Homer: Iliad VIII and IX

134 Pages·1996·11.937 MB·English

by  C. H. Wilson

HOMER
Iliad
Books VIII & IX
Edited with an Introduction, Translation and Commentary
by
C.H. Wilson
Advisory Editor: MM* Willcock
HOMER
ILIAD BOOKS VHIANDIX
Edited with an Introduction, Translation & Commentary
by
Christopher H. Wilson
ARIS & PHILLIPS LTD - WARMINSTER - ENGLAND
© Christopher Η. Wilson 1996. All rights reserved. No part of this publication may be
reproduced or stored in a retrieval system or transmitted in any form or by any means
Contents
including photocopying without the prior permission of the Publishers in writing.
British Library Cataloguing-in-Publication Data Preface
A catalogue record for this book is available from the
British Library. Abbreviations
Bibliography
ISBNs 0 85668 627 1 (cloth)
0 85668 628 X (cloth)
INTRODUCTION
A. Homer and the Iliad
1. The Mycenaean and Dark Ages
2. The Epic Cycle
3. Homer
4. Oral Poetry: Formulas and Themes
B. Books VIE and DC
5. Books Vm and DC and the Iliad
6. BookVm
7. Book DC
Basic Homeric Grammar
Scansion: The Homeric Hexameter
TEXT AND TRANSLATION
Iliad VIII
Iliad DC
COMMENTARY
Iliad VIII
Iliad DC
Printed and published in England by Aris & Phillips Ltd, Teddington House,
Warminster, Wiltshire BA12 8PQ
Index
ν
Preface
This edition is intended primarily for students. The text is that of Allen's 1931
edition (Oxford), with one or two small changes, all of which follow at least one of
Allen's Oxford Classical Text and Willcock's 1978 edition. There is no apparatus
critic us, but it is hoped that the grammatical and linguistic notes at the bottom of
each page of the text and translation will help to make Iliad VBL and IX accessible to
students who are not yet very familiar with Homer's Greek.
In anglicizing Greek proper nouns and their derivatives, I have usually
transliterated; but I have retained familiar forms such as Argive, Helen, Hellespont,
Peloponnese, and Priam.
Professor J. Griffin's Homer Iliad IX (Cambridge, 1995) was unfortunately not
available to me before I had finished my own work.
I should like to thank the General Editor of this series, Professor Malcolm
Willcock, for encouraging me to undertake this work, for the great help that he has
given me over matters both large and small and for saving me from a great number of
mistakes. There is the usual caution to be made about the errors that still remain in
my work.
Christopher H. Wilson
Tonbridge, Autumn, 1996
vi Vll
Abbreviations Bibliography
acc. accusative infin. infinitive Adkins, AWH (1960) Merit and responsibility, Oxford.
act. active intrans. intransitive _ (1972) 'Homeric gods and the values of Homeric society', JHS 92,
adj. adjective JHS Journal of Hellenic Studies 1-19.
adv. adverb LSJ The Greek-English Lexicon of Ameis, KF, Hentze, C & Cauer, Ρ (1965) Homers Was, reprinted, Amsterdam.
Liddell & Scott Andersen, 0 and Dickie, M, eds. (1995) Homer's World, Bergen.
AJP American Journal of Philology m. masculine Andrewes, A (1961) 'Phratries in Homer1, Hermes 89,124-35.
aor. aorist mid. middle Arend, W (1933) Die typischen Scenen bei Homer, Berlin.
BICS Bulletin of the Institute of ms(s). manuscript(s) Blegen, CW (1963) Troy and the Trojans, London.
Classical Studies n. neuter Boardman, J (1985) Greek Ar?, London.
CQ Classical Quarterly nom. nominative Bremer, JM, de Jong, IFF & Kalff, J eds. (1987) Homer: beyond oral poetry. Recent
dat dative Od Odyssey trends in Homeric interpretation, Amsterdam.
fem. feminine optat. optative Burkert, W (1976) 'Das hunderttorige Theben und die Datierung der Ilias', Wiener
ftlt. future part. participle Studien N.F. 10.
G&R Greece and Rome pass. passive (1985) Greek religion, trans. J. Raffan, Oxford.
GB Grazer Beitrage perf. perfect Camps, WA (1980) An introduction to Homer, Oxford.
gen. genitive pers. person Carpenter, TH (1991) Art and myth in ancient Greece, London.
GRBS Greek, Roman & Byzantine pi. plural Chantraine, Ρ (1968-80) Dictionnaire itymologique de la langue grecque, Paris.
Studies plupf. pluperfect Coffey, Μ (1957) The function of the Homeric simile', AJP 78, 113-32.
HSCP Harvard Studies in Classical pres. present Davies, Μ (1989) The epic cycle, Bristol.
Philology s. singular Davison, JA (1962) 'The Homeric question', in Wace & Stubbings (1962), 234-65.
II. Iliad subjunc. subjunctive de Jong, IJF (1987) Narrators andfocalizers: the presentation of the story in the
imperat. imperative trans. transitive Iliad, Amsterdam.
imperf. imperfect voc. vocative Denniston, JD (1934) The Greek particles, Oxford.
Dickinson, Ο (1994) The Aegean bronze age, Cambridge.
Dindorf, G & Maass, Ε (1875-88) Scholia Graeca in Homeri Iliadem, Oxford
Dodds, ER (1951) The Greeks and the irrational, Berkeley & Los Angeles.
Dowden, Κ (1992) The uses of Greek mythology, London.
Easton, D (1985) 'Has the Trojan war been found?', Antiquity 59, 188-96.
Edwards, MW (1970) 'Homeric speech introductions', HSCP 74,1-36.
(1987) Homer poet of the Iliad, Baltimore & London.
(1991) The Iliad: A Commentary. Volume V: books 17-20,
Cambridge.
Emlyn-Jones, C, Hardwick, L & Purkis J eds. (1992) Homer, readings and images,
London.
Erbse, Η (1969-77) Scholia Graeca in Homeri Iliadem, Berlin.
Evelyn-White, HG (1936) Hesiod, the Homeric Hymns and Homerica, Loeb,
Cambridge, Mass.
Fagles, R trans. (1991) Homer; The Iliad, London.
ix
Vlll
Fenik, Β (1968) Typical battle-scenes in the Iliad, Hermes Einzelschriften 21, Manning, S (1992) 'Archaeology and the world of Homer: introduction to a past and
Wiesbaden. present discipline', in Emlyn-Jones, etc. (1992), 117-44.
Finkelberg, Μ (1991) 'Royal succession in heroic Greece', CQ 41, 303-16. Monro, DB (1891) A grammar of the Homeric dialect 2, Oxford.
Fitzgerald, R trans. (1984) Homer; The Iliad, Oxford. (1894) Homer: Iliad Books I-XII, Oxford.
Foxhall, L & Davies, JK eds. (1984) The Trojan war. its historicity and context, Mooro, DB and Allen, TW (1920) Homeri opera I: Iliad I-XII3, Oxford Classical
Bristol. Text, Oxford.
Gieenhalgh, PAL (1973) Early Greek warfare: horsemen and chariots in the Homeric Moorehead, C (1994) The lost treasures of Troy, London.
and archaic ages, Cambridge. Moulton, C (1977) Similes in the Homeric poems, Hypomnemata 49, Gottingen.
Griffin, J (1976) 'Homeric pathos & objectivity', CQ 26, 161-87. Murray, Ο (1993) Early Greece 2, London.
(1977) The epic cycle and the uniqueness of Homer', JHS 97, 39-53. Nilsson, MP (1932) The Mycenaean origins of Greek mythology, Berkeley & Los
(1980) Homer on life and death, Oxford. Angeles.
(1986) Words and speakers in Homer', JHS 106, 36-57. (1933) Homer and Mycenae, London.
Hainsworth, JB (1966) 'Joining battle in Homer', G&R 13, 158-66. Owen, ET (1947) The story of the Iliad, London.
(1968) The flexibility of the Homeric formula, Oxford. Page, DL (1959) History and the Homeric Iliad, Berkeley & Los Angeles.
(1984) The fallibility of an oral heroic tradition', in Foxhall & Parry, A (1971) The making of Homeric verse: the collected papers of Milman
Davies (1984), 111-28. Parry, Oxford.
(1989) The language of Achilles and other papers, Oxford.
- (1990) The Iliad: A Commentary. Volume III: books 9-12,
Pfeiffer, R (1968) History of classical scholarship, Oxford.
Cambridge.
Pinsent, J (1984) The Trojans and the Iliad', in Foxhall & Davies, (1984).
Hammond, Μ trans. (1987) Homer: The Iliad, London.
Potscher, W (1993) 'Die homerische Presbeia in religioser und in poetischer Sicht -
Heubeck, A, West, S and Hainsworth, JB (1988) A commentary on Homer's
ihre Duale und deren Sinn', GB 19,1-33.
Odyssey. Volume I, Oxford.
Redfield, JM (1975) Nature and culture in the IUad: the tragedy of Hector, Chicago
Hooker, JT (1987) 'Homeric society - a shame-culture?', G&R 34, 121-5.
& London.
Hope Simpson, R and Lazenby, JF (1970) The catalogue of the ships in Homer's
Reinhardt, Κ (1961) Die Was und ihrDichter, Gottingen.
Iliad, Oxford.
Janko, R (1992) 77z* Iliad: A Commentary. Volume IV: books 13-16, Cambridge. Richardson, Ν (1993) The Iliad: A Commentary. Volume VI: books 21-24,
Jones, PV (1988) Homer's Odyssey: a companion, Bristol. Cambridge.
Kakridis, JT (1949) Homeric Researches, Lund. Rosner, JA (1976) 'The speech of Phoenix: Iliad 9.434-605', Phoenix 30, 314-27.
(1971) Homer Revisited, Lund. Rutherford, RB (1986) The philosophy of the Odyssey', JHS 106,145-62.
Kirk, GS (1962) The songs of Homer, Cambridge. Schadewaldt, W (1965) Von Homers Welt und Werk*, Stuttgart.
(1985) The Iliad: A Commentary. Volume I: books 1-4, Cambridge. Segal, C (1968) The Embassy and the Duals of IUad 9. 182-98', GRBS 9, 101-14.
(1990) The Iliad: A Commentary. Volume II: books 5-8, Cambridge. Sherratt, ES (1992) 'Reading the texts: archaeology .and the Homeric question', in
Lattimore, R trans. (1951) The Iliad of Homer, Chicago. Emlyn-Jones, etc. (1992), 145-66.
Leaf, W (1900) The Iliad. Vol. I: Books I-XIP, London. Silk, MS (1987) Homer: the Iliad, Cambridge.
Liddell, HG and Scott, R (1940) A Greek-English Lexicon 9, revised by Jones, HS, Snodgrass, AM (1964) Early Greek armour and weapons, Edinburgh.
Oxford (referred to as LSI). (1971) Vie dark age of Greece, Edinburgh.
Lloyd-Jones, Η (1983) The justice of Zeus2, Berkeley & Los Angeles. (1974) Άη historical Homeric society?', JHS 94,114-25.
Lohmann, D (1970) Die Komposition derReden in derllias, Berlin. Taplin, Ο (1992) Homeric soundings: the shaping of the Iliad, Oxford.
Lord, AB (1960) The singer of tales, Cambridge, Mass. Taylour, Lord W (1983) The Mycenaeans2, London.
— (1991) Epic singers and oral tradition, Cornell Wace, AJB and Stubbings, FH eds. (1962) A companion to Homer, London.
Lorimer, HL (1950) Homer and the monuments, London. West, ML (1981) The singing of Homer and the modes of early Greek music', JHS
Luke, J (1994) The krater, kratos, and the polls', G&R 51, 23-32. 101, 113-29.
(1988) 'The rise of the Greek epic', JHS 108,151-72.
Macleod,CW { m i) Homer: Iliad Book XXIV, Cambridge.
χ 1
Willcock, MM (1964) 'Mythological Paradeigma in the Iliad, CQ 14, 141-54.
(1970) 'Some aspects of the gods in the Iliad,' BICS 17, 1-10. Introduction
(1976) A companion to the Iliad, Chicago & London.
(1978) The Iliad of Homer Books I-XII, and (1984) The Iliad of
Note: Dates throughout are B.C. unless otherwise stated
Homer Books XIII-XXIV, London.
(1990) The search for the poet Homer', G&R 37, 1-13.
(1995) The importance of Iliad 8', in Andersen & Dickie (1995), A. Homer and the Iliad
113-121.
1. The Mycenaean and the Dark Ages
Wood, Μ (1985) In search of the Trojan war, London.
Yamagata, Ν (1991) Thoinix's speech - Is Achilles punished?', CQ 41,1-15.
Homer announces the subject of the Iliad with the invocation to the Muse with which
Zanker, G (1992) 'Sophocles' Ajax and the heroic values of the Iliad, CQ 42, 20¬
he begins the poem - 'Sing, goddess, the anger of the son of Peleus, Akhilleus, the
25.
accursed anger, .. - from the time when they first separated in quarrel, the* son of
(1994) The heart of Achilles: characterization and persotial ethics in the
Atreus, the lord of men, and the godlike Akhilleus' (11-7).
Iliad, Michigan.
The son of Atreus was Agamemnon, who was the commander-in-chief of a
punitive expedition which the Greeks, or, as Homer commonly calls them, the
'Akhaians', launched against the city of Troy, in the north-west corner of Asia Minor.
Akhilleus was the leading warrior on the Akhaian side. When the poem begins the
Akhaians are encamped, as they have been throughout the previous nine years since
the war began, on the shore outside the walls of Troy. As it is related by Homer, the
story of the quarrel occupies a space of about twenty-four days, during which time
the war drags remorselessly on, the warriors kill and are killed, and the gods
intervene on behalf of their favourites, now on one side and now on the other. When
the poem ends, the Akhaians have not yet taken Troy, as they will eventually do.
The Iliad, therefore, gives us no more than an insight into the Trojan war as a whole.
Homer gives hints, both of how the war began and of how it will end; and some of
his scenes may be thought of as generic ones, which convey a typical picture of
incidents that must have been continually repeated throughout the ten years of the
war. The poem seeks to give a flavour of what the whole war was like; but the Iliad
is very far from being a historian's account of the war.
The questions of whether there ever was a Trojan war, and of whether any germ
of truth underlies the events of the Iliad, were raised in ancient times, and are still a
matter of much debate today. We do not yet know of a historical Agamemnon or
Akhilleus. But we do know that during the later Bronze Age, from, very
approximately, 1600 to 1100, a number of palace centres were established in Greece,
including one at Mukenai, the site in the north-east of the Peloponnese which Homer
represents as the capital of Agamemnon. During this period, which is commonly
called 'the Mycenaean age', the Greek language was first spoken on the mainland,
and the mainland Greeks, Homer's Akhaians, established considerable trading
contacts overseas. Judging from the Greek pottery discovered there, one overseas
centre where such contacts were particularly flourishing was that at Hissarlik, in
north-west Turkey, just inland from the entrance to the Dardanelles from the south.
It was at Hissarlik that the celebrated Heinrich Schliemann in the I870's uncovered a
2 INTRODUOTON INTRODUCTION 3
massive ancient site that he himself had no doubt was Troy. Schliemann's Kerberos and bring it back to his master Eurustheus; and in his speech at the embassy
archaeological methods were, by modern standards, primitive, and his attitude to the in IX Phoinix recalls his tutelage of the youthful Akhilleus (478-94), and then tells
truth sometimes cavalier; but few scholars would now be disposed to doubt that the the story of the war between the Aitolians and the Kouretes, and of Meleagros'
identification of the Hissarlik site with Troy is correct. The site has been the subject withdrawal and return, including within this references to the Kaludonian boar, the
of extensive excavation since Schliemann's day, up to and including the present; and discord within Meleagros' family, and some excerpts from the family history of
it seems highly likely that it underwent violent destruction somewhere around 1220, Meleagros' wife Kleopatre, or Alkuone (529-99). Elsewhere, Glaukos, a warrior on
a date which on other grounds seems a likely one for a possible Trojan war. But the Trojan side, details the adventures of his grandfather Bellerophontes at VI 155¬
indisputable evidence for such a war remains absent; that the Iliad represents a war 202; and in the course of a long speech to Patroklos at the end of XI (668-761)
that really did take place remains no more than an assumption, albeit an attractive Nestor recalls exploits from his now far-distant youth, when he led his fellow-men of
and interesting one. Pulos against the neighbouring Eleians. Homer has at his disposal a great body of
The end of the second millennium was a period of widespread destruction mythological stories, which he draws on as occasion offers, and often in an allusive
throughout the eastern Mediterranean world. If the Mycenaean Greeks did sack and elliptical way which assumes that his audience is already familiar with the story.
Troy, then this must have been one of their final achievements. Somewhere around The chronological span of Homer's repertoire is really quite limited. He does not
1100 the palaces on the mainland were destroyed - it is not known for certain by tell us of the creation of the gods, or of the universe; and rich and diverse as his
whom; and with them their culture perished too. The art of writing was lost, overseas stories are, they fall within no more than the three or four generations that led up to
trade declined, and there ensued a period that is known as the Dark Age - partly the Trojan war. Such post-war stories as he gives (these are more common in the
because our knowledge of it is so scanty, and partly because such knowlege as we do Odyssey than the Iliad) do not go more than one generation beyond the war. The
have shows an age that was much inferior culturally and economically to the ages setting of the stories is the Mycenaean age; and there is considerable evidence to
before and after. This Dark Age continued into the eighth century. suggest that many, at least, of the stories originated then - rather, that is, than
originating later and being set in what is by then a past age. There was a body of
For Greece in the Bronze Age, and for the Mycenaeans, see Dickinson, and Taylour. epic poems (all of them considerably shorter than the Iliad and the Odyssey), which
For the archaeology of the site of Troy, see Manning; for archaeology and the Trojan later came to be known as the Epic Cycle, which between them told the whole story
war, Easton; and for Schliemann, Moorehead. Wood gives a colourful account of the of the Trojan war - from the gods' original decision to cause the war through to the
story of the archaeologists' search for the Trojan war. On the Dark Age, see quarrel between Agamemnon and Akhilleus with which the Iliad begins, and then
Snodgrass 1971. See also Section 3 of this Introduction. from the death of the Trojan leader Hektor (the final event in the fighting of the Iliad)
through to the end of the war, the return home of the various Akhaian heroes, and
ultimately to the death of Odusseus, whose return is the subject of the Odyssey. Only
2. The Epic Cycle
small fragments of these poems have survived; but their subjects are known from
The Iliad narrates directly no more than 24 days or so of the final year of the Trojan summaries that were later made of them. We also hear of epics on such subjects as
war; but there are frequent references in it to episodes of the war that occurred the story of Thebes, the family of Oidipous, and the adventures of Herakles, and of
outside this brief period. At DC 129 and 366-7 we hear of the raiding operations that the Argonauts, some of which may, though this is not certain, have been included in
Akhilleus had carried out in the towns and islands around Troy; from the moment the Epic Cycle; and when Homer tells us of, for example, the Kaludonian boar, and
that Akhilleus finally decides to rejoin the fighting his eventual death in it is referred the exploits of Nestor in his youth, it is often assumed that these stories must go back
to, or at least hinted at, repeatedly; and at II701-2 and XV 704ff. Homer recalls the to, respectively, an Aitolian and a Pulian cycle of epic, even though explicit evidence
very first incident in the fighting, when Protesilaos was killed as he leapt ashore of such cycles has now disappeared. Homer's poems are part of a network of tales
when the Akhaian fleet first arrived at Troy. And often Homer relies on his which surround the Trojan war as a whole.
audience's knowledge of episodes that he does not himself narrate. When, for It seems that the poems of the Epic Cycle, though precise dates are usually very
example, Helen appears in Book III, Homer takes for granted that we already know difficult to arrive at, were composed later than the Iliad, but that the material which
how she was abducted by the Trojan prince Paris from her husband Menelaos, king they contained did already exist at the time of the Iliad, and would have been
of Sparta and brother of Agamemnon, and how this led to the present war. available tcPHomer. When, therefore, we find in Homer stories whose details are at
Homer also alludes to many incidents from outside the Trojan war. At VIII 364¬ odds with the tradition as it has come to us from elsewhere, it is difficult to be certain
70 Athene recalls how Herakles went down to the underworld to recover the hound whether Homer is giving what in his day was the received version of the tradition,
4 INTRODUCTION INTRODUCTION 5
and the variations from it arose later, or whether Homer is himself introducing and what other works, if any, are to be attributed to the same composer, are questions
variations, and our other version, although itself composed later than Homer, which are still debated. But the following points are more or less generally agreed -
represents a tradition from which Homer has departed. All we can be entirely certain
a. The date of composition is most probably towards the end of the eighth century.
of is that the tales clearly did not exist in canonical form; the fact of variations in the
There are occasional references to objects and customs that on archaeological
different accounts that have survived of what is basically the same story is
grounds seem to rule out an earlier date - hoplite fighting tactics are a commonly
undeniable. A great deal of work has been done on Homer and the tradition as it may
given example; and the very few passages which might seem to suggest a date later
have existed in his day; and when the details of the stories as he gives them are
than 700 are commonly explained away as later interpolations.
closely examined, there are sometimes some grounds for believing that Homer is
In the eighth century, Greece was reawakening after the hardships and
responsible for the departures that his version represents from the tradition as we find
impoverishment of the Dark Age. The century was one of much colonization - i.e.
it elsewhere, even though our other sources are all later than Homer. In his
founding of new cities - overseas; and this must have led to a considerable rise in
examination of the Meleagros story in Book DC, Willcock 1964 makes a strong case
trading and cultural contacts with the world outside Greece. The Greeks were
for believing that Homer's paradigmatic use of this story - Phoinix is presenting it to
becoming more conscious of themselves. The Olympic games, held every four years
Akhilleus as an example of conduct which he should, or more accurately should not,
and open to entrants from all over the Greek world, are supposed to have begun in
follow - has led him to reshape it in such a way that it fits his paradigm better than
776; and there was a great upsurge in the importance of the oracle at Delphi (see DC
the probable received version would have done; and he draws the same conclusion
405), which, like the Olympic games, was a panhellenic institution, i.e. attended from
from the other stories of Homer's that he discusses. The story of Nestor in his chariot
all over the Greek world. At the same time, a new Greek alphabet evolved, probably
being rescued by Diomedes at VIII 80ff. has aroused particular discussion in this
from Phoenician sources; and in painted pottery the rigid geometric patterns of the
connection. One of the poems of the Epic Cycle, called the Aithiopis, continued the
Dark Age began to give way to more lively designs, many of them featuring real or
story of the Trojan war from immediately after the burial of Hektor; and we know
imaginary animals, that came to Greece from the east, and by about the end of the
that it contained a story of Nestor's chariot being immobilised when one of its horses
century the first representations of scenes from mythology were beginning to appear.
was shot by an arrow from Paris, whereupon Nestor was rescued by his son
The century also saw greatly renewed interest in graves from the Bronze Age, and in
Antilokhos, a success which, however, cost Antilokhos his life. At VIE 81 it is again
the hero-cults that were associated with them. It is appropriate that such a period
Paris who has shot one of Nestor's horses; and though it is this time Diomedes who
should have produced the Iliad, an epic that commemorates the earliest known action
saves Nestor, and without losing his life, yet a number of scholars argue that the Iliad
of a panhellenic force against a foreign power. Homer more than once explicitly
episode is a refashioning of a tale whose original form is the one that was followed in
distances his heroes and their exploits from his own times, saying that they
the Aithiopis - though this is to be regarded as controversial.
performed feats which would be beyond his contemporaries; and in historical terms,
he is looking back across the Dark Age, from the reawakening of Greece in his own
On the Epic Cycle, see Davies; for the surviving fragments, see the Loeb edition,
day back to the late Mycenaean age.
Hesiod, the Homeric Hymns, and Homerica, of Evelyn-White. On Greek mythology
and the Mycenaean age, see Nilsson 1932; on Greek epic before Homer, West 1988.
b. The Iliad was composed, not in mainland Greece, but somewhere in the eastern
Kakridis 1949 and 1971 examines Homer's tales in relation to the tradition as he may
Aegean or on the western seaboard of Asia Minor. The simile at DC 4-7, where the
have found it On Meleagros, see Willcock 1964. Griffin 1977 considers differences
north and west winds are described as blowing from Thrace, which is the eastern half
in approach between Homer and the poets of the Epic Cycle. On the Iliad and the
of the Balkan peninsula, is one of several passages which suggest a composer with a
Aithiopis, see Willcock 1976, Appendix D, 285-7.
viewpoint from the eastern Aegean rather than from mainland Greece. The island of
Khios has since ancient times been suggested as Homer's birthplace - we hear of a
3. Homer guild of reciters known as the Homeridae, 'descendants of Homer', there in the sixth
century; and Smyrna, the modern Izmir, opposite Khios on the Asiatic mainland also
We know virtually nothing of the author of the Iliad other than what we can gather has some claims.
from the poem itself. Already to the Greeks of the classical period of the fifth
century Homer was a shadowy figure, little more than a name; and such stories as we c. The poem is an oral composition. Both the poet and his audience may well have
hear about him are unreliable, and often implausible. When the Iliad was composed, been illiterate. (Literacy had been one of the casualties of the Dark Age.) The text of
the Iliad is basically the record of a performance of the poem, and in this respect is
INTRODUCTION INTRODUCTION 7
6
quite unlike the texts of later epic poems such as Virgil's Aeneid or Milton's Paradise On the date of the Iliad, see Silk, 2-5; on the historical background, Kirk 1962, Part
Lost. The poet does not read from a text, nor does he recite from memory (except in 1, 3-51. On the development of art in the eighth century, see Boardman, chaps. 1
a passage such as Odusseus' delivery of Agamemnon's offer to Akhilleus at IX 264¬ and 2, and Carpenter, chap. 1. On oral poetry, see the next section of this
99, which is an almost verbatim recall of the original offer which Agamemnon introduction. On bards, see West 1981, 101 and 113-29. On the 'Homeric question',
presented to the Akhaian leaders, in the absence of Akhilleus, at 122-57). Rather, he and the transmission of the text, see J.A. Davison, in Wace-Stubbings, 234-66; also
improvises as he performs; a parallel has been suggested between the oral poet and Parry 1971, Introduction, ix-lxii, and Have we Homer's Iliadl, in Parry 1989, 104¬
the jazz musician. The exact nature and circumstances of the performance are 40.
completely obscure; but it is tempting to suppose - though it can be no more than
supposition - that, apart from the great difference in scale of the Iliad, the
4. Oral Poetry: Formulas and Themes
performance may have resembled the performances of Phemios at the court of
Our understanding of the way in which Homer's language and diction reflect the oral
Odusseus in Ithaka, and of Demodokos at the court of Alkinoos in Skherie, which are
method of his composition was significantly advanced by the work of Milman Parry.
described in Books I and VIII of the Odyssey respectively. These men are
Parry directed his attention to Homer's use of the formula - which he defined as 'a
professional bards, who are at the beck and call of their masters, and are summoned
group of words which is regularly employed under the same metrical conditions to
to ceremonial occasions to sing what their audiences require of them, accompanying
express a given essential idea' (Parry 1971, 272). Parry began with the name-plus-
themselves on the lyre as they do so. They rely for their knowledge on the Muse of
epithet formulas, such as 'swift-footed Akhilleus' and 'long-suffering god-like
poetry, who Tcnows all things' (//. II485); and their songs are what we should now
Odusseus'; and he showed that such formulas were the building-blocks of Homer's
call Tieroic poetry'. Phemios sings of the homecomings of the Akhaian heroes from
versifying repertoire, metrically convenient expressions which he calls on as required
Troy, and Demodokos gives three separate tales, two from the Trojan war, and one
and which help him to keep his song going.
from the life of the gods in their home on Mount Olumpos.
For an understanding of what follows, knowledge of the scansion of the Homeric
<L We do not know when the text of the Iliad was first put into writing. This could hexameter is essential. This is set out at pp. 43-47 of this Introduction.
have been immediately, or very soon, after its composition; or the poem may at first Suppose that Homer has some action of Akhilleus to describe, something that he
have been committed to memory, and passed on from one singer to the next, with the did, thought, or felt, and that the description of this action fills the first four feet of
text only taking written form some considerable time after the performance of which his hexameter line.
it is a record. We hear of public performances of the poem being given at the
Panathenaic festivals at Athens in the sixth century, which would seem to presuppose Then the formula 'godlike Akhilleus', Βίος Άχιλλεύ^, is available to make up the
some sort of official text. But our manuscripts of the poem derive from the work of final two feet of the line. But if the description of the action ends at the second
the scholars at the great library of the Ptolemies in Alexandria in the third and second syllable of a three-syllable third foot, then this formula is expanded to
centuries, who established a text that is known as the vulgate. The history of the
transmission of the text before that is a vexed subject; but it seems probable that there
'swift-footed godlike Akhilleus', ποδαρκή^ Βίος Άχιλλεύς·. Or, from the second
was no standard text prior to the vulgate. Many extracts from the poem survive from
syllable in the fourth foot, Akhilleus is again 'swift-footed', but the vocabulary
before the time of the vulgate, both in quotations by other authors and in papyrus
fragments; and the many discrepancies that these reveal make the existence of a
is different - πόδα^ ώκύς Αχιλλεύ^. These three positions, the third syllable of the
standard text seem unlikely.
third foot, the second syllable of the fourth foot, and the beginning of the fifth foot,
are very common ones at which the description of an action with which the line has
e. How far our text is a faithful record of the original composition, and how far it has
begun comes to an end, and a formula begins and runs on from there to the end of the
been overlaid by amendments and interpolations, are questions that have produced
line. So, depending on the length of the description of an action which he has
enormous debate. Most scholars nowadays would feel that this debate has been
pursued to excessive lengths, and that, while one or two passages in our texts of the
Iliad and Odyssey have stolen in from elsewhere (in the Iliad Book X is usually done in the first part of the line, Odusseus may be 'godlike', Βιος Όδυσσεύ^, or
regarded as an intruder), the fundamental integrity of the text is not in dispute.
'long-suffering godlike', πολότλα? Βίος Όδυσσεύς, or 'resourceful', πολύμητι^