Strange Instances of Time and Space in the Odyssey (Greek Studies: Interdisciplinary Approaches) 1666920398, 9781666920390

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Strange Instances of Time and Space in the Odyssey

Greek Studies: Interdisciplinary Approaches Series Editor: Gregory Nagy, Harvard University Executive Editors: Corinne Pache†, Eirene Visvardi, and Madeline Goh Associate Editors: Mary Ebbott, Casey Dué Hackney, Leonard Muellner, Olga Levaniouk, Timothy Powers, Jennifer R. Kellogg, and Ivy Livingston On the front cover A calendar frieze representing the Athenian months, reused in the Byzantine Church of the Little Metropolis in Athens. The cross is superimposed, obliterating Taurus of the Zodiac. The choice of this frieze for books in Greek Studies: Interdisciplinary Approaches reflects this series’ emphasis on the blending of the diverse heritages—Near Eastern, Classical, and Christian—in the Greek tradition. Drawing by Laurie Kain Hart, based on a photograph.

Recent titles in the series are: Strange Instances of Time and Space in the Odyssey, by Menelaos Christopoulos The Tragedy of the Athenian Ideal in Thucydides and Plato, by John T. Hogan Black Ships and Sea Raiders: The Late Bronze and Early Iron Age Context of Odysseus’ Second Cretan Lie, by Jeffrey P. Emanuel Dramatic Action in Greek Tragedy and Noh: Reading with and beyond Aristotle, by Mae J. Smethurst Greek Heroes in and out of Hades, by Stamatia Dova Becoming Achilles: Child-sacrifice, War, and Misrule in the lliad and Beyond, by Richard Kerr Holway Chronos on the Threshold: Time, Ritual, and Agency in the Oresteia, by Marcel Widzisz Disguise and Recognition in the Odyssey, by Sheila Murnaghan Choral Identity and the Chorus of Elders in Greek Tragedy, by U. S. Dhuga Light and Darkness in Ancient Greek Myth and Religion, Edited by Menelaos Christopoulos, Efimia D. Karakantza, and Olga Levaniouk When Worlds Elide: Classics, Politics, Culture, Edited by Karen Bassi and J. Peter Euben Archaeology in Situ: Sites, Archaeology, and Communities in Greece, Edited by Anna Stroulia and Susan Buck Sutton The Philosopher’s Song: The Poets’ Influence on Plato, by Kevin Crotty Under the Sign of the Shield: Semiotics and Aeschylus' Seven Against Thebes, by Froma I. Zeitlin Metrical Constraint and the Interpretation of Style in Tragic Trimeter, by Nicholas Baechle Diachronic Dialogues: Authority and Continuity in Homer and the Homeric Tradition, by Ahuvia Kahane Fighting Words and Feuding Words: Anger and the Homeric Poems, by Thomas R. Walsh The Visual Poetics of Power: Warriors, Youths, and Tripods in Early Greece, by Nassos Papalexandrou Homeric Megathemes: War-Homilia-Homecoming, by D. N. Maronitis A Penelopean Poetics: Reweaving the Feminine in Homer’s Odyssey, by Barbara Clayton The Poetry of Homer: New Edition, Edited with an Introduction by Bruce Heiden, by Samuel Eliot Bassett The Other Self: Selfhood and Society in Modern Greek Fiction, by Dimitris Tziovas

Strange Instances of Time and Space in the Odyssey Menelaos Christopoulos

LEXINGTON BOOKS

Lanham • Boulder • New York • London

Published by Lexington Books An imprint of The Rowman & Littlefield Publishing Group, Inc. 4501 Forbes Boulevard, Suite 200, Lanham, Maryland 20706 www​.rowman​.com 86-90 Paul Street, London EC2A 4NE Copyright © 2024 by The Rowman & Littlefield Publishing Group, Inc. All rights reserved. No part of this book may be reproduced in any form or by any electronic or mechanical means, including information storage and retrieval systems, without written permission from the publisher, except by a reviewer who may quote passages in a review. British Library Cataloguing in Publication Information Available Library of Congress Cataloging-in-Publication Data Names: Christopoulos, Menelaos, author. Title: Strange instances of time and space in the Odyssey / Menelaos Christopoulos. Description: Lanham : Lexington Books, 2024. | Series: Greek studies : interdisciplinary approaches | Includes bibliographical references and index. | Summary: “Menelaos Christopoulos offers a detailed, original, and thought-provoking analysis of the major thematic questions raised by the Homeric Odyssey. The interpretations in this book shed new light on this emblematic literary work of Western civilization”— Provided by publisher. Identifiers: LCCN 2023042899 (print) | LCCN 2023042900 (ebook) | ISBN 9781666920390 (cloth) | ISBN 9781666920406 (epub) Subjects: LCSH: Homer. Odyssey. | Space and time in literature. | LCGFT: Literary criticism. Classification: LCC PA4167 .C5285 2024 (print) | LCC PA4167 (ebook) | DDC 883/.01—dc23/eng/20231012 LC record available at https://lccn.loc.gov/2023042899 LC ebook record available at https://lccn.loc.gov/2023042900 ∞ ™The paper used in this publication meets the minimum requirements of American National Standard for Information Sciences—Permanence of Paper for Printed Library Materials, ANSI/NISO Z39.48-1992.

To Ithaca

Contents

Prefaceix Acknowledgmentsxi 1 Trips, Ships, and Helmsmen in the Odyssey1 2 Onward and Backward

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3 Odysseus’ Crimes and the Prolonged Nostos31 4 Crossing Straits: From “We” to “I”

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5 Between Life and Death: Patroclus, Elpenor, the Suitors, and Odysseus’ Companions

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6 Leaving Calypso’s Island or Á La Recherche Du Temps Perdu61 Epilogue 69 Bibliography79 Index Nominum

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About the Author

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vii

Preface

Another book on the Odyssey? Yes, I’m afraid so—another one, and probably not the last by any means in the history of culture. But if you really do think that we don’t need another such book, if you think that we now know everything about the Odyssey, then take some time to test your acquaintances on the matter (or at least the ones who might know). Ask them first to list the right order of Odysseus’ adventures from the moment he leaves Troy to the moment he reaches Ithaca. Then put together some statistics on the answers given. How many answers are right? Twenty percent? Twenty-five? Or less than that? I have often tested my students in this way, to get them to see that the Odyssey is a tricky poem. It fools you and makes you think you already know enough. How many Sirens were there? Did Odysseus encounter them before or after Skylla and Charybdis? How long did Odysseus stay on Circe’s island? How many suitors were after Penelope’s hand? How many ships did Odysseus lead? Were they all his? Why should Odysseus just blind Polyphemus, when he could just as easily have killed him? What did Ajax say to Odysseus when they met in the Underworld? How did Odysseus die? Did Telemachus become king of Ithaca after his father’s death? In what way does the Odyssey allude to facts that are supposed to occur before or after its narrative borders? Then, once you have mastered the whole poem, you are in a position to start on an analysis. Scholars, of course, do have answers to some of these questions, although not to all of them. They know, for instance, that there were two Homeric Sirens. If you ask why, however, then the scholarly bibliography begins to pile up. Still, while non-specialist readers of the Odyssey cannot answer these apparently simple questions, scholars might find themselves getting embarrassed, too, when they are asked to draw conclusions on the relation of the narrative of the Odyssey to epic tradition in the Archaic era; the historical, ix

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social, and anthropological reality involved; and the continuous dialogue with literature, art, and society over history ever since. Most Homer specialists, whatever they might believe, would certainly agree that the Odyssey is a poem that one cannot read enough, study enough, and generally search through enough, and that it is therefore an unending adventure for those it engulfs.1 As for this book, the idea was to explore, as humbly as possible, some difficult and obscure issues relating to Odysseus’ return, which still remain somewhat murky in spite of centuries of abundant Homeric scholarship all listed in the literature one can consult. The aim was not to put this study in some branch of “space theory,”2 however vague this term may appear to some scholars. During recent decades, I have studied some of the issues I mention here. I looked at particular themes and hoped that these approaches would produce some interesting suggestions. I finally realized that these particular thematic entities could be induced to shed new light only if they were tied to each other and tied to the structure of the whole poem. This is what I have tried to do in this book. Although I have altered and reconsidered many of my previous approaches, I must mention here some of my older works that have been essential to the creation of this book (see details in general bibliography): 1995, 123–134; 1996, 271–279; 1997; 2001, 143–151; 2009, 57–66; 2014, 153–166; 2017, 3–8. If it really is important to count the years, then from 1995 to 2017, it took me twenty-two years of study, two years more than the whole duration of Odysseus’ trip from Ithaca to Troy and vice versa. As for my own Ithaca, this is a relationship that, although I had visited Ithaca before, really started in 2000, when I first took part in the International Homer Conference organized, since the 1970s, by the Centre for Odyssean Studies. The critical moment and the critical year for me was 2011, when I had the honor of being elected chairman of the Centre for Odyssean Studies. I am happy to admit that I owe much to the international conferences that take place on Ithaca under the Centre’s auspices every three years. I cherish and, in my current capacity, make every effort to support the warm, friendly, and deeply learned dialogue that always takes place during these fruitful Ithacan encounters with Homer. Ithaca has become, for all of us, a place we always come back to with eagerness and excitement. So there is obviously no other way this could happen—inevitably, graciously, and justly, this book is dedicated to Ithaca. NOTES 1. See indicatively Marks 2020; Martin 2019, 2020; Nagy 2020; Slatkin 2020; Newton 2020. 2. See Lotman 1977; Lotman 1990. Regarding Greek epic and Homer, see note 2.

Acknowledgments

I am grateful to the Department of Philology of the University of Patras for granting me one year of sabbatical leave (2021), allowing me to work intensively and continuously on this book. My warmest thanks are addressed to Andrew Farrington for reading the whole book and advancing valuable suggestions on my text. I am deeply grateful to Gregory Nagy, Leonard Muellner, and Eirene Visvardi for their wise consulting and strong support in view of the publication of this book. I am also grateful to the anonymous reviewers of the manuscript for their knowledgeable and constructive suggestions. My warmest thanks are finally addressed to Jana Hodges-Kluck, Emilia Rivera, Jayanthi Chander, Deanna Biondi, and the team at Deanta for their thoughtful concern and assistance during the whole publishing procedure that allowed my manuscript to become a book. M. Ch.

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Chapter 1

Trips, Ships, and Helmsmen in the Odyssey

If one studies the relation between locations and persons in the Odyssey, one will probably conclude, on the grounds of the quantitative data involved, that the greater part of the action in the Odyssey takes place on land. This conclusion would then confirm that the long-established view that the Odyssey is a poem of the sea rests mainly o n a relatively small part of the work—namely, the Apologoi, the section of the poem in which Odysseus relates his adventures to the Phaeacians (Books 9–12). Yet, at the same time, this action, which takes place on land, actually concerns islands. Even in the few cases in which this is not, strictly speaking, the case, the action still presupposes some maritime movement.1 Thus topography and communication in the Odyssey are determined to a great extent by navigation; therefore, a study of some important maritime trips mentioned in the Odyssey seemed useful to be undertaken in this chapter. Much of the evidence provided in the Odyssey on navigation is not found in Books 9–12 alone. Although the whole poem offers odd pieces of information throughout, there is a great deal in the “Telemacheia”—that is, Books 1–4 of the Odyssey—in which, among other things, the return of the heroes of Troy to their hometowns is described. Nestor, king of Pylos, and Menelaus, king of Sparta, offer this narration when Telemachus visits them during his attempts to gather information on his father’s fate.2 Menelaus, whose knowledge is also derived from the words of Proteus,3 relates his adventures to Telemachus. He also mentions the sad conclusion to Lokrian Ajax’s return (4.499–511).4 Ajax and his ships were wrecked on the rocks of Gyrae. These boulders lie in the strait between Mykonos and Tenos, and several ancient sources mention Mt. Gyras in the southern part of Tenos.5 According to the Odyssey, Poseidon uses his trident to strike the rock where Ajax has taken refuge and tears it off from the rest of the rocky mass because 1

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he has heard Ajax boast of having been rescued from the sea against the gods’ will. The true reason behind Ajax’s punishment, however, is that he raped Cassandra in the temple of Athena in Troy, an act that explains the goddess’ rage against him. In the Odyssey, Athena’s rage is clearly mentioned, albeit without any specific reference to its cause. The precise location of Ajax’s shipwreck deserves our attention as well, for two reasons. One is that it implies a voyage possibly longer than other itineraries mentioned in the Odyssey involved in the return from Troy. Ajax’s route first follows the coast of Asia Minor and then passes through the Cyclades in the Aegean. Though it is longer than the routes followed by other heroes, Ajax’s itinerary may also be safer, as it offers access to many ports. The other route described in the Odyssey (3.169)6 compels sailors to leave the coast of Asia Minor at Lesbos and then pass north of Chios to reach Geraistos in southern Euboea. This route, then, although shorter, still exposes the traveler to the danger of storms on the high seas.7 The second reason why we are interested in Ajax’s shipwreck is the exceptionally concise way in which the loss of all his ships is stated in only one verse (4.499). From the Iliadic Catalog of Ships, we know that Ajax had forty ships (as far as one can trust the numbers in the Catalog8). This otherwise exceptionally speedy destruction of forty ships in the strait between Tenos and Mykonos arises from the needs and priorities of poetic narration. The brevity of this description possibly echoes the somewhat summary presentation of the Lokrian contingent in the Iliad (2.327–335). Yet there is a factual element here in the location of the shipwreck that needs stressing. Strong winds can indeed arise in the area of Tenos and Mykonos, a point well known to both ancient and modern mariners. Another thought-provoking route homeward is followed by the king of Sparta, Menelaus, who describes it himself (4.351–581), joined by Nestor (3.276–312), who travels with Menelaus up to a certain point of the journey. As already mentioned, this route runs along the northern coast of Chios, the southern coast of Euboea, and the eastern coast of Attica down to Cape Sounion. Here the poet sets the death of the helmsman of Menelaus’ ship, Phrontis, whose great skill in guiding the ship safely through rough seas has distinguished him from his peers (see infra). Menelaus’ ships continue their journey after Phrontis' burial and reach Cape Maleas, where they encounter a violent tempest, which creates waves as large as mountains. The tempest separates the ships, taking most of them to Crete, where they are destroyed, while five ships, including Menelaus’, are swept away to Egypt. There are several problems regarding the precise location on the southern Cretan coast where the shipwreck occurs.9 Evans10 thought that the episode was set in the area around the port of Komos (Κωμός). If so, the reference to the Cydonians, who inhabit the area around the river Iardanos (3.291–293, probably today’s Platanias), is probably there to strengthen the authenticity and persuasiveness

Trips, Ships, and Helmsmen in the Odyssey

3

of the narrative. The poet offers some general familiar geographical details that pertain, if not directly to the southern shore of Crete, then at least to its western part, to the region of today’s Chania, where Strabo tells us the Cydonians lived. I also suspect that, apart from the need to persuade the audience of the poem, the presence of these topographical details also obliquely indicates the route of the ships that passed the western end of Crete to reach its southern side. Interestingly, the tempest occurs in the narrative in a spot famed for its violent winds, Cape Maleas. This is the only time in literature (as far as one recalls) when the wind alone is responsible for splitting up a fleet. Lastly, another intriguing detail of the narration lies in the fact that Menelaus sails his five ships down the Nile.11 Although persuasiveness is often sought in the Odyssean narrative, here, technically speaking at least, ships constructed for crossing the high seas would hardly be suitable for sailing in shallow river waters.12 We now have to look at another journey, one of the most important in the Odyssey, although many have considered it unnecessary and of no use for the development of the plot.13 This is the journey of Telemachus to Pylos and from there to Sparta. The route this time holds no particular surprises. The ship reaches Pylos, most probably having sailed along the western Aetolian coasts, passing the mouth of the Corinthian Gulf, and then following the western coast of the Peloponnese. Telemachus’ trip from Pylos to Sparta (and vice versa) takes place on a carriage. This trip on land takes over a day and requires an overnight stay that occurs, according to the passage, at Pherae, a place probably situated near today's Kalamata.14 During Telemachus’ absence, the ship and his comrades remain at Pylos, waiting to carry him back to Ithaca. In the narrative, the trip from Ithaca to Pylos lasts slightly more than one night. The trip from Pylos to Ithaca lasts the same length of time. In the Odyssey, there are forty days of action. Of these forty days, Telemachus spends approximately thirty in Sparta, even though he claims he is in a hurry to leave (4.594), since he arrives at Sparta on the sixth day and leaves on the thirty-fifth. The main reason for this delay seems to be that Telemachus’ arrival in Ithaca needs to coincide structurally with Odysseus’ own return. The most dangerous part of Telemachus’ return is the spot where the suitors have laid their ambush and where they will attempt to kill him. This point is identified in the text as “the strait between Ithaca and the rugged Samos” (4.671). The Samos referred to here is apparently Same of Cephallenia. Telemachus’ ship sails by the shores of Triphyllia and continues its route to the islands named Θοαί (the “sharp (?)” islands), which Strabo (8.3.26) described as “pointed” (perhaps these are the southern Echinades, given the meaning of the Greek word “sharp,” which describes the sharpness of

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thorns). The mystery of the identification of these islands remains unsolved. Perhaps, however, the point is that the interest of the author is not focused on topography this time, but rather on the possibility of Telemachus’ death in the imminent ambush. The word θοός may well mean “sharp” in this passage of the Odyssey, as the word θόωσα means “I sharpened” at 9.327. The meaning “sharp” often occurs in later epic poetry (e.g., Apollonius Phodius, Arg. 2.79, θoοῖς γόμφοις; 3.1281, θοῶν ὀδόντων; 4.1683, θοοῖς πελέκεσσι, etc.). If we accept that θοός does mean “sharp” here, the meaning, instead of referring to the shape or the name of the islands, in fact makes the point that the islands are Telemachus’ potential murderers, hosting the suitors’ ambush. In this sense, neither Ithaca nor Cephallenia are excluded, since the suitors have laid their ambush on the small island of Asteris lying between them. The argument that the islet situated in the strait (today named Daskalio) does not quite offer the physical conditions required for such an ambush is not convincing. Ithaca and Cephallenia remain the most probable “signifiés” of the expression νήσοισι θοῆισι (15.299). Thus Athena’s advice to Telemachus to keep the ship away from the islands (ἑκὰς νήσων, 15.33) has the meaning one would expect, since Same and Ithaca have been mentioned four verses earlier (15.29). Telemachus’ journey takes place on a ship that stealthily leaves Ithaca at night and returns at night, equally stealthily. Many points link this journey of Telemachus to Odysseus’ journey of return. The clandestine arrival of both ships and the handling of the economy of time so that Odysseus and Telemachus meet by chance and in secret at Eumaeus’ hut are two such points. Another point (in my opinion, more significant and not widely discussed) is that both ships have foreign owners. The ship that brings Odysseus to Ithaca is, as we know, the ship of the Phaeacians, who specialize in such missions and, because of this act, have even aroused Poseidon’s wrath. Telemachus’ ship is borrowed by Noemon, an Ithacan whom Athena (transformed as Telemachus) persuades to entrust his ship to Telemachus (2.381–387). The ship is manned by noble youths from Ithaca. Noemon himself is responsible for triggering the suitors’ plan to ambush Telemachus after naively betraying Telemachus’ departure to them (4.630–656). Thus Noemon’s name (= “intelligent”) perhaps acquires an ironic complexion, not unknown in the context of the Odyssey.15 The use of borrowed or rented ships was not uncommon in antiquity. Yet the lack of ships suffered by Telemachus and the destruction of ships during Odysseus’ voyage are generally connected with some peculiarities that pertain to a more general issue concerning the ships in the Odyssey. Scholars, ancient and modern, have used all the power of their imagination in their interpretation of the Odysseus’ voyages and have placed them throughout the world that they knew at the time.16

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Still, one should focus on the trips and the places, whether imaginary or not, mentioned by the poet himself. One should recall here that in the Odyssey Odysseus returns to the point of his departure a total of four times.17 The second of these is the return to the island of Aeolus. One remembers that in the Odyssey Odysseus leaves Troy as leader of a fleet, loses all his ships (except his own), loses his last ship, constructs a raft, seizes a floating plank, and ends up in the sea naked, having traversed all the stages of navigation in reverse.18 There is also a strange echo of this idea in the Aeolus episode. To ensure that Odysseus has a safe trip, a leather bag containing all the winds (except the West Wind) is offered by Aeolus to Odysseus. When Odysseus falls asleep, his companions, thinking that the bag is full of treasure and anxious to have their share of it, open the bag, and the winds thus released push Odysseus’ ships back to Aeolus’ island. Aeolus’ leather bag is, of course, offered as a gift, but the matter of the leather bag in its own right belongs to a particularly rich nexus of anthropological material. Here, I must sidestep the Dionysiac aspect of the matter and the Marsyas myth (both connected with the leather bag but not relevant to any Odyssean context). Still, there is another aspect of this matter that we should mention here, and it concerns the use of inflated leather bags in sailing. An inflated leather bag can be used by an individual as a float. In a more sophisticated form, inflated leather bags can be used to build rafts of the type used in Mesopotamia (the kelek) and in the Creto-Mycenean world. Amphorae could be used instead of leather bags. In a Boeotian skyphos at the beginning of the fourth century BC, we see Odysseus crossing the sea on two such amphorae.19 The scene is obviously not directly depicting the Aeolus episode, but the influence of the Odyssey is clear from the blowing of the wind and the action of Poseidon, stated implicitly through the presence of the trident. When Odysseus encounters Aeolus, he still has all his ships. The next episode in the Odyssey, the encounter with the Laestrygonians, is the critical moment, when Odysseus loses all his ships except his own. In the Aeolus episode, the skin bag seems to retain something of its wider semantic field. Although it does not itself become a vessel, it remains, at any rate, an aid to sailing. Where does the issue of the loss of ships lead us? In relation to the myth of the Argonauts, the other great (and probably pre-Homeric) epic of Greek antiquity, one notices that, in the Argonautic expedition, what is important is the vessel itself, the Argo, which gives its name to the entire myth. By contrast, the name of Odysseus' ship is of no importance. No one ever bothered to learn what it was, and the poet of the Odyssey never bothered to mention it. In the Odyssey, the ship is the means, not the aim. Thus, another peculiarity that, I think, has not been given enough notice, which I have tried to demonstrate in my emphasis on how the ship is borrowed from Noemon and in the stress I have laid on the loss of Odysseus’ ships, is generally the

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absence of ships as a motif in the Odyssey. This absence is stressed in many other parts of the poem, particularly those involving Nausicaa and the Phaeacians, and is always tied to a lack of means, the inability to move, and the absence of power. Odysseus led twelve ships to Troy. Eleven of these were destroyed by the Laestrygonians; the twelfth, the one Odysseus boarded, was then destroyed after the slaughter of the sacred cows on Thrinakia. Naturally, these ships were warships. Whether they all belonged to Odysseus or whether he, as king of the Ithacans, simply led the ships is part of the circumstances that make up the complex political problem of Ithaca. The Odyssey seems to imply that the ships belonged to him. There are Ithacans who are the owners of ships. Whether they are warships or not is unclear, but at any rate they are suitable for carrying out an ambush. Noemon, who has already been mentioned, is such an Ithacan ship owner, but even the suitors, who are not from Ithaca, have no problem in finding a ship to waylay Telemachus. Contrary to what one might expect, Telemachus is not among the Ithacans who own ships. Ships are absent from Odysseus’ wealth, which is stressed constantly and in various ways (as is the manner in which the suitors, whose economic power is noted, eat away at Odysseus’ property). This lack of ships may be another reason why the power of Odysseus’ family is not self-evident in Ithaca. Far from being merely a practical means of transportation at sea, which seems to be their key role in the Odyssey, ships were apparently appreciated as a means of displaying social, economic, and political power. In Ηomeric scholarship, several studies have focused on the construction and function of ships in the Iliad and the Odyssey, especially from a technical and historical point of view. Yet the role of the helmsman, which is crucial both in reality and in the narrative, as we saw in speaking of Menelaus’ ship, has been ignored. The word κυβερνήτης20 occurs twice in the Iliad and seven times in the Odyssey. Of the two Iliadic references, the first refers generally to the helmsmen of the Greek ships, who, in 19.43, seem to respond to Achilles’ urge to all Greeks to join the battle.21 The second reference does not concern real helmsmen and appears in a comparison between the task of the charioteer and that of the helmsman; the idea is introduced when Nestor addresses his son Antilochus, who is preparing to take part in the funeral games of Patroclus.22 Of the seven references in the Odyssey to helmsmen,23 three concern the helmsman of Odysseus’ ship24 one involves the helmsmen of all Odysseus’ ships25 one concerns the helmsman of Menelaus’ ship26 and the other two involve fictional helmsmen—that is, those steering ships that never sailed (except in Odysseus’ false stories, 14.256) and those not steering ships that sail continuously (the Phaeacians’ ships, which sail without helmsmen27). Only two persons exercising helmsman’s duties in the Odyssey are actually presented in detail: the helmsman of Odysseus’ ship and the helmsman of Menelaus’ ship (the only helmsman whose name is preserved in the

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Homeric epic). Regarding these individuals, only two things are precisely noted: their skills and their death. Through an examination of the description of the skills and of the death of these helmsmen, we will attempt to follow the way in which some objective data of maritime travel are integrated in the narrative of the Odyssey. These data are introduced first as realistic entities in the narrative and represent possible dangers at sea, which makes for an increase in narrative credibility and tension. Second, they are introduced as component elements in a clear-cut distinction between Odysseus and his companions. This distinction has already been announced in the proem to the Odyssey and is subtly injected into all the first twelve books of the poem until the shipwreck beyond Thrinakia, where the journey of Odysseus irrevocably and decisively changes from being a collective to individual nostos. The only helmsman whose name we know of in the Homeric epic is, as we have mentioned, the steersman of Menelaus’ ship. His fate is described to Telemachus by Nestor, who narrates (4.276–311) the first and last stages of Menelaus’ return (the intermediate stage of this return will be completed by Menelaus himself in 4.35l–586). It is through Nestor’s story that Telemachus, and with him the listener or reader of the Odyssey, learns that once past Sounion, Menelaus had to interrupt his journey to offer funerary honors to his helmsman, a man of great merit, who met with a sudden death. In accord with the usual pattern of epic poetry, the person introduced in the narrative, who here is Menelaus’ helmsman, is identified by his name and his father’s name: Phrontis, son of Onetor (Φρόντις ’Ονητορίδης).28 Phrontis’ identification belongs to the type of nominal presentations that occur when the narrative describes the death of persons who have not previously been named. An interesting example of this kind of presentation occurs in Book 16 of the Iliad, in which the name Onetor also appears. This Iliadic Onetor is a priest of Zeus Idaeus and has won the esteem of the Trojans. He is the father of Laogonos, killed by Meriones in Iliad 16.604.29 In addition to its appearance in the Iliad, Onetor occurs as a proper name in Demosthenes,30 probably as an adjective in Pindar,31 and also in Thucydides,32 where again the patronymic form ’Ονητορίδης is attested. The proper name ’Ονήτης33 (Doric form ’Ονάτας) is connected to the verb ’ονίνημι, and the same etymological relationship should be inferred for the word ’ονατήρ, which designates Mycenian land assignees in Pylos, whose existence, however, could hardly be known or offer inspiration to the epic poets.34 In contrast to the currency of the name Onetor, the name Phrontis is nowhere else attested in the Homeric epics, and West35 thinks that it was a rather unusual name. However, the female proper name Φροντίς occurs in the Iliad (17.40), once more in the context of death. Phrontis is the wife of Panthos and mother of Euphorbos, who, after the death of Patroclus, fights a duel with Menelaus and is killed. No matter how often the name Φρόντις

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occurs, it remains etymologically associated with the root of the word φροντίς (= “care,” “good thought”). Its combination with the patronymic ’Ονητορίδης builds up a particularly positive semantic context that becomes even stronger when used with the verb ’εκαίνυτο (= “was surpassing,” “was exceeding”) in the same verse (3.282). The “good thought” and the “beneficial action” promised, on a verbal level, by Phrontis’ first appearance seem to serve, both proleptically and analeptically, his wider narrative function. His exceptional activity is retroactively recalled at the very moment when it ceases to exist. Phrontis is introduced into the epic only to die. His absence allows Menelaus to wander throughout Egypt, a journey probably dictated by the pre-Odyssean epic tradition, of which the Odyssey often offers an innovative36 but still compatible variation. On a secondary level, Phrontis’ absence from Menelaus’ ship provides a reason why Menelaus should be absent from the Peloponnese at the very moment of Agamemnon’s murder.37 This is why Phrontis’ special abilities, praised at 3.281–282, must be proleptically neutralized before the storm hurled by Zeus as Menelaus sails past Cape Maleas (3.286–290). Phrontis’ death is thus subordinate to a larger narrative economy, in which it provides a trigger that the larger narrative requires.38 But even in the typology of Phrontis’ death, some peculiarities can be detected. These have nothing to do with any burial customs, which, since the text mentions nothing more than the need to adhere to such rites, simply require the performance of the usual ritual.39 However, the causes of Phrontis’ death need to be examined further. West40 thinks that here we have a death without apparent causes, the type of death usually attributed to the intervention of Apollo (if the victim is a man) or to Artemis (if the victim is a woman). West adduces three Odyssean parallel passages—namely, 7.64 (the death of Rhexenor, Arete’s father), 11.173 (the death of Antikleia, Odysseus’ mother), and 15.411 (deaths of individuals on the island of Syrie, Eumaeus’ homeland, due exclusively to Apollo and Artemis).41 In two of these three passages (11.173 and 15.411; cf. also Iliad 24.759), Apollo’s intervention is depicted with a uniformity of formula. The verse οἷς ἀγανοῖς βελέεσιν ἐποιχόμενος κατέπεφνεν (also used to describe Phrontis’ death at 3.280) is adopted from there unchanged, and so, in terms of verbal typology, 3.280 can be regarded as a formula, although not necessarily as such in terms of narrative significance. There are at least two passages in the Odyssey in which Apollo and Artemis, rather than aiming merely to cause a painless death, are exacting vengeance. In Odyssey 5.124, Artemis kills Orion out of sheer envy. Formulaic uniformity is maintained here (οἷς ἀγανοῖς βελέεσσιν ἐποιχομένη κατέπεφνεν), but the rule according to which Apollo kills men and Artemis kills women is obviously violated. In Odyssey 11.324, Artemis kills Ariadne at the request of Dionysus; here the convention of “sex-dependent” killing (Apollo: men, Artemis: women) is observed, but the formulaic verse is not adopted. It seems, therefore, likely

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that Phrontis’ case enters only the formulaic classification and only at a superficial level. The whole sequence of the Phrontis episode and the fact that it exists only to push forward the Odyssean narrative42 means that Menelaus’ helmsman becomes the target of divine and narrative pursuit, is fulsomely introduced shortly before he dies, and, immediately afterward, is deleted from the action of the Odyssey. The loss of Menelaus’ companions during his return to Greece involves a theme similar to Odysseus’ nostos. Scholars have repeatedly noted a conscious thematic link between these two nostoi in the Odyssey.43 However, some features of Phrontis in regard to the cults of Athena and Poseidon, noted since 1974,44 confirm the view that Phrontis’ death, instead of belonging to the category of abrupt, painless, and unexpected deaths, actually belongs to a group of narratively planned scenes whose structure implies the existence of a causal relationship to previous or future events.45 The existence of such a relationship can be inferred from the fact that Phrontis’ loss brings Menelaus closer to the destructive storm that Zeus has in store for him (3.255–259).46 Yet we find the most basic manifestation of this relationship in the narration of Nestor, who refers to Athena’s wrath (3.131–136) and Zeus’ plan to offer a λυγρόν νόστον to the Achaeans.47 The dispute that ensues (and is the direct result of the goddess’ wrath) causes Agamemnon to remain in Troy in order to offer expiatory sacrifices. It also causes Menelaus to attempt, together with Nestor and initially with Odysseus, the journey to Greece. Thus the two Atreids begin their nostos separately, after which their courses become increasingly dissimilar. Agamemnon sacrifices to Athena, and so his course over the sea is free from all difficulties, only to bring him, however, ὥς βοῦν ἐπὶ φάτνῃ,48 to a dishonorable death at the hands of his mortal wife. Menelaus, however, does not offer sacrifice, and so his course burdens him with many difficulties, only to lead him in the end, as a γαμβρόν Διός,49 to the honorable immortality of Elysium reserved for him by his immortal wife. During this journey, the premature death of the helmsman, Phrontis, who is then buried at Sounion,50 causes Menelaus to leave Greek territory in decisive fashion. Later, during the same journey, the delayed appearance of the Old Man of the Sea, Proteus, who emerges from the waters of Pharos, brings about Menelaus’ equally decisive reincorporation in Greek territory.51 Hence Agamemnon’s fate is clearly set in contradistinction to that of his brother, Menelaus, and to the fate of Odysseus. These three contrapuntal courses, once defined, henceforth function in clear parallel to each other in the Odyssey. Some of the narrative elements that characterize the story of Phrontis are also found, either in identical form or transfigured, in the story of Odysseus’ helmsman. The explicit reference to their skills is one of these elements. In Phrontis’ case, these skills are mentioned, as we have seen, so that their magnitude can be esteemed later, when they are most needed—during the Maleas

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storm, that is. However, in the case of the (anonymous) helmsman of Odysseus, these steering skills are tested indirectly but clearly in action. When Odysseus’ ship passes through the strait of Skylla and Charybdis, Odysseus indicates precisely to the helmsman what direction is to be taken under the circumstances (12.217–221). In essence, Odysseus conveys at that moment to the helmsman recommendations that have been conveyed to him from elsewhere. Before he leaves Circe’s island, she directly warns him to keep his ship, once in the strait, on the side of Skylla, since it is better to mourn six companions, devoured by each of Skylla’s six heads, than for all of them to perish, should the ship approach the side of Charybdis (12.108–110). To Odysseus himself, Circe’s advice, although he follows it, is both a source of safety and futile, since he is exposed twice to the double dangers of the strait, crossing it once with his ship and companions from the side of Skylla (12.234–255) and a second time, after Thrinakia, this time without ship or companions, from the side of Charybdis (12.426–446). The helmsman of his ship helps him navigate the strait safely, but not definitely. Ironically echoing the episode of Phrontis, the narrative dealing with the helmsman of Odysseus’ ship does not deprive the ship of its helmsman at the moment of crisis. Instead, it merely lays down a new condition to the effect that this crossing, even if it is successful, will not be enough since the same enterprise must be performed again in infinitely worse circumstances. When, however, Odysseus has to cross the strait a second time, the helmsman of the ship is already dead, as is Phrontis when Menelaus has to face the storm as he sails past Maleas. The Iliadic Catalog of Ships (2.631–637) states that Odysseus led twelve ships to Troy, which is therefore the number of ships he has at his disposal when he begins his journey back to Ithaca. Thus there are twelve helmsmen in his fleet. These helmsmen are first mentioned in the Odyssey at 9.78, when, after leaving the land of the Cicones and having endured a tempest lasting two days, they at last enjoy a following wind. But this situation will not last long. As it is in Menelaus’ wanderings, so in the first of Odysseus’ wanderings, Cape Maleas is a fixed point and, known as it is for its tempestuous weather, forms a convincing motivation for Odysseus’ sailors to deviate from their course. Unsurprisingly, then, the north wind pushes the ships away from Cythera toward an unknown destination. Ten days later, Odysseus and his companions reach the land of the Lotus Eaters. This is the first factual indication that the helmsmen have failed in their task. It is clear that in this case, in contrast to Phrontis’ story, the helmsmen do certainly exist, but they cannot deal with the uncontrollable actions of the winds. There may be a latent comparison between Phrontis and Odysseus’ helmsman, but it would be difficult to spot it during the flow of an oral narration. This nullification of the function and powers of the helmsmen impacts directly on the action of the poem,

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in which it leads Odysseus to the land of the Lotus Eaters, where the danger that lurks is oblivion.52 As for the second neutralization of the functions and powers of the helmsmen, this, besides being factual, is also mainly narrative in function and concerns the persons whom the narrative has set aside. It is realized through the deaths of the eleven helmsmen—that is, all but Odysseus’ helmsman—who are killed, along with the other members of the eleven crews, by the Laestrygonians in the port of Lamos. The helmsmen, therefore, definitely depart from the scene, lessening the developmental capabilities of the narrative of the Odyssey. Interestingly, the very next stop in the Odyssean nostos, Circe’s island, likewise presents the danger of turning into a place of oblivion for Odysseus. On this very island, after a year’s sojourn, Odysseus’ companions ask him to remember his homeland (10.466–474). The third and last nullification of the helmsman’s role coincides with the destruction of Odysseus’ last ship in the shipwreck after Thrinakia. The only helmsman surviving after the destruction of the ships by the Laestrygonians is the helmsman of Odysseus’ ship. The text mentions him in the Nekyia (11.10), in the Skylla episode (12.217), and in the Thrinakia wreck (12.412), but before this point, he steers Odysseus’ ship to the island of Circe. His worth is proven, as we know, in the strait of Skylla, but before this feat, he is mentioned once more at 11.10, when the ship travels to the Underworld. His skill is not praised explicitly as they travel toward Circe’s island, since the action is mainly conveyed through mention of the favorable wind sent by Circe and by the formulaic verse την δ’ ’άνεμός τε κυβερνήτης τ’ ’ίθυνον, which is also repeated in the other two references to helmsmen—namely, 9.78 and 14.256. Nevertheless, the helmsman’s skill is certainly alluded to in the dark geography of the landscape whose description follows53 and, even more, in the awe provoked by the thought of the intended destination as he steers a ship bound for Hades. The last reference to the helmsman (in the Thrinakia shipwreck) is actually the description of his death. This demise is decided in advance, announced in advance, and, despite all Odysseus’ efforts, unavoidable, as it is for all the companions who taste the meat of Helios’ holy cattle.54 Yet, in contrast to the anonymity of the companions’ fate, some significant details are highlighted in the case of the helmsman’s death. He dies instantaneously, thanks to a cranial fracture that occurs when the wind breaks the protonoi (= forestays), hurling the mast at his head while he sits astern. As his body topples into the water, it is compared to that of a diver (’αρνευτήρ, 12.423).55 The semiology of his death, clearly tied to his professional role, is conveyed through a nautical verbal context. The instrument of his death is the mast, and the reason for his death is the fracturing of the protonoi. The protonoi has broken thanks to the strength of the West Wind. At the time of his death, the helmsman is seated at the stern of the ship, where the helm is located, and his falling body likened to that of a diver. The death of the last helmsman of the last ship, who has

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remained anonymous over a poem of 12,110 verses, now, in his last moments and during his final appearance, is analytically described in terms precisely congruent with his duties. Homer thereby exempts him from all the verbal and narrative polymorphism that in the same passage characterizes the deaths of the other companions, some of whom are anonymous and some of whom are not, while some are directly involved in the chain reaction that pushes forward the plot of the Odyssey. The anonymous helmsman is spared drowning, slow death, thunderbolts, the stench of sulfur, or being borne away by the waves like helpless birds falling alive into the rough waters where, sooner or later, one certainly perishes. The object that both factually and narratively nullifies the function of this last helmsman, the mast of the ship, brings about the definite departure of Odysseus’ companions from the narrative frame of the Odyssey. This same object, the mast, which takes the helmsman’s life, subsequently saves Odysseus’. The mast to which Odysseus clings and on which he sails first to Charybdis and then to Calypso becomes the vehicle that draws him away from the collective nostos he had unsuccessfully been pursuing until that moment to the individual nostos that he will successfully complete. After the death of the last helmsman, Odysseus’ next stop confronts him with the most looming and threatening danger of oblivion, which he encounters during the whole journey—a peril far more potent now since the motivation to save his companions no longer drives him on. This is the danger of a carefree life and immortality, which, however, does not come at the end of his life, in Elysium, when he has returned to his homeland and is next to the wife that, like Menelaus, he has won back. Instead, it comes on him before his nostos, when he is still in midlife, on Ogygia and beside Calypso, rather than the wife he has not yet won back.56 This looming danger that threatens to turn Odysseus into both the subject and the object of oblivion, so that he will neither remember nor be remembered, is removed, as we know, seven years later, after the gods have intervened. Odysseus’ own nostos will finally be accomplished, albeit in different, improvised, and unforeseen conditions: by means of gifts he has acquired (offered by the Phaeacians), through companions that he has, so to speak, borrowed (the Phaeacian crew), and also by means of a borrowed ship.57 This is a Phaeacian ship, one of those that, according to Alcinous’ words at 8.557–562, sail invisibly enveloped in fog, fully aware of the thoughts and the destinations of the travelers, without delay and without rudder or helmsmen. NOTES 1. See Burgess 2017, 27-42; Coy 2003, 225-231. On the concept of space in the Odyssey and in Greek epic generally, see Edwards 1993, 27–78; Grossardt 2003; Purvess 2006, 1–20; Purvess 2010; Tsagalis 2012; Skempis and Ziogas 2014.

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2. See Alden 1987, 129–137; Martin 1993, 222–240; Roisman 1994, 1–22; Rengakos 1999, 87–98. 3. On the semiology of Proteus’ revelations, see Christopoulos 2003. 4. Od. 4.499–511: Αἴας μὲν μετὰ νηυσὶ δάμη δολιχηρέτμοισι. Γυρῇσίν μιν πρῶτα Ποσειδάων ’επέλασσεν πέτρῃσιν μεγάλῃσι καὶ ἐξεσάωσε θαλάσσης καί νύ κεν ἔκφυγε κῆρα καὶ ἐχθόμενός περ Ἀθήνῃ, εἰ μὴ ὑπερφίαλον ἔπος ἔκβαλε καὶ μέγ᾽ ἀάσθη. φῆ ῥ᾽ ἀέκητι θεῶν φυγέειν μέγα λαῖτμα θαλάσσης. τοῦ δὲ Ποσειδάων μεγάλ᾽ ἔκλυεν αὐδήσαντος. αὐτίκ᾽ ἔπειτα τρίαιναν ἑλὼν χερσὶ στιβαρῇσιν ἤλασε Γυραίην πέτρην, ἀπὸ δ᾽ ἔσχισεν αὐτήν. καὶ τὸ μὲν αὐτόθι μεῖνε, τὸ δὲ τρύφος ἔμπεσε πόντῳ, τῷ ῥ᾽ Αἴας τὸ πρῶτον ἐφεζόμενος μέγ᾽ ἀάσθη. τὸν δ᾽ ἐφόρει κατὰ πόντον ἀπείρονα κυμαίνοντα. ὣς ὁ μὲν ἔνθ᾽ ἀπόλωλεν, ἐπεὶ πίεν ἁλμυρὸν ὕδωρ.

Aias was lost, and his long-oared vessels with him. First of all Poseidon drove him against the great rocks of Gyrai, and yet he saved him out of the water, and Aias would have escaped his doom, though Athene hated him, had he not gone wildly mad and tossed out a word of defiance; for he said that in despite of the gods he escaped the great gulf of the sea, and Poseidon heard him, loudly vaunting, and at once with his ponderous hands catching up the trident he drove it against the Gyrean rock, and split a piece off it, and part of it stayed where it was, but a splinter crashed in the water, and this was where Aias had been perched when he raved so madly. It carried him down to the depths of the endless and tossing main sea. So Aias died, when he had swallowed down the salt water. (Translation by R. Lattimore) 5. Some scholiasts of the Odyssey explain the name of these rocks on the grounds of their shape: Sch. Hom. Od.4. 500: Γυρῆισιν πέτραις πλησίον Μυκόνου τῆς νήσου, οὕτω καλουμέναις έπεί εἰσι περιφερεῖς (D). One wonders whether this name reflects the word Κυκλάδες, used of all the islands that were considered to form a circle around Delos. Cf. sch. Hom. Od., 4.500: γυραὶ πέτραι εἰσὶ περὶ τὴν Μύκονον πλησίον, Μύκονος δὲ καὶ Νάξος τῶν Κυκλάδων νήσων. Hesychius mentions the mountain Γυράς (s.v.): ὄρος ἐν Τήνῳ. 6. Od. 3.168–183: ὀψὲ δὲ δὴ μετὰ νῶι κίε ξανθὸς Μενέλαος, ἐν Λέσβῳ δ᾽ ἔκιχεν δολιχὸν πλόον ὁρμαίνοντας, ἢ καθύπερθε Χίοιο νεοίμεθα παιπαλοέσσης, νήσου ἔπι Ψυρίης, αὐτὴν ἐπ᾽ ἀριστέρ᾽ ἔχοντες, ἦ ὑπένερθε Χίοιο, παρ᾽ ἠνεμόεντα Μίμαντα. ᾐτέομεν δὲ θεὸν φῆναι τέρας. αὐτὰρ ὅ γ᾽ ἡμῖν δεῖξε, καὶ ἠνώγει πέλαγος μέσον εἰς Εὔβοιαν τέμνειν, ὄφρα τάχιστα ὑπὲκ κακότητα φύγοιμεν. ὦρτο δ᾽ ἐπὶ λιγὺς οὖρος ἀήμεναι. αἱ δὲ μάλ᾽ ὦκα

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Chapter 1 ἰχθυόεντα κέλευθα διέδραμον, ἐς δὲ Γεραιστὸν ἐννύχιαι κατάγοντο. Ποσειδάωνι δὲ ταύρων πόλλ᾽ ἐπὶ μῆρ᾽ ἔθεμεν, πέλαγος μέγα μετρήσαντες. τέτρατον ἦμαρ ἔην, ὅτ᾽ ἐν Ἄργεϊ νῆας ἐίσας Τυδεΐδεω ἕταροι Διομήδεος ἱπποδάμοιο ἵστασαν: αὐτάρ ἐγώ γε Πύλονδ᾽ ἔχον, οὐδέ ποτ᾽ ἔσβη οὖρος, ἐπεὶ δὴ πρῶτα θεὸς προέηκεν ἀῆναι.

And, late, fair-haired Menelaos came to join us and caught us at Lesbos as we pondered our long sea-voyage, whether we should sail over the top of rocky Chios by the island Psyros, keeping it on our left hand, or else to pass under Chios, by windy Mimas. We asked the god to give us some portent for a sign, and the god gave us one, and told us to cut across the middle main sea for Euboia, and so most quickly escape the hovering evil. A whistling wind rose up and began to blow and the ships ran very fast across those ways full of fish, and at nighttime brought us in at Geraistos. We sacrificed many thigh bones of bulls to Poseidon, having measured the great open water. It was the fourth day when the companions of Diomedes breaker of horses, Tydeus’ son, made fast their balanced ships at Argos. I held on for Pylos. Never once did the wind fail, once the god had set it to blowing. (Translation by R. Lattimore) 7. See Antypas 2017, 9–26; Bracessi 2010. 8. Il. 2.526–535: Λοκρῶν δ᾽ ἡγεμόνευεν Ὀϊλῆος ταχὺς Αἴας μείων, οὔ τι τόσος γε ὅσος Τελαμώνιος Αἴας ἀλλὰ πολὺ μείων. ὀλίγος μὲν ἔην λινοθώρηξ, ἐγχείῃ δ᾽ ἐκέκαστο Πανέλληνας καὶ Ἀχαιούς. οἳ Κῦνόν τ᾽ ἐνέμοντ᾽ Ὀπόεντά τε Καλλίαρόν τε Βῆσσάν τε Σκάρφην τε καὶ Αὐγειὰς ἐρατεινὰς Τάρφην τε Θρόνιον τε Βοαγρίου ἀμφὶ ῥέεθρα. τῷ δ᾽ ἅμα τεσσαράκοντα μέλαιναι νῆες ἕποντο Λοκρῶν, οἳ ναίουσι πέρην ἱερῆς Εὐβοίης.

Swift Aias son of Oileus led the men of Lokris, the lesser Aias, not great in size like the son of Telamon, but far slighter. He was a small man armoured in linen, yet with the throwing spear surpassed all Achaians and Hellenes. These were the dwellers in Kynos and Opoeis and Kalliaros, and in Bessa, and Skarphe, and lovely Augeiai, in Thronion and Tarphe and beside the waters of Boagrios. Following along with him were forty black ships of the Lokrians, who dwell across from sacred Euboia. (Translation by R. Lattimore) See also Kirk 1985 on Iliad 2.484–762. It has often been noted that in this description of the Lokrian contingent in the Catalog the poet's main interest is in Eastern Lokris, whose contingent he tries to strengthen, while the western part of Lokris is not mentioned at all in the Iliad. Besides, some places usually associated with Lokris, such as Alos and Alope, are mentioned in relation to Achilles’ jurisdiction (Il. 2.682). Many scholars believe that several problems in the Catalog of Ships are due to interpolation caused in part by some singers' desire to give greater weight to the entries in

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the Catalog on their own cities. A typical case in which one faces such problems is the Boeotian contingent. The whole problem is one of the most complicated conundrums in the study of epic poetry. For a synopsis, see Kirk 1985, 168–178 and, in particular (for the Lokrian entry), 201–205. The Lokrians go to Troy with forty ships (Il. 2.534), as do the Phocians (whose contingent precedes the Lokrian entry in the Catalog) and the Abantes (= Euboeans), whose contingent follows the Lokrian. Iliad 2.534, which states that Ajax’ ships were forty, is “a standard ship-number verse” according to Kirk (op. cit., 203). 9. Od. 3.286–300: ἀλλ᾽ ὅτε δὴ καὶ κεῖνος ἰὼν ἐπὶ οἴνοπα πόντον ἐν νηυσὶ γλαφυρῇσι Μαλειάων ὄρος αἰπὺ ἷξε θέων, τότε δὴ στυγερὴν ὁδὸν εὐρύοπα Ζεὺς ἐφράσατο, λιγέων δ᾽ ἀνέμων ἐπ᾽ ἀυτμένα χεῦε, κύματά τε τροφέοντο πελώρια, ἶσα ὄρεσσιν. ἔνθα διατμήξας τὰς μὲν Κρήτῃ ἐπέλασσεν, ἧχι Κύδωνες ἔναιον Ἰαρδάνου ἀμφὶ ῥέεθρα. ἔστι δέ τις λισσὴ αἰπεῖά τε εἰς ἅλα πέτρη ἐσχατιῇ Γόρτυνος ἐν ἠεροειδέι πόντῳ. ἔνθα Νότος μέγα κῦμα ποτὶ σκαιὸν ῥίον ὠθεῖ, ἐς Φαιστόν, μικρὸς δὲ λίθος μέγα κῦμ᾽ ἀποέργει. αἱ μὲν ἄρ᾽ ἔνθ᾽ ἦλθον, σπουδῇ δ᾽ ἤλυξαν ὄλεθρον ἄνδρες, ἀτὰρ νῆάς γε ποτὶ σπιλάδεσσιν ἔαξαν κύματ᾽. ἀτὰρ τὰς πέντε νέας κυανοπρῳρείους Αἰγύπτῳ ἐπέλασσε φέρων ἄνεμός τε καὶ ὕδωρ.

But when he too had gone out on the wine-blue open water in his hollow ships, and made his run as far as the steep rock of Maleia, then Zeus of the wide brows devised that his journey should be hateful, and poured out upon him the blast of shrilling winds, and waves that bulged and grew monstrous, like mountains. There he cut the fleet in two parts, and drove some on Crete where the Kydonians lived around the streams of Iardanos. There is the sheer of a cliff, a steep rock out in the water at the other end of Gortys on the misty face of the main, where the south wind piles up a huge surf on the left of the rock horn and the wanderings of Menelaos toward Phaistos, and a little stone holds out the big water. It was there they came, and by lively work the men avoided destruction, but the waves smashed their ships on the splinters of rock, but the wind and the water catching up the other five dark-prowed ships bore them along and drove them on Egypt. (Translation by R. Lattimore) 10. Evans 1928, 86. 11. Od. 4.576–586: ἦμος δ᾽ ἠριγένεια φάνη ῥοδοδάκτυλος Ἠώς, νῆας μὲν πάμπρωτον ἐρύσσαμεν εἰς ἅλα δῖαν, ἐν δ᾽ ἱστοὺς τιθέμεσθα καὶ ἱστία νηυσὶν ἐίσῃς, ἂν δὲ καὶ αὐτοὶ βάντες ἐπὶ κληῖσι καθῖζον: ἑξῆς δ᾽ ἑζόμενοι πολιὴν ἅλα τύπτον ἐρετμοῖς.

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Chapter 1 ἂψ δ᾽ εἰς Αἰγύπτοιο διιπετέος ποταμοῖο στῆσα νέας, καὶ ἔρεξα τεληέσσας ἑκατόμβας. αὐτὰρ ἐπεὶ κατέπαυσα θεῶν χόλον αἰὲν ἐόντων, χεῦ᾽ Ἀγαμέμνονι τύμβον, ἵν᾽ ἄσβεστον κλέος εἴη. ταῦτα τελευτήσας νεόμην, ἔδοσαν δέ μοι οὖρον ἀθάνατοι, τοί μ᾽ ὦκα φίλην ἐς πατρίδ᾽ ἔπεμψαν.

But when the young Dawn showed again with her rosy fingers, first of all we dragged the ship down into the bright water, and in the balanced ships set the masts in place, and set sails, and we ourselves also went aboard and sat to the oarlocks, and sitting well in order we dashed the oars in the gray sea, back to where Egypt is, the sky-fallen river, and there I stranded my ships, and there I rendered complete hecatombs. But when I had ended the anger of the gods, who are everlasting, I piled a mound for Agamemnon, so that his memory might never die. I did this, and set sail, and the immortals gave me a wind, so brought me back to my own dear country with all speed. (Translation by R. Lattimore) On Odysseus’ ships sailing the Nile in Odysseus’ false stories, see also Od. 14.257–261. 12. On Egyptian ships in antiquity, including those sailing the Nile, see Casson 1991, 11–21. 13. Cf. sch. Od. 1. 93: ἄτοπος δοκεῖ εἶναι Τηλεμάχου ἡ ἀποδημία πρῶτον μὲν κίνδυνον προξενοῦσα τῶι νέωι, δεύτερον ἐπανάστασιν τῶν μνηστήρων ἀπειλοῦσα, τρίτον οὐκ ὠφελοῦσα τὴν ζήτησιν τοῦ πατρός. For a general survey of the special problems connected with the Telemachy (= Books 1–4 of the Odyssey), see West 1998, 51–66. 14. Od. 3.487–490. On the historicity of such an itinerary, see MacDonald 1964, 217. 15. It is certainly not by chance that the name of Noemon’s father is Φρόνιος (2.386), but, in this passage, the use of both names does not seem to be ironical. For the name Noemon in the Iliad, cf. Il. 5.678, 23.612. 16. These theories are depicted on a map illustrating Odysseus' wanderings in H.-H. and A. Wolf's book Der Weg des Odysseus (Berlin, 1975). 17. Od. 3.155–164, 10.46–76, 12.1–36, 12.42–446. For more on this concept, see the next chapter. 18. Christopoulos 2001, 93–105. 19. Oxford, Ashmolean Museum, 262. 20. On the helmsman as a member of the ship’s crew, see Casson 1971 (especially 300–321) and Morrison 1969 and 1996, passim. On the helmsman’s relationship to other ranks of the crew (for the Classical period), see Aristophanes (Knights. 542– 544), who briefly indicates the distance between simple rowing and commanding. The three principal ranks in the nautical hierarchy of the Archaic period are κυβερνήτης (who was mainly responsible for the helm; cf. Pind. Isthm. 4.71), the κελευστής (who conveyed commands to the crew), and the πρωράτης (who kept track of the ship’s course from the prow). The κελευστής and the πρωράτης, as distinct ranks, do not

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occur in Homeric epic. In the Odyssey, the position of πρωράτης is held by Odysseus himself in the Skylla episode (cf. 12.217–221). About forty verses earlier, the helmsman’s role is highlighted by Odysseus in his words to the κυβερνήτης, whose main task under the circumstances is to keep the ship away from Charybdis (12.217–221). The most accurate understanding of the helmsman’s role in the Classical period is offered in the comparison made by Plato in the Republic (A341c–d). 21. Il. 19.40–46: αὐτὰρ ὃ βῆ παρὰ θῖνα θαλάσσης δῖος Ἀχιλλεὺς σμερδαλέα ἰάχων, ὦρσεν δ᾽ ἥρωας Ἀχαιούς. καί ῥ᾽ οἵ περ τὸ πάρος γε νεῶν ἐν ἀγῶνι μένεσκον οἵ τε κυβερνῆται καὶ ἔχον οἰήϊα νηῶν καὶ ταμίαι παρὰ νηυσὶν ἔσαν σίτοιο δοτῆρες, καὶ μὴν οἳ τότε γ᾽ εἰς ἀγορὴν ἴσαν, οὕνεκ᾽ Ἀχιλλεὺς ἐξεφάνη, δηρὸν δὲ μάχης ἐπέπαυτ᾽ ἀλεγεινῆς.

But he, brilliant Achilleus, walked along by the sea-shore crying his terrible cry, and stirred up the fighting Achaians. And even those who before had stayed where the ships were assembled, they who were helmsmen of the ships and handled the steering oar, they who were stewards among the ships and dispensers of rations, even these came then to assembly, since now Achilleus had appeared, after staying so long from the sorrowful battle. (Translation by R. Lattimore) 22. Il. 23.316–318: μήτι δ᾽ αὖτε κυβερνήτης ἐνὶ οἴνοπι πόντῳ νῆα θοὴν ἰθύνει ἐρεχθομένην ἀνέμοισι, μήτι δ᾽ ἡνίοχος περιγίγνεται ἡνιόχοιο.

It is by skill that the sea captain holds his rapid ship on its course, though torn by winds, over the wine-blue water. By skill charioteer outpasses charioteer. (Translation by R. Lattimore) 23. Od. 3.283, 8.557, 9.78, 11.10, 12.412, 14.256. Furthermore, there is the verb κυβερνάω (3.279), which refers to the helmsman of 3.283. 24. Od. 11.10, 12.17, 12.412. 25. τὰς δ᾽ ἄνεμός τε κυβερνῆταί τ᾽ ἴθυνον, 9.78. This verse refers to the journey of Odysseus’ ships to Ithaca before the tempest at Maleas carries the ships away to the land of the Lotus Eaters. The verse is used formulaically and is repeated exactly at 14.256, in the description of the hypothetical trip to Egypt in Odysseus’ false story to Eumaeus, and in 11.10, which describes Odysseus’ journey to Hades (with the variable κυβερνήτης, in singular, since in that case only one ship is involved). 26. Od. 3.283. 27. Od. 8.557–562: οὐ γὰρ Φαιήκεσσι κυβερνητῆρες ἔασιν, οὐδέ τι πηδάλι᾽ ἔστι, τά τ᾽ ἄλλαι νῆες ἔχουσιν,

18

Chapter 1 ἀλλ᾽ αὐταὶ ἴσασι νοήματα καὶ φρένας ἀνδρῶν, καὶ πάντων ἴσασι πόλιας καὶ πίονας ἀγροὺς ἀνθρώπων, καὶ λαῖτμα τάχισθ᾽ ἁλὸς ἐκπερόωσιν ἠέρι καὶ νεφέλῃ κεκαλυμμέναι,

For there are no steersmen among the Phaiakians, neither are there any steering oars for them, such as other ships have, but the ships themselves understand men’s thoughts and purposes, and they know all the cities of men and all their fertile fields, and with greatest speed they cross the gulf of the salt sea, huddled under a mist and cloud. (Translation by R. Lattimore) 28. Od. 3.278–285: ἀλλ᾽ ὅτε Σούνιον ἱρὸν ἀφικόμεθ᾽, ἄκρον Ἀθηνέων, ἔνθα κυβερνήτην Μενελάου Φοῖβος Ἀπόλλων οἷς ἀγανοῖς βελέεσσιν ἐποιχόμενος κατέπεφνε, πηδάλιον μετὰ χερσὶ θεούσης νηὸς ἔχοντα, Φρόντιν Ὀνητορίδην, ὃς ἐκαίνυτο φῦλ᾽ ἀνθρώπων νῆα κυβερνῆσαι, ὁπότε σπέρχοιεν ἄελλαι. ὣς ὁ μὲν ἔνθα κατέσχετ᾽, ἐπειγόμενός περ ὁδοῖο, ὄφρ᾽ ἕταρον θάπτοι καὶ ἐπὶ κτέρεα κτερίσειεν.

But when we came to holy Sounion, the cape of Athens, there Phoibos Apollo, with a visitation of his painless arrows, killed the steersman of Menelaos, the one who held in his hands the steering oar of the running ship. This was Phrontis, Onetor’s son, who surpassed all the breed of mortals in the steering of a ship whenever stormwinds were blowing. So Menelaos, though straining for the journey, was detained there, to bury his companion, and give him due rites. (Translation by R. Lattimore) See also Race 1993. 29. According to Janko 1992 (300), the death of priests’ sons, often attested in the Iliad, adds more passion to the story. 30. 29.3, 28, 30 passim, 31 passim. 31. Ol 10.9 (Hermann’s correction). 32. 2.2. 33. Herod. 7.212 34. Janko 1992, 390. 35. S. West 1990, 176. 36. “Tradition” and “innovation” in Homeric epic is an extremely popular subject in Homeric bibliography, which, however, it is impossible to discuss here. For a good presentation of the problem and of the bibliography, see, for example, Zervou (Ζερβού) 2003, 28–32 (with n. 1), 80–81, 229 (n. 91). 37. Cf. Telemachus’ “natural” question to Nestor at 3.248–249: “How did Agamemnon die? Where was Menelaus?” 38. On this narrative frame in Nestor’s story in relation to the internal narrators of the Odyssey, see Maronitis (Μαρωνίτης) 1999, 149–179.

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39. West (1990, 177) supposes a funerary ritual similar to that described at 12.9–15 for Elpenor: cremation of the dead together with his weapons, the raising of a τύμβος and the setting of a gravestone over the ashes, and, finally, the marking of the tomb by an oar placed on the edge of the grave. Pausanias mentions (10.35.2–3) that Phrontis is the only name Polygnotus took directly from the Odyssey when he painted the departure of the Greeks from Troy in the Lesche of the Cnidians at Delphi: Μενελάῳ δὲ τὰ ἐς τὴν ἀναγωγὴν εὐτρεπίζουσι, καὶ ναῦς ἐστι γεγραμμένη καὶ ἄνδρες ἐν τοῖς ναύταις καὶ ἀναμὶξ παῖδες, ἐν μέσῃ δέ ἐστι τῇ νηὶ ὁ κυβερνήτης Φρόντις κοντοὺς δύο ἔχων. Ὅμηρος δὲ Νέστορα ἐποίησεν ἄλλα τε διαλεγόμενον πρὸς Τηλέμαχον καὶ περὶ τοῦ Φρόντιδος: πατρὸς μὲν Ὀνήτορος, Μενελάου δὲ ἦνκυβερνήτης, δοκιμώτατος δὲ ἐς τὴν τέχνην, καὶ ὡς Σούνιον ἤδη τὸ ἐν τῇ Ἀττικῇ παραπλέοντα ἐπέλαβεν αὐτὸν τὸ χρεών.καὶ τέως ὁμοῦ Νέστορι ὁ Μενέλαος πλέων τότε κατὰ αἰτίανἀπελείφθη ταύτην, ἵνα μνήματος καὶ ὅσα ἐπὶ νεκροῖς ἄλλαἀξιώσειε τὸν Φρόντιν. οὗτός τε οὖν ἐν τοῦ Πολυγνώτου τῇγραφῇ καὶ ὑπ᾽ αὐτὸν Ἰθαιμένης τέ τις κομίζων ἐσθῆτα καὶ Ἐχοίαξ διὰ τῆς ἀποβάθρας κατιών ἐστιν, ὑδρίαν ἔχων χαλκῆν. In his depiction of Menelaus’ departure, Polygnotus showed Phrontis on board, in the middle of the ship, holding two poles and by him two other persons: Ithaemenes, carrying clothes, and Echoiax, carrying a bronze hydria. The name Ithaemenes is mentioned at 16.586 of the Iliad. He is the father of the Trojan Sthenelos, and, if this is really the person Polygnotus chose to depict, he was probably supposed to be a prisoner of the Greeks. The name Echoiax (’Εχοίαξ) literally means “helmsman,” holder of the oiax, and if the word is not merely an indication of the person’s function, but a proper name, it is still a proper name derived from a function. 40. 1990, 177. 41. There is also the only relevant parallel from the Iliad (24.759), where the dead Hector is compared by Hecuba to someone who has died with body still intact, “as if Apollo had killed him with his arrows.” 42. See the place given to the Phrontis episode and to Phrontis’ relation to other persons in the Odyssey by Peradotto 1990, 36–40. 43. For the comparison between Leucothea and Eidothea and their respective roles in the two nostoi, see West 1990, 216. Menelaus’ navigation of the Nile, an important event in his return, is almost ironically echoed in Odysseus’ false stories to Eumaeus (14.257–258). The relation between Menelaus’ and Odysseus’ nostoi has already been studied by Klinger 1944; Reinhardt 1960, 47–124; Lord 1960; and Danek 1998, 91. 44. See Vernant 1979. 45. Such is, for instance, the case of Lokrian Ajax, who dies because of Athena’s hostility, which is explicitly mentioned (4.502) but not explained at all. However, Homer’s listener or reader will clearly consider it the result of Ajax’s impious behavior during the sack of Troy toward Cassandra, a suppliant of the goddess’ statue, as we saw in the beginning of this chapter. 46. Vernant 1979, also for the relations of Athena and Poseidon with Tiphys and Ankaios, mythical helmsmen of the Argo, and with Canopus, Menelaus’ helmsman,

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who, in later stories, leads Menelaus’ ships from Rhodes to Egypt, where he dies, probably in an echo of the Odyssean antecedent of Phrontis. For the storm theme introduced at this point of the poem, which recurs in other instances, see de Jong 2001, 83, and Létoublon 2002, 99–117. 47. See Clay 1983, 46–47. On the presence of the gods in Nestor’s words and the relevant interpretations suggested, see Manakidou (Μανακίδου) 2002, 162–186. 48. These are the words with which Agamemnon describes his own death in the Nekyia (ὥς τίς τε κατέκτανε βοῦν ἐπὶ φάτνῃ, 11.411). 49. This is the reason—that he is the son-in-law of Zeus—that Proteus mentions at 4.569 when he foretells Menelaus’ immortality. 50. On the probable existence of a sanctuary of Phrontis at Sounion (with votive finds possibly depicting him), see Abramson 1981, 1–19, Sinn 1992, 176–189. 51. Od. 3.354–586. 52. Od. 9.94–97: τῶν δ᾽ ὅς τις λωτοῖο φάγοι μελιηδέα καρπόν, οὐκέτ᾽ ἀπαγγεῖλαι πάλιν ἤθελεν οὐδὲ νέεσθαι, ἀλλ᾽ αὐτοῦ βούλοντο μετ᾽ ἀνδράσι Λωτοφάγοισι λωτὸν ἐρεπτόμενοι μενέμεν νόστου τε λαθέσθαι.

But any of them who ate the honey-sweet fruit of lotus was unwilling to take any message back, or to go away, but they wanted to stay there with the lotus-eating people, feeding on lotus, and forget the way home. (Translation by R. Lattimore) 53. Od. 11.13–22. 54. Od. 12.407–419: ἡ δ᾽ ἔθει οὐ μάλα πολλὸν ἐπὶ χρόνον. αἶψα γὰρ ἦλθε κεκληγὼς Ζέφυρος μεγάλῃ σὺν λαίλαπι θύων, ἱστοῦ δὲ προτόνους ἔρρηξ᾽ ἀνέμοιο θύελλα ἀμφοτέρους, ἱστὸς δ᾽ ὀπίσω πέσεν, ὅπλα τε πάντα εἰς ἄντλον κατέχυνθ᾽. ὁ δ᾽ ἄρα πρυμνῇ ἐνὶ νηὶ πλῆξε κυβερνήτεω κεφαλήν, σὺν δ᾽ ὀστέ᾽ ἄραξε πάντ᾽ ἄμυδις κεφαλῆς. ὁ δ᾽ ἄρ᾽ ἀρνευτῆρι ἐοικὼς κάππεσ᾽ ἀπ᾽ ἰκριόφιν, λίπε δ᾽ ὀστέα θυμὸς ἀγήνωρ. Ζεὺς δ᾽ ἄμυδις βρόντησε καὶ ἔμβαλε νηὶ κεραυνόν. ἡ δ᾽ ἐλελίχθη πᾶσα Διὸς πληγεῖσα κεραυνῷ, ἐν δὲ θεείου πλῆτο, πέσον δ᾽ ἐκ νηὸς ἑταῖροι.

And she ran on, but not for a very long time, as suddenly a screaming West Wind came upon us, stormily blowing, and the blast of the stormwind snapped both the forestays that were holding the mast, and the mast went over backwards, and all the running gear collapsed in the wash; and at the stern of the ship the mast pole crashed down on the steersman's head and pounded to pieces all the bones of his head, so that he like a diver dropped from the high deck, and the proud life left his bones there. Zeus with thunder and lightning together crashed on our vessel, and,

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struck by the thunderbolt of Zeus, she spun in a circle, and all was full of brimstone. My men were thrown in the water, and bobbing like sea crows they were washed away on the running waves all around the black ship, and the god took away their homecoming. (Translation by R. Lattimore) 55. Cf. also Iliad 16.742–743. When Patroclus kills Kebriones, Hector’s charioteer, who falls from his chariot like an ’αρνευτήρ, Patroclus is watching him and sarcastically compares his body to a diver’s. 56. See also chapter 6. 57. Od. 13.88–92.

Chapter 2

Onward and Backward

Although the Odyssey is usually read and studied by informed readers, who are aware of the poet’s chief device, whereby he launches his narrative “in medias res,” the structure of time and space throughout the poem often displays subtle, subversive, and unexpected aspects. The purpose of this chapter is, therefore, to focus on some of the more significant aspects.1 One such aspect is what I will call the “corrupted nostos,” an idea underlying or parallel to the general narrative of Odysseus’ return. Four times in the Odyssey, Odysseus returns to the same point from which he has departed. The first time occurs at the very beginning of Odysseus’ return and is mentioned by Nestor when Telemachus visits Pylos (3.13–166). The Pylian king tells Telemachus that after the sack of Troy, Odysseus initially sailed with Nestor from Troy up to Tenedos but then returned to Troy to join Agamemnon, who had stayed there to sacrifice to Athena. The second time occurs when Odysseus returns to the island of Aeolus after Odysseus’ companions have foolishly opened the leather bag that Aeolus gave Odysseus (10.46–76). The third takes place when Odysseus returns to the island of Circe, having visited the Underworld on Circe’s advice (12.1–36). The fourth time occurs when Odysseus returns to the strait of Skylla and Charybdis after the destruction of his ship brought about by the impious slaughter of Helios’ cattle by Odysseus’ companions (12.426–446).2 Of these four returns, the first (Tenedos-Troy) and the third (Underworld-Circe) are the result of Odysseus’ own intentions and have no negative consequences, nor have the circumstances in which he first experienced contact with these places changed. On the second and fourth occasions—that is, when Odysseus returns to the island of Aeolus and to the strait of Skylla and Charybdis, respectively—the situation is now totally different. The first time Odysseus crosses the strait of Skylla and Charybdis, he is on his ship, accompanied by his companions, and the danger he encounters 23

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arises from Skylla. The second time Odysseus is without ship or companions, he enters the strait from the opposite side, and the danger he encounters this time comes from Charybdis. In contrast to Jason, the hero of the pre-Homeric Argonautic epic, who crossed the strait of the Clashing Rocks in one direction, Odysseus passes through the strait twice, and each time he does so, he faces a different type of danger. Each of these dangers proceeds from each of the two rocks in the strait. This second crossing is for Odysseus the first danger he experiences alone after the death of his companions. The circumstances of the second crossing are clearly worse than those of the first. The return to Aeolus’ island also leads to a worse departure this time, since, instead of being welcomed, hosted, and offered gifts, Odysseus is this time cursed, rejected, and expelled. Where does this theme of reverse nostos or second departure take us? It seems to me that, here, we have something more than the occurrence of one of the usual, well-known tools often remarked on in Homeric poetry.3 This is neither a simple narrative doublet nor a narrative retardation of the plot. In fact, these reverse nostoi are extremely eloquent as regards their proper content and context. First, the figure two, or multiples of two, occurs persistently (two departures from the same place, four occurrences of the theme, two crossings from two entries of the strait, two dangers from two rocks), whereas the number traditionally associated with the Homeric epics is either three or some multiple of three.4 Second, these reverse nostoi and repeated departures ironically undermine the very concept of nostos by giving us first a return to the point of departure, rather than an arrival at the end—exactly what I would call a “corrupted nostos”—and then offering us a second departure from the same place under much worse circumstances than those prevailing the first time around. Further on, since these corrupted nostoi and their unhappy outcomes are always the result of the companions’ unwise initiatives, one wonders whether the purpose of these narratives concerning Odysseus’ second departure from the same place is not merely to echo but actually to enhance and develop the idea announced in line 5 of the prooimion, where we are told that Odysseus did not finally save his companions, although he very much wished to do so. In other words, these corrupted nostoi may simply be illustrating the idea that the companions were not saved because they did not deserve to be saved. Whether this distinction is to be considered against the background of aristocratic values prevailing in the Odyssey is a question to be answered in another book, but the matter is certainly connected with the way the idea of the collective and the idea of the individual are perceived in the Odyssey. What these narratives say, which the prooimon does not say, is not only that the companions are ruined by their own ἀτασθαλίαι but also, above all, that their existence is ruinous to Odysseus’ own salvation. By the middle of the trip to Ithaca, this major incompatibility has already become

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clear: it is the companions’ salvation against Odysseus’ salvation; it is either him or them. Of these four departures and new arrivals to the place of departure, Odysseus’ departure to the Underworld and his second arrival on Circe’s island seem to be extremely significant. Odysseus’ journey to the Underworld and his encounter with Teiresias reveal what awaits him once he reaches Ithaca. After Teiresias’ revelations, one thing is clear to Odysseus and to the audience, something probably compatible with the whole tradition pertaining to the Ithacan king: Ithaca is the end of the Odyssean wanderings, not the end of Odysseus’ wanderings. Apart from Teiresias, another encounter is important in Odysseus’ descent to the Underworld: his encounter with Achilles. As we know, in Hades, Odysseus meets and addresses seven people in total—Elpenor, Teiresias, Antikleia, Agamemnon, Achilles, Hercules, and Ajax—and he receives a response from each one of them, with the notable exception of Ajax. It is worth mentioning that in the Nekyia and, in particular, in Odysseus’ dialogue with Antikleia, Agamemnon, and Achilles, we can perceive a narrative pattern pertaining to the information provided to three major heroes—Odysseus, Agamemnon, and Achilles—about their own sons—respectively, Telemachus, Orestes, and Neoptolemus. When he speaks to Antikleia, Odysseus has no information about Telemachus, but the audience of the Odyssey has. Odysseus and Agamemnon have no information about Orestes, but the audience of the Odyssey has. But neither Achilles nor the audience has any information about Neoptolemus, and that is perhaps why Odysseus gives a more extant account about Achilles’ son, still an account with significant and, probably, deliberate paralipseis.5 One of these omissions is Neoptolemus’ impious treatment of Priam during the sack of Troy. The other unexpected omission is the fate of Achilles’ weapons, which, after the hero’s death, had been granted to Odysseus following the Trojans’ relevant judgment. The reason for this omission is probably the fact that, immediately after Odysseus’ encounter with Achilles, comes Ajax’s soul, who will not respond to Odysseus’ reconciling address, still showing his grudge because of these very weapons to which he had himself laid claim. The issue of Achilles’ weapons is also what makes the encounter between Achilles and Odysseus in the Nekyia unique, since it brings together the former owner of the weapons (Achilles) and their later recipient (Odysseus). What about Ajax and his claim? If one reasons in terms of kinship, then Ajax’s claim to the weapons could be justified since, apart from being one of the bravest Achaeans, he is also the cousin of Achilles, and, therefore, the weapons would remain in the same genos, since Neoptolemus, Achilles’ son, was not in Troy at that moment. That is why, in many versions of the story, Odysseus received the weapons, promising to give them to Neoptolemus in

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due time. Still, there is an additional reason explaining why the weapons were awarded to Odysseus, a reason that we usually overlook when we read the story of the weapons. As we know, the expedition to Troy was the result of the oath given by Helen’s suitors, who were bound to defend Helen’s marriage should this marriage be threatened by anyone in the future. Odysseus was initially one of the suitors, but he was subsequently betrothed to Penelope thanks to Tyndareos’ intervention, and, in exchange, he offered his wise counsel to Tyndareos by suggesting the idea of the oath. So Odysseus was not himself bound by the oath, as he was not one of Helen’s suitors any longer. Achilles, by contrast, was never a suitor of Helen and was not bound by the suitors’ oath either. But both Odysseus and Achilles had to join the expedition—and we know how reluctant Odysseus was in this regard—because, according to the omens, their participation was a sine qua non condition for the fall of Troy. If these two heroes, Achilles and Odysseus, were assigned by omen to become the conquerors of Troy, then it would be only fair that the former’s weapons would go, after his death, to the latter’s hands. The omens’ assignment is something we tend to forget when we examine the criteria advanced in various narratives concerning the evaluation of bravery between Odysseus and Ajax.6 During Odysseus’ return, there are not only significant departures and arrivals but also significant stays. The longest of these stays is, of course, his sojourn on the island of Calypso, whence the narrative of his return begins. Strangely enough, this idleness of Odysseus on the island of Ogygia allows a remarkable spread of the kleos he acquired at Troy. The wreck of Odysseus’ ship after Thrinakia and the loss of his companions are in many aspects an important shift in the dynamics of Odysseus’ return, since the nostos, rather than being still collective, is now individual, and, consequently, heroic kleos is ascribed to Odysseus alone.7 But from this very moment onward, the nature of the deeds relating to his person changes, and light is now increasingly shed on his Trojan exploits. Until he arrives at the island of Calypso, Odysseus is active in present time, and his efforts concern a collective nostos, his own return as well as that of his companions. But with Odysseus’ sojourn in Ogygia, present time ceases to be dominant. While Odysseus remains inactive on Calypso’s island, witnesses to his Trojan kleos, such as Nestor, Menelaus, and Helen, have time to return home and propagate it, so that the kleos now precedes Odysseus when he regains his spirit of activity as he listens to Demodocus’ song on the Wooden Horse. In terms of time and space, then, just as Odysseus’ nostos brings him physically back from Troy to Ithaca, the renown of his kleos brings him from Ithaca back to Troy, thereby accomplishing an itinerary that, in real life, Odysseus initially had refused to undertake.8 Much has been said about the complementarity of character between Odysseus and Penelope, mainly in matters of mental ability.9 Homer’s persistent

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use of formulae stresses this complementarity. Περίφρων Penelope is the suitable spouse of πολύμητις Odysseus. She even manages to fool him when she tests his identity by pretending that his bed, fixed to the root of an olive tree, can be easily removed to another room of the palace (Od. 23.173–230). Further, formulaic evidence can perhaps strengthen this concept of complementarity in terms of time. Whenever Odysseus’ trip continues once more, we hear that he and his companions (or he alone when he leaves Calypso’s island) “raised the mast and fixed the sail on it,” and, as long as the sail is raised on the mast, on the histos, it brings him closer to his destination, and then the course of time is positive for his timely arrival. What happens with Penelope? She also has her own histos—her loom. But as long as the cloth, the shroud for Laertes, is woven on this histos, the course of time works against Odysseus’ timely arrival. He sails for three years and spends the other seven waiting in Ogygia. Penelope weaves for three years, having spent the previous seven waiting in Ithaca.10 Finally, both histoi stop functioning, and for both characters, the husband and the wife, the course of time seems to lead to an impasse. Penelope’s trick is revealed, and she is now forced to move toward an unwished marital life, while Odysseus is trapped within an unwished substitute for marital life on Calypso’s island, where he has been reduced to grasping at the remains of his broken histos. This idea is perhaps another aspect of complementarity, in terms of time and space, between a sailing Odysseus and his weaving wife, who both know how to “weave malice” (δόλους).11 What kind of son can be the offspring of such an alliance? Another strange occurrence related to time is Odysseus’ arrival on Ithaca, slightly before his son returns. As we have mentioned, there are various views as to the purpose and contribution of Telemachus’ trip in relation to the economy and structure of the whole poem.12 To understand this trip better in relation to Odysseus’ return, one should perhaps consider the whole issue of time in the case of Telemachus and his coming of age. As early as the Iliad, we find two references to Telemachus, both made by Odysseus, both in a strange context and completely unrelated to dramatic time. The first one concerns Odysseus’ threat to punish Thersites in Book 2.260: “Or if I don’t,” he says, “let me not be called the father of Telemachus any longer.” The second reference to Telemachus concerns Odysseus’ answer to Agamemnon in Book 4.353–355, where Odysseus presents himself as “Telemachus’ beloved father” (4.354).13 Aristarchus’ view was that in this passage, the poet has in mind the Odysseus of the Odyssey rather than the hero of the Iliad. In any case, however, Odysseus’ reference to Telemachus in these two passages of the Iliad (2.260 and 4.354) clearly shows that the story of Telemachus was known in the epic tradition some time before it was told in the Odyssey. But what story exactly? At the point when Odysseus mentions his son in the Iliad, Telemachus is about nine years old, and whatever is related to Telemachus

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can refer only to the events of his childhood. In the epic tradition, the role of Telemachus at this stage is only to provide an argument against Odysseus participating in the Trojan expedition, and, indeed, Odysseus’ reluctance to join the army was obviously a well-established epic motif,14 clearly evoked again in Odyssey 24.115–119 by Agamemnon, when he mentions the difficulty he had in convincing Odysseus to join the Trojan expedition. If this is so, then the story of Odysseus feigning madness and sowing salt to avoid this task probably underlies these passages, which meant that Homer could also allude to the device used by Palamedes, who unmasked Odysseus by putting the infant Telemachus in front of the plow.15 Telemachus’ age is also the issue of a famous “error” in the Odyssean narrative—namely, the information given by Antikleia to Odysseus when he encounters his mother in the Underworld. In Odyssey 11.185–187, Antikleia informs Odysseus that Telemachus is already a man who takes part in men’s gatherings and banquets. Although the listener/reader has been watching Telemachus’ adult-like activity during the first four books of the Odyssey, when this information is given by Antikleia, Telemachus is barely twelve years old, and manhood is still far away. When is Telemachus finally about to reach manhood, or will he reach it at all? It is a feature of Telemachus’ portrayal in the Odyssey that all his initiatives, either spontaneous or directed by the gods, remain incomplete. This is true of the Assembly of the Ithacans, of Telemachus’ trip to Pylos and Sparta, and of the efforts Telemachus makes to defend his household from the suitors. In the “Telemachy,” the fact that in Sparta Menelaus is giving his daughter in marriage stresses perhaps a significant reversal in the order of time, since in Ithaca Telemachus is strangely proclaiming the marriage of his own mother, which is another “task” that remains unfulfilled by Telemachus in the Odyssey. Finally, the process of achieving manhood through a series of appropriate and emblematic actions is definitely and surprisingly cancelled for Telemachus by the return of his own father. Odysseus, previously transformed by Athena into an aged beggar, suddenly regains the form of young manhood, regains a promised wife from long ago, takes things into his own hands ipso jure, and, by so doing, pushes Telemachus’ expected and imminent entrée into manhood forward to some distant and undefined point in time. If we knew more about the Telegony, the lost epic of the Epic Cycle, we could more easily guess what happens later to Telemachus. I have my doubts as to whether the double marriage, Telemachus’ to Circe and Telegonus’ to Penelope, announced at the end of the summary of the Telegony by Proclus, really belongs to the Archaic age. But at the present state of our knowledge, I feel that the end of the Odyssey leaves us with at least two suspended issues: political stability in Ithaca in view of Odysseus’ announcement that he is departing once more and, above all, Telemachus’ postponed coming of age

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and manhood, which, whenever it occurred, was not necessarily rooted in the mythographic tradition related to Odysseus’ kingship in Ithaca. Telemachus would never become king of Ithaca. NOTES 1. One should mention here the concept of belatedness, the fact that on several occasions in Odysseus’ wanderings and in his tales Odysseus is portrayed as a traveler who has arrived late. On this point, see Burgess 2012, 269–290. 2. The same theme in miniature can also be detected in the return of Odysseus’ ship to the Cyclops’ shore, which occurs because of the rock thrown by Polyphemus in Book 9. 3. On these narrative tools, see Pache 2020. 4. See Blom 1932, Germain 1954; cf. also sch. on Iliad 6.174. 5. See Tanozzi 2023. 6. On Ajax as a suitor of Helen, see Nagy 2023. 7. This is to say that, in a way, both kleos and time are individually perceived. See Christopoulos 2001, 93–105. 8. See infra (chapter 6) the structural role played by the stay in Calypso’s island in these oppositely oriented nostoi. 9. On Penelope in the Odyssey, see indicatively Katz 1991, Felson 1994, Papadopoulou-Behlmedi 1994, and Felson and Slatkin 2004, 91–115; see also Ready 2014. 10. Odyssey 2.87–110. 11. On “weaving malice” in the Odyssey, see indicatively 5.356, 9.422, 19.137. 12. See supra, n. 11. 13. This is contrary to the usual mode of heroic self-presentation, through the hero’s father’s name (in the case of Odysseus, cf. the frequent formula ’Οδυσσεύς Λ αερτιάδης). 14. See, for instance, Proclus’ summary of the Cypria. 15. On possible traces of Palamedes’ story in Homeric epics, see Christopoulos 2014, 153–166, and chapter 3 in this book, where the conflict between Odysseus and Palamedes is discussed; see also Scodel 2009, 15–16, 108–109.

Chapter 3

Odysseus’ Crimes and the Prolonged Nostos

Odysseus’ Trojan deeds include crimes. Some of these are already mentioned in the Epic Cycle, but most of them are later depicted in tragedy. Examples include the death of Astyanax, the sacrifice of Polyxena, and, in particular, two acts of special importance for our purposes: (i) Odysseus’ attempt to kill Diomedes during the night raid to steal the Palladion, a narrative probably included in the Little Iliad, and (ii) the murder of Palamedes by Odysseus with Diomedes as accomplice, a notorious story most probably related in the Cypria and further evidenced by small preserved fragments of (or comments on) lost tragedies.1 Of this criminal activity, two cases of personal enmity and extreme contrast deserve our attention: the rivalry between Ajax and Odysseus, and the rivalry between Palamedes and Odysseus. Both cases exhibit a similar prevailing narrative pattern: rivalry is suppressed at the expense of the death of Odysseus’ opponent. In the rivalry with Ajax, Ajax is blamed and commits suicide; the story is explicitly mentioned in the Homeric epics (Nekyia). In Palamedes’ case, Odysseus stands accused. His antagonist is callously murdered, although the story is not explicitly mentioned in the Homeric epics. In the first case, that of Ajax and Odysseus, the narrative scheme is probably identical in both epic and drama and easy to understand, at least in its Sophoclean version, in the Ajax. Two heroes, radically different in terms of heroic behavior, are locked in conflict because of this very difference. In the end, one dies when proven superior in warfare but inferior in malicious intent. In the second case, the narrative scheme is anthropologically interesting and easy to recognize: two heroes, equally clever, are at odds because of this very cleverness. One of them is finally killed when he proves to be cleverer but lacking in malice.2 31

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In all three instances of Odysseus’ prospective victims in the Trojan epic tradition—Diomedes, Palamedes, and Dolon—malice (δόλος) is endemic, something emphatically endorsed in Odysseus’ self-presentation to the Phaeacians (Εἷμ’’Οδυσσεύς Λαερτιάδης ὃς πᾶσι δόλοισιν ἀνθρώποισι μέλω, Od. 9.19–20)3. In Diomedes’ case (Little Iliad), δόλος is used; in Palamedes’ case (Cypria), δόλος again appears, while in Dolon’s case (Iliad 10), δόλος is again present, but here the malice is emblematically ascribed to Dolon’s name, which also supplies the title for the whole book (Doloneia). Measuring the exact dimensions of “good” and “evil,” of “moral” and “immoral,” in literary tradition before the Iliad and the Odyssey, is a difficult process. Moreover, the overwhelming influence of the Odyssey on our perceptions of Odysseus makes any attempt to arrive at a precise idea of his pre-Odyssean image, even his image in the Iliad, almost impossible. However, it is reasonable to suspect that the development of Odysseus’ complex figure in the Archaic epic probably reflects larger issues with significant social and anthropological implications—namely, the long process of moving from disregarding δόλος completely to considering it morally acceptable, if it is a priority. In trying briefly to recall the main acts ascribed to Palamedes within the context of the Trojan expedition, things are complicated by the absence of Palamedes’ name from Homer. According to Dictys of Crete (1.4.13), Palamedes is already involved in the Greek demand for the return of Helen (Ἑλένης ἀπαίτησις) before the expedition begins. Palamedes takes part in the meeting of the Greek leaders in Sparta on the matter. Dictys’ version is confirmed by an Etruscan mirror depicting Ajax, Menelaus, Palamedes, and Diomedes. In Gerhardt’s view,4 Palamedes’ presence in this group may reflect a preHomeric tradition. For him, the purpose of this particular meeting is to allow the Greek leaders to convince Odysseus to participate in the Trojan expedition, a story also confirmed by Odyssey 24.118–119. In Dictys and other sources, Palamedes (alternately with Diomedes) also takes part in the (second) embassy sent to the Trojans during the expedition (cf Iliad 3.305 ff). Zografou5 believes that Dictys’ version combines two different variations regarding the Greek embassy sent to the Trojans. In such a situation, there would be a first embassy sent before the expedition and a second embassy sent during the siege. We should, therefore, deduce that Proclus’ summary omitted the first embassy, which would normally appear among the events described in the Cypria. If, however, in the epic tradition there were two embassies, then, in the first one, Palamedes would be a more plausible participant than Odysseus, given Odysseus’ initial desire to avoid the Trojan venture. Regardless of how many embassies were sent, similar criteria seem to apply to the choice of participants in each one of them. Menelaus, Helen’s insulted husband, would clearly play a prominent role in such a claim, and this is precisely what happens in Iliad 3.305. Apart from this, in

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all versions of the embassy, Helen’s husband is accompanied by a companion excelling in subtlety of thought and speech. Such, of course, were Odysseus and Palamedes (Dictys puts them both in this embassy in spite of their mutual rivalry). Diomedes’ participation, however, seems justified in view of his frequent presence on several missions together with Odysseus and, perhaps, also by his name’s verbal resemblance to Palamedes’ (Dio-medes, Pala-medes). What exactly brings Odysseus and Diomedes together in the relevant stories of the epic tradition? We do not know from what time the narrative concerning Odysseus’ attempt to kill Diomedes during the Palladion night raid dates, but ancient lexicographers often associated the proverbial expression “Διομήδειος ἀνάγκη” with the events described in the Little Iliad. However, Diomedes’ unique mention in Proclus’ summary in relation to the theft of the Palladion probably indicates that the story of Odysseus’ attempt had already been inserted into this poem.6 According to this version, once the sacred statue has been successfully removed, Odysseus tries to kill Diomedes in his ambition to arrogate to himself all the glory of its acquisition. Diomedes spots Odysseus’ shadow in the moonlight just in time and makes him walk in front, threatening Odysseus with his sword.7 The sequence of these details in the narrative of the Little Iliad deserves our attention in many respects. The criminal act per se is suspended and has no further impact on the development of the plot, but Odysseus’ malicious intent still remains as a part of the story, if only to illustrate the treacherous aspect of a heroic figure like Odysseus. Strangely enough, this dark side of Odysseus’ character neither foreshadows nor has any relationship at all with the heroic deed itself, which is accomplished with distinction. Should we then infer that in the case of Odysseus, at least in the Little Iliad, achieving and deserving kleos can be factually dissociated, or are we merely witnessing yet another instance of a concept that implies that warfare is not the only pathway to kleos? In Stanford’s8 view, Odysseus’ initial refusal to join the Trojan expedition is indicated by Homer in the Odyssey (24.118–119), in which Agamemnon mentions his trip to Ithaca to persuade Odysseus to participate. Even if Palamedes’ device is not evoked, the poet of the Odyssey knows and mentions the difficulty of convincing Odysseus, obviously because it was familiar to the audience. For Stanford, the main reason for this silence regarding Palamedes is simply the poet’s desire to preserve Odysseus’ heroic prestige, an idea consistent with Philostratus’ principal argument in both the Life of Apollonius of Tyana and the Heroicus. It is hard to believe that the episode concerning Palamedes was unknown to the poet of the Homeric epics. In 1995, Ph. Kakridis9 suggested that Palamedes himself, as a heroic figure, was part of the epic tradition and was gradually shadowed, through syncretism, by another (pre-Hellenic) figure, Odysseus; a similar suggestion had been made by Phillips in 1957.10 In 2011,

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Cantrell11 tried to use anthropological and psychoanalytical tools to explain the relationship between Odysseus and Palamedes and, as a second surmise, between Odysseus and Diomedes and between Palamedes and Dolon. Cantrell sought to apply to these figures the theory of the “double” (Doppelgänger), a pair of figures with similar features, one of which must be utterly destroyed. However, to remain within the limits of the Homeric narrative, an account has to be taken of a strange feature in Odysseus’ Iliadic profile. As mentioned in chapter 2, twice in the Iliad (2.260 and 4.353–355), and contrary to the usual mode of heroic self-presentation (that is, through the hero’s father’s name), Odysseus introduces himself by evoking the name of his son, Telemachus.12 In his second self-presentation as the father of Telemachus (4.353–355), Odysseus refutes Agamemnon’s unjust accusations; the Greek leader, immediately after his ironic address to Diomedes, accuses Odysseus of opportunism, shunning battle, and greediness. Contextual similarities in the beginning of Book 4 and Book 10, and especially the theme of night watch, made Hainsworth13 compare verses 1–179 of Book 10 to Agamemnon’s ἐπιπώλησις of Book 4. What Hainsworth does not compare in relation to Book 4 is precisely Agamemnon’s dialogues with the two protagonists of Doloneia, Odysseus and Diomedes, one after the other. As mentioned above, in Book 4, Odysseus answers Agamemnon by presenting himself as “Telemachus’ beloved father” (Τηλεμάχοιο φίλον πατέρα, 4.354). What is the purpose of naming Telemachus in this context? Scodel14 sees this episode as an allusion to the device used by Palamedes to bring Odysseus to Troy. If this is so, then our confidence that Palamedes is not mentioned at all in Homer is automatically shaken, as we also saw in the previous chapter. West15 mentions two versions about the exact way Palamedes used Telemachus in this episode: in one version, Palamedes put the baby in front of the plow; in the other version, he pretended to kill him with his sword. According to West, the second version is more probable for the Cypria.16 How old are the narratives of the Cypria? West suggests that there would have been a first version, a pre-cyclic poem, already shaped out about the second half of the seventh century BC,17 but the poem’s final form, the one included in the Epic Cycle, should be dated in the early sixth century (between 580 and 550 BC). One may add that mythical narratives normally precede their textual registration, be it oral or written. As for the story of the infant Telemachus, we cannot, I think, exclude the possibility of an interactive influence between the stories of Orestes and Telemachus, the two most famous offspring of the Greek leaders, whose lives are threatened, respectively, by Telephus and Palamedes, whose fates are openly compared several times in the Odyssey. In the first instance, the lives of both children are artificially put in danger to view the successful outcome of the Trojan expedition. In a second instance, the epic tradition anticipates similar murderous activity

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from both children once they reach manhood: Orestes’ killing of his mother’s lover and Telemachus’ participation in the killing of his mother’s suitors. In any case, Odysseus’ mention of Telemachus in the two passages of the Iliad (2.260 and 4.353–355) shows clearly and beyond doubt that the story of Telemachus, known in the epic tradition some time before being related in the Odyssey. We saw in chapter 2 that at the point when Odysseus mentions his son in the Iliad, Telemachus is about nine years old, and whatever is related about him can only refer to events of his childhood. In all the mythical narratives, Palamedes’ device revealing Odysseus’ feigned madness has always been considered the primary motivation behind Odysseus’ revenge. An additional issue related to the antagonism between Odysseus and Palamedes could also be found in Palamedes’ genealogical descent from Poseidon,18 who was notoriously hostile to Odysseus. Palamedes’ murder could provide an additional and, maybe, overriding reason for this hostility, which, in the Odyssey, is exclusively attributed to the blinding of Polyphemus. An epic poet drawing on the epic tradition could, if he wanted, rely on Palamedes’ murder to explain Poseidon’s hostility. If there was any reason for not mentioning Palamedes, then the story of Polyphemus, probably pre-Odyssean, was available to fulfill a similar function. In terms of divine justice, however, one wonders how many years of sea wandering would be appropriate punishment for Palamedes’ murder if the blinding of a cannibalistic monster was already worthy of ten, unless the reasoning hinges on the presumption that Odysseus’ ten years wandering and the search for people ignorant of the use of oars, as Teiresias suggested, are related to crimes committed in Troy, before the return voyage to Greece—and Palamedes’ murder was one of these crimes. For most Greek heroes, the nostos itself, however painful, was their deserved reward for actions they committed before their nostos started; in this respect, the Odyssean hero and his companions are the exception and not the rule. One can hardly disregard the wide semantic field opened through the theme of the oar, given the semantic persistence of the names of Palamedes’ genealogy: Poseidon (grandfather), Nauplios (father), Oiax (brother), and Nausimedon (brother), all emphatically slanted toward the nautical vocabulary. According to Chantraine (Dict. Etym.), the word παλάμη, to which the name of the hero is connected, is related to the Latin word palma (hand; also oar) and derives from a theme that produces words signifying width (among them the word πέλαγος). In a version adopted or developed in Euripides’ lost play Palamedes, the hero’s murder was revealed by means of a message written by Oiax on the oars of the ship. As to the notion of punishment, the Odyssey offers several examples in which the punishment of a hero is justified by a less serious crime than the one traditionally ascribed to him. The case of the Lokrian Ajax, hated by Athena for the rape of Cassandra, is, as mentioned above, characteristic: in Odyssey 4 (502–504),

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his death is exclusively attributed to his hubristic boasting, although this explanation contains no justification for Athena’s prior hostility.19 Turning to examine some aspects related to Dolon in Iliad 10, we observe once more the repeated animal imagery and, in particular, that of the wolf;20 Dolon himself is covered by a wolf’s skin, something consistently depicted in all relative vase paintings.21 Dolon was a renowned Trojan runner, but not handsome at all, as the text takes trouble to make clear (10.316). Already in 1968, Gernet22 compared him to Thersites and associated him with the idea of a pharmakos who is expelled and, often, lapidated or drowned.23 Pausanias, however, confirms what he claims to have read in the Cypria—that Palamedes was drowned by Odysseus and Diomedes while fishing: ἀποπνιγῆναι προελθόντα ἐπὶ ἰχθύων θήραν (10.31, 2–5 = fr. 30 Bernabé);24 Kullmann25 tried to explain this fishing (a non-heroic activity by Homeric standards) by presuming that Palamedes was trying to alleviate an incipient problem of famine in the Greek camp by providing food from the sea.26 What is striking is that, at the end of the Doloneia (10. 572–576), having already killed Dolon and Rhesus, Odysseus and Diomedes jump into the sea and indulge in some night bathing, something that remains a little incongruous, particularly because immediately afterward comes a hot bath in an unexpected asaminthos in the middle of the Greek camp. This rather strange sequence seems less so if we assume that the sea incident is, in fact, a relic of another similar story whose narrative elements were adapted to a new narrative milieu, that of the Doloneia. However, an anti-heroic view of fishing, a purely Homeric feature mainly expressed in the Thrinakia episode, would not necessarily have been held by the poet of the Cypria. Davies27 demonstrated long ago that the style and values of Cyclic poems differ significantly from those of Homeric poetry. Finally, there is the thought that this fishing might be related to a paretymological association of Palamedes’ name with the word πηλαμύς—ύδος, a kind of tuna, and the πηλαμυδεία, the fishing of the πηλαμύς. To close the digression on the wolf that we started earlier, we should bear in mind the association between the image of a wolf and Palamedes himself that occurs in later sources. Philostratus (Heroicus) describes one of the conflicts that supposedly occur between Odysseus and Palamedes at Troy, when wolves suddenly appear in the Greek camp. Odysseus orders their extermination, but Palamedes reveals that the wolves are a sign sent by Apollo to announce the outbreak of plague and gives instructions to honor Apollo Λύκιος and Φύξιος.28 It seems likely that Philostratus has in mind the plague in the Iliad when he makes Palamedes say τοὺς λύκους ὁ Ἀπόλλων προοίμιον λοιμοῦ ποιεῖται. The wrath of Achilles mentioned by Philostratus is also shaped in reference to the same subject in the Iliad, but the reason for Apollo’s wrath is not. According to Heroicus 25.16, Achilles’ wrath was triggered not by the Chryses episode, which

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leads to Briseis’ abduction by Agamemnon, but by the dishonor brought on Palamedes: λέγει δὲ (= Πρωτεσίλαος) καὶ τὴν Άχιλλέως μῆνιν οὐχ ὑπὲρ τῆς τοῦ Χρύσου θυγατρὸς ἐμπεσεῖν τοῖς Ἕλλησιν, ἀλλὰ κἀκεῖνον ὑπὲρ τοῦ Παλαμήδους μηνῖσαι. Philostratus was an avid reader of the epic tradition, but is he relying on the Cypria in regard to this particular issue? No matter what we think about the composition of the Cypria and about Proclus’ dependence on the Iliad, all we have of this part of the Cypria is Proclus’ summary. It mentions Palamedes’ death and, immediately afterward, Achilles’ withdrawal from the battle: ἔπειτα έστὶ Παλαμήδους θάνατος καὶ Διὸς βουλὴ ὅπως ἐπικουφίσῃ τοὺς Τρῶας, Ἀχιλλέα τῆς συμμαχίας τῶν Ἑλλήνων άποστήσας. Is this factual sequence then also causal? The Iliad clearly attributes Achilles’ wrath to the matter of a woman’s abduction (Briseis), with parallels in the greater issue of the Trojan War itself (Helen).29 But the continuity between the “newer” Cypria and the “older” Iliad is such a complex problem that several explanations pertaining to Achilles’ wrath could have coexisted in the substratum of the epic tradition, which does not mean just the Homeric tradition, of course, and so the question of whether there is a causal link between Palamedes’ death and Achilles’ withdrawal from the battle in the Cypria cannot be easily ignored. If there was, it would at least explain the sudden mention of Palamedes at this point in Proclus’ summary. It would be a foolhardy reader who drew hard conclusions on the basis of such disparate and allusive pieces of evidence, but it remains true that, in studying the myths of the epic tradition, scholars have atleast learned to listen not only to the texts’ significant eloquence but also to the texts’ significant silence. When we study the Homeric poems, particularly the Odyssey, we usually detect the poet’s tendency to elevate Odysseus’ status and, therefore, to downplay or remove his negative aspects. Homer also tends to make a moral issue out of Odysseus’ special and contradictory skills. I would then be inclined to see in the narrative scheme of the Doloneia (to ignore the authenticity question for a moment),30 an effort to make sure that Odysseus only commits murders that, within both the objective context of the war and the subjective context of malice, are morally acceptable. Such are the murders of Dolon and Rhesus. Why are these murders morally acceptable when they are committed by these heroes and in this context? Probably because other murders are committed by the same heroes, in similar contexts known to the poet of the Iliad, and because these murders are morally unacceptable. Underlying the action of the Doloneia, and partly explaining its structure, I suspect, are the narratives of the epic tradition concerning (1) the raid to steal the Palladion, in which the relationship of comrades-in-arms between Odysseus and Diomedes undergoes a malevolent metamorphosis into one between

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killer and victim, and (2) the vengeful slaying of Palamedes with Diomedes as accomplice. I wonder, too, whether there was another traditional narrative underlying Odysseus’ delayed return, which adduced causes different from those advanced in the Odyssey. I wonder, in particular, whether we should read, when engaged in the Odyssean narrative, not what the Odyssey chooses to include but what it chooses to omit and remain silent about regarding the reasons for Odysseus’ late and painful return—that is, not the blinding of Poseidon’s son Polyphemus but the murder of Poseidon’s grandson, Palamedes. This might supply more tangible reasons for the severity of Odysseus’ punishment and the length of the wanderings and miseries he has to suffer, separated from his homeland and loved ones, whom he had to leave because of Palamedes’ intervention. We know that Homeric poetry temporarily acquitted Odysseus for his crimes, but the tragic and rhetoric literature certainly bore him a longer grudge.

NOTES 1. On some interesting features in the treatment of Palamedes’ myth in tragedy, see, for example, Phillips 1957, 267–278; Koniaris 1973, 85–124; Scodel 1980; Sutton 1987, 111–153 and passim; Sommerstein 2000, 118–127. On archaeological support of literary evidence, see also Woodford 1994, 164–169. Apart from the lost plays on Palamedes written by Aeschylus, Sophocles, and Euripides (and, later, by Astydamas the Younger), Gorgias’ Defense of Palamedes is another testimony to the popularity that the Palamedes story enjoyed in the fifth century BC. 2. If one traces back Odysseus’ genealogical descent, one can hardly ignore, one generation before Odysseus, the spiritual rivalry between Autolycus and Sisyphus (respectively Odysseus’ grandfather and father, according to some sources) as related in the story of Sisyphus’ cattle that are gradually stolen by Autolycus. Sisyphus finally managed to identify the thief by marking the hooves of his own cows, but not without recognizing the merit of his resourceful opponent. The antagonism between the two men leads, fortunately, to a happy ending, quite the opposite of the Palamedes story, if we are to believe that Autolycus’ daughter, Antikleia, was pregnant with Odysseus by Sisyphus before her marriage to Laertes. On Laertes’ controversial genealogy and his lack of a heroic “past” in the epic tradition, see Cuisenier 2003. 3. On Odysseus πᾶσι μέλων, see also chapter 4. 4. Gerhardt 1966, 30–31 (table CCCLXXX 1, 2). These mirrors are dated by Beazley 1949, 1–17, to between the sixth and the third centuries BC—that is, after the period in which the narratives of the Epic Cycle are supposed to have reached their final form. See also De Puma 1982, 89–100 and also De Puma 2013, 1041–1067. 5. Zografou (Ζωγράφου) 1987, 63. 6. West (2013, 202) thinks that this proverb cannot be explained by reference to the story of Odysseus’ attempt on Diomedes’ life, despite Hesychius and Photius

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referring to the Little Iliad (s.v. διομήδειος ἀνάγκη) to interpret its origin. Another explanation provided by Clearchus (FHG II 320) focuses on the vicious character of Diomedes’ daughters, who used to kill prospective suitors. This story might eventually have provided a more convincing source for the proverb in question. 7. Davies (1989, 67) and West (2013, 202) both think that this story was probably told in the Little Iliad; cf. also Pausanias 14 δ (Erbse): Διομήδης δὲ καὶ Όδυσσεὺς τὸ Παλλάδιον κλέψαντες νυκτὸς ἐκ Τροίης ἐπανήιεσαν, ἑπόμενος δὲ ὁ Όδυσσεὺς τὸν Διομήδην ἐβουλήθη ἀποκτεῖναι. ἐν τῆι σελήνηι δὲ ἰδὼν τὴν σκιὰν τοῦ ξίφους ὁ Διομήδης ἐπιστραφεὶς καὶ βιασάμενος τὸν Ὀδυσσέα ἔδησε καὶ προάγειν ἐποίησε παίων αὐτοῦ τῶι ξίφει τὸ μετάφρενον. 8. Stanford 1951, 83–85. 9. Kakridis 1995, 91–100. 10. Phillips 1957; a different view was advanced by Howald 1966. 11. Cantrell 2011, 24 ff. 12. Felson and Slatkin (2004, 108–109) explain this reference to Telemachus as the poet’s effort to display the gentle ethos of Odysseus (ἠπιότης). 13. Hainsworth 1993, 155. 14. Scodel 2009, 15–16, 108–109; see also the previous chapter of this book. 15. West 2013, 102–103. 16. καὶ μαίνεσθαι προσποιησάμενον Ὀδυσσέα ἐπὶ τῶι μὴ θἐλειν συστρατεύεσθαι έφώρασαν, Παλαμήδους ὑποθεμένου τὸν υἱὸν Τηλέμαχον ἐπὶ κόλασιν έξαρπάσαντες (Procli Cypriorum ennarratio, 41–43, Davies). 17. The earliest evidence in support of this dating may be provided by a bronze tripod from the end of the seventh century from Olympia (Arch. Mus. of Olympia B 3600 = LIMC Achilles 437). 18. Palamedes is the grandson of Poseidon through his father Nauplios, a son of Poseidon. 19. See chapter 1 (and n. 5); on Ajax’s punishment, see Davies 2014. 20. A true zoological parade passes through the lines of Book 10, both literally and metaphorically: lions, panthers, bulls, boars, horses, wolves; see indicatively 10.23–24, 29–30, 257–258, 261–271, 297, 305, 322, 334–335, 351–353, 361–362, 392, 401–403, 436–437, 464, 474, 512, 520, 529–530, 535, 556–557, 568–569 and Hainsworth 1993, 160–162, 178–180, 189. The image of the wolf is even conveyed through the name of Autolycus (Αὐτό-λυκος), Odysseus’ maternal grandfather, who is also the previous owner of the boar’s tusk helmet worn by Odysseus during the Doloneia night raid (10. 261–271). 21. See LIMC s.v. Dolon. 22. Gernet 1968. 23. Cf. Pausanias VI 6, 7–11. 24. On the different versions on Palamedes’ death, see also Ganz 1993, 605. 25. Kullmann 1960, 254. 26. Since Palamedes was also supposed to be involved in the Oenotropoi story (cf. sch. Lycophron Alex. 270), in which a problem arising from famine was again the main issue, Kullmann (supra) suggested that there may have been two instances of famine in the narrative of the Cypria, both implying Palamedes’ action. Kullmann’s

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explanation is followed by Tsagalis (2008, 52–55) and West (2013, 123); however, Marin (2009, 365–390) is perhaps right in being skeptical about this interpretation. 27. Davies 1989, 9–10. 28. See the commentary by Grossardt 2006, mainly 582, 586, 587; see also Falcetto 2003. 29. On the difference between “Iliadic” and “Trojan” war, see Maronitis 2004, 11–28. Οn the whole issue of the Trojan War, see Burgess 2001, passim. 30. On particular aspects of the Doloneia, including the authenticity question, see, for example, Davidson 1979, 61–66; Danek 1989; Dué and Ebbott 2010.

Chapter 4

Crossing Straits From “We” to “I”

In the Odyssey, Odysseus, it seems, cannot avoid crossing the strait of Skylla and Charybdis. The text does not admit any alternative route, involving, say, sailing around land or an island, even at the cost of making the journey longer, that might allow Odysseus’ ship to avoid the perilous strait. Circe’s warning to Odysseus gives him two mutually exclusive possibilities: either crossing the strait of Skylla or attempting something that only Jason, helped by Hera, has ever achieved before—namely, sailing through the Plagktai (12.55–72): αὐτὰρ ἐπὴν δὴ τάς γε παρὲξ ἐλάσωσιν ἑταῖροι, 55 ἔνθα τοι οὐκέτ᾽ ἔπειτα διηνεκέως ἀγορεύσω, ὁπποτέρη δή τοι ὁδὸς ἔσσεται, ἀλλὰ καὶ αὐτὸς θυμῷ βουλεύειν: ἐρέω δέ τοι ἀμφοτέρωθεν. ἔνθεν μὲν γὰρ πέτραι ἐπηρεφέες, προτὶ δ᾽ αὐτὰς κῦμα μέγα ῥοχθεῖ κυανώπιδος Ἀμφιτρίτης. 60 Πλαγκτὰς δή τοι τάς γε θεοὶ μάκαρες καλέουσι. τῇ μέν τ᾽ οὐδὲ ποτητὰ παρέρχεται οὐδὲ πέλειαι τρήρωνες, ταί τ᾽ ἀμβροσίην Διὶ πατρὶ φέρουσιν, ἀλλά τε καὶ τῶν αἰὲν ἀφαιρεῖται λὶς πέτρη. ἀλλ᾽ ἄλλην ἐνίησι πατὴρ ἐναρίθμιον εἶναι. 65 τῇ δ᾽ οὔ πώ τις νηῦς φύγεν ἀνδρῶν, ἥ τις ἵκηται, ἀλλά θ᾽ ὁμοῦ πίνακάς τε νεῶν καὶ σώματα φωτῶν κύμαθ᾽ ἁλὸς φορέουσι πυρός τ᾽ ὀλοοῖο θύελλαι. οἴη δὴ κείνη γε παρέπλω ποντοπόρος νηῦς, Ἀργὼ πασιμέλουσα, παρ᾽ Αἰήταο πλέουσα. 70 καὶ νύ κε τὴν ἔνθ᾽ ὦκα βάλεν μεγάλας ποτὶ πέτρας, ἀλλ᾽ Ἥρη παρέπεμψεν, ἐπεὶ φίλος ἦεν Ἰήσων. Then, for the time when your companions have driven you past them, for that time I will no longer tell you in detail which way of the two your course must lie, 41

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but you yourself must consider this in your own mind. I will tell you the two ways of it. On one side there are overhanging rocks, and against them 60 crashes the heavy swell of dark-eyed Amphitrite. The blessed gods call these rocks the Rovers. By this way not even any flying thing, not even the tremulous doves, which carry ambrosia to Zeus the father, can pass through, but every time the sheer rock catches away one even of these; but the Father then adds another to keep the number right. No ship of men that came here ever has fled through, but the waves of the sea and storms of ravening fire carry away together the ship's timbers and the men’s bodies. That way the only seagoing ship to get through was Argo, who is in all men’s minds, on her way home from Aietes; and even she would have been driven on the great rocks that time, but Hera saw her through, out of her great love for Jason. (Translation by R. Lattimore)

It has often been stated that the poet of the Odyssey probably had in mind one (or more than one) epic poem(s) relating to the journey of the Argonauts, and it is interesting to notice that in the Odyssean mention of the Argo, chronologically the first surviving mention in literature, the theme of the dove already makes an entrance,1 although it is hard to say in what form this theme could have been included in the pre-Homeric version.2 In Archaic epic, however, there is a tendency to depict each heroic accomplishment as unique; when a repetition of a deed occurs, it is usually narrated as a variant version. If the hero of the Argonautic epic managed to cross the Plagktai safely, then the hero of the Odyssey could not restrict himself to a deed already achieved by someone else. For the same reason, Odysseus’ ship must also sail through a strait, through two rocks pregnant with different types of danger. However, navigating a strait is all Odysseus has in common with Jason. After this point, things diverge: Jason’s navigating the Clashing Rocks would cost him merely the decoration on the stern of his ship. Odysseus’ passage through the strait of Skylla costs him the lives of six valiant companions. As I argued in chapter 1, here lies perhaps one of the major differences between Jason’s ship and Odysseus’. In the Argonautic epic, the stress is laid on the ship. In the Odyssey, the stress is laid on the man. Argo, the πασιμέλουσα, is destined to reach Aietes’ land and then come safely back to the port of Iolkos, whence she sailed. Odysseus’ ship, by contrast, is destined to sink, as are all his other ships. When he passes through the straits of Skylla for the second time, he has already lost his last ship. Odysseus’ unnamed ship will never become πασιμέλουσα. He has no other choice but to become himself πᾶσι μέλων, and that is how, as we know, he introduces himself to the Phaeacians in 9.19–20: εἴμ᾽ Ὀδυσεὺς Λαερτιάδης, ὃς πᾶσι δόλοισιν ἀνθρώποισι μέλω, καί μευ κλέος οὐρανὸν ἵκει.

Crossing Straits

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I am Odysseus son of Laertes, known before all men for the study of crafty designs, and my fame goes up to the heavens. (Translation by R. Lattimore)

When Circe gives Odysseus information on his impending journey, she describes in detail the strait of Skylla. How is this information delivered to Odysseus and to the audience? Apart from the departure from Calypso’s island and the arrival on the island of the Phaeacians, all of the adventures that Odysseus experiences on his trip to Ithaca are revealed through, and included in, his own personal narrative. In all these stories, whether true or false, it is always Odysseus’ own words that we hear.3 Of all these stories, the greater part is, of course, included in the four books of the Apologoi (Books 9–12), and, in spite of the bibliographical popularity of these books in Homeric scholarship, the function and the significance of the voice in these adventures does not seem to be exhaustively analyzed. Still, the voice is the sole stable element unifying all these different stories. It becomes the acoustic pathway to our visualization of what otherwise would have remained invisible. It allows the present to see the past. In order to reenact manifold episodes from this past, in Books 9–12, Odysseus lends his voice4 to Polyphemus, the Cyclops, his companions, Aeolus and his family, Polites, Eurylochus, Hermes, Circe, Elpenor, Teiresias, Antikleia, Poseidon, Agamemnon, Achilles, Sirens, Helios, and Zeus. The words of all these figures are registered verbatim. To this list of individuals, one should also add all the other persons whose words are not cited but which Odysseus states that he heard. As a narrative technique, this scheme can theoretically be endlessly multiplied: someone’s words containing someone else’s words containing someone else’s words, and so on. Pucci and Segal are among those who long ago noticed the latent comparison between Demodocus’ song and Odysseus’ narrative, which, of course, further illustrates the significance of the voice in these Odysseus’ stories.5 Odysseus tells Demodocus that he described things as if he himself had attended or if he had been told by someone else (8.491). These two possibilities, self-attending or learning from someone else, are both on display in the Apologoi. The places and the facts included in Circe’s directions to Odysseus (10.504–540, 12.36–141) are displayed twice: first in Circe’s information and then through the lens of Odysseus’ own experience. This two-fold presentation applies to the Skylla episode as well. Skylla’s description echoes Circe’s voice, as narrated by Odysseus’ (and, of course, through the singer’s) voice. οἱ δὲ δύω σκόπελοι ὁ μὲν οὐρανὸν εὐρὺν ἱκάνει ὀξείῃ κορυφῇ, νεφέλη δέ μιν ἀμφιβέβηκε κυανέη: τὸ μὲν οὔ ποτ᾽ ἐρωεῖ, οὐδέ ποτ᾽ αἴθρη 75

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κείνου ἔχει κορυφὴν οὔτ᾽ ἐν θέρει οὔτ᾽ ἐν ὀπώρῃ. οὐδέ κεν ἀμβαίη βροτὸς ἀνὴρ οὐδ᾽ ἐπιβαίη, οὐδ᾽ εἴ οἱ χεῖρές τε ἐείκοσι καὶ πόδες εἶεν: πέτρη γὰρ λίς ἐστι, περιξεστῇ ἐικυῖα. μέσσῳ δ᾽ ἐν σκοπέλῳ ἔστι σπέος ἠεροειδές, 80 πρὸς ζόφον εἰς Ἔρεβος τετραμμένον, ᾗ περ ἂν ὑμεῖς νῆα παρὰ γλαφυρὴν ἰθύνετε, φαίδιμ᾽ Ὀδυσσεῦ. οὐδέ κεν ἐκ νηὸς γλαφυρῆς αἰζήιος ἀνὴρ τόξῳ ὀιστεύσας κοῖλον σπέος εἰσαφίκοιτο. ἔνθα δ᾽ ἐνὶ Σκύλλη ναίει δεινὸν λελακυῖα. 85 τῆς ἦ τοι φωνὴ μὲν ὅση σκύλακος νεογιλῆς γίγνεται, αὐτὴ δ᾽ αὖτε πέλωρ κακόν: οὐδέ κέ τίς μιν γηθήσειεν ἰδών, οὐδ᾽ εἰ θεὸς ἀντιάσειεν. τῆς ἦ τοι πόδες εἰσὶ δυώδεκα πάντες ἄωροι, ἓξ δέ τέ οἱ δειραὶ περιμήκεες, ἐν δὲ ἑκάστῃ 90 σμερδαλέη κεφαλή, ἐν δὲ τρίστοιχοι ὀδόντες πυκνοὶ καὶ θαμέες, πλεῖοι μέλανος θανάτοιο. μέσση μέν τε κατὰ σπείους κοίλοιο δέδυκεν, ἔξω δ᾽ ἐξίσχει κεφαλὰς δεινοῖο βερέθρου, αὐτοῦ δ᾽ ἰχθυάᾳ, σκόπελον περιμαιμώωσα, 95 δελφῖνάς τε κύνας τε, καὶ εἴ ποθι μεῖζον ἕλῃσι κῆτος, ἃ μυρία βόσκει ἀγάστονος Ἀμφιτρίτη. τῇ δ᾽ οὔ πώ ποτε ναῦται ἀκήριοι εὐχετόωνται παρφυγέειν σὺν νηί: φέρει δέ τε κρατὶ ἑκάστῳ φῶτ᾽ ἐξαρπάξασα νεὸς κυανοπρῴροιο. 100 But of the two rocks, one reaches up into the wide heaven with a pointed peak, and a dark cloud stands always around it, and never at any time draws away from it, nor does the sunlight ever hold that peak, either in the early or the late summer, nor could any man who was mortal climb there, or stand mounted on the summit, not if he had twenty hands and twenty feet, for the rock goes sheerly up, as if it were polished. Halfway up the cliff there is a cave, misty-looking and turned toward Erebos and the dark, the very direction from which, O shining Odysseus, you and your men will be steering your hollow ship; and from the hollow ship no vigorous young man with a bow could shoot to the hole in the cliff side. In that cavern Skylla lives, whose howling is terror. Her voice indeed is only as loud as a new-born puppy could make, but she herself is an evil monster. No one, not even a god encountering her, could be glad at that sight. She has twelve feet, and all of them wave in the air. She has six necks upon her, grown to great length, and upon each neck there is a horrible head, with teeth in it, set in three rows close together and stiff, full of black death. Her body from the waist down is holed up inside the hollow cavern, but she holds her heads poked out and away from the terrible hollow, and there she fishes, peering all over the cliff side, looking for dolphins or dogfish to catch or anything bigger, some sea monster, of whom Amphitrite keeps so many; never can sailors boast

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aloud that their ship has passed her without any loss of men, for with each of her heads she snatches one man away and carries him off from the dark-prowed vessel. (Translation by R. Lattimore)

In this description, there is a third voice that Odysseus will never be able to hear: the voice of Skylla herself. Her voice is actually the first thing we learn about her. It sounds like barking, as is to be expected from a creature whose name is so directly associated with the word “dog.” It therefore lies outside the area covered by the nature of the human voice. This voice also has an age, that of a female puppy (τῆς ἦ τοι φωνὴ μὲν ὅση σκύλακος νεογιλῆς). This trait puzzled some ancient scholiasts, who could not see how a puppy’s voice could justify δεινὸν λελακυῖα (12.85): πῶς γὰρ ‘η δεινὸν λελακυῖα δύναται νεογνοῦ σκύλακος φωνὴν ἔχειν (sch. Od. 12.86)

But of course δεινόν could perfectly signify the ferocity and not the loudness of the barking,6 and although φωνὴ is, grammatically speaking, placed in the singular, the audience is completely entitled to imagine that Skylla has not one voice but six since, on the basis of such a description, she possesses six heads, each one equipped with three rows of teeth. Consequently, each head could have possessed its own separate voice. We should, however, infer that, even if these voices are six, they all have the same features denoting the voice of a female puppy (or, ultimately, six female puppies); after all, it is hard to decide whether Skylla is one person with six heads or six persons with one body. Is Skylla an “I” or a “we”? It is more than certain that, whatever the number of voices issuing from each one of Skylla’s heads may be, at the moment she attacks Odysseus’ ship, we also count, within this wild sound narrative panel, six more voices issuing from each of Skylla’s heads. But these voices do not come from her; they come from each one of Odysseus’ six companions, who scream as they are devoured. What is the factual and narrative function of Skylla’s voice in the story, if its sound is not meant to be perceived? First, one purpose is to juxtapose the tender picture that the sound evokes (a little puppy) with the monstrous reality (πέλωρ κακόν) it is part of. Then such a voice (let us imagine there is only one), even if it could have been heard by some unsuspecting sailor (and future victim), would never worry him. The voice would sound perhaps less attractive than the voice of the Sirens but, at least, not threatening at all. When this voice of Skylla cannot be heard because of the noise created by Charybdis, as is the case in 12.226–246, then it cannot reach Odysseus’ ears and guide his eye, when, aware as he is, he tries vainly to make out Skylla

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hidden in her rock before she attacks.7 Finally, the function of this voice is emphatically to ascribe Skylla not to one species, since she belongs to many species, but again to a gender, the female gender. Of all the figures appearing in the Apologoi that represent mortal danger to Odysseus, the wife (and the daughter) of Antiphates, Gorgo, the Sirens, Skylla, and Charybdis are, by definition, female. This, however, is their only common point. With the exception of the Sirens, about whose physiology there is not a word in the Odyssey, of all the female creatures mentioned above Gorgo, Charybdis, and, mainly, Skylla clearly do not have a human shape. Skylla’s terrifying dimensions in particular bring her close to other terrifying female figures, such as Lamia, Empousa, Echidna, Hydra, Gorgo, and Hecate, some of whom are connected with her through parental relations in later genealogies (namely, Lamia, Echidna, and Hecate). In Homer, Skylla’s genealogical origin is defined only by reference to her mother, Krataiis. But, in the relevant passage in the Odyssey, Skylla is also an “immortal mischief” (ἀθάνατον κακόν).8 When Odysseus asks how he can defend himself against Skylla, Circe gives him a somewhat unexpected answer (12.116–126): ‘σχέτλιε, καὶ δὴ αὖ τοι πολεμήια ἔργα μέμηλε καὶ πόνος: οὐδὲ θεοῖσιν ὑπείξεαι ἀθανάτοισιν; ἡ δέ τοι οὐ θνητή, ἀλλ᾽ ἀθάνατον κακόν ἐστι, δεινόν τ᾽ ἀργαλέον τε καὶ ἄγριον οὐδὲ μαχητόν: οὐδέ τις ἔστ᾽ ἀλκή: φυγέειν κάρτιστον ἀπ᾽ αὐτῆς. 120 ἢν γὰρ δηθύνῃσθα κορυσσόμενος παρὰ πέτρῃ, δείδω, μή σ᾽ ἐξαῦτις ἐφορμηθεῖσα κίχῃσι τόσσῃσιν κεφαλῇσι, τόσους δ᾽ ἐκ φῶτας ἕληται. ἀλλὰ μάλα σφοδρῶς ἐλάαν, βωστρεῖν δὲ Κράταιιν, μητέρα τῆς Σκύλλης, ἥ μιν τέκε πῆμα βροτοῖσιν: 125 ἥ μιν ἔπειτ᾽ ἀποπαύσει ἐς ὕστερον ὁρμηθῆναι. Hardy man, your mind is full forever of fighting and battle work. Will you not give way even to the immortals? She is no mortal thing but a mischief immortal, dangerous difficult and bloodthirsty, and there is no fighting against her, nor any force of defense. It is best to run away from her. For if you arm for battle beside her rock and waste time there, I fear she will make another outrush and catch you with all her heads, and snatch away once more the same number of men. Drive by as hard as you can, but invoke Krataiïs. She is the mother of Skylla and bore this mischief for mortals, and she will stay her from making another sally against you. (Translation by R. Lattimore)

Skylla is female, immortal, and, above all, a dog. But why is she a dog here and not, for instance, a serpent or polyp, as several vase paintings depict Skylla in the Hellenistic and Roman periods?9

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The picture of the dog in Homeric epics has been a favorite topic for scholars.10 In Homer, a man is often characterized as a dog when he is worthy of scorn or hatred. This is what Achilles calls Hector (κύον) just before he kills him (Il. 22.345) and what Odysseus calls the suitors (κύνες) when he slaughters them (Od. 22.35). Women are characterized as κύνες when they are proven impudent and shameless.11 This is how Iris, bearing Zeus’ words, treats Athena, who is ready to disobey her own father (Il. 8.423). Melantho, because of her behavior, is for Odysseus a typical case of κύων (Od. 18.338). And, of course, the most illustrious example is Helen, who characterizes herself as κύνα (Il. 6.344) and κυνῶπιν (Od. 4.145).12 But cowardice, too, is a defect that typifies nasty (female) dogs, and this is probably what Menelaus is referring to when he calls the Trojans κακαί κύνες on the battlefield (Il. 13.623). As for the barking of a female dog, what makes it terrifying is perhaps the force that the animal reveals in making clear its intention to kill, especially when she is protecting her puppies. This is the case of the famous (and, in several aspects, dog-inspired) simile that compares Odysseus’ heart to a female dog protecting her puppies when the still-disguised hero sees the maids of his house going secretly out to sleep with the suitors. He regains self-control as he recalls that he has already suffered much more “doggish” (κύντερον) trials than this one13 (Od. 20.9–20). τοῦ δ᾽ ὠρίνετο θυμὸς ἐνὶ στήθεσσι φίλοισι: πολλὰ δὲ μερμήριζε κατὰ φρένα καὶ κατὰ θυμόν, 10 ἠὲ μεταΐξας θάνατον τεύξειεν ἑκάστῃ, ἦ ἔτ᾽ ἐῷ μνηστῆρσιν ὑπερφιάλοισι μιγῆναι ὕστατα καὶ πύματα, κραδίη δέ οἱ ἔνδον ὑλάκτει. ὡς δὲ κύων ἀμαλῇσι περὶ σκυλάκεσσι βεβῶσα ἄνδρ᾽ ἀγνοιήσασ᾽ ὑλάει μέμονέν τε μάχεσθαι, 15 ὥς ῥα τοῦ ἔνδον ὑλάκτει ἀγαιομένου κακὰ ἔργα: στῆθος δὲ πλήξας κραδίην ἠνίπαπε μύθῳ: ‘τέτλαθι δή, κραδίη: καὶ κύντερον ἄλλο ποτ᾽ ἔτλης. ἤματι τῷ ὅτε μοι μένος ἄσχετος ἤσθιε Κύκλωψ ἰφθίμους ἑτάρους. 20 But the spirit deep in the heart of Odysseus was stirred by this, and much he pondered in the division of mind and spirit, whether to spring on them and kill each one, or rather to let them lie this one more time with the insolent suitors, for the last and latest time; but the heart was growling within him. And as a bitch, facing an unknown man, stands over her callow puppies, and growls and rages to fight, so Odysseus' heart was growling inside him as he looked on these wicked actions. He struck himself on the chest and spoke to his heart and scolded it: “Bear up, my heart. You have had worse to endure before this on that day when the irresistible Cyclops ate up my strong companions, but you endured it until intelligence got you out of the cave, though you expected to perish.” (Translation by R. Lattimore)

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The picture of Skylla given by Circe is very detailed, also because Skylla’s terrifying characteristics could not have been visible at the moment of her speedy attack as Odysseus was crossing the strait. In fact, Odysseus and his crew will have the time to witness for themselves what happens when Charybdis sucks in the seawater. Circe also makes it clear that any attempt to fight Skylla is useless. She is a disaster on an immortal scale. Circe’s advice to Odysseus is precise: οὐδέ τις ἔστ᾽ ἀλκή: φυγέειν κάρτιστον ἀπ᾽ αὐτῆς. The ἀλκή, defensive bravery, the manly virtue that leads to victory, here is totally useless. A hero does not fight Skylla; he avoids her, as he avoids Charybdis, the Sirens, and Gorgo, as he also maintains his distance from Circe, Calypso, and even Nausicaa, and from all these variously dangerous female creatures. A hero does not fight a female evil. He sidesteps it. Let us now examine some intriguing hints relating to time and age in this episode. We have already commented on Skylla’s voice, which resembles that of a σκύλαξ νεογιλή. Most ancient lexicographers understand νεογιλή to mean “newly born.” For Hesychius, it means νεαρά, νέα, νεωστί γεννηθεῖσα. An ancient scholion on 12.86 suggests a more specific interpretation: γάλακτος τρεφομένης.14 Chantraine15 associates it with the Mycenean “kira” (= little girl) and lith “zindu” (= to nurse). If so, then the mouth whence a νεογιλή φωνή emerges would be the mouth of a child fed on his mother’s milk. We should then perhaps turn to another detail of this extraordinary description, one also associated with the notion of time: Skylla’s twelve ἄωροι πόδες. Although a derivation from ἀείρω has been suggested (by Klassen), the most probable derivation remains from ἀ+ώρη—that is, “not yet mature,” “too young,” “too small,” a meaning that evokes a picture of atrophic limbs or the limbs of infants, which would explain Skylla’s inability to search for her food away from her cave. This interpretation also sits well with the meaning of the word νεογιλός. And, although the use of νεογιλός might lead us to believe that this creature receives food, in the form of milk, from her mother, to our surprise, we then realize that this mother will intervene only to prohibit a second attack by her daughter. Where exactly this mother is located remains unknown, to the disappointment of both ancient and modern commentators. In Odysseus’ account of the episode, we have no mention of any appeal made to Krataiis, in spite of Circe’s suggestion. But Skylla’s obedience to her mother is the only element linking this monster to any value outside the realm of the monstrous. With this theme of maternal persuasion, then, we have another hint at the childishness already suggested by the use of νεογιλός and ἄωρος. And, of course, since we do not know much about Krataiis,16 one wonders whether this childish monster (or monstrous child) has eventually taken after her mother. As far as we know, Eustathius, in his commentary on the Odyssey, was the first to wonder about the matter: εἰ δὲ καὶ φίλη μήτηρ ὁμοία τῷ πολυκεφάλῳ ἀδίκῳ πρόσεστιν.17

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Thus motherhood is added to the narrative mythemes in this episode. When mariners passing through the strait are not available, Skylla lives off sharks and dolphins. And we suddenly observe that in the next episode, on the island of Thrinakia, Odysseus’ companions, until now Skylla’s prospective victims, are forced to adopt Skylla’s culinary preferences and, in an ironic inversion, practice fishing themselves, a non-heroic way of finding one’s food, as we know,18 since laying hands on Helios’ cows is strictly and repeatedly prohibited.19 This prohibition is upheld by Phaethoussa and Lambetie, Helios’ daughters, who have been assigned to this very task by their mother Neaira, so that the cattle of Helios may remain imperishable. Thus ideas of food and of motherhood remain surprisingly active in both consecutive episodes, as does the idea of time. All three pertain to this next stage of Odysseus’ trip—that is, the island of Thrinakia, the phase that irrevocably separates Odysseus from his companions. The loss of Odysseus’ last ship forms the end of the Thrinakia episode. Shipwrecked as he is, Odysseus is then brought, grasping his ship’s mast, back to the strait of Skylla and Charybdis, and, grasping the branches of the fig tree, is saved from Charybdis.20 Skylla will not see him this time; Skylla is, therefore, the final monster that Odysseus escapes. Monsters will not appear any longer during his trip, as if monstrosity during his nostos was linked, in some strange way, to the existence of his companions. Odysseus is no longer the same man when he crosses Skylla’s strait for the second time. The lightning that destroys his ship in Od. 12.415 seals the most crucial point of his nostos, which is the moment that Odysseus finds his individuality. The first crossing of the strait of Skylla was, as things still were, a matter of “we.” The second crossing is now a matter of “I,” as it will be permanently thereafter. NOTES 1. “Not even the tremulous doves, which carry ambrosia to Zeus the father, can pass through, but every time the sheer rock catches away one even of these; but the Father then adds another to keep the number right.” In most post-Homeric versions of the story, Jason sends a dove to go up the strait, and once the dove reaches the other end of the strait, having lost only some feathers of its tail, the Argo crosses successfully the strait at the sole cost of its stern’s decoration. 2. Mainly since Meuli 1974 (1921). See also Gresseth 1970; Hopman 2012, 21–88. On the relation between ἐπηρεφέες, πλαγκταί, and συμπληγάδες, see Christopoulos 1997, 52–56. 3. The only exception is found in lines 306-343 of Book 23, where the poet lists (as an external narrator) the adventures that Odysseus narrates to Penelope, adventures that, however, have been made known to the audience previously through

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Odysseus’ personal narrative. Homer thus indirectly confirms the compatibility of Odysseus’ stories with his own. 4. Through the singer’s voice, which is virtually different in each performance. 5. Pucci 1987; Segal 1994. 6. Cf. Eustathius sch. 12. 85: δεινόν . . . μεγεθύνει κατ’ ἔννοιαν τὸ τῆς λέξεως ταπεινόν. In Hesiod’s Theogony 834, each of Typhoeus’ hundred heads possesses many voices, among them the voice of a puppy. 7. Odysseus’ use of weapons at this very moment, in spite of Circe’s warning, is associated by Heubeck (Commentary on 12.226-235) with a kind of utopian epic heroism that urges the hero to defend his companions. This view concurs with Odysseus’ aim, already declared at Odyssey 1.5. Still, there is a clear distinction between Odysseus and his companions throughout the Odyssey, and this difference is particularly evident in the case of the Sirens, who come just before the strait of Skylla in the sequence of Odysseus’ adventures. In view of the cruel realism that informs the Skylla episode, one should also recall that metallic objects, such as the two long spears on Odysseus would make him a less suitable piece of food for Skylla. 8. On Skylla’s immortality in post-Homeric versions, see Lycophron Alexandra, 44–51. Skylla eats some of Gyreones’ cows, and Heracles kills her and tears her to pieces. Phorkys, Skylla’s father, gathers up these pieces and brings his daughter back to life; in this later version, Skylla seems to be not exactly immortal, but rather resurrected. 9. See Govers Hopman 2013, 173–263. 10. See, for example, Lilja 1976; Bonnafé 1984, 104, 159 and passim; Beck 1991; Frano 2014, 17–53. 11. On this point, see Frano 2014. 12. See Graver 1995. 13. It is, of course, impossible to mention all the instances of terrifying or dangerous women who are compared or associated with a “bitch” in post-Homeric literature. For example, there is Clytaimnestra, who is compared by Aeschylus to a κύων (Agamemnon 1228) and to Σκύλλα (Agamemnon 1233). There is also Hecate’s sinister relationship with dogs and the Sphinx, called by Sophocles ῥαψῳδὸς κύων (Oedipus Rex 391). 14. Cf. Opp. Κυν. 1.199: νεογιλόν ὀδόντα. 15. Chantraine 1999. 16. She is identified with Ceto in post-Homeric sources. See Burgess 2017, 106; West 1995, 305–306. 17. See his comment on 12.124. 18. See Eustathius’ comment on Od. 12.252: οὐδαμοῦ γὰρ προσώπῳ ΄ηρωικῷ τροφὴν ἐξ ἰχθύων διεσκεύασεν (= Homer). 19. See Vernant 1979. 20. On the function of the mast, see Christopoulos 2017 and chapter 2 (“Onward and Backward”) of this book.

Chapter 5

Between Life and Death Patroclus, Elpenor, the Suitors, and Odysseus’ Companions

The appearance of Patroclus’ ghost to Achilles in Iliad 23 and the encounter of Elpenor’s soul with Odysseus in Odyssey 11 are two Homeric instances often compared or examined together, since they both deal with recently killed individuals (Patroclus and Elpenor, respectively) who speak to interlocutors (Achilles and Odysseus, respectively). Elpenor is still unburied and requests funerary honors from Odysseus. These scenes, in addition to their resemblances of subject, display important semantic particularities and considerably different narrative references. The appearance of Patroclus’ soul to Achilles involves the longest dream speech in the entire Homeric epic: twenty-three lines of uninterrupted discourse emphatically referring to the past, present, and future of both speakers. Thematically, the episode combines several elements related to ghosts and dreams. This double reference allows the narrative to display powerful unconscious emotional features of both characters, the visiting ghost (Patroclus) and the sleeping host (Achilles). Patroclus stands over Achilles’ head in a formulaic position, which occurs in several other dream scenes in the Homeric epics. This position is adopted by Hermes in Book 24 (682) of the Iliad, by Oneiros in Book 2 (20) of the Iliad, and by Athena three times in the Odyssey—namely, in Penelope’s dream (4.795), in Nausicaa’s dream (6.21), and in Odysseus’ dream (20.32). In all these appearances, independently of the person that the dreamer actually sees in the dream, the narrative clearly states (and the reader is perfectly aware of) the divine figure standing behind the dream itself. In Patroclus’ case, by contrast, the appearance occurs through free choice and without divine intervention.

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Patroclus, in his addresses to Achilles, structures his requests in reference to all three dimensions of time—past, present, and future. Let us look at this temporal sequence. 1. You sleep, Achilleus; you have forgotten me; but you were not careless of me when I lived, but only in death!1 This phrase definitely refers to present time, in contrast to past time. 2. Bury me as quickly as may be, let me pass through the gates of Hades. The phrase obviously refers to what is to be done in the immediate future and complies with Achilles’ intentions, which have been stated some lines above (23.43–53). Richardson, in his commentary, is probably right when he speaks of “double causality” in regard to this issue.2 3. The souls, the images of dead men, hold me at a distance, and will not let me cross the river and mingle among them, but I wander as I am by Hades’ house of the wide gates. All the sentences refer to present time. If one regards the “house of the wide gates” as a place and not a building, then there is no contrast between “wandering by Hades’ house of the wide gates” in line 74 and “passing through the gates of Hades” in line 71, an inconsistency that troubled Richardson in 1993.3 4. And I call upon you in sorrow, give me your hand; no longer shall I come back from death, once you give me my rite of burning. This urgent request will be denied when the two interlocutors will attempt and fail to embrace each other. The request concerns the immediate future and is justified by the laws prevailing in the immediate and distant future. This justification also explains why Patroclus is temporarily free to move between the Underworld and the Upper World. 5. No longer shall you and I, alive, sit apart from our other beloved companions and make our plans, since the bitter destiny that was given me when I was born has opened its jaws to take me. This is an impressive overall reference to what is to happen in the future, to what is happening in the present, and to what has happened in the past: No longer shall you and I, alive, sit apart from our other beloved companions and make our plans (future), since the bitter destiny . . . has opened its jaws to take me (present), the bitter destiny that was given me when I was born (past). 6. Do not have my bones laid apart from yours, Achilleus, but with them, just as we grew up together in your house, when Menoitios brought me there from Opous, when I was little, and into your house, by reason of a baneful manslaying, on that day when I killed the son of Amphidamas. I was a child only, nor intended it, but was angered over a dice game. There the rider Peleus took me into his own house, and brought me carefully up, and named me to be your henchman. Therefore, let one single vessel, the golden two-handled urn the lady your mother gave

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you, hold both our ashes. These sentences evoke several dimensions of the past in that they describe acts accomplished only once (I slew, Peleus received me, your lady mother gave you) or accomplished in continuity (named me to be your henchman) and three instances of the future: my bones (instance 1); thy bones (instance 2); let them lie together (instance 3). If we now move on to Achilles’ response, then we need to make a distinction between what Achilles says before he wakes up and what he says when he is awake. What he says before he wakes up is as follows: 7. How is it, o hallowed head of my brother, you have come back to me here, and tell me all these several things? Yet surely I am accomplishing all, and I shall do as you tell me. Here we have a brief mention of past (you have come back here), present (tell me all these several things), and future (I shall do as you tell me) issues. The imminent ritual pyre and the funeral games for Patroclus will ensure the extended fulfillment of Achilles’ laconic promise. 8. But stand closer to me, and let us, if only for a little, embrace, and take full satisfaction from the dirge of sorrow. This sentence refers to the immediate future. It is an urgent response to Patroclus’ request and will of course lead to a dramatic deception, which in turn will lead to Achilles’ awakening. In the meantime, Patroclus’ soul disappears gibbering, a sound compatible with Odyssey 24.6–9. The arrival and the departure of Patroclus’ soul define the external narrative condition that frames Achilles’ dream experience within real life. What Achilles says, when he has awoken, relies, therefore, on his consciousness of this condition. 9. Even in the house of Hades there is left something, a soul and an image, but there is no real heart of life in it. For all night long the phantom of unhappy Patroklos stood over me in lamentation and mourning, and the likeness to him was wonderful, and it told me each thing I should do. His sentence refers to the past (his recent dream) and certifies the resemblance of the soul to the living person, a likeness of which the reader or the listener is already aware. At the same time, this experience is for Achilles a preview of the Underworld whither, as Patroclus’ soul clearly states, he will himself be driven in the near future. In this temporal sequence, the most interesting point, which I have intentionally left until now, is precisely Patroclus’ mention of Achilles’ imminent death: And you, Achilleus, like the gods, have your own destiny, to be killed under the wall of the prospering Trojans. This reference to Achilles’ death,

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although associated with Patroclus’ present condition, mainly concerns Achilles’ not-too-distant future. Here it is obvious that we are once again facing the major theme of Achilles’ fate. As is well known, the decisive consequence of Thetis’ marriage to a mortal (an alliance heavy to bear, as she herself admits in Iliad 18.432–34) was the subsequently mortal fate of her offspring, a doom that Thetis tried to nullify in very many ways, either through the unsuccessful immortalizing procedure she used or through the temporary krypteia in Lycomedes’ palace. In the Iliad, it is clear that all the omens regarding Achilles’ premature death and his decisive role in the Trojan expedition are taken for granted and often recalled. Achilles himself often mentions his own premature death, and his decision to lead a glorious but short life instead of an obscurely long one is presented as a personal choice (although he will reconsider this option in Odyssey 11.488–491). Let us then see the people reminding Achilles of his premature death in the Iliad. First (and repeatedly), it is Thetis, his mother (1.415–416, 18.95–96); then Xanthos, his divine horse (19. 409–410); then it is Hector, his deadly enemy (22. 359–360); and finally it is Patroclus, when he appears in the dream (23.80–81). If we consider the status of these people, we soon realize that, in their own particular way, they all have a very specific relation to human life and death. Thetis, the immortal goddess, is trying unsuccessfully to offer immortality to Achilles. Xanthos, himself immortal, is temporarily granted the ability to speak, to announce Achilles’ death. He is, however, an animal and not a human being, an animal possessing the immortality that, ironically, his human master has failed to acquire. Hector is the mortal hero prophesying Achilles’ death at the very moment of his own death. Finally, Patroclus is the dead man who comes back from Hades to foretell Achilles’ death. These creatures then seem to draw a line that starts from immortality (Thetis) and leads toward death and beyond death (Patroclus). Thetis’ main concern has been to prolong Achilles’ life by preventing him from being exposed to circumstances that might threaten it. However, Achilles’ chief decision has been to prefer a gloriously short life to an insignificant but lengthy one. With Achilles’ wrath (μῆνις), which leads the hero away from the battlefield, Thetis’ aim of keeping Achilles away from any mortal threat is essentially accomplished, while Achilles’ choice of a short, glorious life over a long but obscure one is essentially ruled out. If Thetis’ wish is to be fulfilled, Achilles would have to stay away from battle. If Achilles’ option were to be pursued, Thetis would have to change her initial priorities. Thetis’ request to Zeus removes the final possibility of her preserving her son’s life.4 However, Patroclus’ death is a significant collateral casualty in the plan of Achilles’ virtual return to the battlefield conceived by Nestor (Iliad 11.796–806) and Patroclus (Iliad 16.36–45). For Achilles, this is the heaviest consequence of having approved the plan. Patroclus’ request to Achilles

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in the dream seems to continue what Thetis has started with her own request to Zeus. In a way, Patroclus will also, in his turn, accelerate Achilles’ death, and it is worth noticing that in the dream he is already arranging Achilles’ posthumous fate. Patroclus’ soul appears abruptly in the Iliad. He is an illustrious hero and does not need to be introduced. By contrast, Elpenor is unknown to the audience, and Odysseus introduces him only to describe his death. The whole episode forms a tripartite sequence in the Apologoi, comprising (1) Elpenor’s death itself (10.551–560), (2) Elpenor’s encounter with Odysseus (11.51–83), and (3) Elpenor’s funeral (12.9–5).5 All three instances are narrated by Odysseus, and the whole sequence is, as often stated, a convenient link between the Nekyia and the rest of the narrative of the Odyssey. Elpenor’s description of his own death analeptically justifies the detailed awareness of Odysseus, who did not himself witness the event.6 In Odysseus’ detailed description, Elpenor is searching for ψῦχος (10.555) but instead will lose his ψυχή (10. 560). In the Nekyia, Elpenor is, as we know, the first soul to converse with Odysseus. He does not need to drink blood, as he still lies unburied and has not yet lost his memory. The other souls, apart from Teiresias (and perhaps Heracles), do not remember and do not recognize, but they seem to still possess the memory of two things: (a) that drinking blood is important and (b) that avoiding a sword is also important. Otherwise, the fact that the souls are driven away by Odysseus’ sword is totally incomprehensible, since in their present condition, a sword can hardly hurt them. It seems reasonable to suggest that, apart from its linking function, the Elpenor episode also offers a clear view of the gradations of mortality, given that there are several levels of mortality in the Nekyia. Indeed, it may be that various gradations of mortality are actually associated with blood. Elpenor does not need to drink blood, since he is unburied and apparently retains his memory and ability to recognize others. Teiresias, Odysseus’ second interlocutor, does not need to drink blood in order to recognize and talk to Odysseus, since he exceptionally preserves his memory and ability to recognize others (νοῡν and φρένας, 10.93–94), but he does need to drink blood to prophesy.7 Finally, Antikleia, Odysseus’ most unexpected and personal encounter, corresponds to the third and more generalized grade, since she needs to drink blood to recognize, remember, and talk. If we were to try to establish gradations within this third group, then Ajax would occupy a high position on this scale, in that, although he (apparently)8 drinks blood, he still recognizes and recalls, but, precisely because he recognizes and remembers, he does not talk. In these gradations of mortality, the case of Heracles is certainly of special interest. The different levels of mortality in the Nekyia have been thoroughly studied by Martin, who, however, associates blood with a certain social rank in the Underworld and suggests that “the drinking of the blood does not

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restore awareness or recognition to the witless dead, but provides a measure of honor to those who consciously choose to partake of it.”9 Elpenor’s low heroic status has been judged incompatible with his claims to a lofty heroic funeral.10 Heubeck in particular (comment on 11.74–78) remarked that Elpenor’s funerary claim evokes Eetion’s funeral in the Iliad (6.416–420) and Achilles’ funeral in the Odyssey (24.80–85). If, however, Elpenor in the Nekyia asks for a funeral above his own social and personal level, which would then upgrade him to a heroic status, it is important to observe that in the same book (487–491) Achilles subversively chooses a life below his own standards, which would downgrade him to a non-heroic level. Achilles thus makes a point about lowliness in life that contrasts with the lofty aspirations that Elpenor entertains in death. Elpenor asks Odysseus to burn him with his weapons, to heap up a mound so that the future generations may learn of him, and to fix his oar on the mound. Odysseus’ next interlocutor, Teiresias, suggests a different, opposite use of the oar (11.119–134). Here we probably have yet another of the manifold differences that separate Odysseus from other heroes and from his companions. In Odysseus’ case, it is not the oar that will show men the existence of the hero, but it is the hero who will show men the existence of the oar. According to Elpenor, his own burial will prevent Odysseus from incurring the wrath of the gods. It is usual to think, because we are influenced by Patroclus’ ghost in the Iliad, that Elpenor cannot join the other souls in the Underworld while he still lies unburied, although Elpenor actually says nothing of the kind. Odysseus laconically promises to fulfill Elpenor’s request and describes, in slightly condescending terms, the picture of their mutual stance over the blood. Elpenor’s speech is, of course, too long and incompatible with his king’s rush to continue the procedure and get Teiresias’ counsel. Immediately afterward, Odysseus has the nerve to push away his own mother in his urge to allow Teiresias to speak first. In similar fashion, Patroclus’ ghost in the Iliad, uninfluenced by Achilles’ emotional state, ignores Achilles’ intentions and priorities and speaks only of his own issues and interests. It seems fair, then, to acknowledge that in both cases the souls of the unburied dead convey their restless condition through their considerable and comparable selfishness. Patroclus descends to the Underworld, but he returns to the Upper World to meet the living (and dreams form the best means for such an encounter, cf. 11.222). Elpenor goes to Hades to remain there, since the living make the same trip with him (by boat, see 11.57–58) while remaining alive. Patroclus and Elpenor both possess a clear-cut distinction separating them from their other colleagues, with Patroclus enjoying a positive difference, Elpenor a negative one. In Patroclus’ case, the emotional power of the encounter clearly concerns Achilles, and through Achilles, it is thereby also conveyed to the

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audience (reader/listener). In Elpenor’s case, the emotional request on the part of a non-valiant companion tends to move the audience (reader/listener) more directly, whereas Odysseus, although he pities his companion, is still condescending toward him. If this is true, perhaps it is to be associated with some major general features pertaining in the Iliad and the Odyssey. In the Iliad, although the concept of individual aristeia is often foregrounded, companionship and collective aims are often praised, while the lack of companionship is, by definition, disastrous. In the Odyssey, the companions’ actions often occur in counterpoint to Odysseus’, and the narrative plan of the poem erases any possibility that the companions will eventually reach safety. In this sense, Elpenor’s death is an individualized case of what will happen to all his colleagues, and Odysseus’ response can be as warm as the plan of the Odyssey allows him to be in view of the imminent loss of all his companions. It is true that the Nekyia offers the companions a preview of their imminent fate, just as the encounter with Patroclus’ ghost offers Achilles a preview of his own, but it is less clear how and under what circumstances the companions will find their way to the Underworld in the Odyssey. It seems reasonable to compare Elpenor’s funerary honors to the burial of Phrontis, Menelaus’ helmsman, the only steersman whose name is, as we saw, mentioned in Homer (3.278–285).11 Again, what emerges from such a comparison is Elpenor’s lack of skill versus Phrontis’ qualities, which Homer stresses. There is no reason to elaborate further on Odysseus’ and Menelaus’ parallel returns in the Odyssey and so repeat what we have suggested in chapter 1. Yet, as to Odysseus’ nostos, we should bear in mind that Elpenor is the first and last companion to be buried, which means he is at least spared a pitiful death in the mouth(s) of Skylla or Polyphemus or by the spears of the Cicones or the Laestrygonians. Furthermore, hardly a valiant individual as he is, he also avoids the disastrous atasthalia committed by his comrades on Thrinakia. He therefore becomes the example of the burial that Odysseus’ other companions will never receive, and so he is the most privileged of all of them. His lack of kleos in life is totally and ironically disproportionate to the memory of his posthumous kleos, especially if we compare his fate to that of his companions, who will not even find a tomb. We may be right in doubting whether the companions who are killed by the Cicones (9.60–61) were ever given a proper funeral, but at least they were honored with a ritual evocation of their names on board their ships (9.62–66). Those who lost their lives in the land of the Laestrygonians did not receive even that. It is extraordinary, however, that the other companions who lost their lives were all, apart from Elpenor, devoured, whether by Polyphemus, by the Laestrygonians, by Skylla, or by fish after the Thrinakia shipwreck. Their corporeal being was consumed and incorporated into the bodies of the human or non-human beings who fed on them. What happened

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to these peoples’ souls, and what shape did their eidola assume in Hades, if in fact they ever reached there? If we follow Heubeck’s hypothesis (on 11.41), which claims that the phantoms (eidola) described in 11.36–43 preserve the physical image they had at the very moment of their death, then the precise condition of these unfortunate companions in the Underworld is unclear. Also, if (in the view of Heubeck, on 11.51–54) the funerary honors were a necessary condition for a soul to reach Hades, then we should also infer that these souls would never reach the Underworld since, independent of their possible appearance, they were never granted a funeral. However, the sine qua non of a funeral laid down by Patroclus’ soul in the Iliad does not, as we have mentioned, appear in Elpenor’s arguments to Odysseus, nor is it applied in the Second Nekyia, where Amphimedon’s soul is led to Hades by Hermes and is recognized and addressed by Agamemnon at a moment when funerary honors have not yet been offered (24.186–190). Nor is any sacrificial blood tasted here either. The inconsistency would, of course, have been resolved if Elpenor, in addition to conversing with Odysseus, had talked to one of the souls that appear in the Underworld. In such a case, we would know whether the souls of the poor, devoured companions had a chance to reach Hades, whatever their mauled appearance may have been. This, however, does not occur, since both Elpenor and Patroclus are equally isolated from both worlds, that of the living and that of the dead, at this transitional stage of their existence. The last moments in the lives of Odysseus’ remaining companions are described in lines 418–420 of Book 12, in which they die pitiably in the sea. Nothing more is said of them thereafter. In the structure of the Odyssey, this is perhaps the cruelest narrative punishment inflicted on the fool companions. The Odyssey, otherwise so generous in describing what happens to the souls of the unheroic12 Elpenor and the outrageous suitors, never says a word about the souls of the companions who perished at the hands of Polyphemus, the Laestrygonians, or Skylla in the Thrinakia shipwreck. The νήπιοι companions never receive funerary honors, the honors claimed by and granted to Patroclus in the Iliad and Elpenor in the Odyssey.

NOTES 1. Translation by R. Lattimore. 2. The Iliad: A Commentary. Volume VI: Books 21–24 (Cambridge, 1993). 3. See his comment on line 74. 4. On this point, see Christopoulos, “Casus Belli: Causes of the Trojan War in the Epic Cycle,” Classics@ 6, CHS, Harvard. 5. See Burgess 2020, 175–198.

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6. On the difference between the two descriptions, see Heubeck’s comment on 11.60–65. 7. This may also indicate a form of piety related to sacrificial practice in divination. 8. Tsagarakis (2000, 108–109) is right in suggesting that the poet does not have continually to repeat the point that the dead drink blood to display emotion once he has made the matter clear. 9. Martin 2014, 1–12. 10. See, for instance, Heubeck’s comment on Od. 11.66–78, 74–78. 11. See chapter 1 (“Trips, Ships, and Helmsmen in the Odyssey”) and Christopoulos 2009, 57–66. 12. On Elpenor as an antihero, see Spieker 1965, 57–80; Rohdick 1999, 262–70.

Chapter 6

Leaving Calypso’s Island or Á La Recherche Du Temps Perdu

The fifth book of the Odyssey starts with the second Assembly of the Gods (5.1–42). There Zeus, urged by Athena, assigns Hermes the task of announcing to Calypso1 the gods’ decision regarding Odysseus’ homecoming. The decision is meticulously precise; it makes clear that Odysseus must leave Ogygia alone on a raft that will take him to the island of the Phaeacians, who will consequently help him reach Ithaca. Hermes’ mission is actually the second stage of a decision already taken by the gods in their first Assembly (1.26–95). In this first Assembly, Hermes’ particular task is suggested by Athena but not yet ordered by Zeus. Odysseus’ return has also already been decided, although not yet revealed in its practical details (sailing on a raft, trip to the island of the Phaeacians, etc.).2 One of the particularities of the second Assembly is the decision of the gods to coordinate this time with the accomplishment of two returns, Odysseus’ as well as Telemachus’ (who, in the meantime, between the two assemblies, has visited Pylos and Sparta to inquire about his father). For both cases (5.25 for Telemachus, 5.36–37 for Odysseus), Zeus uses the same verb: πέμπειν.3 In the first case, it is a goddess (Athena) who will direct the action (πέμψει); in the second case, the Phaeacians will direct things and act accordingly (πέμψουσιν). Thus no direct divine action, which might offend Poseidon, will be undertaken to assist Odysseus in his trip from Ogygia to Scheria, and neither divine nor human πομπή (assistance and convoy) will be provided (Od. 5.32): οὔτε θεῶν πομπῇ οὔτε θνητῶν ἀνθρώπων.4

Immediately afterward, Hermes visits Calypso, enjoys her hospitality, is offered ambrosia and nectar, and then reveals the aim of his visit. In doing so, he twice uses the verb ’αποπέμπειν in regard to Odysseus’ departure: 61

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5.112: τὸν νῦν σ᾽ ἠνώγειν ἀποπεμπέμεν ὅττι τάχιστα 5.146: οὕτω νῦν ἀπόπεμπε, Διὸς δ᾽ ἐποπίζεο μῆνιν

Calypso initially protests against the gods’ decision but promises to respect Zeus’ will. Still, she clearly emphasizes the limits of her action. She can only offer advice, since she possesses neither ships nor sailors (5.140–144): πέμψω δέ μιν οὔ πῃ ἐγώ γε. οὐ γάρ μοι πάρα νῆες ἐπήρετμοι καὶ ἑταῖροι, οἵ κέν μιν πέμποιεν ἐπ᾽ εὐρέα νῶτα θαλάσσης. αὐτάρ οἱ πρόφρων ὑποθήσομαι, οὐδ᾽ ἐπικεύσω, ὥς κε μάλ᾽ ἀσκηθὴς ἣν πατρίδα γαῖαν ἵκηται. But I will not give him conveyance, for I have not any ships by me nor any companions who can convey him back across the sea's wide ridges; but I will freely give him my counsel and hold back nothing, so that all without harm he can come back to his own country. (Translation by R. Lattimore)

The lack of ships has already been mentioned by Athena in the second Assembly of the Gods (5.16–17 = 141–142). Athena uses almost the same words (5.16–17), although the lack of ships refers to Odysseus, not Calypso.5 Subtle ambiguities in the text and the adroit use of formulaic verses form a careful semiology that reflects Calypso’s attitude, feelings, and intentions. In Book 4 (559–560), Proteus reveals to Menelaus that he has seen Odysseus weeping on Calypso’s island, as he has no ships or companions who might send him (πέμψοιεν) home. The same formulaic verses are, as we have said, used by Athena in Book 5 (16–17). Calypso (5.141–142) uses the same formula, slightly altered (“he has not” is replaced by “I have not”): οὐ γάρ μοι πάρα νῆες ἐπήρετμοι καὶ ἑταῖροι, οἵ κέν μιν πέμποιεν ἐπ᾽ εὐρέα νῶτα θαλάσσης.

The formula is preceded by the verse (140): πέμψω δέ μιν οὔ πῃ ἐγώ γε (But I will not give him conveyance)

The verb πέμπειν and the noun πομπή refer to the assistance and the transport needed by any sailor, including the divine protection guaranteeing the safe outcome of the trip. Hiding behind the lack of ships, Calypso manages to justify her inability to offer technical and human assistance for Odysseus’ trip and, at the same time, remain faithful to her own feelings, which prevent

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her from allowing Odysseus to leave. She will, of course, comply with Zeus’ will, but she will not be Odysseus’ πόμπιμος δαίμων, the helpful divinity constantly needed by any sea traveler.6 Still, Calypso must keep the promise she made to Hermes. She will announce the news to Odysseus as if it were the result of her own decision. Instead of using the verb πέμπειν, she uses the verb ἀποπέμπειν (“to send away”) that Hermes has used in 5.112 and in 5.146 (πρόφρων ἀποπέμψω, I will willingly send you away). She finds Odysseus on the seashore, where he usually spends his time gazing nostalgically at the sea. This meeting marks Odysseus’ entrance in the Odyssey, and the words he addresses to Calypso are the first words he utters in the whole poem; until Book 5, there is only talk about Odysseus—now, at last, Odysseus talks himself. After Hermes’ departure, some order starts to permeate the hitherto strange circumstances prevailing on Calypso’s island. Among other things, this order seems to redefine the borders between divine space and human space. These have apparently been in a state of ambiguity and confusion until the moment Hermes conveys the decision of Zeus to Calypso. Odysseus has refused immortality, and now he has to leave the space that belongs to the gods. But how is this going to happen in reality? We know that, during the second Assembly of the Gods, Zeus decides that Odysseus will leave Calypso’s island alone on a raft (5.31–33). Hermes does not transmit this detail to Calypso. She, however, mentions the raft when she speaks to Odysseus. Often in Homeric narrative, once a detail is known to the audience, it does not necessarily need to be communicated to the person involved (λύσις ἐκ τοῦ ἀκροατοῦ, σχῆμα κατὰ τὸ ἤδη εἰρημένον). Besides, the absence of ships on Calypso’s island, irrespective of Hermes’ precise message, inevitably leads the action toward the construction of a raft, which seems to be the only means of sailing one can envisage under the circumstances. The discussion between Calypso and Odysseus starts on the seashore and continues in Calypso’s cave. There the goddess and the mortal dine face to face, Odysseus occupying the seat that Hermes has just left. But although he is still situated close to the space of the gods, Odysseus is not offered the food of the gods. Calypso’s servants serve Odysseus food appropriate for mortals, whereas she dines on ambrosia and nectar, sufficient fare for a divine being. For Odysseus, leaving Calypso also means rejecting immortality. Of course, granting Odysseus immortality was part of Calypso’s plan. She sincerely revealed these intentions of hers to Hermes (5.135–136) and deliberately offered such a gift to Odysseus (5.206–210). Revealing this intention to Hermes was proof of her benevolent attitude toward Odysseus, a counterweight to the cruel fate the gods envisage for him once he leaves Ogygia. Calypso’s offer to Odysseus is a gift for the future that allows him to avoid the harshness of a mortal’s fate, a destiny he prefers, in spite of

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the obvious benefits he would have enjoyed had he opted for immortality at Calypso’s side. Immortality is anyway not an option anymore, since Odysseus’ departure has been irrevocably decided, so the issue hypothetically mentioned is by Calypso (5.206–210)—“if you knew . . . you would prefer”: εἴ γε μὲν εἰδείης σῇσι φρεσὶν ὅσσα τοι αἶσα κήδε᾽ ἀναπλῆσαι, πρὶν πατρίδα γαῖαν ἱκέσθαι, ἐνθάδε κ᾽ αὖθι μένων σὺν ἐμοὶ τόδε δῶμα φυλάσσοις ἀθάνατός τ᾽ εἴης. But if you only knew in your own heart how many hardships you were fated to undergo before getting back to your country, you would stay here with me and be the lord of this household and be an immortal. (Translation by R. Lattimore)

Surprisingly, in the Odyssey, Calypso appears fully entitled to grant immortality and youth to a mortal. Calypso has definitely learned from Eos’ mistake, who asked from Zeus only immortality for Tithonus. But the fact that Calypso is herself authorized to grant immortality, whereas Eos had to humbly ask Zeus to grant a mortal such a unique privilege, is probably associated not only with the fact that the offer is to be rejected by the mortal in question but also with a certain downgrading, as it were, that immortality seems to suffer per se within the value system of the Odyssey. After the dialogue that takes place in the cave, Calypso appears energetically determined to assist Odysseus in organizing his departure.7 She leads him to the other edge of the island, where he will find wood suitable for the construction of the raft. From the green, fresh, and flower-strewn landscape in which the goddess dwells, we move to the brown, dry, and flowerless landscape where the raft will be constructed. This transition completes the spatial scheme of Calypso’s island that runs through the whole book. Within this context, one discerns, then, three main instances in terms of space and movement: • Odysseus alone, at the seashore, at one edge of the island; Calypso, who comes and goes (5.149–191) • Odysseus (led by Calypso) and Calypso together in the cave (5.192–227) • Odysseus (led by Calypso) is at the other edge of the island; Calypso, who comes and goes (5.228–267) In addition to distinctions between the foods each one eats, the difference between the domain of mortals and the domain of immortals is now geographically defined. From the green surroundings of the cave, encircled by a

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forest whose appearance charms even the gods (5.73–75),8 Odysseus is driven to the extreme edge of the island, where he finds old, dry, almost dead wood, the material he will use to construct his raft,9 which will lead him to the space inhabited by mortals, where he will soon face death. It is perhaps time to wonder about the revelations that Calypso, in her conversation with Hermes, appeared eager to make to Odysseus, in addition to so willingly giving him her precious piece of advice (5.142–144): αὐτάρ οἱ πρόφρων ὑποθήσομαι, οὐδ᾽ ἐπικεύσω, ὥς κε μάλ᾽ ἀσκηθὴς ἣν πατρίδα γαῖαν ἵκηται.

She promised to hide nothing from him, although she has already hidden that what is supposedly her decision was completely dictated by the gods. And, although when she addresses him, she declares that she knows how many hardships he was fated to undergo before getting back to his country (5.210–211), she presumably ignores the worst of these woes—namely, the wreck of the raft that he is about to construct with such admirable skill. Odysseus works on the raft for four days. On the fifth, Calypso brings him water, wine, and clothes. This day, actually the last of a seven-year sojourn on Ogygia, would normally be the appropriate moment for advice to be given and revelations to be made. Such is the case, for instance, when Odysseus leaves Circe’s island in 12.37–143. However, here we do not witness such a conversation at the moment of Odysseus’ departure. Still later, when Homer describes the course of Odysseus’ raft (5.270–280), we realize that some pieces of advice had, in fact, been given and some revelations were made by Calypso, although we were never given the opportunity to hear them. They mainly concern the constellations that Odysseus should watch in order to guide himself during his voyage and, above all, the direction he should follow, so as to reach the island of the Phaeacians. The lack of this astronomical and geographical information during the hero’s long stay on Ogygia might perhaps explain to any suspicious listener or reader of the Odyssey, that why Odysseus has never tried to undertake such a trip before, although he was well able to build a raft. When one reads Book 5 of the Odyssey, it is clear that the last dialogue registered is that between Odysseus and Calypso in the latter’s cave. This dialogue concludes at verse 224, and, although one would expect some further verbal exchanges between the two protagonists, the text does not ever register any other dialogue at all. In fact, the second part of Book 5 is full of monologues. While there are only three dialogues in the first part (AthenaZeus, 7–27; Hermes-Calypso, 87–147; Odysseus-Calypso, 160–224), there are eight monologues in the second part: Poseidon (286–290), Odysseus (299–312), Leucothea (339–350), Odysseus (356–364), Poseidon (377–379),

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Odysseus (408–423), Odysseus (445–450), and Odysseus (465–473). To these monologues, even when the words uttered seem to expect a response (as in 339–350, 445–450), there is never a verbal reply, unless an answer is provided by the consequent action that follows. The presence of these monologues, of which five out of eight are given by Odysseus himself, seems to stress his isolation, for in the second part of Book 5, Odysseus is in a state of extreme solitude, the longest10 actually registered in the whole Odyssey. Odysseus’ stay on Calypso’s island is preceded by a shipwreck and precedes a shipwreck. Each one of these shipwrecks liberates Odysseus from his previous engagements. The shipwreck after Thrinakia, though perilous, does away with one of the hero’s major priorities, clearly stated already in the prooimion to the Odyssey, the salvation of his companions.11 The shipwreck after Ogygia causes all the traces of Odysseus’ stay there to vanish. Once the raft is destroyed and Odysseus falls into the water, the clothes that Calypso has woven for him, become a burden dragging him toward the bottom of the sea. Following Leucothea’s advice, he takes off these garments and frees himself from the threatening woven circle that surrounds him. Although the sea erases all traces of Odysseus’ journey, whether in the form of men, boats, objects, or clothes, Calypso, acting out the meaning of her own name, undertakes to cover Odysseus himself. From the moment his companions are gone, Odysseus is the only witness to his own existence. He exists only as long as he shows that he exists. As soon as he disappears, he no longer exists. Odysseus’ sojourn under cover, as it were, on Calypso’s island for seven years allows his son almost to reach manhood, gives the other heroes of Troy the opportunity to return home and talk of him,12 and also allows Athena convincingly to transform him into an old man when he finally reaches Ithaca. Yet, above all, these years of disappearance, these years of “lost time,” allow Odysseus to become part of the bardic tradition, as expressed by Demodocus’ song, and firmly to place himself within the stories that tell of the Achaeans’ glorious deeds at Troy. While he follows the track back to Ithaca, Odysseus creates another nostos, a poetic one, that leads him back to his point of departure, to Troy. As long as his real existence is occluded and obscured in Ogygia, Odysseus does not belong to the real dimension of time. While other people’s lives keep moving within time, his own life remains motionless, almost timeless. Thus, when at last he leaves Calypso’s island, he finds his way back, to use Proust’s expression, from “temps perdu” to “temps retrouvé.”

NOTES 1. The best way to understand Calypso in the Odyssean context is to keep to the Homeric data. The figure of Calypso inspired numerous bibliographical approaches.

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See, indicatively, Güntert 1919; Dirlmeier 1967, 79–84; Harder 1960, 148–160; Clay 1983; Hainsworth 1993, 253; Christopoulos 1996. On ’Ωγυγία, see Hainsworth 1993, 85. 2. On the authenticity of the second Assembly of the Gods, see Page 1955; Schadewaldt 1965; Merkelbach 1969; Hainsworth 1990, 136, 249–153. 3. Od. 5.21–42: τέκνον ἐμόν, ποῖόν σε ἔπος φύγεν ἕρκος ὀδόντων. οὐ γὰρ δὴ τοῦτον μὲν ἐβούλευσας νόον αὐτή, ὡς ἦ τοι κείνους Ὀδυσεὺς ἀποτίσεται ἐλθών; Τηλέμαχον δὲ σὺ πέμψον ἐπισταμένως, δύνασαι γάρ, ὥς κε μάλ᾽ ἀσκηθὴς ἣν πατρίδα γαῖαν ἵκηται, μνηστῆρες δ᾽ ἐν νηὶ παλιμπετὲς ἀπονέωνται. ἦ ῥα καὶ Ἑρμείαν, υἱὸν φίλον, ἀντίον ηὔδα: Ἑρμεία, σὺ γὰρ αὖτε τά τ᾽ ἄλλα περ ἄγγελός ἐσσι, νύμφῃ ἐυπλοκάμῳ εἰπεῖν νημερτέα βουλήν, νόστον Ὀδυσσῆος ταλασίφρονος, ὥς κε νέηται οὔτε θεῶν πομπῇ οὔτε θνητῶν ἀνθρώπων. ἀλλ᾽ ὅ γ᾽ ἐπὶ σχεδίης πολυδέσμου πήματα πάσχων ἤματί κ᾽ εἰκοστῷ Σχερίην ἐρίβωλον ἵκοιτο, Φαιήκων ἐς γαῖαν, οἳ ἀγχίθεοι γεγάασιν, οἵ κέν μιν περὶ κῆρι θεὸν ὣς τιμήσουσιν, πέμψουσιν δ᾽ ἐν νηὶ φίλην ἐς πατρίδα γαῖαν, χαλκόν τε χρυσόν τε ἅλις ἐσθῆτά τε δόντες, πόλλ᾽, ὅσ᾽ ἂν οὐδέ ποτε Τροίης ἐξήρατ᾽ Ὀδυσσεύς, εἴ περ ἀπήμων ἦλθε, λαχὼν ἀπὸ ληίδος αἶσαν. ὣς γάρ οἱ μοῖρ᾽ ἐστὶ φίλους τ᾽ ἰδέειν καὶ ἱκέσθαι οἶκον ἐς ὑψόροφον καὶ ἑὴν ἐς πατρίδα γαῖαν.

“My child, what sort of word has escaped your teeth’s barrier? For is not this your own intention, as you have counseled it, Hermes is sent to liberate Odysseus how Odysseus shall make his way back, and punish those others? Then bring Telemachos home skillfully, since you can do this, so that all without harm he can come back to his own country while the suitors in their ship come back with nothing accomplished.” He spoke, and then spoke directly to his beloved son, Hermes: “Hermes, since for other things also you are our messenger, announce to the nymph with the lovely hair our absolute purpose: the homecoming of enduring Odysseus, that he shall come back by the convoy neither of the gods nor of mortal people, but he shall sail on a jointed raft and, suffering hardships, on the twentieth day make his landfall on fertile Scheria at the country of the Phaiakians who are near the gods in origin, and they will honor him in their hearts as a god, and send him back, by ship, to the beloved land of his fathers, bestowing bronze and gold in abundance upon him, and clothing, more than Odysseus could ever have taken away from Troy, even if he had escaped unharmed with his fair share of the plunder. For so it is fated that he shall see his people and come back to his house with the high roof and to the land of his fathers.” (Translation by R. Lattimore)

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4. Calypso’s assistance and Leucothea’s intervention are, of course, of divine origin but are not undertaken directly by the Olympians. 5. The same formulaic verses, in regard to Odysseus’ lack of ships, are earlier used by Proteus in Book 4 (559–560). 6. See Wachsmuth 1967. 7. It is only then (5.233) that the poet (not Calypso herself) describes the goddess’ activity and employs the expression μήδετο πομπήν to do so. 8. Hermes flying over Calypo’s island observes the landscape and admires its charms. 9. On the construction, see Casson 1961 and Mark 1991. 10. Eighteen days (5.278–281). 11. See chapter 2 (“Onward and Backward”) for the idea of “collective” and “individual” nostos. 12. We noted in chapter 2 how Odysseus is mentioned in other heroes’ narrations.

Epilogue

For many centuries, researchers have been haunted by a permanent obsession with drawing reliable conclusions at the end of their work. It is true that in certain types of studies, this practice may be useful and therefore advisable. But in the study of literature, things are perhaps more complicated. I do not know of any poet or poetess who ever bothered to draw conclusions about his or her poems or even cared about whether later scholars would extract conclusions from their study of such poems. Although I cannot prove it, I am utterly convinced that the poet of the Odyssey would have been completely indifferent as to whether I conclude my book with a set of conclusions. So I will not undertake such a task. However, to consolidate any usefulness this book may have for potential readers and to stress some points that one hopes, may be the subject of further academic dialogue, it seems a good idea, in this final section, to bring together and correlate some essential ideas advanced in the previous chapters. I started chapter 1 with the assumption that topography and communication in the Odyssey are profoundly determined by navigation. In the search for some factual data, I explored the main nostoi registered in the Odyssey, and, drawing on all the information provided in Book 4 regarding Menelaus’ return, I realized that the scattering of Menelaus’ ships in southern Crete is, in terms of the literary evidence, the only time a fleet is separated into two parts thanks solely to the effects of the winds. And, also in regard to Menelaus’ ships, another interesting detail lies in the fact that he sails his five ships up the Nile. Technically speaking, it is difficult to imagine how one might conceive that ships constructed for crossing the Aegean and the Libyan seas could be used in shallow river waters, if one considers the knowledge of ship construction acquired over centuries in Greek and Egyptian antiquity.

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To remain within the context of the Telemachy (Books 1–4), there are forty days of action in the Odyssey. Of these, Telemachus spends approximately thirty days in Sparta (even though, at 4.594, he claims he is in a hurry to leave), given that he arrives in Sparta on the sixth day and leaves on the thirty-fifth. This is, of course, a puzzling spell of idleness on the part of Telemachus, who had been facing urgent issues in Ithaca. The only reason for this delay seems to be that Telemachus’ arrival on Ithaca had to occur at the same time as Odysseus' own return. Indeed, the combined action of father and son will at that moment lead, as we know, to a victorious outcome concerning the problem of the suitors and family priorities in Odysseus’ home. At a political level, however, it guarantees neither Odysseus’ nor Telemachus’ sovereignty over Ithaca. In these twin returns of Odysseus and Telemachus, there is another intriguing and little-discussed issue. Both of the ships that bring Odysseus and Telemachus back to Ithaca have foreign owners. The ship that brings Odysseus, as we know, belongs to the Phaeacians. Telemachus’ ship is borrowed from the Ithacan Noemon, who later (4.630–656) naively betrays Telemachus’ departure to the suitors and so becomes the reason why the suitors seek to ambush Odysseus’ son. Both Noemon’s name and that of his father, Phronios, are connected with intelligence and are probably used ironically, something not unknown in the Odyssey. The absence of ships in Odysseus’ wealth, which is stated constantly and in various ways, seems to be one of the reasons why the power of Odysseus’ family in Ithaca is problematic and not at all self-evident. Throughout the Odyssey, ships appear to function as a means of showcasing social, economic, and political power. This perhaps explains why, in the Argonautic expedition, the other great (and probably pre-Homeric) epic of Greek antiquity, the vessel itself, the ship Argo, which gives its name to the entire myth, is the important factor. By contrast, the name of Odysseus’ ship is completely unimportant. No one ever bothered to learn the name, and the poet of the Odyssey never bothered to mention it. In the Odyssey, the ship is precisely the means, not the aim. This Odyssean scheme of anticlimax, which dwindles from the leadership of a whole fleet of twelve ships to a complete lack of any seagoing vessels, parallels the way the seamanship employed on these ships, the crew numbers, and, in particular, the role of the helmsmen decline. In the case of Phrontis, the helmsman of Menelaus’ ship who dies off Cape Sounion, the whole narrative scheme makes him the target of divine and narrative goals. It introduces him with praise shortly before he dies and, immediately afterward, willingly sacrifices him in such a way that his absence allows Menelaus and his ships to be led on new, uncontrollable adventures. As for the (anonymous) helmsman of Odysseus’ ship, whose excellence indirectly infuses the plot of the whole poem, he, too, is condemned to die, as

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are all Odysseus’ companions, but the helmsman earns a death semantically dissociated from those of the other companions. He is killed by the broken mast that falls on his head. The object that both factually and narratively annuls the last helmsman’s function—that is, the mast of the ship—triggers the departure of Odysseus’ companions from the narrative frame of the Odyssey. This same object, the mast, that takes the helmsman’s life subsequently saves Odysseus’ life. The mast that Odysseus grasps, which sails first to Charybdis and then to Calypso, becomes the vehicle that will lead him from the (unsuccessful) collective nostos to the (successful) individual nostos that will take place seven years later. In chapter 2, I developed the idea of “corrupted nostoi,” my aim being to describe the four instances in the Odyssey in which Odysseus returns to the same point from which he had departed, a theme undermining the general idea of homecoming. The first time (3.13–166) occurs right after the fall of Troy, when Odysseus initially sailed with Nestor from Troy up to Tenedos but then returned to Troy to join Agamemnon, who had stayed there to sacrifice to Athena. The second time the “corrupted nostos” occurs during Odysseus’ return to the island of Aeolus, after Odysseus’ companions foolishly opened the leather bag (10.46–76). The third time is during Odysseus’ return to the island of Circe after visiting the Underworld, guided by her benevolent advice (12.1–36). The fourth occurrence takes place on Odysseus’ return to the strait of Skylla and Charybdis after the shipwreck of his ship, thanks to the impious slaughter of Helios’ cattle by Odysseus’ companions (12.426–446). Of these four returns, the first (Tenedos-Troy) and third (Underworld-Circe) arise from Odysseus’ own intentions and have no negative consequences for him, nor do the circumstances appear to be worse than during his first contact with these places. But on the second and fourth occasions (the return to the island of Aeolus and to the strait of Skylla and Charybdis, respectively), the situation is totally different. The first time Odysseus navigates the strait of Skylla and Charybdis, he still has his boat and his companions, and the danger he encounters comes from Skylla. The second time, Odysseus is without his boat and without his companions. He enters the strait from the opposite end, and the danger he encounters comes from Charybdis. In contrast to Jason, the hero of the pre-Homeric Argonautic epic, who passes through the strait of the Clashing Rocks in one direction only, Odysseus passes through the strait of Skylla twice. The strait presents two different types of danger, one from each of the two rocks of the strait. Odysseus faces one of these dangers the first time he navigates the strait and the other when he passes through again. This second navigation of the strait is, for Odysseus, the first danger he experiences alone after the death of his companions. The circumstances of the second trip are definitely worse than those of the first. The return to Aeolus’ island also leads to a worse departure.

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Instead of being welcomed, hosted, and gifted, Odysseus is now cursed, rejected, and expelled. These corrupted nostoi and their unhappy outcomes are always the result of the companions’ unwise initiatives. One wonders whether the purpose of these narratives whenever Odysseus departs a second time from the same place is not merely to echo but actually to enhance and develop further the idea announced in line 5 of the prooimion, where we are told that Odysseus did not in the end save his companions, although he very much wished to do so. In other words, these corrupted nostoi seem to introduce the idea that the companions were not saved because they simply did not deserve to be saved. This distinction certainly has to do with the way the ideas of the “collective” and of the “individual” are perceived in the epic. What these narratives say (which the prooimon does not say) is both that the companions are ruined by their own ἀτασθαλίαι and that their existence is ruinous to Odysseus’ own salvation. By the middle of the trip to Ithaca, things have become pitilessly clear. It is the companions’ salvation against Odysseus’ own salvation. In chapter 2, I also discussed Odysseus’ encounter with Achilles and Ajax in the Nekyia. I argued that we can better understand why, after Achilles’ death, his weapons were given to Odysseus (and not to Ajax) if we take into account the fact that both Achilles and Odysseus were not bound by the oath given by Helen’s suitors and, therefore, they were not obliged to take part in the Trojan War, but they both had to join the expedition because the omens had made clear that Troy would never fall without these two. This prophetic assignment to Achilles and Odysseus could be an essential reason explaining why Achilles’ weapons should fairly go to the second assignee, Odysseus. In the same chapter, I also look at the complementarity between the figures of Odysseus and Penelope. In addition to other matters pertaining to both characters’ intellectual capacity, this complementarity is revealed, as I suspected years ago, through the double meaning of the word histos, signifying both “mast” and “loom,” and here we find another semantic dimension to the histos in the poem. Whenever Odysseus’ trip continues once more, we read (or hear) that he and his companions (or he alone, when he leaves Calypso’s island) “raised the mast and fixed the sail on it.” As long as the sail remains hoisted on the histos, the mast, the sail brings him closer to his destination, and then the course of time is positive for his timely arrival. Penelope also has her own histos, the loom. But as long as the cloth, the shroud intended for Laertes, is woven on this histos, the flow of time works against Odysseus’ timely arrival. How are the ten years of Odysseus’ return spent by the husband and the wife? He sails for three years and spends the other seven waiting in Ogygia; she weaves for three years and has spent the other seven waiting on Ithaca. Both histoi cease to function after three years of use, and consequently, for both characters, husband and wife, the course of time seems

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to lead to an impasse. Penelope’s action is revealed, and she is forced to move toward an undesired marital life. Odysseus’ movement is suspended, and he is forced to remain within an unwished-for substitute for marital life. This circumstance may indicate another aspect of complementarity, this time in terms of time and space, between Odysseus, who sails, and his wife, who weaves. Both know how to “weave malice” (δόλους). Within this familial context, the question that naturally arises concerns the role of Telemachus. In the epic tradition, Telemachus’ existence mainly provides an argument against Odysseus’ participation in the Trojan expedition, and, indeed, the hero’s reluctance to join the army was obviously a well-established epic motif, clearly evoked in the Odyssey (24.115–119) by Agamemnon when he mentions the difficulties he had in convincing Odysseus to join the Trojan expedition. Telemachus’ age is also the subject of a famous supposed error in the Odyssean narrative—namely, the information given by Antikleia to Odysseus (11.185–187) that Telemachus is already a man, joining men’s gatherings and banquets. Although the listener/reader has been watching Telemachus’ quasi-adult activity during the first four books of the Odyssey, at the time this information is given to Odysseus by Antikleia, Telemachus’ manhood is still far in the future. It is characteristic of Telemachus’ portrayal in the Odyssey that all his initiatives, whether spontaneous or directed by the gods, remain incomplete. The end of the Odyssey leaves us with another suspended issue in addition to political instability in Ithaca. Telemachus’ coming of age and manhood were not necessarily rooted in the mythographic tradition regarding Odysseus’ kingship in Ithaca. As far as we can piece the story together from remnants in the Archaic epic tradition, Telemachus never became king of Ithaca, and it sounds as if the Odyssey, through this indistinct and ambiguous depiction of Telemachus’ coming of age, is indirectly presaging this social and political impasse. In chapter 3, I examine the thorny issue of the crimes attributed to Odysseus in the Trojan mythical tradition and associate them with his painful and delayed return. Tragedy is more eloquent than epic on these matters. Still, it seems that in the epic tradition, Odysseus’ attempt to kill Diomedes during the nocturnal attempt to steal the Palladion and the murder of Palamedes by Odysseus, with Diomedes as accomplice, were two prominent narratives, the first included in the Little Iliad and the second in the Cypria. Within the context of the criminal activity involving Odysseus in various ways, two cases of personal enmity and extreme contrast need to be borne in mind. These are the rivalries between Ajax and Odysseus and the rivalries between Palamedes and Odysseus. In both cases, the rivalry ends when Odysseus’ opponent dies. Ajax commits suicide (the story is mentioned in the Homeric epics), and Palamedes is treacherously murdered (the story is not mentioned in the Homeric epics). In the first case, that of Ajax, two heroes who adopt different heroic

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behaviors are enemies because of this difference. In the end, one dies when proven superior in warfare but inferior in malice. In the second case, Palamedes, two heroes, both famous for their cleverness, are in conflict because of this very cleverness. One of them is finally killed when he proves to be cleverer but lacking in malice. Malice (δόλος), Odysseus’ domain of excellence (Od. 9. 19–20), is present in all the three cases examined in this chapter: Ajax, Palamedes, and Dolon (in the latter’s story, malice is even written into his name). In the Odyssey, Homer tends to elevate Odysseus’ status and, therefore, delete his negative aspects (which is, to some extent, the case in the Iliad as well). Homer also tends to make a moral issue out of Odysseus’ particular and somewhat unheroic skills. Perhaps, then, the Doloneia is an effort to credit Odysseus with murders that are morally acceptable, such as the murders of Dolon and Rhesus. Beneath the action of the Doloneia probably lie the narratives of the epic tradition that related morally unacceptable actions attributed to Odysseus, such as his attempt to murder Diomedes and the vengeful slaughter of Palamedes with Diomedes as accomplice. One might also wonder (and this is very important for the structure of the Odyssey) whether there was another cause for Odysseus’ painful wanderings, a cause quite different from the one advanced in the Odyssey. Perhaps it was not so much the blinding of Poseidon’s son, Polyphemus, as the murder of Poseidon’s grandson, Palamedes. This interpretation would offer more comprehensible reasons for the severity of Odysseus’ punishment and the miseries he has to suffer, separated from his homeland and loved ones, whom he has to leave because of Palamedes’ actions. If all this were so, the poet of the Odyssey would have altered the reasons for Odysseus’ painful homecoming, shifting things toward a mythographic explanation more sympathetic to Odysseus. In chapter 4, I demonstrate that, because in the Archaic epic there is a tendency to depict each heroic accomplishment as unique and because the hero of the Argonautic epic managed to negotiate the Plagktai successfully, the hero of the Odyssey could not be confined to a deed already achieved by someone else. Thus he would never navigate the Clashing Rocks, since this task had already been very conspicuously performed. But for this same reason, Odysseus’ ship has also to sail through a strait, past two rocks representing two different types of imminent danger. Navigating a strait is, however, all Odysseus has in common with Jason. One narrative clearly diverges from the other. Jason’s negotiation of the Clashing Rocks costs him only a part of his ship’s stern, but Odysseus’ journey through the strait of Skylla costs him the lives of six brave companions. In the end, Odysseus’ unnamed ship sinks, so never becoming πασιμέλουσα, as was the case of the Argo. However, Odysseus himself becomes πᾶσι μέλων, which is how he introduces himself to the Phaeacians in 9.19–20.

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In the same chapter, I have also demonstrated the importance of the voice in the whole section of the Apologoi but, more particularly, in the Skylla episode. As a part of a wider synthesis of multiple vocal interventions, in this crucial episode, the singer’s voice contains Odysseus’ voice, Odysseus’ voice contains Circe’s voice, and so on. Yet in this description there is a third voice that Odysseus will never be able to hear: the voice of Skylla herself. It sounds like barking, which is, of course, what one would expect from a proper name so directly associated with the Greek word for “dog.” This voice also has a particular age, that of a female puppy. Finally, the function of this voice is to emphatically ascribe Skylla not to any one species but to the female gender. Of the figures that make a deadly and dangerous appearance in the Apologoi, the wife (and the daughter) of Antiphates, Gorgo, the Sirens, Skylla, and Charybdis are, by definition, female. With the exception of the Sirens, whose physical depiction Homer persistently avoids in the Odyssey, of all female creatures mentioned above Gorgo, Charybdis, and, mainly, Skylla clearly diverge from a human appearance. Skylla’s terrifying aspect in particular brings her close to other monstrous female figures, such as Lamia, Empousa, Echidna, Hydra, Gorgo, and Hecate (Echidna and Hecate being associated with Skylla through parental links in later genealogical narratives). In Homer, Skylla’s genealogical origin is defined only through her mother, Krataiis, whose physical image remains undefined. In the next episode, on the island of Thrinakia, Odysseus loses his last ship. Now shipwrecked, Odysseus, grasping his ship’s mast, is carried back to the strait of Scylla and Charybdis and is saved from Charybdis by seizing the branches of the fig tree. Skylla does not see him this time and is therefore the last monster that Odysseus escapes. No more monsters appeared for the rest of his trip, as if monstrosities during his nostos were in some strange way linked to the existence of his companions. Odysseus is not the same man he was when he navigated the strait of Skylla for the second time. The lightning that destroys his ship in Od. 12.415 marks the most crucial point of his nostos, in that it is the moment when Odysseus finds his individuality. He is no longer fighting to save a whole team. He is now struggling for himself alone and so he turns from “we” to “I” for the rest of his journey. Yet, given the current circumstances, how long his return will take is more unknown than ever. In chapter 5, I look at the borders between life and death and how they are presented in the narratives concerning Patroclus’ ghost in the Iliad and Elpenor’s ghost in the Odyssey. Patroclus’ ghost addresses Achilles and, among other things, announces that he will die; the certainty of his death is one of the main mythographic prerequisites concerning Achilles’ presence in the Trojan narrative. We know that Achilles’ attitude toward life and death in the Iliad is very different from what it is in the Odyssey, but it is useful to examine Thetis’ attitude in the Iliad and compare it to her attitude during the

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events preceding Achilles’ wrath. This has, of course, to do with Achilles’ fate within the context of the Trojan expedition. Let us recapitulate who the people are who remind Achilles of his premature death in the Iliad. They are Thetis, his divine mother (1.415–416, 18.95–96); Xanthos, his divine horse (19.409–410); Hector, his deadly enemy (22.359–360); and finally Patroclus, when he appears as a ghost (23.80–81). When seen in connection with their status, these people all have a very specific relationship to human life and death. Thetis is the immortal goddess who tries unsuccessfully to offer immortality to Achilles. Xanthos, although an animal, possesses the quality that, ironically, his human master fails to acquire: immortality. Hector is a mortal hero who prophesies Achilles’ death at the very moment of his own. And, finally, Patroclus, dead as he is, returns from Hades to foretell Achilles’ death. These beings, then, sketch a line that starts with immortality (Thetis) and leads toward death and beyond (Patroclus). We should make particular mention here of Thetis’ and Patroclus’ roles. With Achilles’ wrath (μῆνις), which leads the hero away from the battlefield, Thetis’ aim of keeping Achilles away from any deadly threat is essentially accomplished. If Thetis’ wish is to be fulfilled, Achilles has to stay away from the battle. Thetis’ request to Zeus in the Iliad removes the final possibility of her preserving her son’s life. However, Patroclus’ death is a piece of heavy collateral damage involved in the plan to present Achilles’ supposed return to the battlefield (Iliad 11.796– 806 and 16.36–45). For Achilles, this is the heaviest consequence of his own approval of the plan. Patroclus’ request to Achilles in the dream seems to continue what Thetis had started with her own request to Zeus. In a way, Patroclus, too, accelerates Achilles’ death. The encounter with Patroclus’ ghost offers Achilles a preview of his own death. In the same way, Elpenor’s ghost in the Odyssey and the whole sequence of the Nekyia offer the companions a preview of their own impending fate. It is less clear in the Odyssey, however, how the companions will find their final way to the Underworld. Elpenor is the first and last of the companions to be buried. He, therefore, becomes the example of the burial that Odysseus’ other companions will never receive, and so he is the most privileged of all of them. His lack of kleos in life is completely and ironically disproportionate to the memory of his posthumous kleos, especially if we compare his fate to that of his companions, who do not even receive the honor of a tomb. In chapter 6, I demonstrate the ambiguous relationship between time and space, particularly on Calypso’s island, and the way in which they interact in the structure of the whole poem; the fundamental issue here being that Calypso’s island is the point, both spatially and temporally, from which the action of the Odyssey stems. I suggest that divine space and mortal space remain dissociated from each other, particularly when Odysseus has declined the offer of immortality (thus staying forever at Calypso’s side). The matter

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of space is underlined further as the landscape surrounding Odysseus changes when he is driven to the other side of the island, where he finds dry, almost dead wood suitable for the raft he is about to construct. This change of space also brings on Odysseus a severe wave of loneliness, since he is about to lose the only person to whom he could speak during the seven long years after the loss of his companions. In Book 5 of the Odyssey, the last recorded dialogue is that between Odysseus and Calypso in the latter’s cave. After this, there is nothing. In fact, the second part of Book 5 is full of monologues: Poseidon, Odysseus, Leucothea, Odysseus, Poseidon, Odysseus, again Odysseus, and, one last time, Odysseus. The presence of these monologues, of which five out of eight are given by Odysseus himself, stresses Odysseus’ isolation, in that he is depicted in the second part of Book 5 in a state of extreme solitude, the longest actually recorded in the whole Odyssey. What if Odysseus had stayed in Ogygia? He would then belong forever to the green space of the island, to the immortal part of it. In that case, however, time would actually be endless. Odysseus’ life would not continue in real time since his existence would then have had no end, trapped, as it would have been, in a space beyond time. Would it then have been necessary to cancel Teiresias’ prophecy? It was given, of course, before Odysseus arrived on Calypso’s island. What is then more substantial—a nymph’s wishful proposal or a seer’s truthful prophecy? Of course, Teiresias’ prediction regarding the precise details of Odysseus’ death makes any other option, including immortality, impossible and, consequently, makes Calypso’s offer impossible, too. We remember that Odysseus’ sojourn on Calypso’s island is preceded by and precedes a shipwreck. As I mentioned, each of these shipwrecks liberates Odysseus from his previous obligations. We have seen repeatedly that the first shipwreck, that occurring after Thrinakia, though perilous, removes one of the hero’s main priorities, already clearly stated in the prooimion of the Odyssey: the salvation of his companions. The second shipwreck, after Ogygia, erases all the traces of Odysseus’ time on Calypso’s island. Once the raft is destroyed and Odysseus falls into the water, Calypso’s woven clothes become a burden, dragging him down toward death. Calypso’s time and real time are now incompatible with each other. Following Leucothea’s advice, he takes off these clothes and frees himself from the woven garments, which embody his inactive, motionless, and timeless period on the island. If the sea covers all traces—men, boats, objects, and clothes—connected with Odysseus’ trip, Calypso, faithful to her own name, undertakes to cover Odysseus himself. It is clear from the structure of the Odyssey that, from the moment his companions are gone, Odysseus is the only witness to his own existence. He exists only as long as he signals his existence. If he disappears, he ceases to exist. Odysseus’ time covered and hidden in the obscurity of Calypso’s island for seven years allows his son almost to reach manhood, the other

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heroes of Troy to go safely back to their homes and to talk about him, and Athena to transform him into an old man when he at last reaches Ithaca. Above all, however, this lengthy disappearance allows Odysseus to become part of the aedic tradition, as expressed in Demodocus’ song, and so definitely establish himself as a major figure within the stories that tell of the Achaeans’ glorious deeds at Troy. As he follows the path back to Ithaca, Odysseus simultaneously creates another nostos, poetic this time, that leads him back to his point of departure—that is, to Troy. As long as his real existence is obscured and hidden away in Ogygia, Odysseus has no place in the dimensions of real time. While other people’s lives move forward within time, his own life remains motionless, almost timeless. Can a life be considered real if it is never finished by death? Thus, when Odysseus at last leaves Calypso’s island, he once more encounters real time—time that measures lives. In the Nekyia, Achilles states that he would prefer to labor as the slave of a poor man and be alive rather than to reign as a king among the dead (11.488–491). Is Odysseus’ return in the Odyssey a confirmation of this attitude? Are we witnessing a re-estimation of the values that define the quality of a human life? In the Iliad, the death of Achilles’ companion did not allow Achilles to remain idle for long. In fact, it brought him back to battle and accelerated his death. In the Odyssey, the death of Odysseus’ companions allowed Odysseus to remain idle for seven years. It has thus kept him out of action while, in some sense, prolonging his life. Whether this reflects a new attitude in epic poetry toward the quality of time and life in relation to human fate is a matter for study in the future. But the fact that a mere nymph like Calypso can now offer immortality (and eternal youth) to a mortal, who then rejects it, when Eos had to beg Zeus himself to be allowed to offer such a privilege to Tithonos, shows eloquently that in the eyes of men of the era of the Odyssey, immortality as a value does not enjoy the status that it once did in the past.

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Index Nominum

Given the subject of this book, the words Odyssey, Odysseus, Homer, and Iliad are not included in the index. Abantes, 15n8 Achaeans, 9, 14n8, 17n21, 25, 66 Achilles, 6, 14n8, 17n21, 25, 26, 36, 37, 43, 47, 51–54, 56, 72, 75, 76, 78 Aegean, 2, 69 Aeolus, 5, 23, 24, 43, 71 Aeschylus, 38n1 Agamemnon, 8, 9, 16n11, 18n37, 20n48, 23, 25, 27, 28, 33, 34, 37, 43, 50n13, 58, 71, 73 Aietes, 41, 42 Ajax (Lokrian), 1, 2, 13n4, 14n8, 15n8, 19n45, 35 Ajax (Telamonian), ix, 14n8, 25, 26, 29n6, 31, 32, 55, 72, 73–74 Alcinous, 12 Alope, 14n8 Alos, 14n8 Amphidamas, 52 Amphimedon, 58 Amphitrite, 41, 42, 44 Ankaios, 19n46 Antikleia, 8, 25, 28, 38n2, 43, 55, 73 Antilochus, 6 Antiphates, 46, 75 Apollo, 8, 18n28, 19n41, 36

Apollonius (of Tyana) 33 Apollonius Rhodius, 4 Apologoi, 1, 43, 46, 55, 75 Arete, 8 Argo, 5, 19n46, 41, 42, 49n1, 70, 74 Argonauts, 5, 42 Argos, 14n6 Ariadne, 8 Aristarchus, 27 Aristophanes, 16n20 Artemis, 8 Asia Minor, 2 Asteris, 4 Astyanax, 31 Astydamas, 38n1 Athena, 2, 4, 9, 13n4, 19n46, 23, 28, 35, 36, 47, 51, 61, 62, 65, 66, 71, 78 Atreids, 9 Attica, 2, 19n39 Augeiai, 14n8 Autolycus, 38n2, 39n20 Bessa, 14n8 Boagrios, 14n8 Briseis, 37 85

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Index Nominum

Calypso, 12, 26, 27, 43, 48, 61–66, 66n1, 68n4, 68nn7–8, 71, 76, 77 Canopus, 19n46 Cassandra, 2, 19n45, 35 Cephallenia, 3, 4 Ceto, 50n16 Chania, 3 Charybdis, ix, 10, 12, 17n20, 23, 24, 41, 45, 46, 48, 49, 71, 75 Chios, 2, 13n6 Chryses, 36–37 Cicones, 57 Circe, ix, 10, 11, 23, 25, 41, 43, 46, 48, 50n7, 65, 71, 75 Clashing Rocks, 24, 42, 71, 74 Clearchus, 39n6 Clytaimnestra, 50n13 Cnidians, 19n39 Crete, 2, 3, 15n9, 69 Cyclades, 2, 13n5 Cyclops, 29n2, 43, 47 Cydonians, 2–3, 15n9 Cypria, 29n14, 31, 32, 34, 36, 37, 39n26, 73 Cythera, 10 Daskalio, 4 Delos, 13n5 Delphi, 19n39 Demodocus, 26, 43, 66, 78 Demosthenes, 7 Dictys, 32, 33 Diomedes, 14n6, 31–34, 36, 37–38, 38n6, 73, 74 Dionysus/Dionysiac, 5, 8 Dolon, 32, 34, 36, 37, 74 Doloneia, 32, 34, 36, 37, 39n20, 40n30 Echidna, 46, 75 Echinades, 3 Echoiax, 19n39 Eetion, 56 Egypt, 2, 8, 15n9, 16n11, 17n25, 20n46 Eidothea, 19n41

Elpenor, 19n39, 25, 43, 51, 55–58, 59n12, 75, 76 Elysium, 9, 12 Empousa, 46, 75 Eos, 15n11, 16n11, 64, 78 Erebos, 44 Euboea, 2, 13n6, 14n8 Eumaeus, 4, 17n25, 19n41 Euphorbos, 7 Euripides, 35, 38n1 Eurylochus, 43 Eustathius, 48, 50n6 Geraistos/Geraestus, 2, 14n6 Gorgias, 38n1 Gorgo, 46, 75 Gortys, 15n9 Gyrae, 1, 13n4 Gyreones, 50n8 Hades, 17n25, 52, 53, 54, 56, 58, 76 Hecate, 46, 50n13, 75 Hector, 19n41, 21n55, 47, 54, 76 Hecuba, 19n41 Helen, 26, 29n6, 32–33, 37, 47 Helios, 23, 43, 49, 71 Hera, 41, 42 Hercules/Heracles, 25, 50n8, 55 Hermes, 43, 51, 61–62, 63, 65, 67n3, 68n8 Herodotus, 18n33 Hesiod, 50n6 Hesychius, 13n5, 38n6 Hydra, 46 Iardanos, 2, 15n9 Iolkos, 42 Ithaca, ix, x, 3, 4, 6, 24–25, 26, 28, 61, 66, 70, 72, 73 Ithaemenes, 19n39 Jason, 41, 42, 49n1, 71, 74 Kalamata, 3 Kalliaros, 14n8 Kebriones, 21n55 Komos, 2

Index Nominum

Krataiis, 46, 48 Kydonians. See Cydonians Kynos, 14n8 Laertes, 27, 38n2, 43, 72 Laestrygonians, 5, 6, 11, 57, 58 Lambetie, 49 Lamia, 46, 75 Lamos, 11 Laogonos, 7 Lesbos, 2, 13n6 Leucothea/Ino, 19n41, 66, 68n4, 77 Libyan Sea, 69 Little Iliad, 31, 33, 39nn6–7, 73 Lokris, 14n8 Lotus Eaters, 10, 11, 17n25, 20n52 Lycomedes, 54 Lycophron, 39n26, 50n8 Maleas, 2, 3, 8, 10, 15n9, 17n25 Marsyas, 5 Melantho, 47 Menelaus, 1, 2–3, 6–10, 12, 13n6, 19n39, 19n43, 19n46, 20n49, 26, 28, 32, 47, 57, 62, 69 Menoetius, 52 Meriones, 7 Mesopotamia, 5 Mimas, 13n6 Mykonos, 1, 2, 13n5 Nauplios, 35, 39n18 Nausicaa, 6, 48, 51 Nausimedon, 35 Naxos, 13n5 Neaira, 49 Nekyia, 11, 20n48, 25, 55, 57, 58, 72, 78 Neoptolemus, 25 Nestor, 1, 2, 7, 9, 18n37, 19n39, 23, 26, 54, 71 Nile, 3, 19n43, 69 Noemon, 4, 5, 6, 16n15, 70 Oenotropoi, 39n26 Ogygia, 12, 26, 27, 61, 66, 72, 77, 78 Oiax, 35

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Olympia, 39n17 Oneiros, 51 Onetor, 7, 18n28, 19n39 Opoeis/Opous, 14n8, 52 Oppianus, 50n13 Orestes, 25, 34, 35 Orion, 8 Palamedes, 28, 29n15, 31–33, 35–38, 38n1, 39n16, 39n26, 73, 74 Palladion, 31, 33, 37, 73 Panthos, 7 Patroclus, 6, 7, 21n55, 51–55, 56–57, 58, 75, 76 Pausanias, 19n39, 36, 39n7 Peleus, 52, 53 Peloponnese, 3 Penelope, ix, 26–27, 28, 29n9, 49n3, 51, 72, 73 Phaeacians/Phaiakians, 1, 4, 6, 12, 17n27, 32, 42–43, 61, 65, 67n3, 70, 74 Phaestos, 15n9 Phaethoussa, 49 Pharos, 9 Pherae, 3 Philostratus, 33, 36, 37 Phoebus/Phoibos, 18n28 Phorkys, 50n8 Photius, 38n6 Phronios, 16n15, 70 Phrontis, 2, 7–10, 18n28, 19n39, 20n46, 20n50, 57, 70 Pindar, 7, 16n20 Plagktai, 41, 42, 49n2, 74 Platanias, 2 Plato, 17n20 Polites, 43 Polygnotus, 19n37 Polyphemus, ix, 29n2, 35, 38, 43, 57, 74 Polyxena, 31 Poseidon, 1, 4, 5, 9, 13n4, 14n6, 19n46, 35, 38, 39n18, 43, 65, 74, 77 Priam, 25 Proclus, 28, 29n14, 32, 37, 39n16 Protesilaus, 37 Proteus, 1, 9, 13n3, 20n49, 62, 68n5

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Index Nominum

Psyrie, 13n6 Pylos, 1, 3, 7, 23, 28, 61 Rhesus, 36, 37, 74 Rhexenor, 8 Rhodes, 20n46 Same, 3, 4 Samos, 3 Scheria, 61, 67n3 Sirens, 9, 43, 46, 75 Sisyphus, 38n2 Skarphe, 14n8 Skylla, ix, 10, 11, 17n20, 23, 24, 41–46, 48–49, 50nn7–8, 57, 58, 71, 75 Sophocles, 38n1 Sounion, 2, 7, 18n28, 19n39, 20n50, 70 Sparta, 2, 3, 28, 61, 70 Sphinx, 50n13 Strabo, 3 Tarphe, 14n8 Teiresias, 25, 35, 43, 55, 56, 77 Telegonus, 28 Telemachus, ix, 1, 3–4, 6, 7, 16n13, 18n37, 23, 25, 27–29, 34, 35, 39n12, 67n3, 70, 73

Telephus, 34 Tenedos, 23, 71 Tenos, 1, 2, 13n5 Thersites, 27, 36 Thetis, 54–55, 75, 76 Thoai, 3 Thrinakia, 6, 7, 10, 11, 26, 36, 49, 57, 58, 66, 77 Thronios, 14n8 Thucydides, 7 Tiphys, 19n46 Tithonus, 64, 78 Triphyllia, 3 Trojans, 7, 32, 37, 53 Troy, ix, x, 1, 2, 10, 19n39, 19n45, 23, 25, 26, 34, 36, 67n3, 71, 78 Tyndareos, 26 Typhoeus, 50n6 Underworld, ix, 25, 28, 52, 53, 55–58, 76 Xanthos, 54, 76 Zeus, 7, 8, 9, 15n9, 20n54, 41, 42, 47, 49n1, 54–55, 61–62, 63, 64, 65, 76, 78

About the Author

Menelaos Christopoulos is a professor of ancient Greek literature at the University of Patras. He is the founder of the Center for the Study of Myth and Religion in Greek and Roman Antiquity and president of the Centre for Odyssean Studies. He has published a lot on Homer, Greek drama, and Greek myth and religion. He is the author/editor of the following works: • Πλουτάρχου Γρύλλος, 1996 • Ομηρικά Επιγράμματα, 2007 • Views of Helen in Epic and Drama, 2007 • Light and Darkness in Ancient Greek Myth and Religion (ed., with E. Karakantza, O. Levaniouk), 2010 • Crime and Punishment in Homeric and Archaic Epic (ed., with M. PaiziApostopolooulou), 2014 • Time and Space in Ancient Myth, Religion and Culture (ed., with A. Bierl and A. Papachrysostomou), 2017 • Μιμήσεις πράξεων, 2017 • The Upper and the Under World in Homeric and Archaic Epic (ed., with M. Paizi-Apostolopoulou), 2020 • Reconstructing Satyr Drama (ed., with A. Antonopoulos and G. Harrison), 2021 • Mythical History and Historical Myth: Blurred Boundaries in Antiquity (ed. with A. Papachrysostomou and A. Antonopoulos), 2022

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