Αἰ δ᾽ ἦχεσ ἔσλων ἴμερον ἤ κάλων,
καὶ μή τι ϝείπεν γλῶσσ᾽ ἐκύκα κάκον,
αἴδωσ κέ σ᾽ οὐ κίχανεν ὄππατ᾽
ἄλλ᾽ ἔλεγεσ περὶ τῶ δικαίωσ. [transcription]
Hadst thou wished for things good or noble and had not thy tongue formed evil speech, shame would not have shown from they eyes, but thou hadst spoken frankly about it.
Aristotle ("Rhetoric", i, 9), about 330 B.C., says "base things dishonour those who do or wish them, as Sappho showed when Alcaeus said:
᾽ιόπλοκ᾽ ἄγνα μελλιχόμειδε Σάπφοι
θέλω τι ϝείπεν ἄλλά με κωλύει αἴδωσ. [transcription]
"'Violet-weaving, chaste sweetly smiling Sappho, I would speak but bashfulness restrains me.'"
And she answered him in the words of the present fragment. Blass thinks that these two lines assigned to Alcaeus are also by Sappho, and about A.D. 1110 Anna Comnena certainly suggested the same authorship.