‘My poor countrymen, what monstrous madness is this? Do you believe the foe has sailed away? Do you think that any gifts of the Greeks are free from treachery? Is Ulysses known to be this sort of man? Either enclosed in this frame there lurk Achaeans, or this has been built as an engine of war against our walls, to spy into our homes and come down upon the city from above; or some trickery lurks inside. Men of Troy, trust not the horse. Whatever it be, I fear the Greeks, even when bringing gifts.

’ So saying, with mighty force he hurled his great spear at the beast’s side an the arched frame of the belly. The spear stood quivering and with the cavity’s reverberation the vaults rang hollow, sending forth a moan. And had the gods’ decrees, had our mind not been perverse, he would have driven us