Robert GRAVES, The golden fleece, 1944, reprint Hutchinson 1984, pp. 275-285

Première entrevue Jason - Médéé.

CHAPTER THIRTY-TWO : Jason Speaks with Medea.

THE Argonauts had been well bathed in warm water and well 
dried in warm towels by the palace women, who were for the 
most part Circassian slaves of surprising loveliness. With their 
heads anointed and chapleted and with clean linen shirts next to their 
skins they were soon reclining on couches in the royal dining-hall making 
an excellent repast. Many unfamiliar dishes were set before them, 
which they sampled with gusto, in true politeness not enquiring what 
the ingredients were, even though some of them might be ritually forbidden 
to them, and liable to cause cramp in the belly or death. They 
took no harm, as it proved. But Butes was horrified when the servants 
heaped his plate with what he knew at once for the roasted bodies of 
immature bees; he groaned aloud at the sight and tears gushed from 
his eyes. Idas derided the distress of Butes, and to please his Colchian 
hosts crammed his mouth with the novel food, well sprinkled with 
salt, and called for more.

Jason and King Augeas of Elis were invited to eat at the King's own 
table, which was set on a dais at the eastern end of the hall. There 
they were introduced to four dark-featured, kinky-haired noblemen, 
the King's Councillors of State. Phrontis, son of Phrixus, acted as interpreter; 
for none of these noblemen could understand the Greek language, 
and Aeëtes, to lull any suspicions that might spring from the 
Argonauts' unannounced visit, spoke only in Colchian. The conversation 
was conducted in a formal and halting manner, Jason and Augeas 
relating slight incidents of the voyage, but disclosing nothing of importance. 
Aeëtes, who was wearing a gold diadem set with emeralds, 
and a robe of state, feigned a perfect indifference to Greek affairs. He 
asked only one question concerning the regions beyond the Black Sea: 
how had they forced the passage of the Hellespont against the Trojan guard-ships?

Jason replied carelessly that the Trojans had doubtless been forewarned 
by the Triple Goddess, who was venerated by them under
the name of Cybele, that a Minyan ship was due to pass through the 
strait on divine business. At all events, he said, they had let the Argo 
sail through without challenge.

Aeëtes grunted discontentedly in reply.
However, when Augeas happened to mention the Thessalian traders 
who had joined the ship at Sinope, Aeëtes, whose treaty with the Trojans 
prevented him from direct trade with Sinope, listened with undisguised 
interest. He called down the hall for Autolycus to come and 
sit beside him, and, when Autolycus came, fed him with dainties from 
his own trencher, making much of him. Autolycus answered the King's 
questions frankly and pleasantly (for his trading days were now over), 
and quoted the prices, reckoned in gold dust, that had ruled in the 
last annual fair at Sinope. He felt a malicious pleasure in watching 
the King's face, since it was clear that the Trojan King Laömedon had 
given his ally a most misleading account of business at the fair.
At this point, Medea's only brother, Apsyrtus, a young man with a 
cat-like tread and a strong Taurian cast of features, came in from 
hunting. He saluted his father respectfully and, as Jason judged, 
affectionately, and sat down to meat without another word. His manner 
towards Jason and the other two Greeks was distant and unfriendly.

With dessert came the time for Jason to make a formal declaration 
of his visit. He rose to his feet, stretched out his right hand, first to the 
King and then to his four Councillors, and said:

"Glorious and magnanimous Aeëtes, it has perhaps already come to 
your ears - because the Trojans who trade both with you and with us 
are famous gossips - that our country of Greece has for the last two 
years been ravaged by a threefold plague: by great storms of wind 
that have torn down our fruit-trees and set the roofs flying from our 
houses; by an alarming barrenness among our flocks and herds; and by 
a great plague of poisonous snakes in our fields and woods. Judging 
that these plagues could only have been caused by the Ineffable One, 
and that appeal to any Olympian Oracle was therefore vain, a haggard 
all-Greek Council that met at Mycenae decided to consult your sister 
Circe, who is deeply in the Goddess's confidence, and ask her what 
should be done to propitiate the Goddess. Delegates waited upon your 
fair-haired sister at her palace in the island of Aeaea; who, after purifying 
herself and going into her customary trance, induced by a black 
potion, consulted the Goddess, addressing her as Brimo. 

Brimo responded that she had sent the plagues as a tardy punishment for the 
cruelties inflicted by the Achaeans many years before upon Sisyphus 
of Asopia. She now ordained that Sisyphus should be awarded a hero's 
tomb and be honoured with rich sacrifices every month, and that his 
Asopian lands should be taken away from Creon their usurper and 
restored to the rightful owners, the hereditary Priests of the Sun.

"Since, Majesty, you are the undoubted head of the elder branch of 
this illustrious clan, I have been desired by the inhabitants of the 
double kingdom of Corinth to convey you their loyal and humble 
petition: they beg you to return and rule over them-for your own fair 
lands, which include the city of Ephyra itself, can (after the thrusting-
out of Corinthus, their regent) be reunited under one sceptre with 
Asopia. But if, they say, Colchis has become so dear to you and you 
have become so dear to Colchis that you cannot remove, they beg that 
you will immediately send one of your children  - a daughter or a son 
would content them equally - to rule over them in your stead. Listen 
pityingly to their plea; for only thus can the kingdom of Ephyra, and 
all Greece besides, be saved from the disaster which threatens to engulf it.

"So much for the first message, to the accuracy of which Augeas of 
Elis, head of the younger branch of your illustrious family, will gladly 
testify. To it is joined another message from the Mare-headed Mother 
of Pelion, whom I learned to worship during my childhood; for the 
Centaurs reared me. It runs thus: `Aeëtes of Ephyra, on pain of my 
displeasure you are to give rest to the soul of my servant Phrixus the 
Minyan, which still languishes disconsolately between the bones of 
his unburied skull."'

Then Jason added, using an ancient formula: "It is not my word, but 
my Mother's word."

After a long time Aeëtes answered: "As to the first message, I will 
deliberate with my wise Councillors of State and return you an answer 
within three days; but do not expect it to be a favourable one. For my 
daughter Medea is already expecting an offer of marriage from a 
neighbouring monarch and my son Apsyrtus must remain in Colchis as 
heir to my throne and prop to my declining years. I understand that 
the Corinthians have not invited me to send one of my four grandsons 
to rule over them; I could have spared them a grandson. But the 
Ephyrans do not love the Minyans, and the sons of Phrixus rank as 
Minyans. This is a pity. Nevertheless, for all the disasters that have
come upon Greece since my departure the impious Achaeans and their 
dupes are responsible, not I; these plagues do not concern me.

"As to the second message, am I to believe that the Ineffable One 
speaks contradictorily with two different mouths? As the Bird-headed 
Mother of Colchis she has laid a sacred injunction upon her worshippers 
that no man's bones may be laid in the holy earth of Colchis; and 
the King of Colchis must obey this Bird-headed Mother rather than 
the Mare-headed Mother of Pelion. Let me beg you not to renew your 
plea; because the question whether the bones of Phrixus should be 
interred or not was asked by myself at the time of his death and conclusively 
answered by my priestly Councillors: since he died in Colchis, 
he was necessarily honoured with a Colchian funeral."

The kinky-haired Councillors signalized their approval of this speech 
by drumming on the table with the handles of their knives. Jason kept 
silent, relieved that Aeëtes had not accepted on behalf of Apsyrtus the 
imaginary offer of his former subjects, and hopeful that an accommodation 
could yet be reached in the matter of burying the bones.

That afternoon Phrontis, son of Phrixus, brought Jason a private 
message from Aeëtes, which was that the Bird-headed Mother had not 
expressly forbidden the removal of the bones of Phrixus for burial 
elsewhere than in Colchis; and that therefore, if Jason cared to remove 
them secretly and at his own risk from the high poplar where they 
were suspended, he would find the cemetery unguarded on the 
following night, and could count on conveying them safely out of the 
country for eventual burial in Greece. For he himself, said Aeëtes, had 
loved Phrixus as a son and hated to cause his ghost the least pain or 
inconvenience.

This answer did not altogether please Jason, for the orders of the 
Goddess were that the bones of Phrixus were to be buried before any 
attempt might be made on the Fleece. He told Phrontis of this difficulty. 
Phrontis replied: "Let me take you privately to the apartment 
of my sister Neaera, who returned to the palace while we were at 
dinner. You must not confide to her your design to carry off the Fleece, 
but merely tell her that you have been ordered by the Goddess to 
bury her father's bones before, and not after, you quit Colchis. She is 
quick-witted and may be able to suggest an evasion that will cause 
nobody any offence."

Jason was pleased to accept a policy that would bring him into intimate 
conversation with young Neaera. Phrontis led him by a round-about 
way to her apartment, and he learned from her with what repugnance 
Medea regarded her promised marriage to the old Albanian. 

For though Aeëtes, after his return to the palace that morning, had 
strictly forbidden Medea to speak of her marriage, she had already 
wept out her grief on the neck of an old nurse, from whom Neaera 
presently learned the whole story. Dark-eyed Neaera was almost incoherent 
with grief and sorrow. She told Jason: "O Jason, my far-travelled 
kinsman, this news is almost too cruel for me to endure: I 
fear that I shall go mad if nothing is done to thwart the King's decision. 

A marriage between my glorious Medea and the rank old lice-eater, 
Styrus, would be like one between a white rose and a slug. Can 
you and your comrades do nothing to save her? Can you not carry 
her off to Greece, my lord Jason, and marry her yourself and set her 
on the throne of Corinth and thus justify the holy Oracle of Brimo?"

Jason answered: "Be careful what you say, Princess. How can you 
think either that I should be willing to risk death by stealing away the 
King's only surviving daughter, or that she herself would be so unfilial 
as to slip away to Greece at my invitation? I acknowledge that 
the brief glimpse that I had of her this morning, as she leaned over 
the balustrade by the pear-tree, pierced my heart through with instant 
love, yet I should be mad to imagine her to be burning with equal 
passion for me. Therefore I shall try to forget your strange words, 
though I thank you for them from the bottom of my heart. Yet, dear 
kinswoman, to show your kindness to me, give me advice in the matter 
of your noble father's bones. For the White Goddess of Pelion has 
ordered me to bury them before, not after, I quit the land of Colchis."

Neaera answered: "Only Medea can arrange this matter. But first 
tell me: have I permission to report to Medea what you have just disclosed 
of your feelings for her?"

Jason pretended to hesitate in lover's modesty. Then he answered: 
"If you swear by your own girdle to report my words exactly, secretly, 
and to no living being but Medea herself, you have my permission."
Neaera swore, as she was desired, and then took her leave. Jason 
asked her as she turned to go: "What of Apsyrtus? Does he favour the 
marriage?"

Neaera answered: "He hates his sister, and is pleased by any event 
that discomfits her. Consider him your enemy, as I consider him mine." 

Presently Phrontis came to Jason with the news that Medea would 
visit his apartments that same evening at dusk, if he could absent himself 
from supper without exciting suspicion. Jason's heart bounded for 
joy. In a few hours he had already accomplished what he had expected 
would cost him days, or even months. But he said nothing to any of 
his companions and joined them that afternoon in friendly athletic 
contests with the Colchian nobility. The stadium was enclosed with 
buildings on three sides, namely by the wing of the palace reserved 
for the Royal Family, by the Guards' barracks, and by the Stables of 
the Sun, where the twelve white horses of the Sun God (whose backs 
no man might ever bestride) and the fatal black mare were tended 
with unimaginable honour.

The Argonauts had agreed to treat Jason, publicly at least, with the 
utmost love and deference, in order to enhance his glory in the eyes of 
Medea, who would be watching the games from a palace balcony. 

They chose him to represent them in quoit-throwing, archery, and 
leaping, and his performances, though they would not have been remarkable 
in any Greek city, excited the admiration of his hosts. For 
the Colchians, though courageous, are an indolent, unathletic people 
and, like their Egyptian cousins, execrable marksmen with the bow. 
Aeëtes himself would not watch: he declared that he hated any sight 
that reminded him of his early manhood in Greece, but also perhaps 
he foresaw that his Colchian subjects would not gain many prizes in 
the games.

In effect, the Argonauts were the victors in every contest except that 
of knucklebones, which they despised as childish but at which the 
Colchians were marvellously adept. Apsyrtus, who was the Colchian 
champion of upright wrestling, showed himself ignorant of the simplest 
principles of the art. When opposed to Castor, he sprang forward 
at once to catch at his knee. But Castor was too quick for Apsyrtus: 
he seized his left wrist with the right hand, his left elbow with the left 
hand, turned rapidly about, drew the whole arm over his own left 
shoulder and threw Apsyrtus clean over his head. In the second bout 
Castor, disregarding an attempt to catch and break one of his fingers, 
secured a body-hold almost at once, shook Apsyrtus off his balance, 
and tossed him ignominiously on his back.

Jason absented himself from supper at the hall that night, pleading 
that as a result of his athletic exertions he had been suddenly overcome 
by a recurrent fever; he must huddle himself in blankets and 
sweat it out. Since such fevers are common enough in Colchis, he was 
not suspected of deceit.

At dusk Medea visited him. She came in the disguise of a bent, 
hobbling old hag fetching him blankets for his fever. He paid no attention 
to her at all until she addressed him in a quavering old woman's 
voice, saying: "My lord, I am Medea." With that she laughed, wiped 
the painted wrinkles from her face, unhooded her luxurious tresses of 
yellow hair, kicked away her shapeless felt shoes, tore off her rusty-
black linen smock, and stood up straight and beautiful before him, 
dressed in a white robe curiously embroidered with golden ivy leaves 
and fir-cones.

Jason threw off his blankets, hastily ran an ivory comb through his 
hair, and stood up before her, tall and handsome, dressed in a purple 
tunic fringed with gold lace and decorated at the neck and shoulders 
with amber pendants; these were spoils that he had taken from King 
Amycus the Bebrycian at the sack of his palace.

The two stood gazing at each other for a while, saying nothing, both 
equally astonished that a close view augmented the beauty that they 
had seen from a distance. It seemed to Medea that they were two 
trees: she, a spired white cypress, and he a golden oak that overtopped her. 
Their roots entwined below the earth; their branches 
quivered together in the same southern breeze.

The very first greeting that passed between them was not a word or a hand-clasp but a 
trembling kiss; yet a sense of shame preserved the decorum of the occasion 
and Jason did not press his advantage by handling her familiarly as 
he had handled Queen Hypsipyle at their first meeting.

Jason spoke first: "Lovely lady, your holy powers have not been 
exaggerated. There are priestesses of the Mother who have the double-eye 
and use it to ruin and destroy, but you use the single-eye to heal 
and make whole."

Medea answered wonderingly: "You are the first of your sex who 
has ever kissed me, or whom I have kissed, since I was a child riding 
on the knee of my father."

Jason said: "Only allow me to hope that none other but myself will 
ever have this delight again - until one day perhaps an infant son 
clasps you about the neck, and kisses you, and calls you Mother."

She said: "How can this be, my dear love? Do you not know that 
I am to be courted by old Styrus the Albanian lice-eater, and that for 
the kingdom's sake I cannot refuse to marry him but must smile on 
him as he fetches me away to his gloomy mountain fortress in Caspia? 
Oh, but I can say no more, nor tell you with what horror and loathing
my belly churns at the thought of this union - for my father has strictly 
forbidden me to make the least complaint."

"Perhaps," said Jason, "the Colchian Mother will strike your old 
suitor dead at the palace gates if you pray to her with holy fervour; for 
among the Albanians, I hear, the Sun God presumptuously makes 
himself the equal of his Mother the Moon. But it would be dishonourable 
in me to suggest, as your true friend Neaera has done, that you 
should forget your duty to your father and steal away with me before 
this wretch's arrival. And if you are so scrupulous to obey your father 
in the small matter of making no complaint against the filthy wedlock, 
the barren slavery, arranged for you, how will you dare to disobey 
him in a great matter?"

Medea did not answer this question, but raised her downcast eyes 
to his and said: "Phrontis has already told me of your courtship of 
Queen Hypsipyle the Lemnian. He had the story from your comrade 
Euphemus. Euphemus did not impute any falseness or cruelty to you, 
but is it not true that you quitted the Queen after only two days, and 
would not undertake ever to return?"

"It was three days," Jason answered, flushing, "and that was an 
altogether different case from this. I consider Phrontis most uncomradely 
to have carried an old tale to your ears, knowing how easily 
you might have misunderstood it and judged me accordingly. 

Well, I will tell you briefly how it was. This Queen Hypsipyle invited me to 
share her bed chiefly for reasons of state: she needed a male heir for 
her throne and wished to provide him with a distinguished father. She 
showed me and my crew wonderful hospitality during our visit, and I 
should have been a boor to deny her anything within reason. 

Thus, certain loving courtesies passed between us which are inseparable 
from the act of procreation, and I do not deny that my person attracted 
her greatly. Yet I did not fall in love with her at first sight, as 
I have done with you, or even at second sight. My feelings for her are 
fairly proved by my honourable refusal of the throne of Lemnos. 

How many men do you know, Lovely One, who would refuse a rich kingdom 
freely offered them even if the gift were burdened with the forced 
embraces of an ugly old woman? Hypsipyle was young and generally 
accounted beautiful, though a deal taller than you (too tall, in fact, 
for my liking). She had dark hair, not golden; and a straight nose, 
not one with your falcon-like hook; and her pale lips did not invite 
my kisses as do your red ones. 

It was easy to forget Hypsipyle; but you I could never forget though I outlived the 
Egyptian Phoenix. At the instant that I first set eyes upon you my heart began a 
golden dance. Do you know how a sunbeam quivers on the whitewashed 
ceiling of an upper room, thrown up there by a great cauldron of 
lustral water in the courtyard, whose surface the wind stirs? That is 
how my heart danced, and is dancing now."

"Nevertheless," said Medea, trying to calm the clamour of her heart 
with a prudent speech, "nevertheless, if it ever happened, whether 
because of the timely death of Styrus or for some other reason, that I 
were free to offer you more intimate embraces than those which we 
have thievishly enjoyed, I should be bound to exact an oath from you 
that you would marry me honourably beforehand and afterwards share 
the Corinthian throne with me; for my brother Apsyrtus has already 
privately resigned his claim to it in my favour. Also, I should require 
you first of all to conduct me to the Istrian city of Aeaea ruled over by 
Circe, sister to my father; she has summoned me to her in a dream."

Jason knew Medea to be desperate and believed that she could be 
trusted with any confidence. He said: "I would take that oath at once, 
were you to swear at the same time to help me accomplish my twin 
missions in this country."

"What are they?" she asked. "I have, so far, been told only that the 
Mare-headed Goddess of Pelion wishes you to inter the bones of 
Phrixus in the Greek manner, and this before quitting Colchis. I will 
gladly assist you, and already know the means. Ideëssas, the eldest son 
of the Moschian King, comes here tomorrow with the annual tribute. 

As usual, he will consult the Oracle of Prometheus, for whom the 
Moschians have the greatest veneration because the responses committed 
to me by him always prove to be true. Ideëssas will be told, among 
other things, that Prometheus loves the Moschians well and will graciously 
grant them an Oracle of their own which they can consult 
immediately whenever an unusual event occurs to disturb their peace 
of mind; that they are therefore to build a tomb of shining stone, in 
imitation of the shrine of Prometheus, and are to deposit in it, with 
such and such ceremonies, the heroic bones that Ideëssas, upon returning 
to his apartment, will find laid in his own bed. But he will oracularly 
be warned to conceal these bones from every human eye until 
they are safe in the tomb; and to conceal their provenience ever afterwards, 
lest their oracular properties be impaired; and to speak of the 
hero merely as The Benefactor. And the aspect of the Goddess to
whom he is to be oracular hero shall be the White Goddess, Ino of 
Pelion. I shall not reveal to the prince that under that name the 
Ephyrans have worshipped Ino, by whom Phrixus was sent to Colchis, 
ever since by her suicide and the murder of her son she became one 
with the Many-named Mother."

"That is wonderfully contrived," said Jason; "but who will steal the 
bones and intrude them into the bed of Ideëssas?"
She answered: "The trader from Sinope, Autolycus, is reputedly the 
cleverest thief in the world; Phrontis will instruct him how to act. And 
now for the other matter. You spoke obscurely of your twin missions. 
What other divine task have you been set to accomplish?"

Jason demanded: "First swear by your girdle that you will never, 
by word, sign, or act, reveal this mission to any living soul until we 
are safely home in Greece."

Medea took the oath.

Then Jason said: "It is to carry off the Golden Fleece of Zeus from 
the shrine of Prometheus, and restore it to the oaken image of the Ram 
God upon Mount Laphystios."

Her eyes widened and her lips parted in amazed horror. At last she 
said in a whisper: "You ask this of me, the daughter of Aeëtes and 
Priestess of the shrine of Prometheus?"

"I do," he answered, "and with the explicit authority of the Mother 
herself."

"You are lying," she cried wildly. "You are lying!" She turned and 
ran weeping from the room, all undisguised as she was.

He was taken aback and could say nothing.
Fortunately the corridors were empty, because of the supper-hour: 
Medea regained her own room without having been observed. 

Left alone, Jason presently stretched out his arms and exulted to himself: 
"Was I not wise to say nothing and make no movement to restrain her 
when she ran out? A man should never run after a woman who loves 
him; just as a fisherman would be mad to plunge into the water after 
the fish which he has hooked. This shining fish of mine cannot swim 
further than the length of my line, which will not break."

That evening he watched her from his window as, standing upright 
in a polished car, she drove her mules at full tilt through the streets 
of Aea and out through the East Gate towards the temple of Infernal 
Brimo. The reins were wound about her middle and she wielded a 
heavy whip in her right hand. On either side of her crouched a young
priestess, and behind the chariot ran four more, with their light robes 
kilted to the knee, and each with a hand laid upon the rail. She urged 
the beasts on with cries of rage and the people fell back to avoid her 
onrush, shunning her glance. As Jason watched and wondered, a crow 
chattered at him from a poplar-tree that grew near his window. He 
asked Mopsus, who was with him, what the crow had said.

Mopsus replied: "Crows have only two topics-the weather and 
love. This crow was talking to you about love, assuring you that all 
was well."