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Lesches’ Ilias Parva (Bernabé 1987: 76 ff) begins Μοῦσα μοι ἔννεπε ἔργα ‘Muse, tell me the deeds’, as does the Hymn to Aphrodite (ed. Faulkner 2008), dated c.625 by West (2012: 240):

Μοῦσα μοι ἔννεπε ἔργα πολυχρυ�σου Ἀφροδι�της (Hymn to Aphrodite 1) ‘Muse, to me relate the deeds of much-golden Aphrodite’

Here πολυχρυ�σου is no longer part of a tradition, but an imitation of it, as indicated by its non-Homeric meaning. In Homer, πολύχρῡσος means ‘rich in gold’, generally of cities (Mycenae 7.180+; Troy 18.289: πολύχρῡσον πολύχαλκον ‘rich in gold, rich in bronze’) and only once of a person, the notorious Dolon (10.315), with the same derived phrase used of Troy and still meaning ‘rich in gold’ (Finkelberg 2012: 85).

By the 7th century, poets seem to have reversed the thematic structure. More- over, poets who unequivocally wrote did not generally invoke the Muse/goddess to tell/sing the tale, but took the credit themselves. Compare the following opening lines, the first with a hephthemimeral caesura (§8.7), not admitted by van Raalte (1986: 81):

Μουσα�ων Ἑλικωνιάδων ἀρχώμεθ᾽ ἀείδειν ‘from the Heliconian Muses let us begin to sing’

(Hesiod, Theogony ed. West 1966)

Δήμητρ᾽ ἠΰκομον σεμνὴν θεᾱ�ν ἄρχομ᾽ ἀείδειν

‘Demeter I begin to sing, the fair-tressed awesome goddess’

(Hymn to Demeter [c.580], ed. West 2003; cf. Currie 2012: 191; tr. Foley 1994)

38 Cf. Nagler (1974) on preverbal gestalts. This contradicts the view that the opening of the Odyssey is modeled on that of the Iliad (Pfeiffer 1968: 4; ComOd i. 67 f). Kahane (1992: 117 f) also exaggerates the similarities by focusing exclusively on the opening accusative word. Genuine preverbal gestalts must be distinguished from ad hoc formula derivations, one of which is ἥ φημι θεα�ων ἔμμεν ἀρίστη (18.364) ‘(I) who claim to be best of the goddesses’, generated from the archaic boasting formula with εὔχομαι (§§10.2, 23.5). Note the rare, otherwise Odyssean ἔμμεν modeled on -μεν/-μεναι alternations (§8.10).

Traditional and untraditional proems   103

Ἥρην ἀ̄είδω χρῡσόθρονον, ἣν τέκε Ῥείη

‘Hera I sing of the golden throne, whom Rhea bore’

(Hymn to Hera, ed. West 2003) Ἴ̄λιον ἀ̄είδω καὶ Δαρδανίην ἐΰπωλον

ἧς πέρι πόλλ᾽ ἔπαθον Δαναοί, θεράποντες Ἄρηος ‘Of Ilium I sing and the land of Dardania rich in horses, for which they suffered greatly, the Danaans, minions of Ares’

(Another version (or fragment?) of the Ilias Parva, lines 1–2 [Bernabé 1987: 84], tr. Griffin and Hammond 1982: 129) Μούσᾱς ἀ̄είδω καὶ Ἀπόλλωνα κλυτότοξον

‘Muses I sing and Apollo of the glorious bow’

(An alleged 1-line proem to the Iliad known to Nicanor and Crates; see Allen 1924: 290; Kirk, IlCom i. 52)

The last three contain oddities with respect to traditional language. The use of ἀείδω ‘I sing’ with metrical lengthening of the initial segment is un-Homeric in the second strong position, though ἀ̄είδῃ ‘sings’ is verse-initial at xvii.519, taken by Wyatt (1969: 182) as analogous to the long initial in the “later cyclic poets”. There are at least two good reasons to reject these as Homeric: (i) the author takes credit for the work, and (ii) the localization of ἀείδω with metrical lengthening belongs to a late formula type (cf. Bolling 1925: 58; LFE 155). Moreover, in the last fragment accusative Ἀπόλλωνα κλυτότοξον otherwise occurs only at 15.55 with numerous variant readings.

Homer uses Δαρδανίη only once (20.216), where it is, as in the Ilias Parva, contrasted with Ἴ̄λιος, but it is Ἴ̄λιος that is εὔπωλος ‘well-foaled’ (5.551, ii.18). However, since εὔπωλος is a two-termination adjective and has no separate femi- nine form (cf. Kastner 1967), the Ilias Parva line is ambiguous and ἐΰπωλον could technically modify either Ἴ̄λιον or Δαρδανίην or both.

The second line makes it clear that this tale is not only about Troy but also about the Danaans, a belligerent group39 who suffered there because they were θεράποντες Ἄρηος ‘minions of Ares’, a common expression for warriors. This formula (2.110, 6.67, 15.733, 19.78, accusative 7.382 — all line-final) may be old, and is an epithet of the two Ajaxes at 8.79, 10.228 (also line-final), plus Δαναοί which can occur alone before the hephthemimeral caesura (Parry 1928a: 225‒229).

39 Cf. Ebeling (1885: i. 274): “Graeci, praesertim belligerantes”, sometimes qualified by warring epithets, e.g. αἰχμηταί ‘spearsmen’ (12.419), φιλοπτολέμοισι ‘war-loving’ (20.351).

104   Homer and Early Epic

Θέραψ, θεράπων ‘servant’ may be a borrowing from Hittite tarpalli- / tarpašša- /

tarpan-(alli)- which designated the royal substitute (Householder and Nagy 1972:

774 ff., w. lit). Significantly, the word is frequently applied to Patroclus (e.g. 16.243, 653, 17.164, 18.151/2), especially right before his death, in which he is indeed a sur- rogate for Achilles, even wearing his armor (Miller 1982: 19, w. lit).

In the Iliad it is mostly kings who have θεράποντες, as one might expect given the Near Eastern custom of the ritual substitute. But why would Ares need θεράποντες? One possibility is that θεράποντες here simply has the later, more general meaning of ‘attendants, servants’, as in Archilochus:

εἰμὶ δ᾽ ἐγὼ θεράπων μὲν Ἐνῡαλίοιο ἄνακτος ‘I am a servant of the lord of war, Enyalios’

(Archilochus 1 ed. West 1971)

In Homer, Ἐνῡαλίοιο occurs only at 13.519 in a different slot, but ἄνακτος is often line-final.

There was also a tradition about Ares in which the older meaning ‘royal sub- stitute’ would make sense. In a story about his imprisonment in a bronze urn (5.384 ff.), the poet says (5.388) ## καί νύ κεν ἔνθ᾽ ἀπόλοιτο Ἄρης ‘and forthwith Ares would have perished there’ (cf. 5.311 of Aeneas; see §24.5.2 for νύ κεν). Kirk (IlCom ii. 101) labels this a “theological absurdity”, but a time / tradition in which Ares was not (completely?) immortal would explain why he might have needed θεράποντες. In any event, that the Danaans served that ritual function seems to be implied by the formula under discussion, and the first hemistich suggests that this function is being effected in their suffering about the citadel of Troy. From the more usual Homeric point of view, this is indeed bizarre.

9.6 Summary

The five proems in the previous section continue the tradition that makes the theme the first word of the poem (cf. Kahane 1992). In early epic the topic is then qualified, generally in the second line by unnecessary enjambment. The Odys-

sey’s ‘man of many turns’ is further delimited as the one who sacked the ‘holy

citatel of Troy’, a unique phrase but readily derived; cf. Κικόνων ἱερὸν πτολίεθρον ix.165 ‘holy citadel of the Cicones’ (see ComOd i. 70). The second line of the Ilias

Parva narrows the topic to the Trojan War and the suffering of the Danaans

because of their role as Ares’ surrogates. This is thematically different from the

Iliad, which was intended fundamentally as the tale of the wrath of Achilles and,

Summary   105

suggests that μῆνιν ἄειδε θεα� is not so much a formula as part of a higher-level program, a schema for opening a text within a tradition that invokes the goddess / Muse to sing / narrate the authoritatively sanctioned version of the tale (on which see Redfield 1979: 98 f; Skafte Jensen 1980: 62 ff; ComOd i. 68). Since sche- mata subsume scripts which are instantiated by particular word-choices, includ- ing formulas (Miller 1987), it should not be surprising that there is a dispute over whether or not μῆνιν ἄειδε θεα� is formulaic. It is certainly well-motivated within the canons of traditional epic diction, whether or not one opts to define it as for- mulaic.

MF   Ancient Greek Dialects