Patlen played a cruel joke on them. The furrier rushes to the tavern, but Patlen is gone.

Lawyer Patlen is no longer the full of energy and enthusiasm, trickster and swindler, as he was known to everyone in the district. He has grown old, sick and weak, and feels the end is near. When he was young, he easily earned money, but now his strength is running out and no one needs him. He still holds the position of a lawyer in court, but now his clients are poor, so his affairs are not going well. Together with his wife Guillemette, he lives out his life in poverty and oblivion. One consolation remained to him in life - wine.

He is about to go to court, but feels so bad that he has to go to bed. Deciding that his hour of death has come, Pat-len sends Guillemette for a pharmacist and a priest. Soon both come to a lawyer: one to try to bring him back to life, the other to prepare him for the upcoming meeting with the Almighty. The pharmacist persuades Patlen to take powders and medicines, but he refuses all his potions and demands wine. The priest is ready to accept the confession of the dying, but he does not want to hear about the remission of sins and craves only wine. Guillemette begs her husband to think about saving the soul, but he does not heed her pleas, the Priest asks the stubborn man to remember all the sins that he has committed in his entire life. Finally, he agrees to tell the holy father about his clever tricks. He boasts that he once cheated a greedy cloth maker, taking from him six cubits of the best cloth and not paying a copper. However, he refuses to talk about how he himself was fooled by the clothier's servant after he saved the thief from trial. Seeing that Patlen's death is already close, the priest absolves him of his sins. Now it's time to make a will according to all the rules. But Patlen has nothing, and he bequeaths to his wife an empty casket without a single coin, and to his confessor - the charms of Guillemette. Saying goodbye to the world, in which the most important thing for him was to eat, drink and cheat, Patlen bequeathed to bury himself in a wine cellar, under a wine barrel, and expires.

A quarrel breaks out between husband and wife because she suspects him of infidelity. The angry husband leaves, and the wife complains to the neighbor. She promises her friend to find out if her fears are justified. They develop a plan: when the husband returns home, the wife will pretend to be alarmed and, in response to his questions, will tell him that he suffers from an incurable disease. Then she will bring with her a maid dressed as a priest, who at confession will try to find out the whole truth from him.

The husband comes and demands dinner, and the wife, at the sight of him, begins to sob and kill herself. She manages to play her part so deftly that the husband himself begins to believe that he is dangerously ill. The woman runs after the priest.

A disguised maid proceeds to confession. Frightened by the nearness of death, the husband repents of his sins and admits that he really cheated on his wife. It turns out that his mistress is the neighbor's daughter. Angry women decide once and for all to teach a lesson to the voluptuary who has lost all shame. The imaginary priest imposes a penance on the sinner: he must strip naked and on his knees beg forgiveness from his wife. When he fulfills this requirement, his wife and neighbor attack him with rods. The shamed husband swears eternal love and fidelity to his wife and promises never to cheat on her again.

A young woman complains to her godfather that her elderly husband is unable to extinguish the flame of her love passion. Kuma advises her to seek solace on the side and get a lover. Their conversation is overheard by a monk, brother Gilbert, a libertine and a voluptuary. He offers his services to the old man's wife and assures her that she will not regret if she agrees to make an appointment with him. She invites him the next day, when her husband goes to the market. The monk arrives at the appointed hour, but the old man unexpectedly returns for the sack. The wife hides brother Guilbert under the chest of drawers, and he lies down on the very bag for which the old man returned. Mistaking the monk's pants hanging on a nail for a sack, he takes them and leaves. The terrified monk also wants to leave, but discovers his pants are missing. The wife is in despair, she does not know what to do, and goes to her godfather for advice. She reassures her and says that she can wrap her husband around her finger. Having met an angry old man, she convinces him that the pants that he found in his house are sacred, because they were worn by St. Francis. Women suffering from infertility rub them on their stomach and thighs before lying down with their spouse. Kuma assures the jealous man that only thanks to these trousers, which brother Gilbert kindly delivered from the monastery, his wife became pregnant. The old man believes his godfather and repents that he suspected his wife of treason. Brother Guilbert comes to fetch his pants and, after praying, allows the couple to kiss the shrine.

A. V. Vshilyanskaya

Ten noble gentlemen and ladies who traveled to the waters got stuck on their way back due to the autumn thaw and the attacks of robbers. They take refuge in a monastery and wait for the workers to build a bridge across the flooded river, which should take ten to twelve days. Thinking about how to pass the time, friends seek advice from Mrs. Wasil, the oldest and most respectable lady from their company. She advises to read the Holy Scriptures. Everyone asks Madame Wasile to read the Scripture aloud to them in the morning, while at other times they decide, following the example of Boccaccio's heroes, to tell different stories in turn and discuss them. Shortly before this, the Dauphin, his wife and Queen Margaret, together with several courtiers, wanted to write a book like the Decameron, but not to include in it a single short story, which would not be based on a true incident. Since more important matters distracted the august persons from this intention, the cheerful company decides to carry out their plan and present the resulting collection of truthful stories to the august persons.

Novella eighth. A young man named Borne from County Allais wanted to cheat on his virtuous wife with a maid. The maid told the lady about Borne's harassment, and she decided to teach her lustful husband a lesson. She told the maid to make an appointment with him in the dressing room, where it is dark, and she came in her place. But Borne let his friend know about his plans for the maid, and he wanted to visit the maid after him. Borne could not refuse his friend and, having stayed with the imaginary maid for some time, gave him his place. The friend had fun with the imaginary maid, who was sure that her husband had returned to her, until the very morning and, in parting, took off her wedding ring from her finger. Imagine Borne's surprise when the next day he saw his wife's engagement ring on his friend's finger and realized what a trap he had set up for himself! And his wife, whom he, hoping for some saving misunderstanding, asked where she was doing the ring, scolded him for lust, which would make him even "take a goat in a cap for the most beautiful girl in the world." Having finally made sure that he had set his own horns, Borne did not tell his wife that it was not he who came to her the second time and she unwittingly committed a sin. He also asked his friend to be silent, but the secret always becomes clear, and Borne earned the nickname of a cuckold, although his wife's reputation did not suffer from this.

Tenth novel. The noble young man Amadour fell in love with the daughter of the Countess of Aranda, Florida, who was only twelve years old. She was of a very noble family, and he had no hope of marrying her, but he could not stop loving her. In order to be able to see Florida more often, he married her friend Avanturada and, thanks to his intelligence and courtesy, became his man in the house of the Countess of Aranda. He learned that Florida loves the son of Enrique of Aragon. In order to spend more time with her, he listened to her stories for hours about the son of the Duke of Aragon, diligently concealing his feelings for her. And then one day, unable to restrain himself any longer, he confessed his love to Florida. He did not demand any reward for his loyalty and devotion, he simply wanted to keep Florida's friendship and serve her all his life. Florida was surprised: why would Amadur ask for what he already has? But Amadur explained to her that he was afraid to give himself away by a careless look or word and give rise to gossip, from which the reputation of Florida could suffer. Amadur's arguments convinced Florida of his noble intentions, and she calmed down. To avert his eyes, Amadur began to court the beautiful Polina, and at first Avanturada, and then Florida, became jealous of her. Amadur went to war, and his wife stayed with Florida, who promised not to be separated from her.

Amadur was taken prisoner, where Florida's letters were his only consolation. Mother decided to marry Florida to the Duke of Cardona, and Florida dutifully married the unloved. The son of Enrique of Aragon died and Florida was very unhappy. Returning from captivity, Amadur settled in the house of the Duke of Cardona, but soon Avanturada died, and Amadur became embarrassed to live there. Out of grief, he fell ill, and Florida came to visit him. Deciding that many years of loyalty deserves a reward, Amadur tried to take possession of Florida, but he did not succeed. The virtuous Florida, offended by Amadur's encroachment on her honor, became disillusioned with him and did not wish to see him again. Amadour left, but could not bear the thought that he would never see Florida again. He tried to win over to his side her mother, the Countess of Aranda, who favored him.

Amadur again went to war and accomplished many feats. Three years later, he made another attempt to conquer Florida - he came to the Countess of Aranda, with whom she was visiting at that time, but Florida again rejected him. Using the nobility of Florida, who did not tell his mother about the unworthy behavior of Amadur, he quarreled between mother and daughter, and the Countess of Aranda did not talk to Florida for seven whole years. The war between Grenada and Spain began. Florida's husband, her brother, and Amadur fought bravely against their enemies and died glorious deaths. After burying her husband, Florida took the veil as a nun, "choosing as his wife the one who saved her from the excessively passionate love of Amadura and from the longing that did not leave her in marriage."

Novella thirty-three. Count Charles of Angouleme was informed that in one of the villages near Cognac there lives a very pious girl who, oddly enough, became pregnant. She assured everyone that she had never known a man and could not understand how this happened. According to her, only the holy spirit could do this. People believed her and revered her as a saint.

The priest in this parish was her brother, a stern and middle-aged man, who after this incident began to keep her sister locked up. The earl suspected that some kind of deceit lay in this, and ordered the chaplain and judicial official to investigate. At their direction, after Mass, the priest publicly asked his sister how she could become pregnant and at the same time remain a virgin. She replied that she did not know, and swore, under pain of eternal damnation, that no man came nearer to her than her brother. Everyone believed her and calmed down, but when the chaplain and the judicial officer reported this to the count, he, on reflection, suggested that the brother was her seducer, because "Christ has already come to us on earth and we should not wait for the second Christ." When the priest was put in prison, he confessed everything, and after his sister was relieved of the burden, they were both burned at the stake.

Novella forty-five. The upholsterer from Tours loved his wife very much, but this did not prevent him from courting other women. And so he was captivated by the maid, however, so that his wife would not guess about it, he often scolded the girl aloud for laziness. Before the Day of the Massacre of the Innocents, he told his wife that it was necessary to teach the sloth a lesson, but since his wife is too weak and compassionate, he undertakes to flog the maid himself. The wife did not object, and the husband bought rods and soaked them in brine. When the Day of the Massacre of the Innocents came, the upholsterer got up early, went up to the maid, and really gave her a "beating," but not at all what his wife thought of. Then he went down to his wife and told her that the scoundrel would long remember how he taught her a lesson. The maid complained to the mistress that her husband did not treat her well, but the upholsterer's wife thought that the maid meant spanking, and said that the upholsterer had done it with her knowledge and consent. The maid, seeing that the hostess approved of her husband's behavior, decided that, apparently, this was not such a sin, since it was done at the instigation of one whom she considered a model of virtue. She no longer resisted the harassment of the owner and no longer cried after the “beating of babies”.

And then one winter, the upholsterer took the maid into the garden in the morning in one shirt and began to make love to her. A neighbor saw them through the window and decided to tell her deceived wife about everything. But the upholsterer noticed in time that the neighbor was watching them, and decided to outwit her. He entered the house, woke his wife, and led her out into the garden in just her shirt, just as he had led his maid before. After having fun with his wife right in the snow, he returned to the house and fell asleep. In the morning in church, a neighbor told the upholsterer's wife what a scene she had seen from the window, and advised her to dismiss the shameless maid. In response, the upholsterer's wife began to assure her that it was she, and not the maid, who had fun with her husband in the garden: after all, husbands must be appeased - so she did not refuse her husband such an innocent request. At home, the upholsterer's wife gave her husband all her conversation with a neighbor and, not for a moment suspecting her husband of treason, continued to live with him in peace and harmony.

Novella sixty-two. One lady wanted to entertain another with an amusing story and began to tell her own love adventure, pretending that it was not about her, but about some unknown lady. She told how a young nobleman fell in love with his neighbor's wife and for several years sought her reciprocity, but to no avail, for although his neighbor was old and his wife was young, she was virtuous and faithful to her husband. Desperate to persuade the young woman to treason, the nobleman decided to seize her by force. Once, when the lady's husband was away, he entered her house at dawn and rushed to her bed dressed, not even taking off his boots with spurs. Waking up, the lady was terribly frightened, but no matter how hard she tried to reason with him, he did not want to listen to anything and seized her by force, threatening that if she told anyone about this, he would announce publicly that she herself had sent for him. The lady was in such fear that she did not even dare to call for help. After a while, when he heard that the maids were coming, the young man jumped out of bed to flee, but in a hurry he caught his spur on the blanket and pulled it to the floor, leaving the lady lying completely naked. And although the narrator allegedly spoke of another lady, she could not resist and exclaimed: "You will not believe how surprised I was when I saw that I was lying completely naked." The listener burst out laughing and said: "Well, as I see, you know how to tell entertaining stories!" The unlucky narrator tried to justify herself and defend her honor, but this honor was no longer in sight.

Novella seventy-one. The saddler from Amboise, seeing that his beloved wife was dying, grieved so much that the compassionate servant began to console him, and so successfully that right in front of his dying wife he threw her on the bed and began to caress. Unable to endure such indecency, the saddler's wife, who had not been able to utter a word for two days, cried out: "No! No! No! I'm not dead yet!" - and burst into a desperate scolding. Anger cleared her throat, and she began to recover, "and never since then has she had to reproach her husband for not loving her."

At the beginning of the eighth day, the story ends.

O. E. Grinberg

Addressing glorious drunks and venerable veneers, the author invites them to have fun and have fun reading his book, and asks them not to forget to drink for him.

Gargantua's father was called Grangousier, this giant was a great joker, always drank to the bottom and liked to eat salty. He married Gargamella, and she, carrying a child in her womb for 11 months, overate on the tripe and gave birth to a heroic son, who came out of her left ear. There is nothing surprising in this, if we remember that Bacchus came from the hip of Jupiter, and Castor and Pollux - from the egg laid and hatched by Leda. The baby immediately yelled: "Lap! Lap!" - to which Grangousier exclaimed: "Well, you have a hefty one!" ("Ke grand tu a!") - referring to the throat, and everyone decided that since this was the first word of the father at the birth of his son, then he should be called Gargantua. They gave the baby a drink of wine and, according to the good Christian custom, they christened him. The child was very smart and, when he was six years old, he already knew that the best wipe in the world was a fluffy gosling. The boy began to learn to read and write. His tutors were Tubal Holofernes, then Duraco the Dupe, and then Ponocrates. Gargantua went to Paris to continue his education, where he liked the bells of the Notre Dame Cathedral; he took them to himself to hang around the neck of his mare, and it was with difficulty that he was persuaded to return them to their place. Ponocrates made sure that Gargantua did not waste time and worked with him even when Gargantua washed, went to the latrine and ate. One day Lernean bakers were bringing cakes to the city. The shepherds of Gargantua asked to sell them some of the cakes, but the bakers did not want to, then the shepherds took the cakes from them by force. The bakers complained to their king, Picrochol, and Picrochol's host attacked the shepherds. Grangousier tried to settle the matter peacefully, but to no avail, so he called for Gargantua's help. On the way home, Gargantua and his friends destroyed the enemy castle on the banks of the Ved River, and for the rest of the way, Gargantua combed out of the hair the cannonballs of the Picrohole cannons that defended the castle.

When Gargantua arrived at his father's castle, a feast was held in his honor. The cooks Lick, Gnaw and Suck showed their skill, and the treat was so tasty that Gargantua accidentally swallowed six pilgrims along with salad - fortunately, they got stuck in his mouth, and he picked them out with a toothpick. Grangousier spoke of his war with Picrochole and greatly praised Brother Jean Teethbreaker, a monk who had won a victory in the defense of the monastery vineyard. Brother Jean turned out to be a cheerful drinking companion, and Gargantua immediately became friends with him. Valiant warriors equipped for the campaign. In the forest, they stumbled upon Picrohole's reconnaissance under the command of Count Ulepet. Brother Jean completely defeated her and freed the pilgrims, whom the scouts managed to take prisoner. Brother Jean captured the military leader Picrocholov of Fanfaron's troops, but Grangouzier let him go. Returning to Picrochole, Fanfaron began to persuade the king to make peace with Grangouzier, whom he now considered the most decent person in the world, and stabbed Bedokur, who called him a traitor, with a sword. For this, Picrochole ordered his archers to tear the fanfaron apart. Then Gargantua laid siege to Picrochole at Laroche-Clermot and defeated his army. Picrohole himself managed to escape, and on the way the old sorceress told him that he would become king again when the crayfish whistles. They say that now he lives in Lyon and asks everyone if he hears a cancer whistle somewhere - apparently, everyone hopes to return his kingdom. Gargantua was merciful to the vanquished and generously endowed his comrades-in-arms. For his brother Jean, he built Theleme Abbey, unlike any other. Both men and women were admitted there - preferably young and beautiful. Brother Jean abolished vows of chastity, poverty and obedience and declared that everyone has the right to marry, be rich and enjoy complete freedom. The Charter of the Thelemites consisted of a single rule: do what you want.

At the age of five hundred and twenty-four, Gargantua had a son with his wife, Badbeck, daughter of the King of Utopia. The child was so huge that his mother died in childbirth. He was born during a great drought, so he received the name Pantagruel ("panta" in Greek means "all", and "gruel" in the Hagarian language means "thirsty"). Gargantua was very sad about the death of his wife, but then he decided: "We need to cry less and drink more!" He took up the upbringing of his son, who was such a strong man that he tore the bear to pieces while still lying in the cradle. When the boy grew up, his father sent him to study. On the way to Paris, Pantagruel met a limousine who spoke such a mixture of learned Latin and French that it was impossible to understand a single word. However, when the angry Pantagruel grabbed him by the throat, the limousine screamed with fear in ordinary French, and then Pantagruel let him go. Arriving in Paris, Pantagruel decided to supplement his education and began to read books from the library of St. Victor, such as "Clicking each other's nose by parish priests", "Permanent almanac for gouts and venereal patients", etc. One day Pantagruel met during a walk a tall man beaten to bruises. Pantagruel asked what adventures brought the stranger to such a deplorable state, but he answered all questions in different languages, and Pantagruel could not understand anything. Only when the stranger finally spoke in French did Pantagruel realize that his name was Panurge and that he had arrived from Turkey, where he had been in captivity. Pantagruel invited Panurge to visit and offered his friendship.

At that time, there was a lawsuit between Lizhizad and Peivino, the matter was so dark that the court "understood it as freely as in the Old High German language." It was decided to seek help from Pantagruel, who became famous in public disputes. First of all, he ordered the destruction of all papers and forced the complainants to state the essence of the matter orally. After listening to their senseless speeches, he issued a fair verdict: the defendant must "deliver hay and tow to plug the guttural holes twisted with oysters passed through a sieve on wheels." Everyone was delighted with his wise decision, including both litigants, which is extremely rare. Panurge told Pantagruel how he was a prisoner of the Turks. The Turks put him on a spit, stuffing him with bacon like a rabbit, and began to fry, but the roaster fell asleep, and Panurge, contriving, threw a firebrand at him. A fire broke out that burned the whole city, and Panurge happily escaped and even saved himself from the dogs, throwing them pieces of fat with which he was stuffed.

The great English scholar Thaumast came to Paris to see Pantagruel and put his learning to the test. He suggested that the debate be conducted in the way that Pico della Mirandola intended to do in Rome - silently, by signs. Pantagruel agreed and prepared for the debate all night, reading Bede, Proclus, Plotinus and other authors, but Panurge, seeing his excitement, offered to replace him in the debate. Posing as a student of Pantagruel, Panurge answered the Englishman so famously - he took out a bull's rib, then an orange from the codpiece, whistled, puffed, chattered his teeth, made various tricks with his hands - that he easily defeated Thaumast, who said that Pantagruel's fame was insufficient, because it did not correspond and a thousandth of what is in reality. Having received the news that Gargantua had been taken to the land of the fairies, and that, having found out about this, the dipsodes crossed the border and devastated utopia, Pantagruel urgently left Paris.

Together with his friends, he destroyed six hundred and sixty enemy knights, flooded the enemy camp with his urine, and then defeated the giants led by the Ghoul. In this battle, Pantagruel's mentor Epistemon died, but Panurge sewed his head back in place and revived him. Epistemon said that he was in hell, saw devils, talked with Lucifer and had a good snack. He saw Semiramide there, who caught lice from vagabonds, Pope Sixtus, who treated him for a bad illness, and many others: all who were important gentlemen in this world, drag out a miserable and humiliating existence on that one, and vice versa. Epistemon regretted that Panurge so quickly brought him back to life, he wanted to stay longer in hell. Pantagruel entered the capital of the Amavrots, married their king Anarch to an old whore and made him a seller of green sauce. When Pantagruel with his army stepped into the land of the Dipsodes, the Dipsodes rejoiced and hurried to surrender. Almirods alone were stubborn, and Pantagruel prepared to attack, but then it began to rain, his warriors were shaking from the cold, and Pantagruel covered his army with his tongue to protect him from the rain. The narrator of these true stories took refuge under a large burdock, and from there he went through the tongue and hit Pantagruel right in the mouth, where he spent more than six months, and when he came out, he told Pantagruel that all this time he ate and drank the same thing as he, "taking duty on the tastiest morsels that passed through his throat."

Having conquered Dipsody, Pantagruel resettled a colony of Utopians there in order to revive, decorate and populate this region, as well as to instill in the Dipsodes a sense of duty and the habit of obedience. He granted Panurge the castle of Ragu, which gave at least 6789106789 reais of annual income, and often more, but in two weeks Panurge squandered all his income for three years in advance, and not on any trifles, but exclusively on drinking parties and revels. He promised Pantagruel to pay off all debts to the Greek kalends (that is, never), for life without debts is not life. Who, if not a lender, prays day and night for the health and longevity of the debtor. Panurge began to think about marriage and asked Pantagruel for advice. Pantagruel agreed with all his arguments: both those in favor of marriage and those against it, so the question remained open. They decided to tell fortunes according to Virgil and, opening the book at random, read what was written there, but interpreted the quote in completely different ways. The same thing happened when Panurge told his dream. According to Pantagruel, Panurge's dream, like Virgil, promised him to be horned, beaten and robbed, while Panurge saw in him a prediction of a happy family life. Panurge turned to the Panzuan Sibyl, but they also understood the prophecy of the Sibyl in different ways. The aged poet Kotanmordan, married to Syphilitia, wrote a poem full of contradictions:

and so on. Neither Epistemon, nor the learned man Tripp, nor brother Jean Zubodrobitel could not resolve the doubts that overwhelmed Panurge, Pantagruel called on the advice of the theologian, doctor, judge and philosopher. The theologian and the doctor advised Panurge to marry if he wanted to, and regarding the horns, the theologian said that this is as God pleases, and the doctor said that the horns are a natural addition to marriage. When asked whether Panurge should marry or not, the philosopher replied: "Both", and when Panurge asked him again: "Neither one nor the other." He gave such evasive answers to all questions that in the end Panurge exclaimed: "I retreat ... I renounce ... I surrender. He is elusive." Pantagruel went for the judge Bridois, and his friend Karpalim - for the jester Triboulet. Bridois was on trial at the time. He was charged with passing an unfair sentence with the help of dice. Bridois, generously filling his speech with Latin quotations, justified himself by saying that he was already old and did not see well the number of points that had fallen out. Pantagruel delivered a speech in his defence, and the court, presided over by Sueslov, acquitted Bridois. Pantagruel and Panurge, as usual, understood the mysterious phrase of the jester Triboulet in different ways, but Panurge noticed that the jester had thrust an empty bottle into him, and offered to make a trip to the oracle of the Divine Bottle. Pantagruel, Panurge and their friends equipped the flotilla, loaded the ships with a fair amount of the miracle herb pantagruelion and prepared to sail.

The ships went to sea. On the fifth day they met a ship sailing from Lantern. The French were on board, and Panurge quarreled with the merchant, nicknamed Turkey. In order to teach the bully the merchant a lesson, Panurge for three Turkish livres bought from him one ram from the herd to choose from; choosing a leader, Panurge threw him overboard. All the sheep began to jump into the sea after the leader, the merchant tried to prevent them, and as a result, one of the sheep dragged him into the water and the merchant drowned. In the Procuration - the land of prosecutors and hackers - the travelers were offered neither food nor drink. The inhabitants of this country earned their livelihood in a strange way: they insulted some nobleman until he lost his patience and beat them, - then they demanded a lot of money from him under pain of imprisonment.

Brother Jean asked who wants to get twenty golden crowns for being beaten like a devil. There was no end to those who wished, and the one who was lucky enough to receive a thrashing from brother Jean became the subject of universal envy. After a strong storm and a visit to the island of Macreons, Pantagruel's ships passed by the island of Miserable, where Postnik reigned, and sailed to the Wild Island, inhabited by Postnik's sworn enemies - fatty Sausages. The sausages, mistaking Pantagruel and his friends for Postnik's warriors, ambushed them. Pantagruel prepared for battle and appointed Sausage Cutter and Sausage Kroms to command the battle. Epistemon noticed that the names of generals inspire courage and confidence in victory. Brother Jean built a huge "pig" and hid a whole army of brave cooks in it, like in a Trojan horse. The battle ended with the complete defeat of Sausages and the appearance in the sky of their deity - a huge gray boar, who dropped twenty-seven barrels of mustard, which is a healing balm for Sausages, onto the ground.

Having visited the island of Ruach, whose inhabitants ate and drank nothing but the wind, Pantagruel and his companions landed on the island of the Papefigs, enslaved by the Papomans because one of its inhabitants showed a fig to the portrait of the pope. In the chapel of this island, a man lay in a font, and three priests stood around and conjured demons. They said that the man was a plowman. Once he plowed the field and sowed it with spelt, but an imp came to the field and demanded his share. The plowman agreed to share the harvest with him in half: the imp - what is underground, and the peasant - what is above. When the time came to harvest, the plowman got the ears, and the imp got the straw. The next year, the imp chose what was on top, but the plowman sowed turnips, and the imp was again left with a nose. Then the imp decided to scratch with the plowman on the condition that the vanquished loses his part of the field. But when the imp came to the plowman, his wife sobbed and told him how the plowman scratched her with his little finger for training and tore her all to pieces. As proof, she pulled up her skirt and showed a wound between her legs, so that the imp thought it best to get out. Leaving the island of the papefigs, the travelers arrived at the island of the papomans, whose inhabitants, having learned that they had seen the living pope, received them as dear guests and for a long time praised the Sacred Decretals issued by the pope. Sailing away from the island of papomans, Pantagruel and his companions heard voices, horse neighing and other sounds, but no matter how much they looked around, they did not see anyone. The pilot explained to them that on the border of the Arctic Sea, where they sailed, a battle took place last winter. Words and cries, the clash of weapons and the neighing of horses, froze in the air, and now that the winter has passed, they have thawed and become audible. Pantagruel threw handfuls of colorful words onto the deck, among which were even curses. Soon the Pantagruel flotilla arrived on the island, which was ruled by the almighty Messer Gaster. The inhabitants of the island sacrificed all kinds of food to their god, from bread to artichokes. Pantagruel found out that none other than Gaster invented all the sciences and arts: agriculture - in order to grow grain, military art and weapons - to protect grain, medicine, astrology and mathematics - to store grain. When the travelers sailed past the island of thieves and robbers, Panurge hid in the hold, where he mistook the fluffy cat Saloed for the devil and got dirty with fear. Then he claimed that he was not at all afraid and that he was such a fine fellow against sheep, which he had never seen the world.

Book Five

The travelers sailed to Zvonky Island, where they were allowed only after a four-day fast, which turned out to be terrible, because on the first day they fasted through a stump, on the second - through their sleeves, on the third - with all their might, and on the fourth - how much in vain. Only birds lived on the island: clerics, priests, monks, bishops, cardinians and one finger. They sang when they heard the bell ring. Having visited the island of iron products and the island of swindlers, Pantagruel and his companions arrived on the island of Zastenok, inhabited by ugly monsters - Fluffy Cats, who lived on bribes, consuming them in unlimited quantities: whole ships loaded with bribes came to their harbor. Escaping from the clutches of evil cats, the travelers visited several more islands and arrived at the harbor of Matheotechnia, where they were taken to the palace of Queen Quintessence, who ate nothing but certain categories, abstractions, secondary intentions, antitheses, etc. Her servants milked a goat and they poured milk into a sieve, caught the wind with nets, stretched their legs along their clothes and did other useful things. At the end of the journey, Pantagruel and his friends arrived at Lantern and landed on the island where the oracle of the Bottle was located. The lantern led them to the temple, where they were led to the princess Bakbuk - the court lady of the Bottle and the high priestess in all her sacred rites. The entrance to the Temple of the Bottle reminded the author of the narrative of the painted cellar in his hometown of Chinon, where Pantagruel also visited. In the temple they saw an outlandish fountain with columns and statues. The moisture flowing from it seemed to the travelers cold spring water, but after a hearty snack brought to clear the palate of the guests, the drink seemed to each of them exactly the wine that he loved most. After that, Bak-buk asked who wants to hear the word of the Divine Bottle. Knowing that it was Panurge, she took him to a round chapel, where a Bottle half submerged in water lay in an alabaster fountain. When Panurge fell to his knees and sang the ritual song of the winegrowers, Bakbuk threw something into the fountain, which caused a noise in the Bottle and the word "Trink" was heard. Bakbuk took out a silver-bound book, which turned out to be a bottle of Falernian wine, and ordered Panurge to drain it with one spirit, for the word "trink" meant "drink". In parting, Bakbuk handed Pantagruel a letter to Gargantua, and the travelers set off on their return journey.

O. E. Grinberg

The first book is preceded by an appeal to the reader, where Montaigne declares that he did not seek fame and did not seek to be useful - this is, first of all, a "sincere book", and it is intended for relatives and friends so that they can revive his appearance and character in memory when he comes the time of parting is already very close.

Chapter 1. Different ways can achieve the same thing. "A marvelously vain, truly fickle and ever-fluctuating being is man,"

The heart of a ruler can be softened by humility. But examples are known when directly opposite qualities - courage and firmness - led to the same result. So, Edward, Prince of Wales, having captured Limoges, remained deaf to the pleas of women and children, but spared the city, admiring the courage of three French nobles. Emperor Conrad III forgave the defeated Duke of Bavaria when the noble ladies carried their own husbands out of the besieged fortress on their shoulders. About himself, Montaigne says that both ways could affect him - however, by his nature he is so inclined to mercy that he would rather be disarmed by pity, although the Stoics consider this feeling worthy of condemnation.

Chapter 14 "Anyone who suffers for a long time is to blame for this himself."

Suffering is generated by the mind. People regard death and poverty as their worst enemies; meanwhile, there are many examples when death was the highest good and the only refuge. More than once it happened that a man retained the greatest presence of mind in the face of death and, like Socrates, drank to the health of his friends. When Louis XI captured Arras, many were hanged for refusing to shout "Long live the king!" Even such low souls as jesters do not refuse jokes before execution. And when it comes to beliefs, they are often defended at the cost of life, and each religion has its martyrs - for example, during the Greco-Turkish wars, many preferred to die a painful death, so as not to undergo the rite of baptism. It is the mind that fears death, for only a moment separates it from life. It is easy to see that the power of the action of the mind aggravates suffering - an incision with a surgeon's razor is felt stronger than a blow with a sword received in the heat of battle. And women are ready to endure incredible torments if they are sure that this will benefit their beauty - everyone has heard about one Parisian lady who ordered to tear off the skin from her face in the hope that the new one would take on a fresher look. The idea of ​​things is a great power. Alexander the Great and Caesar strove for danger with much more zeal than others - for security and peace. Not need, but abundance breeds greed in people. Montaigne was convinced of the truth of this statement from his own experience. Until about the age of twenty, he lived with only casual means - but he spent money cheerfully and carelessly. Then he started saving, and he began to save the surplus, losing his peace of mind in return. Fortunately, some kind genius has knocked all this nonsense out of his head, and he has completely forgotten about hoarding - and now lives in a pleasant, orderly manner, commensurate his income with expenses. Anyone can do the same, for everyone lives well or badly, depending on what he himself thinks about it, And nothing can help a person if he does not have the courage to endure death and endure life.

Chapter 12. Apology of Raimund of Sabund. "The saliva of a lousy cur, splashing the hand of Socrates, can destroy all his wisdom, all his great and thoughtful ideas, destroy them to ashes, leaving no trace of his former knowledge."

Man ascribes great power to himself and fancies himself the center of the universe. This is how a stupid gosling could argue, believing that the sun and stars shine only for him, and people are born to serve him and look after him. In the vanity of the imagination, man equates himself with God, while he lives in the midst of dust and filth. At any moment, death lies in wait for him, which he cannot fight against. This pathetic creature is not even able to control itself, but it longs to command the universe. God is completely incomprehensible to the grain of reason that man possesses. Moreover, the mind is not given to embrace the real world, because everything in it is impermanent and changeable. And in terms of the ability of perception, man is inferior even to animals: some surpass him in sight, others in hearing, and others in smell. Perhaps a person is generally devoid of several senses, but in his ignorance he does not suspect this. In addition, abilities depend on bodily changes: for the sick, the taste of wine is not the same as for the healthy, and stiff fingers perceive the hardness of the tree differently. Feelings are largely determined by changes and mood - in anger or in joy, the same feeling can manifest itself in different ways. Finally, estimates change with the passage of time: what seemed true yesterday is now considered false, and vice versa. Montaigne himself more than once happened to support an opinion opposite to his own, and he found such convincing arguments that he abandoned his former judgment. In his own writings, he sometimes cannot find the original meaning, guesses what he wanted to say, and makes corrections that, perhaps, spoil and distort the idea. So the mind either marks time, or wanders and rushes about, finding no way out.

Chapter 17 "Everyone looks into what is before him; I look into myself."

People create for themselves an exaggerated concept of their merits - it is based on reckless self-love. Of course, one should not belittle oneself, for the sentence must be just, Montaigne notices a tendency to underestimate the true value of what belongs to him and, on the contrary, to exaggerate the value of everything else. He is tempted by the state structure and customs of distant peoples. Latin, with all its virtues, inspires him with more respect than it deserves. Having successfully coped with some business, he attributes it more to luck than to his own skill. Therefore, among the sayings of the ancients about man, he most willingly accepts the most irreconcilable, believing that the purpose of philosophy is to expose people's conceit and vanity. He considers himself to be a mediocre person, and his only difference from others is that he clearly sees all his shortcomings and does not come up with excuses for them. Montaigne envies those who are able to rejoice in the work of their hands, for their own writings cause him only annoyance. His French is rough and careless, and his Latin, which he once mastered to perfection, has lost its former brilliance. Any story becomes dry and dull under his pen - it does not have the ability to amuse or spur the imagination. In the same way, his own appearance does not satisfy him, but beauty is a great power that helps in communication between people. Aristotle writes that the Indians and Ethiopians, choosing kings, always paid attention to growth and beauty - and they were absolutely right, because a tall, powerful leader inspires awe in his subjects, and intimidates his enemies. Montaigne is not satisfied with his spiritual qualities, reproaching himself primarily for laziness and heaviness. Even those traits of his character that cannot be called bad are completely useless in this age: compliance and complaisance will be called weakness and cowardice, honesty and conscientiousness will be considered ridiculous scrupulousness and prejudice. However, there are some advantages in a corrupted time, when it is prayed to become the embodiment of virtue without much effort: whoever did not kill his father and did not rob churches is already a decent and perfectly honest person. Next to the ancients, Montaigne seems to himself a pygmy, but in comparison with the people of his age, he is ready to recognize unusual and rare qualities for himself, for he would never compromise his convictions for the sake of success and harbors a fierce hatred for the new-fangled virtue of pretense. In dealing with those in power, he prefers to be tedious and indiscreet than a flatterer and a pretender, because he does not have a flexible mind to wag when a direct question is put, and his memory is too weak to retain a distorted truth - in a word, this can be called courage from weaknesses. He knows how to defend certain views, but is completely incapable of choosing them - after all, there are always many arguments in favor of any opinion. And yet he does not like to change his opinions, because he looks for the same weaknesses in opposing judgments. And he appreciates himself for what others will never admit, since no one wants to be considered stupid, his judgments about himself are ordinary and old as the world.

Chapter 13

There is no more natural desire than the desire to acquire knowledge. And when the ability to think is lacking, a person turns to experience. But the variety and variability of things are endless. For example, in France there are more laws than in the rest of the world, but this only led to the fact that the possibilities for arbitrariness were infinitely expanded - it would be better to have no laws at all than their abundance. And even the French language, so convenient in all other cases of life, becomes obscure and unintelligible in contracts or wills. In general, from a multitude of interpretations, the truth is, as it were, fragmented and dispersed. The wisest laws are established by nature and should be trusted in the simplest way - in fact, there is nothing better than ignorance and unwillingness to know. Better to understand yourself well than Cicero. There are not as many instructive examples in Caesar's life as there are in our own. Apollo, the god of knowledge and light, inscribed on the pediment of his temple the call "Know thyself" - and this is the most comprehensive advice that he could give people. Studying himself, Montaigne learned to understand other people quite well, and his friends were often amazed that he understood their life circumstances much better than they themselves. But there are few people who are able to listen to the truth about themselves without being offended or offended. Montaigne was sometimes asked what kind of activity he felt fit for, and he sincerely answered that he was not fit for anything. And he even rejoiced at this, because he did not know how to do anything that could turn him into a slave of another person. However, Montaigne would have been able to tell his master the truth about himself and describe his character, refuting the flatterers in every possible way. For rulers are endlessly spoiled by the bastards surrounding them - even Alexander, the great sovereign and thinker, was completely defenseless against flattery. In the same way, for the health of the body, Montaigne's experience is extremely useful, since it appears in a pure form, not spoiled by medical tricks. Tiberius quite rightly argued that after twenty years everyone should understand what is harmful and what is useful for him, and, as a result, do without doctors. The patient should adhere to the usual way of life and his usual food - sudden changes are always painful. One must reckon with one's desires and inclinations, otherwise one misfortune will have to be cured with the help of another. If you drink only spring water, if you deprive yourself of movement, air, light, then is life worth such a price? People tend to think that only unpleasant things are useful, and everything that is not painful seems suspicious to them. But the body itself makes the right decision. In his youth, Montaigne loved hot spices and sauces, but when they began to harm the stomach, he immediately fell out of love with them. Experience teaches that people ruin themselves with impatience, while illnesses have a strictly defined fate, and they are also given a certain period. Montaigne fully agrees with Crantor that one should neither recklessly resist the disease, nor succumb to it involuntarily - let it follow the natural course, depending on its own and human properties. And the mind will always come to the rescue: for example, he inspires Montaigne that kidney stones are just a tribute to old age, because it is time for all organs to weaken and deteriorate. In essence, the punishment that befell Montaigne is very mild - it is truly a paternal punishment. She came late and torments at an age that is in itself barren. There is another advantage in this disease - there is nothing to guess about, while other ailments are pestering with anxiety and excitement due to the ambiguity of the reasons. Let a large stone torment and tear the tissues of the kidneys, let life flow out little by little with blood and urine, like unnecessary and even harmful impurities - at the same time, one can experience something like a pleasant feeling. There is no need to be afraid of suffering, otherwise you will have to suffer from the fear itself. When thinking about death, the main consolation is that this phenomenon is natural and just - who dares to demand mercy for himself in this respect?

E. D. Murashkintseva

Not in our days, but a long time ago, old man Taketori lived, wandered through the mountains and dales, chopped bamboo and made baskets and cages from them. And they called him Taketori - the one who cuts bamboo. Once old Taketori went into the very depths of a bamboo thicket and sees: a radiance is pouring from one tree, looking - what a marvel! In the depths of the bamboo stalk, a child shines - a little girl, only three inches tall.

“It seems that she is destined to become my daughter,” said the old man, and carried the girl home. She was extraordinarily beautiful, but tiny, and they put her to sleep in a birdcage.

From the very time that old Taketori goes into the forest, he will find wonderful bamboo, in each joint of it there are golden coins. So he began to get rich little by little. The tiny girl grew quickly, quickly, and in three months she turned into a wonderful girl. They made her an adult hairstyle and dressed her up in an adult dress, attached a long pleated mo train. Because of the silk curtain, the girl was not released, protected and cherished. And everything in the house was illuminated by her wonderful beauty. And they called her the Radiant Maiden, slender as a bamboo - Nayotake-no Kaguya-hime.

People heard about the incomparable beauty of Kaguya-hime, many suitors of a simple rank and noble rich people fell in love with her from other people's words and came to an obscure village, and only worked in vain and returned with nothing. But there were stubborn ones who wandered around her house day and night, sent letters, composed plaintive love songs - there was no answer to their harassment. Days and months passed in succession, hot, waterless days gave way to icy, snowy ones, but the five most stubborn suitors hopefully thought that Kaguya-hime should choose a spouse for herself. And then the old man Taketori turned to her with a speech: "My daughter, I am already over seventy, and in this world it so happened that men woo girls, and girls get married, their family multiplies, the house prospers." “I don’t like this custom,” Kaguya-hime answers, “I won’t get married until I know the heart of my fiancé, we must test their love in practice.”

The suitors also agreed that she decided wisely, and Kaguya-hime, asked all the suitors tasks. One prince, Isitsukura, she ordered to bring from India a stone bowl, in which the Buddha himself collected alms. She ordered Prince Kuramochi to bring from the magical Mount Horai, in the Eastern Ocean, a branch from a golden tree with pearl fruits. Abe no Mimuraji ordered a dress from distant China, woven from the wool of the Fire Mouse, to the Minister of the Right, Abe no Mimuraji. Senior adviser Otomo no Miyuki to get her a stone sparkling with five-colored fire from the dragon's neck. And the average adviser of Isonokami no Maro should give her a swallow shell, which helps to easily give birth to children.

The princes and dignitaries heard about these tasks, became sad and went home. Prince Ishitsukuri began to puzzle over how he should be, how to get to India, where to find that stone bowl. And he announced that he was going to India, and he himself disappeared from people's eyes. Three years later, he took, without thinking twice, the old bowl that, all covered with soot, stood in the temple on the Black Mountain, put it in a bag of brocade, tied it to a branch of handmade flowers and brought it as a gift to Kaguya-hime with a poetic message. letter, and there in verse it is written:

But the girl immediately saw that not even a faint radiance emanated from the cup, and returned it with derogatory verses, and the prince threw the cup in front of the gate in heart annoyance. Since then, there has been a saying about such shameless people: "Drink the cup of shame."

Prince Kuramochi told Kaguya-hime to be told that he had gone to look for a golden branch with pearls on Mount Horai and left the capital. He sailed on a ship to the Eastern Ocean, but after three days he secretly returned, built a house in a secret place, settled goldsmiths in it and ordered to make such a branch as the Radiant Maiden wished. Three years later, he pretended to return to the harbor after a long voyage. The prince put a branch in a traveling chest and took it as a gift to Kaguya-hime. There was a rumor among the people that the prince had brought a magic flower. Arriving at the house of old Taketori, the prince began to tell how he was carried by the waves for four hundred days and how he landed on Mount Horai, completely covered with gold and silver trees, how he broke off one branch and hurried home with it. And Taketori, in response to his story, composed verses:

And he began to prepare a bedchamber for the young. But, as a sin, at this hour goldsmiths arrived at Taketori's house, who made a branch for the prince, demanding payment for their labors. As Kaguya-hime heard about that, she returned the branch to the deceiver and drove the prince out in disgrace. Prince Kuramochi fled into the mountains, never to be seen again. They say about such people: "In vain did he scatter the pearls of his eloquence."

The Minister of the Right, Abe no Mimuraji, whom Kaguya-hime ordered to find for her a dress woven from the wool of the Fire Mouse, wrote a letter to the Chinese guest Wang Qing with a request to buy this curiosity in China. The guest fulfilled the request and wrote that with great difficulty he found a dress in the temple of the Western Mountains. The minister rejoiced and, folding his hands, bowed towards the Chinese land. The dress arrived in Japan on a ship in a precious casket, and it itself was of a deep azure color, the ends of the hairs were golden. It seemed like a priceless treasure. They cleaned this fabric not with water, but with a flame, it did not burn in the fire, but became even more beautiful. The minister in a luxurious dress went to the girl, tying the casket to a flowering branch, and also tied a message to the branch:

But Kaguya-hime, wanting to test her fiancé, threw the precious dress into the fire, and wow! - it burned down. Kaguya-hime, beside herself with joy, returned the empty chest from the outfit to the minister and put a letter in it:

And the unfortunate bridegroom returned home in shame. They say about such people: "His business burned down, it went up in smoke."

The senior adviser Otomo no Miyuki gathered his household and said: “A precious stone sparkles on the dragon’s neck. Whoever gets it can ask for whatever they want, Dragons live in the depths of mountains and seas and, flying out from there, rush through the sky. You need to shoot one and remove the gem from it."

The servants and household obeyed and went in search. But, having gone out of the gate, they dispersed in different directions with the words: "Such a whim will come to mind." And the senior adviser, in anticipation of the servants, built for Kaguya-hime a luxurious palace with gold and silver patterns. Day and night he waited for his servants, but they did not appear, then he himself boarded a ship and set off across the seas. And then a terrible storm with thunder and lightning hit the ship, and the senior adviser thought: "It's all because I set out to kill the dragon. But now I won't touch a hair on it. Just have mercy!" The storm subsided a little, but the senior adviser was so tormented by fear that, although the ship landed safely on its native shore, it looked like an evil demon: some kind of illness was blown into it by the wind, its stomach swelled up like a mountain, its eyes became like red plums. With difficulty they dragged him to the house, and the servants immediately returned and said to him: "You yourself see how difficult it is to defeat the dragon and take away the multi-colored stone from him." There was talk among the people, and the word "cowardly" appeared, because the senior adviser kept rubbing his red eyes like plums.

The average adviser of Isonokami no Maro assigned the servants the task of finding a shell in the nests of swallows, which gives easy childbirth, and the servants said that it was necessary to watch the swallows at the kitchen, where there are a great many of them. Not one, so the other will begin to lay eggs, and here you can get a healing shell. The middle adviser ordered to build watchtowers and put servants on them, but the swallows got scared and flew away. Then they decided to put one servant in a basket and raise him to the nests, as soon as the swallow decides to lay an egg. But then the average adviser himself wanted to go up in a basket to the very roof where the swallows lived. On the ropes they lifted him to the very top, and, lowering his hands into the nest, he felt something hard and shouted: "I found it, pull it." And the servants pulled too hard on the rope, and it broke, and the middle adviser fell right on the lid of a large three-legged rice cauldron. I came to my senses with difficulty, unclenched my hand, and there was just a hard spool of bird droppings. And then he groaned plaintively: "Oh, this evil shell! Unfortunately, I climbed." And it seemed to people: "Ah, all this is the evil fate of wine. Everything is useless." All day long, the average adviser lamented that he did not get the treasured shell, and finally completely weakened and lost his life. Kaguya-hime heard about the end of the middle councilor and felt a little sad.

Finally, the emperor himself heard about Kaguya-hime and her incomparable beauty. He ordered his court lady to go to the house of the old man Taketori and find out everything about the Radiant Maiden. The court lady wanted to look at the young lady herself, but she flatly refused to obey the emperor’s envoy, and she had to return to the palace with nothing. Then the emperor summoned the old man Taketori and ordered him to persuade Kaguya-hime to appear at court. But the Radiant Maiden again flatly refused. Then the sovereign set out to go hunting in those places where the house of the old man Taketori was located, and as if by chance he met Kaguya-hime. The emperor went hunting, entered, as if without intent, Taketori's house and saw a girl shining with inexpressible beauty. Although she quickly closed herself with her sleeve, the sovereign managed to see her and exclaimed in delight: "I will never part with her again!"

Kaguya-hime did not want to obey and begged and begged not to take her to the palace, saying that she was not a person, but a creature from another world. But they gave a palanquin, and just wanted to put Kaguya-hime into it, as she began to melt, melt - and only a shadow of her remained, And then the emperor retreated - and she immediately took on her former appearance.

Retiring to the palace, the emperor, with tears in his eyes, added:

And she sent him back:

So they continued to exchange sad messages for three whole years. Then people began to notice that every time during the full moon, Kaguya-hime becomes thoughtful and sad, and they did not advise her to look at the lunar disk for a long time. But she kept looking and looking, and our world seemed dull to her. But on dark nights she was cheerful and carefree. One day on the fifteenth night of the eighth month, when the moon becomes the brightest of the year, she told her parents with tears that in fact she was a resident of the lunar kingdom and had been banished to earth to atone for sin, and now it was time to return. There, in the lunar capital, my mother and father are waiting for me, but I know how you will grieve, and I am not happy about returning to my native land, but I am sad.

The emperor found out that the celestials would come for Kaguya-hime and take her to the moon, and ordered the heads of the six regiments of the imperial guard to guard the Radiant Maiden. Old Taketori hid Kaguya-hime in a closet, the troops surrounded the house, but at the hour of the Mouse on the fifteenth night of the eighth moon, the whole house was lit up with radiance, unknown celestial beings descended from the clouds, and neither arrows nor swords could stop them. All the locked doors swung open by themselves, and Kaguya-hime left the house, shedding tears. It was a pity for her to leave her foster parents. The celestial handed her an outfit of bird feathers and a drink of immortality, but she, knowing that as soon as she put on this dress, she would lose everything human, she wrote a letter to the emperor and sent with a drink of immortality:

Then Kaguya-hime got into a flying chariot and, accompanied by hundreds of messengers, flew into the sky. The saddened emperor took the vessel with the drink of immortality to Mount Fuji and lit it; and it still burns there.

Once upon a time there lived an average councilor named Minamoto no Tadayori, and he had many beautiful daughters, whom he loved and cherished in luxurious chambers. And he had another daughter, unloved, he once visited her mother, but she died long ago. And his main wife had a cruel heart, she disliked her stepdaughter and settled her in a small closet - otikubo, hence the name of the girl - Otikubo, who always felt lonely and defenseless in her family. She had only one friend - a young maid Akogi. Otikubo played the zither beautifully and was excellent with the needle, and therefore her stepmother always forced her to sheathe the whole house, which was beyond the strength of the fragile young lady. She was even deprived of the society of her beloved maid, but she managed to find herself a spouse - the sword-bearer Korenari. And he had an acquaintance - the junior head of the left guard Mitieri. Hearing of the misfortunes of Otikubo, he set out to make acquaintance with her and began to send her tender messages in verse, but she did not answer. And then one day, when the stepmother and father and all the household went to the holiday, and Otikubo and Akogi were left at home alone, the swordsman brought Mitieri to the house, and he tried to win her favor, but she, ashamed of the poor dress with holes, could only cry and with with difficulty whispered a farewell poem:

But her voice was so gentle that Mitieri finally fell in love. Morning came and he had to leave. Ochikubo was crying alone in her miserable closet, and Akogi began to decorate her poor room with what she could: after all, the young lady had no screen, no curtains, no beautiful dresses. But the maid lit fragrant sticks, borrowed clothes from her aunt, got hold of a curtain, and when Mitieri left the house in the morning, there was a beautiful basin for washing and tasty things for breakfast. But in the morning, Mitieri left, and yet the third wedding night was still ahead, which should be arranged especially solemnly. The maid rushed to write letters to her aunt with a request to bake rice koloboks, and she, guessing what was the matter, sent a whole basket of wedding koloboks and miniature cookies with fragrant herbs - all wrapped in snow-white paper!

A real "treat of the third night". But that night it was raining heavily, and Mitieri hesitated: to go or not to go, and then they brought a message from the young lady:

After reading it, Mitieri threw off his rich dress, dressed in something worse, and with only the sword-bearer set off on foot under a huge umbrella. For a long time and with adventures they traveled in complete darkness. Otikubo, thinking that she had already been abandoned so soon, sobbed into the pillows. Then Mitieri appeared, but in what form! All wet and dirty. But when he saw rice balls, which were always treated to newlyweds in the old days, he was touched. In the morning a noise was heard in the estate - it was the return of the masters and servants. Otikubo and Akogi were paralyzed with fear. The stepmother, of course, looked in on Otikubo and immediately realized that something had changed: there was a pleasant smell in the closet, a curtain hung in front of the bed, the girl was dressed up. Mitieri looked through the crack and saw a rather pleasant-looking lady, if not for thick, frowning eyebrows. The stepmother coveted the beautiful mirror Otikubo, inherited from her mother, and, grabbing it, left with the words: "And I'll buy you another one." Michieri thought: "How unusually sweet and kind Otikubo is." Returning home, he wrote her a tender letter, and she answered with a wonderful poem, and the swordsman undertook to deliver it to the address, but accidentally dropped it in Otikubo's sister's chambers. She read the love effusions with curiosity and recognized the graceful handwriting of the orphan. The stepmother immediately found out about the letter and was frightened: it is necessary to prevent the marriage of Otikubo, otherwise you will lose an excellent free seamstress. And even more she began to hate the poor young lady, to bombard her with work, and Michieri, having learned how she treats Otikubo, became very angry: "How can you stand it?" Otikubo replied with the words from the song that she was "a wild pear flower and that the mountain will not hide her from grief." And a terrible rush began in the house, it was necessary to quickly sew an elegant suit for the son-in-law, and everyone, both the stepmother and the father, urged the daughter: quickly, quickly. And they scolded what the light stands on, and all this Mitieri heard, lying behind the curtain, and Otikubo's heart was torn with grief. She began to sew, and Mitieri began to help her stretch the fabric, they exchanged gentle speeches. And the evil stepmother, fat as a ball, with sparse hair, like rat tails, overheard under the door and, seeing through the crack, a handsome young man in a white silk dress, and under the top dress - in a bright scarlet undergarment of polished silk and a train from below the color of a tea rose, - flared up with terrible anger and conceived to lime poor Otikubo. She was slandered in front of her father and locked in a cramped pantry, left without food. And to top it all off, the evil stepmother decided to give the young lady to her elderly uncle, who is still hungry for young girls. Mitieri languished in anguish, through Akogi they could only secretly exchange sad messages. Here is what Michiyori wrote to her:

Night fell, and the ruthless stepmother brought her uncle, blazing with love longing, into the pantry. Ochikubo could only cry from such a love misfortune, but Akogi advised her to say that she was seriously ill. Mitieri suffered and did not know what to do, the gates of the estate were locked. The swordsman began to think about becoming a monk. The next night, Akogi managed to jam the pantry door so that the crappy old man couldn't get in, and he fought and fought, but his feet were frozen on the bare floor, and besides, he got diarrhea, and he hurriedly left. The next morning he sent a letter:

In the morning, the whole family, with the father and stepmother at the head, with servants and household members, went to the Kamo shrines for a feast, and Mitieri did not wait a minute. He harnessed the carriage, hung the windows in them with simple curtains the color of fallen leaves, and hastened on his way under the protection of numerous servants. The swordsman rode ahead on a horse. Arriving at her stepmother's house, Mitieri rushed to the pantry, the swordsman helped to break down the door, Ochikubo found herself in Michieri's arms, Akogi grabbed her aunt's things, a chest for combs, and the crew flew out of the gate on wings of joy. Akogi did not want her stepmother to think that Ochikubo was in the hands of her uncle, and she left his love letter on the table. Arriving at Mitieri's house, the lovers could not talk enough and laughed to tears at the unlucky old man, who had diarrhea at a crucial moment. The father and stepmother, having returned home and found the pantry empty, came into a terrible rage. Only the youngest son, Saburo, said that Ochikubo had been treated badly. Where Otikubo disappeared, no one knew.

The stepmother, thinking of marrying one daughter, sent a matchmaker to Mitieri, and he, wanting to take revenge on the evil witch, decided to agree for the sake of appearance, and then impersonate another person in order to inflict a terrible insult on her. Mitieri had a cousin called the White-faced Horse, a fool of whom there are few, his face was horse-like, of incomprehensible whiteness, and his nose protruded in some surprising way. On the day of the wedding with his stepmother's daughter, although he felt sorry for the innocent girl, but hatred for his stepmother took over, he sent his brother instead of himself, whose ugliness and stupidity in an elegant outfit was not immediately evident, and Mitieri's fame as brilliant secular gentleman helped the cause. But very soon everything became clear, and the stepmother seemed to have lost her mind from grief: the son-in-law was very ugly, he was frail, and his nose looked high into the sky with two huge holes.

In the house of Mitieri, life went on as usual happier and more carefree, Akogi became a housekeeper, and her thin figure scurried around the house, she even received a new name - Emon. Mitieri enjoyed the favor of the emperor, he gave him dresses of purple color, covered with aromas, from his shoulder. And Otikubo could show her art, she sewed ceremonial dresses for Mitieri's mother, an elegant lady, and for his sister, the emperor's wife. Everyone was delighted with the cut, the selection of colors. Mother Michiyori invited Otikubo - and she was already carrying a child in her womb - to a gallery covered with cypress bark to admire the celebration of the Kamo shrine, and Otikubo, having appeared, eclipsed everyone with her beauty, childishly innocent appearance, a wonderful outfit of purple silk woven with patterns , and on top of it - another, colored juice of red and blue flowers.

Finally, Otikubo was relieved of her burden with her first-born son, and a year later she brought another son. Michiyori's father and he himself received high positions at the court and believed that Ochikubo brought them happiness. Father Otikubo grew old, lost influence at court, the sons-in-law, whom he was proud of, left him, and the White-faced Horse only dishonored him. He thought Ochikubo had disappeared or died. The father and stepmother decided to change the house that brought them misfortune, and restored and brought shine to the old house that once belonged to the late mother of Ochikubo. The house was cleaned up more beautifully and they were about to move, but then Mitieri found out about this, and it became clear to him that this house belongs to Otikubo, she and her letters are all right. He decided not to let the evil stepmother and her daughters into the house, and he solemnly moved in. Mitieri rejoiced, and in the stepmother's house everything fell into despondency, Akogi was also happy, only Ochikubo wept bitterly and felt sorry for the old father, begging him to return the house. Then Mitieri took pity on him and the innocent sisters and the youngest Saburo and invited them to his place. The old man was incredibly happy to see his daughter, and even more so - a happy change in her fate, he recalled with horror his former cruelty to his daughter and was surprised at his blindness. The old man was rewarded with wonderful gifts - real treasures - and they began to take care of him in such a way that words cannot describe. They arranged a reading of the Lotus Sutra in his honor, invited many eminent guests, eight days the monks read the scrolls, the gatherings became more crowded day by day, the emperor's wife herself sent a precious rosary to the altar of Buddha. The screens in the banquet hall were decorated with twelve wonderful paintings according to the number of moons in a year. All the sons of the old man were awarded ranks and titles, and the daughters were safely married off to noble and worthy people, so that the evil stepmother herself softened, especially since she was also given a spacious house and a great many outfits and all kinds of utensils. In general, everything turned out well. , and Akogi is said to have lived to be two hundred years old.

This book of notes about everything that passed before my eyes and worried my heart, I wrote in the silence and solitude of my home ...

In the spring - dawn.

The edges of the mountains are getting whiter, now they are slightly lit up with light. Clouds touched by purple spread across the sky in thin ribbons.

Summer - night.

There are no words, it is beautiful in the moonlight, but the moonless gloom pleases the eye when countless fireflies rush in the air ...

Autumn is twilight.

The setting sun, throwing bright rays, is approaching the teeth of the mountains. Crows, three, four, two, rush to their nests - what a sad charm! The sun will set, and everything is full of inexpressible sadness: the sound of the wind, the sound of cicadas...

Winter - early morning.

Fresh snow, needless to say, is beautiful, white hoarfrost too, but a frosty morning without snow is wonderful. They hurriedly light a fire, bring in flaming coals - and you feel the winter!

Beautiful is the time of the fourth moon during the festival of Kamo. Ceremonial caftans of the most distinguished dignitaries, the highest courtiers differ from each other only in a shade of purple, darker and lighter. The undergarments are of white silk. It breathes with coolness, the sparse foliage on the trees is young green. And in the evening light clouds will come running, somewhere in the distance the cry of a cuckoo is hiding, so obscure, as if it seems to you ... But how it excites the heart! Young girls - participants in the solemn procession - have already washed and combed their hair, pre-holiday fuss reigns in the house - either the strings are torn, or the sandals are not the same. Mothers, aunts, sisters - all smartly dressed - accompany the girls, each decently to her rank. Brilliant procession!

It happens that people call the same thing by different names. The words are different, but the meaning is the same. Monk speech. Man's speech. Woman speech.

A few words are great.

The lady cat, who served at the court, was respectfully called lady myobu, the empress especially loved her. One day, the mother assigned to the lady cat yelled at her when she was dozing in the sun, and ordered the dog Okinamaro to bite her. The stupid dog rushed to the cat, and she slipped away into the chambers of the emperor - and sniffed at him in his bosom. The emperor was surprised, ordered the negligent mother to be punished, and the dog to be beaten and exiled to the Isle of Dogs. The dog was kicked out the gate. Most recently, on the third day of the third moon, he walked proudly in procession, his head adorned with peach blossoms, and on his back a branch of cherry blossoms. At noon we heard the plaintive howl of a dog, then Okinamaro slowly returned from exile. They jumped on him and threw him out again. At midnight, a dog, swollen, beaten beyond recognition, was under the veranda. Approximate empresses wondered and could not understand whether he was or not. And the poor dog trembled, tears flowed from his eyes. So, after all, Okinamaro, Putting down the mirror, I exclaimed: "Okinamaro!" And the dog barked joyfully, the empress smiled, and the emperor himself came to us, having learned what had happened, and forgave the dog. How he wept when he heard the words of heartfelt sympathy! But it was just a dog.

That which is depressing.

A dog that howls in broad daylight.

Scarlet plum-coloured winter clothing at the time of the third or fourth moon.

The delivery room where the baby died.

Waiting all night Dawn is already breaking, when suddenly there is a soft knock on the door. Your heart beat faster, you send people to the gate to find out who came, but it turns out that there is not the one you are waiting for, but a person who is completely indifferent to you.

Or here's another.

In the lively house of a zealot of fashion, they bring a poem in the old style, without any special beauty, composed in a moment of boredom by an old man who is hopelessly behind the times.

Long rains in the last month of the year.

What they laugh at.

Collapsed fence.

A man who was known as a great good man.

What bothers.

A guest who talks endlessly when you have no time. If you can disregard him, you will send him off quickly without much ceremony. And if the guest is a significant person?

You rub the ink stick, and a hair stuck to the ink pot. Or a pebble got into the ink and scratches the ear: creak-creak.

Something that is precious as a memory. Dried mallow leaves. Toy utensils for dolls.

On a dreary day when it rains, you suddenly find an old letter from someone who was dear to you.

That which pleases the heart

The heart rejoices when you write on white, clean paper with such a thin brush that it seems that it will not leave marks. Twisted soft threads of fine silk. A sip of water in the middle of the night when you wake up from sleep.

Flowers on the branches of trees.

The most beautiful spring color is red shades: from pale pink to deep scarlet. In the dark green of the orange, flowers dazzlingly redden. With what to compare their charm on the next morning after the rain. Pomeranian is inseparable from the cuckoo and is especially dear to people. The pear flower is very modest, but in China poetry is written about it. You look closely - indeed, at the ends of its petals lies a pink glow, so light that it seems that your eyes are deceiving you.

That which is subtly beautiful.

A white cape, lined with white, over a lavender dress.

Wild goose eggs.

Snow-covered plum color.

A pretty child who eats strawberries.

At the time of the seventh moon whirlwinds blow, rains rustle. Almost all the time the weather is cold, you will forget about the summer fan. But it is very pleasant to take a nap during the day, throwing clothes on a thin cotton lining over your head, which still retains a faint smell of sweat.

That which is at odds with each other. Snow on a miserable shack.

A toothless woman bites a plum and frowns: sour. A woman from the very bottom of society put on purple trousers. Nowadays, however, you see it at every step.

The man must be accompanied by an escort. The most charming beauties are worth nothing in my eyes if they are not followed by a retinue.

The child played with a homemade bow and whip. He was adorable! I so wanted to stop the carriage and hug him.

Leaving his beloved at dawn, a man should not take too much care of his outfit. At the moment of parting, he, full of regret, hesitates to rise from the bed of love. The lady hurries him to leave: it's already light, they'll see! But he would be happy if the morning never came. But it happens that a lover jumps out in the morning, as if stung. At parting, he only throws: "Well, I went!"

Herbs.

Omodaka grass - "arrogant".

Mikuri herb. Grass "mat for leeches". Moss, young sprouts on thawed patches. Ivy. Kislitsa is bizarre in appearance, it is depicted on brocade.

How sorry I am for the "confusion of the heart" herb.

Themes of poetry. Capital. Creeping vine... Mikuri grass. Foal. Grad.

That which gives rise to anxiety.

You arrive at a moonless night in an unfamiliar house. The fire in the lamps is not lit so that the faces of women remain hidden from prying eyes, and you sit next to invisible people.

It was a clear, moonlit night. The Empress was sitting not far from the veranda. The lady-in-waiting delighted her by playing the lute. The ladies laughed and talked. But I, leaning against one of the tables on the veranda, remained silent.

"Why are you silent?" the Empress asked. "Say at least a word. I'm sad."

"I only contemplate the innermost heart of the autumn moon," I replied.

"Yes, that's exactly what you should have said," said the empress.

I write for my own pleasure whatever comes into my mind unconsciously. How can my careless sketches compare with real books written according to all the rules of art? And yet there were supportive readers who told me: "This is wonderful!" I was amazed.

I recently visited the Cloud Forest Temple, where the ceremony of expounding the Flower of the Law Sutra was taking place, and I met two amazing elders there, they were older in years than ordinary people. One was a hundred and ninety years old, the other a hundred and eighty. The temple was crowded with many people, monks and laity, servants and servants, important gentlemen and ordinary people. But the sutra preceptor did not appear, and everyone patiently waited. Here word for word, and the elders began to recall the past - after all, they survived thirteen imperial reigns and saw and remembered all the courtiers and emperors. All those present moved closer to listen to the stories of antiquity as well. When else will you hear this! The elders, and their names were Yotsugi and Shigeki, really wanted to remember what happened in the old days, they said that in ancient times people, if they wanted to talk, but they couldn’t, dug a hole and told their secrets into it.

How amusing it was to look at old man Yotsugi as he opened a yellow fan with ten slats of persimmon ebony and chuckled importantly. He was going to tell the audience about the happy fate of his lordship Mr. Mitinaga from the powerful family of Fujiwara, who surpassed everyone in the world. This is a difficult, great matter, and therefore he will have to tell in order about many emperors and empresses, ministers and high dignitaries. And then the course of things in the world will become clear. And Yotsugi will only talk about what he himself heard and saw.

Those gathered in the church rejoiced and moved even closer to the elders. And Yotsugi said: “From the very creation of the world, one after another until the present reign, there have been sixty-eight generations of emperors, in addition to seven generations of gods. The first was Emperor Lzimmu, but no one remembers those distant times. the first day of the third moon of the third year of Kajo, in the year of the younger brother of fire and the horse, Emperor Montoku ascended the throne and ruled the world for eight years. His mother, Empress Gojo, was dedicated to the beautiful poems of the famous poet Arivara Narihira. How beautiful and graceful life was in the old days! Not like now."

Shigeki said: "You raised a mirror, and it reflected the many fates of people of nobility and fame. We have a feeling that the morning sun brightly illuminated us, standing before the darkness of many years. I am now like a mirror in a comb box that lies thrown into It is difficult to see anything in it. When we stand in front of you, like a polished mirror, we see past and future, destinies, characters and forms. "

Yotsugi put it this way:

Yotsugi said: “The Left Minister Morotada was the fifth son of the noble Tadahira. He had a daughter of inexplicable charm. the corners of her eyes were slightly lowered, which was very graceful. Somehow, the emperor found out that this young lady knew by heart the famous anthology "Collection of Old and New Songs of Japan", and decided to test it. He hid the book and recited by heart the opening lines of the Preface, "Song of Yamato...", and she easily continued and then recited the verses from all sections, and there was no discrepancy with the text. ceremonial clothes, washed his hands and ordered to read the sutras everywhere and prayed for her himself.And the emperor fell in love with the daughter of Morotada with an extraordinary love, personally taught her to play the zither, but then, they say, his love completely disappeared. She gave birth to a son, the son was good to everyone and beautiful in person, but mournful in head. So the son of a great ruler and the grandson of the glorious husband of the left minister Morotada turned out to be an imbecile - this is truly amazing!

Yotsugi said: “When the emperor-monk Sanjo was still alive, everything was fine, but when he died, everything changed for the disgraced prince and became different from what it used to be. The courtiers did not come to him and did not indulge in entertainment with him, no one served him. There was no one to share his hours of boredom with him, and he could only absently indulge in memories of better times. The courtiers became timid and, fearing the wrath of the new emperor, avoided the prince's chambers. And the servants in the house considered that it is difficult to serve him, and the lowest servants of the department of palace order considered it shameful to clean in his chambers, and therefore the grass grew thickly in his garden, and his dwelling became dilapidated.The rare courtiers who sometimes visited him advised him to renounce his inheritance and lay down his dignity. before being forced to do so, and when a messenger from the mighty Mitinaga of the Fujiwara clan came to the prince, he told him that he had decided to take the veil as a monk: fucking as crown prince and your destiny in this world. Having resigned my dignity, I will satisfy my heart and become an ascetic on the path of the Buddha, go on a pilgrimage and stay in peace and tranquility.

Mitinaga, fearing that the prince might change his mind, came to him, accompanied by his sons and a numerous brilliant retinue, with runners and advanced horsemen. His exit was crowded and noisy, and, no doubt, the prince's heart, although he had made up his mind, was restless. Mr. Mitinaga understood his feelings and himself served him at the table, served dishes, wiped the table with his own hands. Having lost his high rank, the former prince grievously mourned the loss and soon died.

Yotsugi said: “One senior adviser was naturally skilled in making things. The sovereign at that time was still very young in years, and he deigned to somehow order his courtiers to bring him new toys. And everyone rushed to look for various curiosities - gold and silver, lacquered and carved - and they brought the young emperor a whole mountain of beautiful toys. The senior adviser made a top, and attached purple cords to it, and twisted it in front of the emperor, and he began to run after the top in circles and have fun. And this toy became his constant amusement, and he did not look at the mountain of expensive curiosities, And the courtiers also made fans from gold and silver paper with sparkles, and planks - from fragrant wood with various frills, wrote rare poems on inexpressibly beautiful paper. The senior adviser took simple yellowish paper for the fan with a watermark and, "holding back the brush," amazingly wrote a few poetic words in "grass letter". And everyone was delighted, and the sovereign put this fan in his hand box and often admired it. "

Yotsugi said: “Once upon a time, the sovereign went on a journey on horseback and took with him a young page from the Fujiwara clan, the sovereign deigned to have fun playing the zither, and they played it with the help of special claws worn on fingers. So the emperor these claws are somewhere then on the way he deigned to drop them, and no matter how they looked for them, they could not find them. And on the journey there were no other claws, and then the sovereign ordered the page to remain in that place and to find the claws by all means. And he himself turned his horse and rode to the palace. The poor page worked hard to find those claws, but they were nowhere to be found. heart? Apparently, all this was predetermined: both the fact that the emperor would drop his claws, and that he would tell the page to look for them. Such is the history of the Gorakuji temple. It was conceived to build a very young boy, which, of course, is amazing. "

Yotsugi said: “Two boys were born from the prince’s daughter, like two slender trees, beautiful and smart, grew up and became junior military leaders at court, gentlemen,“ picking flowers. brother died in the morning, and the younger in the evening. One can only imagine what the feelings of a mother, whose two children died during the day. The younger brother zealously carried out the laws of the Buddha for many years, and, dying, said to his mother: "When I die, do not do nothing with my body that is appropriate in such cases, just read the sutra of the Flower of the Law over me, and I will certainly return." This will was not only forgotten by his mother, but since she was not herself after the death of two, then someone else from home he turned the headboard to the west and other things that were supposed to, and therefore he could not return.Later he had a dream of his mother and turned to her with verses, for he was an excellent poet:

And how she regretted it! The younger son was of rare beauty, and in future generations it is unlikely that anyone superior to him will appear. He was always slightly careless in his clothes, but much more elegant than all those who tried their best. He did not pay attention to people, but only muttered the Flower of the Law Sutra under his breath, but with what unsurpassed grace he fingered the crystal rosary! The older brother was also handsome, but much rougher than the younger. Once, after their death, they appeared in a dream to a learned monk, and he began to ask them about their fate in the monastery of death and tell how mother grieves for her younger brother, and he answered, smiling affectionately:

The courtiers remembered how once, during a snowfall, the younger brother visited the left minister and broke a plum branch in his garden, weighed down with snow, he shook it, and the snow slowly crumbled in flakes on his dress, and since the inside of his dress was pale yellow, and the sleeves, when he tore off a branch, they turned inside out, the snow stained them, and all of him in the snow shone with beauty so much that some even shed tears. It was filled with such a sad charm!

Yotsugi said: "One emperor was possessed by an evil spirit and was often in a bad mood and sometimes he could completely forget himself and appear in a ridiculous form in front of his subjects, but he knew how to compose beautiful songs, people passed them from mouth to mouth, and no one could compare with him in poetry.He surrounded himself only with exquisite things, I was honored to see his ink pot, which he donated for the reading of the sutras when the Sixth Prince fell ill: Mount Horai was depicted on the seashore, long-armed and long-legged creatures, and everything was done with extraordinary skill. The magnificence of his utensils is indescribable. His shoes were taken out to show the people. He painted pictures very skillfully, knew how to paint rolling wheels of a carriage with inimitable skill, and once depicted the customs adopted in rich houses and among commoners, so much so that everyone admired. "

There was no end to Yotsugi's stories, another elder Shigeki echoed him, and other people, servicemen, monks, servants, also recalled the details and added what they knew about the life of the remarkable people of Japan. And the elders did not stop repeating: “How happily we met. We opened the bag that remained closed for years, and tore all the holes, and all the stories burst out and became the property of men and women. There was such a case. service to the Buddha, but hesitant, he arrived in the capital and saw how the minister came to the court in a brilliant robe, how servants and bodyguards ran ahead of him, and subjects marched around, and thought that, apparently, this was the first person in the capital. But when the minister appeared before Mitinaga of the Fujiwara clan, a man of extraordinary will and mind, powerful and adamant, the holy man realized that it was he who surpassed everyone.But then a procession appeared and announced the arrival of the emperor, and by the way he was expected and received and how the sacred palanquin was brought as he was being respected, the holy man realized that the first person in the capital and in Japan was the mikado, but when the emperor, descending to earth, knelt before the face of the Buddha in the Amida Hall and said a prayer, the saint said: "Yes, there is no one who would be higher than the Buddha, my faith is now immeasurably strengthened.

The jets of the outgoing river ... They are continuous; but they are not the same, the old waters. Bubbles of foam floating along the backwaters ... they either disappear, then contact again, but they are not given to stay for a long time. People who are born, who die... where do they come from and where do they go? And the owner himself, and his dwelling, they both leave, competing with each other in the fragility of their being, just like dew on bindweed: then the dew will fall, but the flower remains, but it will dry up in the early sun; then the flower fades, and the dew has not yet disappeared. However, although she has not disappeared, she will not wait for the evening.

More than forty springs and autumns have passed since I began to understand the meaning of things, and during this time many unusual things have accumulated, which I have witnessed.

Once upon a time, on a restless, windy night, a fire broke out in the capital, the fire, passing here and there, unfolded with a wide edge, as if a folding fan had been opened. Houses were covered with smoke, flames were growing nearby, ashes flew into the sky, flames that had come off flew through the quarters, while people ... some suffocated, others, enveloped in fire, died on the spot. Many thousands of men and women, noble dignitaries, common people died, up to a third of the houses in the capital burned down.

Once a terrible whirlwind rose in the capital, those houses that it covered with its breath collapsed instantly, the roofs flew off the houses like leaves in autumn, chips and tiles rushed like dust, the voices of people were not heard from the terrible roar. Many people believed that such a whirlwind was a harbinger of future misfortunes.

In the same year, the capital was unexpectedly transferred. The sovereign, dignitaries, ministers moved to the land of Settsu, to the city of Naniwa, and after them everyone was in a hurry to move, and only those who failed in life remained in the old, dilapidated capital, which was quickly falling into decay. Houses were broken down and floated down the Yodogawa River. The city turned into a field before our eyes. The former village is in desolation, the new city is not yet ready, empty and dull.

Then, it was a long time ago and I don’t remember exactly when, there was a famine for two years. Drought, hurricanes and floods. They plowed and sowed, but there was no harvest, and prayers and special services did not help. The life of the capital city depends on the village, the villages were empty, gold and rich things were no longer valued, many beggars roamed the roads. The next year it became even worse, diseases and epidemics increased. People were dying on the streets without counting. The lumberjacks in the mountains became weak from hunger, and there was no fuel, they began to break houses and break the statues of Buddha "it was terrible to see a golden pattern or cinnabar on the boards in the market. The stench of corpses spread in the streets. If a man loved a woman, he died before her, parents - before babies, because they gave them everything they had.So, at least forty-two thousand people died in the capital.

Then there was a strong earthquake: the mountains fell apart and buried the rivers under them; the sea flooded the land, the earth opened up, and the water, bubbling, rose from the clefts. In the capital, not a single temple, not a single pagoda remained intact. The dust wafted like thick smoke. The rumble from the shaking of the ground was like thunder. People died both in houses and on the streets - there are no wings, which means it is impossible to fly into the sky. Of all the horrors in the world, the most terrible is the earthquake! And how terrible the death of crushed children. The strong blows stopped, but the tremors continued for another three months.

Such is the bitterness of life in this world, and how much suffering falls to the lot of our hearts. Here are people who are in a dependent position: there will be joy - they cannot laugh out loud, sadness in their hearts - they cannot weep. Just like sparrows at a kite's nest. And how people from rich houses despise them and do not value them at all - the whole soul rises at the thought of this. Who is poor - he has so much grief: you become attached to someone, you will be full of love; if you live like everyone else, there will be no joy, if you don’t act like everyone else, you will look like a madman. Where to live, what business to do?

Here I am. I had a house by inheritance, but my fate changed, and I lost everything, and now I wove myself a simple hut. For more than thirty years I suffered from wind, rain, floods, and was afraid of robbers. And by itself I realized how insignificant our life is. I left home, turned away from the vain world. I had no relatives, no ranks, no awards.

Now I have spent many springs and autumns in the clouds of Mount Oharayama! My cell is very small and cramped. There is an image of the Buddha Amida there, in boxes - a collection of poems, musical plays, biwa and koto instruments. There is a table for writing, a brazier. Medicinal herbs in the garden. Around the trees, there is a reservoir. Ivy hides all traces. In the spring - waves of wisteria, like purple clouds. In summer you listen to the cuckoo. In autumn, cicadas sing about the fragility of the world. In winter - snow. In the morning I watch the boats on the river, I play climbing the peaks, I collect firewood, I pray, I keep silence, At night I remember my friends. Now my friends are music, the moon, flowers. My cloak is made of hemp, the food is simple. I have no envy, fear, anxiety. My being is like a cloud floating across the sky.

As soon as the foggy haze of the festive New Year's morning dissipated, the ladies of the court serving in the Tomikoji Palace appeared in the reception hall, vying with each other in the brilliance of outfits. That morning I was wearing a seven-layer undergarment - the color changed from pale pink to dark red: a purple dress on top, and another light green and red cape with sleeves. The top dress was woven with plum blossom branches over a hedge in the Chinese style. The ceremony of offering a celebratory cup to the emperor was performed by my father, a senior state adviser. When I returned to my room, I saw a letter with eight thin undergarments, capes, and overdresses of different colors attached to it. Pinned to the sleeve of one of them was a sheet of paper with the following verses:

But I wrapped the silks back and sent them with a poem:

The emperor said that he intended to visit our estate in connection with a change of place, as the astrologers prescribed in order to avoid misfortune. In my bedroom they set up luxurious screens, burned incense, dressed me in a white dress and a purple hakama split skirt. My father taught me that I should be soft, compliant and obey the sovereign in everything. But I did not understand what all his instructions were about, and fell into a sound sleep near the brazier with coal, feeling only vague discontent. When I suddenly woke up in the middle of the night, I saw the sovereign next to me, he said that he loved me as a child and hid his feelings for many years, but now the time has come. I was terribly embarrassed and could not answer anything. When the frustrated sovereign departed, it began to seem to me that this was not the sovereign, but some new person, unknown to me, with whom it was impossible to talk simply as before. And I felt sorry for myself to tears. Then they brought a letter from the sovereign, and I could not even answer, besides, a message arrived from him, Yuki no Akebono, the Snowy Dawn:

The next day, the sovereign again granted, and although I was unable to answer him, everything happened according to his will, and I looked with bitterness at the clear month. The night brightened, the dawn bell struck. The sovereign swore to me that our connection would never be interrupted. The moon was leaning to the west, the clouds stretched on the eastern slope of the sky, and the sovereign was beautiful in a green dress and a light gray cape. "Here it is, the union of men and women," I thought. I remembered the lines from The Tale of Prince Genji: “Because of the love of the sovereign, the sleeves got wet from tears ...” The moon turned completely white, and I stood, exhausted from tears, seeing off the sovereign, and he suddenly picked me up in his arms and put me in a carriage. So he took me to Tomikoji Palace. The sovereign spent night after night with me, but it was strange to me why the image of the one who wrote to me lives in my soul:

When I returned home, for some reason I began to look forward to messages from the sovereign. But evil tongues began to work in the palace, the empress treated me worse and worse.

Soon autumn came, and the daughter of the princess was born to the Empress. The father of the sovereign fell ill and died, with his death, it seemed that the clouds covered the sky, the people plunged into grief, bright outfits were replaced by mourning clothes, and the body of the late emperor was transported to the temple for burning. all the voices in the capital fell silent, it seemed that the plum blossoms would bloom black. Soon the term for the funeral prayers ended, and everyone returned to the capital, the fifth moon came, when the sleeves are always wet from spring rains. I felt that I was in a burden, and my father, who bitterly mourned the death of the sovereign and wanted to follow him, having learned about this, decided not to die. Although the sovereign was kind to me, I did not know how long his love would last. My father was getting worse and worse, on his deathbed he was sad about my fate, what would happen to the orphan if the sovereign left her, and in this case ordered me to take the veil as a nun. Soon the father's body turned into incorporeal smoke. Autumn has come. Waking up in the middle of a long autumn night, I listened to the dull tapping of wooden rolls, yearned for my late father. On the 57th day of his death, the sovereign sent me a crystal rosary tied to a saffron flower made of gold and silver, and a sheet of paper with verses was attached to it:

I replied that I thanked him and that, of course, the father in the next world rejoices at the sovereign's affection.

I was visited by a friend of the Akebono family, Snow Dawn, with whom you could talk about anything, sometimes they stayed up until the morning. He began to whisper to me about love, so tenderly and passionately that I could not resist, and was only afraid that the sovereign would not see our meeting in a dream. In the morning we exchanged poems. I lived at that time in the house of a nurse, a rather unceremonious person, and besides, her husband and sons were noisy and noisy all day long until late at night. So when Akebono appeared, I was ashamed of the loud screams and the rumble of the rice mortar. But there has never been and never will be a more precious memory for me than about these, in fact, painful meetings. Our love became stronger and stronger, and I did not want to return to the palace to the sovereign. But the emperor insisted, and at the beginning of the eleventh moon I had to move to the palace, where I stopped liking everything. And then I secretly moved to the wretched abode of Daigo to the nun-priest. We lived poorly and modestly, as at the end of the twelfth moon the sovereign came at night. He looked elegant and beautiful in a dark robe on white snow with a flawed month. The sovereign departed, and tears of sadness remained on my sleeve. At dawn, he sent me a letter: “Farewell to you filled my soul with a hitherto unknown charm of sadness ...” It is dark in the monastery, the water falling from the gutter has frozen, there is deep silence, only in the distance is the sound of a woodcutter.

Suddenly - a knock on the door, looking - and this is Akebono, Snowy Dawn. The snow was falling, burying everything around under it, the wind howled terribly. Akebono distributed gifts, and the day passed like a continuous holiday. When he left, the pain of separation was unbearable. In the second moon, I felt the approach of childbirth. The sovereign was at that time very preoccupied with the affairs of the throne, but he nevertheless ordered the monastery of Goodness and Peace to pray for a safe resolution from the burden. The birth went well, the baby prince was born, but I was tormented by thoughts of my father and my beloved Akebono. He visited me again by the light of a bleak winter moon. It seemed to me that night birds were crying, otherwise they were already dawn birds, it became light, it was dangerous to leave me, and we spent the day together, and then brought an affectionate letter from the sovereign. It turned out that I again suffered from Akebono. Fearing the eyes of people, I left the palace and shut myself up at home, saying I was seriously ill. The sovereign sent messengers, but I excused myself that the disease was contagious. The baby was born in secret, only Akebono and two maids were with me. Akebono himself cut off the umbilical cord with his sword. I looked at the girl: her eyes, her hair, and only then did I understand what a mother's love is. But my child was taken away from me forever. And it so happened that I lost the little prince who lived in my uncle's house, he disappeared like a dewdrop from a leaf of grass. I mourned my father and the boy-prince, mourned my daughter, grieved that Akebono left me in the morning, was jealous of the sovereign for other women - such was my life at that time. I dreamed of the wilderness, of wanderings:

The sovereign was fond of various women, now a princess, then one young artist, and his hobbies were fleeting, but still hurt me. I was eighteen years old, many noble dignitaries sent me tender messages, one rector of the temple burned with a violent passion for me, but she was disgusting to me. He showered me with letters and very skillful poems, arranged appointments - one appointment even took place in front of the altar of the Buddha - and for a while I succumbed, but then I wrote to him:

I fell ill, and it seemed to me that it was he who cursed me with an ailment.

Once the sovereign lost an archery competition to his elder brother and, as a punishment, he had to present to his brother all the court ladies serving at the court. We were dressed as boys in the finest clothes and told to play ball in the Pomeranian Garden. The balls were red, braided with silver and gold thread. Then the ladies acted out scenes from The Tale of Prince Genji. I had already made up my mind to renounce the world, but I noticed that I had suffered again. Then I hid in the abode of Daigo, and no one could find me - neither the sovereign, nor Akebono. Life in the world disgusted me, regrets about the past tormented my soul. my life flowed sadly and gloomily, although the sovereign sought me out and forced me to return to the palace. Akebono, who was my first true love, gradually drifted away from me. I thought about what awaits me, because life is like short-lived dew.

The abbot, who still passionately loved me, died, sending dying verses:

- And added: - But, ascending into the void with smoke, I will still cling to you. " Even the sovereign sent me condolences: "After all, he loved you so much ..." I shut myself up in the temple. the spirit could not stand me, Akebono fell out of love, I had to leave the palace, where I spent many years. I was not sorry to part with the vain world, and I settled in the Gion temple and became a nun. abide with me. And I went on a long journey through the temples and caves of hermits and found myself in the city of Kamakura, where the shogun ruled. The magnificent capital of the shogun was good for everyone, but it seemed to me that it lacked poetry and grace. Thus I lived in solitude when When I saw the smoke of his funeral pyre, everything faded in my life. It was truly impossible to change what had been destined for man by the law of karma.

Scribe's note: "At this point the manuscript is cut off, and what is written further is unknown."

There were many princes in the world, omnipotent and cruel, but they were all surpassed by the descendant of an ancient family, Prince Kiyomori Taira, the monk ruler from the Rokuhara estate, - about his deeds, about his reign, there is such a rumor that it is truly impossible to describe in words. Six generations of the Taira house served as rulers in various lands, but none of them was honored with the high honor of appearing at the court. Kiyomori's father Taira Tadamori became famous for erecting a temple of Longevity, in which he placed a thousand and one statues of the Buddha, and everyone liked this temple so much that the sovereign, in joy, granted Tadamori the right to appear at the court. As soon as Tadamori was about to introduce himself to the sovereign, the envious court decided to attack the uninvited guest. Tadamori, having learned about this, took his sword to the palace, which terrified the adversaries, although in the palace one should have been unarmed. When all the invitees had gathered, he slowly drew his sword, put it to his cheek and froze motionless - in the light of the lamps the blade burned like ice, and Tadamori's appearance was so formidable that no one dared to attack him. But complaints rained down on him, all the courtiers expressed their indignation to the sovereign, and he was about to close the gates of the palace for Taira, but then Tadamori took out his sword and respectfully handed it to the sovereign: in a black lacquered scabbard lay a wooden sword covered with silver foil. The sovereign laughed and praised For far-sightedness and cunning. Tadamori excelled in the path of poetry as well.

The son of Tadamori, Kiyomori, fought gloriously for the sovereign and punished the rebels, he received court positions and finally the rank of chief minister and the right to enter the forbidden imperial city in an ox-drawn carriage. The law said that the chief minister is the mentor of the emperor, an example to the whole state, he rules the country. They say that all this happened thanks to the good will of the god Kumano. Kiyomori was once riding on a pilgrimage by the sea, and suddenly a huge sea pike-perch jumped into his boat by itself. One monk said that this is a sign of the god Kumano and that this fish should be cooked and eaten, which was done, since then happiness smiled at Kiyomori in everything. He gained unprecedented power, and all because the monk ruler Kiyomori Taira gathered three hundred youths and took him into his service. They cut their hair into a circle, made their hair "kaburo" and dressed in red jackets. Day and night they wandered the streets and looked for sedition in the city, as soon as they see or hear that someone is vilifying the Taira house, they immediately rush at the person with a cry of kaburo and drag them to the Rokuhara estate. Everywhere caburos went without asking, in front of them even the horses themselves turned off the road.

The entire Taira family prospered. It seemed that those who did not belong to the Taira clan were unworthy of being called people. Kiyomori's daughters also prospered, one was the wife of the emperor, the other was the wife of the regent, the tutor of the infant emperor. How many estates, lands, bright clothes, servants and servants they had! Of the sixty-six Japanese provinces, they owned thirty. Taira Manor - Rokuhara surpassed any imperial court in luxury and splendor. Gold, jasper, satin, precious stones, noble horses, decorated carriages, always lively and crowded.

On the day of Emperor Takakura's coming of age, when he came to the house of his august parents for a celebration, several strange incidents happened: in the midst of prayers, three doves flew off the mountain of Husbands and started a fight in the branches of an orange tree and pecked each other to death. "Trouble is approaching," said people in the know. And in the huge cryptomeria, in the hollow of which the altar was arranged, lightning struck, and a fire broke out. And all because everything in the world happened at the discretion of the Taira house, and the gods opposed this. The monks of the sacred mountain Hiei rebelled against the Taira, as the Taira inflicted undeserved insults on them. Once the emperor said: "Three things are beyond my control - the waters of the Kamo River, dice and the monks of Mount Hiei." The monks gathered a multitude of monks, novices, and acolytes from Shinto shrines and rushed to the imperial palace. Two troops were sent to meet them - Taira and Yoshifusa Minamoto. Minamoto behaved wisely and managed to persuade the rebellious monks, he was a famous warrior and an excellent poet. Then the monks rushed to the Taira army, and many died under their sacrilegious arrows. Moans and cries rose to the very sky, leaving the arks, the monks ran back.

The abbot of Mount Hiei Monastery, a venerable saintly man, was expelled from the capital far away, to the region of Izu. The oracle of the mountain announced through the lips of a youth that he would leave these places if such an evil deed was accomplished: no one in history dared to encroach on the abbot of Mount Hiei. Then the monks rushed to the capital and beat off the abbot by force. The Monk ruler Kiyomori Taira was furious, and many were seized and killed on his orders, the servants of the sovereign, noble dignitaries, but this seemed to him not enough, he dressed in a caftan of black brocade, tight-fitting black armor, picked up the famous halberd. This halberd came to him in an unusual way. Once he spent the night in the temple, and he dreamed that the goddess handed him a short halberd. But that was not a dream: when he woke up, he saw that a halberd was lying next to him. With this halberd, he went to his son, the reasonable Shigemori, and said that the plot had been arranged by the sovereign, and therefore he should be imprisoned in a remote estate. But Shigemori replied that, apparently, the end of his, Kiyomori, happy fate was coming, since he set out to sow confusion in the country of Japan, forgetting about the precepts of the Buddha and about the Five Consistencies - philanthropy, duty, rituals, wisdom and fidelity. I urged him to change his armor to the monk's robe that was appropriate for him. Shigemori was afraid of violating his duty to the monarch and his filial duty, and therefore asked his father to cut off his head. And Kiyomori retreated, and the sovereign said that Shigemori was not the first time he showed the greatness of the soul. But many dignitaries were exiled to Demon Island and other terrible places. Other sovereign princes began to resent the omnipotence and cruelty of the Taira. All ranks and positions at the court were received only by dignitaries from this kind, and for other dignitaries, soldiers there was only one way - to become monks, and an unenviable fate awaited their servants, servants and household members. Many faithful servants of the sovereign died, anger relentlessly tormented his soul. The sovereign was gloomy. And the ruler-inok Kiyomori was suspicious of the sovereign. And now the daughter of Kiyomori, the wife of Emperor Takakura, was supposed to be relieved of her burden, but she became seriously ill, and the birth was difficult. Everyone in the palace prayed in fear, Kiyomori released the exiles and prayed, but nothing helped, the daughter only weakened. Then sovereign Go-Shirakawa came to the rescue, he began to cast spells in front of the curtain, behind which the empress lay, and immediately her torment ended and a boy-prince was born. And the monk-king Kiyomori, who was in dismay, rejoiced, although the appearance of the prince was accompanied by bad omens.

On the fifth moon, a terrible tornado swooped down on the capital. Sweeping away everything in its path, the tornado overturned heavy gates, beams, crossbars, pillars mixed up in the air. The sovereign realized that this disaster happened for a reason, and ordered the monks to ask the oracle, and he announced: "The country is in danger, the teachings of the Buddha will fall into decay, the power of sovereigns will decline, and endless bloody turmoil will come."

Shigemori went on a pilgrimage, having heard a gloomy prediction, and on the way he rode a horse into the river, and his white clothes darkened from the water and became like mourning. Soon he fell ill and, having taken the monastic rank, died, mourned by all those close to him. Many grieved about his early death: "Our little Japan is too small a container for such a high spirit," They also said that he was the only one who could soften the cruelty of Kiyomori Taira, and only thanks to him the country was at peace. What troubles will begin? What will happen? Before his death, Shigemori, having seen a prophetic dream about the death of the Taira house, handed over the mourning sword to his brother Koremori and ordered him to wear it at Kiyomori's funeral, because he foresaw the death of his family.

After the death of Shigemori, Kiyomori, being in anger, decided to further strengthen his already unlimited power. He immediately deprived the position of the most noble nobles of the state, ordering them to remain in their estates without a break, and others to go into exile. One of them, a former chief minister, a skilled musician and lover of the elegant, was exiled to the distant land of Tosa, but he decided that for a refined person it didn’t matter where to admire the moon, and he was not very upset. The villagers, although they listened to his playing and singing, could not appreciate their perfection, but the god of the local temple listened to him, and when he played "Fragrant Breeze", a fragrance floated in the air, and when he sang the hymn "I beg you, forgive my sin ... ' the walls of the temple trembled.

In the end, the sovereign Go-Shirakawa was sent into exile, which plunged his son Emperor Takakura into great grief. Then he was removed from the throne and elevated to the throne by Kiyomori's grandson, the infant prince. So Kiyomori became the grandfather of the emperor, his estate became even more luxurious, and his samurai dressed up in even more magnificent dresses.

At that time, the second oldest son of sovereign Go-Shirakawa, Motihito, lived quietly and imperceptibly in the capital, he was an excellent calligrapher and possessed many talents and was worthy to take the throne. He composed poetry, played the flute, and lived his life in gloomy solitude. Yorimasa Minamoto, an important courtier who had taken holy orders, visited him and began to persuade him to raise a rebellion, overthrow the Taira house and take the throne, and many vassals and supporters of the Minamoto would join him. In addition, one soothsayer read on Mochihito's forehead that he was destined to sit on the throne. Then Prince Mochihito appealed to the Minamoto supporters to unite, but Kiyomori found out about this, and the prince had to urgently flee the capital in a woman's dress to the monks of the Miidera monastery. The monks did not know what to do: the Taira were very strong, for twenty years all over the country the grasses and trees obediently bent before them, and in the meantime the Minamoto star had faded. They decided to gather all their strength and strike at the Rokuhara estate, but first they fortified their monastery, built palisades, erected walls, and dug ditches. There were more than ten thousand warriors in Rokuhara, and no more than a thousand monks. The monks of the Holy Mountain refused to follow the prince. Then the prince with a thousand of his companions went to the city of Naru, and the Taira warriors set off in pursuit. On the bridge over the river, which broke off under the weight of the horsemen, the first battle broke out between the Taira and the Minamoto. Many Taira warriors died in the waves of the river, but the people of Minamoto drowned in the stormy spring waves, both on foot and on horseback. In multi-colored shells - red, scarlet, light green - they either sank, then floated up, then disappeared again under water, like red maple leaves, when the breath of an autumn storm rips them off and carries them to the river, Both the prince and Yorimasa Minamoto died in battle , slain by the arrows of mighty Taira warriors. In addition, the Taira decided to teach the monks of the Miidera monastery a lesson and brutally dealt with them, and the monastery was burned. People said that Taira's atrocities reached the limit, they considered how many nobles, courtiers, monks he exiled, ruined. Moreover, he moved the capital to a new place, which brought incalculable suffering to people, because the old capital was miraculously how good. But there was no one to argue with Kiyomori: after all, the new sovereign was only three years old. The old capital has already been abandoned, everything in it has fallen into disrepair, overgrown with grass, decayed, and the new life has not yet been arranged ... They began to build a new palace, and residents rushed to new places in Fukuhara, famous for the beauty of moonlit nights.

In the new palace, Kiyomori had bad dreams: he saw mountains of skulls under the windows of the palace, and, as luck would have it, the short halberd presented to him by the goddess disappeared without a trace, apparently, the greatness of Taira is nearing its end. Meanwhile, Yoritomo Minamoto, who was in exile, began to gather forces. Supporters of the Minamoto said that in the house of Taira, only the late Shigemori was strong in spirit, noble and broad in mind. Now they do not find anyone who would be worthy to govern the country. There is no time to waste; there must be a rebellion against the Taira. No wonder it is said: "Rejecting the gifts of Heaven, you will incur their wrath." Yoritomo Minamoto hesitated and hesitated: he was afraid of a terrible fate in case of defeat. But the disgraced sovereign Go-Shirakawa supported his undertakings by the highest decree, which ordered him to start the battle with the Taira. Yoritomo placed the decree in a brocade case, hung it around his neck and did not part with it even in battles.

In the new capital of Fukuhara, the Taira prepared to fight the Minamoto. The gentlemen said goodbye to the ladies who regretted their departure, the couples exchanged elegant poems. Commander Taira - Koremori, the son of Shigemori, was twenty-three years old. The painter's brush is powerless to convey the beauty of his appearance and the splendor of the armor! His horse was dappled gray. He rode in a lacquered black saddle - gold sparkles over the black lacquer. Behind him, the Taira army - helmets, armor, bows and arrows, swords, saddles and horse harness - everything sparkled and sparkled. It was truly a magnificent sight. Warriors, leaving the capital, made three vows: forget your home, forget about your wife and children, forget about your own life.

Behind Yoritomo stood several hundred thousand warriors from the Eight Eastern Lands. The inhabitants of the Fuji River Plain fled in fear, leaving their homes. The disturbed birds flew away from their homes. The Minamoto warriors let out a thrice war cry, so that the earth and sky trembled. And the warriors of the Taira fled in fear, so that not a single man was left in their camp.

Yoritomo said: "There is no merit in this victory, it is the great bodhisattva Hachiman who bestowed upon us this victory."

Kiyomori Taira was furious when Koremori returned to the new capital. It was decided not to return to a new place, since Fukuhara did not bring Taira happiness. Now everyone in a mad rush settled in the old, ruined houses. Taira, although he was afraid of the monks of the Holy Mountain, set out to burn the old monasteries of the holy city of Nara, hotbeds of rebellion. The holy temples were destroyed, the golden statues of the Buddhas were thrown into the dust. For a long time the human souls plunged into grief! Many monks died by fire.

The military turmoil in the eastern lands did not subside, monasteries and temples in the old capital perished, the former emperor Takakura died, along with the smoke of the funeral pyre ascended to Heaven like a spring mist. The emperor had a special fondness for the crimson autumn leaves and was ready to admire the beautiful spectacle all day long. It was a wise ruler who appeared in our perilous time. But, alas, this is how the human world works.

Meanwhile, the offspring of the Minamoto house, young Yoshikata, showed up. He set out to put an end to the dominion of the Taira. Soon, because of the atrocities of the Taira, the whole east and north separated from him. Taira ordered all his companions to set out to pacify the east and north. But then the ruler-inok Kiyomori Taira fell seriously ill, a terrible fever seized him; when water was poured on it, it evaporated, hissing. Those jets that did not touch the body burned with fire, everything was covered with dark smoke, the flame, spinning, rose to the sky. The wife could hardly approach Kiyomori, overcoming the unbearable heat emanating from him. Finally, he died and set off on his last journey to Death Mountain and the River of Three Roads, to the underworld from where there is no return. Kiyomori was powerful and domineering, but he turned into dust overnight.

Sovereign Go-Shirakawa returned to the capital, began to restore the temples and monasteries of the city of Nara. At this time, Minamoto with henchmen approached the capital district with battles. It was decided to send Taira troops to cut them off. They succeeded in defeating the forward detachments of the Minamoto, but it became clear that the Taira's eternal happiness had betrayed them. In the middle of the night, a terrible whirlwind flew in, rain poured down, a thunderous voice rang out from behind the clouds: "Minions of the villain Taira, drop your weapons. You will not win!" But the Taira warriors persisted. Meanwhile, the troops of Yoritomo and Yoshinaka united, and the Minamoto became twice as strong. But clouds of samurai hurried to Taira from all sides, and there were more than a hundred thousand of them. The Taira and Minamoto troops did not meet on a wide plain, but the Minamoto, outnumbered by the Taira, lured them into the mountains by cunning. Both armies stood face to face. The sun was setting, and the Minamoto pushed the enemy back to the huge abyss of Kurikara. The voices of forty thousand horsemen thundered, and the mountains collapsed together from their cry. The Taira were trapped, seventy thousand horsemen fell into the abyss, and all died.

But the Taira managed to gather a new army and, giving a break to people and horses, they became a military camp in the town of Sinohara, in the north. They fought for a long time with the Minamoto army, many warriors from both sides fell in the battle, but finally the Minamoto gained the upper hand with great difficulty, and the Taira fled from the battlefield. Only one stately knight continued to fight, and after a fierce battle with the heroes of the Minamoto, he conceded and was killed. It turned out that the faithful old man Sanemori, a holy man, painted his head black and went out to fight for his overlord. The Minamoto warriors bowed their heads respectfully before the noble enemy. Altogether, over a hundred thousand Taira warriors left the capital in orderly ranks, and only twenty thousand returned.

But the Minamoto did not doze, and soon a large army appeared to the northern limit of the capital. "They have teamed up with the monks and are about to descend on the capital," said the frightened inhabitants of the Rokuhara estate. They wanted to hide somewhere, but in Japan there was no longer a quiet place left for them, there was nowhere for them to find peace and tranquility. Then Koremori stepped out of the Rokuhara estate to meet the enemy, and the estate itself was set on fire, and not only her: they themselves burned, leaving, more than twenty estates of their vassals with palaces and gardens and more than five thousand dwellings of ordinary people. Wept wife Koremori, his children and servants. Tsunemasa, the butler of the Empress, bidding farewell to his teacher, rector of the temple of Good and Peace, exchanged farewell poems with him.

And the answer was this:

Parting is always sad, what do people feel when they part forever? As usual, on the way, the herb headboard became damp from moisture - who can say whether it was dew or tears? The emperor left his chambers and went to the sea, the princes and princesses took refuge in mountain temples, the Taira had already fled, but the Minamoto had not yet arrived: the capital was empty. The Taira settled far to the south, on the island, in the city of Tsukushi, where the residence of the young emperor, the grandson of Kiyomori, was also located, but they had to flee from there, because the Minamoto overtook them. They ran through the stony spurs of the mountains, along the sandy plain, and scarlet drops fell on the sand from their wounded legs. The son of Shigemori, a cavalier with a tender soul, consoled himself for a long time on a moonlit night by singing poetry, playing the flute, and then, having prayed to the Buddha, he threw himself into the sea.

Sovereign Go-Shirakawa granted Yoritomo the title of shogun, the great commander, the conqueror of the barbarians. But it was not he who settled in the capital, but the sea. His wife waited for letters for a long time, but when she learned the truth, she fell down dead. Prince Yoritomo in Kamakura, hearing this news, regretted the glorious warrior, albeit an enemy.

And then in the capital, the ascension to the throne of the new emperor took place, and for the first time in history without sacred regalia - a sword, mirror and jasper. The Taira continued to make small sorties with a force of five hundred to a thousand warriors. But these campaigns brought only ruin to the treasury and misfortune to the people. The gods rejected the Taira clan, the sovereign himself turned away from them, leaving the capital, they turned into wanderers wandering at the behest of the waves in the sea. But it was not possible to do away with them, and Yoshitsune Minamoto decided not to return to the capital until he finally defeated all the Taira and drove them to the Demon Island, China and India. He equipped the ships and, with a strong fair wind, went to the island where the Taira were fortified and from where they made their raids. All night long they rushed along the waves without lighting fires. Arriving in the city of Taira - Tsukushi, they attacked them at low tide, when the water reached only the grandmas to the horses, it was impossible to run across the sea on ships - the water was too low. Many Taira samurai died then. A decorated boat appeared on the sea, and in it a beautiful girl in a brilliant outfit with a fan. She showed by signs that it was necessary to hit the fan with a well-aimed arrow. The boat danced on the waves far from the shore, and it was very difficult to hit the fan. One well-aimed shooter, a vassal of Minamoto, rode his horse far into the sea, took aim and, praying to the god Hachiman, fired an arrow. She flew over the sea with a buzz, and her sound resounded over the entire bay. An arrow pierced a scarlet fan with a gold rim, and it, trembling, rose into the air and fell into the blue waves. From the distant Taira ships, and from the land, the Minamoto warriors looked at it with excitement. The victory went to the Minamoto, and the Taira either died in battle, or threw themselves into the sea, or sailed away to no one knows where.

Once again, House Tyra managed to rise from the ruins, gather troops and fight in Dannoura Bay. The Minamoto had over three thousand ships, the Taira had a thousand. The sea currents raged in the strait, the ships were carried away by the current, the gods woke up from the cries of the warriors from above, the inhabitants of the depths - dragons from below. The ships collided, and the samurai, drawing their swords, rushed at the enemies, cut left and right. It seemed that the Taira would take over, their arrows flying in an avalanche, hitting enemies. But the Minamoto warriors jumped onto the Taira ships, the helmsmen and rowers, killed, lay at the bottom. On one ship was a young emperor, the grandson of Kiyomori Taira, a boy of eight years old, beautiful in appearance, the radiance of his beauty lit up everything around. With him - his mother, the widow of the late sovereign, she prepared for death. The emperor put his lovely little hands together, bowed to the sunrise, read a prayer. He burst into tears, but his mother, to console him, told him: "There, at the bottom, we will find another capital." And she plunged with him into the waves of the sea, tying the imperial sword around her waist. O sorrowful, sorrowful fate! Scarlet banners floated on the waves scarlet with blood, like maple leaves in autumn rivers, empty ships rushed across the sea. Many samurai were captured, died, drowned. The ill-fated spring of the ill-fated year, when the emperor himself sank to the bottom of the sea. The sacred mirror, inherited by the emperors from the sun goddess Amaterasu herself, and the precious jasper returned to the capital, while the sword sank into the sea and perished forever. The sword became forever the property of the Dragon God in the bottomless depths of the sea.

Taira prisoners arrived in the capital. They were carried through the streets in carriages, in white mourning robes. Noble dignitaries, glorious warriors have changed beyond recognition, they sat with their heads bowed, indulging in despair. People have not yet forgotten how they prospered, and now, at the sight of such a miserable state of those who so recently inspired everyone with fear and awe, everyone involuntarily thought: are they not dreaming all this? There was not a single person who would not wipe his tears with his sleeve, even the rude-hearted common people wept. Many people in the crowd stood with bowed heads, covering their faces with their hands. Just three years ago, these people, brilliant courtiers, rode through the streets, accompanied by hundreds of servants, shining with magnificent robes, the radiance of their outfits seemed to outshine the sun!

Father and son, both brave Taira samurai, rode in these carriages, they were taken to a distant estate, both had a heavy heart. They were silent, did not touch the food, only shed tears. Night fell, they lay down side by side, and the father carefully covered his son with a wide sleeve of his caftan. The guards, seeing this, said: "A father's love is stronger than anything in the world, whether a commoner or a noble nobleman." And the stern warriors wept.

Yoritomo Minamoto received the second court rank - a great honor, and the sacred mirror was placed in the imperial palace. The House of Taira perished, the main military leaders were executed, peaceful life came into its own.

But gossip began in Kamakura: vassals reported to Yoritomo that his younger brother Yoshitsune reads himself in his place and ascribes to himself all the glory of the victory over the Taira. And then a great earthquake happened: all the buildings collapsed, and the imperial palace, and the shrines of the Japanese gods, and Buddhist temples, estates of nobles and huts of commoners. The sky darkened, the earth opened up. The sovereign himself and the vassals froze in fear and offered up prayers. People with heart and conscience said that the young emperor left the capital and plunged into the sea, ministers and nobles were carried through the streets to shame, and then executed, their heads hung at the gates of the dungeon. From ancient times to the present day, the wrath of dead spirits has been formidable. What will happen to us now?

But Yoritomo hated his brother and listened to the slanders of the vassals, although Yoshitsune swore allegiance to him, and he had to flee. Oh, our mournful world, where flowering is replaced by withering as quickly as evening comes to replace morning! And all these troubles happened only because the monk ruler Kiyomori Taira squeezed the entire Celestial Empire among the four seas in his right hand, above himself - he was not afraid even of the sovereign himself, below himself - did not care about the people, executed, exiled, acted willfully , was not ashamed of either people or white light. And here the truth appeared with my own eyes: "For the sins of the fathers - retribution to the children!"

Editor: Novikov V.I.

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