JOSEPH OF EXETER'S PAGAN GODS AGAIN

Abstract

Some years ago in this journal, Hugh C. Parker described how the pagan gods function in Joseph of Exeter's Ylias.1 Thetis, when drowning Orontes (v. 16770) or searching for Achilles (V.381-4), is simply the sea. Aurora, when mourning Memnon (VI.370-4), is the dawn, whose tears are the dew. When Minerva restrains Achilles (VI.364-9), she is metonymic for wisdom. I would not disagree with any of this, and so it came as a surprise to find that my own words were one of the points d'appui for his argument. He quotes me as saying that Joseph `introduces pagan spirits and deities (Allecto in Book it, Juno and Athene in Book V) to motivate the action, much as Chaucer does with planetary gods'.2 I did indeed say this, and by it I meant what Parker means. I did not write `much as Homer does' but `much as Chaucer does' (though I might have added `with more subtlety. In the Knight's Tale, the Greeks treat Diana, Mars, Venus, and Saturn as gods, but the poet shows that each of these 'deities' is simply performing its cosmic, planetary role; each one has power in its own traditional area (Diana in relation to chastity, Mars to war, Venus to love, Saturn to death), and each has most power in the day and hour assigned to it.3 Thus, I have no quarrel with the idea that the 'gods' in Joseph are usually - except when mentioned by those who are themselves pagans - simply natural phenomena or agents of a superior divine power. Indeed, it would be astonishing otherwise: Joseph, nephew of a bishop, later archbishop, frequently expresses his disbelief in pagan gods and pagan prophecies.4 I have suggested elsewhere that Joseph actually altered the story to show how Calchas betrayed Troy in order to make his own prophecies come true.5 In short, I agree with Parker. I would not, however, bother the reader if I had no more to say than `that's what I meant in the first place'. I think that there is a great deal more to be said on the subject - more, at least, than Parker, Riddehough, or I have yet said. I now believe that Joseph is not consistent in his treatment of the gods, and I have tried here to categorize the apparently different attitudes he expresses. Twentieth-century critics have tended to expect consistency in medieval writers: we look for coherent religious, moral, social, and political views, and if we do not find them we try to reread the evidence, looking for irony or similar justifications. All writers, of course, deserve to be given a fair analysis, and many of them can, with a sympathetic reading, be shown to have firmly based and well-organized world views. But not all. Although I have great admiration for many of Joseph's talents as a poet - his masterly imitation of a Silver style, and his almost unparalleled powers of inventing entirely new episodes in the wars around Troy - I do not regard him as perfect in every respect. I have divided his varied treatments into five categories: (1) historicism; (2) criticism and scepticism about both gods and prophecies (with some ambiguous cases); (3) fate, fortune, and furies; (4) metonymy simple and applied metonymy (where a metonymic usage concides with a mythological detail); (5) apparent acceptance of pagan deities. Nevertheless, at the end of this article I suggest that in at least one passage (11,15-30) historicism and acceptance of pagan deities may be reconciled as part of Joseph's design. Historicism Joseph is writing about a pagan world, and appropriately has his Greeks and Trojans honouring (and occasionally, as in classical literature, blaming) their pagan gods. The Trojans have an altar to Jupiter (I.545-9) and another to Phoebus (VI.406-9). Encouraged by Paris' dream, they sacrifice to Venus and Priam prays to her (III.1-45). The Spartans have a temple to Diana (III.212), and Paris sacrifices to her there (III.215-17), although it is to Venus that he owes his success. Tribes have emblems of their gods (VI.579-88): the Athenians have Athene's (false) olive of peace, the Thracians have helmets adorned for Mars, and Mars and Juno are all around; the Trojans parade emblems of Cybele, Venus, and Ganymede, and the gods delight to fight against men. …