Met. 3.692"Praebuimus longīs" Pentheus "ambāgibus aurēs"
inquit "ut īra morā vīrēs absūmere posset.'We have lent our ears to your long rigmarole,' says Pentheus, 'so that anger might use up its strength by delay. Met. 3.694Praecipitem famulī rapite hunc cruciātaque dīrīs
695corpora tormentīs Stygiae dēmittite noctī."Servants, seize him headlong, and send his body, racked with dreadful tortures, down to Stygian night.' Met. 3.696Prōtinus abstractus solidīs Tyrrhēnus Acoetēs
clauditur in tēctīs;At once Tyrrhenian Acoetes is dragged off and shut up in a solid building; Met. 3.697et dum crūdēlia iussae
īnstrūmenta necis ferrumque ignēsque parantur,
sponte suā patuisse forēs lapsāsque lacertīs
700sponte suā fāma est nūllō solvente catēnās.and while the cruel instruments of the ordered death, iron and fire, are being prepared, the story goes that the doors opened of their own accord, and that the chains slipped from his arms of their own accord with no one loosing them. Met. 3.701Perstat Echīonidēs.Echion's son persists. Met. 3.701Nec iam iubet īre, sed ipse
vādit, ubi ēlēctus facienda ad sacra Cithaerōn
cantibus et clārā bacchantum vōce sonābat.Now he no longer orders others to go, but goes himself to where Cithaeron, chosen for the performance of the rites, was resounding with songs and the clear voices of the Bacchants.
Met. 3.704Ut fremit ācer equus, cum bellicus aere canōrō
705signa dedit tubicen, pugnaeque adsūmit amōrem,
Penthea sīc ictus longīs ululātibus aethēr
mōvit, et audītō clamōre recanduit īra.As a spirited horse snorts when the war-trumpeter has given the signal on the sounding bronze, and takes on a love of battle, so the air, struck by long wailing, roused Pentheus, and at the shout he heard his anger grew white-hot again. Met. 3.708Monte ferē mediō est, cingentibus ultima silvīs,
pūrus ab arboribus, spectābilis undique campus.About the middle of the mountain, with woods girding its edges, there is a plain clear of trees, visible from every side. Met. 3.710Hīc oculīs illum cernentem sacra profānīs
prīma videt, prīma est īnsānō concita cursū,
prīma suum missō violāvit Penthea thyrsō
māter.Here, as he watches the rites with profane eyes, the first to see him, the first to be stirred to run in mad career, the first to wound her own Pentheus with a hurled thyrsus, was his mother. Met. 3.713"Iō, geminae" clāmāvit "adeste sorōrēs!'Io, my two sisters,' she cried, 'come here!
Met. 3.714ille aper, in nostrīs errat quī maximus agrīs,
715ille mihi feriendus aper."That boar which wanders, hugest of all, in our fields, that boar I must strike.' Met. 3.715Ruit omnis in ūnum
turba furēns;The whole raging crowd rushes upon one man; Met. 3.716cūnctae coeunt trepidumque sequuntur,
iam trepidum, iam verba minus violenta loquentem,
iam sē damnantem, iam sē peccāsse fatentem.they all gather and pursue him in his fear, in fear now, now speaking less violent words, now condemning himself, now confessing he had sinned. Met. 3.719Saucius ille tamen "fer opem, mātertera" dīxit
720"Autonoë!Yet, wounded, he said, 'Help me, aunt Autonoe! Met. 3.720moveant animōs Actaeonis umbrae."Let Actaeon's shade move your heart.' Met. 3.721Illa, quis Actaeōn, nescit dextramque precantis
abstulit: Īnōō lacerāta est altera raptū.She does not know who Actaeon is, and tore off the right arm of the man praying: the other was torn away by Ino's wrenching. Met. 3.723Nōn habet īnfēlīx quae mātrī bracchia tendat,
trunca sed ostendēns dēiectīs vulnera membrīs
725"adspice, māter!"The unhappy man has no arms to stretch out to his mother, but showing the maimed wounds where his limbs had been torn away, 'Look, mother!' Met. 3.725ait.he says.
Met. 3.725Vīsīs ululāvit Agāuē
collaque iactāvit mōvitque per āera crīnem
āvulsumque caput digitīs complexa cruentīs
clāmat "iō comitēs, opus haec victōria nostrum est!"At the sight Agave howled, tossed her neck and shook her hair through the air, and clasping the torn-off head in her bloody fingers she cries, 'Io, comrades, this victory is our work!' Met. 3.729Nōn citius frondēs autumnī frīgore tāctās
730iamque male haerentēs altā rapit arbore ventus,
quam sunt membra virī manibus dīrepta nefandīs.No faster does the wind snatch from a tall tree the leaves touched by autumn's cold and now barely clinging, than the man's limbs were torn apart by those unspeakable hands. Met. 3.732Tālibus exemplīs monitae nova sacra frequentant
tūraque dant sānctāsque colunt Ismēnidēs ārās.Warned by such examples, the Ismenian women throng the new rites, offer incense, and worship at the holy altars.