Homer and Hellenes

[Macedon]

I am currently making a thorough study of the Iliad from the original and among others, I came across this very interesting piece :

"ὀλίγος μὲν ἔην λινοθώρηξ, ἐγχείῃ δ’ ἐκέκαστο Πανέλληνας καὶ Ἀχαιούς·", Homerus, Ilias, B.2, l.529

The text is about Ajax the Oilean who had a lesser linothorax than Ajax the Telamonian and bested all Hellenes (Panhellenas) and Achaeans in the art of the spear.

I really didn't expect to see the word Hellenes in a more generalized sense. I knew, as most do, that in Homer the Hellenes were the people of a relatively small region where Achilles reigned but this particular usage is obviously broader both because of the prefix (pan- (all)) and because of the context.

Thought I shared, maybe some will find this piece of information interesting...

[Dan Howard]

Is is posible he just meant regular Hellenes and joined two words together to fit the meter of the poem?

[Lyceum]

What's the bet I still can't post anything relevant and get 404 again?

A few things. We never quote single lines from the katalogos because that's not how it works...often these things only make sense if you resolve the metre/sense.

He does not have a lesser linothorex, he was a small (oligos) man "armoured in linen" since linothorex here is not a substantiative but an appelative, the oligos here is obviously bringing to mind the antithesis with Aias Megas, e.g he is smaller than the other popular Aias.

Some scholars feel that Oilean Aias was an original component of the saga (by using folkloristics) and that Aias was a letter addition, but its clear that by Homer's time these two are often contrasted and compared throughout. Elsewhere this Aias also comes under the dual form "Aiante" which he should not, and Aias Meizon is usually described as being the best with the spear (see book 7 contra Hektor). So this needs to be borne in mind.

As for panhellenes this is an interesting problem faced by those of us who deal with epic. To my mind it comes up in the works and days "στρωφᾶται, βράδιον δὲ Πανελλήνεσσι φαείνει." = W&D 528/9? (typing from memory, sorry and in the katalogos in the Iliad and that is it. It may turn up in some of the satellite epics too, but obviously I can't magically call it to mind.

So its rare within epic and very common in later inscriptions from the Hellenistic age onwards. Zenodotos attempted to athetise some of the passage you've cited, perhaps on this grounds of it being "non homeric".

The question is, how do we resolve this? Well firstly the katalogos acts in a very weird way and is probably multivariant anyway so we should expect weird stuff to crop up there. Part of my thesis has actually been showing how it basically departs massively from epic tradition in places because Homer is cool like that.

Now I think that the solution is this: Panhellenes should not be a formation permitted to the Iliad. In general Homer explicitly ignores or subjugates things both from his reality and the epic tradition to weave his world. Its what makes him so odd as a text. I shan't hariolate as to why just yet.

I would point out that when Homer wishes to constitute "all the Greeks" his usual method is to call them panakhaioi: Iliad 10.1, 2.404, Odyssey 1,239, 14.369 etc etc

I think, then, that this is a slip via analogy to another word that should take its place but the tighter euphonic constraints imposed by catalogue poetry prevent the usual formation. Which is common in early epic. Its basically down to context of the poem. In fact the best part of three millennia later, I can not think of a better solution to this problem than what Homer did, in fact no one ever has, which may have formed part of Zenodotos' consternation.

[Macedon]

Is is posible he just meant regular Hellenes and joined two words together to fit the meter of the poem?

If by "regular Hellenes" you mean the inhabitants of Homeric Hellas in the kingdom of Achilles then I do not think so, for in that sense, Ajax was NOT a Hellenas. It would be like saying that Achilles was better at chess "than all Cretans and Achaeans"... It would not strike me as odd if the point was about some Hellenic (in the limited sense) hero, but it isn't.

@ Lyceum, As for the linothorax, I indeed found comments on the Iliad that add a comma separating the word from the prior part, which then would read "being smaller, protected by a linothorax.". Without it it still reads as a substantiative. I admit though I prefer it as an appellative and it seems the ancients did also.

The whole text about Oilean Ajax reads :

"Λοκρῶν δ’ ἡγεμόνευεν Ὀϊλῆος ταχὺς Αἴας μείων, οὔ τι τόσος γε ὅσος Τελαμώνιος Αἴας ἀλλὰ πολὺ μείων· ὀλίγος μὲν ἔην λινοθώρηξ, ἐγχείῃ δ’ ἐκέκαστο Πανέλληνας καὶ Ἀχαιούς·"

Aristonicus (1 c. BC - 1 c. AD.), in his commentaries on the Iliad has the said text read :

"ἀλλὰ πολὺ μείων, ὀλίγος μὲν ἔην, λινοθώρηξ, ἐγχείῃ δ’ ἐκέκαστο Πανέλληνας καὶ Ἀχαιούς."

which of course changes the whole read... (too bad the "original" did not have any punctuation marks...)

Hesiod is usually quoted as the first example of using "Panhellenes" in a broader meaning in the text you mentioned.

"βράδιον δὲ Πανελλήνεσσι φαείνει"

I just wasn't aware that Homer had also.

It is of course interesting that the "authenticity" of these specific lines were questioned by commentators in antiquity too, the arguments actually being that Ajax Oilean was not smaller than the Telamonian, that there was no linothorax worn among the "bronze-clad" Achaeans, also mentioned is the issue regarding the "Panhellenes", which means that they also understood it in a broader sense in this specific text. Of course Homer uses other terms to collectively describe the Greek force, but the fact remains that this is a very interesting line. Yet, if we accept that Homer and Hesiod were (near-) contemporaries, then we might more easily also accept such a use by the poet, who at this point may use a term unknown to the forces of Agamemnon some 4-5 centuries prior, yet contemporary to him. His preference to terms more ancient for poetic reasons is of course understandable.

[Lyceum]

Well yes, its essentially what I was saying: the poet had to use this form over the traditional formation for reasons I mentioned (metre/euphony/style).

I said earlier that I want to hold back on commenting on the why this term came to mind, since my opinion is slightly controversial as far as the historiographers are concerned since I take it to mean that the poet could take Hellenes as a synonym for Akhaioi but deliberately kept this in the background.

Now that is, of course, not to say that this usage was "original" to the constitution of the Iliad narrative, however I'm a bit unsure. I mean...its quite obvious that some parts of the katalogos...well its very weird. Some are genuine Mycenaean remembrances, some are contemporary, some are as late as the Athens vs Megara fiasco apparently....so.

Basically, this ought to be a "lapse" on behalf of the poet dating the usage of Hellenes a bit earlier...or a later insertion. Both theories are in line of how we feel these poems worked.

[Giannis K. Hoplite]

I was also thinking that the word "panhellenes" might have been a later addition,perhaps as late as the late fifth or later century bc. The reason is that Thucydides in his first book makes an argument that never does Homer use the word Hellenes to mean all the Greeks but uses the word Achaioi or Danaoi. Assuming that Thucydides had studied homer thoroughly, we either have to accept that the word panhellenes that comes to us was a later addition to the editions that Thucydides had in his disposal, or that there was some distinction between the Southern Greeks(Achaeans) and the northern(Hellenes). Although it is far fetched, we might support this theory if we wish, by noting that in the Iliad the Greek army is divided in two distinctive groups: the Peloponnesians(Achaeans) under Agamemnon and the Myrmidons(Hellenes) under Achilles. Both terms used in the same sentence could be a form of emphasis together with a good solution for keeping the meter.
Khairete
Giannis

[MeinPanzer]

Jonathan Hall has written a great book entitled "Hellenicity" about the creation of Hellenic identity which covers the development of Greek Ethnic terminology, and this issue in particular, at great length. If I remember correctly, Hall takes this term to be original, rejecting the criticisms of Thucydides and other modern scholars, and argues that the term "Hellenes" was basically a shortened form of "Panhellenes," the term for the inhabitants of the original Hellas.

[Macedon]

Thucydides indeed says that Homer never calls all the Greeks Hellenes which can be a clue, unless he is wrong or unless he thinks that Panhellenes would not be the exact same thing. Yet, he makes another comment that seems to be wrong. He writes that the Greeks did not yet call the rest of the world barbarians while the poet specifically calls Carians barbarophonous (of barbarian tongue) (2.867). Furthermore he is aware of the catalogue and talks about 1200 ships, a fact that hints at the complete list as we know it, although certain words might have been absent I guess.

Regarding the possibility that Homer distinguishes between Northeners and Southerners I would rather argue with his own account of the Myrmidons who were called both Hellenes and Achaeans. "Μυρμιδόνες δὲ καλεῦντο καὶ Ἕλληνες καὶ Ἀχαιοί" 2.684. This to me rules out the possibility of the word Achaeans being reserved for the Southerners, making it less possible (rather than impossible) that the Panhellenes could indeed be the Northeners. This might though be the case in the Odyssey. I looked for more information in this book and found a number of instances where the poet seems to generally refer to "Greece far and wide" by the term "Hellas and mid Argos". "καθ’ Ἑλλάδα καὶ μέσον Ἄργος." (Od.1.344, 4.726, 4.816, 15.80). It is interesting to note that although this phrase appears verbatim in 4 places in the Odyssey, it never appears in the Iliad.

[Lyceum]

There is no need to assume that Thucydides' Homer was our Homer. In fact it seems quite unlikely, especially in places like the katalogos. Though I suppose that depends on where you fall on the Nagy vs West issue.

Also, there is no need to assume that Thucydides, or anybody, "studied" Homer before the Hellenistic age, their acquaintance would have been largely via performance and in some instances via rhapsodic texts of specific books, but this is unlucky. The manuscript tradition also plays out this idea of verbatim associations.

Sorry Giannis, that's completely wrong. Firstly Homer would not have been capable of such schematised thinking in his medium and, as Macedon says, it just doesn't occur. Also for what it's worth its clear that the earliest stages of the tradition had a huge southern bias e.g those northerners are later accretions.

re: The work of Hall. His work (and Edith Hall's "Inventing the Barbarian" actually) has been pretty seminal to our modern understanding of Greek thought, alongside Burkert, Kowalzig, Calame etc. H

Hellen is reasonably fecund as a founding figure in genealogies and there are examples of toponyms named thus. You even get deities like Zeus Hellenios etc

I also disagree with his assessment that most of the Greek genealogical relationships/mythology were made in the 6/5th centuries, he's being too Athenocentric there and paying too much attention to the tragedies etc and not enough to all the cool epichoric stuff...

[Sean Manning]

There is no need to assume that Thucydides' Homer was our Homer. In fact it seems quite unlikely, especially in places like the katalogos. Though I suppose that depends on where you fall on the Nagy vs West issue.

Also, there is no need to assume that Thucydides, or anybody, "studied" Homer before the Hellenistic age, their acquaintance would have been largely via performance and in some instances via rhapsodic texts of specific books, but this is unlucky. The manuscript tradition also plays out this idea of verbatim associations.

Haven't there been studies of the few quotations of Homer which we have before Alexander which tend to show a text similar to our own (not word for word, but pretty close)? I agree that one phrase like "babbling Carians" is unlikely to be significant, since it could be a late variant or one which Thucydides simply forgot about.

And didn't memorizing and learning to manipulate the text of Homer start by the 5th century at least? I would consider that a kind of studying, even if it was less professional and writing-centric than Alexandrian scholarship. There is that tradition about the Peisistratids sponsoring a revision of the text of Homer, although in the archaic period its hard to move from "here are the later traditions which happen to survive" to "here is what actually happened."

[Lyceum]

Well...not exactly. Examination of quotations from the Hellenistic period compare favourably with those from before...but then in one sense this is circular since the later text was partially reconstituted from those.

The Alexandrians went to such a great extent trying to remake the text (and, by and large, did a damn good job) because of several variants existing before them. So basically we can't make the best guess as to what Thucydides and co had in many cases. Also even what's meant by "Homer" is something heavily open to interpretation.

In general, when discussing this period, concepts like "multiformity" is absolutely key.

Well..the very idea of a Peisistratean recension/edition is highly controversial in modern Classics (and antiquity too), and rightly so, and one that in general we try to avoid. Personally, I think there are certain Atticisms but its a massive leap to put them down to that period.

Well...its highly controversial as to how the rhapsodic guilds worked in this time, either way we ought to see the performance of Homer as a highly specialist skill only slowly opening up. See my post above.