“Some report that Homer was older by birth than Hesiod—among this number are Philochorus and Xenophanes. But others say he was younger, including the poet Lucius Accius and Ephorus the historian. In the first book of On Images, however, Marcus Varro says that there is little agreement about which was born first, but that what is not in bout is that they lived at the same time. Evidence from this comes from the inscription on the tripod which was allegedly put on Mt. Helikon.
Accius, still, in book one of the Didasalica uses somewhat superficial arguments…he continues ‘since Homer, when he recounts at the start of his poem that Achilles is the son of Peleus and does not add who Peleus is—which is something he would have added if he had not seen it already explained by Hesiod (Fr. 211). Similarly, when it comes to the Cyclops’ Accius says, ‘Homer would have highlighted the fact that he was one-eyed and would not have passed over such a marvelous detail if it had not already been popularized in the older poems of Hesiod.”
(2) alii Homerum quam Hesiodum maiorem natu fuisse scripserunt, in quis Philochorus et Xenophanes; alii minorem, in quis L. Accius poeta et Ephorus historiae scriptor. (3) M. autem Varro in primo De imaginibus, uter prior sit natus, parum constare dicit, sed non esse dubium, quin aliquo tempore eodem vixerint; idque ex epigrammate ostendi, quod in tripode scriptum est, qui in monte Helikone ab Hesiodo positus traditur. (4) Accius autem in primo didascalico levibus admodum argumentis utitur … (5) quod Homerus, inquit, cum in principio carminis Achillem esse filium Pelei diceret, quis esset Peleus, non addidit; quam rem procul, inquit, dubio dixisset, nisi ab Hesiodo iam dictum videret. de Cyclope itidem, inquit, vel maxime quod unoculus fuit, rem tam insignem non praeterisset, nisi aeque prioris Hesiodi carminibus involgatum esset.
Tell me now, Olympus-dwelling Muses,
who first confronted Agamemnon,
an actual Trojan or famed ally?
Iphidamas, Antinor’s son, bold and burly
and reared in rich-soiled Thrace, mother of flocks.
Cisses raised him as a child in his halls,
the father of his mother, sweet-cheeked Theano.
When the splendid youth reached maturity,
to keep him there Cisses offered him his daughter.
He wed, but quit his bridal chamber when news came
of the Achaeans. Twelve ships went with him.
He left the balanced ships at Percote
and made his way on foot to Ilium.
This is who confronted Atreus’s son, Agamemnon.
11.227: . . . μετὰ κλέος ἵκετʼ Ἀχαιῶν (“when news came of the Achaeans”)
Is the preposition μετὰ temporal (“after,” “when”), as I have translated it, or is it purposive (“in pursuit of”)?
How you interpret μετὰ dictates how you interpret κλέος:
Temporal μετὰ should mean that κλέος is “news” (“he left when news came . . .”).
But purposive μετὰ should mean that κλέος is “glory” (“he went in pursuit of glory”).
The temptation to translate μετὰ κλέος as “in pursuit of glory” is understandable: preoccupation with glory is, after all, central to the epic, and men die in their quest for it.
In this particular passage, however, I believe the understandable temptation leads to error.
[2] What have the translators said?
There are those who interpret μετὰ in this passage as temporal: for example, Robert Fitzgerald, Robert Fagles, Edward McCorie, and more recently Caroline Alexander.
There are those who interpret it as purposive: for example, E.V. Rieu, Richard Lattimore, Peter Green, and more recently Stephen Mitchell and Barry Powell.
Then there’s Stanley Lombardo who manages to treat μετὰ as both temporal and purposive: “[he] went chasing after glory when he heard/The Achaeans were coming.”
This might be the place to point out that Iliad.13.363-366 (and perhaps others too) show the sketch of Iphidamas to be essentially formular. And for our purposes, what matters most is the reappearance of μετὰ κλέος in this later passage:
For he killed Orthryoneus who was there from Cabesus.
He’d recently come, after news [μετὰ κλέος] of the war.
He had begged Priam for his finest daughter,
Cassandra, and without a bride-price.
Are the translators consistent in their handling of μετὰ κλέος across the two passages? Some are, some aren’t.
I’ll only point out that Powell who treats the prepositional phrase as temporal in Iliad 11 treats it as purposive in Iliad 13. And Lombardo who would have it both ways in Iliad 11 interprets the phrase as unambiguously purposive in Iliad 13.
Judging from the split among translators, just what μετὰ κλέος means in 11.227 is controversial.
[3] The Scholia: Modest support for purposive μετὰ?
A single scholiast glosses μετὰ κλέος ἵκετʼ Ἀχαιῶν in a way which implies a stance on whether μετὰ is here temporal or purposive. The scholion reads:
“For this man’s undoing, there came the glory of the Greeks”
The word I’m rendering as “glory” is δόξα (“glory,” “splendor,” “repute”). The word I’m rendering as “there came” is “έγίνετο” (“it came into being,” “there was,” etc).
I find it plausible that the scholiast is treating δόξα and κλέος as synonyms, and έγίνετο and ἵκετʼ (“it came,” 3rd person aorist of ἱκέσθαι) as synonyms too.
As such, I take the phrase “there came the glory of the Greeks” (δόξα τών ‘Ελλήνων έγίνετο) to mean something like “an opportunity came to win glory from the Greeks” (τών ‘Ελλήνων as an objective genitive). There’s the purposive preposition at work.
Let me admit that this interpretation of the scholion might be strained, and this scholiast, like the others who commented on the line, does not help us.
[4] A hint from the Hexameter: μετὰ is temporal.
I’m going to suggest that Iliad.11.21-22, which tells why Cinyras gifted Agamemnon an elaborate corslet, supports interpreting μετὰ κλέος in 11.227 temporally.
The Cinyras passage (11.21-22) reads:
For he heard, from far-off Cyprus, the big news [μέγα κλέος]:
Achaeans were about to sail to Troy in their ships.
Cinyras acted when he heard “μέγα κλέος,” “the big news,” just as Iphidamas acted “μετὰ κλέος,” “after the news.” That’s the common theme.
Now the prosody. μέγα κλέος and μετὰ κλέος are structurally identical: In both passages, the phrases come directly after the caesura (the word break in the third dactylic foot). The first syllable of both μέγα and μετὰ contributes the final syllable of the third foot (short); and their second syllable contributes the long syllable which combines with the long first syllable of κλέος to form the fourth foot.
Simply put: Verses 11.21 and 11.227 have a common theme which is reinforced by common prosody. And the common theme is that of men acting on news.
“…Ill-fated Elpenor, the one Kirke’s home stole away–
Like Antiphanes and man-eating Polyphemos–
Of the immortal [ ] [stories like that] I will tell you..
[fragments]
…and the trials of Penelope.
Don’t disbelieve that Odysseus has returned home,
When you see the scar that not even Penelope has seen.
Quit the stable, Philoitios. I will relieve you
Of trembling before the suitors to wander with your cattle.
I will make your household free for you. But in turn
All of you take up arms by my side against Eurymakhos and the rest
Of the suitors. You are well versed in their evil
Just as Telemachus and prudent Penelope are.
Cowherd, pledge yourself…
Become….
I wrote a whole book about the Odyssey and just found out about this fragment. It is dated to the 3rd/4th century CE by Roberts in Catalogue of the Greek Papyri in the John Rylands Library. The hexameter is clearly later than Homer, but the story it tells is interesting: the bulk of the fragment seems to have Odysseus trying to convince the cow-herd Philoitios to join him in the fight against the suitors in exchange for a promise of manumission. This concept is really alien to the Homeric Odyssey
Philoitios is something of a silent double for Eumaios in the Odyssey as one of the “good” enslaved people. He closes the door on the suitors in book 21 (240) but speaks rarely. When He does, in book 20, he asks Eumaios who this stranger is, and confirms that he looks like a kingly man. He expresses sympathy with the stranger and tells Odysseus in disguise how much he misses his former master. Odysseus tells him that Odysseus will soon come home.
Odysseus, zijn zoon Telemachus, Eumaeus en Philoetius verlaten gewapend het paleis en gaan onderweg naar de vader van Odysseus: Laërtes. Minerva verbergt hen in duisternis op klaarlichte dag, zodat ze ongezien wegkomen.
“As in a dream he isn’t able to pursue the one fleeing
Nor in turn is he able to escape him, nor again can the other overtake him
So he can’t catch up to him with his feet and the other can’t get away”
“These three lines are athetized because they are simple in structure and thought and they indicate the uselessness of the chase and its unchangeable nature.”
“The poet wants to make clear the impossibility of the action, how these things are fantasies and not real, that they are achieving nothing: the first does not escape, the second cannot overtake him.”
Odysseus and Diomedes have learned that King Rhesus, bivouacking with his Thracian contingent, has with him some especially large and handsome horses. The warriors want them:
Homer. Iliad.10.469-493.
“The two advanced through battle arms and black blood,
and pushing on, quickly reached the Thracian force.
The men, spent, were asleep on the ground. Their war gear,
so fine, lay beside them, neatly arranged
in three rows. Each man’s yoked horses stood by him.
Rhesus slept among his men, hard by his fast horses.
They were tied to the chariot’s upper rim.
Odysseus saw him first and pointed:
‘Diomedes, that’s him! And those are the horses
the guy we killed, Dolon, told us about!
Come on! Unleash your awesome force!
Don’t stand here armored for nothing. Untie the horses.
Better still, you kill the men. I’ll deal with the horses.’
He said this. Bright-eyed Athena then inspired Diomedes
with fury: left and right he killed. Awful moans came
from men struck by his sword. The earth flowed red with blood.
Just as a lion coming upon untended flocks
(whether goats or sheep) bears evil in his pounce,
Tydeus’s son coursed through the Thracian force
until he’d killed twelve.
As for artful Odysseus–
whenever Tydeus’s son struck a man with his sword,
Odysseus would drag him aside by the leg,
thinking: this is how the horses with handsome manes
will pass through with ease, their hearts not trembling
trampling on bodies. They aren’t used to that yet.”
Astuanassa: A handmaid of Helen, Menelaos’ wife. She first discovered positions for intercourse and wrote On Sexual Positions. Philainis and Elephantinê rivaled her in this later—they were women who danced out these sorts of wanton acts.
We have learned about this embroidered girdle, that Hera took it from Aphrodite and gave it to Helen. Her handmaid Astuanassa stole it but Aphrodite took it back from her again.
As is largely unsurprising from the perspective of Greek misogyny, excessive interest in sexual behavior is projected a female quality. Expertise beyond interest is made the province of female ‘professionals’ (slaves) who may act as scapegoats and marginal figures for the corruption of both men and women. There is a combination of such interest with an excessive emphasis on eating (and eating really well) in Athenaeus where the pleasures of the body are combined.
Athenaeus, Deipnosophists 8.335c
“Dear men, even though I have great admiration for Chrysippus as the leader of the Stoa, I praise him even more because he ranks Arkhestratos, well-known for his Science of Cooking along with Philainis who is credited with a licentious screed about sexual matters—even though the iambic poet of Samos, Aiskhriôn, claims that Polycrates the sophist started this slander of her when she was really quite chaste. The lines go like this:
“I, Philainis, circulated among men
Lie here thanks to great old age.
Don’t laugh, foolish sailor, as your trace the cape
Nor make me a target of mockery or insult
For, by Zeus and his sons in Hell
I was never a slut with men nor a public whore.
Polykrates, Athenian by birth,
A bit clever with words and with a nasty tongue,
Wrote what he wrote. I don’t know anything about it.”
But the most amazing Chrysippus combines in the fifth book of his On Goodness and Pleasure that both “the books of Philianis and the Gastronomiai of Arkhestratos and forces of erotic and sexual nature, and in the same way slave-girls who are expert at these kinds of movements and positions and who are engaged in their practice.” He adds that they learn this type of material completely and then thoroughly possess what has been written on these topics by Philainis and Arkhestratos and those who have written on similar topics. Similarly, in his seventh book, he says ‘As you cannot wholly learn the works of Philianis and Arkhestratos’ Gastronomia because they do have something to offer for living better.’ “
The sacrifice of Iphigenia is a pivotal moment in the tale of the House of Atreus—it motivates Agamemnon’s murder and in turn the matricide of Orestes—and the Trojan War, functioning as it does as a strange sacrifice of a virgin daughter of Klytemnestra in exchange for passage for a fleet to regain the adulteress Helen, Iphigeneia’s aunt by both her father and mother. The account is famous in Aeschylus’ Agamemnon and the plays Iphigenia at Aulis and Iphigenia among the Taurians by Euripides. Its earliest accounts, however, provide some interesting variations:
Hes. Fr. 23.13-30
“Agamemnon, lord of men, because of her beauty,
Married the dark-eyed daughter of Tyndareus, Klytemnestra.
She gave birth to fair-ankled Iphimede in her home
And Elektra who rivaled the goddesses in beauty.
But the well-greaved Achaeans butchered Iphimede
on the altar of thundering, golden-arrowed Artemis
on that day when they sailed with ships to Ilium
in order to exact payment for fair-ankled Argive woman—
they butchered a ghost. But the deer-shooting arrow-mistress
easily rescued her and anointed her head
with lovely ambrosia so that her flesh would be enduring—
She made her immortal and ageless for all days.
Now the races of men upon the earth call her
Artemis of the roads, the servant of the famous arrow-mistress.
Last in her home, dark-eyed Klytemnestra gave birth
after being impregnated by Agamemnon to Orestes,
who, once he reached maturity, paid back the murderer of his father
and killed his mother as well with pitiless bronze.”
This fragment presents what is possibly the earliest account of the tale of Iphigenia and contains the major elements: the sacrifice of Agamemnon’s daughter is tied to vengeance against Helen; the daughter is rescued by Artemis, made immortal and made her servant. [In some traditions she is either made immortal or made into a priestess of Artemis at Tauris]. Orestes kills the murderer of his father and his mother. Continue reading “The Names of Agamemnon’s Daughters and the Death of Iphigenia”→
“So I was speaking, but [the Kyklops] did not answer me because of his pitiless heart.
But then he leapt up, shot out his hands at my companions,
Grabbed two together, and struck them against the ground
Like puppies. Brains were flowing out from them and they dyed the ground.
After tearing them limb from limb, he prepared himself a meal.
He ate them like a mountain-born lion and left nothing behind,
The innards, the meat, and the marrow-filled bones.”
My perplexity over this passage provides a good example of how Twitter can be used for good. Last year, I asked a question about killing puppies got some great responses. One found a later passage that deals with puppies and has some interesting thematic resonance with Odysseus’ development:
I think that all of these ideas are essential to a full interpretation of this passage. But, I do wonder if, in addition, we should consider ancient Greek practices of puppy sacrifice. I know that the following accounts are later, but what if we imagine the simile used here as evoking ideas of purification through sacrifice?
“Nearly all the Greeks made use of the dog in sacrifice and some still do today, for cleansing rituals. They also bring puppies for Hekate along with other purification materials; and they rub down people who need cleansing with the puppies.”
“The Greeks in their purification bring out the puppies and in many places use them in the practice called periskulakismos [‘carrying puppies around’]”
“Here, each of these groups of youths sacrifice a puppy to Enyalius, god of war, because they believe that it is best to make this most valiant of the domesticated animals to the bravest of the gods. I don’t know any other Greeks who believe it is right to sacrifice puppies to the gods except for the Kolophonians. For the Kolophonians sacrifice a black female puppy to the goddess of the Crossroad. The sacrifices of both the Kolophonians and the Spartan youths take place at night.”
“Indeed, the ancients did not consider this animal to be clean either: it was never sacrificed to one of the Olympian goes, but when it is given to Hekate at the cross-roads, it functions as part of the sacrifices that turn away and cleanse evil. In Sparta, they sacrifice dogs to the bloodiest of the gods, Enyalios. In Boiotia, it is the public cleansing ritual to walk between the parts of a dog that has been cut in half. The Romans themselves, during the Wolf-Festival which they call the Lupercalia, they sacrifice a dog in the month of purification.”
Odysseus’ sister Ktimene is mentioned by the swineherd Eumaios but never by Odysseus. The scholia connect her to one of Odysseus’ companions. The evidence for this seems to be the fact that Ktimene was sent to Same for marriage (where Eurylochus is from) and a kinship term used for him by Odysseus. Also of interest, according to the scholion, Odysseus may have had more sisters.
Homer, Odyssey 15.364-41
Strong Ktimenê, the youngest of the children she bore.
I was raised with her, and she honored me little less.
But when we both made it to much-praised youth,
They gave her to Samê and received much in return
But she gave me a cloak, tunic and clothing
Dressing me finely and give me sandals for my feet
And sent me to the field. But she loved me more in her heart.
“She bore the youngest of the children”: [this means] of the female children. For his father only had Odysseus [for a son]. There were more sisters of Odysseus.”
“So he spoke, and I was turning over in my thoughts
As I began to draw the sharp-edged sword next to my thick thigh,
Whether I should cut off his head and drive him to the ground
Even though he really was my relative. But our companions
Were restraining me with gentle words from all sides.”
“Pêos: A relative by marriage. In-law. Also, “in-lawness” [Pêosunê], relation-by-marriage. There is also Pêôn [genitive plural], for “of relatives-by-marriage. Homer has: “relatives and friends” [Il. 3.163]
“…There is a difference between in-law and friend. People who have no connection to you by birth are friends. In-laws are related to you through marriage.”
Let Phoinix, dear to Zeus, lead first of all
And then great Ajax and shining Odysseus.
And the heralds Odios and Eurubates should follow together.
Wash your hands and have everyone pray
So we can be pleasing to Zeus, if he takes pity on us.
So he spoke and this speech was satisfactory to everyone.
The heralds immediately poured water over their hands
And the servants filled their cups with wine.
And then they distributed the cups to everyone
And then they made a libation and drank to their fill. They left from Agamemnon’s, son of Atreus’ dwelling.
Gerenian Nestor, the horseman, was giving them advice,
Stopping to prepare each one, but Odysseus especially,
How to try to persuade the blameless son of Peleus.
The two of them went along the strand of the much-resounding sea, Both praying much to the earth-shaker Poseidon
That they might easily persuade the great thoughts of Aiakos’ grandson.
When the two of them arrived at the ships and the dwellings of the Myrmidons They found himthere delighting his heart with a clear-voiced lyre,
A well-made, beautiful one, set on a silver bridge.
Achilles stole it when he sacked and destroyed the city of Eetion.
He was pleasing his heart with it, and was singing the famous tales of men.
Patroklos was sitting there in silence across from him,
Waiting for Aiakos’ grandson to stop singing.
The two of them were walking first, but shining Odysseus was leading.
And they stood in frontof him. When Achilles saw them, he rose
With the lyre in his hand, leaving the place where he had been sitting.
Patroklos rose at the same time, when he saw the men.
As he welcomed those two, swift-footed Achilles addressed them.
“Welcome [you too]–really, dear friends two have come–the need must be great,
When these two [come] who are dearest of the Achaeans to me, even when I am angry.”
Early Greek at some point in its history had a full system of nominal and verbal endings for what we call the dual number. To add to the number distinction between singular and plural, both Greek and Sanskrit have a dual form to describe pairs of things acting together: eyes, twins, people, etc. In most cases the sound marking the dual is quite distinct: the combination wo in two and the long vowel in both are good examples of the vestigial dual persisting in English.
Classical Greek retained a limited use of the dual and Homeric Greek preserves it here and there. The most striking place where it shows up in the Iliad is in describing the movement of two heralds from one place to another. So, when Agamemnon sends heralds to retrieve the captive woman Briseis from Achilles in book 1 of the Iliad, we find dual forms for their pronouns and their verbal endings.
The embassy includes three speakers, Odysseus, Achilles’ older ‘tutor’ Phoenix, and his cousin, the powerful warrior, Ajax the son of Telamon. The two heralds accompany them as well. Yet the pronouns and verbal forms that describe them move between dual and plural forms. The grammarian responds that this is incorrect because there are at least five entities involved here. Modern responses over the past century have been:
The text needs to be fixed, the duals have come from an older/different version of the poem that had a smaller embassy (with several variations)
The traditional use is imperfect, the dual is being used for groups. Some scholiasts suggest that audiences would have just used the dual for the plural
The dual herald scene is merely formulaic and has been left in without regard for changes in the evolution of the narrative
The text is focalized in some way, showing Achilles (e.g.) refusing to acknowledge the presence of someone he dislikes (Odysseus, see Nagy 1979) or focusing on two people he does like (Phoenix and Ajax, Martin 1989)
The text is jarring on purpose, highlighting that something is wrong with this scene
Ancient commenters seem less bothered by the forms: an ancient scholiast suggests that the first dual form refers to Ajax and Odysseus because Phoinix hung back to get more instruction from Nestor (Schol ad. Il. 9.182). Of course, this interpretation doesn’t even try to explain what happened to the actual heralds who were sent along with the embassy. Yet the interaction of forms seems to give some support to a complex reading. The number and entanglement of the forms makes interpolation seem unlikely (if not ludicrous) as an explanation.
I have presented the responses in a sequence that I see as both historical (in terms of traditions of literary criticism) and evolutionary. The first response–that the text is wrong–assumes infidelity in the transmission from the past and entrusts modern interpreters with the competence to identify errors and interpolations and to ‘correct’ them. The second response moves from morphological to functional, positing that ancient performers might have ‘misused’ the dual for present during a period of linguistic change. Neither of these suggestions are supported by the textual traditions which preserve the duals without significant exception and which show only a very marked and appropriate use of the dual throughout Homeric epic.
The final three answers depend upon the sense of error explored in the first two: first, a greater understanding of oral-formulaic poetry extends the Parryan suggestion that some forms are merely functional and do not express context specific meaning (#3) while the second option models a complex style of reading/reception that suggests the audience understands the misuse of the dual to evoke the internal thoughts/emotions of the character Achilles in one way or another.
The third explanation is harder to defend based on how integrated the dual forms are in the passage: the dual is used to describe travel to Achilles’ tent, then the scene shifts to Achilles playing a lyre and Patroklos waiting for him to stop followed again by dual forms with what seems like and enigmatic line “and so they both were walking forth, and shining Odysseus was leading” (tō de batēn proterō, hēgeito de dios Odusseus). Ancient commentary remains nonplussed: Odysseus is first of two, the line makes that clear, and Phoinix is following somewhere behind.
Nagy’s and Martin’s explanations are attractive and they respond well to the awkward movement between dual and plural forms as well as Achilles specific use of the dual in hailing the embassy with a bittersweet observation. I think I like taking these two together, leaving it up to audiences to decode Achilles’ enigmatic greeting.
The final option builds on the local context of the Iliad and sees the type scene as functioning within that narrative but with some expectation that audiences know the forms and the conventions. As others have argued, the use of the duals to signal the movement of heralds is traditional and functional in a compositional sense because it moves the action of the narrative from one place to another. In the Iliad, the herald scene marks a movement from one camp to another, building on what I believe is its larger conventional use apart from composition which is to mark the movement from one political space, or one sphere of authority to another. When Agamemnon sends the heralds in book 1 to retrieve Briseis, the action as well as the language further marks Achilles’ separation from the Achaean coalition. In book 9, the situation remains the same–Achilles is essentially operating in a different power-structure–but the embassy is an attempt to address the difference. The trio sent along with the heralds as ambassadors are simultaneously friends and foreign agents. Appropriately, the conventional language of epic reflects this tension by interposing the duals and reflecting the confused situation.
I would suggest that in this situation most of the responses except for the first two are valid. The first two responses–that the text is wrong or the usage is wrong–selectively accept the validity of some of the text but not that they find challenging for interpretive reasons or assume a simplicity on the part of ancient audiences (and many generations in between). My primary qualm with the subsequent responses is the tendency to wholly credit a creative intention rather than the collaborative ecosystem of meaning available to Homeric performance. In the telling of epic tales, it may well have been customary to manipulate conventional language through creative misuse; and yet, if audiences are not experienced enough of the forms or attentive enough to the patterns, such usage would not likely be sustained. Audiences (like the ancient scholar) imagine Phoinix lagging behind, or Achilles focusing just on one character, or sense the pattern of alienation and separation that makes it necessary to treat Achilles as a foreign entity and not an ally.
So, while the text relies on audience competency with epic conventions, this specific articulation also allows for depth of characterization in this moment: The final three interpretive options cannot be fully disambiguated, although we can argue for greater weight to the typological argument.
Here are some recent texts with good bibliographies on the issue. I strongly encourage everyone to run out and read Lesser’s brand new Desire in the Iliad
Jasper Griffin. Commentary on Iliad 9. Oxford. 1995
Rachel H. Lesser. Desire in the Iliad. Oxford. 2023.
Bruce Louden. The Iliad: Structure, Myth, and Meaning Oxford 2006.
Richard Martin. The Language of Heroes. 1989.
Gregory Nagy. Best of the Achaeans. Baltimore: 1979
