βοὴν ἀγαθός
The epithet βοὴν ἀγαθός has been used four times in Iliad 10 already, for both Menelaos (10.36, 10.60) and Diomedes (10.219, 10.241), as it is used elsewhere for these heroes in the Homeric epics. We take the opportunity to examine in detail the epithet βοὴν ἀγαθός here because an argument has been made (Machacek 1994) that this particular use of it, in this line, has a special meaning, one that should make us reconsider Parry’s ideas about how epithets work in Homeric epic. Machacek’s article as a whole is a larger reconsideration of Parry’s work, from a stated position sympathetic to Parry (Machacek 1994:322). His basic argument pertaining to the use of this formula here is that “a great shout is a liability at this moment” (Machacek 1994:332)—as noise can indeed be in the night. Machacek argues further that this final use of the epithet in the book is contextually appropriate: once the Achaeans have departed on their mission, they will have to be quiet. Machacek makes several assumptions about the ancient audience’s reception of this episode, including the assumption that they would notice the absence of the epithet after this point, having noticed its use in previous lines (Machacek 1994:331–333). Before we deal with this argument any further, however, let us examine closely what Parry has to say about this epithet and others like it.
The epithet βοὴν ἀγαθός is what Parry calls a fixed epithet. The four characteristics of fixed epithets, as Parry describes them, are as follows:
a. (1) Fixed epithets are used in accordance with their metrical value and not in accordance with their signification;
b. (2) they are traditional;
c. (3) they are always ornamental;
d. (4) they are often generic.
And these four characteristics—a point which cannot be too much insisted on—are interdependent.
MHV 165–166
We will elaborate on what each of these characteristics means for our understanding of this traditional epithet, keeping in mind Parry’s point that they are all interdependent. We can see that βοὴν ἀγαθός is fixed because it is always used in the same position in the line: it follows the so-called weak or feminine caesura, where the previous word ends at the first short syllable of the third foot, and the first (short) syllable of βοὴν completes the third foot. This placement within the line is common for epithets, and Parry comments that βοὴν ἀγαθός fulfills the same purpose as other epithets that extend from the weak caesura to the bucolic diaresis (that is, where the word-end coincides with the end of the fourth foot), even though this epithet extends beyond the fourth foot (MHV 66). Because of its length, this epithet phrase is used most often with the same two names we see here in Book 10, Menelaos and Diomedes, which have the same metrical shape, ⏑ ⏑ ‒ Χ. (It is used with the name Diomedes in the Iliad at least twenty-one times; with Menelaos, at least fourteen times in the Iliad and at least eight times in the Odyssey.) But it has the flexibility to adorn other warriors’ names as well: Ajax, Hektor, and Priam’s son Polites are also given this epithet, which stays in its same position, while the rest of the line follows a different pattern, from small adjustments such as the inclusion of a τε before Polites’ name to greater differences in the metrical patterns for Hektor and Ajax. Thus, as Parry argues about these kinds of “rigorously” fixed epithets as a category, they “clearly must have had, for the poets who used them, an existence independent of any particular type of noun-epithet formula” (MHV 64–65). More controversial is Parry’s contention that the poet uses these epithets for metrical reasons rather than their signification. We will have more to say on this below.
The fixed epithet, as Parry says, is also traditional, having been used again and again over time once it was found to be useful for composing in performance. The principle of analogy applies here since the use of the epithet with more than one hero’s name is profitable for the singer in performance. Parry describes the process as occurring over time, within the tradition, and argues that we cannot discover which hero had this epithet originally:
To try to discover in which formula the use of a given epithet is oldest would be pointless. The significant fact is that the bards had no hesitation in applying to any hero an epithet which at some point in time had first been ascribed to one particular hero. It was used a first time for this one person; then it was used again for the same person, when the rhythm allowed it and made its use easy. Then the bards applied it to other persons whose names were of the same metrical value with that of the original owner.
MHV 87
There are five names in the Iliad that are given this epithet, but if we had more of the epic tradition, we might see it used even more widely. Conversely, if we had only the Odyssey, we would consider this epithet to belong solely to Menelaos. We must be mindful of the limitations of our data when it comes to the larger tradition.
This epithet is also ornamental, meaning that it is not being used in a context in which the warrior is actually shouting in battle. The non-ornamental epithet is one Parry terms “particularized,” meaning that it is essential to the context, and to completing the thought of the sentence (see MHV 158–164 for more on particularized epithets). A typical example of an ornamental use of this epithet is found at Odyssey 4.307, which describes Menelaos as βοὴν ἀγαθός as he awakes, gets out of bed, and gets dressed at home in Sparta, not displaying any of his shouting prowess. Similarly, the uses here in Iliad 10 do not accompany any battlefield cries. There is one case in which the epithet is followed by a shout on the battlefield: in Iliad 17, when Ajax and Menelaos are protecting the corpse of Patroklos, Ajax asks Menelaos to call others to help them. Menelaos is called βοὴν ἀγαθός in both the lines that open and close Ajax’s request (Iliad 17.237, 246). Menelaos then gives a loud, piercing shout to the Danaans (ἤϋσεν δὲ διαπρύσιον Δαναοῖσι γεγωνώς, Iliad 17.247). Here, then, we might think the epithet is particularized to the context, since Menelaos is demonstrating his battle-cry. One objection to that idea, however, might be that, with a different vocabulary and purpose—a cry for help—this kind of shout is not the same as the battle shout. But that distinction is not what would matter to Parry, for he says of ornamental epithets like βοὴν ἀγαθός: “After what we have learned of the ornamental meaning of the Homeric epithet, we must recognize the principle that an epithet used in a given noun-epithet formula cannot sometimes be ornamental, sometimes particularized: it must always be one or the other” (original emphasis, MHV 156).
Finally, this epithet is also generic. The fixed epithet, according to Parry is also often (though not always) a generic epithet; that is, it is used in noun-epithet formulas without specific characterization of the person it is applied to. Just as the ornamental epithet is contrasted with the particularized, in this case, the generic epithet is the opposite of the distinctive epithet in Parry’s terminology. Distinctive epithets are those used for only one hero. In fact, Parry uses βοὴν ἀγαθός as an example of a generic epithet with a general meaning: “The expression βοὴν ἀγαθός will, if used of only one hero, say Diomedes, assign to that hero an unusual power of voice, just as ποδάρκης assigns to Achilles a singular swiftness; said of any hero whatever, the expression will mean no more than ‘good at the war-cry as ordinary men are not’” (MHV 146). This idea of the generic meaning of an epithet, especially in combination with Parry’s assertion that the fixed epithet is used for its metrical value rather than its signification in context, has elicited strong reactions from critics.
But let us notice first that Parry does not say here that this epithet has no meaning at all; he says only that it does not specify one hero in a way that it specifies no other hero. In other words, the heroes designated βοὴν ἀγαθός are, indeed, good at the battle shout. The fact that more than one hero is so designated suggests that such a skill would have been considered a good and useful one for a warrior, just as the formula itself is good and useful for the singer who is composing in performance. And let us also note that there are situations, such as Menelaos getting out of bed at home in Sparta, in which the epithet carries no immediate meaning for the immediate context. In these situations, especially, Parry’s arguments were most illuminating when he first made them, and they freed the critic from spending any more time or energy trying to come up with a reason that the immediate context called for this particular epithet.
With those important insights in mind, we can turn to the more controversial idea that the poet chooses a fixed epithet such as this for metrical purposes. Parry expresses this idea in two ways: first, he argues that, if a generic epithet is applied to several heroes, it is chosen “not according to the character of the hero, but according to the metrical value of his name” (MHV 95). According to this argument, Menelaos and Diomedes both share this trait because their names have the same metrical value. Second, he argues that the metrical shape of the beginning of the line (in this case, that which ends at the weak caesura) determines which epithet is used in that particular line. In other words, heroes acquire certain epithets according to the metrical value of their name, and then which epithet is used in a particular line is determined by the other words in that line. But as we have already seen, this fixed epithet, even as it stays in the same metrical position, can be used for heroes whose names have different metrical values, such as Ajax or Hektor. And the poet is of course shaping the rest of line using the traditional, formulaic language he commands: the use of this language by a skilled singer is as natural as using spoken language is for anyone fluent in it, including the use and creation of formulas by analogy, as Lord has eloquently argued (Lord 1960/2000:30–36). Additionally, as scholars who have followed Parry and Lord have gone on to demonstrate more fully, thought precedes meter in Homeric diction. Meter and formulas do not imprison the poet (see e.g. Nagy 1996b:22–25 and Foley 2002:133–134).
There are additional factors that we need to consider as we use and evaluate Parry’s work on epithets. One is that Parry himself did not live to complete his work on Homeric poetry, dying at the young age of thirty-three. Thus the emphasis, seen all too often in scholarly discussions, on his “failures” or the limitations of what he accomplished is, to be frank, unfair. More egregious, however, is treating Parry’s work as though nothing has come after it, when its issues and questions have been thoroughly addressed and its insights expanded upon by generations of scholars. To properly evaluate Parry’s work, these subsequent studies must also be acknowledged and accounted for.[1]
With that in mind, how should we understand this use of the epithet, or the four others in this Book, or those in the Homeric epics overall? As we have already noted, the epithet has a general meaning for a warrior with a particular skill. For the heroes who are given this epithet, it has a larger meaning within the epic tradition as a whole: although we may not see the heroes shouting at the times when they receive the epithet, within the tradition as a whole, it tells us something about what kind of a warrior the hero is. This larger meaning has already been noted by Parry (MHV 137–138) and Lord (1960/2000:65–67), and both the concept of a formula’s traditional meaning and its significance for the poetics of the epics have been expanded upon by Nagy, Foley, and many others. (See the discussion above on the epithet ποιμένα λαῶν at 10.3.)
We can now return to the question of whether this particular use of the epithet has a contextual meaning in connection with the need for silence on an ambush. Machacek’s argument implicitly understands this aspect of the poetics of ambush, the need for stealth and quiet. In fact, in the earlier episode of this night, Agamemnon asks his herald to summon the Achaeans for an assembly, but tells him not to shout (μηδὲ βοᾶν, Iliad 9.12), indicating that, even at that point in the night, and even within the encampment, only quiet speaking is appropriate. This need for quiet and stealth, however, prompts the question of whether the epithet should be used at all during night episodes if its meaning is felt to be tied so closely to the current circumstances, as Machacek suggests it is. His answer is that the singer uses it four times in Iliad 10 precisely so that the audience will notice its absence in the rest of the book, when Diomedes is actually on the mission. Machacek proposes that the audience members even “listened carefully to see if he [the singer] would slip up and so describe Diomedes” (Machacek 1994:332). Beyond being an odd conception of the relationship between the singer and audience—in which the audience’s reception is focused on waiting for the singer to make a mistake, and a “literary” mistake at that—such a formulation also misunderstands the important point that the audience, as well as the singer, knows Diomedes to be well-known for his battle shout at all times, whether or not he is shouting (and in all instances where Diomedes gets this epithet in Iliad 10, he is not).
Instead, we have to recognize that this epithet is not particularly associated with the ambush theme, even though it is used several times in this particular ambush episode. On some deeply felt level, but perhaps not an immediate one, the audience would associate this epithet with Diomedes’ (and Menelaos’) prowess as a warrior in the polemos, where the battle shout is appropriate, and they would know from hearing many episodes from the Trojan War, and perhaps even the Theban epic tradition, that Diomedes is a warrior who excels at both polemos and lokhos. (See also our discussion of Diomedes in these terms in “The Poetics of Ambush.”) In some ways, though, the uses of this epithet reaffirm Parry’s own observations about how epithet formulas, in particular, can be used in situations in Homeric poetry where they would seem odd or even contradictory in poetry that was not oral and traditional. The singer was not forced by metrical considerations to use this formula, but it was useful for the composition of this Book, even though a battle shout happens nowhere in the episode itself and Diomedes, as well as Odysseus, avoids making excessive noise.
There is one other major methodological problem with Machacek’s argument: it is predicated on this line containing the final instance of this epithet formula. When we consult modern editions of Iliad 10, this can easily appear to be the case. But when we consider the full range of evidence, including papyri and the scholia, and when we fully grasp what composition-in-performance means for the multiformity of the epic tradition (for more on these topics, see our essay “Iliad 10: A Multitextual Approach”), we see that such arguments about epithets in particular can be refuted on an empirical basis. On the papyrus that both Allen and West refer to as “p90” (Oxyrhynchus 6.949 from the second–third century CE), there is a possible use of this epithet again at 10.446: [τον δ ημειβετ επειτα βοην αγα]θος Διομηδης, which would put it squarely in the middle of the mission, after Diomedes and Odysseus have captured Dolon. And from the scholia to both the Venetus A and Townley manuscripts, we hear of a version of 10.349, known to the Homeric critic Aristophanes, that also uses this epithet: ὣς ἔφατ’, οὐδ’ ἀπίθησε βοὴν ἀγαθὸς Διομήδης. (See our textual commentary, on the the Venetus A text, p. 217, for more on this multiform.)
Since name-epithet formulas were so useful, flexible, and traditional—all qualities that Parry himself identifies—it is difficult to prove the argument that the absence of one in a particular passage is significant: even with our limited evidence we can see that this epithet could indeed be used again in this episode, and that doing so would not be considered a “mistake” that an audience would find out of place. Instead, a thorough understanding of the oral traditional poetics of these formulas requires us to take a larger view of their meaning, just as an understanding of the textual tradition requires us to take into account all the evidence we have and to recognize that a singer might have sung this same episode with the variation natural to composition-in-performance. These are some of the differences between Homeric epic and modern poetry that Parry enjoins us to acknowledge and to appreciate with a different aesthetics.
[1] For a concise bibliography of scholarship since Parry that seeks to appreciate the creativity of a poet working within a traditional medium, see Martin 1989:151n16. This brief bibliography is of course already twenty years out of date. See “Interpreting Iliad 10” for a survey of more recent work. The journal Oral Tradition regularly publishes interdisciplinary scholarship that builds on the fieldwork and insights of Parry and Lord.