Beruflich Dokumente
Kultur Dokumente
A series edited by
GREGORY NAGY
by
RICHARD P. MARTIN
edited by
THOMAS W. CARPENTER
and
CHRISTOPHER A. FARAONE
by
STEPHANIE W. JAMISON
edited by JAMES
KUGEL
by
LESLIE KURKE
by
by
STEPHEN A. MITCHELL
by
GREGORY NAGY
edited by
DORA
C.
POZZI
and JOHN
M. WICKERSHAM
Knowing Words:
Wisdom and Cunning in the Classical Traditions of China and Greece
by
LISA RAPHALS
by
STEPHEN SCULLY
Phrasikleia:
An Athropology of Reading in Ancient Greece
by JESPER SVENBRO
translated by JANET
LLOYD
111I1111111111111111111111111111111111111111111111111111111111111
21300097199
THE LANGUAGE
OF HEROES
Speech and Performance
in the Iliad
RICHARD
P.
MARTIN
SBD-FFLCH-USP
""1111111111"1111"111111111111111111
125364
For my parents
Nicholas R. Martin and Marie Daly Martin
Contents
1
2
3
4
5
IX
XIll
1
43
89
146
206
23 1
241
257
261
vii
:1,
Foreword
GREGORY NAGY
Foreword
tion, more than one of the books in this series will deal primarily with
ancient Greece. The testimony of the Greeks is particularly instructive with regard to our central concern, the relationship between
ritual and myth. The very word myth, as derived from Greek muthos,
is a case in point: the semantics of this word bring to life, in microcosm, the relationship between myth and ritual in ancient Greek
society.
In order to grasp the special meaning of Greek muthos, let us consider the distinction between marked and unmarked speech (in the terminology of Prague School linguistics). We find that marked speech
occurs as a rule in ritual contexts, as we can observe most clearly in
th~-reast~~est-sc~e socie-ties. It iSIn such SOCletlesatSo
that we ca~-oEs~~ve---mostaearly -ti;:~symbiosis of ritual and myth,
and the ways in which the language of ritual and myth is marked
whereas "everyday" language is unmarked. The Greek language
gives us an exarhpleOftlieses-emantics:-miiifmeans "I have my eyes
closed" or "I have my mouth closed" in everyday situations, but "I
see in a special way" or "I say in a special way" in ritual. Hence mustes
is "one who is initiated" and musterion "that into which one is initiated, mystery (Latin mysterium)." Hence also muthos, "myth": this
word, it has been argued, is a derivative of muo and had at an earlier
stage meant "special" as opposed to "everyday" speech.
A later classical example of such early patterns of thought occurs in
Sophocles, Oedipus at Colonus 1641-1644: the visualization and the
verbalization of what happened to Oedipus in the precinct of the
Eumenides at Colonus are restricted, in that the precise location of his
corpse is a sacred secret (1545-1546, 1761-1763). Only Theseus, by
virtue of being the proto-priest for the Athenians of the here-and-now,
is to witness what happened, which is called the dromena (1644). This
word is what Jane Harrison used to designate "ritual" in her formulation "myth is the plot of the dromenon." Thus the visualization and the
verbalization of the myth, what happened to Oedipus, are restricted to
the sa~red context of ritual, controlled by the heritage of priestly
authority from Theseus, culture-hero of the Athenian democracy.
From an anthropological point of view, "myth" is indeed "special
speech" in that it is a means by which society affirms its own reality.
In the poetry of Homer, however, as Richard Martin's Language of
Heroes demonstrates, muthos is not just "myth" in the sense Q( a
narrative that affirms reality. It is any speech-actt~y.
In making thiSargument, M-ar-t-in----appites-rheLheones of]. L. Austin
Foreword
Xl
il
Preface
The indication of tone of voice and varying speeds of utterance. In that,
Homer is never excelled by Flaubert or James or any of 'em. But it
needs the technique of one or more life times.
-Ezra Pound, letter to
W. H. D. Rouse, 4 November 1937
To hear the voice which tells the Iliad-that was my simple and
impractical aim as I began this book. The urge to do so came from
my sense that the archaic Greek epic poem is inevitably polyphoniccreated by generations of traditional tellers, narrated in the voices of
many individual characters-yet unique: it seems to have the persuasive force and coherence of a single, powerful performance, by one
poet, whom we have come to call Homer. The interplay between
traditional narrative material and the poet's spontaneous composition
seemed to me particularly important in the Iliad's dramatic representation of the speech of humans and gods. In what sense can the words
of any hero in the poem be "traditional" as are the repeated phrases
used to narrate the poem, the epithets and type-scenes? Conversely,
how spontaneous might such dramatic representation of speech become, if the poet of the Iliad composed rapidly, making verses in a
difficult meter, as he performed? Must a poet (or a heroic speaker)
"misuse" the medium in order to express an idea that was not traditionally expressed in the inherited diction of epic? Can the speeches in
the Iliad be used to prove whether or not the poem was composed
orally at all?
My attempt to answer these questions led me to rethink a number
of my assumptions about language, verbal art, and the individual
performer. With the help of work in ethnography and ethnolinguistics, folklore studies, linguistic philosophy, and literary theory, I have
been able to formulate the answers I offer in this book.
XUl
XIV
Preface
-My central conclusion is that the Iliad takes shape as a poetic composition in precisely the same "speaking culture" that we see foregrounded in the stylized words of the poem's heroic speakers, especially those speeches designated as muthos, a word I redefine as
"authoritative speech-act." The poet and the hero are both "performers" in a traditional medium. The genre of muthos composing requires that its practitioners improve on previous performances and
surpass them, by artfully manipulating traditional material in new
combinations. In other words, within the speeches of the poem, we
see that it is traditional to be spontaneous: no hero ever merely repeats; each recomposes the traditional text he performs, be it a boast,
threat, command, or story, in order to project-his-in~n
ality in the most convincing manner. I suggest that the "voice" of the
poet is the product of the same traditional performance technique. In
Chapters 4 and 5, I show in detail how this technique might explain
the vexing problem of the "language of Achilles," a problem first
raised by Adam Parry and one that goes to the heart of the oralformulaic theory constructed largely by Adam Parry's father Milman
Parry. In short, it seems to me that both father and son can be
confirmed in their intuitions: the speeches of the Iliad are, on the one
hand, perfectly consistent with the assumption of oral compositio~
in-performance; on the other hand, the technique of individualizing
variation within these speeches enables us to uncover the very motivation for the composition of a unique and monumental oral epic
about the hero Achilles.
The problems this book explores first attracted my attention when
I began to teach a graduate seminar, The Poetics of the Iliad, in the
spring ofI985 at Princeton University. My first thanks, therefore, go
to all the students in that memorable course. I am particularly grateful
to Sheila Colwell, Carol Dougherty-Glenn, Carolyn Higbie, Drew
Keller, Leslie Kurke, Lisa Maurizio, Victor Ortiz, and David Rosenbloom for their continued interest and suggestions as this project
grew.
Through the generosity of the alumni and faculty of Princeton
University, I was enabled to devote the academic year I985-86 to
research with a leave provided by the Class of I936 Bicentennial
Preceptorship. For this award I am extremely grateful. My colleagues
in the Department of Classics have lavished on me their encouragement and advice; without the environment they create, in which both
critical practice and philological acumen are valued, I doubt that this
Preface
xv
book could have been written. lowe all a great debt of thanks,
especially three Hellenist colleagues, John Keaney, Froma Zeitlin,
and Andrew Ford, who generously gave their time and expertise in
discussing many aspects of this book with me.
To audiences at Cornell, Columbia, the University of Kansas, and
Harvard I am grateful for appreciative comments and critiques, particularly on portions of Chapter I. I thank Alan Nussbaum, James
Coulter, Stanley Lombardo, and Jeffrey Wills for invitations to speak
on my work at these institutions. Homerists at several other universities provided advice and much needed reassurance, in person or by
letter, while I was engaged in writing: I thank Mark Edwards of
Stanford University; George Dimock of Smith College; J. B. Hainsworth of New College, Oxford; Michael Nagler of Berkeley; and
Norman Austin of the University of Arizona for their kindness.
I have been blessed with good teachers, to whom lowe more than
any book could repay. I regret that Cedric Whitman, in whose classes
I first encountered the power of the Iliad, will not read my thanks.
John Finley, Robert Fitzgerald, and Calvert Watkins showed me,
each in his way, the beauty of Homeric poetry, and how to write of
it. Lowell Edmunds, who has patiently endured my writing since
1975, taught me much about clarity of thought anc,l style and led me
to explore other disciplines to illuminate Greek-poetry. Finally, Gregory Nagy has provided guidance and friendship, inspiration and
motivation. My book would not have been possible without his pioneering studies in the' Greek poetic tradition. My scholarly debts to
him show forth in each chapter. This work stands as a serna of my
deep gratitude for his princely instruction.
It remains to offer thanks to my wife, Maureen, whose patience,
understanding, and affection enabled me to write. Her endurance
deserves Homeric commemoration. The dedication at the front of
this volume records my debt to those whose love and sacrifice reared
and educated me, teaching me from the start the language heroes
speak.
RICHARD
P.
MARTIN
d, '
THE LANGUAGE
OF HEROES
CHAPTER I
Performance, Speech-Act,
and Utterance
ill
II
reaction has set in against the work of Milman Parry and other exponents of an "oral" Homeric poetry-or, we should say, against a
certain portion of this work, for many of Parry's insights are ignored
by the new critique. The oralists' concern with technique has earned
them the label "Formalists," and their emphasis on the traditional
nature of Homeric craft has prompted the charge that they negleCt the
individual genius of the poet.2 Of course, such criticisms were leveled
at Parry from the outset, not surprisingly given the climate of AngloAmerican literary study at the time. More puzzling is the resurgence
today of this reactionary criticism, half a century after Parry's seminal
work. It is disturbing that young philologists such as David Shive
find it necessary to attack the alleged flaws in Parry's first publications, and to defend the "creativity" of Homer, while failing to reexamine the very idea of what creativity in an oral tradition might
mean. 3
This wave has been building; in 1978 David Bynum could note a
"palpable ennui" among scholars first attracted to the Parry view, "as
the practice of formula-counting has become more common, lost its
first blush of novelty, and for the most part failed to deliver the
innovations in the substantive understanding of oral traditions which
were expected of it from the first. "4 The reaction has been aided to
some extent by the honest appraisals of Homeric tradition produced
by philologists who followed the Parry direction. One turning point
came as it was gradually recognized that "oral poetry" and "formulaic
poetry" were not convertible terms, and that the "orality" of our
poems must remain an open question. In one of his last articles,
Adam Parry subjected his father's work to a critical reappraisal. He
concluded that although the style of Homer "shows many features of "
a style originally created for oral composition," the oral composition
of the two epics "probably cannot now be proved. "5 From another
perspective, the apparent uniqueness of the Iliad, at least among the
European epic traditions, has been noted by British scholars generally
sympathetic to Parry's work. J. B. Hainsworth remarks that "the
2Lynn-George (I982) has a salutary critique of such reactionary criticism.
30n the controversy over Parry's demonstration, the best short summary can be
found in Latacz (I979) I-I7. Shive (I987) I39 intends "to help cure Homer of blindness and to put a pen in his hand." A bridge between the old criticisms of Parry and
the new reactionary strain is provided by the work of Goold (I977).
4Bynum (I978) 5; see also pp. 3-I3.
SA. Parry (I972) I.
Performance, Speech-Act, and Utterance
! I" ~
at all to the wealth of insight gained from the post-Parry work in socalled oralliterature.1 1 Perhaps too narrow a focus on the definition
and description of "oral literature" has produced ennui. The term
itself perpetuates an unhelpful stance, as Michael Herzfeld notes:
"Even the recognition of folk texts as 'oral literature' ... merely
projected an elegant oxymoron: by defining textuality in terms of
'literature,' a purely verbocentric conception, it left arbitration in the
control of 'high culture.' "12 Inevitably, the text-centered nature of
academic study shifts the emphasis from "oral" to "literature," from
performance to script. In what follows I intend to redress the balance.
Only within the past few decades have social anthropologists,
folklorists, linguists, sociologists, and a few literary critics begun to
detect the crucial importance of performance in the study of verbal
behavior. One of the earliest and most influential books in the field
was Erving Goffman's study of personal interaction routines, published in 1959, the year before Lord's Singer of Tales. Goffman borrowed the concepts of actor and role from dramaturgy and game
theory in order to show how everyday communication, and the more
stylized communication of art and "performances" in a strict sense,
share essential features. To use Goffman's definition, both types of
communicative "performance" represent "the activity of a given participant on a given occasion which serves to influence in any way any
of the other participants. "13
This approach, which sees verbal art as part of a spectrum of human communicative performance, has led to significant research into
discourse strategies. We have learned that orally produced "texts,"
artistic or not, establish cohesion by a number of means undeveloped
in written texts: they involve the audience through direct quotation
and increased use of deictic pronouns and present-tense verbs, or they
ease comprehension by reduced sentence complexity. At the same
time, written communication can be seen as often elaborating "strategies associated with speaking, in order to create involvement. "14
Such findings regarding everyday communication surely have relevance for the Homerist's judgments concerning "orality" in the
liOn Analyst criticism, see Latacz (1979) and Clarke (1981) 156-82. It is not a
coincidence that reaction to Parry has paralleled the rise ofNeo-analysis, on which see
now M. Clark (1986).
12Herzfeld (1985b) 202.
13Goffman (1959) IS.
14Tannen (1982) 18-19.
'I
"I
it to the triumphant performer. "24 Nothing prevents us from attributing some or all such features of audience behavior to the context
of Homeric performance. If rhapsodic performance, as described in
Plato's Ion, is at all traditional, Homer might well have resembled the
African scepter-carrying epic singer; the stories about Homer's life
might preserve memories of a time when poems could be objects in
gift-exchange. 25 Even the rhapsodic habit of "explaining" Homer
appears to be more traditional when we examine other epic performance: Dennis Tedlock, in his studies of the Mayan epic Popol Vuh,
as also of Zuiii Indian poetry, has shown how poet and audience
interact during performance and thereby actually interpret the poem
in tandem. The text becomes simply the flexible springboard from
which the performer continually takes off and to which he or she
returns-it has no rigid fixity, any more than any other actual oral
poem, even though its content is allegedly sacred myth. 26
One of the most sustained and accessible studies arising from the
new performance-centered approach to verbal art is by Elizabeth
Fine, a folklorist. It surveys the work done since the I960s and contains her own elegant demonstration, using fieldwork with Southwestern storytellers, of how meaning emerges only through performance. Time and again the observer of performances can note that
timing, gesture, voice inflection, tempo, proximity to the audience,
the past relation of a particular performer with his or her audience,
the setting, the season, the time of day-are factors that determine the meaning of the actual words spoken by a performer as much
if not more so than the literal meaning of the words themselves. This
is to say that it is the performance, not the text, which counts. 27
24Hatto (1980) 307, citing V. V. Radlov.
250n one such story, see Burkert (1972). Herington (1985) 13, discussing the links
between rhapsodic performance as in the Ion and Homeric composition, says: "Homeric poetry ... seems to have been designed from the first to be acted. "
26Tedlock (1980) shows that parts of the performance can indeed be "fixed," without benefit of written tradition, by stress, pitch, and pause. But this is not the same as
saying that an entire text is immutably fixed and canonized as some one person's
authoritative version. The latter approach has been tried by Homerists attempting to
account for the gap between postulated oral composition and attested written transmission: see Mueller (1984) 160-61, who cites Kirk (1976; 1978).
27See Fine (1984). On performance as more important than text, see also Hrdlickova (1976) 171-90. An entire oral epic performance is recorded and analyzed by
Slyomovics (1987), the fullest such examination to date. A book could be written on
the roots of the performance-centered approach; I have been selective. Fine (1984) 3237 recognizes the concept in the work of Kenneth Burke, Gregory Bateson, Victor
Turner, Clifford Geertz, and Erving Goffman, as also in the work of folklorists since
i.,",
10
cannot see that it has had any impact on Iliad studies. 35 Ultimately,
the evidence is too thin for us to draw conclusions about Homer from
his depictions of bards.
If we start with the idea that Homer was an oral poet, it seems to
me essential that we should delve more deeply and concentrate not on
poets in the texts. but on orality itself, to look at the very notion of
speech within the poems to discover the parameters of this very basic
sort of performance. Then we can extend the notion of performance,
or rather, recapture what Greeks considered to be a "performance,"
and compare it with our own notions. The task is ethnographic; the
society to be observed happens to be extant only in the remnants of its
poetic production. Yet some reconstruction can be attempted. To my
knowledge, this has not been done yet; I find the task all the more
compelling precisely because workers in the other fields I have mentioned now seem agreed in stressing the importance of performance
as the distinguishing feature of all speech events. We know what
Homer says about the power of memory and of art: Odysseus is an
emblem for their dual potency. But what does this poetry say about
its very stuff, words themselves? And can this tell us something about
the poetry?
II
I2
I,.,
,1 1.1
tional folk cultures such as these. The same must apply to study of
archaic Greece.
The ethnographer of speaking who attempts to reconstruct Greek
talk about words, then, will not be surprised to find a folk taxonomy
of speech that is askew from the standpoint of our own notions. The
difficulty lies in recapturing the semantics of words for speech when
we have no native informants and only poetic texts. Homerists have a
model for overcoming part of this problem: I refer to the brilliant
work of Leonard Muellner, which explains the problematic semantics
of the speech-act verb eukhomai-boast/pray-by analyzing its formulas iIi the text of Homer. 41 I find Muellner's method useful for
analyzing the two terms that demand attention when we turn to
words for "speech" in Homer-namely muthos and epos. In hopes of
recapturing the intricacies of the oral poetic world behind Homeric
verse, I have investigated these two words in their context and can
now redefine the words as follows: muthos is, in Homer, a speech-act
indicating authority, performed at length, usually in public, with a
focus on full attention to every detail. I redefine epos, on the other
hand, as an utterance, ideally short, accompanying a physical act, and
focusing on message, as perceived by the addressee, rather than on
performance as enacted by the speaker. In short, I believe the analysis
of speech terms within Homer offers us an immediate entryway into
notions of performance, through those speeches in the poems which
are called muthoi.
In what follows, I shall explain how I arrive at this reconstruction
of notions regarding speech in archaic Greek. The dichotomy of
speech-performance and utter~e can be used, along the way, to
answer such questions as what kind of speech-act the epic is, and
whether "winged words" is just a convenient ftller or.a meaningful
phrase. In Chapters 2 and 3, as I examine the poetics and rhetoric of
the major types of Iliadic performances, it will be seen that the word
muthos comprises a range of speech-genres similar to that of Chamula "words for heated hearts": political talk, angry speech, and affectionate recollection. Heroes can be distinguished as performers by their
ability in these genres. Chapters 4 and 5 will focus on one heroic
performer, Achilles, and my conclusion on another-the poet Homer.
Before beginning with the semantic distinctions between these two
41Muellner (1976).
I3
14
15
ing glosses the word "sermo intimus"; Hofmann derives the senses of
"fable" and "opinion" from an original meaning "cogitatum"; Fournier followed along similar lines, giving the definition "pensee qui
s'exprime, Ie langage, l'avis, langage interieur"; and even Chantraine
seems to feel this way about the term: "Suite de paroles qui ont un
sens, propos, discours; associe a E:n:O~ qui designe Ie mot, la parole, la
forme."47
It is certain that, in the language of the Iliad, muthos is associated
with words for thinking. For example, Paris in the assembly of the
Trojans alleges that Antenor knows how to think of another and
better proposal than the muthos he has just made (that Helen should
be returned):
"You know how to think of another muthos better than this one."
(7.35 8)
Earlier in the poem, when Antenor recalls during the teikhoskopia the
speech styles of the Achaean heroes who came to Troy, he associates
the word muthos with well-made plans (medea):
"But when they wove speeches (muthoi) and plans for all,
Then, you know, Menelaos discoursed in running fashion,
Speaking little, but very clearly, since he is not much with words
(polumuthos)
nor one to cast words about. And, indeed, he was younger.
But when indeed Odysseus mqch with wiles (polumetis) arose
he'd stand, he'd look down fixing his eyes on the ground.... "
(3. 212 - 1 7)
The same passage shows a clear correspondence between the adjectives polumuthos and polumetis, "with much clever intelligence." We
recall that metis, in turn, bears a close relation to medea in Greek. 48
Elsewhere, muthos is correlated with words for counsel (boule) and
intellect (noema). Adjectives such as "painless" modify muthos but
47Ebeling (I885) II22-24; Hofmann (I922) 28-33; Fournier (I946) 2I5-I6; Chantraine (I968-80) 7I8. Frisk (I96o-70) 2:264 defmes muthos .as "Wort, Rede, Gesprach, Uberlegung, Erzahlung, Sage, Marchen, My thus, " in an unhelpful collection
of attested meanings. Some would go so far as to connect muthos (which has no
known etymology) with words meaning "thought" in other Indo-European languages. See Hofmann (I922) 47.
48See Detienne and Vemant (I974) 222, 23 I.
16
not epos, and denote speech that is meant to have an active role in
resolving a crisis, as when Polydamas addresses the Trojans: "And
the painless word pleased Hektor" (muthos apemon 12.80, 13.748).
Close as is the connection between muthos and "intent," however,
the word always refers to actual speech accompanying a speaker's thought. Thus, one can never justify translating the word as
"thought. "49 This problem, by contrast, never arises with the word
epos. Unlike muthos, this word has a clear Indo-European derivation, which connects it with the root seen in Greek ossa and opa and in
Latin vox. 50 The root refers to voice, and this original sense survives
in epos. A muthos focuses on what the speaker says and how he or
she says it, but epos consistently applies to what the addressee hears.
We can see the root meaning in a number of places in the Iliad, as
when Hektor does not "fail to recognize the epos" of the goddess Iris
(2.807), and Andromakhe says she wants to be out of hearing of
Hektor's death: "May the epos be away from my ear" (22.454).51
Given the etymology of epos, we can see that a consistent image
underlies Aeneas' words to Achilles at 20.203-204:
"We know each other's genealogy, we know the parents,
from hearing the famous epea of mortal men."
Literally, the adjective proklut' means "heard before." Only in the
context of oral tradition can this word come to mean "famous," as
happens also with the noun kleos, "glory." Gregory Nagy has explicated Aeneas' speech in Book 20 showing that epea here in fact refers
to poetic utterances, in the form of traditional narratives about
Aeneas. 52 I would underline in this passage the significant distinction
between "telling" blameful things (oneidea, line 202)-an act described
with the verb muthesasthai-and hearing utterances (epea). Once
again, muthos is associated with the speaker's action in giving a message, whereas epos refers to the transmission of the message, the endproduct of the speech process.
The notion of product (as opposed to action) seems to be embed49The demonstration by Russo and Simon (1968) that thought is often dramatized
as internal speech in Homer can explain the tendency to translate the word this way.
50And perhaps even in the word for "human," anthropos. See Pisani (1981).
51 Compare 22.451, describing how her thoughts are darkened by the sound of
Hektor's voice: (opos ekluon). The vocal quality of epos also underlies the phrase at
17.695: amphasie epeon.
52Nagy (1979) 265-75 and on the semantics of kleos, 16.
17
ded in the word epos. First, it is an inanimate neuter noun (as opposed
to the animate noun muthos).53 In the few places where speech is
described by means of both words, it appears that the term epos refers
to the ~mallest elements of connected discourse, to single words or
emergent sounds. Antenor's description of Odysseus' rhetoric mentions voice (opa) and words (epea) in the same breath, and vividly
compares the latter with winter snowflakes (3.221-22). The image is
that of a powerful, silent natural phenomenon itself composed of
single powerless parts. The description of the speech style of Thersites (a foil for Odysseus) concentrates on his inability to organize the
discrete small units of his talk, the epea:
"Thersites alone, of unmeasured speech, still brawled,
he who knew many disordered epea in his mind,
rashly, not according to good order." (2.212-14)
During one of the rare moments when fighters discuss speech for
more than a few lines, we see again that muthoi are the large units,
epea the small. Toward the end of the challenging speech to Achilles,
in which Aeneas refers to "famous words" that have acquainted the
warriors with one another's deeds, he calls for a fight, to put an end to
childish talk. The contrasting mention of "speech" versus "deeds" is a
frequent Homeric topos. Only at 20.246-250, however, is the first
part of the contrast further subdivided.
"We both have insults to speak formally (muthesasthai),
many of them, nor could a ship with a hundred benches bear the
load.
The tongue of men is pliant, in it there are many muthoi
of all types, of epea there is much share-land here and there.
Whatever epos you say you hear in return."
"Insults" (oneidea) are, in this image, the weightier form of speech:
like goods on a merchant vessel they are tangible, substantial. Note
that the verb Aeneas uses for "speak (insults)" is derived from the
word muthos. As we shall see later, the verb is markedly more restricted than "say" (eipein, from the root in epos): it always means
530n the determinate, material nature of epos, see Fournier (1946) 211-12 and Beck
(1987). I cannot agree with the latter that the use of the two terms in one line is simply
hendiadys.
18
"Zeus father with the flashing bolt, I will place some word in your
mind."
19
solation, but "hand and wor.d" descriptions can also occur whenever
one speaker establishes contact with a listener for an emotional private conversation, as when Athena persuades Ares to leave battle
(5.30): "Taking his hand she spoke to rushing Ares with words
(epeessi). "60 The focus is on speech as a social bonding mechanism,
the equivalent of a handshake, an affirmation, like that between helping divinities (Athena and Poseidon) and Achilles (21.286): "Taking
hand in hand they pledged faith by means of words (epeessin)." The
parallel between verbal and physical gesture is highlighted particularly in the following formulas:
She put her hand on him and spoke a word and called.
She stroked him with her hand and spoke a word and called.
20
21
65The propitiation of Apollo not long before this scene uses similar language
(1. 100), as does the embassy to Achilles (9.639), the only mortal to whom this diction
is applied.
22
23
Thus he spoke, and the old man feared and obeyed the muthos.
(1.33, Khryses = 24.571, Priam)
Nor did he disobey the muthos of Athena. (1.220-21, Achilles)
Be quiet; obey my muthos. (4.412, Diomedes)
Those who are equals, socially or as "performers" of deeds, can
challenge one another's muthoi. As we have seen, Paris does so with
Antenor's proposal in the Trojan assembly (7.358). When the lines of
power are clearly drawn, the speaker who uses a muthos prevails.
Thus, Odysseus speaks to his social equals in the testing scene of
Book 2 and uses epea. The poet says:
Whatever king and outstanding man he met,
he stood beside and held back with mild words (epeessin). (2.188-89)
To Thersites, however, and to the men of the demos, he uses a
muthos:
But whatever man of the people he saw or found shouting
he would drive on with the scepter and berate with a muthos:
"Strange one, sit still and listen to the word of others (aI/on muthon)
who are stronger, while you are un warlike and strengthless."
(2.19 8- 201)
by Athena (oud' apithese). The force of Helen us' muthos comes from its representation
of divine voice-op' akousa theon.
67S ee Herzfeld (1985) and (1985b).
-- "
24
25
the difference in their ages, saying he could be Difather, and approves the substance of his remarks (957-59).
speaks his own mind, as explicit instruction for the younger
how one reaches the "perfection of speeches" (telos muthon,
muthos in Book 9:
he spoke and then they listened and obeyed. (14. 133
= 979)
26
27
similar ideology has been traced in the Poema de Mio Cid: see Read (1983)
2-21.
28
6e EQYOV (19. 2 42 )
Not yet was the whole epos said when they themselves came.
Still, there are differences in the acts referred to by these two terms:
reading context, we see that Odysseus at 19.216-37 makes an authoritative proposal, called by him muthoi (19.220). This the poet
refers to at 19.242. But Nestor (10.533-39) merely voices his suspicion that the best of the Achaeans are returning from' their night
mission: his speech is labeled epos-as one could predict, given the
associations of this word with reported speech. A similar explanation
will show the differences beneath the surface likenesses when the two
different nouns share an adjective, giving the appearance that they are
formulaically interchangeable words. When Hera tells Athena that_
they are dangerously close to reneging on their promise that Men-,
elaos will take Troy, she refers to the original speech-act as muthos:
~
Achilles also mentions a past speech-act when he uses the same adjec-
tive halian, "in vain," and we might expect him to label it muthos,
but the line concludes:
29
But here the nature of the original speech-act gives us a clue to explain \
why it can be called epos in retrospect: as a boast, it is attracted into .
the language of actual boast descriptions, which often contain the
formula UXOf.tvO~ :1tO~ rruOu. 73 Once again, then, external factors-formulaic pressure, poetic themes in the larger discourse, or
accidents of the system-can mask the inherent semantic distinction /
between muthos and epos.
.
And yet, even after we exclude and explain such apparent synonymity, there remain passages in which the two different terms that
we are studying co-occur. For example, we might look at Agamemnon's words during the troop-rousing episode (4.337-48). The poet
introduces his speech to Menestheus and Odysseus as "winged
words" (337), and Odysseus responds to the speech by labeling it
with a formulaic line (350): 'AtQlo'Y], :1to'iov O :1tO~- <j>uyv Q'Xo~
ooov'twv ("Atreus' son, what sort of word has escaped your teeth's
fence?"). Yet at 357, in reference to Agamemnon's apology the poet
says, "He took back the muthos." It seems either that the poet is
simply manipulating formulas without regard for how they correspond (and so is not stopped by any semantic differences between the
two terms, if they exist); or that the two terms simply are synonyms. 74
Rather than being a flaw in the system, this co-occurrence is the
key to Homeric usage of speech terms, and can help us understand the
seemingly aribitrary deployment of lines such as "she spoke winged
words." For the origin of this usage, in which epos resembles
muthos, can be explained if we return to Prague School linguistics for
a moment, in particular to the notion of "marked" versus "unmarked" members of an opposition. The "marked" member of a pair
carries greater semantic weight, but can be used across a narrower
range of situations, whereas the unmarked member-the more colorless member of the opposition-can be used to denote a broader
range, even that range covered by the marked member: it is the more
general term.
----Turning to the words for speech, we can now say that muthos is
730n the formula, see Muellner (I976) I27. Note that similar phrasing occurs at
I4.44-45 describing Hektor's boast/threat.
74The same might be concluded after we read Zeus' declaration at 8.8, "Let no male
or female divinity cut through my word (epos)"-a speech referred to as muthos (29)
by the poet. Here, however, it can be argued that the poet's label refers to the whole
threatening performance of Zeus, while Zeus' term denotes just his (personal) command.
30
: I: ,I
,
:, ,
;
I.
:',i
1,,1
!t' !
!~,
the marked member of the pair, and epos the unmarke~ This
means that a muthos can always be referred to periphras~icilly as
epea, "utterances," since the latter word, singular and plural, has
primary reference to anything uttered or heard; to "words" in the
most general, unmarked sense. One can never simply substitute the
semantically restricted term muthos-~!!1.hor:itatiy~_.S.~_ch
act, or "performance"-for
the ordinary term epos, however. Thus,
.L-----=Odysseus can refer to Agamemnon's words, in the scene just mentioned, as an epos-the formula stresses the physical reality of the
single word or utterance-and the poet can use epea to introduce
them, even though the speech also partakes in the more restricted
term and can be tagged with it if the poet or speaker wants to emphasize the speech's power or importance. The reverse never happens:
that is, in Homer, a speech explicitly said to be an epos, an'd not also
represented as epea (the plural), is never called a muthos. The irreversibility of singular and plural is good evidence that the words are not
synonyms: epea can co-occur to refer to a muthos, but muthoi in the
plural is never correlated with the singular form epos, to describe a
speech. Furthermore, the same distinction applies to the use of verbs
formed from these two roots. There exists a formula "he spoke a
muthos (muthon eeipe)" but there is never a collocation of the type "he
authoritatively spoke an epos," even though we can imagine a metrically possible phrase (*epos muthesato).
With this distinction in mind, I can elucidate perhaps the most
famous and least understood phrase in Homer, "he/she spoke winged
words." Now we have seen that epea, on the one hand, can be a
.'PITh~hra~tic_(!:l(p.r.~s.~i9,p.-Jor~1J!~!hos (but not vice versa). On the other
hand, as we saw earlier,.eposaiid'epea have a reference not shared by
muthos, to speech as utt~tanc~, as-t~d-an.dJranSI!1itted, as an
item of exchange that is ;rt the same time a physical object, like a
weapon. Thus, the formula epea pteroenta can fit two functions. This
is what makes it such a useful, economical poetic device. On a purely
imagistic level, the phrase evokes the swiftness, irrevocability, directness, and reciprocal nature of speech-the adjective affirms the basic
notion in the noun. On the narrative level, as a synonymous phrase
for muthos, this formulaic line can be used to introduce highly
"marked" speeches. That is, the possibility lies open that there is real
750n marked versus unmarked, see Ducrot and Todorov (1972) 148.
31
meaning to Homer's description of just sixty-one of the poem's approximately six hundred speeches as "winged words. "76
Milman Parry has been the most forceful advocate of the view that
the line means nothing in relation to its context. His article on the
phrase was meant to counter the view of Calhoun, who thought that
the Homeric line introduced speeches of high emotion: "Pteroenta
evidently does not mean 'winged' or 'swift' in the general sense that
all words fly with the speed of sound, but is intended to say that the
particular words which follow were spoken quickly, or with animation, or some symptom of emotion." Parry was certainly correct to
challenge this rather vague formulation by Calhoun (after all, as one
critic pointed out, all speeches in Homer are emotionally charged),
but his analysis stopped short because he did not have a framework
for describing common elements in the "winged words" speeches. 77
I now suggest that there are two common elements in these
speeches. First, it has not been noted that they share a pragmatic
speech situation: winged words are spoken by one person to one
other (rarely to two), and the addressee is in close contact with the
speaker, usually as a comrade-in-arms. Even more consistently, the
deployment of these speeches by Homer enables us to to describe all
examples of "winged words" in terms of one category of "speechact": in the terminology adopted by Searle and others, the sixty-one
speeches thus introduced are all "directives." That is, every speech
called "winged words" is meant to make the listener do somethingJ8
Certainly not all utterances in Homer function this way; yet the Iliad
always pays attention to the motivation and effect of heroic speeches.
That the "winged words" all constitute one specific speech-act class
has not been noticed, because typologists have previously used a haphazard mixture of descriptive criteria to analyze Homeric speeches,
relying on such elements as scene, emotional content, or use of certain phrases. 79;' And, on the surface, the "winged word" speeches do
76See Vivante (I975) 2-8 on this image-evoking utterance in its purest form. To
recognize the aptness of the metaphor, however, is not to specify the function of the
speech introductions in which it occurs, and I do not agree with Vivante's impressionistic conclusion that the phrase refers to "sudden" words at points of reunion,
recognition, danger, and perception.
77Calhoun (I935) 226. M. Parry (I97I) 4I4-I8. Combellack (I950), a good summary of the controversy, includes J. A. Scott's comment to Calhoun on emotionality;
Combellack himself saw no particular quality shared by "winged word" speeches.
780n directives, see Searle (I976) I I.
79See Fingerle (I939) for the fullest description.
32
33
er's own "formulaic" art. For now, we can observe that "character"
in the poem (as in life) arises from our perception of a speaker's
selectivity and sensitivity in matching linguistic expression to internal
motivation. Some people always make their directives into imperatives. Some have more tact. Achilles, whose expressive repertoire we
shall examine later, is good at hinting: to his mother, he speaks
"winged words" (19.20-27) to say he will arm. These end with what
is almost an afterthought: "But I fear terribly that flies, meanwhile,
might breed worms down in the bronze-cut wounds, might defIle the
corpse-his life being destroyed, the flesh might all go rotten"
(19.23-27). The description is worthy of poetic narrative at its best. It
convinces both audiences-:-that of the poem (persuaded of the height
of Achilles' el;Ilotion) and that in the poem, Thetis, who replies to this
extended hint/ directive by infusing Patroklos' corpse with nectar and
ambrosia.
Four passages make clear the tone implied by the mention of epea
pteroenta: the death ofPatroklos, the encounter ofHektor and Achilles
in Book 20, the death of Lykaon, and the encounter of Priam and
Achilles in Book 24. We have seen that, out of the hundreds of
passages where speech appears, "winged words" in the Iliad highlight
only "directive" speeches between those sharing a social bond. They
are language appropriate to an "in-group." As the poem nears its end,
enemies exchange "winged words." It must be noted that the four
passages in which this occurs are not casual encounters, but rather
highly charged events important to the outcome of the plot and,
furthermore, that they are given lengthy, elaborate ornamentation by'
the poet. Much of the powerful effect in these scenes comes from
their inclusion in the conventional pattern of fighters addressing
comrades-in-arms with "winged words." For here, the fighters are
paradoxically bonded by their very determination to kill one another.
What seems like a violation of formulaic conventions is actually a
creative extension of the usual meaning of the phrase. 82 The speeches
of Apollo and Hektor resemble one another as warnings to Patroklos
that Troy will not be taken by him or Achilles. Apollo's speech,
furthermore, is an explicit directive: "Fall back, god-born Patroklos!"
What is the force ofHektor's words? They are introduced as a boast
(EJtEUX6!lEVO~, 16.829). They actually contain an embedded directive,
820n the poet's formulaic artfulness in describing the death of Patroklos, see
Lowenstam (r98r) r06-r8,
34
"
i~
i'
1,11..1' '
35
"For you did not die on a bed and stretch out to me your hands,
nor say to me any close-set word (pukinon epos),
one I could recall, sheddirig a tear for days and nights."
84Birds: Kirk (1985) 74; arrows: Latacz (1968) 27-32, following Durante (195 8) 58. These are the two commonest solutions: see D' A vino (1981) 89, who favors
"wings, " but sees a reference to the divine origin of sacral speech, epea. Hainsworth
(1960) 264n.1 doubts that either image applies.
85Gladstone (1874) 844. Vivante (1970) 5 seems to want a similar mixture.
36
The word she wanted from Hektor would have been enduring
through time, unassailable in the way of well-constructed, solid, or
dense-packed objects in the poem tha,t are called pukinon. The adjective and related forms modify arms and armor, beds, troop formations, house construction, branches, and clouds. But mental products
can also be thus qualified: a tightly constructed plan (2.55), Odyssean
wiles (3.202), an ambush (4.392), a trick (6. r87). 86 If epos generally .i~
speech as product, as I have argued, then this particularized fortnor
speech is the paradigm for the best kind of epos, speech that has
become a lasting possession for its hearer, the "last word" to remain
with an intimate (Achilles, Andromakhe) or to put an end to strife
(the truce in Book 7, the ransom in Book 24)
The adjective obtains this sense of !'unassailable" from the basic
reference to density; the same root meaning in the adjective emerges
in adverbial use, but this time with reference to a series of rapid
movements, a density in temporal terms which we might call in the
language of physics "frequency." Homeric similes associate the temporal with the physical sense of "density," as when Hektor's rapid
striking of his enemies' heads (pukna !eareath') is compared to the
action of wind piling up wave and cloud (r1.305-9). I suggest that the
same combination of "density" and "frequency" occurs in the phrase
ptera pukna, so that it describes both the close-packed construction of
the wing and the resultant rapid wing-beating of the bird: this is a
prime example of "interaction" in poetic imagery. 87
It is the aural quality resulting from the flight of birds that is the
primary association in the phrase "winged words. " This is to say that
the one poetic phrase is built on the image of the other, of "thick-andfast wings" (ptera pukna). Such a close association between physical
density or frequency and aural effect is found elsewhere in Homeric
diction where emotional, forceful speech is being described. For the
adverb pukna can also be applied to the sound of the lamenting voice:
't'OLOL 6 n1JAt61J~ MLVOU e1;fjgx YOOLO . .
3tllXV<X I-tUAU O't'EVUXWV (I8.3I6~I8)
86Cf. Cunliffe (1924) s. v. On the phrase's associations, see also Lynn-George (1988)
232-33-
87For the Greek phrase, see 11.454, peri ptera pukna balpl1tes (of scavenger birds). A
comparison with 9.588, thalamos puk' eballeto (of a chamber under frequent assault)
shows that the word pukna in 11.454 can be either adjectival or adverbial. In 23.879 it
is clearly the former. On "interaction," see Silk (1974),
37
38
>
>,
To carry out Hera's project, Aphrodite grants her parphasis, the sort
of speech characterized as "soft," "gentle," and "sweet. "88 It is personal appeal, not authoritative performance, that generates speech
denoted as epea. The ideal "utterance," the enduring pukinon epos, is
set in a context of intimate relationship: it is the language Andromakhe expected from her husband, and that which Patroklos is instructed to provide for Achilles: "But tell him well a pukinon epos and
instruct and give him directions" (11.788-89; c[ 24.744). This kind
of discourse is language one can personally "keep"-or fail to keep,
as is the case when Patroklos forgets Achilles' personal warning
(16.686-87): "If he had guarded the epos of the son of Peleus, he
would have fled the evil fate of black death." In this function, it is
worth noting, epea are often spoken by women, a convention that
appears to be canonical in the deployment of the phrase epos t'ephat' ek
t'onomaze, as we observed earlier.
The private nature of the epos explains the use of this word (rather
than muthos) in those scenes where the poet privileges us with seeing
the communication between heroes and divinities. Diomedes labels
his talk with Athena in this way: "I recognize you, goddess, daughter
of aegis-bearing Zeus. Therefore I will candidly say a word (epos)
and will not conceal it" (5.816-17). Achilles refers to Athena's private
advice (1.216) and his own prayer to Zeus (16.236) with the word
epos. Prayer, which epitomizes private communication, is in fact
never designated muthos in the Iliad. A further indication of the
personal nature of epos comes from Homer's adjective usage: possessives frequently accompany the word epos: Achilles speaks of "your
word" (1.216), as does Aphrodite to Hera (14.212); Achilles, praying
to Zeus, and Hera, using a similar formula to Hypnos, say "You have
880 n persuasion and malakos speech, see 6.337 (Paris describing Helen's words); for
the association of pareipon and epos, see also 6.54-62 (Agamemnon to Menelaos).
39
heard my word before" (emon epos eklues, 14.234, 16.236). Zeus refers
to his own command with this phrase (8.8). By contrast, muthos is
rarely referred to by a speaker as his or her own or as that of his or her
addressee: it is "impersonal" in the sense that it is public discourse
(although it is certainly personal expressive performance).
To talk of one's own "speech" as opposed to "word" would be
equally aberrant in normal American conversation. I have been working with a distinction between epos as "utterance" and muthos as
"speech-act." Were we to attempt a definition in terms of familiar
English vocabulary, "word" or "talk" might best translate epos, and
muthos could be paralleled by "speech" in the sense of "making a
speech." The marked character of the latter can be appreciated if we
examine patterns of co-occurrence in English: one cannot "make a
word" or even "make a talk." The distinction between the terms in
English depends on a number of contrasting features including occasion, tone, audience, and length of discourse: "speech" implies an
audience of more than one, a formal routine (for instance; speakers
take turns, without engaging in cross-talk) and elaborated use of
language occupying a significant amount of time. Precisely these features fit the deployment of the term muthos in the Iliad.
First, we see this in the simple fact of poetic mimesis: speeches
called muthos are almost always quoted in full by the poet, whereas
those designated epos or epea, if quoted at all, occupy only a few
lines. When muthoi are not represented by the poet, we are still given
to understand that the discourses were lengthy, as in the description
of the stories exchanged between Makhaon and Nestor (II.642-43):
When those two drinking put off the parching thirst,
with muthoi they found pleasure narrating to one another.
Not only does the imperfect tense here reinforce our perception of
lengthy storytelling: the narrative itself shows us this pair of heroes
still drinking as Book 14 opens. 89 Notice that a translation for muthos
as "story" accords with our earlier definition of the term-an authoritative speech-act performed in detail. The only unusual feature
distinguishing the "stories" in Nestor's tent is their nonpublic performance.
89The same implication can be seen in the nearly exact line describing Odysseus'
storytelling session with Penelope, Od. 23.300-301.
40
It is worth noting that Achilles believes that Ajax has made a full
disclosure of his views.
Three times the verb appears in the infinitive at line-end, (muthesasthai), with another verb meaning "command." The passages share
certain rhetorical features. Kalkhas (1.74-83) answers Achilles by interpreting the hero's previous speech as a specific kind of request:
"You bid me to make a muthos about the divine wrath of Apollo"
(muthesasthailmenin). Reassured by Achilles, Kalkhas proceeds to
make a formal declaration of the god's will; Achilles' own precise
formulation of the problem seems to have elicited this response (see
1.65-67, raising three possible religious delicts; and 1.85: a call for the
theopropion which Kalkhas knows). The formality of Kalkhas' declaratory speech is enhanced by the priamel at lines 93-96, as also the
double prin construction (97-98) and asyndetic legal phrasing (99). At
7.284-86 a different situation elicits this highly marked verb "to make
a muthos. "The duel of Hektor and Ajax would have continued, if
not for the intervention of the heralds, one of whom, the Trojan
Idaios, "said a muthos" (eipe te muthon, 277). Ajax replies, "Bid Hektor to speak these things (muthesasthai). F?r he himself challenged all
the best to battle. Let him take the lead" (284-86). Hektor then rephrases what had been suggested (290-93): "Let us cease from battle
and strife."
Why does the poet give us such a roundabout description to end the
duel which, itself, has struck critics as inessential? Because Homeric
poetry so keenly attends to socially correct forms of speech. Hektor's
41
42
CHAPTER 2
43
44
'"
45
conventional ways of speaking are the poet's convenient compositional shorthand. Fenik has well shown how Homer builds his narrative of battle in the same way that he builds the poetic line, by reuse in
new combinations of traditional stock elements. 7 But.! prefer to turn
the issue around slightly: Homer would not have "traditional scenes"
if it were not traditional for actual Greek warriors to arm, fight, eat,
sleep, and die. In the same way, the rhetorical repertoire available to
each hero must be rooted in the actual range of speaking strategies
available to any Greek speaker. Although the speeches in the Iliad are
without question highly stylized poetic versions of reality, they are
nevertheless meant to be mimetic, as are the battle descriptions. This
is what heroes would say. As with descriptions of battle, there is
room in Homeric speechmaking for both traditional elements and
innovations. The poetry of Homer at times finds difficulty in handling traditional elements; the role of the chariot, for example, st;ems
unclear to the composer, resulting in the unlikely depiction of warriors who dismount to fight. It is even more likely that the speech
portions of the poem are more freely composed, made up more from
the poet's knowledge of how his contemporaries argue and talk, since
the poet presumably had no need to include archaic coloring in the
speeches of his heroes. 8 In other words, although we see Mycenaean
memories in the narrative of Iliadic fighting, there is no comparable
body of material for the poet to recall when reporting what Agamemnon, Odysseus, or Achilles says. Composition is less subject to tradition here. Speech is qualitatively different; unlike diegesis, it is the
arena for pure mimesis.
How different is this mimesis, the speeches of the Iliad? If its performance was actually of a different sort from that of the narrative
portions, we get no indication in the text. Yet a performance distinction might well have existed: certainly: rhapsodic performance, as we
see from Plato's Ion, indicates that the heroes' speeches were. acted out
7A summary is in Fenik (1986) 3. Thornton (1984) 73-92 discusses other narrative
type-scenes and has a bibliography.
81 know of no evidence that the phonology, morphology, or syntax of speeches in
Homer changes from narrative to nonnarrative portions; in my experience, the poetic
language is consistent over both parts. The important preliminary study by Jasper
Griffin (1986) of vocabulary differences between speech and narrative seems to indicate that certain categories, such as abstract nouns, are virtually restricted to speeches.
Is this poetic stylization or Homeric mimesis of actual Ionian speech habits in the
eighth or seventh centuries? Bauman (1986) 134 remarks on Icelandic sagas: "Oral
tradition may have preserved some features of earlier verbal behavior patterns for
extended periods, but the literary representation of ways of speaking ... more likely reflects the usage of the period in which the sagas were written."
46
cC
47
48
49
From this perspective, which we reach through tracing the distribution of the word muthos, Athena's command (labeled with the
term) to Achilles in Book I appears to be less the unfettered directive
of a beneficent goddess and more a bargain struck among equals. The
phrase used by Poseidon to Achilles in 2I.293, "if you will obey,"
takes on a new resonance here (I.207). Is it possible that Achilles,
himself an authoritative speaker, might not listen to such a low-status
divinity? After all, as Athena herself makes clear, she is merely the
messenger of Hera; her rhetorical strategy relies on this higher authority (r.207-9): "I came to stop your strength, if you will obey,
from the sky. Hera, goddess widi. white arms, sent me forth, feeling
kindly and caring for both in her thumos." Note that Athena's pronoun use slips into an authoritative plural at line 214, "obey us." This
phrase, raising the issue of persuasion again after only six lines, characterizes Athena's lack of authority. The daughter of Zeus actually is
portrayed through Homer's phrasing as more like messengers of her
father. Notice the similarities between this theophany and the
messenger-arrival motif: a reason for coming is stated; the authority
of the sender is cited; motivation and new information is given. 14
Athena announces the motivation of Hera in the manner that Dream
describes Zeus' motives in the next book (2.26-27): "I am the messenger of Zeus, who from afar cares gready for you and has pity. "15 If
we regard Athena in this light, Achilles' reply to her muthos sounds
more relevant to the situation. For, in commenting on the superior
nature of obedience to the gods (I.217-18), he alludes obliquely to his
bargain with Athena. He signals to her that he realizes her dilemma
and will contribute to boosting her status by deigning to obey now,
at the price of being listened to later. The brief scene proceeds as if
Achilles were the one demanding submission.
At first sight, Hermes seems different. Unlike Athena, he is never
commanded with an explicit muthos by any other god. But far from
being a freely acting agent, the god of communication functions
when enacting his sole muthos of command as another emissary from
Zeus. Speaking to Priam in the Achaean camp after Hektor's ransom,
he takes the pose that Dream assumed in an earlier message scene.
Compare 24.682, "He stood over his head and spoke a muthos," with
2.20, "He stood over his head looking like Nestor." There are other
14M. Edwards (1980) 13-15 reads this as a divine visitation type-scene, with slightly
different results.
15Compare also Iris to Priam, 24.173-75.
50
"
,
't,
'
I,
I
"
!'
.I,
I
5I
52
1.1
I'
,.
"Ii
'II
dream: "If anyone else had told us this dream, we would call it a lie
and turn away instead. But now the one who claims to be best of the
Achaeans saw it" (2.80-83). The logical conclusion is never stated,
and indeed Nestor never asserts that Agamemnon is right, only that
he has more authority. We may well imagine that Dream's persuasive
disguise-as Nestor-restrains the self-regarding elder hero from
dismissing the message entirely. Zeus' authority, higher than Agamemnon's, has been de constructed neatly within the first few lines of
this book when Homer demonstrates that muthos speech does not
require truth so much as an effective representation.
It is particularly characteristic of Zeus' commands that they combine several types of speech-act. In his commands, through Iris, to
Hera and Athena (8.399-408) and Hektor (II. I86), directives blend
with explicit promises or threats. He orders Iris to tell Hektor to
retreat a short way (II.I89), then promises killing strength to the
hero (II.I92). Athena and Hera are told to turn back; if they do not,
Zeus will lame their horses, cast them out, and wreck the chariot
(8.402-3). In the chief divinity Homer draws a character whose
speech-acts are consistent. As Searle observes, in certain speechacts-statements, assertions, and explanations-the speaker makes
his language describe his situation, producing a "word-to-world"
fit. 17 Requests, commands, vows, and promises, on the other hand,
involve the speaker in shaping the world to his own word: Zeus'
muthoi fall in the latter group.
One problem appears to arise in the framing of Zeus' commands
here. The words of Iris to Hera and Athena are described as a threat
(epeilese, 8.4I5), but have been introduced by Zeus with a line appropriate to a prediction (40I, "Thus I will speak out and it will be
completed"). Similarly, Zeus' promise to Hektor at II.I9I-94 contains elements of prediction: the strength will come "when struck by
spear or hit by arrrow he leaps to his horse." Since in speech-act
theory predictions are "constatives," and commands are directives,
this correlation in Zeus' rhetoric appears puzzling at first. Is this a
confusion of word to world and vice versa? Is Homer nodding?18
In human terms, yes, this is confusion. But Zeus' language of gods
transcends human speech categories. Searle's remarks on the class of
declaratives can help clarify the poetry here. Most declaratives- "I
17Searle (I97 6) 4.
180n the types of speech-act, see Bach and Harnish (I979) 39-59.
L.
53
find you guilty," "I thee wed," and so on-require that we assume
the authority of an extralinguistic institution acting through the
speaker. But a few escape this requirement. Individuals acting alone
can declare the name for something, just as parents determine what a
child is to be called in many cultures. Divinity exercises this right
over everything in the world: as Searle notes: "When God says, 'Let
there be light,' that is a declaration. "19 In other words, in the language of Zeus, commands, threats, and predictions comprise one and
the same category. It is this very use of language that makes Zeus
supreme. Although humans must prove in the field their boasts and
threats, the mere speaking of a threat by Zeus is effective, the equivalent of action. Homeric poetry respects this mystery of divine
speech, at the same time that it surrounds the speech of gods with a
clamor of competing words. As we shall see shortly, the primacy of
Zeus' divine speech is threatened by the speech-acts of heroes and by
the rival demands of his "family." These touches of realism, showing
that even divine speech is subject to human limits, find vivid correlates in the narrative, which seems at times to circumvent the language of Zeus. Hektor, for example, does not receive strength to
reach the ships on the day that Zeus prornised. 20 His surge occurs
later; the time-frame of divine speech thus differs radically from that
of its divine addressees.
Because Zeus is set beyond the time and distance limits of humanity, his muthos speeches show an amount of verbal detail unparalleled
in heroic discourse. The threat to Athena and Hera (8.399-408) lists
the amount of damage Zeus intends; his promise at 1I. 186-94 specifies exactly the point at which power will be granted. Furthermore,
at the conclusions of both commands, Zeus sets exact limitations on
the action of the threat and promise. Hera he will not berate as much
as Athena, seeing that she is an inveterate adversary. Hektor he will
allow to win, but only until he reaches the Achaean ships (II.19394). Zeus' power to command, then, is matched by his power to
create nuance and give verbal texture to his directives. This shows in
the amplitude of his rhetoric, achieved by repetition and synonymity:
"Turn back and do not allow them onward" (8.399); "I will throw
them from the chariot box and break the chariot" (403); "I do not
blame Hera so much nor am I angry" (407). It is the accumulation of
19Searle (1976) Isn.3.
20See Leaf (1900-1902) on 1 I. 194.
54
I:
55
56
,,
i:
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I
!,
a muthos performance that the other gods on several occasions express dissent by withholding praise. The formulaic line" Act, but we
other gods will not all approve" (epaineomen) occurs three times (4.29,
16.443, 22.181). In each case, it marks those moments in the Iliad
when the speaker, Zeus, has just suggested that the lives be saved. On
two of these occasions, Hera identifies the proposal made by Zeus as a
muthos, prefacing her reply to him with another formulaic line, "0
most dread (ainotate) son of Kronos, what sort of muthos have you
said?" (4.25 = 16.440). The third time, Zeus' speech is introduced as
the initial muthos in an exchange, with yet another formula (22.167):
"To them Zeus father of men and gods began the muthoi." In each
case, the threat of implied public blame among the other gods seems
to force Zeus to yield. We feel, however, that he is prepared for the
outcome. For the three muthoi of Zeus which seek approval for his
plan to intervene in the destinies of heroes are in complete contrast
with the muthos he made in Book 8 when prohibiting the other gods
from meddling. There, we saw him use the rhetoric of force. But
when plotting something he knows to be contrary to the will of
Athena and Hera, Zeus portrays himself as incapable of command,
undecided as to which course to take. Such acting by Zeus can be
taken as directive. It differs from more straightforward commands
only in that the performer has already judged the outcome and adjusted his rhetoric accordingly. His proposal to stop the war in Book
4 is sheathed in neutral, unemphatic, and brief observations: Menelaos has two helpers, it seems; Aphrodite has saved one who thought
he would die; victory belongs to Menelaos (4.7-12). Even when
making an explicit proposal, Zeus phrases it in a gracious hortatory
subjunctive (4.14, phrazometha). He offers alternatives as well: either
to raise war or strike a peace. The audience is politely taken into
consideration: " ... if this might somehow be dear and sweet to all"
(417).
In Book 16, Zeus again poses alternatives, dramatizing his doubts
about whether to whisk Sarpedon off to L ykia or let him die at Troy.
Instead of commands, we hear from Zeus now the language of lament, reinforced by the sound pattern of the lines, .a repeated cry of
grief (16.433-35):
& /laL EYOlV, 0 'tE /lOL ~uQn'l']Mvu, <ptA.'tu'tOv (lv()QOlV,
/lOL? uno I1mQoXA.OLO MEvomMuo ()U/lijVaL.
()LXSa M. /lOL XQuMrlj:tE/lOVE<PQEOLV oQ/lUtVOV'tL.
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Heroic Commands
On the battlefield, the performance of muthos commands follows
the Olympian pattern in exhibiting a hierarchy of performers, and a
frankly antagonistic relationship among peers, especially at the top
echelon. Those with the highest status, like Zeus, direct and enact
muthoi to the largest audiences, all Trojans or Achaeans. The praise
of the group, an important mark of approval, is reserved for the
leading speakers in the contest of command. Whereas "praise" arose
as a topic among the Olympians most often when there was a threat
to withhold it from Zeus, in Homer's depiction of the Achaean camp,
this subject of group approbation is described positively. Three times
the poet says that the Achaeans "approve" a speech: when Odysseus
urges the troops to remain at Troy (2.284-332; cf. 335, muthon epainesantes); when Agamemnon declares that his brother won the duel
with Paris (3.455-60; cf. 461, epi d'eneon alloi); and when Achilles
awards a special prize to Eumelos, loser of the chariot race (23.539,
epeineon). The audience ratification of their proposals defines the triad
of the Iliad's most important speakers-with the exception of Nestor.
While Agamemnon, Odysseus, and Achilles jockey for position,
Nestor remans unchallenged as a commander. As with Zeus on
Olympus, he directs the greatest number of muthoi to others, but is
himself never the recipient of such commands. A further mark of his
status appears when we consider the addressees of the muthoi. Whereas Agamemnon gives muthos commands to Menelaos, Khryses, and
Teucer (three figures with lower status in the poem), Nestor in this
hierarchy commands Agamemnon, and moreover, can enact a muth-
60
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from the alleged "instructions" ofPeleus that will contrast most with
his own recapitulation of another speech of advice, that made by
Patroklos' father, suggesting the companion of Achilles should instruct and guide him (I I. 786-90). In brief, the older man uses his
muthos to praise Patroklos, thereby constructing an image of the role
he is supposed to play. As with Zeus' speeches to Hera and Thetis in
Book 24, Homer here has supplied enough detail to make us appreciate the possibilities for fictional presentation within authoritative
speechmaking.
It helps that Nestor's age makes him an appropriate stand-in for
Menoitios, so that this speech is truly a "performance" by a seasoned
actor. His advice to Patroklos is described in the same terms as Menoitios' instructions (compare 11.783 and 785, epetelle with the same
verb in 840, used by Patroklos). This fatherly instruction is meant to
replicate itself when Patroklos next returns to Achilles. But Patroklos
improvises his performance rather than copying Nestor's. Instead of
reminding Achilles about Peleus, he denies the hero's parentage
(16.33-35) and weeps ominously "like a black-watered stream." In
the poet's image system, the performance ofPatroklos thus resembles
that of the Iliad's weakest rhetorician, Agamemnon, the only other
speaker who resorts to such an act (163-4 = 9.14-15).
So far we have seen that the distribution of muthos speeches among
heroic speakers accurately predicts their success at persuasion within
the poem. In what follows, I want to explore the distinctions in the
power relations thus sketched. This is not a formal poetics, since it
will be seen that the seemingly simple act of issuing a command
becomes so variable as to resist reduction to a schema. Questions of
individual style arise, which in turn are inseparable from notions
of the proper convention for commanding or enacting other types of
speech-act. If we keep in mind the example of Zeus-in which long,
detailed, and self-assertive rhetoric represents the best command
form-it soon appears that only one Iliadic speaker comes closest to
this ideal, Achilles. Other commands bear a kind of family resemblance one to the other, and offer less noticeable similarities to
divine speech.
We can gauge the distance between Nestor, Agamemnon, and the
others in several ways. In terms of the narrative progression, Agamemnon drops out of sight as a source of muthos commands by
Book 14. Odysseus appears in this role up to Book 19, at which point
we see Agamemnon deferring to his judgment. As Agamemnon's
speaking power wanes, Achilles' waxes: it is he who gives the muth-
63
os commands on the Achaean side all through the last two books of
the Iliad. Thus, the control of authoritative speech passes like the
Achaean scepter from the "owner," Agamemnon, to his young competitor.
A second gauge of difference comes in the rhetorical form and
effectiveness of commands. Here, the same hierarchy is reaffirmed.
Agamemnon is less powerful as a speaker than Odysseus, and he, in
turn, must defer to Achilles. We shall see the differences on the level
of individual stylistic choices in the next chapter. But some of the
broader signs of these distinctions should be noted here. An important preliminary strike against Agamemnon comes in the detail that
tells us he speaks against the wishes of his audience: "The other
Achaeans all approved ... but it did not please Agamemnon" (I.2324). His threat to Khryses, that the skeptron of the god will not do him
any good should he return, turns out t() have ironic appropriateness
for himself, when his authority sinks. In contrast to Zeus, whose
similar threat silences Hera at the end of Book 1 (I. 566), Agamemnon's language works destruction, turning the priest to seek divine
intervention with deadly effect. Like the fault of Paris in blaming the
goddesses, Agamemnon's improper speech-act has disastrous consequences.
Another sign of Agamemnon's rhetorical ineffectiveness comes in
his dialogue with Menelaos in Book 10. His brother has not even
been commanded, yet comes (10.25) with as much sympathy as
Agamemnon for the Argive sufferings, only to find that Agamemnon
himself is ceding authority to Nestor over the guards, "for they
might obey him most." In this context, the muthos that Agamemnon
makes to Menelaos shrinks in consequence. In fact, Menelaos has to
elicit the command on his own, since Agamemnon has given no clear
directions in his rambling talk (10.43-59). "How do you instruct and
order me with a muthos?" Menelaos asks. Agamemnon's reply is a
weak warning to stay in place lest the brothers lose one another in
camp (65-71), and a suggestion to "glorify" the other commanders
on waking them up-a rather obvious rhetorical strategy.
Finally, there is Agamemnon's yielding to Odysseus' criticism.
"You very much reached my heart with your tough rebuke, " he tells
him, after Odysseus has demolished Agamemnon's graceless proposal to flee (14.105-5). Odysseus demands silence from him; Agamemnon's only defense is another weak rhetorical excuse, that he was
only fulfilling what his audience wanted (14.90, 105).
'
Odysseus, the speaker to whom control passes at this point, first
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"commands" constitute an equally conventional genre. Modern politicaloratory, seemingly wide-ranging and unbound by formal constraints, might make the proposition seem counterintuitive. But a
study of traditional oratory can show how the act of giving orders
and proposing directives deserves recognition as a separate formal
genre (albeit rarely In a versified form). The work of Raymond Firth
on oratory of the Tikopia in the western Pacific, and Anne Salmond's
studies of Maori oratory in New Zealand, demonstrate that the issuing of directives in public is a highly formalized verbal affair. 30 Learners of such traditional command discourse must memorize innumerable proverbs and genealogies to make their words effective. The
formal nature of such directives is recognized in some cultures within
the taxonomy of speech names. Rosaldo points out that the Ilongot
consider tuydek, the command, to be "the exemplary act of speech,"
because it organizes social life, being used by men in authority to
control and tame women and children. 31 I submit that the Greek
equivalent for "important speech of social control" is muthos.
The political nature of rhetoric within the Iliad deserves more recognition. 32 Homerists have concentrated more, however, on speech
and persuasion in the poem as they relate to later oratory. 33 It has
been noticed that a speaker's success is measured in part by the degree
of persuasion he or she elicits. I would add that this is not merely
Homeric technique, but a social value to be seen in many cultures.
"Among the Araucanians of Chile, the head of a band was its best
orator and his power depended upon his ability to sway others
through oratory," notes Hymes. 34
Although commands might seem less familiar as an institutional- .
ized genre, the second category of muthos speeches, to which I turn
now, should offer no such barrier. The work of Walter Ong, in
particular Fighting Jor Life: Contest, Sexuality, and Consciousness, has
drawn attention to the agonistic nature of discourse in oral-traditonal
societies, and to the remnants of this outlook in our own. 35 The
formalized verbal contests of several contemporary cultures range
from events enacted by adolescents on street corners, like the black
30See Bloch (I975) 29-63.
31Rosaldo (I982) 209.
32A start is made by political scientist J. B. White (I984) 34.
33Karp (I977) 24I recognizes the central place of persuasion in the movement of the
poem's plot, but his article is mostly an attempt to locate the forerunners of later
notions about rhetoric.
34Hymes (I974) 34.
35See Ong (I98I) esp. 26, 29, I08-29.
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68
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70
omedes, he uses the verb (kata)ptosso (340, 371) a verb related to the
word for "rabbit" that still exhibits an active association with the anima1's behavior (cf. the image in 17.676 of an eagle capturing the
cowering creature). The final strategy in these speeches relies on privileging another place, thereby implying that the addressee occupies a
position of no importance. Thus, to the Argives, Agamemnon contrasts their stilled movement with the preferable alternative of engagement in battle. Waiting by the ships is equivalent, in his words,
to the vague hope that Zeus will protect them at some future time
(4.249). The "other place" hurled at Odysseus and Menestheus as an
insult is the dais, which, says Agamemnon, they prefer instead of
battle (343-46). Diomedes is provoked by Agamemnon with the
mention of another place and time, the heroic exploits ofTydeus, his
father, at Thebes.
It is not coincidental that Agamemnon finally selects Odysseus and
Diomedes as targets for his abuse in Book 4. The investigation of the
command genre of muthoi shows us that these two heroes pose the
greatest threat, next to Achilles, in their verbal abilities. 45 Idomeneus
and the two Ajaxes, whom he praises, are conspicuously absent from
the rolls of active muthos speakers in the poem. Nestor, on the other
hand, is too good a speaker for abuse. But even when he has chosen
the right competitors, Agamemnon loses to them in the flyting that
follows, bested by different but equally effective performances.
Odysseus feels himself to be the real target of Agamemnon's
blame, and rightly, since only he (not Menestheus) is called names"pre-eminent in evil tricks, mind on gain" (4.339). Instead of denying
these epithets, Odysseus deftly parries the accusation oflaxness with
a rhetorical question: "What word has escaped the fence of teeth on
you? How can you talk about neglecting war?" (350-52). Then he
switches to speak of the future: "You will see ... the father of Telemakhos mixing in the front lines" (promakhoisi, 354). Finally, he
criticizes Agamemnon's style of speech: "You are talking idly" (an~
molia bazeis, 355). Odysseus gains forcefulness from his manipulation
of poetic devices. Theparonomasia using his son's name allows Odysseus to allude subtly to his own status as an archer, or "far fighter."
The pun furthermore becomes a subtle boast: not only will he fulfill
his traditional epic function, but he will go beyond this, to fight even
in the front lines: he can play any role you like. And this implicit
450n the clash with Diomedes, see Chapter 3.
7I
boast contrasts with the message behind his criticism of Agamemnon's style: we could paraphrase, "I know how to perform, but you
cannot even talk appropriately."
Agamemnon's response certifies what the audience has already garnered by this time, that Odysseus defeated him verbally. He takes
back the neikos speech just made by denying that he was even attempting to blame Odysseus (4.359). In an effort to save face, he
associates himself with the victorious speaker, claiming to share his
thoughts (360-61). The speech is an apology for "bad style" in all
senses of the phrase; significantly, Agamemnon adopts Odysseus'
own poetic formulation to waft away his previous speech: "May the
gods make all these things like the winds" (metamonia-cf. anemolia
earlier, both from the noun anemos, "wind").
If Odysseus resists Agamemnon by clever riposte, Diomedes' strategy is cunning silence. This response is indeed the only possibility,
for Agamemnon has baited a trap in the final words of his neikos
speech about Diomedes' father: "Such was Tydeus. But the son he
begat is worse in war-better in speaking" (399-400). Under these
terms, were Diomedes even to attempt an Odyssean reply, he would
simply affirm Agamemnon's accusation that he is a better talker then
fighter. The insult, of course, reflects back badly on Agamemnon
himself, since branding one's opponent as a slick speaker is the last
resort of bankrupt rhetoricians and demagogues. We are reminded of
Thucydides' portrayal of Kleon in the Mytilene debate (3.38.2-7). In
contrast, the "silent" answer works with complete effect here because
it constitutes an ambiguous sign. The poet reads it for us at face value,
as Agamemnon might: "Strong Diomedes did not address him at all,
ashamed of the rebuke of the respected king." But the rules of the
genre of flyting discourses allow of another interpretation. Walter
Edwards, writing about insult duels in Guyana, notes: "The silence of
the addressee can be interpreted ... as incompetence in 'busin' [the
genre of insults] or as a strategic aloofness which asserts social superiority over the 'buser. "'46 Diomedes' ploy looks like defeat but it is
actually such an assertion. And Diomedes knows the rules well
enough to rebuke his companion Sthenelos, who has tried to counteract the insults of Agamemnon (4.404-IIO). The charioteer decries
the knowing lies of the abuser (404) but Diomedes replies, in effect,
that Agamemnon is simply playing his role correctly (413-14). The
46W. Edwards (I979) 24.
72
apparent gesture of support for the chief, by reference to the way the
game is played, reinforces the agonistic intention of Diomedes' silence. By directing his reply to Sthenelos and then getting him to
consent to a muthos of command (412), he acknowledges that he
knows the ambiguous import of his silence in the duel. Then, singling out Agamemnon for responsibility in the success of the war,
Diomedes has also posed the unspeakable possibility of defeat (41718). This effectively silences the abuser. With a grand gesture, Diomedes leaps full-armed from his chariot, his armor crashing about
him so that "fear would have seized even a stout-hearted one," as
Homer says (421). The audience for this gesture is Agamemnon,
however, and he is neatly put in his place by the poet with this phrase.
The ability to conduct a flyting match forms an essential part of the
hero's strategic repertoire. We shall return in the next chapter to a
consideration of various styles in flyting. For now, it will be useful to
examine three varieties of such speeches-those between ,comrades,
gods, and enemies-to sketch some salient aspects of the poetics of
abuse.
A reference to other authoritative speech is a recurring feature of
flyting speeches among companions. The powerful muthos performed by Achilles as he marshals the Myrmidons begins in this way,
with an injunction to recall their previous threats (apeilai) against the
Trojans: "Myrmidons, let no one forget on me the threats with which
you threatened the Trojans at the ships all during the time of anger" (16.200-201). Adkins has described the conditions under which
the semantic range of apeilai can include threats, boasts, vows, promises, and magniloquent speech.47 All can be classed together as efforts
to make oneself felt in a hostile environment. I would add that
Homeric diction once more proves attentive to the category of
speech-act (as we noticed in the case of winged words). For all senses
of apeilai can be subsumed under the head of assertives or commissives. And the latter can actually fit under the former category, because, in context, vows and promises are made in order to announce a
social assertion of alliance or opposition. 48 Achilles' reference to this
category of speech is at one remove from its original force. Although
he mentions threats, he does so not to threaten anyone himself, but
47 Adkins
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Feats of Memory
"Great narrative artists are drawn to abuses of narrative. Homer is
interested in lies and boasts, Virgil in lies and rumor, Shakespeare in
slander, Milton in temptations, George Eliot and D. H. Lawrence in
gossip. "54 But are "lies and boasts" really "abuses of narrative" to the
archaic Greek poet? Or are we confusing "narrative" with "factual
account"? I believe that in such things as lies and boasts-but most of
all in three speech genres which are named muthoi-epic depicts the
very essence of narrative. So far we have examined Homeric commands and flyting speeches; the third genre of discourse designated
muthos within the Iliad cannot be readily identified with small, embedded genres such as these, but embraces a type underlying both of
the others: performances of memory. Furthermore, this third genre
530n verbatim repetition as a valued element in contest poetry, see Herzfeld (1985)
142-43 on Cretan mandinadhes.
54Hardy (1975) 103.
78
55Notopoulos (1938) 465 cites Mnemosyne, mother of the Muses, as "the personification of an important and vital force in oral composition." J.-P. Vemant (1965) and
Marcel Detienne (1973) have investigated the interactions among Greek notions of
memory, persuasion, truth, and time. For further bibliography, see Svenbro (1976)
3In.88.
56See Moran (1975) esp. 196, 199.
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seen. Achilles in his speech upon return (19.146-53) uses both strategies, conventional and otherwise:
The gifts, if you wish, offer, as is fit, Agamemnon lord of men, most
glorious son of Atreus, or keep them by you. But now let us remember the batde (mnesometha kharmes), right away. For it is necessary not
to chatter nor waste time here, for a great deed is still undone. In this
way, one may see Achilles again with the front-lines, killing rows of
Trojans with a bronze spear. And in this way let anyone of you,
remembering, fight a man (memnemenos andri makhesthO).
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mand of the muthos takes on the job, and fails. Nestor does
succeed-but with what seems to us to be the wrong audience, Patroklos. I observed earlier that Odysseus and Nestor practice similar
rhetorical tacks in their commanding muthoi to Achilles and Patroklos. Indeed, the central trope in these speeches is explicitly an act
of memory. Odysseus had said (of Peleus' speech): "Thus the old
man instructed, but you forget" (9.259). Compare Nestor's words to
Patroklos, in which the same line recurs (I I. 790). Nor is the strategy
of dramatic memory limited to these two speakers. Phoinix, who
seems to stand in for Nestor in the embassy scene, uses a long discourse from memory as the centerpiece of his attempt to induce
Achilles to come back. "I recall this deed from of old, nothing new
indeed, how it was. I will tell it among you, friends all" (9.527).60
The epic tale he proceeds to recount does refer to a past event, but
dearly has been shaped in peiformance to address the present audience
for the composition, Achilles, with hints embedded in such things as
the name of the older hero's wife, Kleo-patra (reminding Achilles of
his companion's name, Patro-klos).61
Alongside the presentation of Nestor as ideal speaker in the Iliad is
that of Odysseus as another effective performer from memory. It is
not, then, inauthentic for Odysseus to be selected as one who tries to
persuade Achilles. An earlier episode, however, shows us the differences between the rhetoric of Odysseus and Nestor and may provide
more insight on why Odysseus' rhetoric is not quite as good. He
performs a muthos to spur the Achaeans into battle in Book 2, just
before a similar speech by Nestor. Again, command is combined
with memory, and pointed up nearly to the sharpness of a flyting
discourse. One could score the speech by noting the shifts in genres of
muthos within it. Odysseus begins with flyting: "The Achaeans want
to make you [Agamemnon] most shameful of mortal men," he says,
comparing the troops to children or women anxious to get home.
Now memory takes over: "It is the tenth year at Troy, so I do not
blame the Achaeans for chafing." A command intrudes: "Bear up,
friends, until we know ifKalkhas is prophesying truth" (2.299-300).
This in turn triggers a long rendition by Odysseus of an earlier
600n this speech in its setting, see Rosner (1976) who has full bibliography of
previous studies; and see Nagy (1979) III-IS on the semantics of the names, which
embody the theme of ancestral poetic glory.
610n the introduction of non-Homeric epic with the verb memnemai see Moran
(1975) 204
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CHAPTER 3
Heroes as Performers
I
"A work about death often modulates readily, if eerily, into a
work about literature. For death inhabits texts."l In the terms of the
Iliad, death generates texts; it is the boundary that one tries to surmount by action in this world. A reputation enshrined in poetry,
"unwithering fame" (9.413), is the goal for every hero; but to reach
this, each must perform, both by arms and by words. In the previous
chapters, I have correlated the performance of deeds with that of a
particular sort of important speech, the realm of muthoi. Furthermore, I explored the correlation between these speeches and three
"genres of discourse" that play social roles: commanding, flyting, and
recollection. I sketched a poetics of each genre.
If we take these speech-genres as the primary types of "performance" by which Homer depicts his speakers, the next step is to ask
how the important figures of the Iliad make use of the genres that are
available to them. This question can be put in two ways, depending
on whether one thinks that epic reports speech events or stylizes them
as poetry. But I hope to have shown by now that the distinction
cannot always be clearly drawn: commanding, flyting, and acts of
memory, when we examine them as separable "genres," already demand to be treated as "poetic" performances, in the sense that they
require verbal artistry on the part of the speaker and a commitment to
an audience, which in turn, judges the performance. When Homeric
poetry portrays a neikos, therefore, it is modeling on the level of epic a
.........- - - - - - - - - - - - - ------
90
Heroes as Performers
91
1 I.
16.
92
Heroes as Performers
93
should assume that traditional poets have a corresponding freem of expression, no mat!er how "formulaic" the medium in which
they have been trained. Cor Huso, the Montenegran epic singer,
impressed his stamp on tradition; other singers might consciously
choose to remain anonymous "classicists" in the performance of their
. traditions. 7 Homer certainly belongs in the former group. But the
point is that both "formulaic" speech culture and the poetry arising
from it allow-indeed require-the individual to have a distinct
style. 8 We can juxtapose the remarks of investigators working at the
temporal extremes of the Greek tradition and deduce the same conclusion. Herzfeld tells us: "In Glendiot idiom, there is less focus on
'being a good man' than on 'being good at being a man' -a stance
that stresses performative excellence, the ability to foreground manhood by means of deeds that strikingly 'speak for themselves. ,,, Actions, in such a context, undergo "stylistic transfiguration."9 Such a
sense of agonistic style structures heroic behavior in Homer, where
"the most important value-terms ... are agathos [good], esthlos [noble], arete [excellence], kakos, kakotes [base; baseness], aiskhron [ugly],
and elenkheie [disgrace]. These commend successes or decry failures in
the field of competitive excellences. "10 And such a sense guides the
poet, who "composes with formulae, and it is by his choice apd
combination of them that he is judged."l1
Comparative evidence from other literary traditions can also show
us that it is worthwhile to regard heroes as style-conscious performers. Richard Bauman's study of thirteenth-century Icelandic
sagas leads him to the conclusion that "artistic verbal performance
and the performance of honor were mutually interdependent elements of a larger performance complex of central moral significance
in Icelandic society." Insouciant heroism showed itself, for example,
in the way a man acted at the moment of his death; in turn, saga
records the "performance." The value system of shame, praise, and
honor, called drengskapr, "was a performance domain par excellence,
characterized by the display of signs of moral worth before an au7See Lord (1960) 5, 63, 93, and Vesterholt (1973) 32-37.
8In this context, compare Crowley (1983) 136 on the apparent paradox that the
folklorist encounters: "We find that to be a traditional Bahamian storyteller, one
is required to create."
9Herzfeld (1985) 16.
lOAdkins (1960) 23.
llBowra (1972) 29.
94
Heroes as Performers
95
realization that an Achaean audience would be eager to notice discrepancies between the twO. 17 Put another way, Odysseus is here concerned with Diomedes' speech style. Not only are heroic performers
their own "authors," then, but they fill the role of "critic" as well,
since all speech in Homer takes place in an agonistic context. The
poet's concern with ranking heroes emerges clearly in catalogues and
invocations within the Iliad (see e.g. 2.577, 673, 760,). An elaborate
system of judging heroic worth is explicitly foregrounded in the
poem through such narrative devices; Irina Shtal' has shown that the
entire system of epithets for heroes fits within the context of critical
praise. 18 I want to point out that the speeches that Homer gives his
characters further this narrative strategy, as can be seen splendidly in
the teikhoskopia in Book 3, a device designed to turn the narrator's
exposition of mundane fact into a dramatically persuasive scene. But
at the same time, the speeches embody an assumption, often overlooked: that heroes themselves can evaluate one another's "style,"
particularly in the act of speaking. To return for a moment to the wall
of Troy: we should notice that along with characterizing Agamemnon and the others in terms of physique and prowess, this scene
serves to show us speech styles, through the reminiscences of Antenor. And the details he notices when recalling an earlier visit to
Troy by Menelaos and Odysseus relate specifically to the "performance" of muthoi (3.212-23):
"But when they wove speeches (muthoi) and plans for all,
Then, you know, Menelaos discoursed in running fashion,
Speaking little, but very clearly (ligeos), since he is not much with
words (polrimuthos)
nor one to cast words about (apharmatoepes). And indeed he was
younger.
But when indeed Odysseus much with wiles (polumetis) got up,
he'd stand, he'd look down fixing his eyes on the ground,
170n this passage, see Nagy (1979) 34-35. Nagy (1986) 89-102 examines the
interrelation of the attested genre of praise-poetry, as in Pindar, with Homeric
epic.
180n ranking, see especially Kotopoulos (1977). Shtal' (1983) 97-105 examines
epithets; on the implications for characterization, see pp. 175-90. See also, on
ranking, Letoublon (1983) 43-44. The gods are shown engaging in rating one
another's worth (20.122-23). For an illustration of the rhetorical use of rating, see
Idomeneus' speech at 13.310-27.
96
Heroes as Performers
97
mance (muthon atimesaite, 14.127) by calling him strengthless and ignoble. Similarly, Odysseus "pulls rank" on Achilles by explicitly
contrasting their special strengths, then relying on his own status as
elder to demand compliance to his own muthoi (19.216-20):
"Achilles, Peleus' son, most powerful Achaean, you are stronger than I
am, and, not a little, more powerful at the spear. In thought, at least,
though, I could surpass you by far, since I was born earlier and I know
more. Therefore let your heart endure my commands (muthoisin
emoisin). "
So speech style, status, and ranking must be taken as related manifestations of the workings of the all-important concept of time ("honor, value, worth, recompense").20
The notion of time depends on a basic sense of structured inequalities, as can be seen in the instructions of Nestor at 1.278-79:
"Never does a scepter-bearing king, to whom Zeus gave glory, have
as portion (emmore) an equal value (time)." "Portion" and "proportion" are inextricable, and it is not coincidental that heroes gauge each
other's speech by calling it kata moiran, "according to proper portion. "21 The problem of the Iliad appears to be rooted in the clash of
two systems: status-based time and performance-based judgments,
the latter an almost economically pragmatic "market-value. "22 But,
in a different view, this is really just one system, in which status must
always be re-created anew by performance, while it is concurrently
threatened by the perfnrmance of other heroes. (Thus, in Agamemnon's view, Achilles' offense is to wish to "speak as an equal" and "be
likened openly" to the king: the first implies the second- 1. 186-87.)
Speech, in the creative use of it that heroes make, puts the system in
motion; the abuse of speech brings the system to a halt. Agamemnon's gifts alone should not persuade Achilles, because he does not
accompany them (despite Nestor's warning) with the proper style, of
"gentle words" (9. 113), but allows Nestor to send a traditional enemy
of Achilles in the place of the chief. Ironically, Odysseus is given his
200n the semantics of this concept, see Adkins (1960) and Nagy (1979) 149.
21 For a similar interpretation of this phrase with different application, set; Nagy
(1979) 134. Proportionality, rather than factual accuracy or detail, is uppermost
in this view, pace Finkelberg (1987).
22Note the verb in description of a woman/prize, "She knew many works and
they rated her at four-cow worth" (tion de he tessaraboion, 23.705).
98
charge with words that fit exactly Odysseus' own speech strategy
status flaunting (9.160-61): "And let him submit to me inasmuch
am kinglier and assert that I am more advanced in ancestry
progenesteros). "23 The strategy is proportionate with Odysseus' uF....~'illI
ing worth, so mere reference to status might carry some .... "'JL"U..."l
weight. In the case of Agamemnon, such rhetoric is overcharged
using it corrodes the heroic system.
To sum up at this point: ethnography, other literatures, and
Iliad itself concur to convince us of the necessity and consciousness
individual style in traditional society. The heroes of the Homeric.
poems surely possess individual styles; furthermore, I suggest that "
these are not mere literary constructs, but are based on a deeper social"
reality. All this would perhaps seem too obvious to reiterate were it
not for two trends affecting recent Homeric study. First, the influential works of Bruno Snell have accustomed critics to believe that the
"individual" did not exist as a category of Homeric thought; personal
style we are told is only "discovered" in the "lyric age. "24 This trend
has combined with a second, found in a too-general application of .:
Milman Parry's work, which amounts to a type of behaviorism, a
claim that neither Homer nor his creations could speak with individual style. 25 The first approach has begun to lose ground from one
border thanks to careful studies showing the conventional nature of
Greek lyric poetry. Rismag Gordesiani has challenged the second
notion as it applies to Homeric characters, who are painstakingly
depicted as individuals, however conventional the medium of Homeric poetry might be. 26 A full-scale critique of the second trend must
await my analysis of formulaic poetry in the next chapters; for now, I
point out that individual heroic "style" at some level has been recognized by readers of Homer from antiquity on. 27 Moreover, even !
1
Heroes as Performers
99
's ...
figures. Norman Austin notices how Kalkhas cites precedent in his speech to establish reliability; Adam Parry sees Menelaos
as always being persuaded by speech; Owen Cramer writes that Odys, seus "is made to tailor rhetoric to an audience and situation but occasionally, to burst out with a characteristic, eccentric speech on some
. I toplC.
. "28
speCla
The work of finding characteristic style among Homeric heroes has
not advanced beyond impressionistic asides, however, mainly because an acceptable method for working on the problem has not been
devised. 29 In the study of style, more so than with any other feature,
we require all that the original performance situation would give. An
informed view about the style of the poet Homer is nearly impossible
in the absence of other long epic productions from his time. Paradoxically, a determination of the style of individual speakers within the
Iliad appears closer to attainment because we have a number of "performances" from each of the major heroes: 960 verses of Achilles'
speech, about 500 each for Hektor and Agamemnon, slightly less for
Odysseus, Nestor, and Diomedes. In sheer length, the number of
verses attributed to these men riV'als some heroic poems in other verse
traditions, such as the South Slavic. 3o Even if we take into consideration the "copying" phenomenon noticed by Lohmann (in paired
speeches, replies tend to follow the structure of the first), the surface
of discourse would seem to vary so that individual style might be
detected. 31 In a mouel study of individual variation in traditional
storytelling, the folklorist Daniel Crowley has shown the ways in
which tellers of "old-story" in Bahamian communities leave their
mark: unique phrases and motifs, special gestures, postures, or favorite sound combinations occur with consistency in the performances of
the best tellers.32 Although we cannot use the sociolinguists' recorders or the folklorists' fieldnotes, a few of these possible systems of
28Austin (1966) 304, A. Parry (1972) 17, Cramer (1976) 303.
29Griffin (1986) reviews the few works written, and offers some valuable
remarks regarding diction and morphology:
30For the figures, see Gordesiani (1986) 93-94.
31Lohmann (1970).
32Crowley (1983) 45-128. On isolating contextual styles, see Labov (1972) 70109; on the privileging of certain grammatical constructions in various narrative
styles, see Pike (1981).
100
r-""""
0__
1:
ff U)
L:J
~ "-
'
variation remain for us in the text of the Iliad and might be recover_
able through microscopic philological study, not yet done, on individual phrases or sound sequences. I attempt this with a portion
Achilles' language in the next chapters.
Meanwhile, we can consider the results of a few investigations into
characterizing style in Homer and other traditions, to suggest where
we might look for "individuality." Because adjectives are emotive
words, some stylistic contrasts might depend on their use. Gordesiani
has demonstrated that Achilles, Agamemnon, and Hektor all use
nearly the same percentage of adjectives (about 10 percent of the total
number of words given each speaker). The specific adjectives used by
these heroes tend to be quite individualized, however: 59 percent of
Hektor's adjectives are not used by Achilles, who has 74.7 percent
unlike Hektor's; Agamemnon's adjectives match Achilles' only in
40.8 percent of the occurrences, while Achilleshas 71.9 percent that
he does not share with Agamemnon. The conclusion must be that the
epic consciously seeks to differentiate heroes by their speech in at least
one way.33 Glimmers of such characterization, at different levels of
the discourse, come from other epic traditions. It is significant that
the Cid in the Spanish epic "is the one most disposed to verbal
play. "34 On the level of formulaic language, Cynewulf's Old English
poems Juliana and Elene distinguish the direct speech of negative
characters by making it noticeably less formulaic (in terms of repeated
diction) than that of the protagonist. 35 And Bhima in Sanskrit epic
tradition can be distinguished from other characters on the level of
speech-act: he performs almost exclusively curses, vows, and the
granting of boons. 36
Let us return once more to Homer's Iliad. At what level do the
heroes explicitly judge another's discourse? This is not to exclude the
possibility that Homer may be signaling heroic capacity at speaking
through metrical, phonological, or morphological means. But do the
speakers themselves ever refer to these means? No; heroic performance gains approval when it is persuasive, as we saw in the preceding chapter. And the sign of persuasion is that speech moves others to
act in sympathy with the speaker. We have seen already that the
33Gordesiani (1986) 91-93.
34Read (1983) IS.
350lsen (1984) 88.
36S m ith (1980) 70 .
Heroes as Performers
101
102
And I fought on my own / But with them no one now might fight
And they understood my counsels / and obeyed my muthos
But you too obey / for obeying is better
You, do not take the girl / but let go
Nor should you, son ofPeleus want to strive with kings / since
never a king had an equivalent value
If you are stronger / a goddess mother bore you
But he is more powerful/since he rules over more.
Heroes as Performers
103
104
Heroes as Performers
105
in the use of speech within the Iliad at least twice, in the scene we
analyzed earlier when he performs for Diomedes' edification the proper way to enacUl muthQ.s (9.52-78), and later, when he instructs the
embassy meu{bers on the technique to be used in persuading Achilles
(9.179-81). The control of speech, furthermore, appears to rest with
Nestor~~~ction as rep~~ of Ach~~!l:_g-~ons, the old
!!gI1~R(!cifl~ally-rep-or.ts::-the....du.tie.s-.cl"JZings, and does so-interms~f
~~~h. 43 He reminds Agamemnon that the king ~lnpe-ak
a word and listen, and give authority to another, whenever one's
thumos impels him to s"peak for the good" (9.100-103).44 While thus
preserving the ideology of~ reciprocal s eech situation?
including both sides under the terms of his speech, he also exc u eS
heroes from the arena of speech, by having pronounced "without
themis" one who wars with the group: notice that the king has "scepter and traditions" (themistas, 9.99). The pairing implies that both are
necessary for the authoritative enactment of speech.
Not only is he advisor to the king and instructor of heroes in
speech; NestQr, in Homer's description (10.212-14) of the night foray, actually promises kleos':"-fame as enshrined in oral tradition-to
whoever undertakes the" dangerous mission.
"Great would be his fame beneath "the heaven
toward all men, and for him there would be fine gifting."
106
tor says about speech, rather than how he makes his speeches.
line between style and other aspects of the poetry is difficult to
exactly because Homeric ideology would conflate the two: style is
man. We can, however, be more specific about the level at
stylization occurs. Now that we have looked at some distinctive
vidual features, it is time to turn to Nestor's repertoire of
a whole. We find that the totality of his performances marks
as a unique orator, a speaker whose rhetoric rests on eulogy.
makes thirty-two speeches in the poem, ranging in length from 2
147 lines. Eighteen different speech-introduction formulas
pany these, so it is impossible to say that the poet characterizes
at this level; of these, only five contain the word muthos (2
10.203, 81, 190; and 23.305). Yet, when analyzed in terms of genre
discourse, all but three of the speeches Nestor makes fall under
muthos categories we have previously identified. 45 .Most .
the distribution among categories is unique: Nestor can make
commands (e.g. 7.327, his instructions to build the wall); but
rarely does. He can use the language of flyting; he does so with
idiosyncratic use of the conventions. The discourse of
what
To
Nestor's range of
speeches: the imperatives directed at Agamemnon and Achilles
Nestor's first intervention are clear enough (1.259, 274, 282,
indirect command at 283-84); but the medium in which these "~'-""U"'1.
acts float is of a different nature, a long recollection of his fight a5CUl""~"
the Centaurs. Again, a straightforward command to keep the
together becomes, in Nestor's rendition, a reminiscence, and he O"i",piil.
the background motivations for his own commands, in a way
other hero attempts, saying, "That is the way the men of old
sacked cities and walls" (4.308). The command at 15.661-"be men
is filled out by Nestor in a manner unparalleled in the other occur-',
rences of this formula, as he calls for the Achaeans to remember,
"raging strength," the usual phrase (e.g. 8.174), but "children
wives and estate and parents" (15.663). In other words, his
ment of recollection differs markedly, whether it be of other times "
other places and persons. Of c~urse, the best illustration of memory'
in the service of an order is Nestor's long and persuasive performance
45The exceptions are 10.128-30 (simple statement), 15.370-76 (prayer), and"
10.532-39 (prediction).
Heroes as Performers
10 7
108
i'
47
Heroes as Performers
109
Yet there is some reason for taking the description seriously. As Kirk
observes, Thersites is good at what he does, delivering "a polished
piece of invective. "49 Moreover, the argumentsThersites makes have
long been recognized as recapitulating the very points Achilles has
made in Book 1. 50 Ahd his strategy at times appears simply to make
use of arguments available in any aggrieved hero's traditional stock.
For the tack of toting up one's opponents' goods, compare 2.22627-"the huts are full of bronze, many select women are in the huts"
with Antilokhos's sharp words to Achilles (23.549-50): "Much gold
you have in the hut, much bronze and movable goods, women-slaves
and single-hoofed horses." If we are meant to think of Thersites'
speech as flawed in some way, at what level does it fail, and is it
related to the style of the speech?
Thersites' speech is overdetermined to look bad by a number of
criteria, at least two of which I would call stylistic. Perhaps less style48As Kirk (1985) does, 142.
49Kirk (1985) 140 points to the elaborate syntax and expansive style of his lines.
sOThe fullest demonstration is by Freidenberg (1930} 243-44. Whitman (195 8)
161 and Kirk (1985) 141 also notice parallels.
1 IO
Heroes as Performers
III
agree with Kirk (1985) 245 who translates the epithet at 2.796 simply
to mean "numberless."
112
~----~
Heroes as Performers
I I
ways. Of course, these figures only make full sense with the
of statistics for correption in the rest of the Iliad. Stephen
's work indicates that the average rate of correption for narrative
in the poem is 20 percent; for speeches, it is 40 percent. I
conclude from this, therefore, that Nestor, "of sweet speech," sounds
Homer as we first hear him. Thersites, on the other hand, is quite
m his performance, markedly more so than
II4
Heroes as Performers
115
116
Heroes as Performers
117
118
60A good example is 14.44-51, his fear that Hektor will complete a boast and
the Achaeans will lose confidence in him.
61Pattison (1982) 16 makes the quoted observation in the course of examining
Agamemnon's blunders.
Heroes as Performers
119
Contrast with this hysterical accumulation the laconic style that begins Nestor's battle description: "I never saw such men nor may I
see" (1.262-65).
120
Heroes as Performers
121
122
65Note that this apparent modesty (ro.555-59) makes it seem that he had no:
divine help, when in fact Athena figured prominently in the raid-a fact he omitsi
~~.
Heroes as Performers
123
I24
Heroes as Performers
I25
I26
going together, the one notes before the other how there may
gain. One alone may notice, but his attention is shorter and his
ning intelligence thin" (ro.224-26).71 Or consider the
again to Nestor, when he rescues the old warrior with his chariot
briefly boasts how he took the horses from Aeneas (8. I02-rr).
artful silence, too, in the face of Agamemnon's flyting insult (4.
can be viewed as a stylistic victory over a king with whom he has. . .
traditional enmity.72 These attempts at developing a style must
seen, first of all, as complementing the Iliad's portrayal of
developing fighting skill, especially in Book 5. In turn, the roots
Homer's concern with Diomedes probably lead back to
traditions that surface later and independently in the -Cyclic epics.
Yet these traditional associations of the hero, particularly with the
role of Nestor's son Antilokhos, support my contention that the;
speech style of Diomedes, as well as his characterization, is consciously shaped.
The encounter between Glaukos and Diomedes in Book 6 must be
considered in this light. It is the turning point in Diomedes' education
in performance, as that affects his speech to enemies. After this, the
hero delivers several quite good flyting attacks, against Dolon (ro.369
and 446), Hektor (r1.36r), and Paris(r1.384). The last is particularly inventive, with its consistent feminizing: Paris is called a "girlwatcher" (parthenopipa, 385); his spear cast is like a woman's or a
child's, but the women and children ofDiomedes' opponents end up
lamenting (393); and there are more scavenger birds than women
around the foe's rotting corpse. Before his encounter with Glaukos,
however, Diomedes manages to assault with words only his charioteer Sthenelos (5.25r-73) and the unwarlike Aphrodite (5.347), despite the opportunity to confront Aeneas, to whom he addresses only
a curt "you missed" and a short threat (5.287-89). If the exchange
with his enemy is such an empowering experience for Diomedes, can
we say that the dialogue itself represents a mastery of a genre of
muthos, the usual mark of such authority?
I am inclined to affirm this by the prominence within Diomedes'
710n Nestor and "cunning intelligence" (metis) , see 23.315-18. Nestor's son
uses the same half-line at 23.590.
72See Brillante (1980) on ancient traditions that feature competing claims to
rule Argos by Diomedes and Agamemnon.
73For a summary and bibliography on this problem in Neo-analytic studies,
see Fenik (1986) 15 and Whitman (1958) 166-67.
Heroes as Performers
127
128
Heroes as Performers
129
appears Glaukos has read him the same way, and calls his bluff. The
fate of Bellerophon, wandering apart from men as he "devours his
own thumos" (200-202), remains puzzling, but perhaps its role in this
narrative is the conventional function of establishing the claim to be
better than one's ancestors (cf. Sthenelos' speech at 4.405). Glaukos'
portrayal of the collateral branches of his house as failures (6.203-5)
accomplishes the same status-raising function, as he can thereby focus
attention on himself, product of the surviving line.
Glaukos' tale of ancestry, then, may have factual information, but,
like any tale in an oral tradition, it makes sense only in performance.
The spontaneous details here gain an air of authority because one
assumes that the speaker has privileged information about his own
"local" tradition. But they are symbols instead in a game of dueling
narratives, important moves of muthos in the new sense I have proposed, an act of self-presentation that attempts to wrest authority.
If this were a conventional scene of flyting before fighting, the exchange of speeches would have ended in a mutual casting of spears. 76
This "duel" remains on the verbal plane; moreover, Diomedes gets an
extra shot. If we think of his reply to Glaukos as another attempt at
lethal speech, we can now reinterpret the story that he tells in this
second performance, how Oineus, his grandfather, played host to
Bellerophon and the two became guest-friends (6.215-31). As Julia
Gaisser notes, this tale is shaped to fit the situation, as are most
Homeric paradigmatic stories: "Bellerophon and Oineusmust exchange gifts because Diomedes and Glaukos are to exchange armor. "77 Her view, taking the Homeric narrator's design as its starting
point, could be sharpened somewhat if we consider the internal dynamics of Diomedes' rhetorical ploy. This is the only passage in
which such a "myth" of Oineus' meeting with Bellerophon is ever
mentioned because Diomedes has just invented the "tradition" in order
to force Glaukos into the socially correct ritual exchange. He speaks
to win, and does. There are enough hints in the text to make an
audience attuned to the conventions suspect his veracity and admire
his cunning. It is not accidental, first, that Glaukos had brought up
the them~ of xenia in mentioning the nine-day hosting ofBellerophon
(6.174); Diomedes retorts with a tale of a twenty-day hosting, putting
Bellerophon into his grandfather's debt (and so Glaukos in his). We
can see his creative expansion of "tradition" at work; the mention of
76S ee Fingerle (1939) 133 on the unconventional nature of the exchange here.
77Gaisser (1969) 175.
13 0
l
I,
Heroes as Performers
13 I
a~ire (as the poet of the Nibelungenlied does). Instead, two comple~entary systems, fighting and speaking, delineate his heroes. Both
are stages for performance of individual style, the latter the more
important. That the two leading characters are given a particular sort
of style tells us something about the poet's own art.
That there are two "creative" heroes at the pinnacle of the Iliad's
stylistic hierarchy lends unusual resonance to the poem, giving it the
complexity of musical counterpoint. In social terms, it also foregrounds once more the agonistic nature of performance in this tradition, which in turn highlights the symbiotic roles of enemies. Hektor
dead, Achilles cannot live on, because the heroes only exist as a pair,
shaping and defining one another through performance, much as
Diornedes and Glaukos determine each other's heroic worth, in consort, by exchange. Like detective and homicide, the opposed heroes
corne to resemble one another more than the rest of the world. The
poet expresses this in the transfer of Achilles' armor (17.213-14), a
trope praised for its psychological insight, but one with unnoticed
stylistic reference as well. For we can expect Hektor and Achilles to
"look" alike. The' problem for a stylistician becomes how to differentiate the pair. I suggest that this can be done, if we return to the
performative genres discovered through the study of muthos. 79
Both Hektor and Achilles give commands, but Hektor's are unusually ingrown while Achilles' negate themselves. Both heroes engage in flyting with riveting inventiveness. And (unlike Agamemnon), both have control of the genre of memories-and here they
differ widely. Hektor's recollections are of human speech. More than
any hero, he quotes others. Achilles, on the other hand, calls to mind
grief. If Hektor's memory-genre is praise, Achilles' is lament.
Oddly enough, the poetic ability of Hektor may occlude his capacity for command. I refer to Hektor's inwardness. This quality
emerges from his own words in a remarkable testimony by the hero
himself about his ability as a performer. When Ajax challenges him to
790f interest but less important for overall contrast are Hektor's use of picturesque language (Bassett [1938] 78-79); and his use of characteristic phrases, such
as "Trojan women with trailing gowns" (Gordesiani [1986] 78-80). Similar traits
have been observed in Achilles' speeches: see discussion later in this chapter and
in Chapters 4 and 5.
13 2
Heroes as Performers
133
I34
Heroes as Performers
135
136
Heroes as Performers
137
13 8
,",VJU,""OlU,[;iSll
uno
uno
Heroes as Performers
139
'I
140
that he has just left on the plain (6.362). Again, Achilles' npT'<:h"I'~;
larger. 93
How does sympathetic imagination prove itself in
then? One technique, as we saw with Odysseus, consists in the
first-person pronouns. Although Achilles makes use of this
start (1.59, 62), he makes deeper changes in the structure
speeches in order to accommodate the addressee in the act. It
unusual for him to explain to his audience why they should
when he urges the Achaeans to fight, he adds that "it is UU.J.H.Ult!
me, though powerful, to follow up on so many and battle
(20.356-57). A simple order to the Myrmidons carefully'
Achilles himself-"Let us not loose the horses yet ... but let.'
weep over Patroklos"-and cites, as explanation, "for this is the
ditional honor (geras) of the dead" (23.6-9). Another mark
Achilles' consideration for the persons he commands is his use'
indirect directives, a strategy we examined in Chapter 1 (e.g. 19.20
Thetis and 1.201 to Athena), and one unexplored by other heroes
the poem. The device of directing another to speak, "so that we
both know" (16.19), also gives us the impression that Achilles
about what his listener thinks.
Nor is this approach simply the Odyssean attitude, a way of
ing his audience by adjusting his speech to fit the hearers.
Achilles' commands are remarkable in that they seem to "negate"
notion of the speaker's authority to order. Achilles uses command
pass on that authority to others, as when he validates Kalkhas' s
in Book 1. In speech-act terms, it would appear that one "t-"111'1:~u"d
condition for a directive-that the speaker be in a position to issue
.
order-is actually jeopardized by the directives themselves. The de-'
nial of authority comes out clearly in the command to Phoinix, "Be
king equally with me and share half the honor" (9.616); in the granting of power to Patroklos to "rule the Myrmidons in battle" (16.65);
in Achilles' later commitment to obey all commands of Patroklos
(23.95-96); and in his directive-really an entreaty-that his companion's spirit "not be angered with me" (24.592) for having released
Hektor's corpse. There is a slightly odd sound to these at first, as if I
Achilles were telling his audience not to regard him as worth listening
to. But this self-deprecating strategy fits with Achilles' preference for
two-way communication between speaker and addressee. And of
930n this quality in his use of place-names, see Griffin (I9 86) 54-55.
Heroes as Performers
141
142
Heroes as Performers
143
144
Heroes as Performers
145
9 8 0n
I,
CHAPTER
147
148
1.49
Adam Parry had posed his essay as an attempt "to explore some of
implications of the formulaic theory of Greek epic verse. "7 On the
that the epic formula represents for the poet the single best
..,,,r..... ''''''lL for a given idea, Parry asserts that "the style of Homer
eJll.l-'lLa.,..~~~ constantly the accepted attitude toward each thing in the
and this makes for a great unity of experience."8 The argu.rnent continues with reference to Sarpedon's famous defense of the
heroic code (II. 12.310-28), the main point of which (honor equals
tangible goods) Parry finds to be agreed on by all Iliadic heroes. This
universal agreement is next compared to Homer's own formulaic
style. The crucial step in the reasoning of the essay comes with Parry's assertion that "the economy of the formulaic style confines
speech to accepted patterns which all men assume to be true"speech, thought, and reality are an undivided whole. Yet Achilles,
who seems to perceive "the awful distance between appearance and
reality," who distrusts the false front of Odysseus, is unable to fit into
this perfect Nominalist world. He is "the one Homeric hero who
does not accept the common language, and feels that it does not
correspond to reality," writes Parry. At the same time "neither Homer in his own person as narrator, nor the characters he dramatizes, can
speak any language other than the one which reflects the assumptions
of heroic society," those precepts uttered by Sarpedon. 9 Therefore,
Achilles' "misuse" oflanguage is needed to break out of the formulaic
system: it consists of his asking questions without answers and making demands that cannot be met; the former, when he questions the
need for the fight with Troy, the latter, his request that Agamemnon
pay back his disgrace. Adam Parry declines to discuss in detail the
great speech in which Achilles allegedly misuses his language, but
describes it as "passionate, confused, continually turning back on
itself," and takes this as another sign of Achilles' inability to fit the
heroic world. 10
The description might rather have been applied to the state of
scholarly discussion on Homeric style once Milman Parry's important work began to become widely known, especially through the
7 A. Parry (1956)
8Ibid. 3.
9Ibid. 6.
lOIbid. 5-6.
1.
ISO
.
writings of his collaborator Albert Lord. 11 It is helpful to recall
thing of this controversy in order to place Adam Parry's challeng.:,'
ing article in perspective; then we can examine the ensuing debates
on the "language of Achilles," and take new steps to solve the prob:lem. The first critical responses sought to save Homer's own "origi.., .
nality," the question of idiosyncratic speech on the part of epic characters being left aside for the moment. Milman Parry's discoveries
had raised four interrelated questions: How much of Homer is for..,
mulaic? What exactly is a "formula"? Does a proof of Homer's for.,
mulaic style mean necessarily that the epics were oral poems? And if,
so, how should one interpret repetitions within the poetry?
Of course, the question of whether Homer wrote had been asked
and answered in various ways since antiquity.12 Perhaps because it
was such an old question, Parry's answer received the most attention.
His suggestion that Homer was an oral poet gained ground because
his fieldwork in Yugoslavia far surpassed in accuracy and scope the
casual observations of earlier travelers acquainted with actual oral
poetry and, in addition, focused on a specific poetic technique-the
deployment of formulas within Serbo-Croatian heroic songs. The
analogy with Homer seemed compelling. Subsequent studies have
shown that the Serbo-Croatian material, while different in many
ways from Homeric verse, still has a claim to being one of the best
comparanda. 13 Parry apparently solved the historical problem, through
the demonstration that systematic formularity underlay Homer's art,
and the suggestion that this could only result from a long tradition of
oral performance and composition. The solution for a time overshadowed the continuing and perhaps more important literary problem of the "meaning" of the Homeric poems, as it did the more
technical unsolved questions about the definition of the formula and
the overall "formularity" of the epics. Acceptance of Milman Parry's
conclusions seemed to carry with it a denial that one could find "meaning" at the level of the individual Homeric word, phrase, or line.
Scholarship echoed contemporary politics: one was called "hard" or
"soft" on "Parryism. "14 Yet the contention of the "hard" Parryists,
llSee Foley (1981) 22-26 for a bibliography of Lord's work, and Foley (1985) for a
listing of some 1,000 articles inspired by Parry-Lord theory.
12For a summary, see Lloyd-Jones (1981); Myres (1958); and Davison (1962).
13See Kirk (1962) 87-88; Vesterholt (1973); Lord (1975) 12-13.
14The terms are those of Rosenmeyer (1965). Holoka (1973) traces the debates over
the Parry~Lord theory in the 1950S and 1960s, a contentious series of misunderstand-
151
ings and inaccuracies. For a representative selection of the work from this period, see
Latacz (1979) 297-571.
15See the debate with Adam Parry and Anne Amory Parry in Lord (1968) and the
response of A. A. Parry (1971). Lord (1960) 25-27, 68-98 discusses and illustrates the
art of expansion. Milman Parry had called attention to the creativity of certain singers
who knew the tradition thoroughly enough to improve it: see M. Parry (1971) 335,
406-7 (hereafter abbreviated MHV).
16This work took several tacks: some, like Whallon (1969) and Anne Parry (1973)
found "meaning" in the so-called ornamental epithets: others, like Edwards (1980),
Fenik (1968 and 1978 especially) and Beye (1964) concentrated on variatio technique
within type-scenes; Austin (1975) and Vivante (1970 and 1982) showed that the poet's
decision to use a formula, when the noun itself suffices, is meaningful; Nagy (1974
and 1979) starts from Parry's insight that all Greek epic is traditional in his own
explorations of the interplay among meter, diction, and theme. Hainsworth (1970)
37-38 has good examples of Homeric innovation. For further developments, see
Foley (1985) 35-41. Recent studies in other poetic traditions show how artistic talent
is revealed through the individual performer's exploitation of traditional material: see
Vesterholt (1973) 75-85 and Beaton (1980) 18. On the richness of Homeric style as
resulting from such free variation, see Bowra (1962) 32-34, Peradotto (1979) 5, and
Russo (1968) 294. Again, Parry was not unaware of the possibilities inherent in the
recombination of fixed formulas: see MHV 220, 270, 307.
17Austin (1975) 79-80.
152
that these labels do not limit the expressive power of the poet;
pressiveness" is simply posited at a different level. The ground
been cut from under Adam Parry's contentions about Achilles'
guage." In retrospect, it can be seen that the younger Parry
three unquestioned assumptions in applying his father's theory.
he used "language" to mean two very different things: as a
expression for" cultural code" or "value system," but also in the
of "diction." In Saussurean terms, when Adam Parry speaks
Achilles' inability to accept the "common language," he refers to
"signified," that is, the heroic code. When he says Achilles has
language" to express his disillusionment, Parry really means "no sig""
nifiers." Of course, his concurrent work on the logos/ ergon distinction
tempted Parry to make this semantic slide in discussing Achilles.
Thus, he was led to make a second assumption-that all Homeric
language is formulaic. Milman Parry, indeed, seemed to believe that
this was so (according to a remark by Antoine Meillet), but he never
specified in what way such a statement might be true, other than by
pointing out the existence of "formulaic systems" in Homer. 1S Nor
did he indicate the essential differences between such regular syntactic .
patterning and the noun-epithet "formulas." This brings us to Adam
Parry's third premise: his claim that the "economy of the formulaic
style" is what predetermines how Homer's figures speak. Even if all .
of Homer's works were "formulaic" in some sense, I believe it is still
the highly developed noun-epithet systems examined by Milman
Parry that exhibit "economy and extension," in a strict sense. There
may be only one way to say "Odysseus" at a certain point in the
hexameter line; there are a half-dozen ways of saying "Achilles was
angry," however. 19 If formulaic "thrift" is an illusion, if characters
can vary their expression at will-why should Achilles "misuse" his
language?
Adam Parry's ideas on the "language" of Achilles were not contested until 1973, when M. D. Reeve briefly and persuasively pointed
out that "neither an unanswerable question nor an impossible demand
18MHV 275-79. On the later transformations of this notion, see Hainsworth (1964)
155
19The notion of "economy," which Milman Parry derived from earlier work on
Homeric Kunstsprache, proved to be the strongest point in the demonstration of the
traditional nature of the noun-epithet system. See MHV 6-16. As Adam Parry points
out, the principle is open to criticism if extended to all Homeric repetitions: MHV
xxxi-ii. See further Russo (1971) 32-33.
153
is by its nature a misuse of language. . . that is; of traditional vocabulary," as Parry had argued it was in Achilles' speech at 9337-38 and
9.3 87. 20 Illogical as the demand to "pay back heart-rending injury"
might be, all-embracing and despairing as the question "Why must
the Achaeans fight the Trojans?" may sound-these speech-acts are
on a plane wholly different from that of the diction used to express
them. Although they may be prompted by Achilles' perception that
there exist constraints in a highly "formulaic" system of correct behavior in war, it is a mistake to equate that system with the system of
formulaic language at work in the poem.
The debate over the "language of Achilles" has continued on two
levels, although most articles bearing the phrase in their titles perpetuate the original ambiguity as to whether "language" should be
taken as "diction" or "thought." Most work, like that of Reeve, has
concentrated on investigating Achilles' words to show that he makes
traditional or nontraditional statements with them. David Claus's
"AIDOS in the Language of Achilles" falls into this category. Claus
leaves unexamined Adam Parry's premise that a system of ideas is
analogous to a system of poetic formulas. Instead, he observes the
tensions and contradictions in the heroic code even within the Iliadas when a hero must decide between two traditional modes of acting
(e.g. the decision of Odysseus at 11.404 whether to retreat or be
defeated). Given such explicit choices at the level of behavior, Claus
notes, we might expect similar possibilities for multiple choice and
meaning in the linguistic structure of the text. His commonsense
argument takes Adam Parry's reductionist theory to its logical end: if
the idea of a complete unanimity of logos and ergon is pressed, notes
Claus, "every statement made in the poem ... must be one that
supports entirely what are taken as the fixed ideas of the society, or it
cannot be spoken. "21 This sort of poetry would hardly lend itself to
characterization. Yet Claus shows that characters are distinguished in
the Iliad exactly on the basis of the way they speak about the heroic
code. Sarpedon (12.310-28) expresses a vision of heroism akin to
Achilles' own view, in its assumption that the hero battles not just for
his own glory and gain, but for the honor of having benefited his
companions without "pay." Achilles and Sarpedon can speak very
20Reeve (1973) 194. Kirk (1976) 74, while expressing reservations about A. Parry's
exaggeration of the rigidity of the system, nevertheless appears to accept his conclusion (at p. 207).
21Claus (1975) 16-17..
154
22Jakobson (1981) contains the classic definition of such forms, which include the
personal and deictic pronouns, as well as other grammatical markers.
23Nimis (1986) 219.
24Ibid. 220-21. Nimis here follows Friedrich and Redfield (1978) in equating rhetoric and language: see my later discussion. Cramer (1976) 301 rightly traces the
differences which A. Parry picked out in Achilles' speeches to the unique rhetorical
155
156
157
style. Indeed, Redfield and Friedrich must concede that several other
speakers in the Iliad command the same linguistic resources: Paris is
"direct" in his choice of words; Aeneas uses similes; Hektor can build
up a rhetorically elaborate series in his speech to Andromakhe in
Book 6. In this light, Achilles stands out because he consistently uses
certain devices, not because he monopolizes them. In addition, Redfield and Friedrich point out that Achilles can be contrasted with
other speakers in his avoidance of certain strategies: unlike Nestor,
Odysseus, or other characters, Achilles does not concede points,
make distinctions, anticipate his interlocutors' objections in argument, or offer multiple reasons for his behavior. But this is to say that
Achilles is simply a different character in the poem; it so happens that
literary "character" is constructed out of language; yet it would be
tautologous and misleading to assert that each character thereby has a
different "language. "30
When the analysis turns to those features that are actually "linguistic" at the level of sentence and clause, rather than at the level of
discourse, it becomes less assured and more speculative. Achilles'
speeches are found to contain more asyndetic expressions; more
subjunctives-perhaps he is more emotional; more elaborate and
combined vocatives, more titles of address, terms of affection and
abuse, emotive particles e and de-clear signs to the investigators of
his passionate nature and dominant relation with his peers.
Redfield and Friedrich do not analyze Achilles' speeches from the
point of view of the formula, other than to note that his words do not
differ from those of other Iliadic speakers in the number of formulas
per line. 31 They conclude, however, with a glance at the theory that
first gave rise to the "language of Achilles" debate. Apparently, they
proceed from Milman Parry's work without reference to later modifications in formula theory, when they assert that "if the choice of
adjective is less meaningful than in non-traditional verse sources of
meaningful variation are to be sought elsewhere-in the general
shape of utterances, in the use of rhetorical devices and in the choice
of particles, or particular highly-marked lexemes, or of marked syn30Ibid. 277-83. On the problems of analyzing "character" in modem poetics, see
Rimmon-Kenan (r983) 29, and on the problem of attributed direct speech in fiction,
Martinez-Bonati (r98r) 30-)2.
31This was one of nearly thirty criteria, ranging from phonology to metrics to
clause-structure, which they checked and found to be nonidiosyncratic in Achilles'
case. See Redfield and Friedrich (r978) 283
!I
il
I'
158
159
160
34See Cantilena (I982) 23n.9 for the list of analyses. Segal (I97I) comes closest to
the goal of combining literary appreciation with formula analysis. For exemplary
close formulaic analysis of other oral poetic traditions, see Davidson (I983 and 1985)
on the Iranian Shah nama and Barnett (I978) 534-60 on Indic epic.
35A. Parry (I966) 12. See his further remarks on the illusion of formulaic inflexibility at A. Parry (I972) IO.
360n the history of attempts to prove orality by formula quantity, see Miller (I982)
28-38.
r61
r62
believe that the uncertainty regarding the relation of the two monumental
especially in the light of such recent work as A. Edwards (1985), esp. II-13,
ing the competitive stance of the Odyssey-poet and the echoic nature of certain
and characters in the Odyssey-compels one to restrict the background, in order to'
avoid calling "formulaic" many lines and expressions that occur only in this speech
and in a restricted number in the Odyssey. To my way of thinking, such iterata are
more likely intentional reworkings of language familiar from Achilles' speech, and
composed with the assumption that an audience will recognize them as coming from a
particular character and context. This is not to say that one must be an Analyst in
considering the two poems: both could be oral compositions, and yet show such
responsions, especially if they are indeed by the same poet, or by two poets in an
agonistic performance situation. Contemporary Nigerian oral poetry affords the best
example, to my knowledge, of the way in which certain themes and ways of narrating
them can come to be associated with one particular poet, even though the performer
in question has never set them down in writing under his name: some virtuoso oral
poets among the Hausa are credited with creating a bakandamiya, "poetic masterpiece," which they consider their favorite song and which they have reworked, expanded, and polished for years. Their reputations are based on these large-scale compositions. See Muhammed (1981).
40MHV 272. This does not include echoed phrases, anaphora, or polyptoton, he
notes.
r63
164
42Hainsworth (I968) esp. 39-45 outlines the various ways in which flexibility is
achieved in the formula. Nagy (I974) showed that correspondence between kleos
aphthiton and Vedic srtivas tik~itam extends to their metrical environments, and that
these, in turn, suggest that the hexameter originated as an expanded lyric line. On the
choice between the metrical and the semantic explanations of formula, see Cantilena
(I982) 45-62.
43S ee Ducrot and Todorov (I972) I39-42 for a concise discussion of these concepts.
16 5
166
44I believe that the first factor explains the almost universal occurrence of the noun
makhe after the trochaic caesura. It has this position in the most common formulas,
but keeps it also when the poet does not "expand" the line by using the full formulas.
See Martin (I983) 67-69.
45Note that this is a shift from the usual practice (e.g. Lord [I960] I43) of using
broken underlining for diction that resembles other formula types: my broken underlinings indicate that the word in question, or a form of the word,. itself recurs in the
slot in question.
46In using as background the single poem, I am taking Lord's dictum that the
formula has meaning only in performance (see Lord [I960] 33) to its logical end: the
formula has significance as "formula" only in the space of a performance.
167
I suggest that the underlinings, and even more so, the frequent
marks that separate "paradigmatic" formulas in the speech of
n.".~--' give us graphic proof of the primary tenet held by field~C ~Ir."r" in oral literature, Lord in particular, that every song is both
traditional and completely new. Having seen the formulaic poet working this way, we cannot help being reminded of an
archaic metaphor: that poetry is carpentry, literally a tekhne in which
the poet consciously fits and rejoins small pieces to make a crafted
whole. 47
__
n.9.307
310
315
320
325
330
(continued)
47Finley (1979) 33. On the roots of the poet-as-carpenter metaphor in IndoEuropean poetics see Schmitt (1967) 14, 297-98.
168
CHART
1. (continued)
335
340
345
350
355
360
vf]a~ E[.tU~,
365
370
aii'tLC,;
169
375
380
oiJv
385
390
395
400
405
410
415
170
CHART
1. (continued)
420
425
17 1
Types of Repetition
My method of determining the "new" and "old" uses of formulas
in Achilles' speech depends on two assumptions: that there is a range
of repetitions 'in Homeric poetry, and that repeated expressions do
not occur in a vacuum. We will review the potential for creating
meaning at each level of repetition shortly. Here I am most concerned
with the level that is most amenable to stylistic analysis, and most tied
to a higher tier of formulaic art. Just as formulas in the narrative are
organized according to theme, as Lord showed, and themselves imply given themes whenever they recur, so formulaic expressions in
speeches are organized according to "genres of discourse." These
small "genres," which I have examined at length in Chapters 2 and 3,
comprising threats, boasts, praise and blame, prayers, prophecies,
and several other categories based ultimately on individual speechacts, will be the primary tool for my analysis.
If we examine the formulas in Achilles' speech in terms of their
appropriateness to one or another genre of discourse, attested elsewhere in the poem, we can establish the larger background which is a
prerequisite for making statements about the foregrounded "language
of Achilles." This technique is especially useful in those cases where
Achilles mixes genres, for we can be led by a few formulas to trace
the genres involved, and thus to see what Achilles leaves out in reshaping the conventional ways of speaking about certain topics. The
method can help us to open up the Iliad, so as to study its construction
as a monumental epic. 49 When working at this level of discourse,
although I approach Achilles' speech from the point of view of oral
traditional poetics, I find myself in agreement with the insights of
workers in ,another area of Homeric studies, the Neo-analysts, on the
fundamental premise that certain portions of Homeric epic allude
with intention to other specific contexts. But whereas Neo-analysts,
491 have explained the notion of "genres of discourse" more fully in applying it to a
problem in Book 8 of the Odyssey: see Martin (1984) 30-32,
172
173
174
175
530n the phenomenon of such formula runs, see Janko (1981) and Hainsworth
(1976).
176
i77
intentional recall. When a line recurs more often, and shows afwith other formulaic lines, we are obliged to examine the
of each occurrence for variations. Near the start of Achilles'
we get one such line (9.314) which occurs two other times in the
(9.103, 13.735) as the introduction to speeches of mild rebuke
advice. When Nestor and Polydamas begin in this way, there is a
implication that the listeners (Agamemnon and Hektor, rehave erred. Nestor discreetly places this line after his elabcaptatio benevolentiae which explains the advantage Agamemnon
wi1l gain from hearing him out (9.96..,...102). Polydamas, the younger
.man, is less discreet as he rebukes Hektor right from the start (13.726,
<'ExtoQ, <l!-tllXav6; EOOL 3taQaQQ'l1'tOLOL 3tL8to8m) and goes on to imply that Hektor does not have his own gift of v60;. In both speeches,
the autuQ EYWV line leads into brief analyses of the status quo. Nestor
notes that no better plan has been found (9.104, v60;-cf. 13.732)
and thus by indirection refers to Agamemnon's faux pas; Polydamas
mentions the dangerous extended position of the Trojans. Both
speakers sum up their advice with exhortations to take counsel: 9. 112,
<j>Qa~w!-tE08' -cf. 13.741 E3tL<j>QaooaL!-tE8a ~01JAiJV. Compared to
this norm, Achilles' speaking strategy is deviant: instead of stating the
status quo, he leaps into the future, asserting that Agamemnon will
not persuade him (9.315). The triad of denials in lines 315-16 takes us
into a past-continuous tense; finally, we are shifted to a general statement of the status quo by means of another triadic structure (3 18-20).
While these lines perform the function of the corresponding statements of grievances by Nestor and Polydamas, they take the form of
general statements about types-the "good man," the "one who
stays," and so on-the referents for which remain in doubt. The
more informative ouM 'tL !-tOL 3tEQLxELtm (321) likewise drifts into
general statement (witness the repeated aLEL of317 and atEv of 322).
In fact, Achilles never states a single grievance, but floods us with a
multitude. The systematic reshaping of the norm extends even to the
"offer of advice" feature of the rebuke speeches. Instead of a firstperson plural hortatory, Achilles uses a third-person <j>Qa~to80)
(347). This deviation fits with a larger one: unlike Nestor and Polydamas, Achilles is advising Agamemnon in absentia. The distance
perhaps encourages him to heap blame on his advisee: the command
to "let him take counsel" forms the summit of yet another triad, the
minatory imperatives ("let him take pleasure," 337; "let him not try
me," 345). Furthermore, I have called Agamemnon the "advisee"-
178
but Homer at this point has placed four men in Achilles' pn~se:nCf~:i.i
each of whom could be the true advisor to the hero. We might
...
this is another deviation, from sociolinguistic patterns, in that Achill.es'
even presumes to use the <llJ"tuQ EYWV line in such company.
.'
The full analysis of such repeated formulaic lines requires that we .
look also at what could have been said but was not. This is dearlya.
vast project once we begin to study. anything more than a few lines.;'
Yet the insight gained into Homer's construction of character is
sometimes worth the effort. Our perception of a speaker's tone de"pends precisely on such cues as can be created through the poet's
selection of one variant. The line we have been investigating reminds
one of a different but related formulaic line, displaying the same
structure: aJ.Jloo bE "tOL EQEW, aU 6'EVI. <j>Q?OI. ~aAAEO ofjm. Although
Achilles at 9.314 uses the "advising" formula, he does so with the
more aggressive tone usually encountered when a speaker employs
this second formulaic line. Achilles himself had used the line to
threaten Agamemnon with bloodshed (1.297). With a similar hint of
anger, Zeus warns Hera that she will not always get her way (4.39).
The fixed value which the line seems to have in the rhetoric of the
poem appears again when Hera concedes to Zeus the right to save his
own son, Sarpedon (16.443):58
"Do so-but all we other gods do not approve.
Yet I shall tell you something else. . . ."
179
180
181
182
alokhon thumarea
phileous' alokhous
aner agathos kai ekhephron
Hellesponton ep' ikhthuoenta
eressemenai memaotas
esti moi
khalkon eruthron
karos aise
psamathos te koilis te
thumalgea loben
gunaika massetai (or gunaika gamessetai)
kourai aristeon
eikuian akoitin
ptoliethra ruontai
psukhes antaxion
Ilion ektesthai
lainos oudos
xantha karena
ameipsetai herkos odonton
kleos aphthiton
The last item on this list brings us once more to the paradox that
diction which can be described as innovative, when compared on the
synchronic level with the rest of the Iliad is highly traditional when
considered from a diachronic perspective: a phrase can be quite "new"
and yet very old. For kleos aphthiton, "unwithering fame," represents
a combination of words which dates to the Indo-European period, as
Adalbert Kuhn demonstrated in 1853, comparing the phrase with the
identical Vedic srava(s) ak~itam. The work of Gregory Nagy has now
shown that the metrical shape of the phrase, as well, presupposes a
common Indo-European prototype and represents within Greek "a
fragment of Indo-European versification. "61 Despite this heritage,
the phrase has been labeled by other scholars a chance innovation,
because it occurs only here in Homeric poetry and employs the adjective as a predicate, with estai. In this view, it was invented because the
poet sought an alternative to the more common kleos ou pot' oleitai to
avoid repetition of the verb in that formula. 62 Yet the flexibility of the
61Nagy (I974) I4I. See also Risch (I987). For collection and analysis of other IndoEuropean poetic phrases, see Schmitt (I967).
62For this interpretation, see Finkelberg (I986). Nagy replies to this argument in a
forthcoming work, Pindar's Homer: The Lyric Possession of an Epic Past.
183
184
185
work, fusing the genitive into the syntax of his sentence in line 339,
rather than leaving it as a noun modifier. A third instance is at 9.400:
geron ektesato Peleus substitutes a verb in pl~~e of the usual epithet
hippelata (e.g. 11.772, 9.438, 18.331). In addltIOn, we have seen that
the ancient formula kleos aphthiton is also remade by the addition of
the verb estai. 66
Thus, the close analysis of noun-phrases automatically leads us to
consider how verbs are employed in the speech of Achilles, to discover whether, in general, their use is idiosyncratic (even if their placement is not). I will sketch out two ways in which Achilles' verbal
expressions in this speech differ from other such phrases in the Iliad.
First, his language differs at the level of semantics and pragmaticsthat is, his verbs relate to objects and events in the world of the poem
in unparalleled fashion. Moreover, through his use of verbs, Achilles
can often be classed with a small group of speakers, usually gods or
the poet himself, who are the only other users of certain expressions. 67 Second, Achilles' use of verbs quite often represents a deviation from patterns visible elsewhere in the poem, either of the placement of the verb within a particular speech or of the associations that
the verb has with other verbal expressions. (The latter aspect is in
turn related to the different rhetorical strategies that the poet chooses
to give Achilles.)
The first set of deviations begins to confront us right from the start
of Achilles' reply. After a conventional greeting (9.308), he informs
Odysseus that he will refuse Agamemnon's offer completely (apelegeos apoeipein). The verb has two meanings in the Iliad. When not
directly connected with the story of Achilles' anger and reconciliation, it means "report" (as in 23.361, 7.416, both line-end). The other
seven occurrences cluster around Books 1, 9, and 19, where there are
66Sakhamyj (1976) 76 observes that a similar reshaping occurs in line 9.409: instead
of the usual subject ("word") in the phrase "passes the barrier of the teeth" we have
here "spirit." On the unusual placement and reference of lainos oudos (404), see
Ramersdorfer (1981) 193.
67This also occurs with a few noun phrases in the speech: for instance, Achilles uses
aise (9.378) in what appears to be the older sense, "measure, estimate" (c Leaf[19001902] 1.418), as opposed to the derived meaning "fate" (c 22.477, 24.428-in this
slot), and he is consistent in this: at 9.608 he uses it in the same way to speak of being
honored "in the estimation of Zeus" (c 378 tio and 608 tetimesthai). The only other
time the noun means "estimate" is in the frozen expressions kata aisan and huper aisan.
An example of phraseology shared by only Achilles and the poet: thea Thetis arguropeza (410), which occurs six other times, but only in the narrator's voice.
186
I87
i
Ii
188
Only here does a speaker use the phrase to refer to what is in another's
mind, as if Antilokhos has shifted into the role of narrator, explaining,
to the audience what Achilles is thinking.70 Compare with this the,
similar formulas in which Homer foretells the dashed hopes of
Agamemnon, at the beginning of the poem, and of Achilles near the,
end: (2.36, Dream leaves Agamemnon) "to. <j>QOVEOV"t' avO. 8uf.tov, a-i
{?' ou "tEAEw8m Ef.tEAAOV and (18.4, Antilokhos comes to Achilles to
report Patroklos' death and finds him) "to. <j>QOVEOV"t' avO. 8uf.tov a. ()~:
"tE"tEAE<Jf.tEV(l ~EV. Agamemnon's ignorance and Achilles' premonitions frame the narrative but also provide vivid capsule characteriza-.,
tions, at two points of particular emotional intensity in the poem;:
The disjunction between thought (phroneont') and outcome (teleesthai, .
tetelesmena) produces pathetic irony when the concepts are juxtaposed
in a single line: by contrast, Antilokhos' reading of Achilles' thought
process (23.544-54) is dramatized with comic irony, as a piece of
negotiation in which the outcome is not what has been thought.
Antilokhos plays the role of an angry young man disappointed by
the division of spoils-that is, the role that Achilles has just aban~
doned at this point in the poem. Antilokhos swears, "I will indeed
be angered if you complete this utterance" (note telesseis at 23 543).
He goes on to reject the alleged basis of Achilles' decision, and
calls for another gift, painting Achilles as that hero had portrayed
Agamemnon: rich in possessions but unwise in their distribution
(23.549-52).71 The contrast between this scene in Book 23 and the
700n Antilokhos as clever rhetorician, see Nagy (1983).
71 As often in the Iliad, we get the impression that a character has heard the previous
poetic narration: Antilokhos here seems to be throwing back at Achilles the latter's
unique way of speaking about his possessions: compare 23.549, Eon tOL ... with
9.364-67, EOLL be !lOL !lUAU 11:0AAU. Note also that Antilokhos' impetuous argument
189
Thus, while thought and outcome at the narrative level are predetermined to diverge, at the level of speakers' discourse within the poem
the one can influence the other-a fine narrator's trick for creating the
illusion of fictive freedom.
The other passage in which the ta plus phroneon phrase is used
prospectively appears to have been constructed with equal attention
to the characterization of Achilles. Phoinix uses the expression to
explain his personal motivations for caring for the young Achilles.
Thinking that a curse was preventing the gods from "bringing offspring to fulfillment" for him, Phoinix attempted to treat Achilles as
his own son (9.493-95: note the disjunction between phroneon and
exeteleion, thought and outcome). The rhetorical technique here is
that used by Hektor in his brief reminiscence at I7. 225, cited earlier: a
speaker analyzes his own state of mind at some important point in the
past, in order to influence his present audience. Again, the poetic
technique behind the display of this strategy aims at creating a sense
oflayering, by showing us characters with a permanence of memory
and purpose. That the same two-word expression (ta phroneon) is
employed so consistently to introduce such rhetorical strategies gives
us more reason to think each small expression in Achilles' speech can
be fruitfully compared with its congeners.
Thus far, the comparison with other occurrences of the verb phroneo has shown us that it appears in patterns that are significant for
moving the narrative forward by focusing on motivations. At times
by anticipation recalls the characterization of Achilles, who had guessed what Kalkhas
had to say (I.90-91). Further touches reminiscent of Book 1 in this scene are Antilokhos' use of u<j>mQTjoE06m (cf. I.230, u3tomQi06m) and his echo of Agamemnon's refusal to hand over Khryseis (cf. I.29: "tTiv 0' eyoo ou Mo<.O; 23.553: "tTiv 0' eyoo
ou 0000<.0.), as also the assertion that he will fight for the mare (23.554)-a contrast
with Achilles' yielding up ofBriseis (I.298: XQot !lEv OU""coL Ey<.Oy !lUXTJoo!lm). The
recognition of a kindred young heroic spirit prompts Achilles' famous smile here
(23.555).
190
At other times, if the speakers are gods, the pattern built on the
seems to function as a linguistic politeness gesture, revealing llUUlJ.Il2"
of the speaker's thought, but inviting further discourse:
(18.426-27) and Aphrodite (14.195-96) perform this way,
their visitors to candor by saying:
aMa 0 'tL <j>QOVEELC;. 'tEAEOaL M. f.LE 8'Uf.Lo avwYEv
EL Mvaf.LaL 'tEAEOaL yE xal. d 'tE'tEAEOf.LEVOV EO'tLV
191
god speak alike. For Achilles, first, uses phroneo to mean "I think,"
without any hint of the meaning "I am disposed toward someone in
thinking. " The depiction of Achilles even before Book 9 has prepared
us for this sort of absolute isolation; I point out simply that this can be
documented by formulaic analysis as well. Second, Achilles like Zeus
does not reveal his thought, even when he most explicitly claims to
value candor. This is an important piece of evidence for the complex
characterization of Achilles as a master speaker. He appears to speak
his mind, after asserting that he must deny the previous offer. But the
topic he then brings up immediately is, instead, the necessity for
others to speak what they think. The poet has constructed a variant of
the politeness gesture used elsewhere in the type-scene of "visit": the
host invites discourse from his guest, but, in Achilles' case, the host
also maintains a tight control on the conversation, is self-assertive
rather than receptive. He employs the same notions, but, instead of
saying "speak what you think" and "I shall fulfill it," Achilles reflects
back on himself: "I must deny the offer ... in the way that I think
and the way it will be fulfilled." As we shall see shortly, the final
phrase of 9.310 is also deviant when considered against the usual
patterns and it is this that creates the arrogant tone we recognize in
Achilles' opening gambit. 72
The principle invoked earlier-that coherent patternings of deviation from a norm make for "style" -can be successfully applied to
this speech. Several other uses of first-person verbs in this speech
relate Achilles to the figures of gods. Only Zeus, for example, uses
the pattern of 9.397: 'tawv flv x' Efh~AWf,tL, <j>LA'Y]V :n:OL~OOf,t' UXOL'tLv.
He does so in a similar context, expressing his ability to choose
whatever he wishes (in this case, whatever speech-act): DV 6E x' EyWV
... E8EAWf,tL vofiom (1.549).73 And only Zeus says "tell all as I command": compare 2.10, :n:av'ta. f,taA' &.'tQEXEW~ &'YOQEUEf,tEV w~ EJtL'tEAAW, with Achilles' words (9.369): 't<j) :n:av't' &'YOQEUEf,tEV w~ EJtL'tEAAW. In both cases, the ultimate recipient of the message is Agamemnon. 74 The god Poseidon is the only other speaker to mention
720n this line, Ameis and Hentze compare 8.415: lptELAl]OE KgovolJ :11:(':iL';, ~
in which the adverbial Ti modifies "he will complete" (said of Zeus' threat):
Note that, in Achilles' version, the adverbial phrase seems to go with both verbphrases: he makes thought and action one process, just as a god who threatens.
73The more immediate model is in the previous speech, 9.288.
74Furthermore, the idea of "telling all" is itself rare in the poem; it is mentioned as a
task possible only for a god, not for a poet (12.176), and treated as an unusual request
from his divine mother by Achilles (1.365).
'tEAEEL :n:Eg
I9 2
193
his life, and at the same time furnishes his killer with words for the
future (in which the victim ultimately gains some memorial). The
man who is addressed by this line gives twice, to the living (eukhos)
and the dead (Aidi). At the same time, this utterance collapses distinctions, by reducing "boast" and "soul" to counters in a game of warexchange. The equivalence of the boast and the life which paid for it is
represented iconically by the careful balance of sound and meter in the
line, with eukhos initially and psukhen-another two-syllable word
with medial kh-at the other emphatic position, after the penthemimeral caesura. The repeated line, then, is itself a memorable
piece of verbal art.76 For a poet who had used it often, only a slight
extension of the metaphor "giving life to Hades" could produce the
more arresting image that Achilles uses, "gaming with my life in
fighting." And we might detect an echo of the more traditional expression in Achilles' reference to the gates of Hades (3 I2).
The emotive quality of Achilles' discourse has led others to compare him to a poet. 77 I shall explore later the way in which the hero
fits the role. For now, we can note that as well as using similes more
often than any other figure in the Iliad Achilles also mimics the poet's
own voice in his use of smaller phrase units and single words. 78 The
expression in the second half of 9. 324, for example (xux&~ 0' uQu 0'1,
3tEAH ulrtfi) is paralleled only by phrasings of the narrator, two in
particular: when Patroklos answers Achilles, to be sent on the mission
that eventually ends his life, the poet comments xuxoii 0' uQu 0'1,
3tEAEvaQxi] (II.604). This technique offoreshadowing creates a momentary distance between audience and actors of the tragedy. In the
same way, pathos results from the narrator's interjection of a brief
biography at the death of Phereklos, son of the carpenter Harmonides, who "had made the ships for Alexandros, the ill-beginners
(arkhekakous) that were an evil for the Trojans and himself." Achilles
uses this poetic sort of expression in the same way, to increase the
emotional response to his own fictional world of the simile. Within
the same group of lines, another instance of Achilles' poetic voice
comes in his use of diepresson. The word occurs at 326 in the first760n the antiquity of the formula ending this line, see Ivanov (1980) 74-76.
77See, for example, Friedrich and Redfield (1978) 277; also King (1978) 21, Maehler
(1963) 9-16, Whitman (1958) 195. The fullest comparison is by Gerlach (1870) 35-37
78Moulton (1977) IOO-IOI lists eight Achillean similes. He compares the bird simile
in this speech with other images, in the narrative, of mothers and children. See also on
the image Randall (1978) 74-78.
194
195
196
of reaching agreement with Hera: she may harry Troy now, says.
Zeus; his turn will come.
Achilles, thus, shares with Hektor a pattern of speaking about his.
wishes. With Agamemnon (and no one else) he shares the distinction
of saying "I honor" within the Iliad. At 4.257, Agamemnon claims to
honor Idomeneus above all the Achaeans-the motivation for his
feeling is not given, only the spheres to which it applies (war and
wine in particular). It is Agamemnon, again, who provides the model
for Achilles' words at 9.378, 't(oo () flLV EV 'XaQo~ a'LOn (line-end),
when he promises in his offer of marriage to honor Achilles as a son
(9.142): 'tELooo bE flLV loov 'OQEo'tn (line-end). Achilles' refo~mulation
of Agamemnon's words is an expressive expansion of the type we
shall investigate shortly. Achilles combines the patterns, whereas other mentions of time refer either to a generous granting of respect
(4.257,5.325-26,6.173,16.146,17.576), in which case the degree of
respect is explicit (e.g. malista, peri pases, prophroneos), or to a withholding of respect (9.238, 13.461), in which case the fact is simply
noted. Achilles denies that he feels respect toward Agamemnon, but
rather than simply stating the fact, he specifies, hyperbolically, the
extent of his disregard: "I honor him not a whit. "
Even the handful of examples reviewed so far has sufficed to show,
first, that the poet reshapes traditional phrases to give them individualized reference, thus creating the illusion of an interiorized, Achillean
language; and second, that we-the uninitiated audience-must
search out such reshaping at the level of formulaic usage patterns. In
other words, to read Achilles' speech properly, we are obliged to
reread every scene in the Iliad in which any phrase of that speech
appears. Just as the analysis of noun formulas led us to investigate
verbal expressions more closely, so this step takes us into a study of
larger units of discourse. Now that we have seen Achilles' deviation
from the normative usage of certain individual verb expressions, I
shall present the most important instances of his variation from these
larger patterns. Whereas the study of the former showed that
Achilles' "voice" is unique, resembling as it does that of the gods and
the poet, the latter set of variations will demonstrate that Achilles'
overall performance in Book 9 depends on a quite rare strategy of
verbal ornamentation, which I call the "expansion aesthetic." Achilles
"speaks" like the poet, it turns out, because, in Achilles' words, epic
poetry reveals its own precise mode of composition.
197
198
tentative aL XE J"tLe'Y)m to the more urgent au 6' '(OXEO, J"tEL8EO 6' lJf.tLV
Achilles makes the choice of words instead of deeds; he will go on .
defeat Agamemnon, symbolically, by being the best performer
the verbal level. In his reply to the goddess at 1.216-18, he affirms
theological correctness of his choice with a gnomic statement: the
who "is persuaded/obeys" the gods gets favor in turn:
Xgi) !-lEv o<j>wL1:Eg6v yE, SEa, EJtO~ dguooaoSm
xat !-laAa JtEg SV!-lcj'> XEXOAW!-lEVOV. d)~ yag a!-lELVOV .
o~ XE SEOL~ EJtLJtELerl1;m, !-laAa 't' EXAVOV (lV'tOV
199
In a similar way he reproaches his horse Xanthos for making predictions of doom (I9.420). With a slightly different formula (formula 2),
which echoes Sarpedon's instructions to Glaukos (I6.492-93), he
threatens Hektor before killing him (22.268-69):
viiv OE !-tuAa XQlJ
aLX!-tT]1:'rlV 1:' E!-tEVaL xaL 8aQoaAEov :n:oAE!-tLO"t'rlv.
These passages show Achilles using the common formulas normally, but his speech also contains the only instance of variation for
formula I, at I9.67-68:
viiv b' ll1:OL !-tEV EYW :n:auw x6Aov, OME 1:( !-tE XQlJ
aoxEAEw atEL !-tEVEaLVE!-tEV.
This shift disturbed ancient critics: Apollonius Sophistes in his lexicon wanted to bring the passage into line by reading se instead of
me. 84 Yet the line is surely referring to Achilles' wish to give up his
anger, and the variation is doubly significant because it occurs in an
important speech which completes the refusal announced in line
9.307. Achilles thus differs from other users of this phrase in that he
makes it refer to himself, whereas other contexts show it referring to
the necessity for others to do something. Furthermore, in the other
instances, the genre of discourse in which the phrase appears is either
84S ee also the remarks of Ameis and Hentze (1905) on 19.67.
200
201
oMe d
Two final examples in this genre of discourse mention the need for
speech: significantly, both occur in Book 9. At the end of the episode,
Ajax admits to Odysseus, within the hearing of Achilles, that the
muthos of the withdrawn hero must be reported (9.627). At the
beginning of the book, Nestor speaks as advisor to Agamemnon.
After a rounded introduction, the structure of which recalls a hymn
to a god (cf. 9.97), Nestor brings up the topic of rhetoric: Agamemnon has the power to speak, to listen, and (like Zeus) to validate
another's authority to offer advice. 89 Nestor implies that Agamemnon is thus empowered to approve his own attempt to persuade
Achilles. His speech is an affirmation of speech, a call for gifts and
soothing words. In the foreground of his remarks, as in those of
Achilles at 9.307- 1 7, is the power of Peitho, that effective speech
which makes Iliadic society cohere.
Keeping in mind the conventional deployment of khre phrases elsewhere in the poem, we can return with fresh insight to the first words
of Achilles. It now appears that his words are distinctive not only in
the'positioning of the "need" phrase, at the head of his statement, and
in the joining of khre with men, but, more important, in relation to
larger patterning. One usually says khre to speak about fighting, or
about speaking: Achilles explicitly denies both topics in his opening
statement. He will not fight, nor do his interlocutors need to speak to
him about the decision. Achilles' denial of the effectiveness of speech
goes beyond the usual expression, which heroes use to silence one
another for the moment. It becomes an abstract principle. If Achilles
resembles any other hero in this use of an idiosyncratic pattern, it is
Nestor; there is a strong hint that the young warrior deserves to be
ranked with the oldest as both speaker and instructor of the niceties of
speech. 90
89For the notion of divine authority contained in the verb kraiaino, see Benveniste
(1969) 2:35-4 2 .
900n speaking as an important aspect of the Indo-European tradition of prince
instruction, see Martin (1984).
202
2.
20 3
204
'
20 5
"il
CHAPTER
20 7
these are highly marked lines, as well, since they finally cap the long
list of impossibilities with a seemingly concrete condition on which
Agamemnon might persuade him-one that turns out to be an impossible demand. This memorable couplet attracted Adam Parry's
attention for good reason: 1 would only point out that a good part of
its power comes from the repetition, for the third time, of the topic of
persuasIOn.
208
Returning to Achilles' phrase at 9.315 with this earlier run of formulas in mind, we see at once that Achilles' words subtly vary the
emphasis of this phrase while retaining its meaning. Instead of focusing on himself as actor, he puts the burden of persuasion on
Agamemnon: "Me he will not sway I expect" (with the Greek wordorder retained to reproduce the effect). Furthermore, the next lines
allow us to see that the formula is switched so that the poet can make
Achilles deny all forms of persuasion on the part of Agamemnon:
neither he nor the troops will trust their leader. The technique of
expansion in this line has added another object to the verb, a variation
not found elsewhere. Such small expansions as this can help create the
impression that Achilles feels more deeply, sees over a vaster range,
and articulates in a manner different from that of his companions.
The exact words peisemen oio occur also in Diomedes' speech to
Sthenelos at 5.252, in a discourse that resembles Achilles' great refusal
in several ways. There is a declaration that the hero is going, despite
objections (5.256; cf. 9.356-61) a reference to future attainment of a
goal, deo volente (5.260; cf. 9.362); and a verse drawing attention to
the discourse itself (5.259; cf. 9.314). But notice that the effect we get
from the expansion of the "persuade" phrase in Achilles' speech is not
to be found here. Instead, the usage is much closer to that in the
exchange of Book 1, a direct denial that the interlocutor's attempt at
persuasion will work. Achilles, distant from his audience (Agamemnon), can expand the denial of persuasion into an insult of greater
proportions, suggesting that Agamemnon is impotent to command.
We might term this technique of filling out a formula "internal
expansion." As we saw, one recurrent expression is involved; added
to it is a further modifying phrase. The introductory section of
Achilles' speech also exhibits two other kinds of expansion worth
examining: th.at in which two expressions normally united are split so
that other sentences can be inserted; and that in which some elements
209
lThis line shows the far more common word order hils kai introducing the final
phrase. The reverse order, entailing epic correption, is found in 9.3 10, but almost
nowhere else in the Iliad as far as these two words are involved.
2Also, with different verb tense, see 1.388: t]3tEtATJOEV llii8ov, 0 bi) 'tE'tEAEOIlEvO;
EO'ttV.
210
words, the second half ofline 310 "belongs with" the first half ofline
314 (ajoin that can be made with no change for the sake of meter).3 I
am far from suggesting that interpolation is the cause for this "split,"
unless we understand the word to mean the poet's own introjection of
different material into the middle of a formulaic line or lines, for
artistic reasons.
The inserted sentences in this split expansion constitute another
form of expansion, which I have termed replacement. We can discover this expansion at work in lines 3 I 1-13 by examining one word in
particular-keuthei, which was underlined, on our formulaic analysis,
because it occurs here in the same slot as the same verb in a formula:
exauda me keuthe nooi. The formula occurs three times in the poem.
The pattern is significant. At 1.363, Thetis consoles the weeping
Achilles by asking him to speak his mind: E~a:uba, !-til 'XEu8E vo<p,
'(va E'Lbo!-tEV u!-tcj>w. Achilles' reply is the direct cause of the subsequent destruction of Achaeans; when the havoc has reached a crisis,
Patroklos, in tears, entreats his companion, and Achilles replies using
the formula that Thetis had used at a similar juncture (16.19). Achilles
listens; Patroklos soon dies; to Achilles once more comes Thetis. This
time, as if she already knows his grief, she omits the second part
of the formulaic line (18.74-75): E~auba, !-til 'XEu8E. 't<l !-tEv bi) 'tOL
'tE'tEAEO'taL / E'X L\LO; ... The three occurrences of the phrase thus
mark three main stages of the narrative. The poet seems to use it as a
refrain. In context, the phrase has two other purposes: it characterizes
the tender relations between Achilles and Thetis, and Achilles and his
companion; and it introduces speech, in such a way that we assume
the following words are the candid outpourings of the speaker who is
addressed. Achilles appears to employ the same rhetorical strategy,
but, once again, with a difference. His opening sally against the "man
who hides one thing in his thought and says another" is, after all, a
request for full disclosure, but Achilles directs this call to himself, and
then fulfills it by speaking his mind at length. He reshapes and redirects the expected pattern by expanding the idea in me keuthe to
a hyperbolic, two-line expression of hatred for the concealer. He
switches the second-person address (still present in 9.311, truzete) to a
third-person description of an ambiguous foil-figure, keinos. 4 The
3T~is is in fact the reading of the vulgate at 9.314.
4The technique can be found in Pindar, the poet with whom Friedrich and Redfield
cpmpare Achilles: (1978) 278. Cf. Pindar, Parth. 2.16.
211
212
213
shape: aAA08Ev aAAor;.7 Whereas Zeus' direct and blunt style in this
speech is emphasized by end-stopped lines, Achilles' tone sounds
more rational because his syntax is more complex: he uses hos and gar
to connect what in Zeus' speech are three separate elements. The
effect of the conjunction and particle is fluidity: we seem to get a
rational explanation of his behavior from Achilles. Furthermore,
rather than calling his interlocutor "most hateful" (although the
thought underlies his words), Achilles mutes his expression to the
simpler "hateful is that man." The couplet 9.312-13 is grammatically
subordinated to 3 II, itself subordinate to line 309. In both the speech
of Zeus and of Achilles, the lines form a separable introduction,
directed to an interlocutor who has made a complaint: note that both
speakers shift the topic abruptly after the rebuke (5.895, all' ou man;
9.314, autar egon).
We have seen how the expansion technique affects the tone, and
ultimately the characterization, within the space of several lines. Because expansions, particularly those of the splitting and replacement
varieties, obscure the formulaic models on which they are. built,
Achilles' "language" comes to sound unique. This can be observed in
greater detail, first, in two passages of the speech that deal with the
central topics of reward and love; and, second, in a number of lines_
that exhibit "telescoping" of formulas which is caused by expansion
of other formulas.
The idea presented in the second half of line 316 recurs twice in
terms that help illuminate the passage in Book 9. When the poet
describes the death of Iphidamas at Agamemnon's hands, the tone is
that of the most haunting of Homeric obituaries: resigned, factual,
yet tense with restrained emotion. The victim "fell and slept the
bronze-hard sleep, pitiable man, away from young wedded wife,
fighting for his townsmen-the wife, from whom he had no joy,
though he had given much (for her)": XO'UQL<>L'Y]r;, ~r; ou 'tL X<lQLV 'L()E,
JtOAAa. ()' MWXE (II.243). Here, as often, kharis signifies both pleasure
and reciprocal giving, reciprocity itself being a "pleasure" in the
world of Homeric epic, and a sign that the cosmos is operating prop7Note that the word, applied to Ares at 5.83 I also, appears to 'mean in context "one
who switches sides. " By contrast, the phrase, at 9.3 I I is less well grounded in context.
Homer, expanding in Achilles' speech with the previous passage in mind, may thereby have been led to improvise a scenario in which three speakers assail Achilles'
resolve, "one from one side, one from another." The expansion technique tends to
ramify in this way, as we have seen.
214
215
2r6
lar passages in the poem; the two later passages are not ''''''''''1:1
identical, in that the second omits two lines which add -....~ .'v~
color to the first. Contrast Achilles' narrative (r6.56-59):
XOUQ'I']V ilv aQu f,LOL YEQU ESEAOV uIE 'AXmwv,
bouQI. b' Ef,Lcj> X'tEU'tLOOU, :rtOALV EU'tELXEa :rtEQOU,
'tl]V &'\jJ EX XELQWV EAE'tO xQELOJv 'AYUf,LEf,LVOJV
'A'tQEtb'l'] 00 EL 'tLV' (hLf,L'I']'tOV f,LE'taVU<J't'l']V
with the story told by his mother a short time later (r8.444-45):
f
21 7
2I 8
13The only other time this placement of Dii occurs is at 10.16. The contracted form
hira occurs also at I 1.707, coupled with a form of the verb rezo and with a dative
indicating a single set of recipients.
14We might speculate that the second half ofline 370 is built on the model of such
lines as I. 17, 23.272, and so on, in which Atreides and "other Achaeans" are named;
the enjambed word Atreides in 369, occurring in the slot it occupies in the formula,
would then have prompted the poet to end the next line as he did.
21 9
220
!J.OLgClv fl' ou nvu <PTJ!lL ltE<pUY!lEVOV !l!lEVClL <xvflgoov ou xClx6v, oME !lEv foSMv,
fnilV 'ta ltgOO'tCl yEVTJ'tClL. Into this gnomic statement, Achilles has inserted movement
and conflict through the mention of honor and fighting strength.
16This is not simply the working of the alleged erasure phenomenon in oral cultures, on which see Vansina (I985) 120-23 and Abrahams's (I985) critique ofOng. As,
I pointed out earlier, audiences evaluate performance within the Homeric poems: the
speech-act must be rhetorically effective as well as new.
221
EYW (325, 342); and obtaO' lXWflaL (393; with different desinence,
4 1 4). That the phrases are repeated for the sake of rhetorically full and
emphatic discourse can be corroborated from other internal repetitions. Consider the following on the phonetic level:
j
f
I
f
1
I
aJt'Y]AEYEW aJtoELJtEiv
(309-initial assonance)
[.t0iga [.tEVOVLl ... [.tuAa ... JtOAE[.ti~OL
(3 18-alliteration)
Jtaga~aAA.6f-tEVO JtoAEf-tL~ELV
(p2-alliteration)
ll[.tata aL[.tatoEvta
(p6-assonance)
bESU[.tEVO bla Jtauga baouoxEto
(333-alliteration)
E[.tJtEba xEitm ... E[.tEU b' aJto [.tOUVOll 'Axmwv
(335-assonance)
[.tEll JtELgutW ... f-tE JtdOEL
(345-double alliteration)
[.tOYl bE [.tEll EXCPllYEV ogf-tY)V
(355-alliteration and assonance)
v'Y]Y)oa Eii vfja
(35 8-assonance)
f-tuAa JtOAAU ta XUAAlJtOV
(364-consonance)
yE YEga
(367-unparalleled repetition of particle and noun)
EgL~OL / loocpagL~OL
(389-90-assonance)
The climax of the repetition of sounds comes at line 388: xouQ'I1v 0'
OVYUflEW 'AYUflEflVOVO~, which makes a pun on the name of Achilles'
adversary by equating it with the preceding verb phrase: "The daughter I will not marry of No-marriage. "17
Repetition of forms of the same word occur throughout. The recurrent words act as refrain devices, foregrounding the five central
concerns of the hero: note the forms in phil- (340, 342, 343); polemiz(318, 322, 326, 35 2); kour- (388, 396); akoitin (397, 399); Atreid- (332,
339, 341). Repetition is subservient to more extended parallelism of
syntax which in turn represents either analogy or polarity in thought.
For example, the line-initial expressions at 331 and 336, exelomen,
heilet', while parallel in position and derivation, are vivid contrasts in
meaning. 18 Occasionally, it seems as if the argument is being carried
on solely by means of such associations of sound. Thus, an elaborate
chiasmus based on contrast of verb forms in 368-77 seems to equate
Agamemnon's robbing of Achilles with Zeus' robbing of Agamem17David Packard noted this paronomasia during a lecture at Princeton, 20 November, 1984. Claus (1975) 18 detects another wordplay in line 318: moira can mean both
"death" and "portion."
18C parallelism for the sake of contrast in 313; 323-24; 325-26; 328-29; 33 1-32;
406 -9; 4 12- 15; 4 29.
222
non's wits: autis ... heleto (368); elpetai exapatesein (37I); ek gar;
apatese (375); autis ... exapaphoit' (375-76); ek gar . .. heileto
The most memorable portions of Achilles' speech depend for
power on this sort of parallelism: his assertion concerning the
coverability of man's life (406-9) not only abolishes
formulation, but takes on authority by being cast in terms of
morphologically related adjectives. And the syntax of his
concerning his own choice of fates mirrors, in its paired "v.uU'U'JU:;~
the content: syntax here is iconic (4I2-I5). Just as powerful, but
a triplex rather than binary structure, are the denials at 3I5-I7
out', ouk . .. ) and at 3 I8-20 (with progressive contrasts of six
all of whom have the same fate). Over a wider expanse, such
structures are themselves made into a trinity of denials: first, oud' .
tosa doie (379), oud' hosa (twice, 38I), oud' ei ... tosa qoie (385),
... peisei' (386); next, ou gameo (388), oud' ei (389), oudt-min hos
(39I); and finally, ou ... antaxion oud' hosa phasin (40I), oud' hosa .
oudos ... eergei (404-note the paronomasia of negative with
noun meaning "threshold"), oute leiste / outh' helete (408-9).
i
The ultimate result of repetition, then, is the construction of a
cohesive and forceful speech. The narrative attests to the power oj
Achilles' discourse, so that its success, on the level of style, is explicit
his audience is silent in amazement at the muthos (9.43I). By speak~
ing so well about his resistance to persuasion, Achilles, paradoxically,
persuades. We have seen the devices by which Achilles/the poet produces such victorious discourse, and I have shown that deviations a1
the level of formula are to be explained by reference to the scope oj
this particular speech, which demands that traditional expressions be
expanded themselves, or telescoped for the sake of expansion at another point in the text. Now it is time to draw conclusions; I offel
two, in brief: first, that the "language of Achilles" is none other that:
that of the monumental composer; and second, that the poetic rhetoric of the narrator, in turn, is that of a heroic performer in the role 01
an Achilles.
The first perhaps seems tautologous; it has already been said that aI
Iliadic heroes, not just Achilles, "speak Homeric." Yet, while that i~
true if we are discussing morphology and phonology, the evidence 0
formulaic diction tells us otherwise-Achilles, as Adam Parry intuited, does not speak quite like the others_ In seeking to find reason:
for his deviations, at the level of diction, we have been led to the
223
higher linguistic structures, beyond the phrase and into the realm of
rhetoric. And at this level, Achilles can be seen to use a rhetoric-the
art of disposing and arranging words-similar only to the poet's
own. In other words, we assume that Homer could have expanded
formulaic diction in the speeches of any other hero so as to produce
dicourse as complex, inward-looking, and pleonastic as Achilles'. But
he did not; he fully reveals all the possibilities of his own poetic craft
only in the extended speech of Achilles. The effect is to make Achilles
sound like a poet, as critics have remarked so often. We can now say,
however, that the reasons Achilles sounds like a performer lie deeper
than such techniques as the use of similes. The similarity arises because Homer, when he constructs Achilles by means of language,
employs all his poetic resources and stretches the limits of his formulaic art to make the hero as large a figure as possible. In short, the
monumental poem demands a monumental hero; the language of
epic, pressed to provide speech for such a man, becomes the "language of Achilles."19
There is one further piece of evidence in Achilles' words in Book 9
to suggest that in Achilles we hear the speech of Homer, the heroic
narrator. Only Homer and Achilles refer, in speaking, to the possibility of endless expansion. Achilles says "not even if Agamemnon gives
ten and twenty times as much will he persuade me" (379). We have
just seen that this denial is expressed within a tripartite structure, each
section of which is also triplex. Form contrasts with context in the
expression: although the limits of wealth are considered, and refused,
the expression of refusal itself is hyperbolic, verbally full, "excessive." I have suggested that this rhetorical auxesis adds weight to
Achilles' verbal defeat of his adversary, as he simply outtalks Agamemnon; I shall trace the consequences of this view shortly. For
now, we must put this speaking strategy-referring to a wealth of
possibilities and then dismissing them-in context. It turns out to be
on a par with the poetic technique which later comes to be called
recusatio, and which Homer himself uses in the proem to the Catalogue of Ships. Just as he is about to begin the most elaborate listing
19Several studies mention the stylistic consequences of monumental composition,
without mentioning the effect on direct speech in the poem. See Kirk (1962) 15960,178 and Kirk (1976) 19, 36, I09, 203-4; also, Hainsworth (1970) 37-38 and Miller
(19 82 ) 44-45
224
225
226
227
228
The only other passage in the poem to mention sacking a city, ships,
and a specific number (in this case, of ships) is 5.638-42, part of the
battle-boast Tlepolemos makes to Sarpedon:
aAA' oLDv nvu <pam ~l.lJV 'HQaXAlJELlJV
ElvaL, E/lOV JtaLEQa 8QaOU/lE/lVOVa 8U/lOAEov'ta
o JtO'tE 6EiiQ' EA8wv EVEX' LJtJtWV AaO/lEbov'tO
E~ OLn oUV vlJuol xaL avbQum JtauQo'tEQOLOLV
'IAl.ou E~aMJta~E JtDALV, X~QWOE b' aymu.
Clearly, the mention of Troy's sack in these lines performs the same
function as the reference to Achilles' raids: it is part of the warrior's
rhetoric of egoism, the verbal performance that authenticates his martial acts. But there are telling differences between the two passages.
Tlepolemos boosts his own status by referring to his father, Herakles,
who sacked Troy in the previous generation, with six ships and a few
men. Achilles boasts of his own sacking, not of one city, but of
twenty-three towns around Troy. 29 His act is bigger; the expanded
two-line expression of his deeds fits the exploits.
If we consider only quantity, Achilles, although not destined to
take Troy, has already surpassed the most important hero of his
father's generation. The difference in size between the two heroes'
achievements is explicit in the doubling of the number at the beginning of 9. 328-twelve (cities) versus Herakles' six (ships); the formula is expanded semantically, as it were, as well as spatially. We
should not think that this similarity of expression between 9.328-29
29La Roche (r878) 24 observes that the Iliad actually names only six of these.
229
230
A Conclusion
Iliad, in an attempt to overcome the long years in which the poem has
been a text, to regain some sense of the poem as performance. I have
claimed that the poet had a word for "performance" in the sense of
authoritative self-presentation to an audience. I used this wordmuthos-to gain access to the genres on which heroic style relies:
commanding, flyting, and acts of memory. And I investigated the
style of the most expressive hero, Achilles, concluding that his
"language" -and not any other hero's-was none other than the
foregrounding of Homer's own aesthetic. But if we have established
thereby some contact with the performance of the epic, what are we
to gain, as readers of the poem, at this distance? Two practical results,
in the first place, I believe arise from hearing Homer's voice in
Achilles. A third result, less practical but perhaps more important for
our understanding of archaic Greek life, comes from seeing the heroic
assumptions that produce the monumental epic: from proposing, in
other words, that Homer composes like his heroes.
For the first result to make sense, we must return for a moment to
the notion of contact and distance. In the light of comparative research into epic, the Iliad as we have it appears two-dimensional
because we have little sense of an audience hearing the poem. This
goes against the grain of the Iliad's own representation of the act of
important speech, sinc~ all but a handful of its hundreds of quoted
speeches take place before a critical listener or group of listeners. It
232
233
234
235
convention for both establishing contact and at the same time keeping
distance between himself and the audience of the Iliad. By assuming
the voice of Achilles, making the hero's performance as monumental
as his own, and using turns of phrase in Achilles' voice that only
Homer as narrator uses elsewhere, he turns the figure of Achilles into
the "focalizer" of narration. The "authorial knowledge" possessed by
Achilles-his ability in Book I to say why Khryses came, or how
Agamemnon thought-is not then an accident of composition, but a
poetic strategy. 14 In a way, this is to validate the notions one sees in
both Hesiod and Plato regarding the relation between a narrator and
narrated speech. Both assume that, to a large extent, the poet takes on
the role of the speaker in his poem. To the eighth-century poet, the
overlap is a status-raising device, in that his Theogony shares in the
authority of divine speech. By the fourth century, such shape-shifting
mimesis is thought dangerous to the soul by the philosopher. 15 Whatever the reception of this strategy, I believe its consistent deployment
by Homer with regard to Achilles can help explain two long-standing
critical problems in the Iliad: the use of apostrophe and the dual verbs
in Book 9.
Adam Parry first made the fullest argument for the view that the
poet's rare use of direct address to certain figures in the Iliad and
Odyssey is only partially determined by metrical necessities in a rigid
system of name formulas. Heroes thus addressed-Menelaos and Patroklos in this poem-are "all in other ways treated with particular
concern by the poet" and are "represented as unusually sensitive and
worthy of the audience's sympathy. "16 More recently, critics have
located the motivation for apostrophizing less in a regard for character and more in the creation of emotional effect, to increase the poignancy ofPatroklos' death or highlight the themes of protection and
responsibility for which they are the focus. These are certainly the
intended effects of apostrophe in other narrative and lyric traditions. 17 If we ask, however, why Patroklos alone is given prime
attention, apostrophized eight times in the course of a single book,
140n this feature, see de Jong (1985), esp. 15. On focalizers, see Rimmon-Kenan
(1983) 71-85.
150n Plato, see Detienne (1986) 22. On the Muses, Walsh (1984) 27-33.
16A. Parry (1972) 9.
170n the emotional effect, see M. Edwards (1987) 37; on theme, Block (1986) 160.
The apostrophe is often used in the Malay oral performances viewed by Wrigglesworth (1977) 106. For its use in Central Asian epic, see Hatto (1980) 305-6 and
Chadwick and Zhirmunsky (1969) 45-46. In general, see Culler (1981).
236
237
stance of Achilles and uses the speech habit again (duals) associated
with this stance.
Thus far, I have offered practical explanations based on my finding
that Homer as narrator carries over into the poem certain habits that
properly belong to Achilles as focalizer. My third proposal does not
attempt to answer an old critical dilemma. Instead, encouraged by the
evidence that Homer throughout the Iliad pays exact attention to the
style and effect of heroic speech, I wish to ask how Homer himself
conceived of poetic speech. What speech-act does the poem make?
This particular question has not been asked before, yet the general
theoretical question of the status of fictional communication has
aroused much interest. 22 Homeric poetry may have something to add
to the debate.
Nor do we necessarily face a dead end on encountering, in the
invocation to the Iliad, the line "Sing, goddess, the anger of Peleus'
son Achilles" (I. I). In Chapter I, I argued that the taxonomy of
speech terms is culture-specific. The same applies to notions of singing. Among the Maori of New Zealand, instrumental music is
classified as a part of "song," and both, ultimately, are regarded as
part of "speech. "23 If performances of epic in other traditions are of
comparative value, it seems that the word, rather than musical accompaniment, is primary; "sing" does not imply melodic performance. 24 And surely Homeric poetry struck later critics, especially
the Romans, as akin to oratory rather than song. 25 The reader finds it
today to be rhetorical, "conceived as a massive utterance, inspired by
the Muse, following its thread independently of an author's will," in
one critic's view. 26
Homeric diction does not pose the poem as an utterance, neverthe22Critics such as van Dijk (I976) 45-50 argue that the literary text does not represent an actual speech-act, but an imitation of one. Searle (I979) 58-75 points out that
no strictly textual property enables us to distinguish between "real" and fictionalized
speech-acts, however; at most, we can say that the illocutionary act behind the latter is
one of pretending. Levin (I 976) I 48- 55 believes that the opening of a poem contains
an implicit performative, to the effect "I imagine myself in a world and invite you into
one in which .... " For a survey of work on literary speech-acts, see Ihwe and Rieser
(I979)
23Hymes (I974) 31. See also Bauman (I978) I2-I3
24Bowra (I952) 39. I choose not to rely, as Austin does (I975) 65-66, on the term
"epic" for evidence that the Greeks recognized a continuing association between the
poetic genre and the meaningful "word," since Koller has shown that the genre term
derives from the use of epos (utterance) to mean "line of verse."
25Cf. Cicero, Brutus 40, Quintilian IO.47-51.
26Vivante (I970) 5.
238
239
rated within a tradition of tales about his exploits. As with the traditional singers of the massive Kirghiz poems about the hero Manas,
the sheer effort of performing the Iliad would have earned him a place
in popular tradition as a hero. We can still appreciate his overpower.:.
ing art in the Iliad's recording of the language of heroes. 30
300n the Kirghiz epic poets as legendary heroes, see Ba~gi:iz (1978) 318f. Wrigglesworth (1977) 105 describes a performance that resembled a test of physical endurance.
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Bibliography
Index Locorum
Iliad
Book I
25
33
65-67
74- 83
93-96
I3 I -47
20I-5
207-9
2I6-I8
220-2I
245-46
254-84
259-74
273
27 8-79
287-89
29 I -9 2
295-96
326
363
379
387-88
388-4 I2
4I9- 2O
426 - 27
545
549
555
57 I
582-83
22 and I14
23
40
40
40
II5
32
49
I98
23
82
IOI
80
I04
97
207
II8
20 7
22
2IO
22
22
I4I-42
26
208
57
I9 In73
58
37
2I
Book 2
IO
26-27
IOI-9
I88-89
I98-20I
2I2- I4
225-42
245-47
335
36I
386
433
4 88-9 2
79 6-97
I9 I
49
86
23
23
I7
II2
I09
37
I04
II9
37
224
III
Book 3
38-62
39-55
I50-5I
I66-80
2I2-I7
2I2-23
2I4-I5
22I-22
398-99
459- 60
75
I35
III
88
IS
95
IIO
I7
20
II8
Book 4
40-42
286
320
I95
II4
I03
257
Index Locorum
323
337-42
35 0
35 0-55
35 6-57
412
104
32
29
70
69
23
Book 5
30
II6
420
47 1-76
632-54
63 8-42
652-53
715
816-17
889-9 0
19
187
37
73
127
228
194
28
38
212
3 0 7-4 2 9
310- 14
315
316
323
32 8- 2 9
340-43
35 8
369-72
3 87
40 6-9
493-95
496-97
58 8
608
6 1 3- 1 4
644-45
645-47
7IO
Book 6
54-6 3
21 5-3 1
337
376
44 1-4 6
459-61
479
38n88
129
38n88
134
133
130
13 6
Book 7
89-90
161
235-4 1
242-43
277
284-86
35 8
137
83 and 108
132 and 217
195
40
40
15 and 23
Book 8
7-9
8
14 1-44
228-30
28 3- 84
415
Book 9
31-33
) 34-4 1
50-62
II3
121-27
158-61
160-61
! 173
I
232
55
29n74 and 39
104
83
II6
52
12 5
24
25
22
21 9
II6
98
37
64
Book IO
47-52
212-14
249-50
540
Book II
13 0-35
186
243
30 5-9
44 1-45
454
604
642-43
671
788- 89
793
170-9 6
209
208
214
204
228
21 5
218
218
20 7
219
18 9
199
36n8 7
186
199
40
142
37
II9
10 5
94
28
203
41
21 3
36
124
36n8 7
193
39
lo7n46
38
104
Book 12
80
16
Book 13
219-23
45 8
72 6
726 - 28
74 8
74
190
177
133
16
Book 14
63
85-9 2
10 7-8
126-27
195-96
103
121
II7
25
190 and 2II
Index Locorum
208-10
212
234
38
38
39
Book 15
45-46
202-4
28 3- 85
557-5 8
192
42
37 and 68
135 n86
Book 16
33-35
56-59
200-201
20 3-6
236
433-35
538-40
63 I
829
859
62
216
72
142
39
56 and 178
80
200
33
133n83
Book 17
142- 68
695
214
16n51
Book 18
74
316- 18
324
426- 27
444-45
210
36
28
190
216
Book 19
23- 27
67-68
81-82
107
121
146-53
149-50
216-20
242
33
199
II7
II7
18
80
200
97
28
Book 20
203-4
24 6-5 0
356-57
449-54
16
17
140
34
Book 21
92-96
182-91
17 8
86
259
28 5-87
286
44 1-45
48
19
83
Book 22
107
126-28
25 0-5 1
268-69
281
45 1
454
482
138
138
84
199
135
16n51
16
211n5
Book 23
6-9
244
306-7
471-84
478-79
544-46
549-52
791-9 6
140
2II n5
108
76
201
188
188nII
74
Book 24
107
109- 10
200
518-5 1
57 1
744
762 -75
58
59
87
34
23
35 and 38
87
Odyssey
Book I
367
37
Book 2
15
188-89
37
23
Book 15
166
37
Book 16
345
37
Book 23
300-3 01
39 n8 9
Hesiod:
Theogony
27-28
105
General Index
Apollo, 58
Apostrophe, 235-36
Arabic poetry, 225n22
Ares, 19, IIOn5 I
Arete, 93
Aristarchus, 12In63
Artiepes, 135
Assertives, 72
Ateires, 75
Athena, 19, 22, 26, 32, 48-49
Audience,s, 88-89, 94, 121, 23 I
participates in performance, 232-33
within poem, 60, '63, 135, 222
Augury, 205
Austin, Norman, 99, 151, 226
Bahamas, storytelling in, 99
Bakhtin, M. M., 43n3
Balinese shadow theater, 9
Bauman, Richard, 8, 93, 161
Bellerophon, 128
Benveniste, Emile, 13
Biebuyck, Daniel P., 233
Blame, 56-58, 75, IIO
Boasts, 29, 172, 192-.93, 228
Bolling, G. M., 14
Burkert, Walter, 229
Burundi, speaking culture in, 92, 96
Bynum, David, 2, 2n4
Calhoun, George, 3 I
Central Asian epic, 6, 9, 46, 67, 227n28 ,
232, 234, 239
and apostrophe, 235nI7
261
General Index
Chamula, II-12
Chantraine, Pierre, 15
Chomsky, Noam, 5, 154
Claus, David, 153-54
Commands, 44, 47, 59, 62-63, 66
Commissives, 72
Composition in performance, I, 81, 85,
129-30, 164, 230
Constatives, 52
Contest of Hesiod and Homer, 94nI3
Cor Huso, 93
Correption, II2, 232n3
Couch, H. N., 19
Cramer, Owen, 99
Crete:
ethnography of, 23, 67, 90, 143
poetry of, 6, 6n2 I
Crowley, Daniel, 99
Cuna,226
Cynewulf, 100
Dais, 116
Dalang, 9
Davidson, O. M., 229n30
Demodokos, 9
Detienne, M., 13
Diomedes, 23-25, 70-72, 86, 143, 229,
238
language of, 125
Direct discourse, scholarship on, 46
Directives, 32-34, 114
Dual verbs, 235-37
Ebeling, H., 14
Edwards, Walter, 71
EnnBpe, 238
Epanastrophe, 138
Epea, 17
synonymous with muthos, 30
Epea pteroenta, 30. See also Winged-words
Epic:
African, 6nI9, 234
definition of, 13
Filipino, 234
Indic, 100, 160n34, 232
Karakalpak, 6nI9
Mayan, 7
Serbo-Croatian, 99, 150
Swahili, 94, 225n22, 232
Turkic,234
Uzbek,6nI9
Epos, 14, 16, 28
in dative case, 20
definition of, 12, 13n43
as epic, 13n42
formulas, 21
as gnomic utterance, 42
later development, 42n94
unlike muthos, 16, 22, 29
as physical act, 18
as private speech, 37
rate of occurrence, 20n64
similarity to muthos, 14, 26, 29
Esti, 202, 203n91
Ethelo, 195
Ethnography of speaking, 225
Ethopoiia, 96, 158, 159n33
Eukhomai, 12
Eustathuis, 127, 148
Expansion:
internal, 208, 218-20
of patterns, 2 I 5
by replacement, 210-13, 220nl5
by splitting, 209-13
of tradition, 129
Expansion aesthetic, 196, 205
Fenik, Bernard, 3, 45, 124
Fine, Elizabeth, 7
Fingerle, Anton, 46
Finley, John, 166
Firth, Raymond, 66
Fish, Stanley, 158
Flyting, 47, 68-75, 107, 124
Focalizer of narration, 235-37
Formula, 8, 79, 93, 150, 152, 159
in Achilles speech, 166
analysis of, 160
definition of, 163
economy of, 8n30, 79
and ethnographic tradition, 92
flexibility of, 164
and genre of discourse, 171
new technique for detection, 160
structural, 165
telescoping of, 213, 215nII, 216-17
Fournier, H., 15
Friedrich, Paul, 156-57
Gaisser, Julia, 129
Genealogies, 127
Genre, 66
of discourse, 42
within Iliad, 225
as social institution, 43-44, 85
Gladstone, W. E., 35
Glaukos, 126-28, 131, 205, 214-15, 220,
238
Gnomic utterance, 51, 102, 104, 125, 192,
198
General Index
Goffman, Erving, 4
Goold, G. P., 2n3
Gordesiani, Rismag, 98, 100
Gossen, Gary, I I
Grice, H. P., 67
Griffin, Jasper, 3n6, 45n8
Hainsworth, J. B., 2, 3n6, 163-64
Hapax Legomena, 179-81
Haya, 67, 103
Heduepes, 102, 105
Hektor, 16, 19, 33, 75
and blame, I3 8
and fame, 133
and flyting, 134-35
language of, 77, 131, 217nl2
and memory, 136-37
as performer, 84
Helen, 20
Hephaistos, 21
Hera, 21, 28, 48, 57
HerakIes, 228-30
Herald, 4In91
Hermes, 48-49
Herzfeld, Michael, 4, 23, 67, 90, 93, 161
Hesiod,235
Hofmann, Eric, 15
Hogan, James, 155
Homer:
creativity of, 2, 150-5 I
fixed text of, 7n26
as hero, 239
Homokle, 128
Hymes, Dell, 66
Icelandic saga, 45n8 , 93
Idomeneus, 76
IlIocutions, 32, 121
Indo-European poetry, 68, 85, 102, 164,
167n47, 232
Insults, 44, 71
Iris, 50
Irish poetry, 85, 91, 105n43, 23 2
Jakobson, Roman, 14
Kakridis, J., 172
Karagheozis, 9
Kata moiran, 97, 102, 142
Kelly, Stephen, 1I3
Kharis, 213-14
Khre, 197-98, 200-201
Khryses, 22
Kleos, 61, 105, 109, 1I6, 1I8, 133
aphthiton, I 64n42, 182-85, 224
General Index
Near Eastern poetry, 215
Neikos, 42, 68-69, 7 1-7 6 , 83, 94, II3
Neo-analyst criticism, 4nII, 17 1
Nestor, 21, 23-25, 52, 54, 59-61, 70, 80,
""}QI",J06=9_"_
language of, 82
nd use of genre, 106
Nibelungen Ie , 13 I
Nigeria:
oral poetry, I 62n3 9
speaking culture, 9 I
Nimis, Steven, 154
Notopoulos, J. A., 163
Odysseus, 9, 29, 61, 63-64, 70
and Achilles, 212
and Agamemnon, 123
contrast with Nestor, 81-82, 121
language of, 99, 120
Odyssey, 9, Ion35, I62n39
Oikhalias Halosis, 229
Oineus, 129
Old Comedy, 9
Old English poetry, I55n27
Old Norse poetry, 214
Oneidea, 16- I 7
Ong, Walter, 66, 227
Onomaze, 19
Oral culture, 226
Oral poetry, 1-2. See also Composition in
performance; Formula; Performative:
of oral literature
Oratory:
as genre, 44, 66
and political power, 60
Packard, David, 22InI7
Parallelism, 222
Paris, 15
Paronomasia, 70
Parry, Adam, 2, 99, 120, 148-50, 152,
179, 205, 235
Parry, Milman, 2, 8, 10, 13, 31, 78, 9 8,
148
Patroklos, 33, 62, 77, 235
name of, 81
Peleus, 144
Performance, 8, 47, 62
of oral literature, 4
personal, 225
as self presentation, 88
Performance-centered approach to verbal
art, 5nI6, 7n27
Performance utterance, 41, 104
Persuasion, 49, 198, 201, 206-8, 222
Phemi, 194-95
Phem~io~~---------------~
roneo,
,
Pindar, 95nI7, 102, I83n63, 21On 4
Plato, 7
Poema de Mio Cid, 27n7I, 100
Poet, assimilation with hero, 94, 233-34
Poetic contests, 229, 23 8
Polydamas, 16, 133
Popol Vuh, 7
Poseidon, 19, 48, 57n2 3
Praise, 55, 58-59, 75, 108
Prayer, 38, 44
Priam, 33, 145
Prin, 155
Prince instruction, 20 In90
Puknos, 35
Puns, 123
Recusatio, 223
Redfield, James, 156-57
Reeve, M. D., 152
Repetition:
and contextual surplus, 174
and formulaic art, 170
whole line, 176
Rhapsode, 7n25, 45
Ricoeur, Paul, I74n52
Risch, Ernst, 238
Russian formalism, 161
Russo, Joseph, 163
Salmond, Anne, 66
Sarpedon, 153
Scully, Steven, 155
Searle, J. R., 31, 52-53
Shahnama, I60n34
Shamanism, 234nI2
Shive, David, 2
Shtal', Irina, 95
Silence, 143
Similes, I93n78, 20 4
and language of Achilles, 193
Snell, Bruno, 98
Somali oratory, 103
Song, as part of speech, 237
Speech:
length of, 226-27
model of s. event, 14
styles, 95-96
terms for, 10-12
types of, 18
typology of s. in Homer, 47
Speech act, 12, 21-22, 31-32, 52
General Index
Speech act (cant.)
in Homer, 72
theory, 5
Status, 50; 96, 129
Style:
characterization by, 100
as deviation from norm, 191
levels of, 159
Stylistics, 90, 99, 101, 156, 158
and analysis of Homer, 161
Supplication, 44, 147, 203
Svenbro, J., In!
Tedlock, Dennis, 7
Teikhoskopia, 95
Tekhne, 167
Thamyris, 229-30
Thersites, 17, 23-24, 67, 109-10, 117, 135
language of, 112
Thetis, 19, 22, 26, 139
Thornton, Agathe, 9
Threats, 209, 212
Thucydides, 148n6
Whitman, Cedric, 3
Winged-words, 5, 30-35, 84
Women, speech of, 38, 87
and traditional language, 184
Word:
and deed, 27, 76, 91n3, III, 120, 146nl
not equal to deed, 17
Zeus, 48, 50-51
language of, 53, 56
similar to Achilles, 2 I 3
will of, 190
Zufii Indian poetry, 7
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