Leonard Muellner
Last updated at
March 31, 2020, 5:55 p.m.
{"blocks":[{"key":"7dkqh","text":"Short version: The verb ἐτελείετο '[the plan/will of Zeus] was beginning to be fulfilled' in line 6 is followed by the expression ἐξ οὗ δή 'just from the time when [they stood apart to fight]' in line 7, so it appears as though Διὸς βουλή 'the plan/will of Zeus' began when Agamemnon and Achilles 'stood apart' to fight. That is a legitimate interpretation based on the conventions of epic syntax and of a parallel prooimion in Odyssey 8.81-82 (which coordinates the πήματος ἀρχή 'beginning of suffering' with the 'plans/wishes of Zeus') , but it is also a convention of epic prooimia to specify the starting point of the poem, so it is reasonable to think that the audience could at the same time sense that ἐξ οὗ δή 'right from the time when' also goes back to the verb ἄειδε 'sing!' in line 1, specifying the starting point of the song as the quarrel between Achilles and Agamemnon, which line 8 then confirms.","type":"unstyled","depth":0,"inlineStyleRanges":[{"offset":415,"length":9,"style":"ITALIC"},{"offset":428,"length":7,"style":"ITALIC"},{"offset":576,"length":8,"style":"ITALIC"}],"entityRanges":[],"data":{}},{"key":"dsoou","text":"Longer version: The verb ἐτελείετο 'was beginning to be fulfilled' in line 6 is the verb of the third and last paratactic clause after the relative clause ἥ... in line 2 of the standard prooimion to the Iliad. The first two finite verbs of the prooimion are aorists (ἔθηκε, προΐαψε) whereas ἐτελείετο and the verb of the previous clause to this one, τεῦχε, are imperfects. As Leonard Palmer 1963 pp.146-148 pointed out, the use of the imperfect after 'establishing' aorists in epic narrative is 'autopsic': it functions to stimulate visualizing/highlighting for the hearers, rather than being reflective of an essential contrast between narrative 'points' (aorist) and enduring narrative moments (imperfect). The essence of the aorist, one could say, is that it is a-horistos 'undefined', or in terms of Prague School linguistics, unmarked as to duration. By contrast, the imperfects do evoke visualization of the past events that they specify as ongoing processes.","type":"unstyled","depth":0,"inlineStyleRanges":[{"offset":187,"length":9,"style":"ITALIC"},{"offset":204,"length":5,"style":"ITALIC"},{"offset":246,"length":9,"style":"ITALIC"},{"offset":767,"length":10,"style":"ITALIC"},{"offset":886,"length":22,"style":"ITALIC"}],"entityRanges":[],"data":{}},{"key":"ctmtk","text":"The sentences after the relative clause are linked by the conjunction δέ, the simplest of connectives, and they may not be felt as part of the relative clause. Parataxis rather than sustained subordination is the rule in Homeric style, as Palmer also points out, p. 156, citing Iliad 5.247-8: Αἰνείας δ᾿ υἱὸς μὲν ἀμύμονος Ἀγχίσαο / εὔχεται ἐκγεγάμεν, μήτηρ δέ οἷ ἐστ᾿ Ἀφροδίτη 'Aineias claims that of blameless Anchises / he was born, and his mother is Aphrodite' (not 'and that his mother was...'). But this grammatical point raises a dilemma about the next line, which begins ἐξ οὗ δή 'right from when': if subordination is not normally sustained in Homeric syntax, then the time specification 'right from when' should refer to the verb of the previous clause, ἐτελείετο, so that the message is that the process of bringing to completion the Διὸς βουλή 'plan/will of Zeus' began when the two heroes started quarreling. The problem is that observable conventions of the prooimia to epic narratives like the Iliad, the Odyssey, and the Homeric Hymns, require that the starting point of the narrative be specified in the prooimion. So one would think that ἐξ οὗ δή 'right from when' depends on the imperative in line 1, ἄειδε 'sing,' in that the poet is asking the muse to sing from the correct starting point. And in fact the starting point actually is (at least nominally) the quarrel between Agamemnon and Achilles, as is made clear by line 8, even though the poem immediately has to backtrack in order to set it up as the starting point.","type":"unstyled","depth":0,"inlineStyleRanges":[{"offset":465,"length":3,"style":"ITALIC"},{"offset":474,"length":4,"style":"ITALIC"},{"offset":972,"length":8,"style":"ITALIC"},{"offset":1009,"length":5,"style":"ITALIC"},{"offset":1020,"length":7,"style":"ITALIC"},{"offset":1037,"length":13,"style":"ITALIC"},{"offset":1121,"length":9,"style":"ITALIC"},{"offset":1273,"length":9,"style":"ITALIC"}],"entityRanges":[],"data":{}},{"key":"3ha","text":"On the other hand, is it possible that ἐξ οὗ δή 'right from when' in the wording of this prooimion could also be specifying that the quarrel between the two of them is the point when the plan/will of Zeus (as against the μῆνις of Achilles) started on its path to fulfillment? To put it another way, is the plan of Zeus coterminous with the Iliad, or should we think of it as something that overlaps it, that began before and ended after it? How can we know? I would argue that the plan/will of Zeus is a cause that starts and completes with the song on the basis of the diction in the first song of Demodocus in Odyssey 8.81-82, where the πήματος ἀρχή 'the beginning (sic) of suffering' began to roll (κυλίνδετο, imperfect) Διὸς μεγάλου διὰ βουλάς 'because of the plans (plural) of great Zeus.' It (the suffering) was prophesied by Apollo at Delphi as starting when the ἄριστοι Ἀχαιῶν 'best (plural) of the Achaeans' δηριόωντο 'quarreled' (again, imperfect) — on this point, see G. Nagy here . So the solution to the syntactical dilemma about ἐξ οὗ δή 'right from when' is that it refers both to the verb ἐτελείετο 'began to be fulfilled' and to the imperative in line 1, ἄειδε 'sing!', because 1) the convention for the specification of the starting point requires it, 2) the conventions of epic paratactic style require it, and 3) the traditional specifics of the plan/plans of Zeus require it to refer to both. Beginning in 1976, G. Nagy has shown in detail how this song of Demodocus is a multiform of our Iliad, and on that basis we can conceive of its diction as stemming from the same tradition as our Iliad. I note that the prooimion to the Odyssey ends with a globally resumptive pronoun τῶν... 'of these things' whose antecedent is all of the contents of the prooimion, just as the narrative of Demodocus' song concludes with ταῦτ' ἄρ' ἀοιδὸς ἄειδε περικλυτός 'these things, you see, the very famous singer began to sing' (8.83). The Iliad prooimion has no such clarifying summative construction, though understanding ἐξ οὗ δή in the way we have means that both ἄειδε at the beginning and ἐτελείετο at the end of the prooimion are the points from which the song begins.","type":"unstyled","depth":0,"inlineStyleRanges":[{"offset":90,"length":9,"style":"ITALIC"},{"offset":184,"length":21,"style":"ITALIC"},{"offset":341,"length":7,"style":"ITALIC"},{"offset":613,"length":7,"style":"ITALIC"},{"offset":1090,"length":4,"style":"ITALIC"},{"offset":1141,"length":3,"style":"ITALIC"},{"offset":1512,"length":5,"style":"ITALIC"},{"offset":1611,"length":5,"style":"ITALIC"},{"offset":1634,"length":9,"style":"ITALIC"},{"offset":1651,"length":7,"style":"ITALIC"},{"offset":1771,"length":9,"style":"ITALIC"},{"offset":1946,"length":5,"style":"ITALIC"},{"offset":1952,"length":9,"style":"ITALIC"},{"offset":2129,"length":9,"style":"ITALIC"}],"entityRanges":[],"data":{}},{"key":"9vhjq","text":"Incidentally, it is also clear just from our Iliad that there could be at least one other starting point for the tale of Achilles' wrath. See the comment on Iliad 1.366-369, which also may cast light on the starting point chosen here. There is also a conflicting point of view about the plan of Zeus that was enunciated in the Epic Cycle and that may or may not pertain to the boundaries of the epic tale of Achilles' anger: in that context, the 'plan of Zeus' was to unburden Earth of overpopulation by generating a war that would decimate it. Tying the diction of the Iliadic prooimion to that external definition of the Διὸς βουλή in the Cypria appears to me to conflict with the first two conventions specified above as well as the parallel passage in Odyssey 8.81-82.","type":"unstyled","depth":0,"inlineStyleRanges":[{"offset":45,"length":5,"style":"ITALIC"},{"offset":157,"length":5,"style":"ITALIC"},{"offset":283,"length":16,"style":"ITALIC"},{"offset":579,"length":9,"style":"ITALIC"},{"offset":643,"length":6,"style":"ITALIC"},{"offset":758,"length":7,"style":"ITALIC"}],"entityRanges":[],"data":{}},{"key":"5seqb","text":"L. R. Palmer, \"The Language of Homer,\" in A. J. B. Wace and F.H. Stubbing, A Companion to Homer. New York, 1963.","type":"unstyled","depth":0,"inlineStyleRanges":[{"offset":75,"length":21,"style":"ITALIC"}],"entityRanges":[],"data":{}},{"key":"74mst","text":"G. Nagy, The Best of the Achaeans. Baltimore, 1976; rev. ed. 1999, pp. 333-337. See also G. Nagy, Classical Inquiries, April 10, 2015 (http://classical-inquiries.chs.harvard.edu/who-is-the-best-of-heroes-achilles-or-odysseus-and-which-is-the-best-of-epics-the-iliad-or-the-odyssey/) and G. Nagy, Homeric Responses. Austin, 2003, pp. 7-19","type":"unstyled","depth":0,"inlineStyleRanges":[{"offset":9,"length":24,"style":"ITALIC"},{"offset":98,"length":19,"style":"ITALIC"},{"offset":296,"length":17,"style":"ITALIC"}],"entityRanges":[],"data":{}}],"entityMap":{}}