Homeric Epithet Research Articles

Homer and Ancient Narrative Time

This paper considers the nature of time and temporality in Homer. It argues that any exploration of narrative and time must, as its central tenet, take into account the irreducible plurality and interconnectedness of memory, the event, and experienced time. Drawing on notions of complexity, emergence, and stochastic behavior in science as well as phenomenological traditions in the discussion and analysis of time, temporality, and change, and offering extensive readings of Homer, of Homeric epithets and formulae, and of key passages in the Iliad and Odyssey, the paper argues against chronological notions of linear (“numbered”) time and progression and in favor of a complex, dynamic temporal “geometries” of Homeric temporality. The paper concludes by briefly extending the argument to the wider domain of ancient time in general. Homer is a fundamental point of reference in the ancient world. Thus, Homeric temporality—irreducibly complex—affects the cognition and perception of time throughout the whole of antiquity.

Homeric Epithets that Seem to Be Humorously Ironic

Homeric Epithets that Seem to Be Humorously Ironic RICHARD D. BENSON Although there is a tendency to see Homeric epithets as merely ornamental, if not meaningless, a form of humor seems to be occasionally provided by epithets used ironically. To my knowledge, Arieti (2016) was the first scholar to suggest that humorously ironic epithets are probably pervasive in Homer. The present paper is the first effort to collect all such epithets in Homer. I find 33 instances of humorously ironic usage of epithets in the Iliad and the Odyssey . One unexpected result is the discovery of the comic nature of some of Agamemnon’s speeches; these comic speeches augment the already-recognized complexity of Agamemnon’s character. 1. introduction one of the means of elevating the language of epic poetry , and of other forms of discourse, is by the repeated use of stock epithets. Just as a Christian may not be content to just say “Jesus” but might prefer to say “Jesus Christ our lord and savior,” or a Moslem not “Mohammed” but “the Prophet Mohammed, the Just, the Merciful,” Homeric epic sometimes says “Zeus” but more frequently elevates that personage by such expressions as “father Zeus” (πατὴρ Ζεὺς), or “Zeus who bears the goatskin shield” (Διὸς αἰγιόχοιο); Hera is “queenly ox-eyed Hera” (βοῶπις πότνια Ἥρη), or “whitearmed Hera” (λευκώλενος Ἥρη); Aphrodite is best known as “golden Aphrodite” (χρυσέη Ἀφροδίτη), or “laughter-loving Aphrodite” (φιλομμειδὴς Ἀφροδίτη). Achilles is well-known arion 29.1 spring/summer 2021 36 homeric epithets that seem to be humorously ironic as “swift-footed Achilles” (πόδας ὠκὺς Ἀχιλλεύς) and “the handsome son of Peleus” (ἀμύμονα Πηλείωνα). Odysseus is often called “Odysseus of many wiles” (πολύμητις Ὀδυσσεύς) and “Zeus-born Odysseus” (διογενὴς Ὀδυσσεὺς). Homeric epithets avoid becoming tedious in at least two ways. One way is to multiply the number of epithets per personage . One subset of this method is to use epithets which to all appearances seem to be stock epithets and yet are used only once. The expression, for example, “Zeus the lightning -gatherer” (στεροπηγερέτα Ζεύς) occurs only once (Il. 16.298). We hear of “Achilles the peer of Enyalius” (Ἀχιλλεὺς / ἶσος Ἐνυαλίῳ) only once (Il. 22.130–31). We find “golden -sandaled Hera” (Ἣρης χρυσοπεδίλου) only once (Od. 11.604). There are numerous examples of these once-used name-epithet combinations in Homer, as if the master poet Homer were often parodying (I would venture to say), rather than following, the practice of using stock epithets. Another way of avoiding epithet-fatigue, and which is the subject of this paper, is occasionally to use an epithet ironically for the sake of humor. But here there may be a difficulty . Current orthodoxy would deny that Homeric epithets can ever be ironic, supposedly because the epithets are so single-purposed that they can have no added meaning (e.g., Lord 2000). Even if this were true, however, it should at least be useful, for the record, to have a list of all the possibly humorously ironic epithets in Homer, so that we would have an idea of what and how many there may be. As such a list has not heretofore existed, this paper attempts to fill that gap. 2. methods arieti (2016) described a humorously ironic epithet θεοειδής (Il. 3.16–37) repeatedly applied to Paris (discussed below). Arieti (2016:9) concluded: “Though I have focused on . . . this one example, I should like to suggest that a broader investigation will show its pervasiveness [of humorous epithets] throughout Richard D. Benson 37 Homer.” Later I came upon another humorous epithet while rereading Finley’s World of Odysseus (1965:108) where a speech by Agamemnon (Od. 24.115–19) is quoted. I saw that Finley gave no sign of recognizing Agamemnon’s hilarious use of an epithet (πτολίπορθον, of Odysseus, ironic in this one instance; see below). To perform the “broader investigation” called for by Arieti, I reread the Iliad and the Odyssey to collect all epithets which were used in a humorously ironic manner. By a humorously ironic epithet I understood one by which a competent comedian could get a laugh. Examples of the four types of humorous irony considered in this paper can be classified as follows. (1) Most typically, there is classical irony, that is, the irony of stating the opposite —for example calling a coward “valiant” for the sake of ridicule. Such humorous...

Homeric Epithets that Seem to Be Humorously Ironic

Homeric Epithets that Seem to Be Humorously Ironic

Гомеровские постоянные эпитеты золотой и серебряный

This article provides a comprehensive linguistic analysis of the Homeric epithets golden and silver in comparative terms. They are considered in the following aspects: frequency of use, semantic structure, contextual environment, word-formation features and capabilities, stylistic originality and aesthetic signifi cance, as well as translation options into Russian. The quantitative (higher usage statistics) and qualitative (more complex semantic structure, richer word-formation capabilities and lexical compatibility) predominance of golden over silver, its greater social and aesthetic value is established. As a result of the research, the degree of traditionality of these epithets and the tendency to a variety of their use are clarifi ed. There is also a general desire of translators to preserve the tradition and constancy of these epithets with the assumption of only some variation. The problem of the infl uence of the Homeric use of these epithets on the further literary tradition is raised due to the fact that the basis for ideas about the Golden age was already laid in the Homeric era.

Słowo jako medium tradycji: szkic z teorii oralności

Word as Medium of Tradition. Essay on Theory of OralityThe goal of the paper is to outline the concept of word as medium of intergenerational transfer of tradition in cultures of primary orality as formulated in the theory of orality since the 1960s. According to the classic anthropological approach, it emphasizes the orientation on tradition and stability of oral cultures. It also focuses on mechanisms of preserving fidelity and persistence of cultural patterns in the utterances/messages despite the lack of the written form. The basic mechanism here is to grasp messages in the form of epic poetry. Information (technical instruction and moral norms) is depicted in the narrative context, that is, descriptions of heroes’ activities as only by that the listeners’ emotions and – consequently – actions were stimulated. Combining poetry with music, singing, gestures and dancing were also used as mnemotechnical tools – messages affected listeners by rhyme, rhythm, and melody. On the verbal level, shaping messages according to mnemotechnical mechanisms have led to the origins of preservative language (elevated speech) that differed from flexible language used for everyday communication. Its main constitutive trait was dominance of formulas (formulative style) aimed at preserving those messages from critical analysis and being reshaped by the recipients. On the structural level of stories, formulas’ equivalent were typescenes and story-patterns. They were used to secure high fidelity of several performances (repetitions) of particular pieces. Other inherent traits of oral messages are: paratactic composition, redundancy, and Homeric epithets for descriptions of heroes.

Apollonius and the Golden Fleece: a neo-mythological screen legacy

A number of ancient poets and painters described or showed the Golden Fleece, one of the most intriguing supernatural objects in classical myth. But the poets were not as specific as their modern readers may wish. By contrast, cinema and television show the Fleece in all its specific aspects. Moving-image adaptations of classical myths always change their sources, a phenomenon usefully termed “neo-mythologism,” but they display the Fleece to good effect, if often in a variety of recreations. The seven European and American films examined here show us why the Fleece deserves the Homeric epithet thauma idesthai.

LAME HEPHAISTOS

The Return of Hephaistos to Olympus was a popular scene in Attic vase-painting from the beginning of the sixth century through the end of the fifth centurybce, and it is found occasionally on other forms of pottery as well. According to myth, Hephaistos was lame, and this disability is sometimes depicted on painted pottery, almost always in scenes of his Return. The most well-known example is the François Vase, which is often the only vase cited when discussing instances of Hephaistos's lameness on Athenian pottery. Although three other Attic vases are occasionally cited as showing the disability, one of which does not show his Return, but instead the Birth of Athena, there are actually quite a number more Attic vases that depict his lameness than have previously been recognised. In this paper I present seven new Attic examples that clearly display his lameness, and consider both the different ways in which his disability is rendered and how they relate to the various epithets associated with him For example, he is often associated with the epithet ‘clubfoot’, and while there was an established iconography of clubfoot Corinthian komasts, the god's disability is never rendered in this manner on Attic vases. Instead, he is depicted in ways more similar to other epithets associated with him. Most notably, four vases represent the disability in a fashion that seems to be connected with Hephaistos's most common Homeric epithet, ἀμφιγυήεις, or ‘with both feet crooked’.

Homer in Print: A Catalogue of the Bibliotheca Homerica Langiana at the University of Chicago Library ed. by Glenn W. Most and Alice Schreyer (review)

Reviewed by: Homer in Print: A Catalogue of the Bibliotheca Homerica Langiana at the University of Chicago Library ed. by Glenn W. Most and Alice Schreyer Fred Schreiber Glenn W. Most and Alice Schreyer (eds.). Homer in Print: A Catalogue of the Bibliotheca Homerica Langiana at the University of Chicago Library. Chicago: The University of Chicago Press, 2014. Pp. viii, 339. $55.00. ISBN 978–0-94305–641–8. As stated in its preface, this elegantly produced volume is the result of collaboration between the worlds of private collecting, philanthropy, research libraries, and scholarship. Its genesis was the Homer library (“Bibliotheca Homerica Langiana” [BHL]) formed by the bibliophile Michael C. Lang who, in 2006, presented his collection to the University of Chicago to stimulate research, discovery, and knowledge not only of Homer, but also of the bibliographic sciences. Far from being a mere list of editions, which the word “catalogue” might lead some to expect, the volume contains considerably more detailed information than names of authors, titles, printers, and dates; each of the 175 entries is accompanied by informative commentaries, or brief essays, whose focus, as the editors state, is “on the transmission of the Homeric text and the printing, publishing, and editorial history and critical reception of the editions included rather than on the individual copies.” Thus, the work traces the transmission [End Page 300] and reception of the Iliad and Odyssey in printed form from the editio princeps of 1488 to the first decade of the twenty-first century. The 175 entries are grouped into five main sections: A: Greek Editions; B: English Translations (by far the largest section, comprising 109 entries, including “Retellings for Children”); C: Translations in Other Languages; D: Scholarly Works; E: Illustrations, Facsimiles, & Manuscripts. In section A, all significant Greek editions are included. This reviewer, however, found it puzzling that among the bibliographical references following the commentaries on the editions, the standard printers’ bibliographies are strangely omitted: for example, A. A. Renouard for the Aldine and Estienne editions (A2, A6, A14, A16) and A. Willems for Elzevier (A17). Section D deals with Homeric scholarship from the publication in 1521 of Didymus’ scholia (D1) and culminates in Milman Parry’s revolutionary 1928 Paris dissertation on traditional Homeric epithets that strengthened belief in the oral nature of the poems (D14). In addition to the main entries there are three longer essays. The first consists of an introductory account by Lang on the genesis and formation of his collection, “The Architecture of Accumulation: A Book Collector’s Apology,” including an enlightening section on English translations of Homer. Lang states that although the Homeric poems have been translated into virtually all Western and several Eastern languages, more have appeared in English than any other: at least 105 complete English translations have appeared since Chapman’s. (As a side note Lang points out that over these last five centuries, “there is as yet no complete translation by a woman of the Iliad or Odyssey in English.”) The other two essays, both dealing with aspects of Homer’s Nachleben, are found in appendix; in the first, titled “A Shaggy-dog Story: The Life, Death, and Afterlives of Odysseus’s Trusty Dog Argus,” the author, Glenn W. Most, has chosen this touching little episode of the Odyssey to illustrate the vaster history of the reception of Homer in the works of editors and translators through the centuries. The second, “Quarreling over Homer in France and England, 1711–1715,” is an account by David Wray of the battle waged in intellectual circles during the second decade of the eighteenth century known as the Querelle d’Homère, a revival of the culture war known as the “Quarrel of the Ancients and the Moderns.” This volume elegantly fulfills both the editors’ and Lang’s stated objectives by contributing the first in-depth study of “Homer in print.” Fred Schreiber E. K. Schreiber Rare Books Copyright © 2015 The Classical Association of the Atlantic States, Inc.

Why it is Important to Take Account of History

During a lull in the action of the epic movie, Troy, Achilles confides to Briseis his view that ‘the gods envy humans their mortality’. A surprising, almost shocking, view. The Homeric epithet for ...

Formulas, Orality and Arthurian Romance: A Short Note on a Long Story

In the field of medieval French studies, before Orality, there was the Formula, and before that, there was nothing, just texts badly written. To the pioneers of Romance philology, the chanson de geste appeared hampered by all those repetitions that modern French aesthetics had taught its pupils to track down and eliminate. Leon Gautier, for instance, who spent most of his academic life studying the chanson de geste, which he admired for its noble and patriotic content, remained somewhat reluctant when it came to judging its style. Speaking of the evolution of the chanson de geste, Gautier can only state that it suffers from the same shortcomings as poetry: the Homeric epithet, the nucleus of what today we would probably call formula: Ces odieux versificateurs de vingtieme ordre, qui regnerent trop longtemps sur la poesie francaise, trouverent un precieux et inestimable avantage dans l'emploi de l'epithete homerique: c'est qu'elle remplissait la moitie d'un vers. Pour ces pauvres imaginations, quelle heureuse rencontre! Ils multiplierent l'epithete de facon a en composer la deuxieme partie de leurs alexandrins, et n'eurent plus se mettre en frais d'invention que pour leur premier hemistiche. Alors commenca le regne de la cheville. (1) This is presumably one of the very first occasions in the history of French studies in which a semantic and metrical entity, a formula, is recognized as a device facilitating versification. It is certainly not a pure coincidence if it occurs in the context of a study on the chanson de geste, a genre to which the formula will remain linked even when everything else has changed. Many things have happened since Leon Gautier, most of them in the fifties, when scholars began to appreciate the poetic potential of the formula and discovered the artistic achievement obtained by the deliberate repetition of certain lines within a given chanson de geste. (2) That was the first step away from the cheville toward something new, something inconceivable, or at least not yet conceived, the first step towards the idea that there could be something more than laziness or incompetence in those texts, an Art epique des jongleurs, as Jean Rychner would entitle his fundamental book on the medieval French epic. (3) In 1955, when his study was published, the title could still almost appear as an oxymoron to all those accustomed to the norms of nineteenth-century writing even if Rychner was less concerned with poetry than with poetic technique, techne, the poet's craft, his ars; his art in the Latin sense of the term. Rychner's book was not only a step away from the cheville in the direction of aesthetics, but also a step toward something that was equally neglected in those days: orality. Cette litterature orale nous est parvenue ecrite, Rychner states plainly in the opening pages of his book. (4) The written word, in the case of the chanson de geste, is secondary and accessory: what counts is the moment in which the poem was recited, or, as we would say today, in which it was performed. Every performance is unique, since there is always an element of improvisation to it. Each written document captures just one given performance, and that is why there are so many differences between the manuscripts. By working on the written documents, the scholar can shed light on the conditions of these recitations, and the elaboration of the texts. What enabled Rychner to overcome and leave far behind him everything that had been written up to that time on the chanson de geste was the fact that he drew on work on poetry undertaken by scholars outside the field of French studies, focusing on professional singers active in the former Yugoslavia. (5) There, Rychner found answers to all the puzzling questions that medievalists had always been asking: those singers could memorize several thousands of lines without difficulty, and when they were asked to sing the same song again a couple of hours later, one would of course hear the same song, but with so many variants that it was impossible even to record them: changes in the order of words, one hemistich replaced by another, and lines added or omitted, exactly as with the medieval chanson de geste. …

Tim's Ajax (my brother's dissertation)

Tim'sAjax (mybrother's dissertation) LAWRENCE DUGAN Theverificationist wouldbesurprised Atthechange insetting From theislesofGreece tothesandy-floored PineBarrens. TheHouseofAtreus becomes Fourgenerations ofbikers, dragracers Andoneheroic state trooper brooding Ina deserted summer resort lostinthewoods, Closedfordecades, built bya hotelier With confidence inthepines Andlittle understanding ofhotels. Wouldthebikers Assemble hereandargue fortheheroic sense Oflife, fortheoldsouth Jersey waysthat wereslipping IntoDelawareBaywith thebattered shoreline, Soontobeas remote as theSwedish towns? Where intheforest isthethrone they'd defend? UpanddowntheDelaware Thesmallcities sinkintotheriver, Trenton, Camden, Chester, likeso many citadels named ina catalogue ofwar. Whosaysa statue inthewoodsishidden orbenighted? Whyapologize foranaesthetic solitude, a cenotaph To remoteness, nomoreoutofplace ThanNewJersey's Homeric epithet, TheGarden State? Likerosy-fingered dawnorsandy Pylos thename Has lasted, likethewoods.Theturnpike exits Winddowntosandy floors. ARION 17.2 FALL 2OO9 ...

Penelope in Ovid's Metamorphoses 14.671

Penelope in Ovid's Metamorphoses 14.671 Mark Possanza In a passage in Ovid's Metamorphoses, book 14, the god Vertumnus, who has transformed himself into an old woman, is speaking to the orchardist nymph Pomona, who finds plants and trees more companionable than the opposite sex:1 concubitusque fugis nec te coniungere curas.atque utinam uelles! Helene non pluribus essetsollicitata procis nec quae Lapitheia mouitproelia nec coniunx +timidi aut+ audacis Vlixei. (668-71) timidi aut codd. Vertumnus offers three mythological exempla, Helen, Hippodamia, and Penelope, to persuade the nymph that if she did show an interest in men, she would attract more suitors than those illustrious heroines. Although the reference to Penelope in 671 is obvious and the epithet audacis looks genuine, it is not clear whether what lies hidden under the corrupt +timidi aut+ has to do with Penelope or Ulysses.2 Most of the proposed [End Page 89] emendations are based on the assumption that the words after coniunx belong to an epithet phrase that describes Ulysses.3 Of these, timidis audacis Vlixei, adopted by Heinsius from Vaticanus Barberinianus Lat. 70 (13th cent.),4 seems by far the least implausible, although the super fi cial attractions of the collocation timidis audacis begin to fade when one considers that the addition of timidis fits neither Ulysses nor the context. If we take audax as an epithet expressing a permanent quality of the hero, then timidus unduly limits the range of that quality embodied in audax, a quality that allowed Ulysses to best foes, the Cyclops, for example, who certainly cannot be called timidus. If, on the other hand, we are to interpret the combination of timidus and audax as the speaker ' s jibe at Ulysses' pretensions to heroic valor,5 it must be pointed out that such a jibe, while appropriate in the mouth of an Ajax, is completely out of place here where suitors, courtship, and sex are uppermost in the speaker's mind, not the ranking of Achaean warriors.6 Moreover, the [End Page 90] epithet phrase timidis audacis, by virtue of its riddling quality (are we to think of the encounter with Dolon? the slaughter of the suitors?) distracts attention from Penelope herself, who is, after all, the exemplum. In short, the addition of timidus either disparages the heroic stature of Ulysses in a context where such disparagement is clearly out of place or undercuts the force of the Penelope exemplum by giving prominence to the husband, when in fact it is Penelope who is the more important of the two. I want, therefore, to suggest that in its original form the line contained an epithet for Penelope, prudens, which can be taken as the equivalent of the Homeric epithet most often applied to Penelope, 7: line 671 would then read "proelia nec coniunx prudens audacis Vlixei." It may be coincidence that prudens, corresponding to Homeric , identifies the unnamed coniunx through her characteristic trait, which associates her with Pomona, who exhibits that same trait in shunning suitors. And it may be coincidence that prudens produces with audacis a pleasing iunctura that is worthy of our poet, bringing together the distinctive and contrasting traits of husband and wife that helped to make possible their reunion.8 But that both of these coincidences should occur within the metrical space () occupied by the corruption timidi [End Page 91] aut is one coincidence too many, especially in a context where Penelope ' s prudentia and Ulysses' audacia are relevant to the situation of Pomona and Vertumnus. There is more to these epithets than the clever collocation of contrasting traits. When a lover in disguise (Vertumnus), speaking to his beloved (Pomona), cites Penelope as an example of a woman much sought after by suitors, the poet achieves a heightening of the erotic tension through the Penelope exemplum because the meeting between Pomona and the disguised Vertumnus recalls the meetings between Ulysses, disguised as a beggar, and his wife, Penelope, in the Odyssey. In its present context the exemplum suggests that the revelation of identity, though long delayed (Odysseus' by his taking revenge on the suitors and Vertumnus' by his telling of the Iphis-Anaxarete tale), will bring the two...

(G.) Nagy Poetry as performance: Homer and beyond. Cambridge, 1996. Pp. x + 254. £37.50 (£13.95 pb). 0521551358 (0521558484 pb).

Introduction: a brief survey of concepts and aims Part I. Mimesis and the Making of Identity in Poetic Performance: 1. The Homeric nightingale and the poetics of variation in the art of a troubadour 2. Mimesis, models of singers, and the meaning of a Homeric epithet 3. Mimesis in Homer and beyond 4. Mimesis in lyric: Sappho's Aphrodite and the Changing Woman of the Apache Part II. Fixed Text in Theory, Shifting Words in Performance: 5. Multiform epic and Aristarchus' quest for the real Homer 6. Homer as script 7. Homer as 'scripture' Epilogue: dead poets and recomposed performers Appendix Bibliography Index.

Tradition and the Collective Talent: Oral Epic, Textual Meaning, and Receptionalist Theory

with a nagging and seemingly insoluble dilemma that has taken many forms and resists being held captive in any single, all-encompassing formulation. I mention as examples the academic jousting over analytical terms such as the phraseological "formula" and the narrative "theme" and the long debates over what is or is not a "motif. " The basic question amounts to this: can we agree on a grammar of compositional units and further, does our chosen model remain viable as we cross the linguistic line from one tradition to another? For the purposes of this essay and in order to speak directly to the concerns of this special collection of papers, I shall leapfrog both a bibliographical rehearsal of particular issues and the inevitable polemics involved, and instead concentrate on proposing a solution to the "unit problem" which, while perhaps rather radical in itself, finds its seeds in the writings of Walter Ong, Eric Havelock, Werner Kelber, Franz Bauml, Charles Segal, Robert Kellogg, and others. In concert with the general shift of critical focus from the text as object to the work as the reader's experience of that object, I suggest that we define the "units" of oral traditional discourse not strictly and exclusively as textual data, but also and equally as the necessarily subjective apprehension of those data by a reader or participant (whatever the prior experience of the reader or participant may be). I propose that we take as a starting point the idea of the work and its parts as processes rather than as an artifice and its discrete components, and that we stipulate that the unit of discourse-whether phraseological or narrative-cannot be understood as an object but only as a response. In other words, to summon the canonical Parry-Lord "oral formula" as an example, we need to realize that the phraseological unit consists not only of whatever chirographic avatar the highly literate reader uses as a reading mnemonic, but also and crucially of the informed but finally subjective response one makes to those "little black dots on the white page" in the larger context of the unexpressed (and inexpressible) reality of an oral tradition.

Poetical and metrical value of Homeric Epithets: A study of the Epithets applied toχεíρ

The five epithets of χεíρ studied here are seen to fall into two distinct groups: παχ৹σ and στιβαρóσ are used of the hand in action, while βαρ৹σ, θρασ৹σ, and άαπτōσ are emotionally laden, and denote the hand primarily as a harmful instrument. The metrically equivalent formulae χειρİ παχεíη and χειρİ βαρεíη are thus not duplicate formulae, but serve different purposes. Modifications of standard formulae with χεíρ are also discussed.

The Parry-Lord Theory Meets Operational Structuralism

EVEN TODAY MANY FOLKLORISTS, classicists, and Anglo-Saxonists, unconvinced that the oral-formulaic theory is anything more than hypothesis, explain recurring units, whether Homeric epithets, Old English formulas, or ballad commonplaces, as the result of either or memorial transmission.1 In a profoundly different approach, the Parry-Lord theory focuses on the compositional process: the way in which the poet generates formulas from his internalized grammar of the poetry (Lord 1965:35-36). The crucial distinction between the oral-formulaic theory and hypotheses about borrowing or epic commonplaces is the theory's emphasis on the compositional process. The theory is concerned with the structuring or compositional nature of the materials under study. From this perspective, the texts are seen as a means of revealing, through a consideration of their underlying structure, the process that shaped them. Significantly, Parry and Lord eschew literary interpretation; neither presents an explication de texte. Instead, their concern is with a distinctive type of convention by which ordinary language becomes poetic discourse. Through a systematic study of Homeric and Serbo-Croatian poetry, they attempt to specify the conventions responsible for this process and the role of these conventions in meaning. The Parry-Lord theory is a structural account of narrative discourse (Culler 1977:8) from a particular point of view: that of its formation and its potential for change. The focus of the oral-formulaic theory on process owes a great deal to Milman Parry's study of a living traditional Parry recognized that in order to relate Homeric formulas to the manner in which the poems were composed, he had to study a living tradition in its cultural context, and thus to collect materials in the field.2 Once Parry elected to study Yugoslavian guslars, he set up a field hypothesis that proposed differences of form between oral poetry and written poetry. These structural differences, Parry hypothesized, derive from the compositional process:

Irus' "Queenly" Mother and the Problem of the Irrational Use of Homeric Epithets

Irus' "Queenly" Mother and the Problem of the Irrational Use of Homeric Epithets

Blameless Aegisthus: A Study of AMYMŌN and Other Homeric Epithets. Anne Amory Parry

<i>Blameless Aegisthus: A Study of AMYMŌN and Other Homeric Epithets</i>. Anne Amory Parry

The Use of the Leitmotif in Achim von Arnim's Stories

Achim von Arim's tales have repeatedly been censured for lack of structural unity and only a few, for instance Der tolle Invalide and Frau von Saverne, have escaped such criticism. However, attempts have been made recently to reevaluate Arim's narrative art. In his penetrating study on Die Majoratsherren Heinrich Henel has demonstrated the surprisingly coherent structure of this seemingly confused story.' Basing his interpretation on several short narratives by Arnim, Wolfdietrich Rasch has tried to defend the author against his critics on the grounds that such features as the loose plot contruction and sudden transitions of his tales resemble the techniques of an improvising oral storyteller.2 While Rasch's approach helps us to appreciate a number of Amim's stories, among them Angelika, die Genueserin und Cosmus, der Seilspringer, it fails to account for the existence of an interesting unifying device in several of his tales, namely the leitmotif.3 To be sure, unsophisticated leitmotifs like the recurring Homeric epithet are part of the tradition of the oral epic. But Arnim's use of complex leitmotifs in Die drei liebreichen Schwestern und der gliickliche Firber or Owen Tudor, for instance, goes far beyond the range of an improvising narrator and implies a considerable amount of deliberation and planning. In order to demonstrate the scope of Arnim's leitmotif techniques I shall progress from a discussion of simple devices, namely the repeated emphasis on certain phrases, gestures, and physical features, to an analysis of more complicated forms.

Homeric Epithets for Troy

The publication of the fourth volume on the excavations conducted at Troy by the University of Cincinnati in the years 1932–1938 enables us to review with more confidence the historical events which lie, no matter at how great a distance, behind theIliadand to reconsider the Homeric epithets for Troy in the light of new knowledge. We may at the start agree with the writers that no other city in the Troad except Hisarlik has any reasonable claim to be the site of Troy, and it is now clear that Troy VI, which was gravely damaged by an earthquakec. 1275 B.C., was succeeded by Troy VIIa, which had a real continuity with VI and was largely a rebuilt version of it, until it perished itself from firec. 1240 B.C. VIIa has thus a substantial claim to be the Homeric city, and the date of its destruction agrees with that given by Herodotus for the Trojan War as κατὰ ὀκτακόσια (ἔτεα) μάλιστα ἐς ἐμέ (ii 145.4). We may ask how relevant the Homeric epithets are to Troy as we now know it and when they may have been introduced into the oral tradition which Homer inherited and used in the eighth century. At the start we may say that, while all of them are at least adequate for a walled city on the site of Hisarlik, and some are much to the point, not all are equally individual, and we may classify them according to their use for cities in general and for Troy in particular. In doing this we must remember that in the Homeric poems cities need epithets as much as gods and heroes do, and that there is bound to be a certain overlap between one city and another in the epithets applied to it. Though we may postulate a pool of adjectives suitable for cities from which the poet draws those that meet his needs most adequately, there are some which are confined to Troy and others which are specially appropriate to it.