The Odyssey
“Iliad,” would have stuck to his borrowing.]
[33] [ cf. “Il.” xxiv. 587, 588 where the lines refer to the washing
the dead body of Hector.]
[34] [ See illustration on opposite page. The yard is typical of many
that may be seen in Sicily. The existing ground-plan is probably
unmodified from Odyssean, and indeed long pre-Odyssean times, but the
earlier buildings would have no arches, and would, one would suppose,
be mainly timber. The Odyssean {Greek} were the sheds that ran round
the yard as the arches do now. The {Greek} was the one through which
the main entrance passed, and which was hence “noisy,” or
reverberating. It had an upper story in which visitors were often
lodged.]
[35] [ This journey is an impossible one. Telemachus and Pisistratus
would have been obliged to drive over the Taygetus range, over which
there has never yet been a road for wheeled vehicles. It is plain
therefore that the audience for whom the “Odyssey” was written was one
that would be unlikely to know anything about the topography of the
Peloponnese, so that the writer might take what liberties she chose.]
[36] [ The lines which I have enclosed in brackets are evidently an
afterthought—added probably by the writer herself—for they evince the
same instinctively greater interest in anything that may concern a
woman, which is so noticeable throughout the poem. There is no further
sign of any special festivities nor of any other guests than Telemachus
and Pisistratus, until lines 621-624 (ordinarily enclosed in brackets)
are abruptly introduced, probably with a view of trying to carry off
the introduction of the lines now in question.
The addition was, I imagine, suggested by a desire to excuse and
explain the non-appearance of Hermione in bk. xv., as also of both
Hermione and Megapenthes in the rest of bk. iv. Megapenthes in bk. xv.
seems to be still a bachelor: the presumption therefore is that bk. xv.
was written before the story of his marriage here given. I take it he
is only married here because his sister is being married. She having
been properly attended to, Megapenthes might as well be married at the
same time. Hermione could not now be less than thirty.
I have dealt with this passage somewhat more fully in my “Authoress of
the Odyssey”, p. 136-138. See also p. 256 of the same book.]
[37] [ Sparta and Lacedaemon are here treated as two different places,
though in other parts of the poem it is clear that the writer
understands them as one. The catalogue in the “Iliad,” which the writer
is here presumably following, makes the same mistake (“Il.” ii. 581,
582)]
[38] [ These last three lines are identical with “Il.” vxiii. 604-606.]
[39] [ From the Greek {Greek} it is plain that Menelaus took up the
piece of meat with his fingers.]
[40] [ Amber is never mentioned in the “Iliad.” Sicily, where I suppose
the “Odyssey” to have been written, has always been, and still is, one
of the principal amber producing countries. It was probably the only
one known in the Odyssean age. See “The Authoress of the Odyssey,”
Longmans 1898, p. 186.]
[41] [ This no doubt refers to the story told in the last poem of the
Cypria about Paris and Helen robbing Menelaus of the greater part of
his treasures, when they sailed together for Troy.]
[42] [ It is inconceivable that Helen should enter thus, in the middle
of supper, intending to work with her distaff, if great festivities
were going on. Telemachus and Pisistratus are evidently dining en
famille.]
[43] [ In the Italian insurrection of 1848, eight young men who were
being hotly pursued by the Austrian police hid themselves inside
Donatello’s colossal wooden horse in the Salone at Padua, and remained
there for a week being fed by their confederates. In 1898 the last
survivor was carried round Padua in triumph.]
[44] [ The Greek is {Greek}. Is it unfair to argue that the writer is a
person of somewhat delicate sensibility, to whom a strong smell of fish
is distasteful?]
[45] [ The Greek is {Greek}. I believe this to be a hit at the writer’s
own countrymen who were of Phocaean descent, and the next following
line to be a rejoinder to complaints made against her in bk. vi.
273-288, to the effect that she gave herself airs and would marry none
of her own people. For that the writer of the “Odyssey” was the person
who has been introduced into the poem under the name of Nausicaa, I
cannot bring myself to question. I may remind English readers that
{Greek} (i.e. phoca) means “seal.” Seals almost always appear on
Phocaean coins.]
[46] [ Surely here again we are in the hands of a writer of delicate
sensibility. It is not as though the seals were stale; they had only
just been killed. The writer, however is obviously laughing at her own
countrymen, and insulting them as openly as she dares.]
[47] [ We were told above (lines 356, 357) that it was only one day’s
sail.]
[48] [ I give the usual translation, but I do not believe the Greek
will warrant it. The Greek reads {Greek}.
This is usually held to mean that Ithaca is an island fit for breeding
goats, and on that account more delectable to the speaker than it would
have been if it were fit for breeding horses. I find little authority
for such a translation; the most equitable translation of the text as
it stands is, “Ithaca is an island fit for breeding goats, and
delectable rather than fit for breeding horses; for not one of the
islands is good driving ground, nor well meadowed.” Surely the writer
does not mean that a pleasant or delectable island would not be fit for
breeding horses? The most equitable translation, therefore, of the
present text being thus halt and impotent, we may suspect corruption,
and I hazard the following emendation, though I have not adopted it in
my translation, as fearing that it would be deemed too fanciful. I
would read:—{Greek}.
As far as scanning goes the {Greek} is not necessary; {Greek} iv. 72,
(Footnote Greek) iv. 233, to go no further afield than earlier lines of
the same book, give sufficient authority for {Greek}, but the {Greek}
would not be redundant; it would emphasise the surprise of the
contrast, and I should prefer to have it, though it is not very
important either way. This reading of course should be translated
“Ithaca is an island fit for breeding goats, and (by your leave) itself
a horseman rather than fit for breeding horses—for not one of the
islands is good and well meadowed ground.”
This would be sure to baffle the Alexandrian editors. “How,” they would
ask themselves, “could an island be a horseman?” and they would cast
about for an emendation. A visit to the top of Mt. Eryx might perhaps
make the meaning intelligible, and suggest my proposed restoration of
the text to the reader as readily as it did to myself.
I have elsewhere stated my conviction that the writer of the “Odyssey”
was familiar with the old Sican city at the top of Mt. Eryx, and that
the Aegadean islands which are so striking when seen thence did duty
with her for the Ionian islands—Marettimo, the highest and most
westerly of the group, standing for Ithaca. When seen from the top of
Mt. Eryx Marettimo shows as it should do according to “Od.” ix. 25, 26,
“on the horizon, all highest up in the sea towards the West,” while the
other islands lie “some way off it to the East.” As we descend to
Trapani, Marettimo appears to sink on to the top of the island of
Levanzo, behind which it disappears. My friend, the late Signor E.
Biaggini, pointed to it once as it was just standing on the top of
Levanzo, and said to me “Come cavalca bene” (“How well it rides”), and
this immediately suggested my emendation to me. Later on I found in the
hymn to the Pythian Apollo (which abounds with tags taken from the
“Odyssey”) a line ending {Greek} which strengthened my suspicion that
this was the original ending of the second of the two lines above under
consideration.]
[49] [ See note on line 3 of this book. The reader will observe that
the writer has been unable to keep the women out of an interpolation
consisting only of four lines.]
[50] [ Scheria means a piece of land jutting out into the sea. In my
“Authoress of the Odyssey” I thought “Jutland” would be a suitable
translation, but it has been pointed out to me that “Jutland” only
means the land of the Jutes.]
[51] [ Irrigation as here described is common in gardens near Trapani.
The water that supplies the ducts is drawn from wells by a mule who
turns a wheel with buckets on it.]
[52] [ There is not a word here about the cattle of the sun-god.]
[53] [ The writer evidently thought that green, growing wood might also
be well seasoned.]
[54] [ The reader will note that the river was flowing with salt water
i.e. that it was tidal.]
[55] [ Then the Ogygian island was not so far off, but that Nausicaa
might be assumed to know where it was.]
[56] [ Greek {Greek}]
[57] [ I suspect a family joke, or sly allusion to some thing of which
we know nothing, in this story of Eurymedusa’s having been brought from
Apeira. The Greek word “apeiros” means “inexperienced,” “ignorant.” Is
it possible that Eurymedusa was notoriously incompetent?]
[58] [ Polyphemus was also son to Neptune, see “Od.” ix. 412, 529. he
was therefore half brother to Nausithous, half uncle to King Alcinous,
and half great uncle to Nausicaa.]
[59] [ It would seem as though the writer thought that Marathon was
close to Athens.]
[60] [ Here the writer, knowing that she is drawing (with
embellishments) from things actually existing, becomes impatient of
past tenses and slides into the present.]
[61] [ This is hidden malice, implying that the Phaeacian magnates were
no better than they should be. The final drink-offering should have
been made to Jove or Neptune, not to the god of thievishness and
rascality of all kinds. In line 164 we do indeed find Echeneus
proposing that a drink-offering should be made to Jove, but Mercury is
evidently, according to our authoress, the god who was most likely to
be of use to them.]
[62] [ The fact of Alcinous knowing anything about the Cyclopes
suggests that in the writer’s mind Scheria and the country of the
Cyclopes were not very far from one another. I take the Cyclopes and
the giants to be one and the same people.]
[63] [ “My property, etc.” The authoress is here adopting an Iliadic
line (xix. 333), and this must account for the absence of all reference
to Penelope. If she had happened to remember “Il.” v. 213, she would
doubtless have appropriated it by preference, for that line reads “my
country, _my wife_, and all the greatness of my house.”]
[64] [ The at first inexplicable sleep of Ulysses (bk. xiii. 79, etc.)
is here, as also in viii. 445, being obviously prepared. The writer
evidently attached the utmost importance to it. Those who know that the
harbour which did duty with the writer of the “Odyssey” for the one in
which Ulysses landed in Ithaca, was only about 2 miles from the place
in which Ulysses is now talking with Alcinous, will understand why the
sleep was so necessary.]
[65] [ There were two classes—the lower who were found in provisions
which they had to cook for themselves in the yards and outer precincts,
where they would also eat—and the upper who would eat in the cloisters
of the inner court, and have their cooking done for them.]
[66] [ Translation very dubious. I suppose the {Greek} here to be the
covered sheds that ran round the outer courtyard. See illustrations at
the end of bk. iii.]
[67] [ The writer apparently deems that the words “as compared with
what oxen can plough in the same time” go without saying. Not so the
writer of the “Iliad” from which the Odyssean passage is probably
taken. He explains that mules can plough quicker than oxen (“Il.” x.
351-353)]