Redesigning Achilles: 'Recycling' the Epic Cycle in the 'Little Iliad' (Ovid, Metamorphoses 12.1-13.622) (Untersuchungen zur antiken Literatur und Geschichte - Band 89)

Sophia Papaioannou Redesigning Achilles

≥

Untersuchungen zur antiken Literatur und Geschichte Herausgegeben von Gustav-Adolf Lehmann, Heinz-Günther Nesselrath und Otto Zwierlein

Band 89

Walter de Gruyter · Berlin · New York

Redesigning Achilles ‘Recycling’ the Epic Cycle in the ‘Little Iliad’ (Ovid, Metamorphoses 12.1−13.622)

by

Sophia Papaioannou

Walter de Gruyter · Berlin · New York

앝 Printed on acid-free paper which falls within the guidelines 앪 of the ANSI to ensure permanence and durability.

ISSN 1862-1112 ISBN 978-3-11-020048-5 Library of Congress Cataloging-in-Publication Data A CIP catalogue record for this book is available from the Library of Congress. Bibliographic information published by the Deutsche Nationalbibliothek The Deutsche Nationalbibliothek lists this publication in the Deutsche Nationalbibliografie; detailed bibliographic data are available in the Internet at http://dnb.d-nb.de. 쑔 Copyright 2007 by Walter de Gruyter GmbH & Co. KG, 10785 Berlin, Germany. All rights reserved, including those of translation into foreign languages. No part of this book may be reproduced or transmitted in any form or by any means, electronic or mechanical, including photocopy, recording, or any information storage or retrieval system, without permission in writing from the publisher. Printed in Germany Cover design: Christopher Schneider, Berlin. Printing and binding: Hubert & Co GmbH & Co KG, Göttingen.

Preface The book is the first critical study on the structure and the themes of Ovid’s retelling of the Trojan Saga in Metamorphoses 12.1-13.622, and it explores the motives and the objectives behind the selected narrative moments from the Epic Cycle that found their way into the Ovidian version of the Trojan war. Specifically, I claim that the key to the selection and arrangement of the particular narrative material in the compact recollection of the Trojan War in Met. 12.1-13.622 is poetics: the Ovidian Trojan experience is meant to read as a conflux of assorted focalizations on Achilles, wherein Achilles’ hero model is reconstructed, and the process is reported through the eyes of other epic characters, who represent different standpoints or ‘readings’ depending on their particular involvement in the Trojan plot and their peculiar perspective on the Trojan adventure. Thus, the characterization of Achilles proves a work-in-progress, never definite and never complete, for it is never meant to be so, because the composition principles of the epic genre are never final but always evolving. Through the narrative outcome, an intelligent anti-epic narration, Ovid introduces the theoretical principles of innovation that mark his transformed epic. I assumed research for the present volume simultaneously with the composition of my earlier book, on Ovid’s reception of Vergil’s Aeneid in Met. 13.62314.582, but the actual writing of the manuscript began three summers ago. The composition process lasted nearly two years, and in the course of my labor I have accumulated many personal debts. I have greatly benefited from the advice and incisive criticism of Philip Hardie, Helen Lovatt, Alden Smith, Richard Tarrant and Chrysanthi Tsitsiou-Chelidoni. Ulrich Schmitzer commented judiciously on an earlier version of chapter four, part of which was originally published as an article in Gymnasium 2002. I presented segments of my work, while still in progress, at various workshops and conferences, including the 2006 Symposium Cumanum at Cuma in Italy and the 2006 Conference on Orality and Literacy in Auckland, NZ, and I should thank the colleagues in the audiences for their constructive and prompt criticism. I am especially grateful to Heinz-Günther Nesselrath and Otto Zwierlein, the referees of the Untersuchungen der antiken Literatur und Geschichte Series, for reading my arguments with their customary diligence, and offering an amplitude of corrections, supplements and comments, that indubitably strengthened and

VI

Preface

improved the flow of my arguments. I could hardly hope for more meticulous editors. The University of Cyprus generously funded two long summer research visits at Cambridge, MA (summer of 2005) and Austin, TX (summer of 2006), and to advantage of their library resources and various other research facilities. I am grateful to Richard Thomas and Michael Gagarin, the chairs of the Classics Department, respectively, at Harvard University and the University of Texas at Austin during my visits there, for facilitating my research in every possible way; and no less, my most courteous host at Austin, my former teacher at UT, Ingrid Edlund-Berry. At home, I was fortunate to have at my disposal the great collection of the Blegen Library of the American School of Classical Studies at Athens and the unfailing assistance of the staff of the University of Cyprus Central Library. Christopher Schabel, Associate Professor of Medieval History at the University of Cyprus, once again found the time to proofread my manuscript despite the formidable load of his own work and his various other pressing obligations. The last, editorial phase of the book materialized in the early fall of 2007, at the difficult time of transition that followed immediately after my move from Cyprus to Athens to undertake a new position at the University of Athens, Department of Philology. And it would be a serious omission on my part to pass over without expressing my gratitude to my colleague at the University of Athens, Eleni Karamalengou, Director of the Classical Philology Division of the Department of Philology, who so generously allowed me to virtually take possession of her office, computer and printer, during those last, crucial weeks of laborious and intense editing and polishing up the manuscript for publication, and compiling the indexes. Were it not for her discretion, as much as for the courtesy of Ms Argyro Frantzi, the Classics Librarian, who allowed me to print the final version of the CRC on her own printer, this book would not have been finished within the deadline originally set for its publication. Finally, on the part of the publisher it is my delight to extend my profound appreciation to Sabine Vogt for her instant addressing all my inquiries. Needless to note, responsibility for all arguments and opinions advanced, as well as all errors remaining in the book, are wholly mine. Athens, October 2007

S.P.

Table of Contents Preface ........................................................................................................................ V Table of Contents .................................................................................................. VII Abbreviations .......................................................................................................... XI Introduction ................................................................................................................ 1 Chapter One Designing Epic Beginnings 1. Calchas in the ‘Iliad’ and the Iliad through Calchas (Met. 12.7-38) .............. 25 1.1 Funeral Beginnings: Aesacus’ Cenotaph ........................................... 25 1.2 Marvelous Beginnings: The Snake Prodigy ...................................... 31 1.3 Maiden Beginnings: The Sacrifice of Iphigeneia ............................. 37 2. The Fama of Epic Tradition .............................................................................. 44 Chapter Two Epic Self-Affirmation and Epic Self-Consioucsness: Introducing Achilles (Met. 12.64-145) 1 Protesilaus, the Proto-Achilles ........................................................................... 49 2. Cycnus, the alter Achilles .................................................................................... 50 2.1. Cycnum aut Hectora ................................................................................. 50 2.2 Do You Know Thy (Epic) Self? ......................................................... 59 2.3 The Anger of Achilles .......................................................................... 67 2.4 The Hero’s Gender ............................................................................... 72 3. Achilles’ ‘Victory’ ................................................................................................. 79 4. The Swan Poetics ................................................................................................ 83 Chapter Three Epic Memory and Epic (De)Composition: Deconstructing Achilles 1. Introduction ......................................................................................................... 87 2. Epic Singing and Epic Tales .............................................................................. 88 3. Epic Poetics: The Master of Epic Memory .................................................... 93 4. Epic Labor: Fighting the Freaks ....................................................................... 98 4.1 The Homeric Subtext ........................................................................... 98

VIII

4.2 Epic Gender and Epic Performance ............................................... 102 4.3 The Architecture of the Epic Spectacle .......................................... 108 5. The Spectacular Politics of Immortality ........................................................ 116 Chapter Four Facets of Elimination: Killing Achilles 1. Introduction ....................................................................................................... 125 2. Challenging Nestor: Tlepolemus Protesting ................................................. 126 3. The Fate of Periclymenus ................................................................................ 135 4. The Death of Achilles ....................................................................................... 138 Chapter Five The ‘Judgment of the Arms’: Re-Constructing Achilles 1. Introduction ....................................................................................................... 153 2. The Poetics of Argument ................................................................................. 154 3. The Price of the Prize ....................................................................................... 155 4. ‘Writing Up’ the Contest .................................................................................. 159 5. Staging the Mênis, the Arms and the Men ..................................................... 164 6. Scripting the Mêtis and the Arms as the Man ................................................ 169 7. The Iliad vs. the ‘little Iliad’ .............................................................................. 171 8. Polemic En-listing ............................................................................................. 187 9. Daedalean Poetics ............................................................................................. 197 10. The Logic(al) Fashioning of the Epic Hero ................................................ 200 11. Epigrams, Epitaphs, and Epigraphs: Sealing the Closure ........................ 202 Chapter Six Fe/Male Sacrifice: Performing the Poetics of Genre- and Gender-Crossing in the ‘Fall of Troy’ (Met. 13.399-575) 1. Introduction ....................................................................................................... 207 2. The Falls of Troy ............................................................................................... 209 2.1 The Fall of Troy and the Iliad ........................................................... 209 2.2 The ‘Fall’ of Polydorus ...................................................................... 214 3. The ‘Fall of Troy’ and Hecuba ........................................................................ 222 4. The Anger of Hecuba ....................................................................................... 225 5. Staging Polyxena ................................................................................................ 228 6. Fe/Male Virtus and Sacrifice ........................................................................... 236 7. The Poetics of Lamentation ............................................................................ 244 Chapter Seven Memnon’s Fate and Fame: Impersonating Achilles 1. Introduction ....................................................................................................... 253 2. Memnon and/as Achilles ................................................................................. 254

IX

3. The Power of Aurora ........................................................................................ 257 4. Memnon’s ‘Hectorean’ Side ............................................................................. 259 5. Avian Allusion and Illusion ............................................................................. 262 5.1 Allusion: The Birds of Meleager ....................................................... 262 5.2 Illusory Sêmata ..................................................................................... 273 5.3 Sema-ntic Nomina ................................................................................. 279 Bibliography ............................................................................................................ 285 Indexes ..................................................................................................................... 293

Abbreviations The Latin text throughout is quoted from R. Tarrant’s OCT edition, P. Ovidi Nasonis Metamorphoses (Oxford 2004), noting any divergences; other texts according to standard editions (normally either the OCT or the Teubner series). Unless indicated otherwise, the translations of the Metamorphoses are quoted from F.J. Miller (ed. and trans.), Ovid IV, Metamorphoses IX-XV, 2nd edition, revised by G.P. Goold (Cambridge, MA and London 1984), with a few changes. The translation of the Iliad is quoted from R. Fagles, Homer: The Iliad. With Introduction and Notes by Bernard Knox (London 1990). In translating passages from the Aeneid and the Odyssey I have basically consulted, respectively, H.R. Fairclough’s translation of Vergil and A.T. Murray’s, translation of the Odyssey, both in the Loeb series, with occasional changes. Abbreviated names of ancient authors and works follow Liddell-Scott-Jones, A GreekEnglish Lexicon, Glare, Oxford Latin Dictionary, and the Oxford Classical Dictionary, except where expanded for clarity. Abbreviations of journal titles follow those used by L’ Année Philologique. Works of modern scholarship repeatedly referred to are noted in the text in abbreviated form (by the author’s name and date of publication, as they are listed in the bibliography at the end of the book). The following abbreviations are used throughout for booklength works: Bernabé Bömer 1969 Bömer 1977 Bömer 1980 Bömer 1982 Chantraine EpGF

A. Bernabé (ed.), Poetae epic Graeci: Testimonia et fragmenta. Volume 1 (Leipzig 21996 [1987]). F. Bömer, P. Ovidius Naso: Metamorphosen. Kommentar 1. Buch I-III (Heidelberg 1969). F. Bömer, P. Ovidius Naso: Metamorphosen. Kommentar 4. Buch VIII-IX (Heidelberg 1977). F. Bömer, P. Ovidius Naso: Metamorphosen. Kommentar 5. Buch X-XI (Heidelberg 1980). F. Bömer, P. Ovidius Naso: Metamorphosen. Kommentar 6. Buch XII-XIII (Heidelberg 1982). P. Chantraine, Dictionaire étymologique de la langue grecque, 4 vols. (Paris 1968-1980). M. Davies (ed.), Epicorum Graecorum Fragmenta (Göttingen 1988).

XII

Frisk H-E

LIMC LS LSJ M-W OLD Page Radt RE Roscher ThLL West, Iambi West

Abbreviations

H. Frisk, Griechisches Etymologisches Wörterbuch, 2 vols (Heidelberg 21973). M. Haupt, O. Korn, H.J. Ehwald (edd.), P. Ovidius Naso, Metamorphosen, vol. 1 (Books 1-7), vol. 2 (Books 8-15), revised by M. von Albrecht (Dublin and Zurich 1966). H.C. Ackermann and J.R. Gisler, Lexicon Iconographicum Mythologiae Classicae (Zürich 1981-1997). C.T. Lewis and C. Short, A Latin Dictionary (Oxford 1879). H.G. Liddell and R. Scott, revised by H. Stuart Jones, A Greek-English Lexicon. 9th ed. (Oxford 1940). R. Merkelback and M.L. West (edd.), Fragmenta Hesiodea (Oxford 1967/1999). P.G.W. Glare, Oxford Latin Dictionary (Oxford 19681982). D.L. Page (ed.), Poetae Melici Graeci (Oxford 1962). S. Radt (ed.), Tragicorum Graecorum Fragmenta 3 (Aeschylus) (Göttingen 1985). A. Pauly, G. Wissowa, et al., Real-Encyclopädie der classischen Altertumswissenschaft (Stuttgart 1894-1978). W.H. Roscher, Ausführliches Lexicon der griechischen und römischen Mythologie, 7 vols. (Leipzig 1884-1937). Thesaurus Linguae Latinae (Leipzig 1900- ). M.L. West (ed.), Iambi et Elegi Graeci ante Alexandrum cantati, vol. 1 (Oxford 1978). M.L. West (ed.), Greek Epic Fragments. Loeb (Cambridge MA 2003).

Citations to Bömer’s Kommentar follow the following pattern: Bömer 1982, 370-373 ad 13.632-704, refers to pages 370-373 of the 1982 volume (volume 7, which covers books 13-15 and was published in 1982), and more specifically to the section that covers lines 632-704 of Metamorphoses 13. Bömer 1980, 370-373, refers generally to pages 370-373 of the 1980 volume.

Introduction men praise more the song which is newer Od. 16.351-352 Ovid’s readers have adopted the phrase ‘little Iliad’ to refer to the precis of the Trojan Saga recounted in Metamorphoses 12.1-13.622. With the story of the Trojan expedition and its aftermath, Ovid signals a turn towards a more structurally disciplined, thematically coherent and chronologically linear narrative, which covers the last four books of the epic. 1 The ‘little Aeneid’ (Met. 13.62314.608) following next is in many respects the logical sequel to the Trojan affair: it covers simultaneously the fates of the Trojan survivors, the legend of Aeneas along with the foundation of Rome, and the transference of epic and narrative action from the East and the sphere of the Greeks to the Roman West. The last book-and-a-half of the poem is devoted to the legends of Rome, and culminates in a celebratory forecast of Augustus’ and Ovid’s apotheoses. The organic integration of an abbreviated Trojan story inside the flow of the Ovidian carmen perpetuum does not necessarily regulate the narrative syn-

1

Ellsworth 1980, 23: “At this point there is a major break in Ovid’s narrative, since he turns from the chiefly ‘mythological’ period to ‘historical’ times”. Scholars who consider the opening of Book 12 the beginning of a new section include H. Fraenkel, Ovid: A Poet Between Two Worlds (Berkeley/Los Angeles 1945), 101; Otis 1970, 83-86, 278-305, 315-316. For R. Coleman, ‘Structure and Intention in the Metamorphoses’, CQ 21 (1971), 472, n. 1, “the ‘historical’ section actually begins at 11.194 with Laomedon’s founding of Troy”; Kenney (1986, 439) and Tissol (2002, 315) side with Coleman’s categorization. For W.S. Anderson, Ovid’s Metamorphoses: Books 6-10 (Norman, OK 1972) 13-14, the ‘historical’ period begins at 11.748-749 with the story of Aesacus. W. Ludwig, Struktur und Einheit in den Metamorphosen Ovids (Berlin 1965), 60-65, suggests that we distinguish between the narrative in Book 11 (11.194-795), a separate ‘mythical’ prelude that introduces the characters and the history of Troy prior to the war, and the Trojan War proper, which begins along with Book 12. Wheeler 2000 is the most recent advocate of this view, contra Croisille (1985, 58), who considers Ludwig’s separation rather tenuous. Contemporary appraisals of the Metamorphoses structure generally support the regulated recurrence of certain thematic motifs and structural patterns as a principal narrative technique, guaranteeing the smooth progression of the plot in an epic that lacks a well-defined unifying theme or a protagonist hero.

2

Introduction

thesis of the ‘little Iliad’. 2 The story line in Met. 12.1-13.622 observes tenets largely independent from the structural function of the same cluster of Trojan stories when these are taken en bloc. The aspiration to identify the constraints behind Ovid’s idiosyncratic reproduction of the Iliad saga and to rationalize the various objectives served by this unorthodox synthesis has partly inspired the undertaking of this study. The imperative for an in-depth exploration of the ‘little Iliad’ texture, in order to address certain questions on Ovid’s selfawareness of his place within literary tradition, and especially his relationship with Homeric poetry, makes the undertaking of the present work a desideratum in the area of Ovidian criticism. Met. 12.1-13.622 has not been among those sections of the epic much favored by scholarship, and prior to the 1990s it had hardly received in-depth attention: Dippel’s dissertation is still the only exclusive publication on this intriguing intertextual experiment. 3 Well worth consideration is a second, nearly contemporary, but unpublished, and thus little known, dissertation, by M. Musgrove, which offers a first comprehensive narratological study of the structural organization of the cluster ‘little Iliad’-‘little Aeneid’. 4 Two brief articles by Ellsworth and Croisille, both of which are heavily indebted to Otis’ discussion of the episode more than a decade earlier 5 , represent the only other known efforts towards appreciating the ‘little Iliad’ as a narrative unit in its own right. All these critics were concerned with establishing links between Ovid and the Iliad in terms of actual episodes and verbal echoes, and with justifying Ovid’s structural choices in his odd recollection of the Iliad in terms of experimentation with myth, and representation of history through myth. 6 Generally speaking, Homer’s presence throughout the whole Metamorphoses, although often quite obvious, has been virtually ignored. 7 Michael von 2

3 4 5 6

7

Von Albrecht’s comment on the overall structure of the Ovidian carmen perpetuum could apply also to its particular thematic subdivisions: “Der Aufbau der ‘Metamorphosen’ ist im großen und ganzen relativ klar, im einzelnen schwer zu analysieren” (M. von Albrecht, ‘Ovids Metamorphoses’, in: E. Burck (ed.), Das Römische Epos [Darmstadt 1979], 143). Dippel 1990; the book reproduces closely the text of the author’s 1988 dissertation, presented at the Justus-Liebig-Universität Gießen. M.W. Musgrove, Narrative Experimentation in Ovid’s Metamorphoses, Books 12-14 (Doctoral Dissertation, University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill 1991). Ellsworth 1980 and Croisille 1985; Otis 1970, 278-305. Dippel 1990, 16: “Mittels dieser vorbereitenden, einbettenden Verbindungslinien erreicht Ovid ein Ineinandergleiten der Welt des Mythos in den quasi-historischen Raum des trojanischen Krieges. Dies legt die Vermutung nahe, daß Ovid den trojanischen Krieg mythisieren will, da der Mythos als lingua franca ihm erst die Freiheit gibt, sich gängigen Darstellungs- und Interpretationsmustern zu entziehen, sie zu modifizieren und Neues zu gestalten”. Baldo 1995, focusing on Vergilian influences on Ovid, devotes the entire second chapter (pp. 112-141) to Homer in the Metamorphoses, but the Homeric passages discussed are the

Introduction

3

Albrecht’s assertion already thirty-five years ago that the study of Ovid’s reception of Homer in depth and in its own right has been sorely neglected has hardly lost any of its validity. 8 It has often been remarked that the Ovidian retelling of the Iliad circumvents the great Homeric epic, which supposedly it seeks to reproduce. Literally speaking, Ovid’s ‘Iliad’ is best described as a ‘non-Iliad’, since the plot of this story includes episodes that thematically belong to the legend of the Trojan War but chronologically precede or follow the events narrated in the 24 books of the Homeric epic. 9 Criticism agrees that Ovid’s primary source for the construction of the chronological framework of his Trojan narrative was the broader Epic Cycle, and especially the Cypria and the Aethiopis, both the poems themselves and their posterior literary receptions in Greece and Rome. As a matter of fact, the narrative strategy adopted in the composition of the ‘little Iliad’ points to the Cyclic rather than the Homeric poems. Ovid’s account of the Trojan War covers a much greater expanse of narrative time compared to the Homeric model, a characteristic also distinguishing the Cyclic epics, according to Aristotle (Poetics 8; 23). 10 The logic of plot articulation has been a challenge to trace as well. For Ellsworth, Ovid’s choices should be attributed to a desire for original variatio, a need “to tell the story of the Trojan War, and yet not repeat the contents of these works [i.e. the Iliad, the Odyssey and the Aeneid]”. 11 The ultimate success of this variatio experiment relied on “allusion to well known episodes, expan-

8

9

10 11

ones already incorporated in Vergil’s Aeneid (most notably the Cyclops episode). Baldo takes it for granted that as a rule Ovid reads Homer through Vergil. M. von Albrecht, Quellen- und Interpretationsprobleme in Ovids Metamorphosen (Hildesheim/New York 1971) XII. On specific Homeric passages adapted in Ovid, the observations in Lafaye (1904/1971), esp. pp. 115-140, are still useful. See, for example, Solodow 1988, 32: “Though Books Twelve and Thirteen concern chiefly the Trojan War, Homer’s poem is more evidently absent than present”. Solodow considers this a “recognized feature of Alexandrian literature”, which would make Ovid here appear as “the fulfiller of neoteric tendencies”. On the conflicting narrative strategies that pit the Cyclic and the Homeric epics at opposite corners, see now J.S. Burgess, ‘Performance and the Epic Cycle’, CJ 100 (2004), 1-22. Ellsworth 1980, 24, following Galinsky 1975, 4-5, 219-222, and passim, who first explored extensively Ovid’s narrative strategy of treating older material in new and different ways (referre idem aliter). Ovid’s narrative imitatio cum variatione has been lionized in most premodern assessments of the Metamorphoses, called, among other things, “the poem’s premier principle of arrangement” (H. Herter, ‘Ovids Kunstprinzip in den Metamorphosen’, AJP 69 [1948], 347), its “ordering principle” (Due 1974, 133; E.J. Kenney, ‘Ovid’, in: E.J. Kenney and W. Clausen (edd.), The Cambridge History of Classical Literature, II [Cambridge 1982], 432), the “hallmark” of Ovid’s poetic style (G.M.H. Murphy, Metamorphoses XI. Edited with an Introduction and Commentary [London 1972], 6), and the “character of the poem” (Galinsky 1975, 106; also 1990, 25).

4

Introduction

sion of short scenes, and similarity of theme and structure”. 12 Nonetheless, what exposes the limitations of all these approaches is their inability to identify specific motives for Ovid’s predilection for particular episodes as opposed to others, especially given the variety of suspending action moments that the Epic Cycle and the Trojan legend throughout its broader literary reception across time presented. The puzzling case of a seemingly erratic narration accentuates complications surfacing from the fact that as a rule the Ovidian composition is subject to dynamics that are rarely mastered by a cursory or prejudiced reader. So far, critics have failed to understand the narrative structure of the ‘little Iliad’. Misguided perhaps by the fact that Metamorphoses 12 opens to a series of familiar themes, they sought to discern behind the clusters reproducing the Iliad and the Aeneid patterns of symmetry, regularity, or consistency. Without specifically declaring it, essentially they initiated a partition, in terms of narrative strategy, between the first eleven, the ‘mythological’ books, and the concluding four, the more disciplined ‘historical’ ones. 13 This initiative, however, is unauthorized: it is experimentation with fluidity and unpredictability that forges a peculiar unity among the various episodes of the ‘little Iliad’. 14 My study focuses anew on the sophisticated rationale behind the manipulation of a narrative of flux. It is fortunate that in the last decade Ovid has become a favorite of literary scholars, and the flood of truly intelligent scholarship, emulating in diversity, depth, and orientation the creativity of the poet’s genius, has certainly benefited Met. 12.1-13.622. A number of readings, centering on individual episodes of the ‘Iliad’ recollection, have been illuminating, especially in discussing the various expressions of allusive and crosstextual appropriation. Musgrove’s reading of the opening of the ‘little Iliad’ (12.11-23) illustrates the 12 13

14

Ellsworth 1980, 28. For example, W. Marg, Gnomon 21 (1949), 44-57 (review of H. Fränkel, Ovid), 55-56; Galinsky 1975, 217-218, implying that the ‘little Iliad’ is the weakest spot in the last four books of the epic; and Due 1974, 139-140; contra Ellsworth 1980, 28. Galinsky’s statement (1975, 62) is telling: “there is no rigid formal scheme in the Metamorphoses. Everything is in flux and the ever-changing structure of the poem… reflects metamorphosis and, metaphorically speaking, is metamorphosis”; Barchiesi 1997, 181-182, likewise sees in Ovid’s text a conscious effort to resist strict schematization. Still, even though single all-encompassing schemes such as those suggested in the 1960s by Ludwig and Otis have been abandoned nowadays, the effort to argue for the epic’s orderly arrangement on the basis of book design has not lost its attraction. Thus, E. Rieks, ‘Zum Aufbau von Ovids Metamorphosen’, WJA 6 (1980), 85-103, and A. Bartenbach, Motiv- und Erzählstruktur in Ovids Metamorphosen (Frankfurt am Main 1990), promote a structural arrangement sustained by thematic parallels in books 5, 10 and 15; N. Holzberg, ‘Ter quinque volumina as carmen perpetuum’, MD 40 (1998), 77-98, traces parallel themes within the internal section of each pentad; also Fowler 1989, 95-97; prior to Fowler, Crabbe 1981, 2274-2327, argued for a centripetal arrangement around book 8.

Introduction

5

confluence of the Vergilian and Homeric intertexts behind the omen of the snake at Aulis, which she takes to be programmatic for Ovid’s composition strategy in his rewriting of the great epics. 15 In a frequently cited article on the poetics of Fama in Metamorphoses 12.37-63, Zumwalt has made ingenious observations on Fama as an allegory for the Ovidian narrator of the ‘little Iliad’, but also as a reflection of the ongoing shape-shifting that runs through the entire Ovidian text. 16 A recent article by Möller is the first independent study on the duel between Achilles and Cycnus, and it approaches the character of Achilles as if the latter were an active composer of textual narrative. 17 The Centauromachy account has generated considerable interest lately: between 1998 and 2004 three separate studies addressed from different perspectives this particularly long episode. Musgrove, first, discusses Nestor’s status as narrator of the Centauromachy and as an extension of Fama in terms of manipulating the formulation of epic poetics. 18 My own contribution focuses on the Cyllarus and Hylonome love story, a tale embedded in the Centauromachy, and it advances further several of Musgrove’s thoughts on Ovid’s intention to proffer a well-defined theory about his poetics. Among other things, I center on Ovid’s embrace of Nestor’s persona in order to undercut the culture of masculinity as primary characteristic of an epic hero but also of a Roman male. Nestor’s logorrhoeic recollection of gory combats patently mocks the stereotype of epic virtus. 19 Finally, DeBrohun’s lengthy article uses the Cyllarus and Hylonome interlude as reference point to discuss hybridity in Ovid’s epic poetics. DeBrohun defines hybridity as the interaction of conceptual opposites (e.g. civilization vs. wilderness, male vs. female), which naturally expands to embrace the omnipresent clash of contrasting genres that is the conceptual backbone of Ovid’s poetic corpus – especially his epic ideology as fleshed out in the Metamorphoses. 20 15

16 17

18 19 20

Musgrove 1997, 267-283; Musgrove believes that in reviving the omen of the snake Ovid has in mind the fall of Troy, and the devouring of Laocoon and his sons by Neptune’s snakes in Aeneid 2. In her reading, the Homeric intertext recalled to highlight the Vergilian allusions (“to activate the [Vergilian] intertext”) introduces a competition between Homer and Vergil, which emphasizes Ovid’s deep familiarity with both the Vergilian and the Homeric narratives. An alternative reading, also based on convergence of multiple intertexts, is presented in Baldo 1995, 115-120. Zumwalt 1977. Möller 2003. Her arguments often run counter to the objective of my discussion, but there is much to be valued in her methodology, and her close reading of the episode allows stimulating points to surface. Musgrove 1998. Papaioannou 2000 (on Cyllarus and Hylonome) and 2002 (on Nestor); arguments developed in the latter of these pieces are revisited in this study. DeBrohun 2004.

6

Introduction

The second half of Ovid’s Trojan War has benefited from Hopkinson’s recent commentary on Metamorphoses 13. Hopkinson’s overview of the ‘Judgment of the Arms’, Hecuba’s fate and the Memnonides, is replete with suggestive comments, several of which I will develop further in this study. 21 The exchange of speeches between Ajax and Ulixes has been the episode of the ‘little Iliad’ most favored by critics, but the pole of attraction has been rhetoric, not poetics. Even well into the 1990s the agon between the two heroes over the armor of Achilles primarily represented a lighter in tone, but sophisticated in style, model controversia adaptating a theme greatly favored by ancient dramatists and orators, and popular among educators in oratory in ancient Rome. 22 The ‘Judgment’ episode has become, too, the object of an exclusive commentary, by Huyck, which provides a wealth of information, especially on the earlier tradition behind the contest and on the influence of rhetoric on its structure. 23 The entwined fates of the Trojan survivors (Hecuba-Polydorus-Polyxena) are webbed so intricately that the meticulous pattern of their narration can be appreciated only through the guidance of equally penetrating studies. One such recent reading, by Paschalis, introduces semantics as an interpretive tool, and proves the potentially dominant role that etymology can play in the narrative construction of a text that is mainly set to celebrate intertextuality. 24 The present study is indebted to all the above approaches, as it endeavors to integrate and further their insights inside a more comprehensive theoretical reading of the ‘little Iliad’ cluster. A better understanding of the mindset that forged Ovid’s distinctive reading of the Iliad is contingent on the poet’s fervent desire to proclaim himself a deserving heir to the Homeric epics 25 , and so, more broadly, to gain recognition as a particularly creative recipient of the overall Trojan War literary tradition, epic and beyond. The best way for him to do this, naturally, would be through engaging in direct dialogue with prominent segments of the great epic archetype. The composition of this dialogue should show not only the successor’s deep familiarity with the principal themes and structural forces of 21 22 23

24 25

Hopkinson 2000; the introduction to the commentary (pp. 9-29) is indispensable for adjusting the lens of literary criticism over these episodes. Bibliographical summary in Dippel 1990, 71-75. Huyck 1991; also worth mentioning is Gross’ brief and selective treatment of the element of parody in the characterization of Ajax and Ulixes (Gross 2000); Zumwalt 1977, 218, had suggested in passing that Ulixes’ victory over Ajax in this allegoric conflict between brain vs. brawn should be seen as a victory of Fama, the epic/poetic voice, which may alter facts and manipulate the truth to win. Paschalis 2003. For an illuminating general introduction to epic succession in Latin poetry, see G.B. Conte, Memoria dei poeti e sistema letterario (Turin 1985) [= G.B. Conte, The Rhetoric of Imitation (Ithaca 1986), transl. C.P. Segal, excepting the last chapter on Lucan].

Introduction

7

the Iliad, but also his ability to take advantage of their poetic transformation across time and genres, and then cast them into a new and distinctly personal shape which he would use as the foundation to support a new ‘Iliad’. In one sentence, a truly successful ‘little Iliad’ must and would be an analytical appreciation of the Iliad and its reception, but in dissimulation. My suggestion to consider a direct line of intellectual exchange between Ovid and Homer stems from the confidence that Ovid’s reception of archaic epic is a direct and personal intellectual process, critical of, and often resistant to, the compelling influence of Vergil’s reading, and consciously challenging initiatives to introduce Vergil as the exclusive direct successor of Homer. 26 The ‘little Iliad’ should be greeted as a major literary accomplishment, because its composition proves that Ovid could converse directly with the Iliad and the archaic epic tradition and its reception, outside the shadow of the Aeneid. Vergilian intertexts are taken into consideration, but Vergil’s presence is not so much enforced as freely chosen. Ovid eagerly acknowledges Vergil’s instruction in the field of Homeric appropriation and adaptation, but he all the same makes clear that the Aeneid has been an instructing guide rather than a compositional bedrock sine quo non. 27 As the structure of the mini-‘Iliad’ is mapped out in detail in the following chapters, the discussion will occasionally identify Ovid’s creative readings of the Aeneid, which as a rule relish any opportunity to compensate in originality for the influence the poet received in inspiration. A close look at selected units in Met. 12.1-13.622 that are visibly indebted to the Aeneid will illustrate both the actual process of rewriting Vergilian narrative moments and, more broadly, selective structural mechanisms embraced for the successful accomplishment of this rewriting. The analysis of Ovid’s literary initiatives to forge his independence from Vergil’s influence will affirm the merit of the ‘little Iliad’ as a daring experiment in literary analysis. In fact, the creative reception of archaic Greek epic materialized in the narrative of Met. 12.1-13.622 allows the reader to explore recollection techniques that are at work in full development later in the ‘little Aeneid’, where model emulation, infused with originality, matures into creation. 28 The inter26

27

28

Hardie 1993 introduces briefly the leading aspects of succession in Latin epic. In Hardie’s study Vergil emerges as the premier heir to the Homeric epic tradition, and the Aeneid as the uncontested Latin redefinition of Homer. Hardie proposes that neither Ovid nor the epic poets of the following generation contested Vergil’s preeminence, but rather strove for acknowledgment as heirs to the Aeneid spirit. Ovid is always aware of his own place in literary history, especially when epic heritage is concerned, and in his writings he regularly positions himself opposite his literary originals; cf. R. Tarrant, ‘Ovid and Ancient Literary History’, in: P. Hardie (ed.), The Cambridge Companion to Ovid (Cambridge 2002), 13-33. A cerebral process described in Hinds 1998, 106: “rather than construct himself as a reader of the Aeneid, Ovid is constructing Virgil as a hesitant precursor of the Metamorphoses”. An

8

Introduction

action between the two great poets is designed to appear as a matter of authorial choice on Ovid’s part rather than a fiat, and the conspicuousness in his pronouncing the Vergilian influence aims precisely at defining this liberal relationship with the Vergilian text more clearly and persuasively. This experimentation with the Greek and Roman epic tradition in combination introduces poetology as the core constituent behind the particular formation of the ‘little Iliad’ texture. Interlaced with literary evolution regardless of genre, metapoetics is essential to the definition of epic emulation. 29 Ovid’s engagement in textual exchange with Homer naturally projects this antagonistic relationship in poetological terms. Besides, the poetry of Homer is, in its totality, a statement on literary self-consciousness, the perfect example of a heroic narrative against which every literary undertaking classified as an epic is henceforth to be measured. 30 Ovid’s occasional borrowings from the actual text of the Iliad, such as the Aulis omen, or the battle between the Lapiths and the Centaurs that frames Nestor’s narrative, convince scholars that had our poet wished to sound more ‘Homeric’ he was certainly able to do so. 31 Also, the two Trojan narratives are related in their structural methodology more closely than an untrained reader may realize. To mention just one example, a detail noted by nearly every reader of the ‘little Iliad’ has to do with the peculiar timeframe of the ‘epic’, which is set at a time either prior or posterior to the dramatic time of the Iliad. Ovid, in other words, is not being original but actually follows Homer’s own compositional choices. The 24 books of the Iliad relate events that took place within a two-month-long period during the tenth year of the Trojan War.

29

30

31

entire (the third) chapter in Hinds 1998 advances a sensible theory on the Latin poets’ pattern of personal quasi-confessions and their place within literary history and genre evolution. Hinds 1998, esp. 99-100 (discussing the centrality of ambiguity and allusiveness in Ovid’s metapoetics): “[The Ovidian text] [t]reat[s] poetic tendentiousness… as… constitutive of allusive writing and of the alluding poet’s emplotment of his work in literary tradition”. On classical and Hellenistic theory about epic, with the Iliad perceived as identical to the broader definition of epic, see S. Koster, Antike Epostheorien (Wiesbaden 1970). Nagy 1990, 52-115, points out the panhellenic dissemination of archaic epic, and notes that the popularity of Homer was concomitant with the active participation of local bards in the composition of these epics already in the 8th century. Havelock 1963, 61-83, emphasizes the central place of Homeric poetry, especially the Iliad, in the upbringing of Greek males. Keith 2000, 8-35, discusses how the masculine epic worldview and the interpretive (social and ideological) conventions of Greek epic are appropriated by Roman poetry and education to serve an even more male-valorizing social structure. For example, Ellsworth 1980, 28: “Ovid, pretending to ignore the Iliad and to tell the story of the entire war, actually produces his own Iliad although [sic] allusion to well known episodes, expansions of short scenes, and similarity of theme and structure”.

Introduction

9

Still, the Ovidian epic narrative strategy stands apart, because it advocates the understanding of ‘epic’ exclusively as a genre. In every episode of the recast Iliad the dialogue centers on poetics, unlike the Homeric epics and, to a considerable extent, Vergil, too, for whom an epic narrative is meant to be on top a celebration of ethics. 32 The Metamorphoses does not simply eschew ethics completely, but often makes morality the target of unrelenting attack, which our poet enjoys greatly. In the ‘little Iliad’, the deconstruction of epic ethics becomes a leitmotif, and its constant presence influences the formulation of Ovid’s leading structural percept behind the narrative development of Met. 12.1-13.622. This percept identifies with a core issue of ancient epic composition in general: the character of the epic protagonist, which in archaic epic is idealized in the Homeric Achilles. This book asserts that the ultimate key to understanding the narrative choices and objectives behind the narrative of Met. 12.1-13.622 is to focus on Achilles and to observe his evolution from episode to episode through a succession of different portrayals. This prominence of Achilles is remarkable but has not been properly addressed by modern readers. 33 Ovid was fully capable of producing an ‘Iliad’ with Achilles confined to anonymity or to the margins of narrative action; his treatment of Aeneas, the Roman ‘Achilles’, in the ‘little Aeneid’ immediately following, attests to this. The omnipresence of Achilles in the Ovidian text lifts to prominence the axial issue of Homeric succession. It sounds simple, even self-evident, that an aspiring heir to the Homeric poetics would broadcast his credentials in composing a text, even in miniature form, centered on an Achilles-like figure. Vergil’s Aeneas is a most celebrated paradigm of such an Achilles-character emulation, and the issue of the ‘alter Achilles’ is a paramount theme of Vergil’s epic world. Vergil’s Trojan War culminates in the decapitation of King Priam by Pyrrhus, the son of Achilles, following a verbal exchange about whether the son is or is not entitled to his fathers’ unique epic heritage. The storyline of the entire second half of the Aeneid identifies with the quest to determine who would be the successor of 32

33

Along these lines the protagonist epic hero (or heroes) becomes the embodiment of this ethical universe, and his characterization the rationalized application of an abstract ideology; see S. Scully, ‘The Polis in Homer: a Definition and Interpretation’, Ramus 10 (1981), 1-34, especially the later section that focuses on Hector as a tool of the city; also M. Detienne, Les Maîtres de Vérité dans la Grèce Archaïque (Paris 1967), 9-24; and Havelock 1963, 97-114. Musgrove (1991, 31-33) alone distinctly identifies Achilles and his wrath as the two themes that feature in all individual stories of the ‘little Iliad’, but her approach, besides being too brief (a mere three pages), is preoccupied with the forging of a rational sequence for the unorthodox chronology of the cluster. The consistent presence of an Achilles in rage creates an ‘orderly’, and thus acceptable, concatenation of narrative units that do not follow a sequential chronology.

10

Introduction

Achilles. The epic concludes with a rehearsal of the battle between Achilles and Hector. Overall, the fashioning of Aeneas’ character, which evokes but does not copy that of Achilles’ own, reflects Vergil’s aspirations to project the authenticity of his epic vein through creative mastery of Homer’s artistry. Achilles in Ovid is cast likewise in a multifaceted role governed by poetics. More than that, the hero’s characterization becomes a leitmotif in Ovid, emerging as the organizing theme of the unit’s plot. This realization generates a series of questions. First, one needs to look at the individual episodes that piece together the ‘little Iliad’, assess Achilles’ presence in each one of them, and uncover the motives that prompted Ovid to select these particular episodes from the Epic Cycle and, to the extent this is possible, from the multi-generic, Greek as well as Roman, reception of the various Epic Cycle moments thereafter. I shall argue that the assortment was planned with Achilles’ characterization in mind. Even though the Ovidian recollection of the Iliad circumvents the content of the Homeric poem, it resurrects the same generating forces that fueled the narrative action in Homer, namely the character and the anger of Achilles. 34 Achilles’ portrayal in the ‘little Iliad’ is neither pretty nor flattering, but it has its precedent in Great Homer. Ovid simply embraces a practice that the Iliad narrator first initiated. Critics have noted that as a rule several of the same moments and situations of the Trojan War are related in both the Iliad and the Odyssey, and often a story’s full picture depends on knowledge carried in both texts. Yet, never do the two Homeric poems directly acknowledge each other. Achilles’ treatment in the Odyssey is a very good example of this Homeric practice, and of great pertinence to our discussion on the manipulation of the hero in Ovid’s version of a rival ‘Iliad’, since it constitutes, so to speak, a very early, if not nearly contemporaneous, critical reception of the Achilles epic character in the epic tradition, and likely even in the corpus of the same authorial genius. The Iliad is the epic of Achilles, 35 but in the Odyssey the best of the Achaeans 34

35

Ovid’s peculiar structure of the Trojan story has inspired several attempts to rationalize the mechanics of its narrative unity. For Otis (1970, 278ff.), for example, the cluster consists of an ‘epic’ section (the Achilles-Cycnus combat, Caeneus’ story and the Centauromachy) and a ‘tragic’ section (Hecuba and the death of Polyxena), and between the two stands the ‘Judgment of the Arms’. Otis’ analysis, the one most widely accepted, is seriously limited. It does not take into account several smaller units, such as the death of Achilles and the story of Periclymenus just preceding it, or the marvel of the Memnonides, which nonetheless contribute significantly to the thematic coherence of the cluster. On Otis’ limitations, see Croisille 1985, 59. Cf. the Scholia AbT on Il. 1.1: μ . For a summary of the various scholarly attempts to answer this question, see Latacz 1995. Latacz believes that the Iliad should be read above all as a story of the ‘anger of Achilles’, despite the fact that Achilles is

Introduction

11

appears only twice in person. These two appearances occur in the two Underworld scenes, the Nekyias of Books 11 and 24, and on each occasion Achilles persistently refuses to reminisce on specific moments of his past in the Iliad. 36 In a way, the Odyssey records an interesting conflict between this new pessimistic self-reflection of Achilles’ ghost and the image of the Iliadic Achilles, which again shows up briefly in the Odyssey, in the dramatized shapshot of the Trojan War poeticized by Demodocus. In the first of three songs that the bard of the Phaeacians performs in honor of Ulixes/anonymous guest (Od. 9.75-82), he tells of a quarrel between Agamemnon and Ulixes, which recasts inside the new world order of the Odyssey the conflict between Achilles and Agamemnon. 37 Few would disagree that Homer’s Iliad bears a rather unconventional title, since the dramatic time during which its action is set covers only a few days of the entire Trojan campaign, precisely the time between the outbreak and the mitigation of Achilles’ anger. The narration of the Trojan story in the Metamorphoses, however, does not trace the course of Achilles’ mênis, but instead explores the various ways in which mênis directs and colors the hero’s conduct. Achilles’ anger, a catalyst for the development of the plot in the Iliad, is received in the ‘little Iliad’ as a distinct character trait. Thus, Ovid’s compact Trojan story reads as a conflux of assorted focalizations on Achilles, in which Achilles’ world and the hero’s role in it are reconstructed, and the process is reported through the eyes of other epic characters. Each of these characters allegorically represents a different point of view or ‘reading’, depending on the viewer’s personal experiences, his or her involvement in the Trojan plot, and his or her perspective on the Trojan adventure. In the language of metapoetics, Ovid’s Achilles stands for the text of the Iliad, while the characters through whose eyes the hero comes to life, ‘Nestor’, ‘Ajax’, or ‘Ulixes’, signify

36

37

not physically present in more than half of the epic, while the narrative thematics in the poem largely identifies with Achilles’ ongoing resistance against a system of epic values that he, as model hero, is expected to exemplify. Both passages feature in sections of highly contested authorship; cf. discussion and bibliography in Edwards, 1985, 9-10. In the earlier Nekyia, Achilles rejects the hero ideology, regretting that he once chose kleos over longevity, and, instead of focusing on himself, he avidly inquires about the welfare of his father and son. In Odyssey 24, he does not spare his praises for Penelope’s exemplary fidelity. The intricate design of Demodocus’ first song, including its dramatization of the polarized epic worldviews represented in the Iliad and the Odyssey, and embodied, respectively, by Achilles and Ulixes, is optimally presented in Nagy 1979, 15-68. The conflict between the different ideologies of the two Homeric epics is a leading theme in the Armorum Iudicium, where Ovid seems genuinely concerned with the meaning of epic heroism and the definition of epic poetry.

12

Introduction

disparate but all the same persuasive interpretations of the hero by postHomeric ‘readers’, namely, the aspiring Homeric successors. 38 Ovid’s deconstruction of the world-famous Achilles of the Iliad draws on the less famous traditions about the hero, as these are preserved in various literary sources. A survey of these traditions is obviously not within the scope of this study, 39 but a brief summary is illuminating, to acquaint the reader with the possibilities and the challenges alike facing the aspiring student of Ovid’s undertaking. Already in the Iliad, the portrait of the hero 40 is based on the confluence of many previously independent and not always congruent mythological traditions and themes, and it is marked by extremes and contradictions directed by a deep concern for his fama or epic reputation. Achilles’ most distinguished characteristic is his unparalleled physical ability, his irre38

39

40

Wheeler 1999, 189, expresses a similar view in discussing homodiegesis and heterodiegesis in Ovid. Commenting on the narrative in Books 12 and 14, Wheeler points out the conspicuous absence of the Ovidian narrator’s voice, compared to the earlier sections of the poem, and justifies it as a logical outcome of the subject matter: “[r]ather than repeat in his own voice the events surrounding the Trojan War… Ovid reconfigures the epic cycle from the point of view of characters in the story-world”. In this book I argue precisely that the complex construction (deconstruction and reconstruction) of Achilles is the outcome of a similar reconfiguration from the individual standpoints of various characters in the peculiar story-world of the ‘little Iliad’. The literary sources on Achilles are listed in M. Roussel, Biographie légendaire d’Achille (Amsterdam 1991); those most important are also listed in A. Kossatz-Deissmann, ‘Achilleus’, LIMC 1.1 (1981), 37-200; a brief overview of the hero’s literary biography, with up-to-date bibliography, has been recorded more recently in J. Scherf, ‘Achilleus’, DNP 1 (1996), 7681. The best comprehensive appreciation of Achilles’ literary career is King 1987. King outlines the “archetypal” Achilles, the Homeric hero, in the first section of her book (pp. 1-49), and then devotes two chapters to the literary response to this archetype in archaic and classical Greece – Epic Cycle, tragedy, Plato – (pp. 50-109), and in Rome and the Western tradition (pp. 110-170); her last chapter is also important, for it surveys the tradition behind the portrayal of the Lover Achilles (pp. 171-217). Latacz 1995, concisely outlines those ‘representative’ character traits of the Homeric hero passed down in the literary tradition. My brief overview of the Homeric Achilles is based on these two monographs. D. Shive, Naming Achilles (Oxford 1987), is particularly good with the history behind the original construction of the Homeric hero. On the deconstruction of Achilles in Greek tragedy, see now Michelakis 2002. Sistakou 2004, is valuable on the critical reception of the Epic Cycle – more precisely, the Trojan legend – in Hellenistic and later Greek poetry; the Hellenistic Achilles (esp. pp. 215-236 and passim) follows after his Euripidean counterpart. Even though Sistakou’s study does not extend to the poetics of Achilles’ Hellenistic metamorphosis, her readings of Achilles’ presence in Callimachus and other poets strongly supports the use, by the Hellenistic poets, of the image of the Homeric hero as allegory for the composition of consciously counter-Homeric epic. The definition of the ‘epic hero’, who is essentially the Homeric hero, is recently discussed in J. Haubold, Homer’s People: Epic Poetry and Social Formation (Cambridge 2000), 3-10, with full bibliography.

Introduction

13

sistible prowess on the public space of the battlefield. When the hero is present in battle the Greek army is always victorious. On the contrary, the Greeks suffer heavy defeat when Achilles is mastered by mênis, his second leading characteristic, which drives the hero to the opposite direction, to seclusion, and away from the openness of the battle. The extreme emotions that dominate Achilles’ conduct are a perfect match for his extreme physical strength, and they result from a rigid and monolithic process of reasoning that stems from an obsession with kleos, the acknowledgment of his deeds as klea, ‘deeds of glory’. This acknowledgment would offer solace to the hero, who is destined to die young, 41 because the record of his accomplishments, by becoming klea, will survive into eternity in the performances of the epic poets. As long as the hero is alive, the official recognition of his klea is substantiated through the attribution of ‘honor’, timê, which follows the awarding of a material reward, a geras, ‘prize’. In Achilles’ case, famously, his geras, the slave Briseis, is taken away to replace the geras of Agamemnon, the commander of the Greek army and warrior hierarchically superior to all heroes, including Achilles, a geras, which the king had to give back. This gesture Achilles interprets as dishonoring and as a threat to the recognition of his epic-hero status – the acknowledgment of his deeds, in honor and reward of which the geras was awarded, as klea. These emotions of insecurity and anxiety about the control of his epic memory beyond his death are leading directives behind Ovid’s redesigning of the Achilles portrait. Achilles’ mênis emerges in its most extreme expression in the course of the events following the death of his beloved companion Patroclus in the later part of the Iliad. Again, as in the case of Briseis, Achilles experiences mênis, which is likewise related to the affirmation of his kleos and his postmortem epic memory. Patroclus is for Achilles, at various times, a surrogate father (Il. 24.511-512, where he and Peleus are mourned interchangeably), brother (11.786-789), and son (16.7-10), but he is foremost a substitute of the hero’s own self. In Patroclus, Achilles sees a reflection of his own life, and, by analogy, in Patroclus’ death, he sees the rehearsal of his own death. Ironically, this is what actually happens, since Patroclus at the time of his death is not merely dressed up in Achilles’ armor pretending to be Achilles, but he truly believes that he can be a substitute Achilles, and so he disregards the admonition to withdraw from the battle early. As the death of Patroclus forecasts the death of Achilles, the latter subconsciously sees in the extraction of the proper revenge not only the fulfillment of his duty to his dead friend, but also the ret41

All the passages in the Iliad about Achilles’ mortality and premature death are collected in Edwards 1991, 158 ad Il. 18.95-96; the recurrence of the theme explains the hero’s obsession with establishing the desired version of his posthumous fama already before his death.

14

Introduction

ribution for his own impending death. In his bloodthirsty spree against the Trojans at the banks of Skamander, in his killing of the suppliant Lycaon (21.34ff.), and in the mutilation of Hector’s body in Iliad 22 and 24, Achilles takes in advance revenge for his own death. Even before his death he is anxious to ensure that his kleos will receive its due posthumous acknowledgment. With respect to content, Ovid’s narration circumvents the story of the Homeric poem, since the chronology of its plot coincides with incidents that occurred either before or after the time covered in the Iliad. This odd storyline allows a group of additional stories about Achilles to influence the Roman ‘metamorphosis’ of the hero’s Homeric conduct. These non-Homeric stories include Achilles’ duels with the Trojan warrior Cycnus and the Ethiopian King Memnon, Achilles’ death before the Scaean Gates, the ‘Judgment’ over Achilles’ arms, and the hero’s apparition as a ghost to detain the Greek fleet at Thrace and to demand the sacrifice of Priam’s daughter Polyxena. These episodes were originally narrated in the Cypria, the Ilias Parva, the Iliupersis, the Aethiopis, and the Nostoi, all epics like the Iliad, and all parts of the Epic Cycle 42 ; and like several episodes in the Iliad or the Odyssey, they had inspired several later compositions of various genres. In Ovid’s treatment of all these incidents Achilles is the fierce warrior we know from the Iliad, but in the Roman text his obsession with kleos is entwined with a high and constant anxiety to prove his martial prowess, which often revolves around the polarity of gender. Even further, on several occasions the narratives of these epics portray a distinctly non-Homeric Achilles, at times an Achilles best defined as the warrior of love rather than the lover of war. It is, further, surprising that so little attention has been paid to the regular inclusion of transformation stories in the non-Homeric poems of the Epic Cycle. Recent discussion of the differences between Homer and the other epic poets of his era in their choice of material has indeed observed the suppression of metamorphosis in the Homeric poems, especially in the Iliad as one conspicuous example of the general neglect for themes that border the magical and the fantastic.43

42

43

Even though in their original form the Cyclic poems might have been conceived independently from the Homeric poems and the story narrated in them; this view has recently been argued by J.S. Burgess, ‘The non-Homeric Cypria’, TAPA 126 (1996), 77-99. Focusing specifically on the Cypria, Burgess puts forth the interesting speculation that the original version of the poem, far from serving as an introduction to the Iliad and its storyline, presented a comprehensive overview of the Trojan War, which adeptly integrated various local traditions into a widely known account of the first great panhellenic expedition. Cf. J. Griffin, “The Epic Cycle and the Uniqueness of Homer”, JHS 97 (1977) 39-53; the suppression of the preternatural, including transformations, by Homer is discussed on pp. 40-42. Griffin identifies specific metamorphoses in the poems of the Cycle, including the daughters of Anius, whose magic touch could produce wine and oil, and who later were

Introduction

15

The metamorphosis of Achilles in the Epic Cycle launches a process of deconstruction that deepens and accelerates as the same epic stories are retold as fabulae of texts that belong to different literary genres, and reflect different political and cultural ideologies. Ovid’s critical consideration of the dynamics of Homeric epic is indebted to Achilles’ new image in Greek (and likely also in Roman) drama. Nearly 75 dramas were composed on or about Achilles in the fifth and fourth centuries in Athens, deriving sometimes from the Iliad but mostly from the broader mythological tradition. In most of these dramas, Achilles rarely belongs among the leading characters, and his marginalization, which usually highlights a drastic character anasynthesis, has empowered narratives firmly set to antagonize the ideology of the Iliad. Granted that the bulk of classical and post-classical Attic drama, and certainly the near-totality of Roman, is for now irretrievable, of the three tragedians known through complete works, Euripides is the one who deconstructs and utterly demythologizes the Homeric ideal of the epic Achilles, and in whose plays, significantly, gender is pivotal and often a leading factor towards the interpretation of the play. The sophistication that distinguishes Ovid’s rewriting of the epic protagonist through the eyes of the female survivors in Metamorphoses 13 is best studied through the lens of the Euripidean reading of the Trojan tradition. Most crucial is the impossibility to lauch a systematic study of the archaic epic reception in the centuries that followed the end of the Classical Era. Indeed, if it is regrettable that so little has survived on the whole from the Cyclic tradition, since so much of the ‘little Iliad’ plot draws on it, surely, it is outright depressing, for our better understanding of Ovid’s embrace of archaic epic literature, that our knowledge of the Hellenistic receptions of the Epic Cycle rests on such slight foundations. The loss of these conceivable Hellenistic formations of grand epic may be as catalytic for mastering the dense Ovidian poetics, as seminal is the extensive disappearance of the Greek models for Ovid’s narration in general, 44 , and especially the poetic collections

44

turned into doves (and who also feature in Ovid, in the opening of the ‘little Aeneid’, at Met. 13.623ff.), and Cygnus, the warrior-turned-into-swan, in the Cypria. Hutchinson’s most recent ZPE study of the newly published P.Oxy. 4711, a substantial fragment of a catalogue of metamorphoses in elegiac verse, may help shed new light on the deeper mechanics of Ovid’s source reception methodology. The text on the papyrus, most likely from Parthenius, and hence, a well-known piece that Ovid had studied closely, records stories of transformations that also appear in the Metamorphoses: the stories of Adonis, Asterie, and Narcissus. Hutchinson’s comparative analysis of the Greek and Latin texts shows a stark differentiation in each poet’s writing ideology: Parthenius opts for a very concise, dense, and discontinuous narrative style in obvious contrast with Ovid’s eloquent narrations. Hutchinson believes that Parthenius poeticizes some specific literary text now lost, suggesting that these myths had undergone an even earlier literary treatment. The importance of texts like this, though, “can easily be obscured for modern critics by more ac-

16

Introduction

of metamorphosis, which emerged for the first time in these times, notably the works of Nicander and Boios. 45 With respect to the Achilles-portrait reception, the Hellenistic tradition is disappointingly poor. Still, the anti-hero ideology that marks the extant epic texts from this era (conspicuously the Argonautica) and gave birth to the epyllion heroes, such as the Hekale Theseus, and the marginal-hero culture of this sub-genre, indicates a general literary policy of deconstruction and challenge against established and venerable tradition, and especially, lofty literature. Mindful of the interpretive caveat that the lack of evidence regarding Ovid’s possible Hellenistic predecessors in mock-epic reception entails, it is fair to postulate that the thematically dense union that results from the convergence of the individual narrative parts of the ‘little Iliad’ is the product of a logically structured composition observing its own literary dynamics. The ubiquity of Achilles, usually conspicuous yet at times imperceptible to a cursory reader, and Ovid’s effort to maintain throughout a competitive edge against Homer in terms of complex poetics, including a regular display of literary allusivity, are the two backbones of the narrative structure in Met. 12.1-13.622. Their fundamentality, first, in guaranteeing both the soundness and the ingenuity of Ovid’s reading of the Iliad, and, subsequently, in working towards its positive reception by a demanding audience, is crucially aided by a plot architecture that observes a remarkable regularity. This regularity in narrative design is maintained through adherence to a set of recurrent thematic patterns and rules, conceived in order to uphold and justify the peculiar ordering in the composition of the Ovidian ‘Iliad’. Overall, the ‘little Iliad’ consists of eight units. A brief precis of the plot is imperative to envision more clearly the structural and thematic parameters

45

cessible intertexts”, and so an Ovidian reader should always be alert about the interpretive perils of selective Quellenforschung; see details in G.O. Hutchinson, ‘The Metamorphosis of Metamorphosis: P. Oxy. 4711 and Ovid’, ZPE 155 (2006), 71-84. Nicander and Boios are the two Hellenistic poets of metamorphosis compositions which, one may argue safely thanks to Antoninus Liberalis’ testimony, have influenced both the content of the Metamorphoses and Ovid’s methodology about the reception and manipulation of metamorphosis myths; regrettably, from the original poetry of either Nicander or Boios only scant fragments have survived: our most substantial text (Nicander fr. 62 GS) is barely four lines long, and it is almost impossible to confirm its provenance from the Heteroioumena. On the basis of Antoninus’ narrative, both Hellenistic poets conferred major and frequent changes to the plot of various myths compared to earlier versions of the same tales, but they also differ from Ovid’s later treatments, and this most likely means that the Roman poet embraced the importance of transformation in poetic expression more broadly, no less in the sphere of thematics than in structure; on Hellenistic metamorphosis literature, mainly Nicander and Boios, behind Ovid’s epic, see Forbes Irving 1990, 19-37.

Introduction

17

that directed Ovid’s choices in putting together Met. 12.1-13.622. 46 The story takes off with the mustering of the Greek army at Aulis, where the Greeks witness the omen of the snake and the nestlings and the sacrifice of Iphigeneia. As soon as the Greek fleet sets sail for Troy, the narrative focus moves skywards to describe the domain of Fama, an awesome personification and a most prominent allegory of poetics. The battlefield action at Troy is summarized in a narrative that relates the single combat between Achilles and Cycnus, ending with the latter’s transformation into the homonymous bird. The triumph of Achilles initiates the fourth unit, the banquet scene where Nestor takes the opportunity to reminisce about the good old days of his youth and specifically recall the battle between the Centaurs and the Lapiths in the longest individual speech in Ovid’s entire Metamorphoses. Following Nestor’s account, the action moves rapidly forward to the actual death of Achilles. Book 12 closes with the gathering of the Greek chiefs to determine who most deserves to inherit the arms of Achilles. Book 13 opens with the two contestants, Ajax and Ulixes, presenting their cases in opposing speeches, each claiming to be the one most qualified for the great award of Achilles’ armor. Ulixes wins and Ajax, overwhelmed by rage and madness, commits suicide. A second instance of rapid plot progression comes after Ajax’s death. During this time-sweep, Troy falls, its men are killed, and the women are reduced to captivity. The next episode relates the destinies of Trojan princess Polyxena and her mother Hecuba. Polyxena is sacrificed over the tomb of Achilles at the request of the dead Greek hero’s ghost. Under these circumstances Hecuba is called to become the avenger of both her daughter and her son, Polydorus, before she is metamorphosed into a bitch. The concluding episode of the ‘little Iliad’, the eighth in total, records a rather extraordinary scene, the transformation of the birds called Memnonides from the ashes of the dead Ethiopian warrior Memnon, a Trojan ally who was killed in battle by Achilles. The element of transformation naturally holds a consistent presence. In Ovid’s epic, transformation becomes the main linking theme not least because a text subject to metamorphosis welcomes, if not alludes to the outcome of, a competition 47 against earlier tradition, and in the case at hand, against the Homeric epic tradition. In fact, as already noted, the presence of 46

47

Dippel 1990, 18-22, offers an annotated summary of the cluster, and he concludes his work with a five-page appendix (pp. 147-151) which is practically a verse-by-verse recording of the ‘little Iliad’ content. Metamorphosis is generally considered an allusive reference to the literary technique of intertextuality and literary emulation. Hardie 1992 observes that even the Aeneid, the model Roman traditional epic, abounds in metamorphoses (p. 62: “it [metamorphosis] is a more common thing in the poem as a whole than is usually allowed”), and this predilection is largely dictated by the metapoetical potential of a metamorphosis.

18

Introduction

transformation incidents recurrently in the various epic narratives that draw on the Epic Cycle beyond the Iliad, plausibly substantiate their allure as thematic models for Ovid. Nonetheless, the centrality of metamorphosis as a poetological signifier is at odds with the actual textual space and prominence devoted to transformation narratives inside Met. 12.1-13.622. The ‘little Iliad’ unit, which occupies a total of 1250 lines over two contiguous books, records in all eight physical transformations, five of which are recorded in Metamorphoses 12, and three in Metamorphoses 13. All of them seem of secondary, ‘peripheral’ importance in nearly every episode, while for most even the justification for their presence appears enforced. Ovid presents his audience with an interesting challenge when he invites them to explore the deeper function that these odd accounts perform. Performance is inherent in ancient epic, as the oral nature of the genre is transposed upon the characters-heroes, who in their words and deeds, themselves mini-genres, substantiate the ‘epic’ definition of the genre.48 Dramatization is an essential feature in a narrative whose structure relies on a dialogue with the model of all epics. Ovid’s homage to the dramatic ‘lives’ of his heroes in his rewriting of the Trojan legend is conspicuous. Several episodes in the ‘little Iliad’ have become more than once the topic of dramatic production. It is impossible to read the sacrifice of Iphigeneia at the opening of Metamorphoses 12, or the death of Polyxena later in the ‘Survivors’ episode, without recalling Euripides’ Iphigeneia at Aulis and Hecuba. The ‘Judgment of the Arms’, which extends over nearly a third of the ‘little Iliad’, and the ensuing fate of Hecuba also enjoyed great popularity with the Roman dramatists and the Roman rhetoricians and educators. 49 The recourse to the mechanics of dramatic performance is furthermore in accord with the multiplicity of narrative voices that invariably disturb and blur the speech of the omniscient narrator Ovid. Most drama, and in particular Greek tragedy, is a nexus of an elaborately performing multitude of voices, each with its own claim to judi-

48 49

On ancient epic as performance, see Martin 1989, esp. chapters 3 and 4. Bömer 1982, 196: “der Streit zwischen Odysseus and Aias um die Waffen des Achilleus ein eigenes umfangreiches Kapitel griechischer und römischer Literatur-Geschichte (füllt)”. Our sources and surviving fragments offer evidence of at least two productions under the title Armorum Iudicium by Pacuvius and Accius. On the Roman tragedy background of the ‘little Iliad’, see G. D’Anna, ‘La tragedia latina arcaica nelle “Metamorfosi” ’, in Atti Conv. Int. Ovidiano. Sulmona, maggio 1958 (Rome 1959), 266ff.; also Bömer 1982, 197. On tragedy in the Metamorphoses, see Lafaye 1904/1971, 141-166; Currie 1981, 2701-2742; I. Gildenhard and A. Zissos, ‘“Somatic Economies”: Tragic Bodies and Poetic Design in Ovid’s Metamorphoses’, in: Hardie-Barchiesi-Hinds 1999, 162-181; A. Keith, ‘Sources and Genres in Ovid’s Metamorphoses 1-5’, in: Boyd 2002, 258-268 (focusing especially on the ‘Thebaid’); on the rhetorical background of the Armorum Iudicium, see, for example, Dippel 1990, 72 n. 7.

Introduction

19

ciousness, truth and authority. 50 As the absence of an external narrator and his superior knowledge renders all dramatic speech equally credible and suspicious, the outcome is a blending, or rather a coexistence, of what would otherwise be separate points of views. In the particular case of a mock-epic narrative, these correspond to variant genres, specifically lyric (the interlude of Cyllarus and Hylonome) and elegiac (the mourning of Hecuba), but they also identify with speech that belongs to various other spheres of expression, including oracles (the snake and the birds), prayer (Polyxena), lament (Hecuba or Aurora) and contesting oratory (Ajax and Odysseus). Finally, the genre of drama relies on an ongoing play with illusions of presence and affirmation of identity, on a plurality of perspectives that produces ambiguity about the scope of narrative action. The reader of the ‘little Iliad’, accordingly, like the spectator of a Greek tragedy, is faced not only with a variety of voices but also with many contesting points of view and types of speech. Each time a new unit of the ‘little Iliad’ is introduced, the audience faces anew the challenge of deciphering the enactment of a text that is subject to its own peculiar generic constraints, while the variant narrative voices in it compete for the readers’ attention. In this respect, Ovid’s investment in a recast that relies on a combination of perspectives introduced in dramatic coloring is not unrelated to his reluctance to compete against the consistency of Homer’s omniscient narrator’s voice. Fragmentation is the forerunner of variation. Greek tragedy was the most conspicuous terrain of polarization, the acted expression of early Greek thought, translated in organized civic behavior, which more often than not relied on binary oppositions. At the center, each tragic performance situates a dilemma or a clash of opposing beliefs, pivotal among which is the dichotomy of gender, the constant conflict between the male and the female. Male and female belong among the leading pairs of opposites already in Pythagorean thought. In Pythagoras’ table of opposites male is related to, or is inclusive of, limit, odd, one, resting, straight, light, good and square, while female is synonymous with lack of limit, even, plural, curved, darkness, bad and oblong (Aristotle, Metaphysics 1.5.986a). To this conflict of genders Greek tragedy has attached several other conflicting pairs, such as culture vs. nature, city vs. wilderness, public vs. private, or decision50

Wheeler 1999, 186, calls this form of multivocal narrative “mimetic”, pointing to Aristotle’s appreciation of the Homeric narrative style, which allots minimal space to the omniscient first-person narrator and “dramatizes” the dialogues of the characters, the epic heroes. Wheeler notes (p. 164) that Ovid’s epic narration represents one such ‘mimetic’ narrative: “By speaking less and less in his own voice, Ovid ironically fulfills Aristotle’s prescription that the epic poet should be a mimêtês (Poetics 1460a 7-11). However, instead of acting out a drama, the primary narrator’s impersonations lead to the dramatization of storytelling itself”.

20

Introduction

making vs. obedience. The spirit of Greek tragic drama, however, capitalizes on the obfuscation, the blurring of the lines separating the two gender categories, and everything these stand for. 51 Any attack against some well-defined gender categorization poses a threat for the male and for the orderly civic system of patriarchy. And if the world of tragedy raises and articulates for the first time an awareness of the female as a threatening force for the male cosmos and the male definition of order, the world of epic idealizes precisely this male definition of order. 52 Ovid’s Achilles perceives his combat against Cycnus in terms of a manliness challenge, in an agonizing effort to uphold the traditional definition of epic as the extolling of klea andron (‘glorious deeds of men’). 53 My discussion of the Achilles vs. Cycnus encounter will illustrate that in Ovid’s epic universe the deeds of Achilles are neither glorious nor manly, and they should rather be downplayed than extolled. This affront against epic masculinity characterizes most units in Met. 12.1-13.622, although in some it occupies a much more central place than in others. To be more precise, the inclusion of the story of woman/man Caeneus(-is) and its immediate narrative context, the parable of the Centauromachy, reduce Achilles’ boastfulness on his masculinity to selfdelusion, and take advantage of an amusing story about transgenderism to theorize the deconstruction of heroism. Likewise, the debate between Ajax and Ulixes dramatizes the polarization between biê and mêtis, which on a different level translates as the conflict between masculine (biê, physical strength) and feminine (mêtis, craftiness often linked to female nature). Polyxena, finally, delivers her dying speech in phraseology that evokes the sermon of the dying Hector in Iliad 22, and surprisingly, also of the Homeric Achilles. Ovid’s admirable erudition represents another valuable structural incorporation mechanism, and even determines the methodology of the ‘little Iliad’ plot articulation. 54 With few exceptions, the transformations in Met. 12.151

52

53 54

On the confluence of gender roles and gender symbolism as a core theme of most classical tragedies, see, for example, H.P. Foley, ‘The Conception of Women in Athenian Drama’, in: H.P. Foley (ed.), Reflections of Women in Antiquity (New York/London 1981), 127-168; also F. Zeitlin, Playing the Other: Gender and Society in Classical Greek Civilization (Chicago 1996), which includes a chapter on the gender polarization in Euripides’ Hecuba (‘Euripides’ Hekabe and the Somatics of Dionysiac Drama’, pp. 172-218; first published in Ramus 20 [1991], 53-94). Succinctly expressed at the opening lines of Keith 2000, 1: “From Homer to Claudian, classical Greek and Latin epic poetry was composed by men, consumed largely by men, and centrally concerned with men”. Keith’s study is a highly recommended introduction to the perception of masculine and feminine identity in Latin epic. Cf. Il. 9.189, 524; Od. 8.73. Cf. Barchiesi 2002, 187: “It must be significant that Ovid writes in the wake of the traditions not just of Alexandrian poetry but also of the exegesis of Alexandrian poetry”.

Introduction

21

13.622 either are unattested in prior literature, such as the metamorphosis of the Memnonides, or are known only from some obscure earlier reference, like the inscription bearing the name of Ajax on the petals of the hyacinth. This results in the forging of a chain of elusive transformations which runs through the ‘little Iliad’, proclaims acumen to be a presupposition for accessing each ring/narrative unit beyond the surface, and functions as a connective, a facilitator of storyline progression. Most importantly, the chain of these erudite metamorphoses touches upon a subtle but critical issue of the ‘little Iliad’ structure, namely the definition and containment of the epic fama. As most of these changes revolve around elusive memorials and funerals, the tantamount issue of anticipating postmortem survival becomes a signature theme that extends beyond the boundaries of Ovid’s epitome of the Trojan War and generates reflection about the uncertainty that hovers over the memory of the poet’s poetry in general. Deriving, then, its content inspiration from the broader Epic Cycle but its epic ideology and narrative mechanisms from the Iliad, Ovid’s mini-‘Iliad’ is as distanced from the Homeric prototype as it is tied to it. This fusion of Epic Cycle material with Homeric thematics and methodology generates a systematic reconstruction of the archetypal hero character. The ‘little Iliad’, like the Homeric original, is an epic on and about Achilles vis-à-vis the Ovidian Achilles, and even though half-way into the story the hero physically drops out of the epic action, through various substitutes he maintains a ubiquitous, dominant presence to the end of the cluster. Ovid builds his ‘epic’ structure on a leading Homeric plot-advancement mechanism, that is, Achilles’ eager subjection to models of behavior proposed to him by others; characters who, poetically speaking, try to usurp Homer’s part in designing the development course of the Iliadic narrative. 55 Ovid’s Achilles reminds us of the epic poet who adheres to the traditional ideology of the genre, but whose effort to impose the epic hero portrait that he considers ideal is constantly stymied. Instead, various rivaling narrators/epic poets in the ‘little Iliad’, themselves also transplants from Homer in their majority, reduce the great hero into a text, a combination of character traits, which they manipulate in order to compose what they advocate as ideal hero models. The narrative outcome produces an intelligent anti-epic narration, which at times is tinted with mockery and eschews predictability in its focus on inconsistency, expressed in different manifestations of the transformation theme. Through this narration, the poet of the

55

Rabel 1997 advances that argument that the leading narrative strategy in the Iliad comprises a consistent effort by different characters to direct Achilles’ conduct through various hero models that are presented to him as paradigms.

22

Introduction

Metamorphoses introduces his readers to the theoretical principles of innovation that mark a transformed, or rather transformable, epic. Chapter one tackles the various issues attached to the Aulis episode and the character of the mysterious Aesacus. Ovid’s decision to begin with the combination of an omen (the birds and snake) and a prophecy (the necessity to sacrifice Iphigeneia) invites the reader to ponder on these two traditional epic motifs as poetological techniques, and also as generators of plot progression. Additional major issues in this chapter include the role of the seer Calchas as interpreter of these omens and forerunner for Nestor. The chapter includes extensive discussion on the definition of ‘metamorphosis’ as this is expressed in the cases of Aesacus and Iphigeneia, and concludes with a discussion on the thematics behind the personified Fama (Met. 12.39-63). Chapter two reviews the battle between Achilles and Cycnus (Met. 12.64-145). The setting of this battle, modeled on the single combat between Achilles and Hector in the Iliad, questions the traditional definition of the epic hero and focuses anew on masculinity as much as it justifies the notion of ‘mock-epic’ as the most appropriate term for the generic character of the ‘little Iliad’. In this chapter we witness the first effort on Achilles’ part to put up a literary ‘fight’, against the manipulation of his literary biography. Nestor’s episode, the object of the third chapter, is the lengthiest and the most complex in the cluster (Met. 12.146-579): it technically occupies the narrative time of the Trojan War proper. In this episode Ovid in the persona of Nestor revisits the narrative dynamics that determine the progression of the plot in Homer’s Iliad. Ovid’s Nestor takes advantage of Achilles’ susceptibility to external influences, and he reinterprets the character of the hero to conform to the playful spirit of a metamorphosed epic. The death of Periclymenus, treated in the first part of chapter four, allows Ovid to expand his ruminations on poetic memory by discussing the mechanics of oral poetry. The remainder of the chapter considers the circumstances surrounding Achilles’ death and finesses a series of issues visited previously by Nestor, which are related to the ability and possibility of regulating the fashioning of epic tradition (Met. 12.580-619). Achilles’ fama, surviving his death and spreading all over the world, reaches backwards to the monstrous Fama at the opening of Metamorphoses 12, in a comparison that is both paradoxical and ironic, and instructive for the fluidity that underscores the orally-based dissemination of literature. The fifth chapter is devoted to the oratorical debate between Ajax and Ulixes over the possession of Achilles’ armor and, on a second level, over the issue of succession (Met. 12.620-13.398): each hero claims to be the one suited the most to perform Achilles’ role as the epic protagonist par excellence. This chapter advances further poetological issues, such as the malleability of epic memory, and comments on the fluidity associated with epic composition,

Introduction

23

especially of the Homeric (oral) type. In the sixth chapter, which discusses the account of the fall of Troy and the fates of the ‘Survivors’ (Met. 13.399-575), the Ovidian narrator revisits the systematic deconstruction of the portrayal of Achilles undertaken by Euripides. In the staging of Polyxena’s sacrifice, Ovid assesses the problematic, contradictory, and overall questionably heroic portrayal of the Euripidean Achilles, as this is articulated in the Hecuba and the Iphigeneia at Aulis through a subtle gender inversion. In Hecuba’s mourning, in the same chapter, the poet composes a detailed ritual lament on the principles of the Homeric models. Taking advantage of the performance factor that underscores this genre, Ovid attacks the gender poetics of the lament, and more specifically its function as a kleos-bestowing form of literary praise. The coda to the ‘little Iliad’, the Memnon episode, treated in the seventh and final chapter of my study, is intimately tied to Achilles in more than one way. Next to the epic tradition, recorded in the Aethiopis, that placed Memnon and Achilles against each other on the battlefield, Aurora’s plea to Jupiter as related in the Metamorphoses is modeled on Thetis’ plea to Zeus in Iliad 1, and fittingly opens the field for intriguing closural poetological speculations.

Chapter One Designing ‘Epic’ Beginnings 1. Calchas in the ‘Iliad’ and the Iliad through Calchas (Met. 12.7-38) 1.1 Funeral Beginnings: Aesacus’ Cenotaph The opening episode of Ovid’s Trojan story begins ab ovo 56 , with the rape of Helen and the subsequent gathering of the Greeks at Aulis. The text of Metamorphoses 12, however, does not introduce these events until at least five lines into the narrative; the four opening verses refer to the presumed death of Priam’s son Aesacus: Nescius adsumptis Priamus pater Aesacon alis vivere lugebat; tumulo quoque nomen habenti inferias dederat cum fratribus Hector inanes. defuit officio Paridis praesentia tristi, [postmodo qui rapta longum cum coniuge bellum attulit in patriam] (Met. 12.1-6) His father, Priam, not knowing that Aesacus had acquired wings and was alive, was mourning him. And to a tomb that bore that man’s name Hector with his brothers had offered meaningless sacrifices honoring the dead. Paris was not present at the sad ceremony [the man who a little later brought a long-lasting war upon his country along with a stolen wife].

Aesacus’ full story, told just before the opening of Book 12 (11.749-795), is not part of any tradition of, or about, the Trojan legend prior to Ovid. Despite the Ovidian narrator’s claim that he did hear the story in two different versions, from two (not just one) interlocutors, and on account of this discordance is uncertain whom to believe as the true source (Met. 11.749-751 aliquis senior… laudat… proximus, aut idem, si fors tulit… dixit, ‘some old man spoke in praise… Then one nearby, or perhaps the same speaker… said’), the Aesacus account, at least as it is recorded in the Metamorphoses, is quite likely an Ovid56

While both the Iliad and the Odyssey (and also the Aeneid) open in mediis rebus, in the ‘little Iliad’ (and later the ‘little Aeneid’) Ovid follows the events in chronological order.

26

Designing ‘Epic’ Beginnings

ian invention. Ovid’s alleged attribution of the narrative to earlier authority is a brilliant expression of Alexandrianism, a challenge to his readers’ erudition. 57 Aesacus sought to end his life by drowning when his beloved Hesperia, in her effort to run away from his pursuit carelessly stepped on a snake and died of its poisonous bite. The gods pitied the miserable lover and transformed him into a bird, a mergus. His family, however, unaware of this outcome, took Aesacus’ disappearance for death and mourned for him. This Aesacus prelude of Metamorphoses 12 has generally been considered a misplaced unit, which disturbs the structural coherence of the given narrative 58 , and is justified only as a linking device between Books 11 and 12. 59 Today we should know better: the seemingly awkward proem to the cluster that summarizes not merely the Trojan War but the entire Trojan Epic Cycle, is an intriguing experiment in structural tendentiousness. Lines 1-4 in particular are dense with allusions, and they are so designed in order to anticipate the core themes in several other episodes along the course of the ‘little Iliad’. My detailed analysis below will show that Ovid introduced his compact ‘Iliad’ with an equally terse and sophisticated unit, which could be read in retrospect as a miniature representation of the whole cluster. Central themes in the four-line prelude are, a prince’s tomb that is actually a cenotaph, a bird transformation unattested in earlier tradition, the mourning of the parent, and the offering of inferiae by the prince’s brothers. The exact same themes are central in the concluding episode of the ‘little Iliad’ as well. There, a heroic prince is lost, Memnon (13.579 Memnonis amissi, ‘of the lost Memnon’), who is mourned by a parent, his mother Aurora (13.584; 586 parens… crine soluto; lacrimis, ‘the mother… with streaming hair; tears’). He is buried and receives inferiae (615 inferiae … cadunt, ‘[the ashes] fall down as funeral offerings’), though not by his brothers but by a group of ‘sisters’ (13.603 sorores). These originated from the flames that rose from the hero’s pyre amd miraculously were transformed into birds, the Memnonides – another bird 57 58

59

Tissol 2002, 318, calls this invented literary tradition a “send-up of learned claims to poetic authority”. Bömer 1982, 12 ad 12.4-6, citing, among others, J. Latacz, ‘Ovids Metamorphosen als Spiel mit der Tradition’, Würzb. Jahrb. 5 (1979), 149: “diese Überleitung ist ja so grotesk beiläufig, daß ihr Sinn nur sein kann, die ganze Trojasage und speziell ihre epische Darstellung durch Homer in dasselbe Reich mythologischer Phantasie einzureihen wie alles zuvor Erzählte”. For Otis 1970, 168, the Aesacus story infuses the Trojan legend with amatory themes to effect a smart transition from Book 11, which is dominated by stories of deep love, both happy and unhappy (Ceyx and Alcyone, Peleus’ erotic pursuits and Aesacus’ affair), to Book 12; similarly, Tissol 2002, 318. Otis, further, understands the prominence of the erotic element in the accounts preceding Troy as a mode of “compensation” on Ovid’s part for the excision of the love element from the Trojan account and the confinement of Helen to the outermost edges of the story’s margins.

1. Calchas in the ‘Iliad’ and the Iliad through Calchas

27

transformation story and, moreover, a story that is considered an Ovidian invention, too. 60 Additional similarities are present: the aition behind the type of new bird mergus (‘diver’) that takes Aesacus’ place captures the ‘suicidal’ habit of this bird, which ‘dives deep down below water and toils endlessly to find a way to death’ (11.791f. profundum / pronus abit letique viam sine fine retemptat). Regularity and custom merge in the Memnonides’ annual habit of renewing their deathly fight in Memnon’s honor (13.618f. cum sol duodena peregit / signa, parentali moriturae more rebellant, ‘when the sun has gone through all twelve of his signs, they renew their deadly, customary fight in their father’s honor’). Finally, the cenotaph theme, a climax of the Metamorphoses and the symbol for the immortality of the poet’s genius through his work, at once introduces and closes the ‘little Iliad’. Here, structure meshes with poetics. Capitalizing on the power of the ring composition scheme, Ovid offers a sample of gifted authorship and predicts the everlasting fame of his poetry. Early in the story (11.758-760) Aesacus is introduced as Hector’s brother: frater fuit Hectoris iste; qui nisi sensisset prima nova fata iuventa, forsitan inferius non Hectore nomen haberet Hector’s brother that man was: had he not met his strange fate in early manhood, perhaps he would have a name no less renowned than Hector’s.

These lines are echoed at Met. 12.2-3 tumulo quoque nomen habenti / inferias dederat cum fratribus Hector inanes (‘and to a tomb that bore that man’s name Hector with his brothers had offered meaningless [lit. ‘empty’], sacrifices honoring the dead’). The ‘immortal’ poetics of the cenotaph reflects the artistry of the entire cluster: nearly every episode in the ‘little Iliad’ involves a cenotaph or a metaphoric expression of a cenotaph. As these cenotaphic moments, subjects of close study in this book, are usually situated at the end of each episode, they unite the various tales of the Ovidian Trojan Cycle into a coherent composition. Furthermore, the common sphragis that closes each of them compartmentalizes the larger synthesis into its individual elements or episodes, which thus ‘sealed’ qualify as separate, independently standing little epics. Even more sophisticated in articulation is the nexus of themes that legitimizes the placement of the Aesacus tale as the prologue to the ‘little Iliad’. A prologic piece is always marked as such, and at the same time it is a herald, and an epitome, of key ideas and issues in the main narrative body. There exists a second literary account on the fate of Aesacus, which supports a possible etymology of Aesacus’ name from the Homeric aisa. This literary source, 60

The Memnon episode (Met. 13.576-622) is examined in detail in the last chapter of my study.

28

Designing ‘Epic’ Beginnings

which postdates Ovid and is identified with Apollodorus, an author of the late 1st c. AD, holds (3.12.5 = 3.147) that Aesacus, still the son of Priam, was additionally a dream interpreter, that is, someone gifted with the ability to tell the future, to access ‘destiny’. Apollodorus, further, notes that Aesacus was actually the one who interpreted the fated dream of Hecuba, when the queen, pregnant with Paris, dreamt that she was giving birth to a burning torch, the fire of which spread through the whole city of Troy. Aesacus explained this as meaning that the son to be born was destined one day to become the cause of the city’s ruin, and he went on to recommend that the child be exposed to die following his birth. Apollodorus’ Aesacus, then, has knowledge not merely of aisa, through his divination gift, but of Troy’s aisa, which he in vain tried to alter. 61 It is not possible to know whether Ovid was aware of the Aesacus version recorded later in Apollodorus, but it is tempting to believe so, for two reasons. Foremost, right at the exordium of the ‘little Iliad’ this alternative account situates a vates – in anticipation of Calchas, the literal one, and Nestor, the literary one, both of whom feature prominently in subsequent sections of the cluster. Then, it dates the beginning of Troy’s fall as early as the birth of Paris and the ominous dream of Hecuba. In doing so, it proposes the birth of Paris as the actual beginning of the woes for Troy, and it introduces the notions of beginning and end in tight embrace already at the outset of the Trojan legend. Aesacus’ elusive literary existence, lastly, introduces as programmatic the themes of shape-shifting and illusion, all but anticipating their recurrence throughout the ‘little Iliad’. From a different perspective, the opening of the ‘little Iliad’ alludes to the close of the Homeric epic, with Priam mourning over the tomb of another son, Hector, whom Ovid mentions by name, and the offering of funeral honors along with a great pyre that burns for several days. Conversely, the association between Hector’s pyre and the fall of Troy by fire – which already looms ahead and is prefigured in the mourning of the Trojan women for the dead leader – is detectable in the Ovidian passage, too. The contrasted images of the mourning Trojans led by Priam and Hector over a would-be-Hector son of Priam, on the one hand, and Paris, who is bringing home Helen and

61

The scant information on Aesacus is recorded in Knaack, ‘Aisakos’, RE I.1, 1047-1048. Knaack names Apollodorus as the only other source on Aesacus; Apollodorus does not follow Ovid in every detail, and given the encyclopedic nature of his work it is likely that he borrows from some alternative version of the legend. For example, the Apollodorean Aesacus was married to Asterope, the daughter of the river-god Cebren; Asterope died early, and Aesacus was changed into a bird while lamenting her death. The beloved consort’s loss features also in Ovid’s Aesacus, but the other details have been altered.

1. Calchas in the ‘Iliad’ and the Iliad through Calchas

29

the war, on the other, draws the beginning and the end of the Trojan War into very close sequence. Two additional subtleties substantiate the narrator’s intention to project, however implicitly, Aesacus as a substitute Hector. One is the genealogical king-list that follows the introduction of Aesacus’ name to the Ovidian narrative. et si descendere ad ipsum ordine perpetuo quaeris, sunt huius origo Ilus et Assaracus raptusque Iovi Ganymedes Laomedonve senex Priamusque novissima Troiae tempora sortitus. frater fuit Hectoris iste (Met. 11.754-758) And if you wish to follow his ancestry down to him in continuous succession, his forefathers were Ilus, Assaracus, Ganymede, seized by Jupiter, and Priam, allotted Troy’s last days. That man was Hector’s brother.

This list celebrates Aesacus’ noble pedigree and Aesacus himself as the hopeful successor to this pedigree. Suggestively, Hector appears on the last line right next to Aesacus (iste). The convergence, or rather, exchange of epic personalities is declared through the specification of the fraternal relationship that tied Hector to Aesacus and, no less, by the emphasis on the closeness between the two brothers. This closeness is captured by the clausula that is formed by the proximal arrangement of their names (Hectoris iste). The other allusion projecting Aesacus as alter Hector is tied to the reference to the cenotaph at 12.1. As the Ovidian audience was very well aware, Hector’s memory had likewise been honored with a cenotaph, built, as Vergil had reported a few years earlier, by the hero’s wife Andromache at Buthrotum: sollemnis cum forte dapes et tristia dona ante urbem in luco falsi Simoentis ad undam libabat cineri Andromache manisque vocabat Hectoreum ad tumulum, viridi quem caespite inanem et geminas, causam lacrimis, sacraverat aras. (Aen. 3.301-305) It so happened that Andromache was offering ritual feast and sad gifts in libation to the ashes of the dead, in a grove before the city by the waters of the fake Simoeis, and was calling the ghost to the tomb of Hector, an empty tomb of green turf and the twin altars that she had consecrated, a cause for tears.

Vergil’s Buthrotum, which in addition to Hector’s cenotaph, hosts a rebuilt replica of Troy, transcribes the nostalgic desire of the Trojan War survivors not merely to recreate the past, but to find a way so that this construction will resist the change that comes with time. Hector’s cenotaph, marked

30

Designing ‘Epic’ Beginnings

by critics as a reflection of the Underworld, should appear as metaphor for this utopic new ‘Troy’. 62 By embracing the same idea of regression to an idealized utopia memorialized in an image of death, Priam and his sons at the opening of Ovid’s Trojan narrative willingly turn blind eyes to reality. Yet, by refusing to face the truth that is captured in the idea of (Aesacus’) change, the Trojans essentially condemn the idea of historicity and the future survival of their city. Already before the Greeks had set foot on the shores of Ilium, Ovid’s Troy is a city of the past. The image of Aesacus’ cenotaph marks both the beginning and the end of the Trojan story for Priam’s capital. The above two readings of the cenotaph imagery are characteristic of the unassuming but artful fashion in which the narrator frames the story of Troy, and prefigures, by way of an exemplar, the intricacy in composition and the openness in interpretation that distinguishes the text of the ‘little Iliad’. Additional engaging readings of this intriguing scene are possible. The cenotaph representation of the Underworld elicits the imagery of fama, which, likewise, is often likened to an insubstantial nether world, “the emptiness out of which comes the fullness of textual presence”. 63 Truly, the Underworld, with its throngs of dead heroes and heroines, is an athenaeum of myths and legends, the place where every epic hero ultimately arrives to stay, along with every tradition honoring his past life. It is not different from a mirror of the House of Fama – to be introduced shortly into the ‘little Iliad’ –, since both offer alike a haven for the epic poet, and especially the Alexandrian-minded epic poet, like Ovid, who may find there all sources and versions of earlier epic traditions. 64 Finally, it is impossible to read of Aesacus’ cenotaph without flashing forward to the end of the Metamorphoses, and the fate that Ovid advertises for himself. Ovid’s tomb is bound to be a cenotaph, since the essence of the poet, his genius, captured in the texture of his poetry and more specifically in the Metamorphoses, will not perish with the mortal texture of his body. Turning 62

63 64

D. Quint, Epic and Empire: Politics and Genre from Virgil to Milton (Princeton 1993), 58-60, likens Buthrotum to the Underworld; like Hades, Andromache’s toy-Troy is occupied by replicas and ghosts of original structures, but is devoid of life. This stagnation is monumentalized in the image of Hector’s cenotaph, which bears the likeness of the original but is empty and hence a fraud, an illusion of reality; Hardie 2002, 87-88, expands Quint’s argument on Buthrotum to the general imagery of the cenotaph, including the cenotaph of Aesacus. Hardie 2002, 89. On the epic Underworld as allusion to the total and complete epic tradition, see G. Most, ‘Il Poeta nell’Ade: catabasi epica e teoria dell’epos tra Omero e Virgilo’, SIFC 10 (1992), 1014-1026; Hardie 1993, 60-65, explores the self-consciousness of the Latin epic poets, especially those after Vergil, on the poetics of the katabasis episode, which was a standard theme in most ancient epics.

1. Calchas in the ‘Iliad’ and the Iliad through Calchas

31

the tables on the Aesacus cenotaph thematics, Book 12 concludes with an actual tomb, of Achilles, which contains a body whose fama has reached beyond the boundaries of the grave monument. As a pair, the two thematically united monuments envisage Ovid’s monumentalizing of his own poetry in the sphragis of his epic. 65 In particular Met. 15.875-876, parte tamen meliore mei super alta perennis / astra ferar, nomenque erit indelebile nostrum (‘yet with my better part I shall be eternally borne above the lofty stars, and my name shall be imperishable’), calls to mind the imperishable name that provides an identity for the tomb of Aesacus, whose body has literally fled upwards. To sum up, Aesacus’ monument, the first in a long series of memorials, epitomizes the symbolism of the Ovidian epic cenotaph more broadly: its deceptive concreteness highlights metaphorically the fluidity as the key characteristic of epic tradition, and projects Ovid’s Metamorphoses as the outcome of a particularly successful application of this principle. Priam, who tries to hold down and immortalize in an imperishable, yet firmly prescribed, form the memory, the essence of his son Aesacus, may well embody traditional epic poetry, the kind of epic that Ovid’s Metamorphoses is not. 1.2 Marvelous Beginnings: The Snake Prodigy The absence of Paris from Aesacus’ funeral marks the transition to the ‘Iliad’ proper, for at that same time the hero is occupied with seizing and carrying his spouse-to-be off to Troy. The intersection of the beginning and the end of the Trojan War, accomplished through the adjacent positioning of the Aesacus cenotaph and Paris’ rape, becomes a recurrent theme in the ‘little Iliad’. In the episode immediately following, for example, the Greek army has just gathered at Aulis to begin their expedition, when they witness an omen, the snake that eats nine birds, which predicts the fall of Troy. The implicit coniuge to refer to Helen, who is never mentioned by name, perhaps reflects Ovid’s tactful appraisal of Helen’s insignificant contribution in determining the real

65

Hardie 2002, 96: “[I]f we think of the Metamorphoses as Ovid’s funerary monument, the poem is a cenotaph, since the poet is not dead but eternally alive, like the unfortunate Aesacus at the end of the twelfth and the beginning of the thirteenth books. But the poem is at the same time the most replete tomb imaginable, for, to borrow the words used of the posthumous fame of Achilles at 12.617 at vivit totum quae gloria compleat orbem, it contains the poet’s ‘glory that fills the whole world’”; cf. also pp. 84-91, where Hardie talks about the cenotaph theme as another image for the text, and even speculates on the possible origin of the motif in the genre of the Hellenistic epigram.

32

Designing ‘Epic’ Beginnings

causes or the course of the war, 66 and the terrifying narration of the omen prefigures the mercilesness and cruelty each epic victory entails. The same urge to assess one’s own power at all cost already directed the Homeric heroes’ arguments (in Iliad 1) over losing and gaining the ownership of a woman. 67 Compactness and allusivity underlie the synthesis of the Aulis narrative texture. The Homeric past is revisited through the recollection of two prophecies arranged to appear in successive order. Prophecy belongs among the fundamental tropes of literary allusion. A dynamic narratological mechanism, a prophecy dominates an epic narrative: it stresses the importance of fate, itself often a code term for literary tradition, and it generates plot development, because it determines and regulates the incorporation of earlier narratives/intertexts. 68 Prophecy and epic poetry are interlocking. A formidable plague sent by Apollo opens the Iliad, and its interpretation by a prophet, Calchas, sets the plot of the epic in motion. A different omen of divine origin (birds and snake), accompanied by a different manifestation of the narratological modality of prophecy (Iphigeneia), also signals the opening of the ‘little Iliad’, but the Ovidian account is considerably more nuanced. The narrative of the prodigium of the snake and the nestlings (12.11-23), is brief but powerful – powerful enough, at least, to have had already impressed Cicero, who included a close Latin translation of it in his Div. 2.63-64. 69 Baldo, in appreciating Cicero’s translation of the Homeric omen, argues that it is not the Vergilian snake narratives but Cicero’s translation that Ovid re66

67

68

69

Beyond Met. 12.5-6, Helen is never again mentioned in connection with the course or the conclusion of the Trojan War and, as an individual, she is virtually absent from Ovid’s ‘Iliad’. She is simply part of a rebuke to Paris, once, who is labeled ‘the cowardly raptor of a Greek wife’ (12.609 timido Graiae raptore maritae); and she is mentioned in passing a little later in Ulixes’ recollection of his ambassadorial mission to Troy prior to the outbreak of the hostilities, (13.200 praedamque Helenamque reposco, ‘I ask the return of the booty and Helen’). The need to assert one’s own power inside an epic environment precisely by means of manipulating a given myth highlights the plot-fashioning in several epically-colored sections throughout the Metamorphoses; see G. Rosati, ‘Mito e potere nell’ epica di Ovidio’, MD 46 (2001), 39-61; pp. 55-59, in particular, focus on Fama and Nestor, whose re-writing of stories centered on power also directs the affirmation of power for those featured in these stories. In the words of Barchiesi 2001, 133, “[b]eing in itself a separable and to a certain degree preformed utterance, prophecy too serves well to create an interface not only between different time periods inside and outside the narrative, but also between different texts”. Barchiesi subsequently (pp. 134-135) discusses how Apollo directs the course of the Aeneid, by heralding a strategy of model adaptation that Vergil would follow in his ‘reading’ of the Homeric models. M. Timpanaro, Marco Tullio Cicerone, Della divinazione (Milan 1988) ad loc, with bibliography.

1. Calchas in the ‘Iliad’ and the Iliad through Calchas

33

calls as a second intertext. Baldo calls this interesting incorporation of Cicero’s reading of the Homeric model “un lusus emulativo duplice”, and considers Cicero’s experiment to be “una sorta di selezione preventiva, un filtro letterario indispensabile per l’inserimento di temi omerici nella sua biblioteca”. For Baldo, Cicero’s translation was of great value to Ovid – even though Ovid himself follows the Homeric text more faithfully than Cicero does – because it disengages the particular text from its Homeric, metadiegetic and aetiological-metamorphic context, and thus makes it easier for the Augustan poet to use it as “un motivo incipiario”. 70 Baldo’s discussion justifies the outstanding placement of the episode and suggests that multiple readings of the same textual models result in autonomous narratives, not unlike the ‘little Iliad’, that are openly antagonistic towards their archetypes. In her thoughtful study on the Aulis unit, Musgrove stresses the centrality of embracing multiple perspectives to explore the Ovidian narrative, as she traces the complexity of meaning and the interpretive value of complementary readings that result from the interweaving of the Homeric and the Vergilian intertexts. 71 In her examination of the Homeric subtext, Musgrove notes the closeness of Ovid’s account of the omen (12.11-17) to the Homeric model (Il. 2.305-317), echoed in several verbal parallels. 72 Musgrove stresses the power of the intense emotions generated among the spectators of the prodigy, but also draws attention to additional intertexts, from Vergil’s Aeneid, which are even more emotionally electrifying. The backbone of these, more or less identifiable, intertexts 73 form the serial snake, or snake-likened, attacks all through Aeneid 2 – including the attack of Pyrrhus/dragon against Priam/Troy, which tragically signals the fall of Troy. Musgrove’s analysis, however, considers the Aulis account in its own right, not as the opening of a 70

71 72 73

See the full argument in Baldo 1995, 115-120; the quoted text comes from p. 116; Forbes Irving 1990, 139-148, also discusses the theme of petrification as an omen, but in more general terms. Musgrove 1997. Musgrove 1997, 268-271. Musgrove (1997, 167 n.1), follows Ben-Porat’s (Z. Ben-Porat, ‘The Poetics of Literary Allusion,’ PTL: A Journal of Descriptive Poetics and Theory of Literature 1 [1976], 117-127) in adopting the terms “obvious” and “less obvious” for the intertexts alluded in Ovid’s narrative. I prefer Genette’s (G. Genette, Palimpsests: Literature in the Second Degree, transl. C. Newmann and C. Doubinsky [Lincoln, NE 1997]) typological distinction between “primary” and “secondary hypotexts”, that implies hierarchical ordering among the intertexts in terms of greater or lesser significance; also, I use the terms ‘intertext’ and ‘hypotext’ interchangeably, distinguishing, when necessary, between primary and secondary. Richard Thomas’ “window reference” also refers to the textual phenomenon of clear allusion through an intermediary to a more distant common source; cf. Thomas 1986, 171-198, and ibid. ‘Catullus and the Polemics of Poetic Reference (64.1-18)’, AJP 103 (1982), 144-164. Musgrove considers Thomas’ “window reference” “a variation” of Ben-Porat’s theory.

34

Designing ‘Epic’ Beginnings

larger unit, and, like Baldo, she surveys the poetics in Calchas’ act. My study, on the other hand, considers the same episode as a sequel to the Aesacus story: a programmatic carrier of similar or complemetary thematic and structural parameters, crucial for directing the shape of the plot of the whole cluster. The Aulis episode runs as follows: soon after the gathering of the Greek army at Aulis (Met. 12.6-7) and during a sacrifice presided over by Calchas, a snake makes its appearance and swiftly climbs a tree and eats a nest full of eight young sparrows and their mother (12.8-17). Everybody is dumbfounded except Calchas, who rejoices in the omen, which he explains as a divine sign for Greek victory at Troy after nine years of fighting (12.18-21). As soon as Calchas has finished speaking, the snake turns into stone (12.22-23). Hardly is the interpretation of the omen completed when the setting abruptly changes, and the audience, still at Aulis, is now confronted with a second memorable spectacle, the sacrifice of Iphigeneia (12.24-34). Once again, divine will in the form of an order for the maiden’s sacrifice is communicated through the seer Calchas, who is, further, in charge of executing the grim act; once again, a god-sent miracle occurs, when a hind takes the maiden’s place on the altar. The Aulis account and the ensuing description of Fama’s domain (12.3963) summarize Ovid’s methodology of re-reading the Homeric epic, his theory about revisiting epic composition in Vergil’s aftermath. In the pages immediately following, I maintain that the seer Calchas tacitly negotiates the rules of epic discourse as he focuses anew on his presence in the Iliad. Later in the chapter, I look at Fama as an allegory for the poetics of literary antagonism, and specifically, as a metaphor for Ovid’s meditations on traditional epic deconstruction. The omen of the snake at Aulis, a core tale in the plot of the Cypria according to Proclus 74 , chronologically belongs beyond the timeline of the action in the Iliad, which covers only a few days of the tenth year of the war. The Homeric narrator, in other words, flashes backwards to dramatic time prior to the Iliad, and reports it through the mouth of Ulixes who witnessed the deed. Early in Iliad 2, Agamemnon, advised by a false dream to put the loyalty and fighting spirit of the Greek army to test, pretends to grant his men permission to give up fighting and return to Greece. The Greek army, weary by the prolongation of the war, turns around to leave, and at that crucial moment Ulixes reminds them of an omen that they had witnessed at Aulis nine years earlier (Il. 2.299-329), when during a sacrifice a snake climbed the tree near the altar and ate a nest full of eight little sparrows and their mother. Calchas explained at the time that the nine birds signified nine years of fighting 74

Davies 1989, 44; Bömer 1982, 14.

1. Calchas in the ‘Iliad’ and the Iliad through Calchas

35

for the Greeks at Troy before the eventual fall of the city in the tenth year. Ovid transforms this metadiegetic narrative into a narrative of the first degree, and so he draws attention to the original text, which is echoed very closely in its Latin ‘translation’ 75 : obstipuere omnes, at veri providus augur Thestorides ‘vincemus’, ait; ‘gaudete, Pelasgi! Troia cadet, sed erit nostri mora longa laboris’ atque novem volucres in belli digerit annos. (Met. 12.18-21) All stood dumbfounded, but Thestor’s son, the augur, who foresaw the true meaning (sc. of this portent or/and of portents), said: ‘we shall conquer, Greeks, rejoice! Troy will fall, but our endeavor will last long’, and he interpreted the nine birds as nine years of war.

A closer look at the language of the Latin text, however, makes plain that Calchas’ image at Met. 12.18-21 is deeply indebted to a second intertext, again from the Iliad, the first of the two appearances of the seer in the poem, in 1.68ff.: ’ ’ ƘƴǂǃƾǀƮƳƶǁ, ’ ’ ’ ’ μ ,

’

·

’ ,

’ μ

’

, .

μ · (Il. 1.68-73) Thus he spoke, and sat down again. And among them stood up Calchas, Thestor’s son, by far the best of bird interpreters, who knew the things that were, the things to come and the things past, who guided into the land of Ilion the ships of the Achaeans through his prophetic skill, which Phoebus Apollo gave him. With favorable intention he spoke and addressed them.

This passage essentially introduces Calchas to the Iliad and its world. A ’ professional seer, Calchas is of undisputed credibility ( ): the god who procured the charisma of divination for him is none other than Apollo himself. The formal tone of his presentation is highlighted principally by the employment of his patronymic, Thestorides, next to his name: this is the only occasion in the Homeric corpus when the seer is addressed by his patronymic. Inevitably, this distinctive mode of introduction of Ovid’s Calchas, casts the Greek prophet in the light of his earliest epic ap75

Musgrove 1997, 269, upon comparing the two sections (Met. 12.13-18 ~ Il. 2.308-316), notes that “when Ovid introduces the birds, every element of his sentence can be paralleled in Homer’s lines”; also, Hill 1999, 203: “Ovid marks his entry into a Homeric section by following, unusually closely, his Homeric model”.

36

Designing ‘Epic’ Beginnings

pearance. The exclusiveness of the crosstextual relationship is underscored by the absence of the seer’s actual name in Ovid, an omission implicitly demanding the audience’s familiarity with the particular Homeric source. Second, the Ovidian Calchas is specifically an augur, a ‘diviner by bird-flight’ 76 , which . Third, Ovid’s Calchas is veri providus, translates literally the Greek ‘he who foresees the truth’. This phrase corresponds to Il. 1.70, but it is not a translation of this cardinal verse that encapsulates the completeness in scope of Calchas’ vision across time. 77 Ovid, though perfectly capable of providing an exact translation of this important Homeric line, prefers instead to follow a more challenging path and render Il. 1.70 in words that at once reproduce the verse and interpret it from Ovid’s own perspective. According to Dickson, Il. 1.70, like Calchas’ patronymic, is unique in the Homeric poems, but it does echo closely the language portraying the Muses , , (‘for you are godin Il. 2.485 μ desses, you are present, and you know all things’), and it occurs verbatim in Hesiod’s description of the epic poet himself (Theog. 31-32; 38). 78 Equally poetically colored is the other appearance of the seer, in Il. 2.298ff., which recalls the Aulis omen. 79 The 30 lines of this episode do not expedite the progression of the plot more that a single summarizing phrase would. Rather, the anecdotal style of the narrative with the graphic description of the snake omen and the report of Calchas’ address in direct discourse, amplified by Ulixes’ opening remark that the memory of the event is as vivid as if it had happened yesterday, dramatizes the past before the audience. In so doing, the Homeric narrator highlights not only Calchas’ divination skills, but also his status as an influential instructor, whose divinatory advice forecasts the concluding scene of the Trojan narrative, and so generates epic action, both in the Trojan War in general and in the Iliad plot. As a prophet, Calchas is both a performer and a metaliterary agent. He is able of reading signs that nobody else can, and he has foreknowledge, which enables him to revisit the past by knowing how it will turn out in the future. Still, it is at his discretion to reveal the past and the future as he actually 76 77 78 79

Ovid employs the term augur five times in the Metamorphoses; two of these attributions are reserved for Teiresias (3.347 and 3.511). Providus followed by a genitive is frequently translated as ‘circumspect’, ‘prudent’, removed from any temporal specifications; cf. OLD s.v. providus 2. Dickson 1992, 330-331; Kirk 1985, 60. For an analysis of Calchas’ second speech as a binary dilemma between the correct and an incorrect possible solution, see Dickson 1992, 332. In addition to his speech on the cause and the cure of the plague in Iliad 1, and his interpretation of the Aulis omen, as reported through Ulixes, in Iliad 2, Calchas is ‘seen’ one third time in the Iliad, at 13.43-65, when Poseidon disguises himself as Calchas and urges the two Ajaxes to hold their ground before Hector’s attack against the Greek ships.

1. Calchas in the ‘Iliad’ and the Iliad through Calchas

37

‘reads’ them, or to ‘perform’ a different, distorted version of the actual reading. Calchas, through his divination skill, has access to the fata, the events to be acted out, which he can subsequently communicate to a wider audience that is directly affected by them. Were it not for Calchas, the Greeks would have never left Aulis for Troy and the Iliad would have never been written. Being an exclusive connoisseur of deciphering divine messages, Calchas controls the content of these messages, which he can reveal or suppress, completely or partially. In the language of poetics, then, Calchas is as much in control of the Iliad narrative as is the epic narrator, and from this perspective the seer could become, in this particular case, an alternative persona for the Ovidian narrator. The prophet’s complex identity has found a successful description in Dickson’s words: “Like all seers, Kalkhas recounts prior events only in order to lay bare their abstract causal nexus and to project their future narrative contingencies, all the better to ‘clarify the framework within which [decision] operates’. The poet’s mirroring of his own control over the tale in the figure of the prophet as an embedded narrator thus paradoxically draws attention to how disengaged and extratextual this position truly is”. 80 1.3 Maiden Beginnings: The Sacrifice of Iphigeneia Calchas also officiates in the sacrifice of Iphigeneia, which in the Metamorphoses is reported after the omen of the snake (Met. 12.24-38). The story centers on Calchas’ revelation that Agamemnon’s daughter Iphigeneia should be sacrificed in order to pacify Artemis, who, angry at Agamemnon for having killed her sacred hind, withheld all winds. As a result, the Greek fleet was kept anchored at Aulis unable to cross over to Troy. The story is not related in the Iliad: Permanet Aoniis Nereus violentus in undis bellaque non transfert; et sunt qui parcere Troiae Neptunum credant, quia moenia fecerat urbi. at non Thestorides; nec enim nescitve tacetve sanguine virgineo placandam virginis iram esse deae. postquam pietatem publica causa

80

Dickson 1995, 64; the italics are Dickson’s own, while the quotation in it is Peradotto’s; the passage is the conclusion to a more extensive discussion (pp. 50-64) on Calchas as an allegory for the Homeric narrator, and on the ties of both to the Muses as authorities of poetic inspiration. For the narrative function of prophecy in the Homeric poems, Dickson draws on Peradotto (J. Peradotto, Man in the Middle Voice: Name and Narration in the Odyssey [Princeton 1990]; and ibid. ‘Prophecy Degree Zero: Tiresias and the End of the Odyssey’, Oralità: Cultura, Letteratura, Discorso [Urbino 1986], 429-455).

38

Designing ‘Epic’ Beginnings

rexque patrem vicit castumque datura cruorem flentibus ante aram stetit Iphigenia ministris, victa dea est nubemque oculis obiecit et inter officium turbamque sacri vocesque precantum supposita fertur mutasse Mycenida cerva. (Met. 12.24-34) But Nereus continued stormy in the Aonian waters, and refused to transport the war. And there were some who held that Neptune was sparing Troy because he had built its walls. But not so Thestor’s son; for, he was neither ignorant of the truth nor did he withhold it, that the wrath of the virgin goddess with a virgin’s blood must be appeased. After the public cause overwhelmed affection and the king the father, and just as Iphigenia stood there before the altar in the middle of mourning servants, ready to shed her innocent blood, the goddess was moved to pity and spread a cloud before their eyes, and there, while the sacred rites went on, amidst the confusion of the sacrifice and the cries of the suppliants, she is said to have substituted a hind for the maiden of Mycenae.

The echoes of Calchas’ portrayal in this passage (12.27-29) to the seer’s presence in Iliad 1.68-73 are clear. For the second time in less than ten lines the seer is addressed with his Homeric patronymic. The litotis, nec nescitve, toys with the seer’s comprehensive omniscience captured in Il. 1.70, and the next verb, tacetve, reflects back on Homeric Calchas’ determination to speak the ), if Achilles promises to truth about the plague in Il. 1.76 ( protect him. Finally, the circumstances of the maiden sacrifice are similar to the debate over another maiden’s fate, Chryseis, in Iliad 1. The snake omen in its original manifestation at Aulis brought about surprise and sensation, but overall the impression is self-contained and momentous, for it does not imminently affect the course of the Trojan War. It is only in its recollection, in Iliad 2, that it becomes a psychological catalyst against the Greek army’s faintness of heart. Likewise, the sacrifice of Iphigeneia is the required resolution to a problem (violent winds prohibiting sailing) that affects the course of the Trojan War and needs to be removed. The Iphigeneia affair mirrors the Chryseis impasse. In Iliad 1, a situation beyond human comprehension (a plague) has stalled the epic action; the tracing of the causes and the potential solution requires special knowledge. Under these considerations Calchas’ argument for restoring Chryseis to her father and his revelation of the necessity of Iphigeneia’s sacrifice are the resolutions required for the epic plot to move forward. On both occasions, the stalling of the Greek army (and the storyline) is the outcome of divine anger, dutifully noted in the Greek and the Latin texts alike: Met. 12.28-29 virginis iram… deae (‘the wrath of the virgin goddess’); cf. μ (‘[…] to explain the wrath of Il. 1.75 μ Apollo’). On both occasions, the same man, King Agamemnon, is responsible for the standstill, and Calchas’ intervention to engineer the appeasement of divine anger only results in a renewal of this anger, as Agamemnon initially

1. Calchas in the ‘Iliad’ and the Iliad through Calchas

39

refuses to comply with the mandates of the seer’s revelations. Needless to say, the satisfaction of Agamemnon’s mênis in the Iliad comes about only after he has provoked an even greater mênis. Thus, even though the quelling of the commander’s mênis allows the plot in the Homeric narrative to advance, epic action is stalled because the mênis of its leading agent, Achilles, remains unmitigated, and spurs the hero to withdraw from participation in the epic action. Agamemnon’s image in the ‘little Iliad’ is shadowy and kept to the fringes of the narrative. Still, the narrator of the Metamorphoses needs only a few words to picture accurately the king’s character in the Iliad, by referring to his title as chief leader of the entire army and to the antagonistic spirit of his speeches. 81 Alone among the Greek warriors in the ‘little Iliad’, Agamemnon is addressed as rex – five times in total, and without additional attribute or marker of identity. 82 The emphasis on the title of supremacy reflects the Homeric Agamemnon’s devotion to the culture of nomenclature and hierarchical stratification on the basis of wealth and influence, and underhandedly remarks on the commander’s anxiety over asserting his leadership status over Achilles and the latter’s merit-based definition of excellence. 83 Inside the Roman cultural periphery, moreover, the title ‘rex’ could converse both with the notoriously negative synonym for the tyranny of the legendary Tarquins and the paradigmatic absolutism of a Roman commander-father, like Manlius Torquatus (Livy 8.7.1ff.), who, not unlike Agamemnon, subdued his identity as pater to that of commander. 84 The vocabulary selection and word arrangement in the phrasing of the hero’s ethical dilemma in 12.29-30, postquam pietatem publica causa / rexque patrem vicit, which accommodates an alliteration, a chiasmus and 81

82

83

84

For Martin (1989, 113-119), Agamemnon’s speeches are distinguished by two principal traits: a defensive spirit eager to counterattack, dispute, or rebuke the interlocutor, and an overblown style of rhetoric. By embracing speeches of flyting Agamemnon strives to compensate for his inferior oratorical skills. The passages in question include 12.30 rexque patrem vicit (‘the king conquered the father’) and the near parallel 13.187 in rege tamen pater est (‘yet the king had a father’s heart’): both texts refer to the king’s great dilemma. The other three passages are 13.217, 13.276 and 13.328. On a sixth occasion, 13.232, the word rex is used in the plural and describes the Greek leaders as a group. In this last case, Thersites utters the word rex to qualify (or rather, ‘disqualify’, on account of their association to Agamemnon) summarily the Greek leaders. On the various debates over the title of the ‘best of the Achaeans’ in the Homeric poems, see Nagy 1979. Martin 1989 provides an analysis of the performer profile of each of the major heroes in the Trojan War; for Agamemnon, see pp. 113-119 and passim. Münzer RE XIV, 1186, appropriately calls this inner conflict between one’s private and public duty the “Torquatus-Motiv”; cf. Bömer 1982, 22 ad 12.29-31, quoting Kjellberg’s description (in RE IX, 2617) of the same situation as “ein dem Römergeist besonders zusagendes Motiv”.

40

Designing ‘Epic’ Beginnings

two synecdoches, reflects the sophisticated compression that distinguishes the Ovidian methodology of epic adaptation. In flashy speech Agamemnon tries to tone down his private identity (Agamemnon, the father of Iphigeneia) lest it clashes against the prescripts of his public role (as ‘rex’ – or rather, THE ‘rex’, given the absence of the definite article in Latin –, the supreme commander of the army). In sum, the setting of Calchas’ two Homeric moments at the outset of the Ovidian ‘Iliad’ experiments with the narratological effectiveness of simultaneously alluded multiple beginnings: the chronological beginning of the Trojan campaign intersects with the beginning of the Iliad. Even though Achilles is completely absent and Agamemnon is barely mentioned, Calchas’ presence redirects the audience’s attention beyond the narrative surface to the revival of the axial theme of the Iliad, that is, the feud between Agamemnon and Achilles on excellence and leadership. From a certain standpoint, Ovid’s edgy insinuations about the Homeric Agamemnon’s preoccupation with titles reaches back to Aesacus’ cenotaph, the tomb that bears a name (nomine) but is void (inani) of substance. The intercrossing of the beginning and the end of the Trojan War in this brief opening scene to Metamorphoses 12 is, likewise, part of the thematic texture of both the snake prodigy and the sacrifice of Iphigeneia. First, the sacrifice of Iphigeneia, that enables the Greeks to cross over and start their war, pairs the revelation of the conclusion to the war as told in Calchas’ interpretation of the portent. Second, the portent of the snake and the sparrows encapsulates the cyclical course of the Trojan War, for the revelation of the end to the war appears at the very beginning of the expedition. The specification, furthermore, of the chronological duration – nine-plus-one years – of the campaign makes the omen sound more real and credible, and so accentuates the perception that the war will eventually be completed. Third, the portrayal of Iphigeneia looks ahead to another maiden sacrifice of striking similarity inside the narrative frame of the Ovidian Trojan story, which signals outright the end of the war. In the aftermath of the fall of Troy (Met. 13.398ff.), the Trojan princess Polyxena is offered as an honorary sacrifice to the ghost of Achilles. The language that describes the sacrifice overall and especially the moment of the execution is explicitly sexual, and pictures the death in terms of an enforced, perverse ‘marriage’. In Iphigeneia’s tragedy Achilles’ presence is catalytic, since the pretext of an arranged marriage to the great hero brought Iphigeneia to Aulis in the first place. All in all, the prodigy of the snake and the nestlings and the sacrifice of Iphigeneia are intimately connected to Achilles even though the hero’s presence is not readily obvious on a less attentive reading of the Ovidian narrative. Secondary thematic associations tighten the nexus of text and intertext in the two incidents at Aulis. In her discussion of the dramatization of the snake’s devouring the helpless nestlings (12.13ff.), Musgrove argues that

1. Calchas in the ‘Iliad’ and the Iliad through Calchas

41

Ovid’s experimentation with the Homeric model is heavily influenced by the text of the Aeneid, and, explicitly, the powerful snake imagery and snakemetaphors of Aeneid 2. 85 The activation of this dramatic Vergilian intertext forces the Metamorphoses reader to view the Aulis omen from the perspective of the victims of the Trojan War, the Trojan populace, and thus, to dismiss the glorious Greek campaign as a mass murder against innocent victims. Then, the unsuspecting Iphigeneia is undone, no differently than the Trojan enemy, by her countrymen’s treachery and with the consent of her own father. The projection of victimized innocence as a catalyst for the accomplishment of kleos signals the systematic deconstruction of the traditional heroic ethos that foremost distinguishes Ovid’s rewriting of the Trojan legend. Along with the clear references to Homer and Vergil in the reproduction of the snake omen, the Ovidian reader should realize that in the Metamorphoses the petrification miracle is reported slightly differently. In Homer, the snake turns to stone before the viewers express their amazement and before Calchas μ , elucidates the portent (Il. 2.318-319 , ‘the god, who had ·/ μ μ caused his [the dragon’s] appearance, made him disappear from sight; for the son of crooked-advising Cronus turned him to stone’). Ovid’s snake, however, remains alive until after the seer’s triumphant interpretation, its petrification emphatically reserved for the very last line of the narrative (22-23). The discrepancy comments subtly on a problematic Homeric passage. As Kirk admits, Il. 2.318-319 had been highly suspected as interpolation among ancient grammarians, and Aristarchus had no reservations to reject 2.319, the line describing the actual petrification. 86 The miracle, however, was absolutely necessary for Ovid’s purposes, for it provides the ostensible justification for the inclusion of the Aulis omen in the ‘little Iliad’, the metamorphosis. The snake prodigy features, paradoxically, side-by-side with a manipulated narrative account and an exegetical note cautioning against textual manipulation. By transgressing the Homeric narrative order and reserving for the very last, and thus particularly prominent, line the announcement of the metamorphosis, Ovid takes an affirmative stance on the question of authenticity tied to the particular verse. This emphasis on multiple change (a metamorphosis story altered from its original version, which features a chronological switch rendered with a textual metathesis) is conspicuous – as much as the change, or rather the ex85

86

Musgrove 1998, 271ff.; the classic treatment of the snake motif in Aeneid 2 is still B.M.W. Knox, ‘The Serpent and the Flame: The Imagery of the Second Book of the Aeneid’, AJP 71 (1950), 379-400. Kirk 1985, 149-150 ad Il. 2.318-319.

42

Designing ‘Epic’ Beginnings

change, in the Iphigeneia account, which carries its own extraordinary imprint. The miracle is literally a substitution, an exchange, since a hind is ultimately sacrificed in lieu of Agamemnon’s daughter. The verb, however, chosen to describe this exchange, mutare (12.34 subposita fertur mutasse Mycenida cerva, ‘[Diana] is said to have replaced a hind for the maiden of Mycenae’), is a term whose principal meaning, ‘to change’, epitomizes the plot thematics and the generic orientation of the Metamorphoses (Met. 1.1-2). The play on the double meaning of mutare endorses the expansion of the definition of metamorphosis to embrace further the notion of substitution/exchange. 87 The cenotaph in Aesacus’ story represents a comparably broadened case of metamorphosis, because it acts as a substitute for a tomb with the mission to capture, stabilize and immortalize the fleeting and the evasive. “In Greco-Roman mythology and legend, the death of a beautiful woman often serves as the prelude or postlude to war. Thus the Greek expedition to Troy departs from Aulis only after the sacrifice of Iphigenia…. When the Greek army is similarly becalmed in Thrace after the Trojan war, the sacrifice of Polyxena appeases the wrath of Achilles’ ghost and secures the Greek ships favourable winds for the homeward journey. Although Homeric epic takes as its primary subject the Trojan war and its aftermath, the poems ignore the deaths of these maidens in their focus on male death and heroism”. Thus Alison Keith; evidently, Ovid embraced a similar view. In the last chapter of her book titled Engendering Rome, Keith discusses the representation of the death of women in Latin epic, which is nearly always expressed in clearly sensual overtones and is chain-linked to political order. 88 In the same chapter she points out that the male epic universe abounds in violence and sexuality, and that these are very often “displaced onto the female body, which is represented as the site where sexuality and violence coincide”.89 The female figures in Ovid’s ‘Iliad’ and later in the ‘Aeneid’ endorse this rule. On the other hand, Keith’s analysis of the semiotics of the epic female is interwoven with the very definition of the epic genre, which is meant to be a panegyric of male values and idealize maleness. Since it is often easier to define an abstract idea through detailed description of its opposite, epic embraces the female image precisely because it encompasses discernibly all these characteristics opposite to, and opposing, masculine completeness. The comparison against the female presented the more permanent, secure standard against which maleness 87 88 89

On Ovid’s wordplay in redefining mutare, see Tissol 1997, 25; Kenney 1986, 453. Keith 2000, 101-131; my approach of Ovid’s viewing of gender in the ‘little Iliad’ owes much to arguments developed in Keith’s book; the text above is quoted from p. 101. Keith 2000, 104.

1. Calchas in the ‘Iliad’ and the Iliad through Calchas

43

could be measured and safely prescribed. This concept is ideally verbalized in Vergil’s famous swagger of Numanus Remulus in Aen. 9.603-620, where he boasts of innate Italian endurance (603 durum genus) and contrasts it to Trojan effeminacy (614ff.). Numanus assimilates the Trojans to women (9.618 o vere Phrygiae, neque enim Phryges, ‘You, essentially Phrygian women, and certainly not Phrygian men’), in an effort to set the two cultures as the absolute polar opposites and, by eliciting comparison of the two, to extol the heroic masculinity of the Italians. 90 Overall, the speech bespeaks of an ongoing anxiety on the part of the Roman male over asserting his virtus, and of an intimately ingrained fear that his conduct might come out as less than appropriately masculine and hence risk being stigmatized as feminine or effeminate. It is precisely this esoteric apprehension that characterizes Ovid’s epic world of the ‘little Iliad’. Homeric heroism, personified in Achilles who defines male excellence in the Iliad, is revived in Metamorphoses 12 and 13. Iphigeneia’s sacrifice firmly ensconces gender politics into epic poetics. The entire episode in Ovid spans a mere eightlines (27-34), but the verbal influence from Lucretius’ detailed account of the same story, which likewise operates as programmatic by being set at the opening of De Rerum Natura, is obvious. Both texts open similarly, by stressing the blood of the designated victim (Met. 12.28 sanguine virgineo, ‘with a maiden’s blood’; 12.30 castum… cruorem, ‘innocent blood’ ~ DRN 1.85 Iphianassai… sanguine, ‘with the blood of Iphianassa’). Both emphasize the victims’ virginal status (Met. 12.28 virgineo ~ DRN 1.87 virgineos) and both portray Iphigeneia as a spectacle for a male audience (Met. 12.31 flentibus ante aram stetit Iphigenia ministris, ‘Iphigeneia stood before the altar amidst the weeping attendants’ ~ DRN 1.89-90 et maestum simul ante aras adstare parentem / sensit et hunc propter ferrum celare ministros / aspectuque suo lacrimas effundere civis, ‘and she immediately sensed her father standing by gloomy before the altars, and the attendants next to him hiding the sword, and the citizens shedding tears at the sight of her’). Keith notes that a central theme in the Lucretian portrait of the heroine is the objectification of the maiden under the combined gaze of the male audience, which also stands for the male poet and his readership. The anatomical presentation of the sacrifice – which in Lucretius does actually take place – and the emphasis on the response of the female victim’s body to the ritual that evolves around her clearly sensualize Iphigeneia. Even the poet’s denial that the spectacle of 90

Keith 2000, 18-35, discusses the social construction of gender in Roman ideology during the Augustan Age and the early empire, and the extent to which constant reference to female was essential for defining virtus; Numanus Remulus’ speech is discussed on pp. 19-22. For Numanus the Trojans’ unmanliness is indubitable given their oriental descent, a stereotypical synonym to effeminacy; on the manipulation of the gender factor in the speech, see Horsfall 1971, 1108-1116; also Hardie 1994, 185-198.

44

Designing ‘Epic’ Beginnings

Iphigeneia’s death pleases the onlookers operates between the lines as a challenge towards the reader to scrutinize the account of the sacrifice looking for evidence to the contrary; for details that would render the scene a pleasurable spectacle. 91 Admittedly, Ovid’s terse account merely hints at the aesthetic view of Iphigeneia’s body, but the stylistic finery of the text stresses the elements of spectacle and performance, and so balances the lack of narrative explicitness. The phrasing of line 31 (flentibus ante aram stetit Iphigenia ministris, ‘Iphigeneia stood before the altar amidst the tearful attendants’), the verse that identifies Iphigeneia and introduces her into the narrative and before the mental eyes of the reading audience, observes a careful grammatical symmetry. At the center of the verse stands the verb, stetit, ‘stood’, which is framed by the subject, Iphigenia, and ‘the altar’, the specification of the place where the subject is standing. The central placement of Iphigeneia standing before the altar encourages the readers to visualize a dramatic setting, an orchestra with a woman at the very center standing before an altar. The woman is surrounded by male attendants in mourning, an image likewise suggested by the grammar in the text, where the ‘tearful attendants’ (flentibus… ministris) are the opening and closing brackets to the line, and literally encircle the standing Iphigeneia. Iphigeneia’s ‘acting’ follows only one line after Agamemnon’s own ‘theatrical’ dilemma (rexque patrem vicit): The commander is required to separate his two personalities/roles of the ‘father’ and the ‘king’, which he sees as mutually exclusive, distance himself from both of them, and then choose only one. 92 The dramatization of the near-sacrifice moment may even tone up the element of sensuality in the texture of the scene. When Ovid, unlike Lucretius, spares Iphigeneia from murder, and implements the happier conclusion, the heroine’s replacement by Diana’s hind, he likely acknowledges that the tragic account of the sacrifice in Lucretius’ poem might discourage his male audience from enjoying guilt-free this spectacle of death. By substituting a hind for the maiden right before the blow strikes her, Ovid reassures his audience that Iphigeneia’s sacrifice did not really take place, and that the woman is alive and thriving as Diana’s priestess somewhere in the Taurian region. Accordingly, the readers can go back to Lucretius and recontextualize, 91

92

Cf. the analysis of Lucretius’ Aulis sacrifice in Keith 2000, 107-111, including her brief comparison to Ovid’s Iphigeneia (p. 122); specifically on the sacrifice as an erotic act, Keith follows the analysis in G. Bataille, Erotism: Death and Sensuality, transl. M. Dalwood (New York 1962), 90-91. Cf. Tissol 1997, 56-57, on this “cleavage of identity”, the hero’s self-driven separation of his pater- from his rex-role. Notably, Tissol refers to Agamemnon’s identity dilemma as ‘objectification’ (“A. becomes thus doubly objectified”), recalling Keith’s argument on the spectacle of Iphigeneia’s ‘objectification’.

2. The Fama of Epic Tradition

45

deconstruct, or just recall without guilty regrets the pleasures of their original text/narrative spectacle. Underscoring, while simultaneously undercutting, the Roman epic obsession with the social construction of gender and the various aspects of sexuality and sexual expression, is a recurrent theme throughout the ‘little Iliad’; in fact, more than that, it is one of its main interpretive parameters.

2. The Fama of Epic Tradition The House of Fama, a location at the center of the universe, somewhere at the cross-section of earth, sea and heavens, is crowded with faceless voices that mix and interlock, are confused and confusing, and are in constant motion (Met. 12.39-63). A mixture of countless faceless narrators of truth and lies, yet so solidly amalgamated that the two may never be separated completely, these voices fly everywhere and change their form ceaselessly, in a most spectacular manifestation of metamorphosis. The elusiveness of the Fama text is tantalizing, and numerous readers in recent decades have visited this passage, proferring arguments as diverse and complex as the voices dwelling in the House of Fama. Even though particular in their separate focalizations, all these voices stream out of the premise that Fama is an allegory for Ovid’s composition strategy and his application of metadiegesis to the construction, manipulation, alteration and even illusory distortion of GrecoRoman literary tradition. 93 This assessment may be corroborated when closer attention is paid to the immediate proximity of Fama to Calchas. 93

Zumwalt 1977, the first full-fledged treatment of the personification as allegory for Ovid’s composition, reads Fama as anticipatory of Nestor and his long speech-parable of how a narrator’s partiality can alter tradition. Tissol 1997, 85-88, focuses on the elusive shape of the voices in Fama’s domain, “the semantic limitlessness of rumors themselves”, which renders them absent and present at the same time, in a constant state of vagueness. The mixing of truth and lies, and the domain’s description as an echo chamber which receives and transmits but, in truth, is only an ambiguous likeness of the original, stress further the element of flux as the core principle of a narrative structure based on the ever-changing meaning of words. Barchiesi 2001, 130-132, views Fama in Roman epic as a trope of intertextuality. Rosati 2002, 281-304, esp. 292-304, discusses the importance of multiple narrative voices and metadiegesis (“the replication of narrative levels”, p. 282) in the Metamorphoses as these are expressed in “episodes that explore ways of reading and the interpretation of stories” (p. 292), among which belongs the House of Fama. For Hardie 2002, passim (especially, 4; 6; 18-19; 89; 232; 236-238; 265; 311-312; 332-334), Fama’s abode, full of rumors and enticing deceptions, is foremost a personification of the power of poetic composition. Hardie, moreover, takes this domain to represent the vastness of literary tradition available not only to Ovid but also to the reader, who is called to evaluate a variety of mixings of truths and lies (i.e. variations of different stories).

46

Designing ‘Epic’ Beginnings

A vates, both a prophet and (because of this) an epic poet, Calchas has universal knowledge, succinctly expressed, as we saw, in Il. 1.70 (‘he knew the things that were, the things to come and the things past’), and this knowledge aligns him with the omniscient Muses and transforms him into the goddesses’ proxy among mortals. Seated at the meeting point of the universe (12.39-40 Orbe locus medio est inter terrasque fretumque / caelestesque plagas, triplicis confinia mundi, ‘there is a place in the middle of the world, between the earth and the sea and the heavenly regions, the boundaries of the threefold universe’), Ovid’s Fama likewise has full sight of everything that happens everywhere (41-42 unde quod est usquam quamvis regionibus absit, / inspicitur, ‘from here, whatever is anywhere can be seen, however distant it may be’). 94 The outstanding importance of comprehensive vision as the core of Fama’s identity is underlined by means of a closural repetition, and simultaneously a ring composition (62-63 ipsa quid in caelo rerum pelagoque geratur / et tellure videt totumque inquirit in orbem, ‘and [Fama] herself sees and seeks out through the whole world whatever transpires in heaven, at sea, and on land’). Fama, thus, complements Calchas’ symbolic identity as keeper of knowledge who directs the course of the events, but also as interpreter of these events, and hence as controller of the plot. Still, Fama is only partly a reflection of Calchas. The Ovidian narrator carefully notes that the Greek seer delivers prophecies that are true (veri providus). This is anything but the case with Fama. Because she is able to see and tell stories about things that happen anywhere in the universe, Fama can easily mix with them accounts about things that happen nowhere in the world. Invisible hence undetectable, these lies can easily deceive mortals. For the Ovidian narrator the absence of clear boundaries between truth and lies is the most distinguishing trait of Fama’s identity: this reconsiders the meaning of her ubiquity, introducing a poetics-directed perspective, and brings about the evolution of the syllepsis from its original conception in Vergil (Aen. 4.173-190). The Vergilian account focuses on Fama herself and embarks on a graphic personification that endeavors to capture the apprehension and insecurity unsubstantiated speech can produce, with an elusive image of a terrifying monstrosity. 95 The adulteration of truth with fiction notably appears in 94

95

For Bömer 1982, 25 ad 12.39-40, the phrase triplicis confinia mundi recalls the ekphrasis of the human universe on the Shield of Achilles, and possibly the division of the world into three different spheres of divine authority each ruled by a separate ruler, Jupiter, Neptune, and Pluto. Since each of these three divinities is also the center of a separate group of myths, Fama’s domain occupies an ideal location in the universe of poetics, the point where the various traditions intersect. Hardie 2002, 13, reviews the poetics behind Fama’s monstrous appearance in the Aeneid; the personification represents “the poet’s semi-credulous and half-guilty awareness of his

2. The Fama of Epic Tradition

47

the concluding lines of the ekphrasis (188-190 tam ficti pravique tenax quam nuntia veri. / haec tum multiplici populos sermone replebat / gaudens et pariter facta atque infecta canebat, ‘tenacious messenger of both the fictitious and fickle, and the truth, she was then filling the peoples with complex speech, rejoicing, and she was singing alike things done and things never done’). The residence of Fama in Ovid is the sequel to Vergil’s Fama ekphrasis, for, technically, it takes on in further detail a theme introduced summarily on the three last lines of the Vergilian text. Ovid’s composition expands not on what Fama looks like, that is, something that nobody is ever to see and verify, but on how Fama is perceived among people, namely, as an inextricable accumulation of voices of indistinguishable origin and inherent co-dependence, which people experience regularly even beyond a literary environment. By situating Fama’s deceptive multivocality next to Calchas’ precise truth, Ovid makes an important statement on the nature of his own poetry, including the composition of the ‘little Iliad’ narrative. His texture builds itself on an ever-developing fusion of fiction and fact, just as Ovid’s Fama does (Met. 12.54-58 mixtaque cum veris passim commenta vagantur / milia rumorum confusaque verba volutant. / e quibus hi vacuas implent sermonibus aures, / hi narrata ferunt alio, mensuraque ficti / crescit, et auditis aliquid novus adicit auctor, ‘and thousands of lying rumors mixed with truth roam here and there, and confused words flit about; some of these fill empty ears with talk, others carry the talk elsewhere, and the measure of invented talk grows, and the new inventor adds something to what he has heard’), encouraging exploration of the narrative in multiplice sermone (‘talk on multiple levels’) as if assessing a product of Vergil’s Fama. By introducing his sources as the ‘one thousand rumors’, Ovid recasts the one thousand ever-open doors that the domain of Fama presents (44-46 innumerosque aditus ac mille foramina tectis / addidit et nullis inclusit limina portis; / nocte dieque patet, ‘and added countless entrances and a thousand openings in the roof, and has shut the threshold with no doors; night and day the house lies open’). By confessing that his Fama’s Whispers are of ‘no certain source’ (dubio auctore), Ovid acknowledges his embrace of source manipulation as a fun-

own powers as a maker of fictions that have designs on the world of history”. A. Laird, Powers of Expression, Expressions of Power: Speech Presentation and Latin Literature (Oxford 1999), 273, commenting on the closing lines of Vergil’s Fama (Aen. 4.188-194): “The subject matter of her rumour is the very subject matter of the fourth book of the epic. In fact, everything she reports is just as it has already been narrated….[i]f one considers Fama’s report on a pragmatic level then it can be no more true than the Aeneid is true. In this respect, poetry is very much like rumour – after all Horace, Virgil’s contemporary, characterized the ideal epic poet as someone who ‘lies and mixes truth with falsehood’ (Ars Poetica 151-152, ita mentitur, sic veris falsa remiscet)”.

48

Designing ‘Epic’ Beginnings

damental narrative strategy throughout, including, naturally, the ‘little Iliad’. 96 And he extends to his audience a comparable challenge ‘of various levels’, as he invites them to assess the depth, size and success of his text as a multivocal synthesis of many different traditions, in turn subjected to varied readings by different characters. 97 Still, it is not the accuracy of source identification that matters, because precise identification like absolute truth is hardly traceable in the ocean of epic tradition. What matters is the evolution, the stages of metamorphosis that the various sources of knowledge have passed through, and the criteria that inspired the Ovidian narrator along the way. In sum, if Calchas exemplifies the Ovidian narrator, the epic vates with comprehensive knowledge of earlier literature, Fama offers an anatomy of the Ovidian methodology of epic synthesis, as much as she provides the guidelines for its assessment.

96 97

For Wheeler 1999, 56, the ekphrasis of the House of Fama (12.39-63) “represents poetic tradition and authority in terms of the hazards of oral communication”. Wheeler 1999, 164: “The House of Fama, which introduces the epic cycle in the final books of the poem, signifies the fundamental shift away from the poet’s own voice to the voices of characters, as the poet effectively becomes a mouthpiece for fama”.

Chapter Two Epic Self-affirmation and Epic Self-consciousness: Introducing Achilles (Met. 12.64-145) 1. Protesilaus, the Proto-Achilles With their ‘idle ears filled with gossip’ (12.56 vacuas implent sermonibus aures), or rumores, through which ‘the fictitious grows in size’ (12.57-58 mensuraque ficti / crescit), the readers of the ‘little Iliad’ come upon the leading character of the story, the famous Achilles. The Trojan War has officially started, and Ovid notes it by relating the death of Protesilaus at the hands of Hector (12.67-68), according to epic tradition the first officially recorded eponymous death of the war. 98 The inclusion of the account on this first combat victim of the Trojan War in Ovid’s Trojan compendium solidifies the thematic unity of the ‘little Iliad’ cluster, before it proceeds to launch the first serious attack against the epic ideal. Traditionally, Protesilaus might have been killed on Trojan soil, but his tomb was reportedly built across the Hellespont, at the city of Eleous, on the coast of the Thracian Chersonese facing the Troad. His burial-place, to which were attached a shrine and a sacred enclosure, was a famous landmark in antiquity, and the hero was revered as a god. Furthermore, the hero’s temenos enjoyed respect in the wider Hellenic world, as indicated by the punishment of the Persian satrap Artaÿktes at the hands of the Athenians for his offenses against it. 99 By Ovid’s time the shrine of Protesilaus was probably in a derelict state, but it is widely reported to have been still standing as late as Pliny and

98

99

The story of Protesilaus was part of the Cypria (fr. 26 Bernabé); cf. F. Canciani, ‘Protesilaos’, LIMC VII.1 (1994), 554-560, on the rich tradition behind it, including Ovid’s own detailed treatment, in Heroides 13. Artaÿktes’ story is reported in Herodotus 7.33, and also in 9.116, the closing paragraph to the Histories; on the political and literary significance of the episode and its placement in the corpus, see D. Boedeker, ‘Protesilaos and the End of Herodotus’ Histories’, ClAnt 7 (1988), 30-48.

50

Epic Self-affirmation and Epic Self-consciousness

Arrian. 100 All in all, Protesilaus may have had hardly any presence in the Trojan War and no martial accomplishments worth praising, but he had acquired divine status and, most importantly, historical existence, a firm, uncontested and tangible memory. This was not the case with the celebrated warrior Achilles, whose tomb, located on the Trojan side of the Hellespont, ironically, just opposite that of Protesilaus, never enjoyed an undisputed historical tradition. Irony also underlies the spirited narration of Achilles’ death, prominently situated at the close of Metamorphoses 12. Here, the greatness of the hero’s size and the fame bestowed upon his name thanks to the Iliad are compared to the nothingness of the paltry ashes that are left following his death (12.615-616). Even the prophecy-promise that Achilles’ gloria would survive to eternity (617) is ambiguous and vague since Ovid’s definition of gloria, we shall see, is more akin to that of a fama. The reference to Protesilaus, then, is intended as an allusion to Achilles’ death. Once again, thematics and structure intersect at the simultaneous evoking of two episodes in the same story. The episodes represent, respectively, a crucial beginning and a landmark closure in terms both of the progression of the Trojan War (Protesilaus is the inaugural dead; Achilles’ death marks an end of all sorts) and of the narrative structure of the ‘little Iliad’ (Protesilaus is set at the outset of Book 12; Achilles’ death closes the same book).

2. Cycnus, the alter Achilles 2.1 Cycnum aut Hectora The first Ovidian ‘Trojan’ episode relates how the great Achilles and the Trojan Cycnus, Hector’s pre-Homeric substitute, encountered each other on the battlefield (Met. 12.64-145). The combat between Achilles and Cycnus is the only detailed battle narrative from the Trojan War in Ovid’s revision, and concerns an event that took place early in the war and prior to the dramatic time of Homer’s Iliad, the 50-odd days of the tenth year. The Cycnus affair and its narrative sequel, Nestor’s account of the battle between the Centaurs and the Lapiths (12.146-579), are designed to deconstruct the epic function of

100

On the legend of the deified Protesilaus at Eleous and the history of his temenos, including its archaeological record, see T. Mantero, Richerche sull’ Heroikos di Filostrato. Pubblicazioni dell’ Instituto di Filologia Classica dell’ Università di Genova 30 (Genova 1966), 107-119; 215-218.

2. Cycnus, the alter Achilles

51

the war narrative, that is, the establishment of the epic hero’s kleos and fama. 101 One of Ovid’s sources for the duel between Achilles and Cycnus was the Cypria, which told how Cycnus, the invulnerable son of Neptune, was killed by Achilles at Troy (Bernabé 42; Hes. fr. 237 M-W). 102 By Ovid’s admission, the fight is both anticipatory of, and a substitute for, the Achilles-Hector encounter in the Iliad 103 : commissaque proelia magno stant Danais, fortisque animae nece cognitus Hector; nec Phryges exiguo quid Achaica dextera posset sanguine senserunt. et iam Sigea rubebant litora, iam leto proles Neptunia Cycnus mille viros dederat, iam curru instabat Achilles totaque Peliacae sternebat cuspidis ictu agmina; perque acies aut Cycnum aut Hectora quaerens 101

102

103

The importance and overall value of the Achilles-Cycnus narrative has been underestimated so far (e.g. Due 1974, 84, 149; Bömer 1982, 33: “groteske Überhöhung des epischen Stils”; Dippel 1990, 60: “Alles is für einen homerischen Zweikampf vorbereitet – doch welch eine zum Grotesken neigende Persiflage”). Those who bother to mention it dismiss it as a parodic substitute (Ellsworth 1980, 22) of the Iliadic war scenes. To describe the Cycnus unit as a parody, or even a mock-narrative, may be correct in theory (on the definition of parody and its historical evolution, see, for example, S. Dentith, Parody [Routledge 2000]), but it misrepresents the intricacy of Ovid’s composition, which renders tagcharacterizations too simplistic. R.F. Glei, ‘Der interepische Diskurs: Zum Verhältnis von Metamorphosen und Aeneis’, in: H.C. Tristram (ed.), New Methods in the Research of Epic/Neue Methoden der Epenforschung (Tübingen 1998), 85-104, baptizes Ovid’s ‘little Aeneid’ “eine dekonstruktivische Verflachung ihres historischen Tiefgangs” (p. 101), a labeling which is certainly true. Since, however, it is not argued in detail, it hardly allows the readers to get a grasp of Ovid’s idea of model deconstruction and its significance as a declaration of poetic rivalry. To my knowledge, only Möller 2003 provides an in-depth discussion of the Cycnus-Achilles episode, and undertakes a poetological reading that captures the Callimachean flavor of the Ovidian ‘Iliad’. In Proclus’ summary of the Cypria, Hector’s killing of Protesilaus and Achilles’ of Cycnus are conjoined and represent the two opening battles of the Trojan campaign (Homeri Opera, OCT, vol. 5, p. 105, 1-3, ed. Allen; Bernabé 42.53-55; and now also West Cypr. arg. 10; fr. 22). The placement of these battles in sequential order at the opening of the ‘little Iliad’ very likely follows the Cypria, and in some respect exemplifies the thoughtful source criticism that Ovid’s rival reconstruction of the Trojan story entails throughout. The adjacent placement of the two encounters may also direct the well-read reader to speculate on the discrepancy among the ancient sources over the identity of the hero who killed Protesilaus, since at least one tradition, preserved in Quintus of Smyrna (Posthom. 4.469), identifies him with Cycnus, not Hector. Segal 1997-98, 23, notes how metapoetics have inspired the substitution of Hector with Cycnus, enabling Ovid “to replace Homer’s Iliad with his own, for he adds in the next line that Hector’s death ‘was postponed to the tenth year’ (12.67f.), thereby embracing the entirety of the Homeric poem”.

52

Epic Self-affirmation and Epic Self-consciousness

congreditur Cycno (decimum dilatus in annum Hector erat) (Met. 12.68-77) And the battles that were fought cost the Greeks dearly, and famous for his brave spirit Hector did become on account of his slaughters; nor was the bloodshed little that made the Phrygians fully realize how mighty the Greek hand was. And now the Sigean shores grew red, now Cycnus, Neptune’s son, has given one thousand men to death, now Achilles was pressing on in his chariot and was laying down entire army ranks with the throw of his Pelian spear. And as he was searching through the battlelines for either Cycnus or Hector, he fell into Cycnus (Hector had been postponed until the tenth year).

The introduction of the two opponents comes at the end of the description of a setting that may correspond to an artistic representation. This can be a single panel, which its ‘spectators’ would initially envision as a comprehensive unit and then focus on individual scenes or details. Or, it can be a series of panels in succession, arranged so that the viewer’s eye would initially traverse through those scenes depicting nondescript moments from the battlefield, and then progressively move onto more detailed, self-contained, and specific encounters. Moving to specifics, the audience initially observes two group battle-narratives: a high moment for the Trojans with Hector in their lead and a victorious counterattack by the Greeks (68-71). The next two panels describe, respectively, the aristeias by Cycnus and Achilles, the leading Trojan and Greek heroes (69-75). To the enmeshing of the identities of Aesacus and Hector, Ovid adds a more advanced experiment with personality exchange, this time between Hector and Cycnus. 104 The two Trojan leaders are described similarly to spread death among the Greeks (69 fortisque animae nece cognitus Hector, ‘and famous for his brave spirit Hector did become on account of his slaughters’ ~ 72-73 leto… Cycnus / mille viros dederat, ‘Cycnus has given one thousand men to death’). A few lines later, Achilles himself, who searches among his enemies for a worthy opponent, indirectly identifies the two, by not giving any indication that he ranks either of them higher than the other (75 perque acies aut Cycnum aut Hectora quaerens, ‘And as he was searching through the battle-lines for either Cycnus or Hector…’). Cycnus is present to replace the absent Hector as Achilles’ opponent, just as the cenotaph at the opening of the book took the place of absent Aesacus for Priam and his sons, and the hind a few lines later traded places with Iphigeneia upon the altar. On each of these three instances a different form of identity exchange takes place, but what underlies all three is the elusiveness 104

Pindar, Isthmian 5.39, names Cycnus and Hector as two of Achilles’ great Trojan victories, and a little later he adds to them Memnon, whose funeral closes the ‘little Iliad’, and Telephus, whose story is alluded to in the tale of Caeneus in the Centauromachy.

2. Cycnus, the alter Achilles

53

attached to shape-shifting. The elaborate play with the absens/praesens dichotomy rephrases the element of flux, a leading directing parameter of Ovidian poetics overall, and now clearly of the ‘little Iliad’. 105 Cycnus’ replacement of Hector on the battlefield does not merely rewrite the duel between Achilles and Hector to poke fun at the culminating moment of the Homeric Iliad. 106 Above all, it is drafted as a commentary and a critique, on the hero ideal as embodied by ‘the best of the Achaeans’, and on the leading theme of the Iliad, the wrath of Achilles. The ekphrastic precision, with which the different panels that compartmentalize inasmuch as compose the grand battle are developing at the periphery of the contest between Achilles and the substitute Hector, begs for closer inspection, because the panels remind one of the murals in the temple of Juno at Carthage in Aeneid 1. The Carthaginian murals, in similar fashion, open with two general battle scenes, contrasting the fighting Trojans with the charging Greeks led by Achilles: namque videbat, uti bellantes Pergama circum hac fugerent Grai, premeret Troiana iuventus, hac Phryges, instaret curru cristatus Achilles. (Aen. 1.466-468) For, he [Aeneas] saw how as they fought around Troy: here the Greeks were fleeing, the Trojan youth pressing after them, there fled the Phrygians, crest-bearing Achilles in his chariot right on their heels.

The Vergilian ekphrasis continues with a parade of several tragic moments from the war, all of which picture the Trojans as victims, and it retells the fall of Troy from Aeneas’ (and Dido’s) point of view; but mainly, it degrades Achilles. At least half the stories narrated in the panels (1.469-493) depict Achilles’ treachery and deceit (the ambush of Troilus), impiety and sheer brutality (Priam begging before Achilles; Achilles’ mutilating the corpses of Troilus and Hector), and his slaughter of all Trojan leaders (Hector, Memnon, Penthesileia). In his particular portrayal of Achilles, Vergil attacks the Homeric ideal of epic heroism, which along the course of the Aeneid he juxtaposes with his own as embodied in Aeneas. 107 Revisiting epic as the poetry of 105 106

107

For Hardie (2002), the absens/praesens juxtaposition rephrases more colorfully the idea of illusion, a theme as central in the Metamorphoses as the actual notion of metamorphosis. For Solodow 1988, 32, Hector’s replacement by Cycnus exemplifies Ovid’s overall relation to the Iliad. His strategy “to recount familiar stories only through a displacement or from a novel perspective”, all the while drawing attention to the adaptation, is Alexandrian is spirit, and set to fulfill his “neoteric tendencies”. A good discussion of the complex intertextuality behind Vergil’s use of the Homeric Achilles as foil (and model of) Aeneas is K.C. King, ‘Foil and Fusion: Homer’s Achilles in Vergil’s Aeneid’, MD 9 (1982), 31-57. King’s conclusions, however, on Aeneas’ representing a

54

Epic Self-affirmation and Epic Self-consciousness

‘glorious manly deeds’, Ovid discredits the Homeric hero teleology reflected in Achilles, through the construction of a counter hero model. This model is primarily distinguished by susceptibility to ongoing change and as such, it transcribes Ovid’s effort to outperform the artistry and contest the ethics of a literary genre that by definition celebrates the archetypal, the axiomatic. As soon as Achilles comes upon Cycnus on the battlefield he hurls his spear at his Trojan foe and, simultaneously, introduces himself (12.80-82): ‘Quisquis es, o iuvenis’ dixit, ‘solamen habeto mortis, ab Haemonio quod sis iugulatus Achille.’ haectenus Aeacides; vocem gravis hasta secuta est. “Whoever you are, young man”, he said, “let this console you for your death, that you were slain by Achilles of Thessaly”. That much Aeacus’ descendant spoke: his heavy spear followed his word.

These words exude an aura of arrogant overconfidence and enjoyment in fight and death. Achilles’ self-introduction at 80-81, observing a chiasmus, opens with the ‘no-name’ of the opponent (quisquis) and closes with the name of the speaker (Achille). By calling Cycnus iuvenis, Achilles underestimates his enemy further: a iuvenis is not yet a vir, and hence, technically, he may not lay claim on ‘manliness’, or the epic vir-tus (Gk. andreia from anêr, ‘man’). Further, according to Achilles, Cycnus should welcome his impending death, for he is about to die by the hand of the ‘best of the Achaeans’. Line 81 in particular is full of murder: mortis is followed by Haemonio, which echoes the sound of the Greek word for blood, μ (/haema/), and then by iugulatus. The etymology (‘pain’) is set within a semantically fitting conof Achilles’ name from text, which could inspire additional wordplay: in avenging the loss of his timê, the hero causes pain to allies and enemy alike.108

108

transplanted version of the violence and fury of Achilles’ epic world, should be read with caution. R.D. Williams, ‘The Pictures on Dido’s Temple (Aen. 1.450-493)’, in: S.J. Harrison (ed.), Oxford Readings in Vergil’s Aeneid (Oxford 1990), 37-45, endorses the view that the temple paintings, and the tradition behind them, project Achilles as the incarnation of the Greek behavior that is marked by crudelitas and perfidia. Cf. Nagy 1979, 64: “Achilles is a pêma [‘pain’] for the Trojans when he is at war and a pema for the Achaeans when he withdraws from war and when he dies” (see Nagy’s discussion in detail on pp. 69-93); ibid. ‘The Name of Achilles: Questions of Etymology and ‘Folk Etymology’’, ICS 19 (1994), 3-9, explains morphologically the name of Achilles as *Akhilawos, ‘he who has akhos (‘pain’) for the laos (‘host of fighting men’). Nagy’s explanation has been contested in F. Létoublon, ‘Review of G. Nagy, Le meilleur des Achéens: La fabrique du héros dans la poésie greque archaïque [transl. J. Carlier and N. Loraux]’, Revue de Philologie 68 (1995), 289-290. G. Holland, ‘The Name of Achilles: A Revised Etymology’, Glotta 71 (1993), 17-27, also opposes Nagy, in favor of a new etymology founded on comparative linguistics and exploring a possible etymology from some original form in the proto-

2. Cycnus, the alter Achilles

55

Met. 12.80-81, with its careful word selection and syntactical arrangement, including the employment of direct discourse, to increase the force of a curt speech and so effectively project Achilles’ arrogance and thirst for bloodshed, deserve closer attention: only the well-versed reader of Augustan intertextuality may traverse without erring through the labyrinthine route that, reaching backwards in time, leads from the comically braggart Achilles of Metamorphoses 12 to his Homeric counterpart’s hybristic behavior towards the dying Hector in Iliad 22. In all, the relationship between the two texts is an elaborate one, and presupposes the detection of independent exchange between each of these two texts and Vergil’s Aeneid. To explain: when Ovid makes his Achilles haughtily tell Cycnus at 12.80f., that his dying at Achilles’ hand is such an honor that it should even console him for the loss of his life (solamen habeto / mortis ab Haemonio quod sis iugulatus Achille, ‘let this console you for your death, that you were slain by Achilles of Thessaly’), he probably recasts the concluding words of Vergil’s Aeneas over the dying Lausus in Aen. 10.829-830: hoc tamen infelix miseram solabere mortem: / Aeneae magni dextra cadis, ‘however, let this, unlucky fellow, be the consolation for your dreary death: you fall by the hand of the great Aeneas’). 109 Aeneas’ particular words, however, convey sincere compassion for the loss of the young and innocent Lausus. They are set at the end of a sixline-long apostrophe to Mezentius’ son, which opens with simultaneous expressions of mourning and praise for the youth’s courage to fight Aeneas in defense of his wounded father (10.825-826), and proceeds with the statement that as a gesture of respect Aeneas will return the dead body for burial to Lausus’ family and with the armor untouched: 827-828 arma, quibus laetatus, habe tua; teque parentum / manibus et cineri, si qua est ea cura, remitto (‘Keep as your own the weapons which you wore and delighted in; and in case you do bear this care, I restore you back to the spirits and the ashes of your ancestors’). Both Aeneas’ eulogy and the Ovidian Achilles’ brash opening constitute conspicuous expressions of solacia mortis, a traditional epic topos, which suggestively links Achilles to his archetypal Homeric self. Yet, even a less informed reader soon realizes that the recollection of the Vergilian model in reality undermines the epic image of Achilles. To begin with, Ovid’s use of solamen rather than following Vergil’s solabere leads to two additional Vergilian passages. Solamen is a rare word, attested only here in Ovid, and prior to the Metamorphoses only thrice more, all three in Ver-

109

language. This misses Nagy’s point, as Nagy himself notes in his 1994 response (in ‘The Name of Achilles’). I thank Professor Zwierlein, for bringing this intertextual association to my attention and suggesting that I pursue more deeply the exploration of this relationship.

56

Epic Self-affirmation and Epic Self-consciousness

gil’s Aeneid 110 : it is very likely that Ovid engages in conversation with one or more of these Vergilian passages. Two of these passages are located in Aeneid 10, where Aeneas’ solacium mortis to Pallas is found; not least, all three instances are closely and clearly related. The first is part of the alleged consolation that Turnus offers to Pallas’ bereft father at Aen. 10.491-494: ‘Arcades, haec’ inquit ‘memores mea dicta referte / Euandro; qualem meruit, Pallanta remitto. / quisquis honos tumuli, quidquid solamen humandi est, / largior’, ‘Men of Arcadia’, he said, ‘remember to report these words of mine to Evander: I send him back Pallas as he has deserved him. Whatever honor there is in a tomb, whatever comfort there is in burial, I freely give’. The Rutulian leader, anticipating Aeneas, also promises to return (remitto, 492; cf. 828) the dead body to Evander, but his tone is arrogant and obviously ironic: the ‘payback’ he offers is intended to exacerbate the pain of the aged and devastated father. And, in sharp contrast with Aeneas, as soon as he finishes his speech he strips the body from the baldric, the most precious piece of Pallas’ armor (495-500).111 Both Aeneas’ and Turnus’ gestures, respectively in sparing and despoiling the dead body of their heroic opponents, have their precedents in similar acts of Achilles in the Iliad. The chivalrous Aeneas, who picks up the body of Lausus himself, copies Achilles of Il. 24.589, who lifts the corpse of Hector from the ground to aid Priam; while, his decision to abstain from despoliation of Lausus’ corpse (830-832) again calls to mind Achilles’ similar act of generosity towards the Trojan Eëtion, at Il. 6.416-417. 112 Still, it is Turnus’ imitatio Achillei that strikes one immediately, for it is modeled not on the Greek hero’s few and rare acts of humanity, but on his habitual behavior towards his dead enemies, and most conspicuously, towards Hector, whose dying wish to restore the body to his parents he denies, declaring instead his intention to throw it to the dogs (Il. 16.338-354), and whose dead body, he first spoils from its blood-drenched armor (Il. 22.367-369), and then brutally mutilates. 113 It is the Iliadic Achilles’ cruelty towards the fallen Hector, lurking in 110 111

112 113

On solamen as a Vergilian coinage, see Harrison 1991, 197 ad 10.493-4; also, Bömer 1982, 38 ad 12.80f. For a layout of the sharp, deliberate juxtaposition of Turnus’ conduct over the slain Pallas (Aen. 10.491-500), against that of Aeneas over the body of Lausus (Aen. 10.825-830), see P. Schenk, Die Gestalt des Turnus in Vergils Aeneis (Königstein 1984), 84-92; also B. Otis, Virgil: A Study in Civilized Poetry (Oxford 1963), 359-360; and more recently Harrison 1991, 196198; 267-269. On the Homeric subtext behind Aeneas’ humane treatment of Lausus, see Harrison 1991, 268 ad 10.827-828, and 269 ad 10.830-831. The direct model behind Turnus’ conquest and subsequent hybristic despoiling and boasting over Pallas’ body is the Homeric Hector’s treatment of the dead Patroclus (see details in Harrison 1991, 199 ad 10.500-505), which further undercuts the Ovidian Achilles’ heroic self-profiling.

2. Cycnus, the alter Achilles

57

the shadow of Turnus’ mutilation of Pallas, that Ovid slyly tempts his readers to recall, by employing the Vergilian hapax coinage solamen through a maze of entwined epic intertexts, all of which revolve around the ethics of epic conquest. 114 Beyond intertextuality, Ovid’s effort to revive the performance parameters of the Homeric epic environment is visible in his imitation of the nature and structure of Achilles’ speech pattern in Homer: the curt words Ovid’s Achilles fires at Cycnus are inspired by the Homeric Achilles’ verbal exchanges with the enemy. As a rule, Achilles in the Iliad habitually takes recourse to utterances of brief, scornful remarks when he confronts his foes in combat. The brevity of his speech is meant to insult the addressee by conveying the impression that the latter is worthy only of the minimum of words required to formulate a threatening and condescending address. 115 These derogatory snippets usually target and expose a dark moment in the opponent’s fighting résumé, and a typical example is Achilles’ speech to Aeneas at Il. 20.188-195, a text that in turn recalls the earlier encounter between the two, at which Aeneas was routed and forced to flight. Or, they merely phrase an inquiry on the imminent victim’s identification, as is the case of Asteropaeus in Il. 21.150-150, who is only asked where he comes from. Martin, who lists the above two passages as representative examples of Achilles’ speaking habits during combat, points out that this curtness is not caused because the hero is uninformed about the identity of his opponent. Rather, it purports to produce the impression “that Achilles simply wants to be done with the inevitable killing”. 116 In my view, this is hardly the case. The Homeric Achilles is very

114

115

116

It should be noted that Achilles’ sole act of chivalry in his sparing the body of Eëtion from despoliation is a problematic one. The event is recalled by a woman, Andromache, who describes the occasion by attributing the hero’s generosity to ‘fear’ (Il. 6.417 μ’, ‘he feared to do so in his heart’); and by using the exact phraseology that earlier in the same book (Il. 6.167) reported Proetus’ hesitation to order the execution of Bellerophon, a decision bespeaking his failure as leader (a warrior-king is expected to undertake instant action and outright kill his opponent); cf. details about the significance of Achilles’ suggestive comparison to Proetus in K. Bassi, ‘Orality, Masculinity, and the Greek Epic’, Arethusa 30 (1997), 327-328. Perhaps Ovid here engages in wordplay of irony with the Vergilian Pyrrhus’ response to Priam’s words at Aen. 2.540-543. To the old king’s comments that even the steal-hearted, bloodthirsty Achilles took pity on him and his supplication, Pyrrhus rudely tells Priam to shut up and die (2.547-550). Dippel 1990, 60 n. 11, parallels Pyrrhus’ and Achilles’ battlefield oratory with Camilla’s similar taunt at Aen. 11.688-689: nomen tamen haud leve patrum / manibus hoc referes, telo cecidisse Camillae (‘nonetheless, you shall carry to the souls of your ancestors this name that is hardly trivial, having fallen to Camilla’s weapon’). On the condescending cue of Achilles’ brief taunting verbal exchanges, see Martin 1989, 143, whence the quote; on vaunting as part of the preliminary epic ritual leading to the sin-

58

Epic Self-affirmation and Epic Self-consciousness

much interested in whom he is confronting. Notably, as soon as he kills Asteropaeus, the hero reports a thorough account of Asteropaeus’ glorious ancestry (21.184-199). Precisely this mentality is targeted and transplanted by Ovid in the Cycnus episode. When Achilles dismisses Cycnus with the perfunctory quisquis es, o iuvenis, he does not communicate that he is ignorant of, or uninterested in, finding out who his adversary is: in reality, he knows very well whom he is confronting, for only a few lines earlier Ovid explicitly revealed that the Greek warrior was looking out specifically for either Hector or Cycnus, and happened to encounter the latter. Instead, by resorting to epigrammatic speech (haectenus) and by pretending ignorance of his fellowcontestant’s identity Achilles degrades him even more markedly, for he refuses to remember him. As he acts out this typical poetic analogue of damnatio memoriae, Achilles seems to nurture literary aspirations. He has transcribed the text of the ‘Iliad’ in his memory, a text that, by Ovid’s age, is not the original Homeric poem, a composition largely based on oral tradition, but a written text with a firm manuscript tradition that could be precisely known. Ovid’s Achilles rehearses the moves of his Homeric self, and so he appears on stage as a bloodthirsty warrior, initially in routing the entire Trojan army and then in seeking to confront man-to-man one of the two leading Trojan warriors to substantiate his kleos. Cycnus, however, sabotages his plans: sed quamquam certa nullus fuit error in hasta, nil tamen emissi profecit acumine ferri. utque hebeti pectus tantummodo contudit ictu (Met. 12.83-85) Yet, although there was no fault whatsoever in his well-aimed spear, the flying weapon nonetheless struck with its sharp point without success; and only shook his [Cycnus’] breast by a blunt stroke.

Even though there is no fault in his acting, and his spear hits the target, Achilles misses. To his justified amazement, noted twice (87 miraris; 88 mirabatur enim), his ‘heavy spear’ (82 gravis hasta) is no more effective than a ‘mere blunt stroke’ (85 hebeti tantummodo… ictu). This comes as a great blow to Achilles’ virtus. 117 The Ovidian readers, mostly Roman elite males educated in an institutional context devoted since the earliest stages to the prescription and promotion of masculinity, knew their Homer well, if anything. Few would

117

gle combat, including a detailed study of the typology of vaunting, see P. Kyriakou, ‘Warrior Vaunts in the Iliad’, RhM 144 (2001), 250-277. When virtus is perceived in the definition provided by V. Pöschl, Die Dichtkunst Virgils. Bild und Symbol in der Aeneis (Berlin/New York 31977), 20-23, as “tapfere Haltung im Kampf”.

2. Cycnus, the alter Achilles

59

ignore that the Homeric Achilles’ trademark weapon 118 was an ash spear of divine origin, which he alone and nobody else had the ability to lift. 119 The failure of the spear hurts Achilles’ heroic status, and given the prominent sexual undertones generally attached to the spear 120 , his masculinity as well. 2.2 Do You Know Thy (Epic) Self? ‘nate dea, nam te fama praenovimus’ inquit ille, ‘quid a nobis vulnus miraris abesse? (mirabatur enim) ‘non haec, quam cernis, equinis fulva iubis cassis neque onus cava parma sinistrae auxilio mihi sunt; decor est quaesitus ab istis. Mars quoque ob hoc capere arma solet. removebitur omne tegminis officium, tamen indestrictus abibo. est aliquid non esse satum Nereide, sed qui Nereaque et natas et totum temperat aequor’. (Met. 12.86-94) The man [Cycnus] said: “Goddess’ son, for rumor has made you already known to me, why are you amazed at the fact that there is no wound on me?” (For Achilles was amazed.) “Neither this reddish-brown helmet, which you now see, with its crest made of horse-hair, nor this hollow shield which hangs heavy on my left arm, are intended to succor me: they are here for ornamental purposes. Mars, likewise, is used to wearing his arms for the same reason. Let all protection be removed: still, I shall walk away unharmed. It is something to be the son, not of Nereus’ daughter, but of him who rules both Nereus and his daughters and the whole sea besides”.

Cycnus’ reply shows that Achilles’ rival is a formidable epic performer in his own right 121 ; and being as thorough a reader of Homer as anybody, he

118 119

120 121

Alternatively referred to as hasta (Met. 12.82, 83, 112, 115), telum (Met. 12.79, 95, 118), and cuspis (Met. 12.74, 100). Il. 16.143-144 = 19.390-391; this is a crucial passage: it describes Patroclus’ preparation to march off at the head of the Myrmidones’ army in the place of Achilles, dressed in Achilles’ armor, but he leaves behind the spear. According to the Cypria fr. 3 Bernabé, the armor was a wedding gift to Peleus from Athena and Hephaestus, while the famous ash spear, which nobody except Achilles could carry, was a gift from the Centaur Cheiron. Likewise an ash spear – temptingly suggesting THE ash spear – is the weapon that the Ovidian Achilles carries when he later fights against Cycnus (12.122 fraxinus). On the spear, hasta, and its various synonyms, as predominant phallic metaphor, see Adams 1982, 17, 19-20, 74. Critics have unanimously regarded Cycnus as a caricature of a character, an exemplar of anti-heroic performance (i.e. vain talk and invulnerability) that undercuts Achilles’ epic profile; Dippel 1990, 61-62, sums up earlier assessments: “Cycnus wird von Ovid als Nebenfigur eingefügt, er wird vorgestellt als naiver Jüngling, der sich mit seiner Abstammung

60

Epic Self-affirmation and Epic Self-consciousness

does not hesitate to delve into the subtext of the Homeric epic to contest Achilles’ status as aristos. In Iliad 9, Phoenix reminds Achilles that he was sent by Peleus to Troy as companion to Achilles, in order to instruct the young hero how to be a speaker of words and a doer of deeds (9.432-434 μ μ , / μ ’ μμ , ‘he sent me along with you to teach you all these matters, to make you a speaker of words and one who is accomplished in action’). Throughout the Iliad, Achilles strives to excel in both. As Martin has noted, both acts are performances, because their mastery and maintenance require life-long training and regular display, while Peleus’ dictum renders epic heroism a performance act and “every epic hero a performer”. 122 Markedly, Peleus does not rank one of the two concepts higher that the other, and this detail inspires the Ovidian narrator to transform the real contest between Achilles and Cycnus from a martial conflict into a speech competition, which metaphorically dramatizes also Ovid’s agonistic take on ancient epic. The Ovidian Achilles fights and at the same time acts out his own epic, in which he has scripted for himself a role patterned on his epic self in the Iliad. Yet, the contestant the Greek hero now chooses, Cycnus, effectively thwarts Achilles’ ‘authorial’ efforts, because he proves to be a smarter and craftier orator than the son of Thetis, and as a result a more successful scriptwriter. Even without the presence of the cletic nate dea, the opening of Cycnus’ direct address would strike the Augustan reader as a play on Vergil’s text, and actually on a prominent poetics-conscious passage. Met. 12.86 nam te fama praenovimus (‘rumor has made you already known to me’) echoes an important line from the opening part of the Carthaginian murals episode, which is already present in Ovid’s readers’ mind as argued earlier. When Aeneas first casts a comprehensive look at the narrative on these murals, he exclaims that the reputation of the Trojans, the story of the Trojan War, has already preceded their arrival: Aen. 1.457 bellaque iam fama totum vulgata per orbem, ‘wars already spread in fame through the whole world’. Then, when a little later he is introduced to Dido, the queen phrases her excitement at meeting him in similar words, specifically stressing the hero’s widely-spread fame. Commenting on 1.457, Barchiesi emphasizes the poetological subtext behind this line inserted just prior to the ekphrasis. He notes that these ‘wars’, in reality the Trojan saga, have lost originality, and hence appeal, since they have become familiar through continuous oral performances and the recasting of individual episodes in other epics. Vergil’s/Aeneas’ task is to step outside the much

122

brüstet und hybrid seiner Unverwundbarkeit wegen prahlt – im Kampf helfen ihm jedoch weder Abstammung noch Atrosia”. Martin 1989, 146.

2. Cycnus, the alter Achilles

61

trodden Epic Cycle and write a new epic. 123 Aeneas’ reading of the murals – the order that he chooses to present them in and the details that he focuses on – substantiates this view. In this alternative account of the Trojan saga, which constitutes an epic-within-an-epic since the praemia laudi (1.461) on the murals actually describe (and paraphrase) klea andron, Aeneas unwittingly becomes an epic auctor. He reads Dido’s visual transcription of the Trojan War, the klea, from a new, pro-Trojan point of view. Aeneas introduces his reading as a collection of incidents renowned due to fama. Likewise, in Ovid, it is fama that has made Achilles’ name, according to Cycnus, a familiar celebrity. Yet, which fama is this? And how does it relate to Fama and her domain featured less than twenty lines earlier and likely still present in the Ovidian readers’ minds? As noted in the previous chapter, fama in Latin epic is generally used either in the neutral sense of ‘report’, a ‘reported deed’, which by means of repetition becomes ‘reputation’, or in the poetically tinged sense of ‘epic tradition’, when it is attributed as ‘fame’ or ‘personal glory’. A ‘reported deed’ becomes ‘epic tradition’, that is a new epic, when it is acknowledged as something outstanding, an action or a group of actions, tied to an individual or a community of people, which are worth remembering and perpetuating. Not all deeds reported and included in epic tradition, however, are necessarily praiseworthy. Fama is a mixture of truth and lies, often so tightly intertwining that their separation is (deliberately?) impossible. 124 Epic fama, consequently, is a reported deed, fleshed out as an epic poem; depending on the bias of the epic poet/auctor, it may become an epic tradition of positive or negative fame. A positive epic tradition bestows ‘personal glory’, fêmê, to its agent(s); it becomes kleos. 125 But the assessment of 123

124

125

A. Barchiesi, La traccia dell modello: Effetti omerici nella narrazione virgiliana (Pisa 1984), 118; also my discussion on the programmatic poetic function of this passage in the Aeneid, in Papaioannou 2005, 157. Cf. Barchiesi 2002, 195, commenting on the ekphrasis of Fama and her house in Metamorphoses 12: “Ovidian narrative is not free from the traces left by a multitude of narrative voices … the poem cannot escape the interference of its many echoes and inflections”; and 196: “The notion of auctor is wittily split into competitive meanings… a seller; a creator; a guarantor; while the fourth is suggested by the contextual association with novus and adicit, and by the etymology of augeo, ‘augment’: ‘someone who increases, adds to something’. In Roman culture, stories regularly need an auctor, but for Ovid it is thought-provoking that the word can describe the producer of a text, the guarantor of pre-existing information, or the latecomer who brings a little something new to add to the series of fictions”. S.D. Olson, ‘Blood and Iron’: Stories and Storytelling in Homer’s Odyssey (Leiden 1995), 2-3, has argued that neither in the Iliad nor in the Odyssey may kleos mean ‘glory’ conferred by epic poetry. Instead, for Olson, the most appropriate translation for the term would simply be an “oral report”, etymologically akin to kluô (‘to hear’), about an event, object or individual, and thus synonymous to rumor, “hearsay” or “news” (p. 2) – in other words, kleos may be equivalent to fama. P. Pucci, The Song of the Sirens: Essays on Homer (Lanham, MD 1997), 36-

62

Epic Self-affirmation and Epic Self-consciousness

kleos is always subjective; this subjectivity at the foundation of defining kleos is Ovid’s primary target in redesigning Achilles, and Cycnus becomes his agent. From a narratological perspective, a deed is a story, and it acquires fama – and perhaps fêmê so as to become kleos – through the technique of storytelling. Cycnus becomes the metadiegetic narrator who brings to the Ovidian readers’ attention the fact that every fama is subject to examination regarding its truth, and that more often than not the truth in a fama may not be a verifiable fact, but a negotiable hypothesis. It is the creation of a particular individual under particular circumstances often directed by that individual’s interests. 126 Briefly put, something that would qualify as kleos, according to Achilles, in Cycnus’ view might simply be hearsay. Kleos is of course what epic heroes aspire to in Homer’s poetry, yet Achilles’ obsession with the pursuit of kleos is unparalleled 127 , and this passion for kleos is so great that he has bargained a long and prosperous life for its attainment: μ

μ μ μ

126

127

μ

. μ μ

μ ,

39, seems to share Olson’s opinion when he discusses the meaning of kleos, which he translates as “rumor”, in the invocation to the Muses at Il. 2.484-487, and notes that “in Homeric language the word carries the neutral, ‘zero-degree’ meaning of ‘that which is heard’, ‘rumor’, in addition to the marked meaning of ‘fame, reputation, glory’” (p. 37). Nonetheless, only a few lines later, on the same page, he admits that this translation is not the only acceptable one in the particular passage, but “all the possible meanings in the spectrum of the kleos are here valid in principle”. What is more, the only passage that he lists with kleos meaning “people talk” is Od. 16.461, “what the people speak about”, while he does not produce a comparable example from the Iliad. Overall, I rather tend to agree with Nagy in believing that Olson and Pucci fail to consider that the attribution of kleos in Homeric poetry is always diachronic. This means that a deed is judged worthy of kleos after it has been performed, and that its commemoration depends on its being recalled regularly and repeatedly; cf. Nagy 2003 on Olson. What is more, a kleos narrative serves a metapoetical function. A poet who elevates a deed to the status of kleos by recollection also confers kleos upon his own poetry, for his narrative will be repeated on account of the deed it extols, and it likewise will become glorious, worthy of kleos. The following chapter, on the performance of the Ovidian Nestor, explores how poetic kleos is generated by the diachronic self-referentiality of rhapsodic performance. Cf. Rosati 2002, 292, on storytelling in Ovid as a reflection “on the problem of producing truth… and on the relationship between the intention of the narrator and the reception of the narrator’s story by its audience. A person who tells a story affirms… his own truthfulness, but the listener is not required to accept this truth passively; in fact, he can resist”. A report, after all, is “a dialogue” between the narrator and the audience, “a negotiation that has as its object the meaning of the story”. On Achilles’ choice of kleos as a predicate on his being the ‘best of the Achaeans’, see Nagy 1979.

2. Cycnus, the alter Achilles

μ

μ

,

·

μ μ

, ,

,

63

μ

μ

. (Il. 9.410-416)

My mother the goddess, the silver-footed Thetis, tells me that two fates bear me on to the day of death. If I hold out here and I lay siege to Troy, my journey home is gone, but my glory never dies. If I voyage back to the fatherland I love, my pride, my glory dies; true, but the life that’s left me will be long, the stroke of death will not come on me quickly.

In this passage, which comes from what is probably the most important speech of Achilles in the Iliad, Achilles admits that his participation in the Trojan War is tied to kleos aphthiton (‘imperishable fame’). The phrase is a hapax legomenon, but according to Nagy it represents a combination of terms that originates in the Indo-European period, and a “fragment of Indo-European versification” within the Greek language. 128 This grandiloquent phrase 129 is not Achilles’ own, but it is actually part of Thetis’ original speech-promise to her son on his future glory. It is not hard to see Achilles’ intentions: the placement of a grand, antique, hapax phrase that includes the most archaic epithet for kleos, inside a divine, prophetic utterance legitimizes the divination’s authenticity and its truth; Achilles’ kleos, should he stay and die at Troy, WILL be aphthiton. Interestingly, the same adjective, aphthiton, is used in the Iliad to describe all objects made by Hephaestus (Il. 2.46, 186; 14.238ff.), including, of course, the new armor of Achilles (18.369-370). 130 The very issue of armor and protection emerges as the next item in Cycnus’ speech. Achilles’ failure to harm his foe and the great wonder this failure causes, call for an explanation. Cycnus readily discloses that he is no usual mortal because his body is invulnerable and indestructible, and he seeks to enhance his unique status by emphasizing the ornamental, rather than protective, function of his armor, a statement that leads to a direct comparison with Mars, the god of war. 131 More intriguing are the metapoetical implications of Cycnus’ emphasis on the armor, because, it will be shown, Cycnus’ invulner128

129

130 131

G. Nagy, Comparative Studies in Greek and Indic Meter (Cambridge, MA 1974), 141; also, ibid. ‘Another Look at Kleos Aphthiton’, Würzburger Jahrbücher für die Altertumswissenschaft 7 (1981), 113-116. Martin 1989, 183, discussing kleos aphthiton along with several other hapax phrases in Achilles’ reply to the embassy, calls the particular verbal combination “an heirloom from the poet’s word-hoard”. See Nagy 1979, 178-198, esp. § 8 n. 1, on the applications and meaning of aphthitos. On viewing Cycnus as an aesthet, contemplating the conflict between prodesse (benefit) and delectare (pleasure) as he talks about the redundancy of his armor in terms of utility, see Möller 2003, 55-56.

64

Epic Self-affirmation and Epic Self-consciousness

ability, or rather near-invulnerability, and the theme of the divine armor, are part of Ovid’s combination of two different traditions on Achilles, the early archaic as reflected in Homer, and a later one, which developed in the Hellenistic period. 132 To begin with the latter, by the early first century AD, when the Metamorphoses was initially published, Achilles was reputed to be nearly invulnerable but for a weak spot in the foot. According to this tradition, Thetis, intending to make her son invulnerable, dipped him in the Styx. The procedure hardened his skin as to become impenetrable to weapons, but there remained one vulnerable spot in the foot, the area of the ankle, which was covered by the hand of Thetis as she dipped her baby son’s body into the water. By the time of Hyginus (Fab. 107) Achilles’ imperfect invulnerability was tied to his death: the hero died when he was struck by an arrow in the very area of the foot left untouched by the water of the Styx. 133 In the Homeric texts, and throughout the archaic age, however, there is no such concept as Achilles’ invulnerability. In the Iliad Homer clearly portrays the hero as vulnerable. Achilles receives a wound on the arm at 21.166-167 and, later in the same book (568-570), Age/ nor exclaims that (‘the skin even for this one is , ’ / μμ vulnerable to sharp bronze, and there is only one life in him, and men say he is mortal’). On the other hand, several early sources, including artistic evidence, are affirmative about a crucial wound in the ankle; this wound most likely brought about Achilles’ death, in the sense that it slowed him down and gave the opportunity to Paris (and Apollo) to strike the fatal blow. 134 In all probability, the tradition of this decisive lower leg would later develop into 132 133

134

A detailed overview of the most important traditions related to the invulnerability and the death of Achilles throughout antiquity is found in Burgess 1995. The first time the Styx-dipping tradition is attested in literature is in Statius’ Achilleid, well after Ovid, but the relevant passage is very allusive and difficult to comprehend without the assistance of scholia. This suggests that Statius’ audience knew the story well, which presupposes a tradition of a certain age; cf. Burgess 1995, 220ff., on the Styx tradition; Burgess (p. 222) assumes a Hellenistic origin of this tradition, even though he concedes that there is no way to ascertain it on the basis of surviving evidence; and he mentions Hyginus and the evolution of the tradition in order to tie near-invulnerability and death through a wound to a uniquely ‘soft’ spot in the body (pp. 224f.). The most notable literary source on this is the Aethiopis, according to Apollodorus, and Quintus of Smyrna who used the Aethiopis as his main source for Achilles’ death; both state that the hero was struck in the ankle. Artistic representations dating from the archaic period, which depict Achilles wounded (or about to receive a wound) in the foot or the lower leg, include, among others, a 6th c. Chalcidian amphora and an early 7th c. proto-Corinthian lekythos. Cf. Burgess 1995, 225 (on the literary sources) and 226-229 (on the various artistic images). On the tradition surrounding the death of Achilles, see also below in chapter four.

2. Cycnus, the alter Achilles

65

the story of Achilles’ imperfect invulnerability, identifying some area in the foot as the only weak spot. Homer’s Achilles was nearly invulnerable from a different perspective: he was in possession of special, indestructible armor. This included both the famous armor of Iliad 18 that Hephaestus, yielding to the pleas of Thetis, fashions for the hero, and the armor that Achilles brought with him to Troy – the armor that Patroclus wore when he entered the battlefield as ‘Achilles’. This first armor also was divine in origin: Peleus had received it as a gift from the gods on the day of his wedding to Thetis (Il. 17.194-197; 18.84-85). This , 17.174, 202), an exceparmor is described as ‘immortal’ ( μ tional compensatory gift to the mortal hero intended to elevate his status to match that of his divine bride-to-be. 135 Ovid through Cycnus initiates a radically judgmental approach to the Homeric Achilles and the Homeric definition of epic ‘glory’ as a kleos that is ‘everlasting’, aphthiton, because it is secured through an armor likewise aphthiton. The drama of Achilles’ famous life dilemma (immortal glory but premature death over peaceful longevity in obscurity) is metamorphosed into a strong feeling of insecurity about fighting without the superhuman protection that would guarantee security from death. From a complementary perspective, Cycnus’ allusions to Achilles’ vulnerability may shrewdly comment on the evolution of a complex, and multi-variant epic tradition behind the motif of imperfect invulnerability in the legend of Achilles. Achilles introduces Cycnus as the exemplar of the worthy rival, the truly formidable opponent, whose conquest will bestow upon his conqueror the coveted kleos. Yet, the trait of invulnerability and its arrogant advertisement by Cycnus becomes a boomerang in Achilles’ literary hand, because it evokes Achilles’ own invulnerability and the long tradition behind it. When Cycnus points at his armor and declares that he wears it simply for aesthetic reasons he may actually make the Ovidian Achilles feel selfconscious, even inferior. In his Homeric textual life, the son of Thetis, quite contrary to Cycnus, had to wear an armor because he was not invulnerable. Furthermore, the armor that Achilles wore in the Iliad, the Ovidian readers should recall, always was impervious to enemy weapons. It is tempting, then, to read the hero’s plea to his mother to lobby for a new set from Hephaestus as a covert confession of insecurity about entering the battle without this special protection. This realization jeopardizes Achilles’ status as ‘best of the 135

For Muellner 1996, 166, the armor-centered parallel allows us to compare Thetis’ mênis for the lowering of her status as a result of her enforced marriage to Peleus, to the mênis of Achilles. This mênis-projection from the son onto the mother, and/or vice versa, is already a cardinal theme in the Iliad; cf. the treatment of the mênis theme in Slatkin 1991, also discussed in some detail in my last chapter.

66

Epic Self-affirmation and Epic Self-consciousness

Achaeans’, for it portrays him as someone who owes his achievements to special equipment that is not readily available to other heroes with less powerful ‘connections’. To this end, the conclusion of Cycnus’ speech, with a comparison between his own divine ancestry and the ancestry of Achilles, is set to transfer the competition between the two to another arena of great importance in the orbit of the epic system of values: ancestry. Genealogical talk features prominently in the agonistic exchanges of the Homeric heroes before they confront each other on the battlefield, and it is a potentially powerful status-argument. A hero’s glorious ancestry is assaulted as spurious; a hero is taunted as unworthy of his superior heritage; a conquered warrior’s famous ancestry bestows kleos upon his conqueror; two contestants antagonize each other by comparing their family backgrounds – these are representative expressions of the genealogy argument in the Homeric neikea. In each of these instances the genealogy talk develops along distinctly individualized argument parameters. Nonetheless, they all share a common denominator: the dueling warriors’ acquaintance with their opponents’ family background, and the manipulation of this knowledge to provide evidence that bolsters their claim of superiority over their rivals. 136 This is precisely the objective behind Cycnus’ option to close his speech (12.93-94) with a direct comparison between his own, superior, ancestry and the lower status of Achilles’ family line: est aliquid non esse satum Nereide, sed qui / Nereaque et natas et totum temperat aequor (‘it is something to be the son, not of Nereus’ daughter, but of him who rules both Nereus and his daughters and the whole sea besides’). Once again the brilliant choice in signifier – or, vocabulary and syntax – enhances the signified, i.e. the derogatory content of the sentence overall. Cycnus does not mention his father, Neptune, by name; but he employs an apposition so distinct that it leaves little doubt about who might be he ‘who rules both Nereus and his daughters and the whole sea besides’. The principal aim of this periphrasis is not the specification of Neptune’s identity but the clear projection of the definite gap in power that separates Neptune from Thetis. Thetis, referred to by her patronymic, Nereis, is the daughter of, and hence inferior to, Nereus, who in turn obeys Neptune. This stratified genealogical ranking of the Oceanic deities at the close of Cycnus’ speech wraps up a systematic undercutting of the epic Achilles, and deflates the effect of the grand epic appellation, nate dea, with which the Trojan fighter distinctly opened his address to Achilles. No less, the indefinite pronoun clause, est 136

Genealogy as powerful argument in epic speech performance is treated in Martin 1989, 126-128, centering on the Glaucus-Diomedes and the Tlepolemus-Sarpedon exchanges, in Iliad 6 and 5 respectively.

2. Cycnus, the alter Achilles

67

aliquid, with which Cycnus opens the last line of his address playfully turns on its head the expression by which the son of Thetis had condescendingly opened his own address to Cycnus when they first met fifteen lines earlier, quisquis es (80). 2.3 The Anger of Achilles As soon as Cycnus concludes his reply he hurls a spear at Achilles, which pierces nine layers of the latter’s shield only to stop at the tenth (12.95-97). Ovid’s deconstruction of Achilles’ epic profile continues; the Ovidian hero evidently needs twice as many layers of protection as his Homeric counterpart, since the famous Shield of Iliad 18 consisted of only five layers. 137 Achilles responds with two successive spear shots, both of which, again, fail to penetrate Cycnus’ body. And on top of the surprise at the incomprehensible failure, the Greek hero has to put up with the arrogance of Cycnus, who actually volunteers his body as target ‘quite unprotected’ (12.100 apertum). Is it the impossibility of providing a rational explanation for his ineffectiveness, the unwillingness to accept the illogicality of the superhuman, or the humiliation for a ‘hit’ that doesn’t actually hit, which causes Achilles to lose his temper? haud secus exarsit quam circo taurus aperto, cum sua terribili petit inritamina cornu, poeniceas vestes, elusaque vulnera sentit. num tamen exciderit ferrum considerat hastae: haerebat lingo. ‘manus est mea debilis ergo, quasque’ ait ‘ante habuit vires, effudit in uno? nam certe valuit, vel cum Lyrnesia primum moenia deieci, vel cum Tenedonque suoque Eetioneas inplevi sanguine Thebas, vel cum purpureus populari caede Caicus fluxit opusque meae bis sensit Telephus hastae. hic quoque tot caesis, quorum per litus acervos et feci et video, valuit mea dextra valetque’. (Met. 12.102-114) He flared up at this just like a bull in the broad arena when he rushes on the object of his wrath, the purple cloak, with his formidable horns, and realizes that it has eluded 137

The typical Homeric shield, held by Odysseus and Teucrus, has four layers ( Il. 15.479); only Ajax’ famous has seven (Il. 7.245 ; cf. Met. 13.2 clipei… septemplicis Aiax, ‘Ajax of the sevenfold shield’), and, likewise, seven are the layers, both of Aeneas’ shield (Aen. 8.448) and of Turnus’ shield (Aen. 12.924-925), even though the former also was a handicraft of Vulcan/Hephaestus, and the latter a man-made product; cf. Bömer 1982, 34 ad 12.67.

68

Epic Self-affirmation and Epic Self-consciousness

the damaging blows. And he inspected the point of his spear lest it had been dislodged: it was affixed on the wooden shaft. “So, is my hand so impotent”, he said, “and the strength, which it had earlier, dissolved in this one instance? For certainly it was strong when I flattened first the walls of Lyrnesia, or when I caused Tenedos and Thebes, Eetion’s city, to overflow with their own blood, or when the Caicus River flowed purple with the blood of the neighboring people, and when Telephus twice felt my spear at work. Here, too, given so many slain, of whom heaps all along the seashore I have both accomplished and see, my right hand has been strong and remains strong”.

Achilles’ reaction to the situation is a typical example of Ovidian thematic density. In just thirteen lines, the poet of the Metamorphoses has managed to list, evaluate and revise core issues and criteria that determine the composition and interpretation of the Homeric epic: the definition of heroic virtue and the pressure to assert one’s masculinity; Achilles’ conflicted personality as both the best and the be(a)st of the Achaeans; the epic simile and hero profiling; and, tied to all of the above, Achilles’ self-awareness that he is expected to perform a role of firmly-set, well-known standards. 138 First and foremost, however, Ovid taps on Achilles’ anger, the thematic and narrative backbone of the Iliad. Achilles’ anger in the Iliad is a complex issue of unique prominence, being the opening word of the most influential ancient epic. With his heroic prestige (timê) gravely wronged at being deprived of his war prize (geras), Achilles feels entitled to develop his wrath against Agamemnon, the mastermind behind his dishonoring. Having joined the Trojan War to win for himself the kleos that would guarantee his posthumous immortality, Achilles is forced to surrender a prize, and so concede to a defilement of his honor, in order to help Agamemnon maintain his own honor. Obviously, a study of Achilles’ mênis is beyond the scope of this book, as it certainly was beyond the scope of Ovid’s own, too. Nonetheless, the inextricable relation between rage and Achilles’ 138

Achilles’ self-beating for failing to meet the standards expected of the epic hero of his caliber is echoed later in the Centauromachy, in the words of the Centaur Monychus (Met. 12.499-509). The latter degrades himself and his fellow Centaurs for not justifying their legendary reputation as creatures hyper-masculine and formidable, because they fail, despite persistent efforts, to conquer the transgendered hero Caeneus, whom they hardly acknowledge as a true male (498ff. ‘heu dedecus ingens! / … populus superamus ab uno / vixque viro; quamquam ille vir est, nos segnibus actis / quod fuit ille, sumus. Quid membra inmania prosunt, / quid geminae vires et quod fortissima rerum / in nobis duplex natura animalia iunxit?, ‘What shame is this!… We, an entire people, are defeated by one, and he hardly a man. And yet, he is the man, while we, with our feeble strikes, are what he once was. What is the use of our huge members? What of the double strength and what avails it that a double nature has united in our bodies the strongest living things?’). The intratextual affinity to Achilles’ indignant words earlier, at Met. 12.106ff., is likely deliberate, a part of Ovid’s strategy of deflating Achilles’ epic profile by assimilating him to the Centaurs.

2. Cycnus, the alter Achilles

69

kleos is not to be ignored. Ovid, at work on his groundbreaking literary agon against grand epic, capitalizes on the pairing of Achilles and mênis in the opening verse of the Iliad 139 , where rage is seen as a trait inherent in Achilles’ hero identity, because he has identified as prime target for his literary attack the axiomatic inseparability of the two throughout the posterior literary tradition. The anger Achilles felt over the slighting of his timê, his honor as a hero worthy of a glorious posthumous reputation, receives the label mênis in the Iliad. This is an unusual title: properly speaking, mênis is the wrath of gods, and Achilles’ mênis is the only instance in the Iliad where the term applies to mortals. 140 By characterizing Achilles’ angry response to Agamemnon’s insult as mênis – rather than cholos, the term generally used in the epic to denote the anger of epic heroes including Achilles – Homer introduces Achilles’ mênis as a reflection and direct outcome of Apollo’s mênis toward Agamemnon (cf. Il. 1.75). 141 As such, Achilles’ mênis becomes the microcosmic manifestation of divine mênis, and on a symbolic level endorses the hero’s attitude, the withdrawal, and ratifies its consequences—the pain (algea) inflicted upon the Greeks. 142 One final point: the attribution of mênis to qualify Achilles’ anger, beyond the associations with the divine serves an additional purpose, namely to tie the praeter-human anger of the leading Achaean warrior to his in-/subhuman behavior when under the influence of this anger. This behavior is tellingly defined as menos, a term which shares a common etymological origin with mênis and in its essence combines the notions of rage and power. 143 Menos (together with thymos) controls Achilles’ conduct during his combat

139 140

141

142

143

Redfield 1975, 11, nicely captures this as follows: “Achilles’ wrath is in the first place grounded in his character”. On mênis as term signifying specifically divine wrath, see C. Watkins, ‘À propos de MHNIS’, BSL 72 (1977), 187-209. In an earlier treatment of mênis, P. Considine, ‘Some Homeric Terms for Anger’, Acta Classica 9 (1966), 15-25, suggested that mênis “is a solemn epic term for any wrath, divine or human” (p. 21), but noted that Achilles is the only epic hero whose anger is described as mênis; also, Nagy 1979, 72-83, and passim. Nagy 1979, 143, lays out the multiple thematic and formal correspondences between Achilles and Apollo. Cf. also Muellner 1996, who sees the Iliad’s tale of Achilles’ mênis as the sequel to the Theogony, where anger and strife are inherent in the creation of the cosmos; only, “at the end of the Theogony and not before then, a world order exists for Zeus to preside over and defend with the ultimate sanction, mênis” (p. 94). King 1987, 28-37, offers a lucid, brief reading of the heroic code of values, both on individual and community levels, and rationalizes Achilles’ wrath in terms of timê violation and the subsequent jeopardizing of the hero’s kleos. Nagy 1979, 73 §8 n. 2, who further notes the existence in the Iliad of a third form, which derives from the same etymological root, *mna-, and combines rage beyond control, and peculiar to Achilles’ Iliadic conduct, the verb memonen, ‘he is in a rage’ (Il. 21.315).

70

Epic Self-affirmation and Epic Self-consciousness

against Hector, and it is very much responsible for transforming the warrior into a wild beast. 144 Similes involving hunting and wild beasts make up one of the three major simile groups in the Iliad. Similes in general are an essential ancient epic narrative feature, for they function as the windows through which the audience may look out beyond the battlefield culture of the poem. They are the means to integrate the experiences of the heroes into the imaginary world of the epic narrative and into the daily experience of the readers of this narrative. The overwhelming majority of these similes concern representations of violence, and this is the case because “the rhetorical purpose of the similes is not to describe the world of peace but to make vivid the world of war”.145 Among those violent similes involving wild animals, nearly all of them feature a predator and a prey, while the leading choices target beasts like lions, wolves and wild dogs. All these comparisons of the Homeric warriors to savage predators from the animal kingdom are notable, for each usually underscores a moment of major display of heroism. 146 All of Achilles’ no less than five attacking-lion similes are momentous: they are situated in Books 18-22, the section of the epic where Achilles’ savagery peaks following Patroclus’ death 147 , and transcribe the hero’s conduct in battle. 148 Even more frequently than to a predatory lion, Achilles in battle is likened to a raging fire. 149 Explosiveness and savagery likewise distinguish Ovid’s Achilles. Upon failing to harm Cycnus, he ‘flares up’ (102 exarsit), simi-

144

145

146 147 148

149

Cf. LSJ s.v. μ : “… II. of the soul, spirit, passion, Ƭ. the battlerage of men”; ThLGr s.v.: “animi ardor [cf. the association with exarsit, the verb describing the anger of the Ovidian Achilles at Met. 12.102] quidam, impetus quo aliquis paratus est irruentem hostem excipere, minimeque ei cedere; nam a μ derivatum est hoc vocabulum, ut grammatici tradunt”. Redfield 1975, 186-192, offers a thorough, concise discussion of the nature, structure and function of similes in the Iliad; the quoted text above comes from p. 187. A systematic modern refocusing on the Homeric simile is much needed, since the only monograph on the topic is Moulton 1977, a rather brief study, and by now nearly thirty years old. Il. 20.164-175, the lengthiest of Achilles’ five lion similes in Iliad 18-22, is representative of this category. Moulton 1977, 100. Finally, two of the most memorable lion similes are crucial in the drawing of Achilles’ portrayal in Iliad 24, a narrative centering on reconciliation and peace negotiations: Il. 24.41-43, features a lion simile that recalls Achilles’ own wish to eat his opponent’s raw meat, a statement voiced already once before, at 22.346-347; in 24.572, 578-579, Achilles rushes like a lion to get hold of Priam’s ransom. Cf. Redfield 1975, on the savagery of Achilles; on the two lion similes in Iliad 24, cf. D. Wilson, Ransom, Revenge, and Heroic Identity in The Iliad (Cambridge 2002), 126-127 (on Il. 24.41-43), 131 (on Il. 24.572, 578-579). Fourteen times in Iliad 18-22; Moulton 1977, 100.

2. Cycnus, the alter Achilles

71

lar, in his furor 150 , not to a lion but to a raging bull fighting in the arena (102 circo taurus aperto). This is a simile with no precedent in Homer or ancient epic in general 151 , but the motive behind Ovid’s ingenuity is indebted to the same rationale that inspired the Homeric similes of savage beasts and devastating natural forces. 152 The poet of the Metamorphoses is driven by a desire to make the world of his narrative appear as part of the real world, an extension of an idea, an image or some practice familiar to his readers’ daily experience, even though in this way he risks sounding anachronistic. Bull-fighting clearly evokes the milieu of the Roman amphitheater and the spectacles in the arena 153 , a much-favored cultural experience that cut across social classes in Rome – and, not least, the stage hosting the action in many of Ovid’s works. 154 Yet, despite the change in literary stagecraft, throughout his conflict with Cycnus Achilles thinks and behaves as if he is still acting on the epic stage of the Homeric Iliad, driven by a heroic mentality that, ironically, rejects flexibility and change, the overriding ideas in Ovid’s epic world. It is this literary clash between two fundamentally different genre definitions and ‘ideal’ heroportrayals that defines the conduct of Achilles and Cycnus, as the former 150

151

152

153

154

A little later (12.128), the furens Achilles is described with the rare fremebundus. The association of furor or ira, the Latin translation of μ , and ardor, is typical, and there are numerous occasions in the Aeneid where the two appear together (i.e. Aen. 2.311, 2.316, 4.101, 5.277 [ferox ardensque], 7.445, 7.623-625, 8.219-220, etc.); ‘flaring up’ may come about as the result of pudor, ‘shame’, likewise a premier incentive for the break-out of epic warfare; cf. Aen. 5.455-456, 9.787-789, 10.398, 10.871, etc.; as well as Il. 5.529-532, 6.441-442, 13.121125, 15.561-567, 661-667, etc. Though, as Baldo (1995, 188-190) notes, the bull simile occurs already once in the Aeneid, at 12.101-106, and describes a raging Turnus. This ‘explosiveness’ is an additional trait that casts the Ovidian Achilles in the light of Vergil’s Turnus: Achilles flares up in anger, exarsit, evoking the Rutulian leader who is routinely modified as ardens and is the king of Ardea. Achilles is portrayed as an aggressive predator with bestial instincts already in the Homeric text. In Iliad 22, for example, following Patroclus’ death, blind hatred and desire for vengeance transform Achilles into a carnivorous wild animal. Homer initially compares the hero to a dolphin eating smaller fish (21.22-24), and then makes him acknowledge his animal instincts in his own words, when he admits that he desires to devour Lycaon’s dead body (21.303-4) and wishes to eat the moribund Hector raw (Il. 22.345-47). Wheeler 1999, 204, sees in the narratives of the angry bull, which is shown the red cloth, and the wild beast hunt (Met. 11.25-27), direct influence from the language and imagery of the spectacles in the amphitheater; also, C. Segal, Landscape in Ovid’s Metamorphoses: A Study in the Transformations of a Literary Symbol (Wiesbaden 1969), 93, on the popularity of allusions to the amphitheater in the Metamorphoses. Bömer 1982, 44 ad 12.102f., offers a good discussion of the bull simile, including its original employment in the Homeric animal-simile manner and its reflecting the Augustan experience of the spectacle.

72

Epic Self-affirmation and Epic Self-consciousness

represents the Homeric system of epic performance while the latter embodies epic heroism as revisited in the Metamorphoses. And the absurdity of this antagonism causes Achilles’ conduct to appear comical. 2.4 The Hero’s Gender The competition continues, more clearly defined, in Achilles’ own angry words following his failure to battle down Cycnus. The scene develops around the core issues of epic virtus and Achilles’ anxiety over properly demonstrating this ‘manliness’ on the battlefield, in confirmation of his status as the leading epic hero. Very broadly put, the great merit of intellectual insecurity or skepticism is its clear perception of the double-sided character of things, the fact that any determination (an idea, an institution, or an individual) is conditioned by its opposite. In this respect, Achilles’ insecurity about epic ‘manliness’ is best captured when contrasted to the female system of values. Hector’s directions to Andromache in Iliad 6.490-493 offer the earliest clarification on the distinctly separate areas of action reserved for men and women. The earliest surviving literary description of maleness in terms of , femaleness, however, is recorded a few books earlier, in Il. 2.235 ( , ‘My poor weak friends, you sorry ’ ’, , ’ disgraces, you Achaean women, not men’), a passage in which Thersites, the ‘worst’ of the Achaeans, denounces the bravery of the Achaean leaders by calling them women, a rebuke returning twice more in the Iliad. The degrading of the opponent’s heroic status by impugning his masculinity, which notably dates as early as the Iliad the centrality of the gender dichotomy in epic poetry, is a recurrent epic topos in the Aeneid too. As noted earlier, Numanus Remulus (Aen. 9.603-620) delivers a striking direct commentary on the juxtaposition between male and female, and the definition of the one in sharp contrast against the other, when he discredits the Trojans’ claims to heroism and manliness by calling them ‘Phrygian women’. The Ovidian Achilles’ effort to assert his masculinity is directed by the prescripts of the same masculine vs. feminine dichotomy. The exchange of words of flyting between Achilles and his opponent is spelled out in terms that allow a gender-based analysis. And Cycnus no less than Achilles is challenged by this conflict and the genderbased politics enmeshed with it. After drawing attention to Achilles’ amazement at his failure to cause him any harm despite hitting him (12.87ff.), Neptune’s son promptly comments on the anti-heroic aspects of his own person-

2. Cycnus, the alter Achilles

73

ality. He emphasizes his invulnerability 155 , a feature that renders any opposition against him an unequal, if not mock, combat (91f.), and he labels his armor an ‘ornament’ (90 decor est quaesitus). This reduction of a signature masculine apparatus to an item serving the particularly feminine function of decoration projects Cycnus as effeminate. 156 The remark subsequent to this selfsarcastic comment, that he can afford an ornamental armor as a result of having an impenetrable body, refers specifically to the theme of the penetration of the body. And so, he at once entertains the association with effeminacy and refutes it quite categorically. Achilles catches this tongue-in-check challenge on gender affirmation. The verbalization of his disappointment at failing to penetrate Cycnus’ body with his spear attests to his grave concern about proving his virility. 157 The penetration leitmotif lies at the heart of this ideological construction of the duel along the parameters of the gender dichotomy, and conjoined to this is the assimilation of Achilles to a raging bull. The bull was traditionally an animal reputed for its sexual prowess, whose name in the Greek sexual vocabu, frequently alluded to the phallus. 158 Achilles disappointed at his lary, 155 156

157

158

Forbes Irving 1990, 157 n. 34, notes that ‘wounding’ is used in a sexual sense already in Aeschylus (fr. 44 Radt). Numanus Remulus, in the later half of his speech (Aen. 9.614-620), degrades the Trojans as effeminate on account of their ornate clothing. On the unanimity of the ancient Greek tradition on the effeminacy of Cycnus’ look, see Theocritus’ comment at Id. 16.48-50: ’ , μ / μ ƷʞƺDŽƼ ǜƿɔ džǀƾƸʏǁ ,/ μ μ ; ‘who would have known the Lycian kings, the long-haired sons of Priam or effeminate Cycnus, if singers had not hymned the battle of men of the past?’ Theocritus’ remark deserves serious consideration, for it is part of a poem that extols the power of literary memory in controlling the past by means of manipulating its propagation, precisely what Ovid sets out to do in his rewriting of the Trojan story; on the poetics in Theocritus 16, see, for example, M. Fantuzzi, ‘Theocritus and the Demythologizing of Poetry’, in: Depew-Obbink 2000, 135-152. See, finally, Keith 2000, 29, citing Livy 34.7.8-9, a passage from the speech for the repeal of the Republican sumptuary law, in which women and ornaments are linked. On pegging in Latin sexual terminology, see Adams 1982, 141-151; on penetration as distinguishing male from female, and on the inseparability of impenetrability and confirmed masculinity in Roman culture, see especially J. Walters, ‘Invading the Roman Body: Manliness and Impenetrability in Roman Thought’, in: J. Hallett and M. Skinner (edd.), Roman Sexualities (Princeton 1997), 29-43; and most recently, D. Fredrick, ‘Mapping Penetrability in Late Republican and Early Imperial Rome’, in: D. Fredrick (ed.), The Roman Gaze: Vision, Power and the Body (Baltimore 2002), 236-264; both essays list ample bibliography on a topic much discussed in feminist scholarship across disciplines. Henderson 1975, 122 and 133, on as code word, respectively, for phallus and the vagina. The Achilles/taurus sexual wordplay is enhanced soon afterwards in the narrative when a different set of ‘bulls’, the Centaurs (Gk. ) enter the contest over the prize of masculinity and sexual prowess.

74

Epic Self-affirmation and Epic Self-consciousness

failure sarcastically blames his own debilis manus or a massive drainage of vires (106-107), and in order to minimize its importance and eventually discard it as a one-time freak accident, he reminds himself and the audience of his wellknown (that is, literarily attested) Trojan accomplishments. This recollection of past triumphs observes a rhetorical pattern through which Achilles displays mastery in words and deeds alike. Lines 108-112 record various conquests led by Achilles against the allies of Troy during the first nine years of the Trojan War, and although chronologically prior to the events recorded in the Iliad, they all receive brief, and often allusive, mention inside the Homeric text. 159 Through the recollection of these deeds, the Ovidian reader is directed backwards to the original portrayal of Achilles in Homer. And the indignant Achilles is able to give meaning to the ruins still visible, to project them as an undeniable fact of martial performance, a certification of valiance. This valiance is impressed via a powerful vocabulary of murder and destruction (moenia deieci; inplevi sanguine; purpureus… caede Caicus; opusque meae… hastae; tot caesis… acervos, ‘I knocked down walls; I filled… with blood; Caicus… purple with blood; the work of my spear; heaps… of so many slaughtered victims’). Stylistics is, finally, the means through which the hero records his frustration in his passionate and aptly structured monologue. The latter observes a mini-ring composition, marked by the presence of the same phrase, manus or dextra valere, at the opening and the closing line alike (108 [manus] valuit; 114 valuit mea dextra valetque 160 ), in direct, emphatic refutation of the debilis manus (106), the proposition to be refuted. 161 Even in a state of extreme emotion, Achilles qualifies as leading performer, equally of the fighting arena (bull) and the speech arena (orator). 159

160 161

Bömer 1982, 45-47 ad 12.108-112. The conquests specified by Achilles at 12.108-112 are recorded, in near identical order, also at Met. 13.171ff., as part of Ulixes’ argument against Ajax. In chapter five I argue that poetics is a core theme in the Armorum Iudicium, and that the two different versions of epic aristeia embodied respectively by Ajax and Ulixes subject Achilles’ presence in epic tradition to analysis under two perspectives that antagonize each other. Cf. also 12.100-101, where Achilles’ spear, which may stand for his hand, is likewise impotent: nec tertia cuspis… valuit, ‘nor was a third spear valiant’. Even through debilis does not occur again in the Metamorphoses, there appears almost precisely a book later, at 13.112, a cognate verbal form, also a hapax, debilitare. This verb belongs in a phrase that, in both sound and meaning, points directly to the cluster debilis manus: debilitaturum… munus (‘a gift… that will debilitate [you]’). The so-called munus, which sounds nearly like manus and likely evokes this term, is Achilles’ famous Shield, the bone of contention between Ajax and Ulixes (the phrase comes from Ajax’s speech in the earlier part of the Armorum Iudicium episode). A shield is a self-evident extension of, or substitute for, the hand (manus) that holds it (e.g. Met. 12.89 onus, cava parma, sinistrae, ‘the hollow shield, the burden of my left hand’); and Achilles’ Shield, in the context of Ajax’s speech, is a gift unfit for an unworthy holder’s (like Ulixes’) ‘debilis’ hand.

2. Cycnus, the alter Achilles

75

Recent criticism, further, has proposed the intriguing idea to consider Achilles’ anxiety over the potency of his hand in terms of epic poetics: Achilles’ hand is the hand of the artist who composes an epic in compliance with the traditional – Homeric – standards of the genre. This idea is endorsed by the emphasis on the strength of Achilles’ hand throughout the duel with Cycnus. 162 The following attestations are telling: 70 quid Achaica dextera posset, ‘how strong was the Greek hand’; 79 suis… lacertis, ‘with his arms’; 89 onus… sinistrae, ‘the burden [sc. the shield] of my left hand’; 98f. forti… manu, ‘with his strong hand’; 106 manus debilis, ‘impotent hand’; 108 [manus] valuit, ‘[my hand] was valiant’; 114 valuit mea dextra valetque, ‘valiant my right hand used to be, and valiant it still is’; and 120 haec manus est ‘this is my hand’. To these one may add phrases that refer to the strength of the spear, which in turn represents an extension of the warrior’s hand: 79 concutiensque suis vibrantia tela lacertis, ‘brandishing his spear with his arms’; 98f. trementia forti / tela manu torsit, ‘[Achilles] hurled a quivering spear with his strong hand’; 100f. nec tertia cuspis… valuit, ‘nor did a third spear… avail’; 120 haec manus est, haec, qua modo vicimus, hasta, ‘this is my hand, this is the spear with which I have just conquered’. Achilles’ emphasis on the firmness of the hand impresses the traditional definition of the epic genre, defending it against the fluidity of Ovid’s text and its unorthodox perception of the epic world. Conversely, the theme of the ‘weak’ (debilis) hand may allude to the ‘decadent’, effeminate style, represented in the Ovidian epic narrative, and ingeniously synopsized in the ‘ornate’ armor, the spicy tongue, and eventually the shape-shifting of the insolent Cycnus. Under this interpretive prism, which is governed by self-sarcasm, Ovid’s hand, being without a masculine (sc. traditionally epic) nerve, can only put together a brief, unconventional remake of the ‘Iliad’ centered on a debilis Achilles. Or, alternatively, Ovid’s impotence (debilis) to write epic poetry in the style of Homer may function as a form of recusatio, conveniently liberating the enterprising poet from the restrictions of the genre, and so encouraging his inventiveness 163 , which, like the invulnerable Cycnus, is resistant to negative critique. All the same, this attribution of ‘impenetrability’ to Ovid’s work

162

163

Möller 2003, 56-58, is the first to have seen the recurrence of the ‘hand’ theme in the Achilles-Cycnus narrative, which she promptly, and correctly, termed “Leitmotiv” next to Achilles’ obsession with his potency (valere), and has discussed its harboring poetics. Segal 1997-98, 23-25, summarily expresses a similar appreciation of the Cycnus character contribution in terms of metapoetics. Specifically, he detects behind Cycnus’ replacement of Hector a clever move on Ovid’s part that would enable him to “replace Homer’s Iliad with his own”, since the young poet “obviously delights in effacing Homer’s war-poetry with his own fantastic metamorphic narrative” (p. 23).

76

Epic Self-affirmation and Epic Self-consciousness

by virtue of its comparison to the body of Cycnus accurately describes the multi-vocal aspect and the complex texture of the Ovidian narrative. Along similar lines, Achilles’ recalling his earlier Trojan victories, in order to highlight as a freak, unprecedented one-time event his failure against Cycnus, insists upon a traditional reading of the Iliad. The hero’s ecstatic reaction upon hitting poor Menoetes, a mere commoner (12.116 de plebe Lycia, ‘one of the Lycian commoners’) but, still, a handy, expendable body, a literary guinea-pig whose death serves only to confirm Achilles’ ‘manly’ hand, is telling: loricamque simul subiectaque pectora rupit. quo plangente gravem moribundo pectore terram extrahit illud idem calido de vulnere telum atque ait: ‘haec manus est, haec, qua modo vicimus, hasta. utar in hoc isdem; sit in hoc, precor, exitus idem!’ (Met. 12.117-121) [A]nd he [Achilles] broke open his [Menoetes’] breastplate and his breast beneath. As his victim dying after his breast was struck fell down upon the solid earth, he [Achilles] plucked out the spear from the hot wound and cried: “This is the hand, this is the spear with which I have just conquered. I likewise shall use it on this man; may the outcome be the same for him, I pray!”

The passage evokes the spirit of a typical Homeric combat scene, the milieu inside which Achilles, who fights against the transformation of his epic role inside the Ovidian arena of action that is determined by unpredictability and irregularity, feels at home. This milieu the hero now eagerly seeks to reconstruct, nurturing the illusion, or rather the self-assuring delusion, that he may get back his traditional epic strength and effectively face the challenges against his hero status by reinstating a representation of the familiar literary environment. This simulation of a Homeric-like literary space justifies the presence and the name of Menoetes. Even though a common Greek name, ‘Menoetes’ in the particular context, as Achilles’ opponent, is Ovid’s invention 164 , a shrewd combination of the familiar and the novel, a character acting simultaneously in two dramatizations obeying juxtaposing definitions of the epic genre. Menoetes’ manufactured character fleshes out the literary creation that Achilles envisions to write: an ‘Achilleid’ molded on the principles of ancient epic and centered on his deeds, but with supporting characters who 164

Bömer 1982, 47-48 ad 12.116-117, notes that even though ‘Menoetes’ is a name frequently attested in ancient Greek texts, it does not occur in the Homeric poems, and believes that it is an Ovidian innovation. This invented character carries, according to Frisk, II.1, s.v. μ , an interesting, obviously ironic, etymology from *μ (an unattested future tense cognate to μ , meaning ‘I shall hate’) and (‘destiny’), suggesting an interpretation such as ‘he who shall hate his destiny’.

2. Cycnus, the alter Achilles

77

have no previous literary existence so that direct comparison would be avoided. Following Menoetes’ death, Achilles aims at Cycnus, using once again the same spear. His throw meets the target, but the spear strikes the opponent’s shoulder and bounces back, leaving behind – and on Cycnus’ armor – a trail of blood. Achilles rejoices in vain: Met. 12.127 vulnus erat nullum, sanguis fuit ille Menoetae! (‘there was no wound; it was Menoetes’ blood!’). Invulnerable Cycnus remains unhurt. He may carry the blood traces of Menoetes, as Ovid’s epic narrative carries the blueprint of Homeric structure, but this affects only the surface of his body, the appearance. Nor is Achilles’ recollection of the ruined Asian cities, at 12.108-111, devoid of nuances that nurture poetics. Ruins without context are ruins that do not have a story tied to them; they never become a part of collective, ‘epic’ memory. When Achilles names his accomplishments he offers context to topographical landmarks (108ff. Lyrnesia moenia; Tenedon; Eetioneas… Thebas; purpureus… Caicus), lest they be erased from literary memory, should they remain unattached. In these landmarks Achilles finds the raw material for the composition of a mini-epic about himself inside the broader frame of the recast Trojan narrative. To this end, the prosaic and assertive tone of the rhetorical question, at 12.162-163, with which the omniscient narrator evaluates the content of the table talk at Achilles’ celebration (12.150-167), all but acknowledges that defining (his own) klea is Achilles’ exclusive objective – and obsession: quid enim loqueretur Achilles, / aut quid apud magnum potius loquerentur Achillem? (‘for of what else should Achilles speak, or of what else should others speak in great Achilles’ presence?’). Telephus, king of Mysia, the country that encompasses the plain of the river Caicus, was a peaceful ruler until the Achaeans arrived and invaded his land, during their abortive first expedition to Troy. Telephus fought against Achilles, and received a wound in the right thigh. According to the tradition most likely attributed to the Cypria (fr. 20 & 22 Bernabé), an oracle directed Telephus to Argos to be healed by Achilles, or else his wound would not heal. In return Telephus had to become the Achaeans’ guide to Troy. 165 In the archaic epic tradition, the details of the hero’s recovery are not clear, and our only relatively specific information comes from Euripides. There, Apollo informs Telephus that his injury would heal only by the same spear that caused it, but the god does not reveal that the actual owner of the spear is Achilles 165

Telephus is the fourth great foe named by Ovid (next to Hector, Cycnus and Memnon) to have been conquered by Achilles in single combat. All four are listed side-by-side in Pindar, Isthmian 5.38-42; cf. King 1987, 59. In Ovid, they appear in roles that are similar, but also complementary and even parallel, to that of Achilles (especially Memnon, whose death comes as the concluding episode of the ‘little Iliad’).

78

Epic Self-affirmation and Epic Self-consciousness

himself. Thus, disguised as a beggar Telephus goes to Argos, where he seizes baby Orestes from his cradle and, after disclosing his identity, threatens to kill Orestes if the Achaeans will not treat his wound. The Achaeans, aware of an oracle telling them that they need Telephus as a guide to Troy, and with Ulixes as intermediary, plead with Achilles to heal the begging Telephus. Achilles, ignorant at the beginning, eventually concedes assistance once Ulixes explains to him the great powers of his spear. 166 For the scarcity of information on the archaic Telephus, the innovative manipulation of the myth by Euripides is largely to blame, which, on account of its popularity, became the standard version for the Telephus legend thereafter. 167 Why, then, would Ovid choose to introduce Telephus as one of the conquered foes mentioned by name in the speech with which Achilles ‘defends’ his manliness, and more specifically, the strength of his hand? From Achilles’ point of view, the obvious justification for the recollection of the Telephus episode is the role of the spear in it. No less, Ovid’s systematic but entertainingly defiant to prescription method of attack against Achilles’ epic self-profiling, benefits from Euripides’ anti-heroic reading of the Telephus myth. In the play, Telephus voluntarily adopts the disguise of a beggar, and his overall conduct relies on the interlocking of trickery and deception, melodramatic speech, fake humility and blackmail – ultimately setting before the reading audience the distinct portrait of an anti-hero. As a consequence, Achilles’ conquest is reduced in significance. This reduction becomes greater in the light of the detail – already part of the archaic legend – that Achilles overcame his foe only because during their duel Telephus tripped over a vine branch and fell. 168 166

167 168

For brief and concise information on the Telephus legend, see M. Strauss, ‘Telephos’, LIMC 7.1 (1994), 586-587; the reader interested in detailed analysis should consult foremost the introduction in Preiser 2000, 41-115, while pp. 41-48 discusses the presence of Telephus in the Cypria and the Ilias Parva; see also the introduction (pp. 17-26) to the edition of the fragmentary Telephus of Euripides in Collard-Cropp-Lee 1995, which provides (pp. 22-24) a detailed reconstruction of the myth on the basis of all available ancient sources. According to Collard-Cropp-Lee 1995, 25, all post-Euripidean treatments of the legend, including the two Latin ones by Ennius and Accius, in all probability follow Euripides. In his disguise as a beggar and in his eloquence Telephus resembles Ulixes, on more than one occasion, including the times the king of Ithaca dressed himself as a refugee slave to enter Troy secretly and as a beggar to spy inside his own palace. The allusion to Telephus promotes the subtle but continuous presence of Ulixes through the earlier section of the ‘little Iliad’ prior to the ‘Judgment of the Arms’ (already spotted in the subtext of the Aulis episode). The anti-heroic element in Telephus’ tripping on a grapevine stump tempts the reader of the Metamorphoses to recall Book 8 and Telamon’s similar fall facedown during the Calydonian hunt, when his foot was caught by a projecting root (Met. 8.378-379). The evocation of the mock-heroic staging of the Calydonian episode, a legend no less popular with

3. Achilles’ ‘Victory’

79

It should be noted that the Telephus story combines the two diametrically opposed but coexisting sides of Achilles’ personality, of the warrior-killer and the healer. A disciple of Cheiron, Achilles was taught to master the art of healing, and in the Iliad there are specific references to his ability to heal, even though he actually does not make a display of this skill. 175 In antiquity, moreover, a healer was considered a skilled artist, of the same caliber as the poet and the prophet. 176 With this in mind, it is possible to assess the allusion to the Telephus legend from the standpoint of poetics and interpret the confrontation between Achilles and Telephus as an interesting coexistence of epic traditions. Anti-hero Telephus, a double-tongued shape-shifter, belongs inside an alternative epic, and familiarity with the details of his mythological biography marginalizes the archetypally epic element in his tradition and so works against the motives of Achilles’ appropriation of this character. In this respect the integration of Telephus is symbolic for Ovid’s neoteric-type epic writing that accommodates conflicting traditions and favors their ongoing interaction.

3. Achilles’ ‘Victory’ Ultimately Achilles does defeat Cycnus, but the circumstances of the victory are curious, and certainly unsuitably epic. Following his triple failure to conquer Cycnus’ body with his spear, Achilles attacks with his ‘flashing sword’ (12.129f. nitido… ense), now in ‘headlong rage’, fremebundus (128). 177 Still in disbelief about the ineffectiveness of his weapons, he is eager to put the blame for his failure on the distance separating him from his target. He fares no better, even though he strikes his foe repeatedly and mercilessly: Cycnus’ armor is pierced through (130f. parmam gladio galeamque cavari cernit, ‘[Achilles] saw the shield and the helmet pierced through’), but it is Achilles’ sword, instead, that ends up useless (131 at in duro laedi quoque corpore ferrum, ‘but the blade was actually blunted on the tough body’). Cycnus remains impossible to

175

176 177

the epic bards than the Trojan War, further hampers Achilles’ effort to prove himself a genuine epic hero. On Homeric Achilles as healer, see King 1987, 7-10; the tradition of Achilles’ training as healer was likely recorded in the Cypria (fr. 36 dubium Bernabé [Bernabé p. 62]), and it already occurs repeatedly in the Homeric scholia; cf. Preiser 2000, 46-47. Asclepius is the god of medicine but also of prophecy, while Apollo, Asclepius’ father, is the patron deity of all three domains of skilled artistry: singing, healing and divination. The rarity of the term, attested only once before, in a tragic fragment attributed to Accius (Bömer 1982, 50 ad 12.128), captures the novelty surrounding both the situation and Achilles’ extreme reaction to it.

80

Epic Self-affirmation and Epic Self-consciousness

wound 178 , while he is suggestively addressed as securus, ‘carefree’ (129). This is an important term in the language of neoteric and Augustan poetics, as cura is a prominent metaphor for a poet’s anxiety over the quality of his work, his literary performance. 179 Cycnus’ indifference to play along the epic combat game is provocative because it leads Achilles to realize that he needs to recourse to a new fighting strategy: strangulation. The shield and the sword work now as hammering tools: Cycnus, taken by surprise, is overpowered by his opponent’s breathless pummeling. The invasion of fear (135 pavor occupat illum, ‘fear gets a hold on him’) marks the beginning of his demise, soon to be followed by retreat (136f. retroque ferenti / aversos passus, ‘and as he steps backwards… ’), and the loss of control over his surroundings (137f.): he loses his balance, falls down, and defenseless succumbs to strangulation: quem super inpulsum resupino corpore Cycnum vi multa vertit terraque adflixit Achilles. tum clipeo genibusque premens praecordia duris vincla trahit galeae, quae presso subdita mento elidunt fauces et respiramen iterque eripiunt animae. (Met. 12.138-143) Achilles, with great force, dashes to the earth Cycnus as he lies with his body stretched out and pressed back upon [the rock]. Then crushing his chest with shield and hard knees, he unties the laces of his helmet; these are pulled tight under his chin and choke his throat, and cut off his breathing along with his life.

Achilles even compromises his Homeric fighting style – nowhere in Homer does Achilles throttle an opponent – in a final effort to uphold ancient epic combat sterotypes. His pummeling of Cycnus, further, may be inspired by a well-known Homeric instance: the conclusion of the duel between Paris and Menelaus in Il. 3.369ff. 180 The victorious and enraged Menelaus breaks his sword while pummeling on Paris’ helmet (3.361-363), but, undeterred, falls upon the Trojan foe, who already lies helpless on the ground, and is dragging him from the crest so that the laces of the helmet stretch tight 178

179

180

The image of Achilles’ useless ferrum against Cycnus’ durum body (on durus as defining quality of Romanhood and Roman maleness alike, see Horsfall 1971, 1009-1011) is outright comic and detrimental to the hero’s epic self-profiling. That securus and cura infuse Cycnus’ imagery with poetics has been pointed out by Möller 2003, 58 n. 24. Möller draws attention to the association of securus with artistry, which is established in the listing of the term in the OLD s.v. securus 4c (‘of performance’), and the parallel attestations that she has collected, of cura as a poet’s anxiety over his work, include several from Horace’s Epistles, a work devoted to poetics. The particular Homeric echo has been detected by Bömer 1982, 54 ad 12.140-141; also, Möller 2003, 60.

3. Achilles’ ‘Victory’

81

under Paris’ chin and nearly choke him to death (371f. μ μ ,/ ’ , ‘and the much-embroidered strap beneath his chin, that was fitted tightly underneath his jaw to hold his helmet up, was choking him’). Paris evades strangulation only because Aphrodite intervenes, breaks the (notably, much-embroidered, and thus suggestively oriental and ‘effeminate’) strap, and carries him away from the battlefield and into his chambers at Troy. There, Paris has a scented bath and sex with Helen, while Menelaus, ‘ranging through the crowd like a wild beast’ (Il. 3.449 ’ μ ), like Achilles in Ovid, looks in vain to finish off his opponent. The recollection of this Homeric subtext likens Achilles to Menelaus and projects Cycnus as a Paris-type fighter. Thus the issue of gender and its looming inversion are viewed from a corrective angle, and Achilles’ virile fighting portrayal is restored. 181 Despoiling one’s conquered enemy marks the triumphant conclusion to an epic duel. Achilles, robbed of the pleasure of seeing his opponent succumb under his spear, hopes that he will not be denied the conqueror’s right to take possession of his victim’s armor and honor (12.143 victum spoliare parabat, ‘he was getting ready to strip the vanquished’). Yet, once again he is faced with the irrational and is cheated by the unexpected. Cycnus miraculously disappears and turns into the homonymous bird, the swan (12.144-145 arma relicta videt; corpus deus aequoris albam / contulit in volucrem, cuius modo nomen habebat, ‘he sees the armor empty; for the god has changed the body into the white bird whose name he lately bore’). Achilles can have his spoils, but empty as they stand, as if rejected by the body that bore them, they lose their value – epic and otherwise. An epic warrior’s armor is the costume that marks him as an epic character; on the contrary, the stripping of the opponent’s body of its armor robs it of its warrior identity and its heroic essence. This symbolic function of the epic armor, for both him who originally owns and wears it, and him who 181

A second hypotext at work reinforces the Ovidian Achilles’ retrospective search for epic paradigms as appropriate models. Aeneid 8 (184-275) records one other single combat that concludes with the strangulation of the conquered opponent, the giant Cacus, like Cycnus a divine offspring, at the hands of Hercules. Hercules’ anger upon realizing the theft of his cattle by Cacus ‘flares up’ just like the anger of Achilles: Aen. 8.219f. hic vero Alcidae furiis exarserat atro / felle dolor: rapit arma manu nodisque gravatum / robur et aerii cursu petit ardua montis, ‘then indeed the wrath of Alcides furiously blazed forth with black bile: seizing in hand his weapons and heavily knotted club, he seeks with speed the top of the soaring mountain’. That Cycnus and Cacus are comparable cases in Ovid’s mind becomes clear in the light of the account of the Cacus story in the Fasti, which is reported in vocabulary consciously resembling that of Vergil’s text and the Cycnus narrative in the Metamorphoses; cf. the stylistic analysis in Bömer 1982, 53 ad 12.136-137.

82

Epic Self-affirmation and Epic Self-consciousness

takes possession of it as a trophy, is summoned forth in Achilles’ eagerness to strip Cycnus of his epic trappings. Foremost, the armor is inseparable from any great warrior’s worthiness as such. In the Iliad, with the exception of Diomedes, every hero about to perform an aristeia on the battlefield is introduced with a detailed account of his putting on his armor, piece-by-piece. Second, Achilles’ fervor to possess Cycnus’ arms is congruent with a typical epic tradition descending from Homer in which a warrior’s spoils on the battlefield mirror his merit as hero. As a matter of fact, it was a typical Homeric no less than Roman act to despoil one’s defeated enemy. The acquisition of spoils was the tangible proof and token of conquest; as such it conferred the much-desired kleos, timê, or kudos, upon the despoiler, while, by the same token, the despoiled body of the conquered enemy, bereft of its armor, the badge of masculinity, was a dishonored body. 182 All the above are connected in the Ovidian Achilles’ mind when he turns to strip Cycnus’ body. Unable to overcome his enemy with his weapons, the son of Thetis hopes that at least by despoiling his defeated opponent’s corpse he can partake of the honor tied to a typical epic conquest. Still, Ovid’s fluid ‘epic’ reality distorts Achilles’ initiatives. As a result of Cycnus’ metamorphosis and disappearance, Achilles is suddenly left with an empty suit of armor and no actual body to strip. The Greek hero eventually does take possession of the spoils but the absence of the dead body to prove the conquest transforms his triumph into a deficient, inferior epic performance. 183 And finally the transformation itself: the miraculous vanishing of Cycnus before Achilles’ eyes is an Ovidian invention, for prior to Ovid there is no testimony of the warrior’s transformation into a swan. 184 Naturally, the presence of a metamorphosis integrates the Achilles-Cycnus episode into the 182

183

184

On the importance of spolia in the construction of the ideology of Roman virtus or ‘manliness’, that was defined on the basis of ongoing competition, quest for honor, and display of excellence in battle, see the articles by F. Lammert, in RE, s.v. spolia and spolia opima, Zweite Reihe, Sechster Halbband (1929), 1843ff. (citing several references regarding Roman heroes despoiling conquered foes after individual combat). As for the shame of one’s despoliation in Homeric culture, the agony of the dying Sarpedon is worth noting, expressed in his appeals to Glaucus not to let the Greeks despoil and hence, dishonor him, but also of Glaucus, for whom the protection of Sarpedon’s body is an ethical obligation, tied to the defense of his own honor (Il. 16.492-501). The absence of a dead body dangerously puts at risk the literary (epic) value of an acclaimed feat; cf. Martin 1989, 89: “In the terms of the Iliad, death generates texts; it is the boundary that one tries to surmount by action in this world”. Forbes Irving 1990, 258, implies that even though Ovid seems to have been the first to talk specifically about Cycnus’ transformation into a swan, earlier authors had noted the swan link, which they tried to rationalize: Hesiod fr. 237 M-W, for example, mentions the hero’s white head.

4. The Swan Poetics

83

ence of a metamorphosis integrates the Achilles-Cycnus episode into the broader thematic and structural frame of the Metamorphoses overall, but this is obviously only a pretext. A metamorphosis in a poem about, and on, metamorphoses is self-evident, but a metamorphosis is also an intriguing challenge well attested in ancient epic. In addition to projecting an impressive description of extraordinary events, a metamorphosis has a cause and an effect, and often a hidden symbolism. 179 It is quite likely, in this view, that Cycnus’ change at the end of Achilles’ introduction to the ‘epic’ fore of the ‘little Iliad’ operates along parameters extending clearly beyond genre, and influencing the structure and thematics not just of the Achilles-Cycnus unit but of the entire Ovidian poem.

4. The Swan Poetics The Cycnus transformation in Metamorphoses 12 constitutes the third version of the swan aetion in Ovid’s poem. This triple aetion is unique, for, from the over three hundred myths related or alluded to in the Metamorphoses, only the swan receives three different aetiological narratives, while an additional five references to this bird are interspersed along the Ovidian epic. 180 One obvious explanation emerges from the metaliterary associations of the swan, being 179

180

Transformations are part of both Homeric poems, nurturing allusion and a pluralism of critical perceptions. The trope is present already in the Iliad (Calchas’ recollection, at 2.317320, of the transformation into stone of the snake that ate the sparrow and her nestlings in Aulis, and Achilles’ narrative of Niobe’s transformation at 24.602-617), but it is more frequent in the Odyssey (including, among others, the transformation of Ulixes’ comrades into pigs by Circe, the shape-shifter Proteus, and the metamorphosis of the Phaeacian ship into a sea-rock). In the Aeneid metamorphosis is upgraded from an isolated poetic trope to an elaborate narrative mechanism, seminal for interpreting the poem; cf. the classic treatments by M. Putnam, ‘Aeneid VII and the Aeneid’, AJP 91 (1970), 408-430 [= ibid., Essays on Latin Lyric, Elegy, and Epic (Princeton 1982), 288-310], and C. Segal, ‘Circean Temptations: Homer, Vergil, Ovid’, TAPA 99 (1968), 419-442; also, P. Hardie, ‘Augustan Poets and the Mutability of Rome’, in: A. Powell (ed.), Roman Poetry and Propaganda in the Age of Augustus (London 1992), 59-82. On metamorphosis in ancient epic prior to Ovid, see E. Fantham, ‘Metamorphoses before the Metamorphoses. A Survey of Transformations before Ovid’, Augustan Age 10 (1990-92), 7-18. J. Loehr, Ovids Mehrfacherklärungen in der Tradition aitiologischen Dichtens (Stuttgart 1996), 161166. Only the myth of the hyacinth features in more than one version, the youth Hyacinthus (Book 10) and the Ajax (Book 13) version. What strikes one as most intriguing regarding the two hyacinth aetia, is their conspicuous mutual entwining. The episode centering on the Hyacinthus legend (Met. 10.207ff.) clearly refers to the Ajax aetion, and again later, when Ovid ties the flower to the suicide of Ajax at the conclusion of the Armorum Iudicium (Met. 13.394-398), he explicitly notes the existence of the earlier account.

84

Epic Self-affirmation and Epic Self-consciousness

a famous symbol of Callimachean and neoteric-type poetics. Thus the popularity of the swan imagery throughout the Metamorphoses, on the one hand underscores Ovid’s ambitions to follow up on the literary tradition of Alexandria, transgressing boundaries and embracing ongoing redefinition. On the other hand, one encounters the effort to maintain a focus on regularity in terms of structure. This is evidenced alike in the symmetrical positioning of recurrent themes or kindred narratives, and in the diligence to mark their differentiation. As a result we are witnessing the regular concatenation of a number of swan accounts, which share enough similarities to put together a larger scheme but are nonetheless distinct cases and deserve to be appreciated individually. Three different swan aetia, with Achilles’ Cycnus closing the line, are situated symmetrically in Books 2 (368-380), 7 (371-381), and 12 (144145), introducing their own pentad-based pattern to bolster the architectural sophistication of the epic’s structure overall. These three clear aetiologies are joined by five less prominent and more or less fuzzy ‘swan’ attestations, such as the anonymous birds at Met. 2.252-253, which throng the river Caÿster of Maeonia, or the quasi-swans of Diomedes, the transformed companions that look like swans but are not (Met. 14.496-509). 181 In sum, the generic flux that envelops the swan motif in both Vergil and Ovid with elegiac, both erotic and mourning, and epic themes, harmonizes with Achilles’ controversial ‘epic’ image into accentuating the unorthodoxy and elusiveness of Ovid’s idea of epic narrative. Elusiveness and inversion are intrinsic to the broader issue of identity, the Ovidian Achilles’ heroic profiling, and by extension to the thematics of the ‘little Iliad’, the narrative that nurtures this identity. The study of an aetiology allows to ponder over the link between form and essence, signifier (name and image) and signified (identity formation). The interaction between Cycnus’ nomen and the broader symbolism of his new transformed self, the omen of the swan, has recently come under the scrutiny of Philip Hardie. His reflections offer an intriguing twist to the obvious link between the swan transformation of Neptune’s Cycnus and that of Phaethon’s Cycnus ten books earlier: “In two cases the fact that a name is shared carries an association from the first bearer of the name that exerts a pressure on the kind of fate experienced by the second bearer. In the early stages of the Trojan war the invulnerable warrior and Hectorsubstitute Cycnus (‘swan’) is finally throttled to death by Achilles, Met. 12.144-5 corpus deus aequoris albam / contulit in volucrem, cuius modo nomen habebat ‘the sea god turned his 181

Papaioannou 2005, 149-165, focuses on the impact of the swan motif on structure of the Metamorphoses, and on its function as leading symbol of Ovid’s idiosyncratic poetics. Keith 1992, 137-146, discusses the swan as poetological marker of Alexandrian and neoteric literature, and its adoption, first by Vergil in Aeneid 10, and subsequently by Ovid in Metamorphoses 2.

4. The Swan Poetics

85

body into the white bird whose name he previously bore’. Here nomen is omen, determining the final shape of the body of an individual who in his previous existence had nothing of the swan about him. As a result, ornithologically he merges with the other Cycnus, the grieving friend of Phaethon (2.367-80), whose qualities as a mournful singer and enemy of the upper air where Phaethon met his fate are perpetuated in the swan. This Cycnus is a very different character from the martial and invulnerable Cycnus, a narrative substitute for the great epic warrior Hector; the name itself has the power of conjuring up a bodily form with which it is arbitrarily associated”. 182

This “arbitrary association” embraces Ovid’s second and middle swan aetion as well. The spoiled puer Cycnus shares with Phaethon’s Cycnus an involvement in a homoerotic relationship, elegiac mourning and water, as the puer Cycnus is lamented by his mother, Hyrie, who ultimately also undergoes transformation and turns into water, the homonymous lake. In this case, Hyrie embodies and perpetuates not the ornithological but the poetological qualities attributed to Phaethon’s inconsolable friend. Hyrie’s part is an Ovidian addition to the traditional version of the puer Cycnus legend known from Nicander. 183 Her change into a pool is standard for a grieving female in the Metamorphoses (cf. Cyane at 5.425ff.); in addition, it reflects the change of Ligurian Cycnus at the banks of the river Eridanus. All the leading motifs identified in the three swan-aetia (homoeroticism, a grieving mother, non-epic poetics and the prominence of the water element) are present subcutaneously in the Trojan Cycnus affair; only, they apply not to Cycnus, but to the Homeric counterpart of Achilles. The close relationship between Achilles and Patroclus, the pathetic mourning of Achilles over the body of Patroclus, Achilles’ association with water, because of his being the son of Thetis, the mourning of Thetis and the Nereides, deities of the water, all combined redraw the map of parallelisms. The nomen-is-omen rule that causes the Neptunian Cycnus to “merge ornithologically”, semantically and thematically with Phaethon’s Cycnus, directs a comparable merging of thematics between Phaethon and the Iliadic Achilles. The two put together a visual epitome of the poetics of Ovidian epic, a symbolism describing the poem’s generic fluidity with a combination of three distinct but synchronically evoked, and, most importantly, elusive entities, the avian, the water and the song. The recollection of the Homeric story thus emerging, obedient to strict but unassuming rules of careful selectivity, maintains a continuous evocation of the Homeric model at the back of the reader’s mind, and renders the surface narrative a ground for antagonistic aemulatio. Too implicit and convoluted, it is; alien to Ovid’s genius, definitely not. 182 183

Hardie 2002, 249; Hardie calls this play of inversion with names and identities a coincidentia oppositorum. On the puer Cycnus, and the Hyrie addition to the legend, see Anderson 1972, 283-284.

86

Epic Self-affirmation and Epic Self-consciousness

Arma videt relicta: In the end Achilles is left with empty armor. The Trojan duplicate of Hector has eluded him once and for all. The solidity in material and contour of Cycnus’ panoply, a firm casing that protects, identifies with, but also imprisons the Trojan’s human body shape, clashes against the fleeting form of the avian that carries on and immortalizes the hero’s spirit. The situation, strangely, flashes backwards to the opening of the ‘little Iliad’. There, another potential duplicate of Hector, his brother Aesacus (Met. 11.758-761), succumbs to avian transformation and gains immortality in the body of the bird mergus, and is only symbolically encased, inside an empty tomb: Met. 12.2-3 tumulo quoque nomen habenti / inferias dederat cum fratribus Hector inanes (‘at a tomb inscribed with his [Aesacus’] name Hector with his brothers had in vain offered funeral sacrifices of honor’). Cycnus’ armor is no less a memorial, but not so much for the vanished warrior as for his victor. Achilles may display it as a prize in lieu of proof for his accomplishment, but more importantly, as evidence in support of his kleos, a confirmation of his own existence. Still, the empty armor is only half the prize for the conqueror, just like an empty tomb never offers full solace to the parties intimately connected to the deceased. And it is precisely this negative feeling, the disappointment and the helplessness before the unexpected or/and undesired emptiness that the conclusion to the Achilles-Cycnus story presents to its audience, direct (Achilles) and indirect (readers) alike, leaving them unsatisfied and with mixed feelings. The lack of katharsis means that the intricate and opaque narration of a ‘play’ that Ovid is unraveling is not complete; very appropriately our poet communicates that, far from applying a closure, Cycnus’ transformation, similarly to Aesacus’ cenotaph, marks a new beginning.

Chapter Three Poetic Memory and Epic (De)Composition: Deconstructing Achilles184 1. Introduction In the next, and largest, section of the ‘little Iliad’ (Met. 12.146-535), Achilles’ warrior image is subjected to the appreciation of a new internal audience under the direction of King Nestor. Nestor’s adverse response to Achilles’ presentation of the Cycnus affair is chronologically proximal to the duel, and like all episodes narrated since the opening of Metamorphoses 12, it relates events that took place before the action dramatized in Homer’s Iliad. Nestor’s speech is delivered during the banquet organized by Achilles to celebrate and extol his victory over Cycnus. But Nestor wittily draws the general attention to himself. Through the implicit but never clear promise of a speech that would corroborate Achilles’ heroic status, he takes advantage of the invitation to participate in Achilles’ game of plot manipulation and advances his own poetic aspirations. These not only fail to validate Achilles’ epic point view but deliberately antagonize it in so far as they seek to appropriate it. In all, in demonstrating the ruling force of the epic ‘words’ in a long and convoluted performance (Met. 12.189-535), Nestor challenges Achilles’ perspective that centers on the mastery of epic ‘deeds’. Nestor’s speech consists of three sections. The speech begins with the story of Caeneus (12.189-209) and continues with the tale of the Centauromachy (12.210-535), an event where Caeneus plays a leading part. The concluding section (12.536-577), the discussion of which I shall postpone until the beginning of the next chapter, relates a segment of Nestor’s own family story, the miraculous fate of his brother Periclymenus. Prior to the Centauromachy comes a brief but dense passage describing the celebrating Achilles and his companions at a banquet during the remission from warfare (12.146-167). Here Achilles mounts an effort to talk a broader audience, in184

Part of this chapter expands on arguments initially developed in Papaioannou 2000 and 2002.

88

Poetic Memory and Epic (De)Composition

cluding the readers, into embracing his personal interpretation of the Cycnus episode. Despite the fact that Nestor’s performance takes up the greatest part of the dramatic time of the ‘little Iliad’185, it has only recently attracted serious study.186 Focusing on the narrative significance of the Centauromachy, the lengthiest topic in Nestor’s speech, critics have pointed out the thematically balancing role that the Pylian king’s long-winded narration plays against Achilles’ martial action. Nestor attacks and reverses the polarity of gender roles espoused by Achilles as a leading strategy of epic thematics. Anything but a digression gone off track, Nestor’s nearly 500-line-long account is a carefully constructed piece of rhetoric, which assimilates Achilles to the Centaurs, a group of liminal, semi-bestial creatures, and Cycnus to Caeneus, the victim of the Centaurs. For O’Bryhim, the parallel, thematically contrasting pairs actually “manipulate the sympathies of Nestor’s listeners and Ovid’s readers”.187 In reality, this analogy of mutually exclusives denounces Achilles’ view of heroism and his endeavor to establish his version of the Cycnus victory as one of those narratives suited to develop into kleos-granting epics.

2. Epic Singing and Epic Tales The festivities are set up to celebrate a conquest which in terms of epic warfare is at least atypical: the body of the ‘defeated’ has disappeared, while the so-called ‘defeated’ (143 victum) has both evaded death and gained a form of immortality through transformative metensomatosis. On his part, Ovid does not explicitly label the event a victory, preferring instead the neutral terms labor and pugna (146f. hic labor, haec requiem multorum pugna dierum / attulit, ‘this labor, this fighting brought about a repose that lasted many days’). The strip185

186

187

Taken together, the Achilles-Cycnus duel and Nestor’s long narrative account for 468 of the total 579 lines that comprise Ovid’s version of the events at Troy, and they are allegedly synchronous with the timeline of the Trojan War. Until only a few years ago, the Nestor episode was read as a substitute for the gory Iliadic battle scenes that have been left out, and so, it was virtually ignored as yet another typically Ovidian moment of excess bloodshed and graphic cruelty; cf. Ellsworth 1980, 23-29, esp. 25-26. Subsequent studies, however, have shown that Nestor’s long-winded speech is a well-wrought narrative of many levels; cf. Bömer 1982, 55-182; Dippel 1990, 33-58; Musgrove 1991, 27-29. More recently the focus has centered on the poetics of the episode, Nestor’s image as an epic bard and, often, a mouthpiece for Ovid’s literary theories on the epic genre; cf. Musgrove 1998; Papaioannou 2002; Möller 2003; DeBrohun 2004. O’Bryhim 1989, 49-53. S. Mack, Ovid (New Haven/London 1988), 128, interprets Nestor’s account of the Centauromachy as a parody of an epic motif that figures an epic bard singing of heroic deeds “for the entertainment of warriors in a feast”.

2. Epic Singing and Epic Tales

89

ping of the foe’s body, which would complete the conquest, never takes place. Rather, the Cycnus affair is called a victory because Achilles declares it so (132) inside the spirit of the celebration (150 festa dies) he organizes.188 A little later, Achilles again is mentioned to have scored a ‘victory’ over Cycnus (164f. proxima praecipue domito victoria Cycno / in sermone fuit, ‘the talk turned especially to Achilles’ last victory and Cycnus’ overthrow’), yet, at the same time his defeated foe has remained ‘unconquered’ (167 invictumque a vulnere erat, ‘he was not conquered by any wound’). This vagueness of discordant voices predominates in Nestor’s ensuing long-winded parable, which allegorizes Ovid’s polemic against traditional epic. As shown in the previous chapter, the development of the confrontation between Achilles and Cycnus is comical, for it is based on a logical paradox. It pitches against each other the invulnerable Cycnus and the almost invulnerable Achilles, and so excludes a logical resolution in favor of either contestant. Nonetheless, Achilles cannot see the paradox, or accept the invulnerability of Cycnus, but persists stubbornly to battle down the unconventional body of his oppenent by means of conventional weapons. And when his effort to rationalize (12.106-114) the situation fails, he finds in the mindlessness of rage (12.128 fremebundus) a release from his cognitive impasse. The celebratory banquet echoes similar epic settings: proxima praecipue domito victoria Cycno in sermone fuit (‘and his most recent victory and the conquest of Cycnus was chiefly their talk’, 12.164f.). Achilles’ deed is the leading entertainment topic among the Greek chiefs, while battle talk becomes, by common applause, the only form of amusement that night: non illos citharae, non illos carmina vocum longave multifori delectat tibia buxi, sed noctem sermone trahunt, virtusque loquendi materia est; pugnam referunt hostisque suamque, inque vices adita atque exhausta pericula saepe commemorare iuvat. quid enim loqueretur Achilles, aut quid apud magnum potius loquerentur Achillem? (Met. 12.157-163) Neither the sound of the lute, nor the voicing of songs and the long flute of boxwood, pierced with many holes, pleases them; but they drew long the night with conversation, and valor was the subject of their discussion: they narrate of the fighting, both their own and their enemy’s, and it is a pleasure to recall over and over again, turn by turn, the dangers which they had encountered and overborne. For of what

188

Zumwalt 1977, 213, commenting precisely on this uncertainty – should one call the outcome of the conflict a ‘victory’ of Achilles? –, Ovid leaves us with an “ambiguity of viewpoint”, which he opts not to resolve.

90

Poetic Memory and Epic (De)Composition

else should Achilles speak, or what else should others speak in great Achilles’ company?

Achilles’ guests do not find satisfaction in songs (carmina vocum) and the melodies of the lute (cithara). They long for a different form of carmina, the traditional bardic performances. Such performances are those given by Phemius and Demodocus in the Odyssey, and reportedly by Vergil’s Cretheus – all of them performances that center on wars and heroic exploits of the past.189 The recurrent recollection of the combat between Achilles and Cycnus is intended, as far as Achilles is concerned, to satisfy precisely this desideratum. To this extent, the staging of the banquet directs the audience to reach mentally across the Ovidian text to a famous intertext, the conclusion of Aeneid 1 (748ff.). This section is a widely acknowledged metaphor of embedded poetics, because it recasts within the Vergilian epic space well-known Homeric episodes of similar thematics, and most prominently, Demodocus’ performance in Odyssey 8. The setting is, typically, a banquet featuring a professional singer on stage. Only, the Carthaginian singer, Iopas, even though promptly applauded at the end of a carmen on cosmogony, a didactic poem (Aen. 1.742-746), fails to satisfy Queen Dido, who longs for an Iliadic-type epic of action, for deeds featuring Hector, Priam, Diomedes and, of course, Achilles (Aen. 1.750-752).190 The Ovidian banquet focuses similarly on heroic conquests (12.159-160 virtus… loquendi / materia est, ‘valor was the topic of conversation’), especially Achilles’ own (12.164-165 proxima praecipue domito victoria Cycno / in sermone fuit, 189

190

Epic narratives are songs no less: Phemius’ performance in Od. 17.261-263 is an actual song ( ) accompanied by a μ . Likewise, Demodocus sings ( , Od. 8.45) of the glorious deeds of heroes ( , 8.73). His song is a sweet one ( , 8.64), and it is accompanied by the tunes of the bard’s μ (8.67-68). Finally, Vergil refers to Cretheus, the Trojan epic bard and accomplished lute-player, at Aen. 9.774-777, as amicum Crethea Musis, Crethea Musarum comitem, cui carmina semper / et citharae cordi numerosque intendere nervis, / semper equos atque arma virum pugnasque canebat (‘Cretheus, dear to the Muses, Cretheus, the Muses’ companion, who always found delight in song and lyres, and in stringing notes upon the chords; who always sang of steeds and arms, of men and battles’). On the textuality of the close to Aeneid 1, see G.N. Knauer, Die Aeneis und Homer: Studien zur poetischen Technik Vergils mit Listen der Homerzitate in der Aeneis (Göttingen 1964), 148-173. That the setting of the Carthaginian banquet was modeled on Alcinous’ reception in Homer was recognized already in antiquity; cf. Macrobius, Sat. 7.1.14. Specifically on the relationship of Iopas’ song and Aeneas’ personal narration to several Homeric intertexts, including Demodocus’ song in Odyssey 8 and Ulixes’ subsequent narrative, see, e.g., W. Clausen, Virgil’s Aeneid: Decorum, Allusion and Ideology (Münich/Leipzig 2002), 53-59. For a reading of Iopas’ song as poetological and advancing climactic intertextual allusions (to Demodocus’ Ares and Aphrodite song, but also Vergil’s own Aristaeus tale in G. 4.315558), see Farrell 1991, 259-262.

2. Epic Singing and Epic Tales

91

‘chiefly the talk centered on Achilles’ last victory and Cycnus’ defeat’). Through emphasis on recollection (160 referunt) Achilles’ account aligns with the personal narratives of the Homeric Ulixes and Vergil’s Aeneas. The emphasis on the extraordinariness of the Cycnus adventure, which Achilles and his listeners in unison label a marvel (12.165; 168 visum mirabile cunctis; … hoc ipse Aeacides, hoc mirabantur Achivi, ‘it seemed a marvel to them all; … Aeacides himself and the Greeks were marveling at this’), ratifies the special status of the achievement. As such, the event, or rather the Achilles-directed focalization of the event, is intended to become one of those memorable moments that epic heroes/participants treasure and enjoy relating (commemorare iuvat)191, and epic poets afterwards reproduce by repetition (referunt)192 and fashion into epic songs. Repetition is a leading principle of oral poetry, facilitating the transformation of a given, self-standing fabula or oral narrative, of heroic achievements – also called a mythos193 – into an epic. Repetition alone, however, does not raise a piece of narrative to the status of an epic. An epic is defined after all in terms of its audience, and it is the audience that determines whether a mythos narrative should be called an epic, by repeatedly asking for its recollection. An epic bard cannot enforce his performance upon his audience; instead, the audience asks for the narrative/song.194 Thus a cyclical 191

192

193

194

Commemorare, literary means ‘to share a common memory with someone else’, and conveys both the notion of repetition (since the reminiscence of an event results in its repeated recollection by all the listeners who possess a memory of it) and that of μ μ (since repetition follows the recollection). Referunt, the main verb of 12.157-163, defining epic as foremost the result of recollection, both in the traditional form as expressed in the Homeric epic and in its alternative manifestation in the Metamorphoses (referre idem aliter), is situated precisely at the center of the passage. In addition, the power of orality in determining the epic status of a given reported deed is imprinted in the use of finite verbs, predominantly cognates of ‘speaking’ and often poetically marked (sermone trahunt; loquendi; referunt; exhausta; commemorare; loqueretur; loquerentur). I employ mythos with Martin’s definition of the term in mind, as a marked way to designate speech (with epos serving as the term for the unmarked way): “a speech-act indicating authority, performed at length, usually in public, with focus on full attention to every detail” (Martin 1989, 12); Nagy 1990, 31-33, and 1992, 315f., points out the linguistic affinity between mythos and myô/mystery, and underlines the semantic context of mythos as “special speech”. On the narratological definition of myth as “oral storytelling”, see also L. Edmunds, ‘Myth in Homer’, in: I. Morris and B. Powell (edd.), The New Companion to Homer (Leiden 1997), 415-441, who is building on Martin 1989. L.E. Doherty, Siren Songs: Gender, Audience and Narrators in the Odyssey (Ann Arbor 1995), 7374, notes, for example, how Ulixes’ praise of Demodocus’ performance translates anew into a request for a song. Thus, the saga of the Wooden Horse, the conclusive episode of the Trojan epic that features Ulixes himself as the main agent (Od. 8.492-98) brings about an Ulixes-centered reading of the Iliad in congruence with the enveloping narrative space of the Odyssey.

92

Poetic Memory and Epic (De)Composition

process of epic craftsmanship emerges. A heroic deed becomes kleos, and a narrative of klea repeatedly praised by an epic singer receives acknowledgment from an audience and becomes mythos. This kleos becomes then a song. The epic singer who sings such a kleos-song himself receives kleos, which he in turn bestows, through the praise of his song, upon his hero(es).195 Occasionally, the epic heroes resolve to commemorate themselves their klea before an audience, thus becoming at once substitute bards and direct recipients of kleos. For example, Ulixes’ narrative of his adventures in Books 9-12, which follows Demodocus’ performance – a re-evaluation of the Iliad from the Odyssey’s point of view – famously represents such an epic-in-anepic, earning double kleos for Ulixes, the ‘singer’ and hero of the narrative. Notably, in acknowledment of his enticing storytelling the hero garners praise from King Alcinous, by being paralleled directly to an aoidos.196 Ovid’s effort to picture an Achilles versed in the techniques of epic composition likely draws on Iliad 9.186ff., where the son of Thetis is portrayed as a lute-player and singer – the only Homeric character to be cast in a bard’s image – when Agamemenon’s embassy meets him: μ ,

’

μ

, , .

μ

,

· ,

μ

,

. (Il. 9.186-191)

[A]nd they [the ambassadors] found him [Achilles] delighting his spirit with a clearsounding lyre, beautiful, and finely wrought, and with a silver arch on it. He took it as a winning prize of the spoils after he destroyed the city of Eetion. Now he was delighting his spirit with it, and he sang the glories of men (klea andron). But Patroclus, alone, was sitting opposite him in silence, waiting for whatever moment the Aeacid would leave off (lego) singing.

The ambassadors’ view of the seated Achilles consoling himself on his lute coincides with the readers’ perspective: this is the first time, for both parties, that they set eyes on Achilles since his angry withdrawal from battle in Iliad 1. The hero’s self-imposed exclusion from the shaping of the epic plot is 195

196

A typical Homeric example: as a result of the ‘charm’ ( ) of his song about the Nostoi of the Achaeans (Od. 1.325-359), the bard Phemius occupies the center of his narrative himself. Just as the heroes he glorifies, the bard becomes himself, too, worthy of kleos, which is bestowed upon him by his listeners (Od. 1.351-352 μ ). On the enticing power of the bard upon the audience, and the latter’s function as literary critic, establishing the credentials for the bestowing of upon the singer and for qualifying his narrative as ‘epic’, see Pucci 1987, 191-208. Cf. detailed discussion in Pucci 1987, 218ff.

3. Epic Poetics: The Master of Epic Memory

93

reflected in his portrayal as aoidos, singing of ‘the glorious deeds of men’ (Il. 9.189), possibly including his very own. At the same time, the fact that the lyre itself is at once a spoil of war, that is, a proof of kleos, and a symbol of the fine arts and the culture of peace, fuses the epic warrior and the epic singer. By profiling Achilles as his alter ego, the Iliad singer projects himself upon Thetis’ son and claims a part of his kleos. Conversely, the great Greek warrior being also a skilled bard has access to the kleos-granting power of the epic singer.197 Ovid’s Achilles treads along the same path. Aware of the direct relationship between epic song and the power of epic memory, he calls for a typical epic festive interlude, and ascertains that his Cycnus ‘victory’ mythos, marvelous and anti-heroic though it may be, dominates the heroes’ table talk and becomes the deed of glory to corroborate Achilles’ hero status in their war/epic memories.

3. Epic Poetics: The Master of Epic Memory Achilles’ plans, however, are stymied, and the mastermind behind this is Nestor, with his more conservative and conventional employment of paradigmatic mythos. Unlike Achilles, Nestor understands mythos as an ad hoc invention, a narrative that stems out of particular, imminent situations affecting personally the characters-addressees.198 Upon confronting Achilles’ effort to manipulate his audience’s memory, Nestor offers his own counterperformance, by enforcing, via the parable of a distant mythos known only to himself, his own reading of the recent mythos of Cycnus which is familiar to everybody. Nestor’s recollection of this remote past event extends chronologically beyond the narrative time of the epic and certainly beyond the literary memories of his direct listeners. Naturally, the control of mythos presupposes ), defined as knowledge of past control of the field of memory (μ μ accomplishments, especially those accomplishments that have already become the subject of epic poetry or deserve to become epic poems, and thus gain immortality in the memory of future generations.199 The unusually long mem-

197

198

199

On Achilles’ portrayal in Iliad 9 as a lyre-player/bard in performance of epic songs, see Nagy 2004, 39-48, who distinctly describes the scene (p. 43) as “a stylized representation of rhapsodic relay performance”. On the Homeric mythos as an ad hoc personal invention, see M. Willcock, ‘Mythological Paradeigma in the Iliad’, CQ 14 (1964), 141-154; ibid. ‘Ad Hoc Invention in the Iliad’, HSCP 81 (1977), 41-53. W.S. Moran, ‘Mimneskomai and “Remembering” Epic Stories in Homer and the Hymns’, QUCC 20 (1975), 195-211, discusses in detail the use of the verb μ μ in Homer

94

Poetic Memory and Epic (De)Composition

ory that Nestor possesses as a result of his unusually long life is a rare quality, a quality that ranks him next to the Muses, the sources of comprehensive memory and the generating forces behind an epic vates’ performance.200 This exceptional mnemonic faculty is emphasized as soon as the elderly king is first mentioned, in Iliad 1201: ... ,

, μ

’

μ

· μ μ

’,

’

,μ

. (Il. 1.247-252)

[A]nd between them Nestor the sweet-spoken rose up, lucid speaker of Pylos, from whose lips the word flowed sweeter than honey. In his lifetime two generations of mortals had already died, those who had grown up with him and those born to them in noble Pylos, and he was ruling among the third.

The last three verses of this passage are closely reproduced by Ovid’s Nestor, who, only a few lines into his long account of the Centauromachy (Met. 12.187f.), bolsters his credibility by referring to his longevity: vixi / annos bis centum; nunc tertia vivitur aetas (‘I have lived for two centuries/two hundred years and now I am living in my third/third age/generation’). Despite Ovid’s ingenious pun on the double meaning of aetas, ‘age’, as both generation and , the reference to Homer is century, in his reproduction of the Greek readily identifiable. Like his Homeric counterpart, Ovid’s Nestor has the (plura tamen memini, ‘still, I remember much’, Met. power of μ μ 12.184).202 Ovid toys with the double meaning of Nestor’s control over epic memory. Because the Homeric hero’s memory goes farther back than anyone else’s does, he can both direct his audience by presenting them with instruc-

200

201 202

as a technical term for performing an epic song; also Martin 1989, 59-61; 80-82; on the close relationship between memory, μ , and epic composition, see Martin 1989, 78ff. Vergil’s appeal to the aid of the Muses being the embodiment of wide-ranging epic memory is phrased in axiomatic fashion in the proem of the Italian forces catalogue in Aeneid 7.645: et meministis enim, divae, et memorare potestis, ‘for you, goddesses, remember, and you can recall’; cf. also Wills 1996, 309, acknowledging possible influence by the passage at Il. 2.485-486. The commentary on the text below summarizes Dickson 1995, 25-45, a detailed study of Nestor’s first appearance in the Iliad (Il. 1.247-252). Wills 1996, 31, includes memini among his external markers of allusion, or phrases that point to an earlier literary source.

3. Epic Poetics: The Master of Epic Memory

95

tive paradigms and conceal from them those less-than-heroic moments in his own long career.203 In addition to his exceptional memory, the result of his no less unprecedented long life, the Homeric Nestor is distinguished for his faculties as speech manipulator and performer of the epic word (Il. 1.247-249). The king , ‘sweet-spoken’, a Homeric hapax that is used elsewhere of Pylos is in traditional epic to describe the Muses and the epic singer himself.204 Likewise, in Homer is the song of the Muses, while in the Homeric Hymns μ (Hym. 25.5) the phrase refers to the epic singer whom the Muses love.205 Yet, ‘sweet’ and ‘lucid’ song, and tongue ‘sweeter than honey’ are qualities that also distinguish the Homeric Sirens. The latter represent the beguiling power of the epic song, or else, the epic bard’s ability to manipulate the audiences’ emotions206, thus pairing him with Fama, the formidable, elusive apparition that feeds on the inextricable fusion of truth and lies. On account of his proximity to epic singers, the Muses, the Sirens, and Fama, the Homeric Nestor enters an elite group of master manipulators of oral speech.207 By replacing Achilles’ point of view with Nestor’s bard-like control over the transmission of heroic tradition208, Ovid offers a new reading of the same Iliad mythos, and specifically

203

204 205 206

207

208

Such as his conduct during the Calydonian hunt (Met. 8.365-368), when Nestor narrowly escapes an attack by the enraged boar, by leaping out of sight and onto the safety of a tall tree. Hym. 32.2, for the Muses; Hym 21.4, for the epic singer; cf. Dickson 1995, 26. Dickson 1995, 27-28, 30-31. Nestor’s identification as aoidos and his association to the Muses and other epic singers is the topic of extensive discussion in Dickson 1995, 45-100; on the identical description of Nestor’s speech and the Sirens’ song, see Dickson 1995, 27-28, 30-31, 35. On the epic-like function of the beguiling song of the Sirens in the Homeric narrative, see Pucci 1987, 209213; while in the association between the Homeric warrior (e.g. Achilles) and the epic bard (e.g. Nestor, or Homer/Ovid) as competing performers in need of divine inspiration to perform at their highest level, see Segal 1994, 138f. See, finally, my reading of the Ovidian Sibyl in Metamorphoses 14, as another metamorphosis of the epic bard figure, in Papaioannou 2005, 63-64. The power of oral performance, which is based on special knowledge and has the ability to influence the mindset of the attending audience so as to determine its subsequent course of thought and action, links Calchas’ prophecies, Nestor’s admonishing parables and the song of an epic singer; see Dickson 1992, about poetics in the Homeric Nestor’s profiling. Performance aptitude and strong memory are the prerequisites for the composition of an epic, and the brief mention of Thamyris in the Iliad (2.594-600) is perhaps the earliest literary definition of bardic performance (aoidê) as an arena of competition. It is worth pointing out that, once Thamyris loses the contest, the Muses punish him by taking away his memory; on the Iliad passage on Thamyris, see H. Maehler, Die Auffassung der Dichterberufs im frühen Griechentum bis zur Zeit Pindars (Göttingen 1963), 16-17; for more details on Thamyris,

96

Poetic Memory and Epic (De)Composition

targets the conception of the Homeric Achilles as embodiment of the epic ideal. A strong memory in retelling the past, and the power of recollection and paradigmatic speech, are distinct attributes of the epic narrator209; not surprisingly, all three are features of Nestor’s character, alike in Homer and in Metamorphoses 12. In both epics, the king of Pylos on account of his intimate knowledge of the literary tradition controls the development of the epic plot, including the role and characterization of Achilles in it.210 Specifically, Nestor challenges Achilles’ heroic self-portrayal by playfully antagonizing Achilles’ obsessions with epic gender and his anxiety to follow after the conduct of his Homeric counterpart. Gender and the poetics of gender determine the interpretation of the story of Caeneus, in whose identity the masculine and the feminine coexist: his preternatural invulnerability and male sexuality were conferred as reparations for the violation he previously suffered as a female. It will be shown that the Caeneus story is proffered as a parable intending to undermine the excessively masculine profile of the Centaurs, Caeneus’ opponents in the Centauromachy, and by association, of Achilles, whose rage against Cycnus the Centaurs vividly and purposely evoke. Set at the center of the Centauromachy, the erotic drama of Cyllarus and Hylonome (12.393-403), an invented love story which draws on famous epic intertexts that celebrate, among other

209

210

see Od. 1.351-352 and 9.73-75; Hym. 21.146-152, 160-161, 169-176; and Theognis 993-996 West. Hinds 1998, 3-5, and J.F. Miller, ‘Ovidian Allusion and the Vocabulary of Memory’, MD (1993), 153-164, have discussed how attestations of the word ‘I remember’ in the Metamorphoses may be interpreted as allusions to earlier literary texts; specifically on poetic annotation in Latin epic, see S. Hinds, ‘Reflexive Annotation in Poetic Allusion’, Hermathena 158 (1995), 41-51. For Wheeler (1999, 189) the performance of Ovid’s Nestor encapsulates the dynamics that underlie the texture of the Metamorphoses: “Ovid uses the same technique of repetition and variation in the two set-pieces of pitched battle in the Metamorphoses. One is narrated by the poet himself (5.1-235, Perseus and Phineus); the other is narrated by Nestor (12.210-535, Lapiths and Centaurs). … Ovid is a heterodiegetic narrator who operates from a virtually omniscient point of view. Nestor, by contrast, is a homodiegetic narrator who was an eyewitness and participant in the battle that he narrates”. Wheeler believes that Ovid eventually distances himself from Nestor, when at the close of the Centauromachy the king of Pylos is cast as an unreliable narrator, who “is rendered suspect when Tlepolemus points out that he purposefully excludes Hercules from his account (12.536-577)”. I do not agree with Wheeler’s assessment here. In my understanding (see also my argument in the first part of the next chapter) Nestor’s inaccurate narration before Tlepolemus denotes purposeful selectivity in the details of his chosen mythos, and so reflecting Ovid’s customary radical treatment of earlier tradition to underscore his control over poetic memory.

3. Epic Poetics: The Master of Epic Memory

97

issues, the ideal of heroic companionship and self-denial, represents another expression of gender fusion. The study of the gender factor in the Centauromachy narrative is interlocked with epic poetics, inviting us to consider Nestor’s antagonistic reaction to Achilles’ portrayal of his Cycnus conquest in the light of his traditionally famous deeds, and accordingly, to read the Centauromachy as an allegorical commentary on the earlier battle between Achilles and Cycnus. By improving on his Homeric counterpart, Nestor redrafts his recollection of the battle between the Centaurs and the Lapiths into a new shape, at once original and familiar, so that it may comment on the Iliad all the while it reads as a mise en abyme of the ‘little Iliad’.211 Moreover, Caeneus’ change into a phoenix at the end of Nestor’s recollection (12.522-532) is part of a wider web that links this rare bird to other avian transformations that mark openings and closures in the ‘little Iliad’ – the Cycnus miracle, the Aesacus story and the transformation of the Memnonides. The thematics of the phoenix and the closural significance of this miracle will be fittingly discussed in the closing part of this chapter. The combination of newness with the familiar that determines the poetics of Ovidian epic, and evidently is mirrored in the texture of Nestor’s narrative, is hard to separate from another major prescript underlying Ovid’s epic synthesis: hybridity. Hybridity is defined as the outcome of mixing together, or more correctly, amalgamating, to produce a single entity, an assortment of elements that are prima facie incompatible. This convergence of mutual exclusives produces a monstrum, an object that elicits admiration because it belongs outside the common experience, and which, because of this extraordinariness, qualifies as a ‘spectacle’, something worth pointing at, and hence, worth seeing. The Ovidian narrator is fascinated with graphic visualizations of monstra, and the Centauromachy offers a chance for him to make a display of his virtuosity to capture with words complex images and transform them into nearly animated ekphrases. The hybrid nature of the Centaurs is remarked upon in a variety of fashions, because it assumes various shapes in the images and actions of individual Centaurs. Hybridity is manifested most prominently in the love story of Cyllarus and Hylonome, where several distinct elements that normally do not belong together unite and line up next to other similar unorthodox binaries. Thus, disparate physiognomies (human and equine) be211

Ovid is fond of the mise en abyme technique, and several of his most poetically colored episodes are designed to function as miniatures of the Metamorphoses; the Centauromachy comprises a prime such narrative moment, as principal elements of the literary composition process, the author, the text and the addressee, are mirrored within; on mise en abyme in Ovid, see especially Rosati 2002; and in Latin epic more broadly, Fowler 2000, focusing on the Aeneid.

98

Poetic Memory and Epic (De)Composition

come directing agents in a narrative of fuzzy sexuality and ambiguous gender roles, and, no less, of undetermined genre, since different literary forms (epic, didactic and elegiac) are simultaneously at work and interlock. The outcome celebrates the composition of a multi-generic epic of high quality in terms of poetics, while simultaneously poking fun at the whole conception of such a daring literary experiment.

4. Epic Labor: Fighting the Freaks The battle between the Centaurs and the Lapiths is originally mentioned in the Iliad, and the broader symbolism of the episode as a miniature parody of the Iliadic battlefield action depends closely on the consideration of the Homeric text as the leading reference. The objectives addressed in this Ovidian mock-fight, even though not profoundly different, are much more varied. Ovid’s Nestor is presented with the opportunity to reinvent his Homeric narrator self, and so he revisits his Centauromachy experience, his very first Homeric appearance as advisor, and he refashions it according to the role of the epic critic he is called to play under Ovid’s different poetic circumstances. Endowed with an epic poet’s literary memory, he elaborates on the same metaphoric and metaliterary parameters of his story as these were originally presented in the Iliad. Thus, for a second time his recollection of the Centauromachy serves as a parable about, and a commentary on, the occasion that generated it, and not least, as an allegorical advertisement of the great storyteller’s meta-narrative artistry. 4.1. The Homeric Subtext The Homeric Nestor’s recollection of the battle between the Centaurs and the Lapiths is told as early as the first book of the Iliad (1.259-273), shortly after the outbreak of the argument between Achilles and Agamemnon. When Ovid’s Nestor follows his Homeric counterpart in reproducing the negative parallelism of Agamemnon (or Achilles, or Paris) to the women-snatching Centaurs212, he embraces much more than a trope of fashioning or evaluating epic morality. Nestor’s morally corrective recollections revolve around some 212

Cf. Alden 2000, 80-82, on the multiple audiences conceivably affected by the bride-stealing theme in Nestor’s first paradigmatic recollection. Ovid was particularly fond of bringing up the parallelism between Helen’s rape and the rape of the Lapith women in his erotic poetry (Am. 2.12.17-26 and Her. 15.249-252), while in a similar amatory context the paired rapes feature also in Prop. 2.6.15-23.

4. Epic Labor: Fighting the Freaks

99

exemplar of epic conduct, a parable centered on some reputed hero or wellknown story. This parable purports to serve Achilles with influential models to imitate – a ‘script’ for the composition and the continuation of the Iliad narrative. A basic narrative rule of Iliad plot progression dictates that whoever suggests an appropriate model to Achilles may also succeed in controlling, through Achilles’ actions, the main story of the Iliad – the epic mythos.213 The connoisseur par excellence of Achilles’ receptivity to action models is Nestor. It is Nestor’s suggestion that dispatched Phoinix’s embassy to plead with Achilles to reconsider214 and to present him with the influential (anti-) paradigm of Meleager.215 And it is Nestor who tries to lure Achilles back into action in Iliad 11, again indirectly, and offers the hero the alternative of a substitute in the character of his friend Patroclus (Il. 11.516ff.).216 Ovidian scholars have seen how the structure and the content of Nestor’s lengthy parable produce an example of the traditional epic flashback technique, with the narrator himself as leading participant.217 This technique, developed around the same hero, already appears in Homer. The Homeric Nestor is the character most fond of autobiographical digressions, always for 213

214 215

216

217

This argument is the subject of Rabel 1997. The main thesis of the study is summarized in the following statement quoted from p. 27: “Achilles repeatedly allows his fate to be determined by the external contingency of conveniently available models”. The embassy to Achilles in Iliad 9 is formed after Nestor’s suggestion; cf. Martin 1989, 81: “Phoinix... seems to stand in for Nestor in the embassy scene”. Meleager (Il. 9.524-99) is introduced as a model to reject turn away from rather than imitate. Achilles hears the story from the elderly Phoinix, in several respects a double for Nestor. The most complete study on the paradigmatic function of the Meleager story in the Iliad is Alden 2000, 179-290. On the numerous parallels between the cases of Meleager and Achilles in the Iliad, see Nagy 1979, 103-11, and G.F. Held, ‘Phoenix, Agamemnon and Achilleus: Parables and Paradeigmata’, CQ 37 (1987), 245-261, with earlier bibliography. Meleager is also discussed in the last chapter of this study, with relation to the death of Memnon and the miracle of the Memnonides. Nestor once again relates a distinguished military accomplishment of his youth, and by urging Patroclus to report in detail their conversation to Achilles (11.791 ’ , , ‘you should report these to the wise-hearted Achilles, in case he might hear’), he tries to influence the hero’s mindset expecting that his own achievements will inspire Achilles. Patroclus, however, never reports the first part of Nestor’s speech to Achilles; instead, captivated himself by Nestor’s rhetorical power, he usurps the role intended for Achilles. See the thorough study of the encounter between Nestor and Patroclus in Rabel 1997, 143-147; E. Minchin, ‘Speaker and Listener, Text and Context: Some Notes on the Encounter of Nestor and Patroclus in Iliad 11’, CW 84 (1991), 273-285; and V. Pedrick, ‘The Paradigmatic Nature of Nestor’s Speech in Iliad 11’, TAPA 113 (1983), 55-68. Ovid uses this technique to undermine the infallibility of the narrator, and thus, to challenge the existence of a single correct epic version; cf. Musgrove 1998, 223-231. Zumwalt 1977, 209-222.

100

Poetic Memory and Epic (De)Composition

the purpose of offering advice, prompting action along similar lines, and establishing his credentials as advisor.218 In the course of the Iliad, Nestor refers specifically to four of his past exploits and each time he emphasizes his part as an agent of epic deeds but mainly as giver of wise advice. The earliest of these memoirs concerns his participation in the battle between the Lapiths and the Centaurs (Il. 1.259-273).219 According to his account, the hero was an ) at the time when invited guest of the Lapiths (270 their fight against the Centaurs, the ‘mountainous beasts’ (268 ), broke out. Nestor fought on the Lapiths’ side, and his guidance led his hosts to victory (271-273). In the Iliad, Nestor’s Centauromachy parable counsels Agamemnon and Achilles to end their argument and reconcile. A compromising solution is introduced immediately afterwards (Il. 1.274-277). Nestor, however, never mentions what his advice to the Lapiths actually was, nor how this benefited them. Obviously this guidance was not an effort towards reconciliation, since the battle between them and the Centaurs continued until the Lapiths eventually won. The correspondence to the Agamemnon vs. Achilles feud, then, likely lies elsewhere, in those details of the Centauromachy omitted from Nestor’s speech, namely the wedding feast of Peirithous and the rape of the Lapith women. These themes, the narrative core of the legend, already determine the plot of the Trojan story, which likewise celebrates a war that broke out because a marriage was violently dissolved and the bride was led away – albeit on her own accord.220 The parallels are so profound that Nestor’s silence on the pivotal bride-stealing, the cause of the brawl, might hardly generate any surprise. Moreover, Nestor’s direct listeners are innocent victims of an alternative ‘bridal’ rape whose consequences have just begun to appear: the cause of the very argument between Achilles and Agamemnon, which Nestor tries to avert, is another case of rape. The implications of this subtle correla218

219

220

The interpretation of Nestor’s autobiographical parentheses as hortatory paradigms in close correspondence with the circumstances that caused their narration originally came under scope in N. Austin, ‘The Function of Digressions in the Iliad’, in: J. Wright (ed.), Essays on the Iliad (Bloomington, IN 1978), 70-84 [= GRBS 7 (1966), 295-312]. Prior to Austin critics rejected Ovid’s Nestor as a garrulous and leery windbag. For a full discussion, including bibliography, of Nestor’s tales and their decisive impact on the development of epic action in the Iliad, see now Alden 2000, 74-111. The other three include his response to the taunts of Ereuthalion (Il. 7.132-156), his role in the wars of the Pylians against the Arcadians (Il. 11.605-803), and his participation in the funeral games at Bouprasion (Il. 23.630-642). The same correlation of Paris’ rape of Helen to the Centaurs’ rape of the Lapith women is noted in the ‘little Iliad’. In 12.5, Ovid reflects Helen’s abduction by Paris (rapta conjuge) as the beginning of the Trojan War. Likewise, in 12.223, Hippodameia is abducted by Eurytus, and so the battle between the Centaurs and the Lapiths breaks out (raptatur nova nupta).

4. Epic Labor: Fighting the Freaks

101

tion reduce Agamemnon to the status of the bestial Centaurs. Alden (80ff.) believes that Nestor’s insinuations hit the target with Agamemnon, who admits that the proposals by the king of Pylos subsequent to the parable, includμ , ing the restoration of Briseis to Achilles (Il. 1.275), were spoken ‘fitly’ (Il. 1.286). Neither Alden nor anybody else comments on how Achilles received Nestor’s words in the Iliad. Nestor’s intervention in the ‘little Iliad’, coming at Achilles’ invitation rather than being self-motivated, provides an answer to this, because the Ovidian Centauromachy has been composed above all to antagonize Achilles’ epic expectations. The hero, for the second time in his diachronic, crosstextual lifetime, listens to the same outlandish myth, and he faces the challenge to assess his role in it anew. The external audience221, too, is served a similar challenge, to assess the Centauromachy account, first in the light of the exchange between Achilles and Nestor, and subsequently in agonistic comparison to the meta-narrative success of its Homeric model. A story initially addressing the major themes of a narrative cluster ‘A’ (‘the rape of Briseis by Agamemnon and the chain-reaction this causes for the Greek fortunes at Troy’) is recalled by the same internal narrator (‘Nestor’) inside a new crosstextual cluster ‘B’ (‘Achilles’ celebration of his Cycnus conquest’). The recollection is designed to cause sensation, for its integration inside Ovid’s narrative frame is marked by a profound chronological inconsistency: in actual Trojan War time, Achilles’ banquet after the Cycnus ‘victory’ takes place before the argument between Agamemnon and Achilles over Briseis, the occasion that elicited Nestor’s original (Homeric) recollection. Accordingly, the Ovidian, not the Homeric, Centauromachy is the one actually told first!222 The interpretation of the Ovidian Centauromachy is directed by the narrative function of the same story in its original Homeric version, but the chronological reversal of the two events as a result of the ‘precedence’ of the Latin narrative dissolves this balance. This logical breach underscores the independence of the Ovidian Nestor from the model text, empowering Ovid to maintain that his own master narrator has crafted a superior narrative, certainly in length but more importantly in complexity. Nestor, in a word, personifies in the Metamorphoses the mechanics of composing new, engrossing narratives out of textual models seemingly limited and exhausted. Nestor’s investment in the unprecedented and the spectacular (175 monstri

221 222

Wheeler 1999, 189, clearly distinguishes between Ovid’s and Nestor’s audiences. On temporal inconsistencies, a recurring feature in the Metamorphoses, see the papers by D. Feeney, ‘Mea Tempora: Patterning of Time in the Metamorphoses’, and A. Zissos and I. Gildenhard, ‘Problems of Time in Metamorphoses 2’, in: Hardie-Barchiesi-Hinds 1999, 13-30 and 31-47, respectively.

102

Poetic Memory and Epic (De)Composition

novitas, ‘the newness of this marvel’) trumps over, so to speak, Achilles’ ‘minutely [i.e. repeatedly] treated military feats’ (161 exhausta pericula).223 4.2 Epic Gender and Epic Performance Caeneus was one of the Lapiths mentioned by name in the Iliadic Nestor’s reminiscence of the Centauromachy, the third in a list of six names of Lapith fighters. The list (Il. 1.263-265) opens with Peirithous, whose wedding furnished the setting for the battle, and closes with Theseus, Perithous’ inseparable companion. The six heroes are called the ‘mightiest of men on earth’ (266·/ μ , 267 ‘they were the mightiest men on earth: they were the mightiest’), but also men who belong to a time bygone (272). In the Latin Centauromachy, Caeneus becomes from a mere name the center of a paradigm. Thematically, this complements the Achilles-Cycnus episode, and the two together rephrase essential issues of the Homeric Iliad. Caeneus’ extraordinariness is of course his fused gender status: a transsexual male whose impenetrable body was his reward for being subjected, as a female, to rape, that is, forced penetration.224 For Achilles who epitomizes epic masculinity, the entwining of invulnerability with questionable sexuality in Caeneus’ tale is as interesting as the way in which this marvelous human died. Nestor’s initial evasiveness in identifying Caeneus’ opponent stimulates Achilles’ curiosity (12.179-181) and activates his imagination, possibly envisioning in the Lapith’s conquest the desirable parallel to his own victory – the established epic precedent – and in Caeneus’ uniqueness the original epic material he craves to enhance his epic status.

223

224

The production of original compositions from much-treated material had already been problematized by Vergil. In the Aeneid, Diomedes refuses to initiate a re-production of the ‘Trojan War’ when invited to do so by the Rutulians in Book 11, and proves himself a selfstanding narrator by opting against parallel treatments of much-discussed material (exhausta); cf. P. Hardie, ‘Fame and Defamation in the Aeneid: The Council of the Latins, Aeneid 10.495-505’, in: H.-P. Stahl (ed.), Vergil’s Aeneid: Augustan Epic and Political Context (London 1998), 254-260; Papaioannou 2005, 157-163, interprets the act of Ovid’s Diomedes in the ‘little Aeneid’ as a parable about reinventing much-told narratives; Ovid’s Nestor appears to observe the same model of the transmigrant vates speaking from experience. Caeneus’ legend was popular in antiquity, especially in the Hellenistic period, principally because of the transsexuality element in it. Forbes Irving 1990, 155-162, offers an informative analysis of the thematic complexity behind the Caeneus legend (specifically of the literary treatment of the theme of sex change and the male vs. female antithesis).

4. Epic Labor: Fighting the Freaks

103

Does Achilles deservedly claim to establish himself as heroic exemplar, to be a model rather than to follow a model? Nestor does not think so. Rather, as he compares Achilles’ fight against Cycnus to the fighting of the Centaurs against Caeneus, the king of Pylos not only makes Cycnus look less marvelous and Achilles less original, but he also announces that the Greek warriors at Troy have limited, and thus unreliable, memory. Nestor’s emphasis on his great age brings across the idea that he possesses authentic knowledge, the result of personal experience: Met. 12.186-188 ac si quem potuit spatiosa senectus / spectatorem operum multorum reddere, vixi / annos bis centum; nunc tertia vivitur aetas (‘and if long-extended age could have made someone a witness of many deeds, I have lived for two centuries/two hundred years, and now I am living in my third century/third age/generation’). This longevity enables him to control the earlier epic tradition, to know personally of epic incidents that nobody else has experienced, heard of, or remembers.225 Achilles’ fellow combatants are ignorant of the story of Caeneus, and they are led to believe, as the banquet setting suggests, that the case of Cycnus is unique. The revelation of their ignorance suggests that they are not ready to determine whether Achilles’ feat deserves to become part of epic memory, and this diminishes their authority as a kleos-granting audience. Turning to the issue of masculinity and its centrality to all things epic, the account of the combat between Caeneus and the Centaurs takes on the demonstration of virtus, in the general sense of distinguishing oneself in action as well as in the particular way of executing the foe – issues which, as seen earlier, concern Achilles seriously: his anguish about his inability to pierce through the body of Cycnus communicates his deep anxiety about the success of his ‘epic’ performance. Nestor’s recollection of the Centaurs exemplum shatters Achilles’ deluding self-profiling. The overlong account responds to Achilles’ Cycnus experience with a counter example of a marvelous epic hero226 so proximal that the similarity could only make Achilles self-conscious. It involves the Centaurs, creatures associated with brutality227 and excessive masculinity.228 It speaks of 225 226

227

For Zumwalt (1977, 215), Nestor is portrayed as “the virtual embodiment of vetustas, in the sense of ‘antiquity’ or ‘ancient tradition’”. For the parallels between Caeneus and Cycnus, and for the subsequent equation between the angry Achilles and the wild Centaurs, see O’Bryhim 1989, 50-52. More recently, Keith 1999, 231-238, has emphasized a different set of parallels centered on Cycnus’ and Caeneus’ exemplification of virtus as a result of their invulnerability, and the similarly “unmanly” way of their respective deaths. For example, both Caeneus and Cycnus are favorites of Poseidon, both are invulnerable and cause their attackers’ weapons to break, both finally succumb to a bloodless death by suffocation, and they are both transformed into birds. Half-humans and half-animals, the Centaurs very early in Greek mythology were identified with the barbaric ‘other’, the uncontrolled and misanthropic. In the Centauromachy, exces-

104

Poetic Memory and Epic (De)Composition

Caeneus, a hero, whose heroic status resulted from the gender transformation granted to him as compensation for his being raped (Met. 12.188-208) and whose sexual identity is constantly evoked as a rebuke. After her rape, Caenis asks for gender inversion because she does not wish to be penetrated ever again (12.201-202). In the course of the Centauromachy, Caeneus’ former sexual identity is made a matter of a most explicit sexual taunt by the Centaur Latreus (12.470ff.). Latreus, unlike other Centaurs, does not fight with sacred chandeliers, altars, or stools, but, like Achilles, he has a lance, which is further described as Macedonia sarisa (466; 478; and as hasta at 476), a weapon known for being longer than a usual spear. Weapon terminology was perhaps the most popular source of sexual metaphors for the penis, with the most common being the spear, the sword, and a variety of synonyms for the latter.229 For his part, Achilles appears very distressed by the fact that his spear (82 gravis hasta; 83 certa... in hasta; 105 ferrum... hastae; 112 opusque meae... hastae; 115 hastam) cannot harm Cycnus. As already seen, in his mind, this may potentially jeopardize his claim to virility: ‘manus est mea debilis ergo, / quasque’ ait ‘ante habuit vires effudit in uno?’ (‘“Is my hand then impotent’, he said, ‘and the strength that it once had wasted away in this single occasion?”’ Met. 12.106f.). Achilles’ earlier assimilation to an animal well known for high sexual drive, a taurus attacking his foe with his terribile cornu230, is sexually explicit, and thereby puts him once again very close to the Centaurs.

228

229

230

sive consumption of wine (a product of civilization) caused their bestial side to take control over their human side, leading to the outbreak of the fight. In Ovid, there is specific mention of the energy and passion for combat with which wine injects the Centaurs (Met. 12.242-243 vina dabant animos, et prima pocula pugna / missa volant fragilesque cadi curvique lebetes, ‘wine was giving them courage, in the beginning of the fighting wine-cups and fragile jars and hollow jugs went flying through the air’). On the symbolism behind the Centaurs’ myth in antiquity, see du Bois 1982. The Centaurs, being half horses, were seen as sexually licentious creatures, and the violent temperament of their equine nature added to that of their human virility; on the sexual aggressiveness of the Centaurs, see du Bois 1982, 31; for Henderson 1975, a ‘Centaur’ (Gk. Kentauros) is a compound of two terms descriptive of violent sexual intercourse. , “any point or goad”, was common for the phallus (p. 122); , in addition to toying with the reputation of the bull as a highly sexed animal, frequently alluded to the phallus (p. 127). Likewise, alluded to the act of penetration in intercourse, while as sexual term it always applied to rapid coitus (pp. 178-179); cf. also n. 159 above. Adams 1982, 19-21; Loraux 1987, 11-13; cf. also the approach to war as rape in R. Mitchell, ‘The Violence of Virginity in the Aeneid’, Arethusa 24 (1991), 219-238, and the assimilation of murder by the sword to sexual penetration – and in particular virginal defloration – in some famous single combats in the Aeneid. The term cornu (Gk. ) itself is frequently employed by both Greek and Latin authors to signify the penis, and thus, it appears to have a function synonymous to that of ; cf. Archil. 247 West, Iambi; Petronius 134.11: nisi aliud tam rigidum reddidero quam cornu; also Pliny, HN 11.261: (genitalia) urso quoque, simul atque expiraverit, cornescere aiunt, who

4. Epic Labor: Fighting the Freaks

105

An even better way to observe Nestor’s play on the politics of masculinity, and to study Ovid’s grappling with the poetics of genre, in particular traditional epic poetics, is to reflect on the figure and the role of the female Centaur Hylonome. The Cyllarus-Hylonome pair and their fated love story are featured at the core of the Centauromachy, and they invert the epic politics of gender and genre. In the affair, the pursuer is the female Centaur, Hylonome, who not only fights alongside her mate, but ends up defending Cyllarus and dying over his body. This temporally regressive digression operates both as foil and mirror for the broader, temporally regressive digression within which it belongs, and conveys the same doubly dubious message to Achilles. In the attack against Achilles’ masculinity, as the hero is being likened now to bestial Centaurs, now to cross-gendered Lapiths, and in the puzzling paradigm that develops around the fated union of an effeminate young Centaur and his manly female partner, Ovid assesses the essence of the epic genre. Women and love, and specifically manly women in love, are alien bodies inside the world of ancient epic, and when they appear they release forces that stall or distort the progression of the story as designated by the rules that govern epic composition. Ovid conceives his Cyllarus idyll to theorize about the problematic treatment of the female in epic – a theme that the code of the genre excludes de facto, but whose inclusion the success and self-ascertainment of an epic absolutely demands.231 The central presence of a most extraordinary, altogether unprecedented in literature, female hybrid expresses the poetic fermentation over epic self-consciousness, inasmuch it serves the more specific objective to advertise the epic alterity and the marvelous uniqueness of the Metamorphoses. “All oral storytelling is performance. Whether it is produced for an audience of one or an audience of a hundred, whether the context is informal or formal, a storytelling is an event in itself”.232 With this assessment in mind,

231 232

seems to record here a popular belief; cf. Adams 1982, 22. See Keith 1999, 231-233, for an interesting reading through which Cycnus emerges as an excessively masculine hero with a latent feminine side, and, suggestively, Achilles’ dormant alter ego. For the gendered dynamics of the Caeneus story and their correlation to the broader thematic structure of the ‘little Iliad’, see Keith 2000, 81-86. An insightful introduction to the topic is S. Hinds, ‘Essential Epic: Genre and Gender from Macer to Statius’, in: Depew-Obbink 2000, 221-244. E. Minchin, Homer and the Resources of Memory (Oxford 2001), 17, discussing storytelling as social activity. There (see pp. 17-20 for an exposition of the author’s arguments) she touches upon the ambitious storyteller’s code of success when the purpose of the story told is to persuade the audience about something. This includes the presentation of a tale that, first, is appealing by containing “an element of the unexpected” and, second, has “a recognizable procedural format”, that is, it develops along a specific series of moves. Ovid’s Nestor, like his counterpart in Homer, is one such successful storyteller.

106

Poetic Memory and Epic (De)Composition

few would doubt that Nestor’s narrative, which is the lengthiest first-person recollection in the Metamorphoses, qualifies as a first-rate performance, being both a carmen, an epic poem, and a verbalized visual spectacle fit for amphitheatrical production.233 The battle between the Centaurs and the Lapiths is ideally suited to the space of the arena. A Centauromachy is an allegory for the Roman games and the culture of the amphitheater, since the Centaurs are not merely beasts but exotic monsters of a hybrid nature, similar to those frequently introduced before the arena spectators in antiquity.234 Yet, monstrous and exotic, or rather monstrous in order to look exotic, were also the human fighters of the amphitheaters, the gladiators.235 In their double roles as both attackers and victims the Centaurs flesh out one other facet of their natura duplex (502). Nestor’s repeated affirmations that he saw various battle moments (172f. Perrhaebum Caenea vidi, Caenea Perrhaebum236; 327 vidi ego Petraeum; 429 ante oculos stat et ille meos; 444 signa vides), apart from confirming his own active participation and bolstering his epic-hero profile and the credibility of his memoirs, further suggest that the extraordinary contest before his eyes is literally a performance, a verbal depiction of graphic violence, and that this performance is attended by an audience. Likewise, the employment of imago at 12.225 (captaeque erat urbis imago, ‘the image was that of a captured city’) suggests envisioning the Centaur attack against the Lapiths and their women in

233 234

235

236

Cf. also A. Lord, The Singer of Tales (Cambridge, MA 1960), 4: “An oral poem is not composed for but in performance”. For P.R. Hardie, ‘Coming to Terms with the Empire’, in: O. Taplin (ed.), Literature in the Greek and Roman Worlds. A New Perspective (Cambridge 2000), 430, the Centauromachy in Ovid’s epic “has a strong feel of the amphitheatrical; the half-man, half-beast Centaurs may be read as a phantasmagoric image of the confusion of man and beast in the arena”. Hardie professes elsewhere (1992, 63-66) that this fusion of man and beast was particularly popular among the ancient Italians, not only as spectacular entertainment, but also as a motif of decorative art. Literally speaking, the uncommon beasts of the arena and the human gladiators, who go through various disguises that detract from their humanity and their identity in order to make them look uncommon, converge because they represent variant expressions of monstra (etym. monstrare), attracting attention on account of their extraordinariness. On the appearance of gladiators, see M. Junkelmann, ‘Familia Gladiatoria. The Heroes of the Amphitheatre’, in: E. Köhne and C. Ewigleben (edd.), Gladiators and Caesars: The Power of Spectacle in Ancient Rome, transl. A. Bell (London 2000), 31-74. The chiastic recurrence of Perrhaebum Caenea after the verb vidi ‘translates’ the verbal recurrence into a reflection, with vidi acting literally as mirror. Overall, words and small phrases are repeated in close succession in identical or similar form throughout the Centauromachy; DeBrohun 2004, 421, justifies them as a reflection of the Centaur biformity.

4. Epic Labor: Fighting the Freaks

107

terms of an ekphrasis, likely drawing on the many well-known images of fallen cities in both the Iliad and the Aeneid, Ovid’s two great rival epics.237 Nestor, further, would explicitly refer to the many ‘deeds’ (opera; Gk. klea) he witnessed in his long life as spectacle, by calling himself a spectator, and not once but twice in five lines: Met. 12.183 multa… primis spectata per annis, ‘much… which I attended as spectator in my early years’; 186-187 potuit… senectus / spectatorem operum multorum reddere, ‘old age could make one a spectator of many heroic deeds’. The centralized placement of the ekphrasis-like account of the controversial Centaur couple, the anti-Centaur Cyllarus and the masculinized female Centaur Hylonome, the only female Centaur in the melee (and in surviving Greco-Roman literature for that matter), enhances the exotic dimension of the Centauromachy. The visual uniqueness of the two unorthodox Centaurs in combat by being further dramatized is advanced from picture or ekphrasis to a performance and a spectacle. In this light, the overlong battle between the Centaurs and the Lapiths is made to appear as a sequel of diverse stagings of theriomachies. Reflecting back to the AchillesCycnus combat, which was compared to a bullfight, Achilles’ assimilation to the bull translates the duel into a theriomachy. As such, it does not merely constitute the prelude to the fighting of the Centaurs; it is its mirror image in miniature form, its cameo appearance. A fighting bull keeps an audience’s attention suspended only because someone else wishes this to happen. The real master in control of the bull’s performance in the arena is not the bull, but the bullfighter. The latter scripts the bull’s moves, and determines the degree of physical strength and the amount of excitement that the bull will display. The fighter consciously limits his movements, as to appear on the sidelines of the action kinetically speaking, and directs the audience’s gaze instead to focus on the bull’s hypermovement and the fluttering of the rage-stirring red cloak. It is the skill of handling the cloak that dictates the pace of the bull’s anger, the direction of the animal’s course, the intensity of its moves, the trajectory of action of the overall performance. In one phrase, it is the mastery of art over the crude and the uncontrollable that is crowned victorious. The applause at the end is for the fighter; the bull’s ‘reward’ is usually death. Did Ovid need a better parable to project his poetics of reinvented epic? 237

Baldo 1995, 196-198. For Baldo, two famous epic images are specifically alluded to with this phrase. The first imago features the clamor raised by Hecuba and Priam when they see Hector’s dead body on the battlefield following his single combat with Achilles (Il. 22.40511); Homer parallels the mourning over Hector to the mourning over Troy. The second captures the mourning (clamor) that was raised in Dido’s palace right after the queen’s suicide, which is projected in terms of the mourning that the Carthaginian people would raise if Carthage perished in flames.

108

Poetic Memory and Epic (De)Composition

4.3. The Architecture of the Epic Spectacle The structure of the elite Roman’s life was a performance of maleness on various fronts (in the forum during peace, on the battlefield during war). Death, the final scene in the play of life, was naturally subject to the same performance anxiety. An epic, a masculine performance, is not the prerogative of the actors in a given narrative more than of those who set the parameters for this narrative to unravel smoothly. These directors are, of course, the aoidoi. Nestor, who wins kleos for himself by validating the kleos (the masculinity) of the heroes he praises, and the skilled aoidos who directs a performance, intersect. It is interesting that the Homeric Nestor is cognizant of the power and metaliterary value of his words, and especially his paradigms. He carefully points out that his speech is not mere ‘words’ ( ), but μ , a term that Martin translates as ‘commands’, but the more suitable ‘directions’ expresses better its function as part of a speech that talks about advice in terms of a scripted performance.238 Along these lines the Centauromachy is as much about Achilles as it is about Nestor, and it extols the elderly narrator’s own virtus by means of undercutting Achilles’ virtus. The son of Thetis, instead of finding the champion of his prowess in Nestor, unwittingly opens the field to a serious competitor, whose great weapon is his eloquence in combination with his long, photographic memory.239 Every epic contains multiple battle scenes of spectacular killings steeped in cruelty and the grotesque.240 In Nestor’s epic, the fighting proper (219-535) spreads over a long sequence of individualized single combats. Nestor, careful 238

239 240

Martin (1989, 104f.) cites Il. 1.273 and 4.323 as representative cases where Nestor uses mythos with the meaning of ‘command’; Martin justifies his interpretation on the basis of Nestor’s function as the speech instructor, and to some extend, the epic-conduct director, for younger heroes. On rhetorical eloquence at the service of praising masculinity, including the orator’s own, see M. Gleason, Making Men: Sophists and Self-Presentation in Ancient Rome (Princeton 1994). Baldo 1995, 170-202, discusses Ovid’s treatment of the epic battle. Focusing on the conflict between Perseus and Phineus in Met. 5.1-235, a narrative often evoked in the Centauromachy, Baldo argues that the battle is a distinct epic moment: “La battaglia è il tema principe dell’ epica eroica, l’ epica per eccellenza, oggetto di recusatio da parte del poeta alessandrino e, poi, del poeta elegiaco romano, desideroso di radicare i propri versi in una scelta di vita ‘altra’, decisamente anticonformistica” (173). Ovid, who likewise serves a Muse that is both epic and ‘altra’, indulges in gory battle moments, but he transposes them into unfitted contexts so as to appear comic (174). According to T.B. Brunner, ‘The Function of the Simile in Ovid’s Metamorphoses’, CJ 61 (1966), 354-355, these battle accounts incorporate similes that point directly to battles in Vergil and Homer. Brunner calls these similes “epico-omerica”; in Metamorphoses 12, he identifies a total of 9: 102-104, 225, 248249, 274, 276-279, 402, 480, 481, 520-521.

4. Epic Labor: Fighting the Freaks

109

not to sound repetitive, produces a serial of extreme violence but of episodic structure, and even though every battle narrative is drenched in horror and blood, no two of them read alike. At the same time, the emphasis on the minutiae of the carnage reveals Nestor’s concern to take further advantage of the thematization of the grotesque, and so to combine variatio with enargeia. Enargeia, ‘vividness’ (Latin, e-vide-ntia, illustratio, de-monstra-tio [cf. the monstra that dominate Nestor’s recollection]), is the power to make the audience draw an image mentally by listening only to a description of it, and it even can invade the domain of memory.241 Bardic performance crosses paths with dramatization, enmeshing narration and spectacle. Even further, the visual properties of a song that reputedly versifies eyewitness experience are hardly different from those of a historian’s account of the past, also perceived as a ‘visible’ reconstruction of the events.242 By reviving the Centauromachy, Nestor urges his various audiences, and foremost Achilles, to respond to it as spectators, and invites them to comprehend the supporting texture that harmonizes his ‘text’ within the thematic structure of the ‘historical’ present wherein it belongs, that is the Trojan War.243 DeBrohun, in her recent discussion of the Cyllarus and Hylonome interlude, labels the verbal narrative of the exceptional portrayal of the two young Centaur lovers a “double ecphrasis”. DeBrohun’s characterization comprises much more than the graphic detail of the physique of the two star-crossed hybrid lovers and the aesthetics of their visualization. The notion of duplicity applies beyond the male and the female caption of a monstrum, to the double (equine and human) nature of the Centaur creature and, further, to a long series of opposites. These values are mirrored in the dichotomy of the Centaur symbolism, and include paired antitheses such as nature (horses)/culture (humans), male/female, masculinity/femininity, war/love, heroes/beasts, spectator/spectacle, and, encompassing all, love elegy/epic.244 The contrast241

242

243

244

On the spectrum of the technical vocabulary deployed in Greek and Latin to capture the stylistic quality termed as enargeia, see G. Zanker, ‘Enargeia in the Ancient Criticism of Poetry’, RhM 124 (1981), 297-311; and A. Vasaly, Representations: Images of the World in Ciceronian Oratory (Berkeley/Los Angeles 1993); p. 90 n. 4 lists basic bibliography on the subject. On the historian’s understanding of success as the reconstruction of an event as visually inviting as possible, see G. Miles, Reconstructing Early Rome (Ithaca, NY 1995), 10-20 (discussing enargeia in Livy). A. Feldherr, Spectacle and Society in Livy’s History (Berkeley/Los Angeles 1998), 4-19, draws the parallels between the historian and the epic bard in their respective efforts to ‘illustrate’ the past. Referring specifically to Livy, Feldherr contends that the Augustan historian embraces enargeia in order to integrate his work into the sequence of public acts he reports. DeBrohun 2004, discusses all these antinomies in the Centaur love affair – each pair separately but also their interrelation to other pairs – following a concentric movement from the central piece of the interlude to the periphery of the entire Centauromachy.

110

Poetic Memory and Epic (De)Composition

ing of opposites proceeds further: each member of these pairs is itself the fusion of elements mutually discordant. For DeBrohun and others, the Cyllarus-Hylonome pair, a successful union of opposites, encapsulates the definition of harmony in a world of discord and disruption. This harmony, however, is, ironically, only on the surface and perhaps this is why it stands out so centrally and so prominently. The very humanity of the two lovers, which their mutual affection underwrites and DeBrohun advertises, is “starkly anthipathetical” to the battle context inside which they are encased; it is the startling exception to a sweeping rule. This immediate context consists of four brutal and grossly portrayed deaths of Centaurs. The cruelty marking all four of them is combined with a consistent emphasis on their hybrid Centaur physique, the half-man, half-horse nature, and on the inferior status of the beast versus the man. In reality the “exploitation of the Centaurs’ double form by their opponents”245 proceeds more deeply: the Lapiths make a point of attacking and mutilating first the human half of their enemies. Once the human side is de-formed, and so dehumanized, the animal half falls an easy, and all the more spectacular, prey. This abrupt, always explicit and usually brutally graphic separation of the two variant natures of the hybrids exploits the dynamics of spectacularity to stress that mutual opposites merely coexist but they never amalgamate; therefore, their union is fragile and temporary, and always extremely problematic. By recontextualizing the same pairs of opposite values that mark the CyllarusHylonome episode, the Ovidian narrator/Nestor assaults the archaic epic system of values, and specifically, the culture of antagonism, this epic crux of martial virtus. Prior to Cyllarus246 Nestor narrates of the deaths of the Centaurs Bienor and Dorylas. The former falls victim to Theseus, who sprang on the Centaur’s back and smashed his face (12.345-349). The latter dies doubly struck, first by Nestor and then by Peleus (12.380-392). The respective passages are worth quoting: tergoque Bienoris alti insilit, haut solito quemquem portare nisi ipsum, opposuitque genu costis prensamque sinistra caesariem retinens vultum minitantiaque ora robore nodoso praeduraque tempora fregit.

245 246

DeBrohun 2004, 420, noting the recurrent emphasis on the twofold shape of the Centaurs and the accentuation this ‘bi-formity’ receives in battle descriptions. The images of Dorylas and Bienor are visual inversions to that of Cyllarus; this is suggested at the opening of the Cyllarus unit with nec (393), a conjunction enforcing the connection of the two contrasting narrative segments; cf. Bömer 1982, 134 ad loc.

111

4. Epic Labor: Fighting the Freaks

[Theseus] sprang on tall Bienor’s back, who never before had carried anyone but himself. He pressed his knees into the Centaur’s sides and with his left hand clutched his flowing locks, and crushed with his knotty club the opponent’s face and mouth, which was screaming out threats, and his hard temples. additur his Dorylas, qui tempora tecta gerebat pelle lupi saevique vicem praestantia teli cornua vara boum multo rubefacta cruore. huic ego (nam viris animus dabat) “aspice”, dixi “quantum concedant nostro tua cornua ferro” et iaculum torsi; quod cum vitare nequiret, opposuit dextram passurae vulnera fronti. adfixa est cum fronte manus; fit clamor, at illum haerentem Peleus et acerbo vulnere victum (stabat enim propior) mediam ferit ense sub alvum. prosiluit terraque ferox sua viscera traxit tractaque calcavit calcataque rupit et illis crura quoque inpediit et inani concidit alvo.

380

385

390

To these is added Dorylas, who wore a cap of wolf’s hide on his head, and instead of a deadly spear he carried a notable pair of hooked bull’s horns, deep red, soaked in blood. To him, I (for my spirit gave me valiance) said: ‘Look, how little your horns avail against my steel!’ and I hurled the spear. Since he could not avoid it, he raised his right hand against his forehead to protect it from the wound: the hand was pinned against his forehead. A scream arose, but while the Centaur stood nailed and overwhelmed by the bitter wound, Peleus – for he was standing close by – stabbed him with his sword full in the belly. Fierce, he jumped forward, his own entrails on the ground dragged, and the dragged entrails he then trampled, and as he was trampling on them he burst them, and he entangled his legs in them and fell to the ground, with his belly empty.

The description of both deaths focuses on the spasmodic reaction of the equine half of the victim once the human half is neutralized. Both examples are distinguished by the same convergence of opposites: the Centaurs appear at once indomitable – and in vocabulary alluding to the dynamics of battlefield masculinity – and particularly vulnerable to emasculating modes of death. In fact, the animal half, the more valiant of the two, is ironically the body part so openly unprotected that it becomes a liability, and it brings about the death of the Centaur in a spectacularly tragic way. Bienor is incapacitated when Theseus rides on his equine back. Catalytic for the Centaur’s demise is the effect of the feeling of surprise at his being ridden for the first time – in other words, the realization that he is actually a horse. Nestor’s (or rather, the omniscient Ovid’s) comment that prior to Theseus’ attack Bienor ‘never before had carried anyone’ on his back designates a most crucial moment. The Centaur submits to his rider, as an animal would do under the circumstances. Since, however, he has not experienced a rider before, feeling powerless as a result of being ridden is something new to him. Thus his sub-

112

Poetic Memory and Epic (De)Composition

mission becomes humbling: at once he is mastered and realizes for the first time the whole truth about the innate limitations of his own nature. Bienor’s de-humanization is completed soon afterwards, first, when Theseus handles the Centaur’s exquisite hair-lock, a distinctly human characteristic, as if it were a horse’s reins247; and then, in the juxtaposition, on the one hand, of the possible etymology of the hybrid monster’s name from biê, ‘force’, the Homeric Achilles’ distinguishing quality, and, on the other, of the popularity of the same name among slaves in early imperial Rome.248 The same juxtapositions that mark Bienor’s characterization distinguish in particularly accentuated form the description of Dorylas’ horrible demise: the haughtier and more self-confident the hero (or the villain), the sounder and more crushing his downfall. Dorylas’ ferocity is underscored already in the details of his ambience. His head is covered with a cap of wolf’s hide and he holds a ‘bi-dent’ of two hooked bull’s horns (380-382), symbolically assuming traits of wild animals and projecting his bestial side amplified. His weapon along with the reference to the bull links Dorylas to Achilles, whose struggle against Cycnus was likened to that of the fighting bull in the arena at Met. 12.102-104, thus subtly drawing the trail of contingencies between Achilles and the Centaurs all through the Centauromachy: haud secus exarsit quam circo taurus aperto, cum sua terribili petit inritamina cornu, poeniceas vestes, elusaque vulnera sentit hardly different was his rage from that of a bull in the wide-open arena, when he attacks the scarlet cloak, the object of his wrath, with his formidable horns, and he realizes that it has eluded his blows.

The detail that these twin horns are soaked in blood, deep-purple in color, recalls in Achilles’ case the red cloth, which is used in a bullfight by the fighter to irritate the bull and force an attack, the culminating moment of this spectacle. Even the Centaur’s name, Dorylas, reminiscent of the ‘spear’ (Gk. doru), bespeaks of his wish to identify with his weapon and its broader sym247

248

Not least, the narrative of Bienor’s conquest is also sexually suggestive. As Adams has shown, the verb sedeo is employed to denote sexual intercourse in terms of horse riding, as it is in the Cyllarus case; Adams 1982, 165-166; the association of Cyllarus’ tergum sessile with the sexually charged meaning of sedeo has been noted also in DeBrohun 2004, 431. F. Bömer, Untersuchungen über die Religion der Sklaven in Griechenland und Rome I (Wiesbaden 21981), 206, lists several Latin inscriptions of slaves carrying this name. Much more pronounced is the etymological association of both these Centaurs’ names to violence. Dorylas’ name, in its Greek transliteration, , sounds particularly close to , one of the many attested proper names that are compounds of , ‘spear’ (Chantraine, p. 294), while Bienor is a transliterated form of the Greek name , a compound of (Chantraine, p. 174).

4. Epic Labor: Fighting the Freaks

113

bolism. And yet, this most violent and provocative wild creature suffers a most humiliating as much as horrible death, as if he is somehow being punished for his arrogance. A holder of a weapon that delivers double death, he becomes in turn himself the victim of a double attack. Nestor and Peleus reverse the pattern of attack implemented by Theseus, for they choose to strike first the human half of their hybrid foe; once the half-human is incapacitated, the battle is essentially, and tragically, over. Nestor nails the Centaur’s hand against his forehead. Like Bienor’s hair-tresses, the hand is a distinctly human body-part, and in the particular scene it embodies Dorylas’ humanity. Once the human side of the monster is immobilized, Peleus is free to attack the more vulnerable animal side, and conquer with little effort the enemy who dies in a ghastly way. The narrative of Peleus’ charge is reminiscent of a rape act, for the hero targets and penetrates the particular area of the monster’s lower belly (389 mediam ferit ense sub alvum, ‘stabbed him with his sword full in the belly’). The graphic description of Dorylas’ demise is distinguished by recurrent vocabulary suggestive of prolongation. The Centaur, trailing his entrails all over, leaves behind a long and macabre track of his own (figuratively as well as literally) prints, which is aptly rendered through elaborate verbal repetition: 390-391 viscera traxit / tractaque calcavit calcataque rupit, ‘his own entrails dragged, and the dragged entrails he then trampled, and as he was trampling on them he burst them’. Thanks to Nestor’s unparalleled skill in producing narratives of striking enargeia249, the reader visualizes the entrails as they unravel and pour out of the belly in a long, ghastly sequence, prefiguring a comparably long, horrific and agonizing death for Dorylas.250 Likewise structured around the vulnerability of the hybrid Centaur physiognomy, commenting on the logical impossibility of fusing the mutually exclusive natures of human and animal, are the death narratives of Phaeocomes and Hodites that follow after the Cyllarus episode. On both occasions there is a conscious effort to portray the awkward self-consciousness of this hybridity 249

250

Nestor’s oratorical talent to produce verbal ekphrases is distinguished by commutatio, ‘reciprocal change’. The author of the Rhetorica Ad Herennium defines a commutatio as a two-way equation between a verbal text and a painting (4.28.39). The orally produced picture the author of the treatise has in mind here is a poem – a ‘talking picture’ no less. Elsewhere in the Ad Herennium (3.28-40), the memorization and narration of certain images (imagines) is prescribed for orators to strengthen their mnemonic faculties, and this association between oratory, poetry, and narrative is particularly applicable in the case of the masters of poetic memory, Nestor and Ovid. On the definition of an orator’s skill of commutatio in terms of poetic narrative and verbally described pictorial representation in the Ad Herennium, see T.J.B. Spencer, ‘The Imperfect Parallel betwixt Painting and Poetry’, G&R 7 (1960), 175. For DeBrohun 2004, 421, the vocabulary repetition in these lines is part of a broader play on duplicity that underlines Dorylas’ death description, and involves double sounds and images. The aim is to associate the Centaur’s demise with his two-nature physiognomy.

114

Poetic Memory and Epic (De)Composition

as sensed by the Centaur. The etymology of Phaeocomes’ name (Gk. phaios+komê, ‘dark-haired’) confirms the designation of hair as a marked word in this multi-leveled game of polarities, identifies the Centaur’s human nature once again with the hair, and pairs Phaeocomes with Bienor. Phaeocomes’ equine body is remarked upon distinctly: Nestor mentions that no less than six animal hides are required to provide sufficient cover for the Centaur’s entire body. A few lines earlier, hides of wild animals dress Hylonome’s body (12.414-415 nec nisi quae deceant electarumque ferarum / aut umero aut lateri praetendat vellera laevo, ‘and on her shoulder or her left side she wore fitting hides from carefully selected animals’). Phaeocomes and Hylonome also have in common distinguishing hair. The Centauress’ concern for enhancing her feminine beauty includes special attention to the decoration of her hair (12.409-411 ut sit coma pectine levis, / ut modo rore maris, modo se violave rosave / implicet, interdum candentia lilia gestet, ‘that she would comb to smoothen her hair, that she might braid her hair sometimes with rosemary, sometimes with violets and roses, and sometimes she wore gleaming white lilies’).251 The violets and roses braided with Hylonome’s hair are multicolored (violet and red), a detail, however, that is only implicit, just like the unspecified, but semantically denoted, dark color of Phaeo-comes’ hair. Still, even though the focus on the hair as a marker of human identity in the ekphrasis of Hylonome’s physique favors the femina-side of the Centauress, the dominance of the wilderness theme in her environment, from dress to lifestyle, projects foremost her feral side, and forges an intended link between the ekphrastic core of the Centaur idyll and its contextual periphery. Phaeocomes’ strength, like his physique, is another unique hybrid, both super-human in strength and hyper-feral. In the pattern of the super-human epic heroes, the likes of the Homeric Diomedes or Achilles and the Vergilian Turnus, who alone lift boulders that normally only the joint effort of many humans could handle, Phaeocomes ‘hurls a log which two yokes of cattle could scarcely move’ (432 caudice … misso, quem vix iuga bina moverent).252 Fi251

252

DeBrohun (2004, 433-437) establishes Ovid’s liberal borrowing on his own beauty advice to women lovers (AA 3.101ff.) to produce the humanity and the femininity of Hylonome’s toilette. DeBrohun argues that each of the two young Centaurs clashes by design against the stereotypical Centaur model, while the antinomies in Cyllarus’ portrayal are different from those distinguishing Hylonome. The brutality of the Centaurs is, actually, not just super-human but non-human. The grotesque death of the Lapith warrior Cometes by the Centaur Rhoetus at 12.285-289 relies on an intertext from the Odyssey (10.391-394). The passage comes from the Cyclops episode, and describes how the monster crushes the skulls of Ulixes’ comrades before he devours them. This hypotext likens the Centaurs to the Cyclops, and emphasizes further their nonhuman, cannibalistic and monstrous nature; the Homeric intertext is noted in Baldo 1995, 177-179.

4. Epic Labor: Fighting the Freaks

115

nally, Phaeocomes’ undoing is ghastly and humiliating. The Centaur has brutally killed his Lapith opponent, Tectaphus, and he prepares to strip the dead body of his armor in the pattern of the victorious epic hero, when Nestor, replicating Peleus’ earlier example, stabs him and buries his sword deep in the area of the Centaur’s groin (439-441). Phaeocomes’ intention to strip naked his opponent (439 parat hic armis nudare iacentem, ‘he was getting ready to despoil his fallen victim’; 440 spoliantis, ‘the spoiler’s’) echoes Achilles’ attempt to despoil the body of Cycnus (143 victum spoliare parabat, ‘he made ready to despoil the conquered’). The comparison appears all the more intentional in view of the fact that no other Centaur (or Lapith) in the course of the battle demonstrates an intention to celebrate a victory by stripping the armor of the opponent’s dead body. The narrative leading to the death of Caeneus dramatizes one final instance of excessive bloodshed, all the while echoing in its thematics the story of Cycnus. The Centaur Latreus has just ended a series of sneers and insults at Caeneus and the latter’s former identity as a woman, and prepares to nail the body of his Lapith oppenent with his spear. Latreus’ rage is expressed both in the etymology of his name (latrare, ‘to bark’, alludes to an enraged dog) and in his distinct weapon, a sarisa (466), a particularly long spear. When the time for action comes, however, the Centaur fails to uphold his taunting speech, in which he projects the imagery of the raped female onto the impenetrable male fighter facing him: like Achilles’ sword against Cycnus, Latreus’ weapon does not penetrate his opponent’s body (482-483 laterique recondere duro / luctatur gladium; gladio loca pervia non sunt, ‘and strove to bury his sword in [his opponent’s] impenetrable side’); struck against Cycnus’ unbreakable skin the tip of the sword becomes useless, and when the Centaur stubbornly turns it edgewise and tries a new attack, it breaks into pieces (485489 in latus ensem / obliquat… / plaga facit gemitus ut corpore marmoris icti, / fractaque dissiluit… lammina, ‘he turned his sword edgewise… the blow resounded on the flesh as of on stricken marble, and the blade… broke into pieces’). Latreus fails to humiliate his foe; instead, he becomes himself a victim of a most violent attack and brutal death: Caeneus counterattacks and mutilates the Centaur’s body by throwing himself into a stabbing spree (12.490-493). Hodites, lastly, the second Centaur whose death is recorded in some detail following the death of Cyllarus and Hylonome, and the last Centaur to fall prior to Caeneus’ miraculous demise, meets the most tragic death of all – a fully ‘human’ death. His human half becomes incapacitated when Mopsus strikes him in the face with a spear, pierces his mouth and nails his tongue to his chin and the chin to the throat. Speech is of course the most distinct marker of human identity, and Mopsus’ blow affects every part of his opponent’s human anatomy contributing to the articulation of words: throat, mouth cavity and tongue. Deprived of the ability to express his agony and

116

Poetic Memory and Epic (De)Composition

pain in words, Hodites is robbed of his life along with his human identity. The victor Mopsus is not just any Lapith warrior: he is a seer, a vates, and so a speech manipulator, who aims precisely at the part of the human anatomy that he considers the most dangerous, the organs that contribute to the formulation and articulation of speech.253

5. The Spectacular Politics of Immortality Mopsus will be the crucial witness to attest to the transmogrification of Caeneus into a phoenix, contrary to the otherwise general consensus that wanted him dead and buried under a pile of tree trunks: exitus in dubio est. alii sub inania corpus Tartara detrusum silvarum mole ferebant; abnuit Ampycides medioque ex aggere fulvis vidit avem pennis liquidas exire sub auras, quae mihi tum primum, tunc est conspecta supremum. hanc ubi lustrantem leni sua castra volatu Mopsus et ingenti circum clangore sonantem adspexit pariterque animis oculisque secutus, “o salve” dixit, “Lapithaeae gloria gentis, maxime vir quondam, sed avis nunc unica, Caeneu!” credita res auctore suo est….’ (Met. 12.522-532) His end is doubtful. Some said that his body was forced down under the weight of the trunks to the void of Tartarus; but the son of Ampycus denies this. In the middle of the pile he saw a bird with golden wings fly up into the lucid air. I saw it too, then for the first time and the last. As Mopsus watched him circling round his camp in easy flight and heard it sounding with loud clangor, he followed him both with soul and eyes, and cried: ‘Hail, Caeneus, thou glory of the Lapithean race, once most mighty hero, now sole bird of thy kind!’ This story was believed because of him who told it.

Nestor’s decision to introduce Mopsus as the principal eyewitness in Caeneus’ phoenix metamorphosis is intriguing, especially since Nestor was himself standing by, a detail that our speaker does note (526 quae mihi tum primum, tunc est conspecta supremum, ‘I saw it too, then for the first time and the last’). Why does Nestor feel the need to employ someone else’s testimony to substantiate Caeneus’ metamorphosis? Or rather, why is it that, of all narrative moments in the course of the Centauromachy, only its coda receives the corroborating testimony of an additional eyewitness? Does this have to do 253

For discussion of Ovid’s use of the term vates, see J.K. Newman, ‘The Concept of Vates in Augustan Poetry’, Latomus 89 (1967), 100-111.

5. The Spectacular Politics of Immortality

117

with the particular miracle of Caeneus’ assumption of his/her new avian shape? And why does Nestor select the seer Mopsus of all the Lapiths present to fill in this role? Nestor identifies Mopsus by name in the tale of Caeneus in order to invalidate counter-opinions. Caeneus’ assumption is a miracle, beyond common experience and therefore, an occasion not readily plausible to the noneyewitness. Nestor, in fact, indirectly confesses to the existence of discordant or disbelieving voices, when he admits the circulation of rumors that Caeneus was simply smothered to death under a pile of trees (522f. alii… ferebant). For this reason, a second testimony in corroboration of the transformation is not merely desirable but necessary. Nestor’s eagerness to accept as true the miraculous rather than the rational version of Caeneus’ demise is dictated by the fact that Achilles’ own theriomachy also ended with a metamorphosis. As aforementioned, Cycnus, like Caeneus an impenetrable warrior, was throttled to death, and his body was changed into that of a swan leaving behind an empty armor and no trace of his former identity. In his systematic undermining of Achilles’ original scripting of himself as an epic hero, Nestor composes a text that would both replicate Achilles’ own and antagonize it by complementing the missing narrative details. The self-absorbed, overtly self-conscious Achilles, while chronicling the miraculous change of his opponent, seems oblivious to his surroundings, and, curiously, hardly interested in the particular event of the avian metamorphosis. To this attest the terse description of the miracle, in less than two lines (12.144-145), and, mainly, the epicenter of the army talk during the banquet, which specifically concerns Cycnus’ impenetrability; this is the sodefined mirabile visum, not the Trojan’s turn into a swan-like bird: proxima praecipue domito victoria Cycno in sermone fuit; visum mirabile cunctis, quod iuvenis corpus nullo penetrabile telo invictumque a vulnere erat ferrumque terebat. (Met. 12.164-167) In particular, the talk turned on Achilles’ most recent victory and the vanquishing of Cycnus. It seemed a marvel to everybody that a young man should have a body that no spear would penetrate, invulnerable, which blunted the sword’s end.

It is clear from the text above that Cycnus’ invulnerable body has generated much greater sensation than his change into a swan. Likewise oblivious to the avian metamorphosis of Achilles’ opponent is Nestor, whose longwinded sermon first and foremost refutes the so-introduced uniqueness of Cycnus’ impenetrability to weapons. Nestor’s own preternatural human counter-paradigm, Caeneus, is outstanding not for his postmortem transformation into an avian, but for its gender identity at birth as a female (12.174175).

118

Poetic Memory and Epic (De)Composition

The anonymous voices on Caeneus’ death (ferebant), finally, set up a possible crosstextual dialogue on poetics between Ovid and the earlier epic tradition, and in particular, Vergil. In the Aeneid, Caeneus did die and descend to the Underworld, where he is seen by Aeneas; but in the afterlife he resumed *her* female form: Aen. 6.448-449 it comes et iuvenis quondam, nunc femina, Caeneus / rursus et in veterem fato revoluta figuram, ‘then comes his comrade and young man once, now a woman, Caeneus, who by fate had switched back again to *her* female form’.254 Ovid attacks Vergil’s version, and in order to affirm the authority of his dictum he identifies the speaker who produces this new report with the seer Mopsus. Nestor’s decision to name Mopsus as the commentator on the phoenix spectacle is ingenious. First, as a vates, Mopsus has considerable authority, superior knowledge, vision and foresight, in so many words, someone not likely to lie. Second, according to tradition, there were two seers with the name of Mopsus. Mopsus, the Lapith seer who participated in the Centauromachy, enjoyed a special relationship with bird omens, and in epic literature he was considered an expert in understanding the language of birds.255 Since he was the one who saw the bird flying out of the stack of wood that was piled upon Caeneus and hailed it as a metastasis of the hero in avian form thus identifying the two, he is not to be disputed. Nestor’s stance on the miracle issue is very diplomatic. He does make a point of confirming that he saw the bird, but he carefully keeps his voice low, allowing the identification 254

255

Or alternatively, as A. Feldherr (‘Putting Dido on the Map: Genre and Geography in Vergil’s Underworld’, Arethusa 32 (1999), 99f.), astutely suggests, because “that is what is said of him” in the text of the Aeneid. For Feldherr “the linguistic playfulness in Vergil’s account of Caeneus makes the character’s transformation appear literally as a consequence of the poem’s description of him”. For the connection between ‘speech’ and ‘fame’ in the same term fatum/fata throughout the Aeneid, see S. Commager, ‘Fateful Words: Some Conversations in Aeneid 4’, Arethusa 14 (1981), 101-114, while Barchiesi 2001, 130-132, speaks generally on the complementary metaliterary function of fate and fame in the Augustan literature. The name and identity of Mopsus sits at the head of two different traditions, which are often mistakenly confused. There are two heroes, both famous seers, reported with the name Mopsus: the Lapith hero Mopsus, and a younger Mopsus, who lived a generation later. The former joined the Argonauts’ expedition, and during the journey he displayed his soothsayer skills when he explained the flight of a halcyon above Jason’s head. In the Metamorphoses, he appears again, as one of the participants in the Calydonian hunt (Met. 8.316). The latter Mopsus, an even more famous vates being the son of Apollo and the grandson of Teiresias, took part in the Trojan War. In the Nostoi, it is reported that he competed against Calchas in a divination contest and defeated him, and that as a result of this defeat Calchas committed suicide; cf. Rzach, ‘Kyklos’, RE XI.2, 2426; for a full list of sources on the two homonymous seers, see E. Simon, ‘Mopsos I’ and ‘Mopsos II’, in LIMC 6.1 (1992), 650-652 and 652-654, respectively.

5. The Spectacular Politics of Immortality

119

of the phoenix with Caeneus to come from the mouth of the accredited seer Mopsus. Third, as aforeshown in the present chapter, this link between the special mnemonic power of Nestor and a vates’ great knowledge is defined already in Homer, and the emphasis on Nestor’s exceptional memory and deep knowledge draws clear parallels with the supernatural omniscience of a divinely inspired vates. Nestor’s vates profile was part of the hero’s introduction to the epic, suggesting that his function in the narrative is defined through this double role as both epic singer/actor and epic hero/auctor. As Nestor is about to end his long narrative performance, Ovid deems it proper to underscore the binary nature of his most eloquent character. In his pronouncement of the conclusion to the Centauromachy narrative, in a speech emphatically reported in direct discourse, the seer Mopsus seeks indirectly to be acknowledged as a literarily accredited auctor (532 credita res auctore suo est, ‘the story was believed because of its author’). The seer is acknowledged as a bard, an author and narrator of his own epic creation. And so, vicariously through Mopsus, Nestor’s characterization comes full circle: his interconnected identities as hero and poet/bard, related to his invited introduction to the epic stage of the ‘little Iliad’, are recalled again. The epic poetics personified in the ‘sweetspoken’ mastermind of epic reminiscence, and the literary politics of reconciling a transformation miracle of an avian, a symbol of elusiveness, with traditional heroic narrative, interlock. The fourth reason for the invitation to Mopsus to partake of Ovidian poetics is complicated and twofold. The poetics in Mopsus’ act is easy to identify. Already the presence of ferebant (523), a marked term of literary annotation, translates the difference of eyewitness opinions on the avian marvel tied to the death of Caeneus into competing variant literary traditions. Mopsus incorporates a metamorphosis miracle, a non-epic as much as an anti-epic happening, and potentially a tall tale, into an epic narrative. A translator of the elusive and the visionary, Mopsus offers explanations that are logically not acceptable. In this respect, his role is most significant for two reasons, ostensibly at odds but in reality interlaced. On the one hand, the seer’s speech, which purports to dispel ambiguity about Caeneus’ fate, embodies the ‘fuzziness’ and allusivity of the Ovidian literary subtext. Through the avian disappearance of Caeneus as reported by the Lapith seer, Nestor provides what Hinds has described as an “exact account of allusive inexactitude”.256 From this perspective, Mopsus like Nestor questions the manipulation of epic accreditation. On the other hand, the Centauromachy first and foremost is an 256

Hinds 1998, 25; Hinds borrows the term “fuzzy logic” from computer modeling to describe (p. 50) the systematic effort to study the ever inexact nature of literary allusivity.

120

Poetic Memory and Epic (De)Composition

outright parody of Homeric-type epic. Achilles’ earlier combat with Cycnus is similarly a deflating account of an epic aristeia scene. By comparison, their respective closural narratives of avian miracles that follow similar thematic structures unfold along the same lines of critique of epic poetics. The employment of the auctoritas of a seer little known in literature, to make the absurd crowning scene of the parodic rehearsal of a Homeric battle appear serious, encapsulates the spoudaiogeloion257, the thematic foundation beneath Ovid’s antagonistic reenactment of the Homeric epic. The texture of the narrative on Caeneus’ avian metamorphosis deserves its own closer look. Applied properly it can disengage the marvel from its Centauromachy context, especially since the same issues recur later in the Metamorphoses and reach backwards to the opening of the ‘little Iliad’, the Aesacus story. Caeneus’ tale is unusual. Ovid never clearly designates the type of the bird appearing from underneath the pile of tree trunks toppled over Caeneus. Mopsus, seconded by Nestor, specifies that the bird has golden wings (524-525), and comments on particular features on its appearance (527-528 leni… volatu, ‘easy flight’; ingenti… clangore sonantem, ‘sounding with loud clangor’). Nestor, further, hastens to note that never again in his life did he see that same bird species (526). The rare bird with the golden plumage calls to mind Herodotus’ description of the phoenix, the earliest major surviving account on this magical avian.258 The strongest clue in Ovid that this bird must be the phoenix is when Mopsus calls it ‘sole bird of thy kind’ (531 avis unica).259 The phoenix indeed was known as a unique bird. There lived only one phoenix at a time, its life spanned over a period of five hundred years, and every new phoenix was reborn from the ashes of the old. These details are inductive towards identifying Mopsus’ bird as a phoenix; the deductive conclusion is forged in the light of the realization that the same details on the uniqueness of the phoenix are recorded only once more, a little later in the very text of the Metamorphoses. In the final book of the epic Pythagoras, a legendary embodiment of metamorphosis, near the end of his long speech to Numa (Met. 15.60-478) 257

258

259

A practice widely acknowledged as fundamental in Aristophanic Comedy, it has recently been argued to contribute seriously to the composition of the Homeric text; cf. F. Maiullari, Omero anti-Omero. Le incredibili storie di un trickster giullare alla corte micenea (Rome 2004), where the Homeric narrator emerges as a poet who cherishes irony, parody and humor. Hdt. 2.73: ‘They [the Egyptians] have also another sacred bird called the phoenix which I myself have never seen, except in pictures. Indeed it is a great rarity, even in Egypt, only coming there… once in five hundred years, when the old phoenix dies. … Its plumage is partly red, partly golden, while its overall shape and size are almost exactly that of the eagle’. To add to the parallelism between Caeneus and Cycnus, the later is also called unicus (12.169), in reference to his impenetrability.

5. The Spectacular Politics of Immortality

121

tells his own tale of the phoenix (15.392-407). Pythagoras announces (392) that he will talk about ‘the bird which itself renews and reproduces its own being’ (una est, quae reparet seque ipsa reseminet, ales), and on the line immediately below he identifies the bird by the very name (393 Assyrii phoenica vocant, ‘the Assyrians call it phoenix’). The implicit and the explicit references to the phoenix are in self-conscious interaction, for several important reasons. Pythagoras in Metamorphoses 15 has recently been read as a figure for the poetic voice through which Ovid works out his multi-vocal and multi-structural perpetuum carmen.260 This rebirth theme has been widely acknowledged as a metaphor for apotheosis, including the apotheosis of Ovid, and hence, for the immortality of his art. Then, the figure of Pythagoras both personifies and comments on transformation, fusion and hybridity, core issues of the NestorAchilles debate.261 Even further, Pythagoras embodies superhuman knowledge to the highest degree. His longevity extends back centuries, and his experience identifies with the history of humanity – or, literary tradition in its totality. On account of his omniscience of the past he is in a position to utter predictions for the future since the progression of time follows a circular pattern and every event repeats itself.262 In this view, Pythagoras stands for a grander embodiment of the omniscient and long-living Nestor – because he is a narrator convoluted and loquacious,263 and, at the same time, self-conscious and self-distanced.264 The phoenix epiphany draws all these parallels together. The placement of the phoenix’s birth to effect the transition from the whirling timezone of Nestor’s spatially and thematically labyrinthine reminiscence to the ‘Iliadic’ dramatic time, constitutes an elusive narrative error, a 260

261 262

263

264

On Pythagoras and transformation in Ovid, see principally, U. Todini, L’altro Omero. Scienza e storia nelle Metamorfosi di Ovidio (Naples 1992); also K.S. Myers, Ovid’s Causes: Cosmology and Aetiology in the Metamorphoses (Ann Arbor 1994), 133-166; P.R. Hardie, ‘Questions of Authority: The Invention of Tradition in Ovid’s Metamorphoses 15’, in: T. Habinek and A. Schiesaro (edd.), The Roman Cultural Revolution (Cambridge 1997), 185-189; K. Galinsky, ‘The Speech of Pythagoras in Ovid’s Metamorphoses’, PLLS 10 (1998), 330-331. On Pythagoras’ speech as confirmation of flux as central theme in the Metamorphoses, see Wheeler 2000, 120-121. Cf. Wheeler 2000, 114-127, on the circular structure of Pythagoras’ speech. Wheeler himself contends that eventually Pythagoras breaks out of this circular repetitiveness by espousing a historical perspective. Nestor’s speech in Metamorphoses 12, including his response to Periclymenus, comes to a total of 388 verses, a mere 30 verses short of Pythagoras’ 418 lines, the lengthiest primary narrative in Ovid’s epic. On Pythagoras as narrator, whose prophecy is not an act of foretelling but of memory (15.436 quantumque recordor; cf. Nestor’s plura tamen memini), see Barchiesi 2001, 62-69. In corroboration of his narrator profile, Pythagoras, like every Ovidian narrator and epic vates, invokes fama as his authority, at 15.431, when he is about to announce the rise of Rome; see Zumwalt 1977, 219.

122

Poetic Memory and Epic (De)Composition

most pertinent closure unit of analogous sophistication. Nestor’s turning over the vates role to Mopsus allows the voice of the Ovidian narrator to be heard with clarity, closing his mock epic with a marvelous parable on the poetics of epic transformation. The phoenix imagery regresses further, beyond its swan mirror reflection, to the opening of the ‘little Iliad’ and the story of Aesacus. As aforenoted, Aesacus’ is an invented story. Unhindered by Homeric archetypes urging comparison, the Ovidian reader is faced with a tradition-free text that is a non-epic but is acted out by the most celebrated epic characters, the Trojan War heroes. Aesacus is a son of Priam, but no son of Priam is ever recorded bearing this name in the Trojan epic tradition. Aesacus falls in love that is not reciprocal, and once scorned, he obsessively tries to kill himself; yet, no Homeric hero falls in love and is rejected, let aside considering suicide on account of this. Aesacus’ suicidal obsession determines his new form and becomes a trait of his new life as mergus, a ‘diver’. Finally, Aesacus’ funeral is a parody of an epic funeral: there is no body to bury – in fact there is no death at all, only a cenotaph, an expression of the desire to control the fleeting, incoherent and impossible to capture, let alone to contain. Neptune’s rape of Caenis, which opens Nestor’s narrative, recasts the theme of one-sided erotic passion leading to the offended side’s transformation. Transgenderism, desired (the Amazons) or enforced (Achilles at Skyros), is part of the ancient epic tradition and corroborates the genre’s masculine identity; cross-gendered characters, however, just like suicide-inclined scorned lovers, are unprecedented, for they do not belong inside the perimeter of the genre. Caeneus undergoes double transformation: born a (wo)man, s/he asks to be changed into a man as reparation for having been raped by Neptune; and from a (hu)man s/he changes into an avian. This double transformation, complete with a double change of name, follows after Aesacus’ similar switch of identity; but, while Aesacus fails to measure up to his name, Caeneus succeeds. Aesacus does not fulfill his promising future, the building of a name as famous and literarily meaningful as that of Hector, to whom he is directly contrasted (Met. 11.759-760 qui nisi sensisset prima nova fata iuventa, / forsitan inferius non Hectore nomen haberet, ‘had he not experienced a strange fate in his first youth, perhaps he would have a name not inferior to Hector’s’). Caeneus, on the other hand, does prove his new identity, of the male hero, and he carries it along in the masculine ending –eus that transformed his original name, the feminine ‘Caenis’. The first part of Caeneus’ story in Nestor’s speech describes the transformation of Caenis, the female rape-victim, into Caeneus, the impenetrable male warrior. The Centaurs taunt and discredit their opponent by referring to the hero’s initial sexuality, but in the end, their repeated and impressive failures to conquer Caneus’ body in conventional battle confirm conspicuously the Lapith’s maleness. Mopsus’ epigraphic exclamation at 531 addressing

5. The Spectacular Politics of Immortality

123

Caeneus as maxime vir quondam, ‘once mightiest of heroes’, confirms the male sex (vir) of the hero to the superlative degree (maxime), and by adding the past temporal marker (quondam) projects the male identity of the hero far backwards265, into a time of indeterminate length, editing the initial female part of the hero’s life out of future memory. Furthermore, Mopsus’ intervention, which juxtaposes Caeneus’ form in life and his new one after death (maxime vir quondam, sed nunc avis unica, Caeneu!), fires a direct challenge at Vergil. As seen above, the poet of the Aeneid held that upon descending to the Underworld Caeneus was transformed back into a woman (Aen. 6.448 iuvenis quondam, nunc femina, Caeneus / rursus et in veterem fato revoluta figuram, ‘Caeneus, once a youth, now a woman once again changed by fate into her initial form’). Ovid’s precise parallel construction parodies the Vergilian line as much as corrects it. The divinely inspired seer Mopsus has enough authority to rebuke Aeneas’ testimony and set the record straight on Caeneus’ posthumous fate. The miraculous escape of Caeneus from underneath the pile of treetrunks intended to become his tomb (Met. 12.524-525) leaves behind a cenotaph, which reflects the fate of Aesacus, but only in order to reverse it. Caeneus’ tomb is made to contain and retain forcibly within in the hero’s body; an ignominious pile of trees conveys precisely the Centaurs’ intention to bury not just the body of their opponent but every memory of his existence. Aesacus’ cenotaph, on the contrary, is made to give a name and an identity to a character who has nothing but a name to account for him. Aesacus’ cenotaph is an ironic way to memorialize and secure, through the epitaph inscription bearing its presumed owner’s name on it, an identity and a visible mark for the youth who vanished without a trace from Troy and the Trojan legend alike. In reality, however, the emptiness of the tomb only accentuates the emptiness of Aesacus’ name. On the other hand, Mopsus declares that the avis unica is the very essence of Caeneus in his new form: the ‘new man’ (Gk. < ) is replaced by an avian no less new ( ), being the only one of its kind and unseen before or afterwards (526). Mopsus, by the ) of Caeauthority of his prophetic omniscience, uses the ‘emptiness’ ( neus’ humble and anonymous tomb to confirm the hero’s presence. When he declares before the crowd of the fighting parties that the bird reaching for the sky before everybody’s eyes is actually Caeneus in a new form, he ‘memorializes’ the hero.266 The audience is directed to identify the vanished ‘greatest 265

266

Bömer 1982, 170 ad 12.530, notes that the first part of Mopsus’ address, Lapithaeae gloria gentis, ‘glory of the Lapiths’ race’, is a typical ancient epic formula, and it occurs both in the Greek epic and in the Aeneid (6.767 Procas, Troianae gloria gentis). The invocation of Polydorus’ name by the Trojan people in Aen. 3.68 (magna supremum voce ciemus, ‘with a loud voice we call him for the last time’), presents a close parallel. The Trojans have just completed the re-burial of the murdered youth in the proper manner (62),

124

Poetic Memory and Epic (De)Composition

man’ with a new, but unique and very specific physiognomy, which on account of its being extremely rare is unlikely to be easily forgotten. Emptiness and presence, oblivion and immortality, and the importance of memorializing as tribute of honor as much as prerequisite for survival, will converge for one final time, in the case of Memnon, whose fate, significantly, has been reserved for the official closure of the ‘little Iliad’ cluster – and it will be discussed, accordingly, in the final chapter of this book.

and they have built a properly designated funeral monument (62-63; 67-68) and offered the due funeral rites (65-67). Thus, Polydorus, who until then was ‘lost’, the undetected and forgotten victim of a secret crime, and whose disappearance from both life and human memory was encapsulated in the undesignated, ignominious mound of dirt that covered his spear-pierced body, is ‘recovered’, and through the body’s proper monumentalization, he gains immortality.

Chapter Four Facets of Elimination: Killing Achilles 1. Introduction Achilles’ death is a moment of closure, obviously for the hero himself who departs from life, and poetically, in terms of the Iliad-story formation. The Iliad does not end with Achilles’ death since the theme of Homer’s epic is not Achilles himself but the anger of Achilles; still, the hero’s untimely and impending end looms constantly over his life and directs his actions. The son of Thetis knows that he will die prematurely, and that his death is imminent and about to happen at Troy shortly after he has killed his great opponent Hector. Thetis herself affirms the inevitability of her son’s death, during their second encounter at the Trojan shore in the earlier part of Iliad 18 (Il. 18.95-96). Homer’s Achilles appears to have fully accepted his doom in his determination to go out after Hector whatever the cost, and his main motive, which he himself identifies, is the desire to avenge Patroclus’ death. This rather selfpunitive decision may equally be explained and justified as an attempt to repair his own fighter portrayal, which Patroclus earlier undertook and tragically failed to uphold to the end. In some respect, Achilles’ pain for the loss of his companion and the hero’s indignation at the marring of his aristos profile, fuse. The former incentive, the urge to avenge the beloved companion’s loss, never entered the epic worldview of the Ovidian Achilles. Instead, the hero’s construction of self is exclusively preoccupied with personal kleos and combat imagery on the battlefield, and the anxiety over epic immortality becomes a goal in its own right. Ovid’s version of the circumstances leading to Achilles’ death, and just prior to this, to the debate over Hercules’ right to commemoration, revolves precisely around death in epic as a closure device and as a theme actively contributing to the mock-epic poetics debate. This chapter will address a set of questions on the shape-shifting of literary death as an expression of the elusive immortality of memorializing. Prior to Achilles, the author’s anxiety over the manipulation of epic immortality as bestowed through poetics already concerns the hero Tlepolemus. In a brief passage intended to connect the Centauromachy and Achilles’ death, Tlepolemus, who introduces himself as the son of Hercules and has

126

Facets of Elimination: Killing Achilles

listened to the Centauromachy story, challenges Nestor’s credibility as epic narrator, because the latter omitted any mention of Hercules’ participation in the event. In other words, the anxiety projected on behalf of Hercules’ memory rephrases Achilles’ concerns. Additionally, Tlepolemus’ doubts on the validity of Nestor’s account invite a broader, deeper reflection on the acceptability and the limits of bias. In the exchange between Tlepolemus and Nestor, Ovid explores the extent to which partiality and preoccupation due to methodical and deliberate falsification of facts, may ultimately, paradoxically, lead to a conscious quest for objectivity. The central topic of this debate, Hercules and his performance, ingeniously becomes a parable for an allegorical Achilles construction, a prelude to the ultimate deconstruction (physical death) of the hero and the politics behind its inclusion inside the selective space of the ‘little Iliad’.

2. Challenging Nestor: Tlepolemus Protesting In the first of his two classic treatises on closure, the late Don Fowler upon commenting on what he identifies as the five “senses of closure” in literary criticism, considers the audience to be the most important factor in determining whether a unit closes satisfactorily or not.267 As “satisfactory” closure, Fowler defines that concluding section which, according to the reader/audience, “resolves all the conflicts” developed in the main body of the literary work. “A work on the other hand”, Fowler notes, “which leaves questions unanswered will be ‘open’ to different interpretations, and may leave the reader feeling that where the work stops, is not really The End”.268 In Fowler’s definition, satisfaction and success are plainly distinguished, for the assessment of the former is principally a subjective matter, while the latter is accomplished when specific, broadly agreed-upon criteria are met. On the basis of these criteria, which are determined by stylistic and thematic rules, Nestor’s mode of closing the account of his youthful adventure among the Lapiths is doubtlessly a success. Nestor’s opening is formally recapitulated in the closing narrative of Caeneus’ turning into an avian, and there are indubitable verbal echoes and thematic recurrences attesting to this. To select a few pointed examples, the king of Pylos opens his speech with the promise to relate the marvelous story of a transformed warrior more unique than Cycnus. Caeneus’ case fulfills Nestor’s promise and the triumphant proclamation 267 268

Fowler 1989, 75-122, and ibid. 1997, 3-22. Fowler’s theorizing on closure owes much to Smith 1968. Fowler 1989, 78-79.

2. Challenging Nestor: Tlepolemus Protesting

127

placed in Mopsus’ mouth voices both the confirmation of the omniscient narrator and the approval of the audience – the latter assumed in its allencompassing sense. The name of Caeneus features both at the opening (172f.) and the closing (531) sections, and both parts emphasize the significance of vision, or direct perception, in bolstering the credibility of the reported miracles (172 vidi ~ 525 vidit; 529 adspexit). The cluster opens and closes in like fashion, with a specific reference to the ‘uniqueness’ of the two avians (169 unicus aevo… Cycnus ~ 531 avis unica, Caeneu).269 Nestor’s wisdom remarked upon by Achilles in the beginning (178 aevi prudentia nostri, ‘wisdom of our age’) is recast when Nestor himself acknowledges the authority of Mopsus (532 credita res auctore suo est, ‘the story was believed because of him who authored it’). And although death is not the actual ending of Caeneus’ story, the hero’s transformation is preceded by a burial and a tomb, in literature no less than in life a moment of closure270, even though in the end this tomb stays a cenotaph. Should we, additionally, agree to identify the avis unica that replaced Caeneus with the phoenix, the resurrection of the bird from its tomb rephrases the tradition on the rebirth of the new phoenix from the tomb holding the body of the old one. Definitely an exitus (522; cf. 525 exire), Caeneus’ ‘exiting’ his human existence becomes another occasion for narrative reintegration; barely three lines later (12.533-535), the battle between the Centaurs and the Lapiths comes to an end, too.271 Not everyone among the Achaeans listening to Nestor’s reminiscences, however, is ready to call it a (narrative) day. Tlepolemus, the son of Hercules, angrily (537f. dolorem… non pertulit, ‘he could not manage his anger’) confronts the aged king and inquires as to the reason why his father has not been mentioned among the participants in the battle against the Centaurs. In order to 269

270 271

Next to each of the two occurrences of the adjective unicus, Ovid situates terms that sound similar (aevo ~ avis) to enforce the correspondence; the name Cycnus, moreover, is the common name of the man and an avis, both of whom are further modified as ‘unique’. Death and the rites associated with death and burial belong among the marked elements of closure that Smith (1968, 172-182) collectively calls “closural allusion”; cf. Fowler 1989, 81. The shift of the narrative focus effected on account of Caeneus’ miraculous change calls to mind the similar circumstances of the transformation of Aeneas’ ships into nymphs in Aeneid 9 (77ff.). As in the Metamorphoses, the Vergilian ships’ sudden shape-shifting causes an abrupt stalling of the narrative – likewise an armed conflict under way – and the outlandish spectacle (9.120 mirabile monstrum) draws the exclusive attention of fighters (9.123 obstipuere Rutuli, ‘the Rutulians stood dumbfounded’) and readers alike. Once the focus has moved from the dramatization of war onto the miracle of the changing ships, the epic momentum is irreparably broken. Soon after the transformation the battle hurriedly concludes, with the convenient arrival of the nightfall (156 melior quoniam pars acta diei, ‘since the better part of the day had passed’). Not surprisingly, the arrival of the darkness also signals the end of the battle between the Lapiths and the Centaurs (12.535 partem fuga noxque removit, ‘and flight and darkness carried away the rest [sc. of the enemy forces]’).

128

Facets of Elimination: Killing Achilles

anticipate Nestor’s potential denial of Hercules’ actual presence in the battle, Tlepolemus hastens to add that he has first-hand information about his father’s participation, because the great hero told him so himself (Met. 12.539541): ‘Herculeae mirum est oblivia laudis acta tibi, senior. certe mihi saepe referre nubigenas domitos a se pater esse solebat.’ “Dear elder, it is strange that you have forgotten to praise Hercules; for surely my father often used to relate to me of the cloud-born creatures which he had conquered”.

Tlepolemus’ words are right to the point: he has heard a different version of the same story by a narrator who also happens to be his father. In the epic system of values the father-son relationship was deemed a most solemn one. In fact, the ground rule for all father-son relationships is that a father’s world is continued and perpetuated by his son. Epic heroes are often referred to by their patronymics rather than their own names, and this bond between father and son asserts the heroic ethic, as epic deeds are usually accomplished because a younger generation of heroes is set to outperform the successes of their fathers.272 An epic father never lies to his son (certe mihi… referre), especially when he relates the same stories repeatedly (saepe). In the view of Hercules’ son the ‘miracle’ in the lengthy account (mirum est) is the omission of Hercules’ role. His anger at Nestor is conveyed in his offensive claim that the Pylian king’s disregarding of Hercules’ pivotal role in the Centauromachy is due to defective memory, ‘oblivion’ (oblivia). Already in the Iliad, referring to one’s paternal reputation may lead to armed conflict, when a hero is taunted that his performance has not met (epic) expectations because he has not managed to surpass his father.273 And there are a few extreme cases when a hero is outright rejected as a complete failure by being blatantly accused of not being his father’s son. One of these extreme expressions of disparagement is put in the mouth of Tlepolemus. 272

273

On the primacy of the father-son relationship in Homeric epic, see recently G. Wöhrle, Telemachs Reise: Väter und Söhne in Ilias und Odysee oder ein Beitrag zur Erforschung der Männlichkeitsideologie in der homerischen Welt (Göttingen 1999). Wöhrle views heroic competitive violence in Homer through the lens of a father-son conflict, and in his study he sets out to demonstrate, even though from an anthropological rather than literary perspective, that father-son relationships are leading factors in generating epic action in both Homeric epics. This taunting speech, acting as a catalyst of war action, is called a , and it may include a variety of hostile verbal attacks, from offense to command or even threats. On in Homer, see especially Adkins 1969; also, Nagy 1979, 222-242; and Martin 1989, 68-76 and 113-118. A typical example of a hero slandered for failing to meet the standards set by his father is Diomedes, who becomes the target of Agamemnon’s reproaches (Il. 4.370-399) that Tydeus’ son has fallen far short of his father’s deeds.

2. Challenging Nestor: Tlepolemus Protesting

129

The latter insults Sarpedon, by implying that the prince of Lycia avoids combat engagement, and so, belies his paternity from Zeus; on the contrary, Tlepolemus himself, in his enthusiasm to fight against Sarpedon, does live up to the reputation of his father, Hercules (Il. 5.633-642).274 Still, Tlepolemus’ eagerness to show off his supremacy on the battlefield only partly explains his preoccupation with his descent from Hercules. As a matter of fact, confirming one’s own heroic status by comparing oneself to one’s father takes for granted the identity of the father. And being acknowledged as Hercules’ son is as important for Tlepolemus as proving himself worthy of Hercules’ reputation, since it is his paternity of Hercules that sets Tlepolemus apart from the crowd of the Trojan heroes. The fact that he is advertised as a son of Hercules, the only son of Hercules fighting in the Trojan War, secures a name and an individual identity for him, which guarantee his epic immortality, his remembrance among future generations – the readers of the Iliad. When Nestor omits mentioning Hercules, Tlepolemus protests, not only for the sake of tradition’s accuracy, but even more, for the sake of his own epic survival. Tlepolemus’ anxiety, then, about his own epic status, resulting from Hercules’ absence from Nestor’s alternative ‘Iliad’, adds another, deeply personal, perspective to the discussion on the poetics of absent presence. For ‘Nestor’ the epic narrator, the process of selectivity in recasting an established literary narrative is essentially an experiment in reconstructing absence. A few Iliadic moments suffice for his effort to succeed. For Tlepolemus, however, the epic performer in the text which is the subject of the narrator’s reconstruction, minutiae are crucial because his own presence, his own literary existence in this broader textual ‘presence’ under reconstruction, is not a mere ‘detail’. Rather, by checking Nestor for inaccurate reporting, the son of Hercules is mouthing a complaint on behalf of several literary heroes whose deeds furnish the epic narrator with the material to put together his epic, but whose literary immortality relies solely on the vates’ critical choices and narrative politics. 274

The Homeric Tlepolemus’ recollection of Hercules as part of his speech of flyting against Sarpedon serves as a good example where genealogy is employed as a paradigm. Alden 2000, 158-161, who seeks to place Tlepolemus’ speech in some broader thematic context, asserts that the crux of the unit is Hercules. The great hero’s name is tied to a different, narrative frame, the celebrated first fall of Troy, when Hercules led the heroes that lived a generation prior to those fighting in the Iliad against Troy’s king Laomedon, who had previously cheated and lied to him. Since perjury, lies and injustice brought about the first fall of Troy no less than the second one, with Paris’ behavior actually mirroring that of his grandfather Laomedon, the first fall of Troy foretells the second one, which falls outside the narrative time of the Iliad.

130

Facets of Elimination: Killing Achilles

Tlepolemus’ language of complaint passing across as an accusation for defective mnemonic faculties naturally hits Nestor hard. The taunt is obviously meant to insult Nestor, because it is clearly inaccurate. In his description of the individual single combats during the Centauromachy, the elder of Pylos displays an impressive memory as he meticulously provides the names of the contestants, no less than 51 names of Centaur fighters and 26 of Lapiths and allies in all. Hercules’ presence at the wedding of Perithous is obviously one of those details tactfully surrendered to deliberate oblivion, and Nestor does not hesitate to admit as much. His reply to Tlepolemus, with which he justifies his decision to edit Hercules’ role out of his version of the Centauromachy, is a model lecture on the obligatory source manipulation at the outset of any literary composition, and on the inevitable compromise of accuracy and objectivity to the perspective and motives of a biased (that is, any) narrator. For Ovid’s Nestor, mention of Hercules recalls painful past events – the ‘undeserved’ (inmeritas, 12.550) destruction of Pylos and Elis, and the death of Nestor’s father and eleven brothers – which the elderly king of Pylos tries to delete from his memory (12.542-576). In Nestor’s eyes Hercules is an enemy, to be hated as much as the Trojan leaders: Met. 12.547f. sed neque Deiphobum nec Pulydamanta nec ipsum / Hectora laudamus—quis enim laudaverit hostem? (‘but we do not praise either Deiphobus or Pulydamas, or even Hector himself; for who will praise one’s own enemy?’). And the king seems to have discovered what is perhaps the ideal way to take revenge upon his undefeated enemy: to ‘delete’ him from the memory of epic poetry. When Nestor rhetorically wonders aloud “who cares to praise his enemy?”, at that moment he confesses that he can censor the domain of epic memory; that he has the power to determine whom and what event he wishes to relate, and so to secure its survival into posterity.275 For the epic narrator Nestor, forgetfulness is not the logical con275

Hercules’ invasion of Pylos and the death of Nestor’s elder brothers in the Iliad are summarily recounted in a mere four lines (Il. 11.690-693). The speaker is Nestor himself, and he situates it within a narrative context set to extol his kleos as a young warrior. A careful glance at this brief passage reveals that Nestor’s reference to Hercules there is deliberately elliptic. Nestor speaks of an event that took place at some indefinite past time (Il. 11.691 , ‘in former years’) and involved Hercules’ attacking Pylos and killing all eleven of Nestor’s elder brothers (11.694 μ , ‘of whom only I was left’). Hercules’ raid against the Pylians, which devasted Nestor’s people and especially his family, is artfully employed as evidence to bolster Nestor’s epic hero credentials. Even though the young Nestor is the only survivor and hope for survival left to the royal family of Pylos, he does not stay away from war; instead, he takes the lead in the army when the Eleians attack his country. In the ensuing retaliatory cattle raid he performs with such distinction that the Pylians pray to him as to a god (Il. 11.761 ’ ’ , ‘and all glorified Zeus among the gods, and Nestor among men’). Nestor’s narra-

2. Challenging Nestor: Tlepolemus Protesting

131

sequence of aging, but a version of damnatio memoriae, the intentional obliteration of past events.276 Thus, when the great speaker asserts that the intervening lapse of time has affected his memory (12.182f.), he may be intentionally stating so, to awe his audience with what he does remember, especially the impressive details of Caeneus’ life and death.277 Nestor’s ‘intentional’ forgetfulness in essence corroborates the king’s complete control over memory, his ability to remember and forget at will: this explains the omission of Hercules.278 Hercules’ deliberate excision from the narrative record is as effective a mechanism of revenge as anything, and it celebraces Nestor’s performance as an affirmation of the power of language and memory manipulation over historical accuracy: nec tamen ulterius quam fortia facta silendo ulciscor fratres; solida est mihi gratia tecum (Met. 12.575-576) Nor do I seek any vengeance for my brothers other than to keep silence on his mighty deed: between you and me the bond of friendship is solid.

Tlepolemus’ protests essentially serve Nestor’s poetic self-advertisement. Tlepolemus, personifying a competing, even though not less biased, epic narrator, attacks first. He offers evidence that confirms the (at least) partial inac-

276

277

278

tive boldly asserts that the hero established his epic kleos already in his first battle and at a much younger age than expected, and he has been enjoying divine-like honors since the outset of his long and unique epic career. Impressively, the shrewd king of Pylos manages to use perhaps the most tragic moment in his family’s and country’s history to his own advantage. From such a perspective, one could even assume that, were it not for Hercules’ murderous invasion, Nestor could never have attained such a prodigious beginning to his heroic career! In admitting his dynamic intervention in the Hercules legend, Nestor is fighting a twofold battle against Tlepolemus, because he combats not only a representative of a younger generation of heroes who view their elderly peers as antagonists in the effort to gain epic glory and immortality, but also a literary antagonist-in-the-making to Nestor’s own established authority. On the theme of rivaling conflict between generations as a source of violent competition in the Iliad, see C.A. Querbach, ‘Conflicts between the Young and the Old in Homer’s Iliad’, in: S. Bertram, (ed.), The Conflict of Generation in Ancient Greece and Rome (Amsterdam 1976), 55-64. On the contrary, for Musgrove (1998, 223-231), Ovid’s emphasis on Nestor’s forgetfulness underlines the unreliability of memory and warns that the final and definite version of an epic story is an illusion, for there is always “the possibility of other versions of epic narrative besides the canonical texts” (p. 231). Modern criticism has argued that the allusive but distinct presence of Hercules in the Iliad is the result of crosstextual dialogue between the Homeric poet and the poet of a contemporary epic, some lost Herakleia. This view is espoused most recently by Martin, 1989, 230, who states that the Iliad “is composed under pressure from the Herakles epics and in response to them”.

132

Facets of Elimination: Killing Achilles

curacy of Nestor’s account, raising the issue of epic credibility more broadly. In response, Nestor sets out to explain the process of epic composition. The justification he offers for silencing Hercules out of his recollections stresses the element of bias, which is the leading criterion for directing the course of an oral composition. In the case at hand, the bias originates in the narrator; alternatively, the narrator may take into consideration the biases of his intended audience. Tlepolemus’ knowledge of Hercules’ role in the Centauromachy is isolated. Lacking the support of a wider public or the championship of a leading vates figure, it is doomed to the margins of epic tradition, if not to oblivion. Tlepolemus’ secondary status as an epic hero known and existing only because of Hercules can hardly compete with Nestor’s celebrity. Ovid’s intelligent appendage to his Centauromachy problematizes the mechanics of appreciation in literary criticism, and once again underscores the imposing authority of a famous epic writer over the preservation of literary tradition. The elimination of Hercules also comments on the politics of memory control, which obviously prefers ‘forgetfulness’ to distortion. A distorted narrative is more difficult to handle, because it entails counter-argument, an attack against its author. Like Nestor, Ovid in his recast ‘Iliad’ generally speaking does not distort the episodes of the Iliad legend that he embraces. Eschewing direct confrontation with Homer, he presents an alternative version of the story based on less famous moments of the Trojan saga, simultaneously antagonizing Homer without attacking him and producing an intelligent, original text that speaks of his own high potential as a bard. The literary debate over the deletion of Hercules from Nestor’s narrative279 in some respect rephrases the latter’s treatment of Achilles’ fame, since both episodes present Nestor contemplating from alternative perspectives the controlling power of the deliberately compromised literary memory. The proximity between Achilles and Hercules in the area of poetics, however, has already been firmly established in the Iliad, and the structural dynamics of this bond is integrated inside Ovid’s reception of the Iliad narrative. The Homeric Achilles is brought next to Hercules on numerous occasions, and by a variety of speakers. This is deliberate, because since Iliad 16

279

This ‘forgetful’ silence is even more damning, inasmuch as a “successful act of revenge is one that so appropriately caps the original injury that it draws attention to its own significance” in a society which values heroic style. The quoted phrase is from M. Herzfeld, The Poetics of Manhood: Contest and Identity in a Cretan Mountain Village (Princeton 1985), 202, and is reported in Martin 1989, 143. Martin further argues (1989, 142-143) that Achilles in Book 16 engages in a damnatio memoriae by refusing to acknowledge Agamemnon’s words.

2. Challenging Nestor: Tlepolemus Protesting

133

Hercules has become Achilles’ principal model of action.280 The comparison may often lead to uncomfortable conclusions: Hercules’ character embodies major contradictions, which he frequently exemplifies to a superlative degree.281 He represents the extreme case of the pre-Trojan generation of heroes, widely known for their ability to exercise great force ( , Hesiod, Op. 148).282 Specifically in the Iliad, in seven of the eleven references to Hercules, . Six of these seven referthe hero’s name is set right next to the noun , while in the seventh, at Il. 18.117, ences include the clausula (‘Hercules’ might’) is grammatically the equivalent the phrase *, but the poet’s choice to set the ‘might’ rather than for * ‘Herakles’ in the place of the subject defines Hercules foremost through his might, if not identifies him with it. The use of the particular periphrasis to refer to Hercules is not lost on Ovid, whose Nestor refers to Hercules with the phrase Herculeis… viribus (12.554-555), virtually a translation of the Greek formula. In Rabel’s terms Hercules “is first and foremost a predator”, ... “a hunter, who engages his foe, whether a man or a beast, as predator to prey”, and who identifies victory with complete annihilation and the death of his opponent.283 Achilles, a bloodthirsty predator in his own right, who is likened to raging lion more than anyone else in the Iliad, could hardly find a more kindred model to follow.284 Achilles confesses so himself, when he states that he has Hercules in mind when he readies himself, at 18.117-125, to reenter the fight and look out for Hector. The undercutting of Achilles’ heroic and human profile in Nestor’s presentation of the Centaurs points to an additional thematic crossover in the experiences of Achilles and Hercules, namely the first-hand experience the two of them share with the semi-human and semi-bestial world of the Centaurs. Both heroes are reported to have been pupils of the Centaur 280

281

282 283 284

See Rabel 1997, esp. 163-164, 166-169, on Hercules as Achilles’ action paradigm in what Rabel defines as “the third phase” of the hero’s anger, his return to fight (18.117-125) after Patroclus’ death. Additional bibliography in Rabel’s notes verifies the strong parallels between Achilles and Hercules (e.g. they are the only heroes in the Iliad to be called μ [5.639; 7.228]; and they are the only ones said to have sacked cities). K. Galinsky, The Herakles Theme: The Adaptations of the Hero in Literature from Homer to the Twentieth Century (Oxford 1972), is still a good starting point to access the literary portrayal of Hercules. Schein 1984, 134-135. Rabel 1997, 168-169, in turn elaborating on M. Eliade, Zalmoxis: The Vanishing God, transl. W.R. Trask (Chicago 1972), 6-7. R.L. O’Connell, Arms and Men: A Study of War, Weapons, and Aggression (New York 1989), 41 (cited in Rabel 1997, 169 n. 15), argues that dehumanizing one’s opponent, and visualizing him as a being of a different species, is customary for warriors, and makes the task of killing easier for them.

134

Facets of Elimination: Killing Achilles

Cheiron.285 The latter was an exceptional Centaur, the most ‘human’ of those liminal creatures, being benevolent, with a vast knowledge of medicine and the arts. He was the widely reputed tutor of the great heroes, and he was married, too. That his two most famous pupils, Achilles and Hercules, appear alike to have been influenced not by the example of their teacher, the civilized and tame Centaur, but by the belligerence of the other Centaurs, the uncivilized and violent beasts, is at least ironic. In the context of the Centaur imagery in Metamorphoses 12, the allusion to the Achilles-Cheiron bond via the implied comparison of the former to Hercules reflects back on the imagery of Cyllarus, Ovid’s invented Centaur. The latter’s humanized portrayal, an ingenious digression denigrating Achilles by stressing his brutality, projects a younger version of Cheiron.286 In view of the above, the mention of Hercules’ name by Tlepolemus as Nestor completes his speech appears all the more relevant.287

285

286

287

Hesiod, fr. 96 M-W, 49ff.; cf. du Bois 1982, 29f. On Ovid’s taking advantage of Cheiron’s close association with both Achilles and Hercules, his two famous students, to undermine the traditional heroic models of the two superheroes through a series of paradoxes that surface as a result of their comparison to their Centaur tutor, see B.W. Boyd, ‘Arms and the Man: Wordplay and the Catasterism of Chiron in Ovid Fasti 5’, AJP 122 (2001), 67-80. Boyd’s arguments are centered on a play on shared motifs in the stories of each of the three mythological characters, motifs that are made prominent in the Fasti story of Chiron’s death via a string of etymological wordplays. These arguments expand on observations published a few years earlier in Brooks 1994, an insightful literary analysis of the whole passage based on etymological wordplay. The etymology of Cyllarus’ name is uncertain. His close similarity to Cheiron, however, temptingly proposes an etymological derivation from , ‘club-footed, bow-legged’, to toy with the etymology of Cheiron’s name from , ‘to handle’, which indicates aptitude and skill, or even to suggest a potential etymological link with , ‘the worse’. In other words, the two ‘perfect’ Centaurs ironically and amusingly are given names suggestive of imperfections! The wordplay associating Cheiron’s name with is also at play in the Cheiron episode in Fasti 5.379-414), and it is discussed by Santini (‘Lettura strutturale ed etimologica in un catasterismo dei Fasti’, in: Materiali e contributi per la storia della narrative greco-latina 1 (Perugia 1976), 49-56). In that same Fasti episode Cheiron and his two famous pupils, Achilles and Hercules, appear together – all three of them. Referring to the same Fasti episode, Brooks expands on Santini’s paretymology and argues that the association with the ‘hand’ there is meant to point to Achilles and his ‘terrible man-slaying hands’ ( ), as these are described in Iliad 18.317 and 24.478-479. For Brooks (1994, 444-450), Ovid in the particular passages toys with irony and ambiguity as he depicts together Cheiron, Achilles and Hercules, and simultaneously, underscores, by ingenious twisting, those details in their respective mythical biographies that are shared with the other two. Contra E.M. Glenn, The Metamorphoses: Ovid’s Roman Games (Lanham, MD/New York/London 1986), 166: “[Tlepolemus’] objection is irrelevant and petulant... ”.

3. The Fate of Periclymenus

135

3. The Fate of Periclymenus The avian imagery that distinguishes every single unit in the ‘little Iliad’ cluster so far sports another intriguing presence, in Nestor’s reply to Tlepolemus’ bitter complaint. Only, this time, the featured avian is not a rising, but a falling one. As he justifies the excision of Hercules from his memoirs, Nestor seems particularly preoccupied with the miraculous death of his brother Periclymenus (12.556 mira Periclymeni mors est, ‘Periclymenus’ death was a miracle’).288 That man Periclymenus had been endowed with shape- (hence, identity-) shifting ability (556-558), and the god who favored him was once again, as for Cycnus and Caeneus, Neptune. Notwithstanding Neptune’s connection with water, a symbol of transformation, the god’s regular appearances in Metamorphoses 12 anticipate his most important contribution to the Trojan story, his role in the undoing of Achilles, which is reserved for the closing scene of the whole book. When Hercules attacked, Periclymenus initially managed to escape death by changing forms. Ultimately though, while in the shape of an eagle, he was struck in the wing by Hercules’ arrow, and he died by falling on the ground chest-first upon the arrowhead sticking out of his wound (560-573). Nestor’s account of Periclymenus’ death calls for closer study, for Ovid made notable changes to the legend. In its archaic and best-known version, which dates from as early as the Trojan Cycle and is certainly attested in Hesiod, the legend reports that after going through a series of transformations Nestor’s brother was finally shot down in the form of a bee.289 Ovid is the first who reports that Periclymenus died in the form of an eagle. The eagle innovation very likely originated in Ovid’s mind (though some Alexandrian precedessor is conceivable), and it is not difficult to comprehend why the eagle form would appeal to our poet as Periclymenus’ final transformation. The staging of a battle scene that would combine the spectacular and the mock-heroic without descending to the level of the ridiculous is better served when it develops around an eagle. After all, the imagery of an eagle is a popular theme in the Homeric similes, producing a sensational comparison be-

288

289

The beginning of his account of Hercules’ slaughter of Nestor’s family (Met. 12.549-554) echoes the report by the Homeric Nestor (Il. 11.690-693), which is part of the hero’s third, and lengthiest, digression in the Iliad. The story of Periclymenus, however, is not reported in Homer, where the principal topic is young Nestor’s great exploits against the Eleans; cf. Alden 2000, 88-101, for full discussion on the orientation of this narrative. On the traditions about Periclymenus and his shape-shifting travails, see Forbes Irving 1990, 180-181, and Bömer 1982, 174. Hyginus (Fab. 10), postdating Ovid, is determined to save the life of Periclymenus, and so he makes him escape in the shape of an eagle.

136

Facets of Elimination: Killing Achilles

tween the swiftness of the bird’s swoop and a warrior’s charge (e.g. Il. 15.690692, 21.252-253, 22.308-310; Od. 24.538).290 The eagle imagery is a well-known allegory for anti-epic poetics, and Hercules’ battle with Periclymenus likely considers from yet another perspective Ovid’s antagonistic take on traditional epic. Pindar, in a famous simile at O. 2.83-88, proudly likens his poetic self also to the eagle of Zeus, in a context where he contrasts his poetry (epinicians) against the epic genre, which in the same simile is symbolized by another bird, the raven. In a recent study, Donato Loscalzo has argued that Pindar’s choice of the eagle and the ravens symbolizes the juxtaposition of Pindaric lyric to epos.291 The poetry of Pindar, like the eagle, is ‘sublime’, reaching the highest parts of the literary sky. On the other hand, the epic poets, the rhapsodoi, the ravens in the simile, represent the ‘lowest’ poetry, because this is a poetry that stems not from genuine knowledge and inborn skill but from repetition, professional reciting. Ovid’s eagle could champion the same polarity between his own ‘high flying’ poetics and the poetics of the ‘cyclic’ epic. And, notably, like Pindar, Ovid defines his superior artistry, by attacking not the Homeric-type epic genre itself but the murky ‘cyclic’ poetry written in the tradition of the Homeric epic292 – the poetry that the figure of Hercules, the most famous epic hero, or the Centauromachy composition ideally mirror. Additional, poetically marked vocabulary establishes the parallelism between Periclymenus’ identity shape-shifting and Ovid’s multifarious ‘epic’ verse. The hero’s alternative shapes are invariably called figurae, formae and facies. All three terms are assumed to be synonymous293, they feature inter290

291

292

293

On similes in Homer, the place to start is Edwards 1991, 24-41. A systematic study on the Homeric similes, including their categorization into subject-based lists, is D.J.N. Lee, The Similes of the Iliad and the Odyssey Compared (Melbourne 1964). Redfield 1975, 188-189, labels the hunting and herding similes that usually involve wild animals including attacking eagles, among the three most common simile groups in the Homeric poems. Redfield points out that, on most occasions where a wild creature fights against humankind, the losing side is the human. Cf. D. Loscalzo, La parola inestinguibile. Studi sull’ epinicio pindarico (Rome 2003). The theory, summarized in this paragraph, of the anti-epic polemic in Pindar’s juxtaposition of the eagle and the ravens simile in O. 2.83-88, unfolds on pp. 35-59. Loscalzo’s taking the two ravens to allude to the epic bards is intriguing, and steps away from the widely held opinion, which assumes them to mean Simonides and Bacchylides, both of them lyric authors. Pindar’s attack on the poetics of the ‘cyclic’ epic finds a worthy successor in Callimachus, who likewise takes on the imitators of the archaic epic rather than the very poems of the Epic Cycle; the authors of these ‘cyclic’ imitations are rebuked as the poet’s actual attackers, and in turn receive Callimachus’ counter-attacks; see this thesis argued in detail in A. Cameron, Callimachus and His Critics (Berkeley/Los Angeles 1995), esp. chapters one and two. Bömer 1982, 177-178 ad 12.559-561.

3. The Fate of Periclymenus

137

changeably in Ovid’s text, and here, they are markedly cited together in a fiveverse passage (555-560): 556f. cui posse figuras / sumere, quas vellet, rursusque reponere sumptas… ‘[Neptune had given] to him the power to assume any shape he wished and to take it off again at will’; 559f. hic ubi nequiquam est formas variatus in omnes, / vertitur in faciem volucris, ‘when by now he had changed to every form, in vain, he switches to the form of the avian’. Periclymenus literally typifies metamorphosis, and his experience allegorizes Ovid’s artistry. It is not unreasonable to expect from an erudite Ovidian reader to detect that the name of Periclymenus and the significant adjective , ‘most famous’, are etymologically related. The former is a comμ , ‘famous’ or ‘infamous’294, which is a later form of the pound of , both sharing the same etymological base, the verb , Homeric is attributed to epic heroes and epic bards ‘hear’. The modifier alike295, denoting the cyclical relation of dependence between the two: the heroes owe their fame, even their epic existence, to the bards, who in turn build their fame on the deeds, that is, the epic existence, of the heroes.296 Since a hero’s fame relies on subjective factors, its increase or decrease is a variable process, constantly in a state of shape-shifting verbally captured in the interchangeability of figura, facies and forma. The shape-shifter Periclymenus, Mr. ‘Most Famous’, both embodies the notion ‘Epic Hero’ as subject 294

295

296

Periclymenus (and/or Clymenus) was also an epithet for Hades in archaic poetry, echoing a tradition that held Hades to have fought once against the people of Pylos. Forbes Irving 1990, 180 (esp. n. 143 listing the various ancient sources), suggests that the chthonic element may expand to the name and broader symbolism of the shape-shifter Periclymenus. modifies Phemius (Od. 1.154) and Demodocus (Od. 8.367), and is part of the cluster μ , a formulaic attribution to Hephaistos (e.g. Od. 8.300; 349; 357). The exiled Argive vates, who had fled to Pylos, where he met Telemachus when the latter visited Pylos to inquire about his father, is called Theoclymenus (‘God-famous’). Theoclymenus accompanied Telemachus back to Ithaca and there he read (Odyssey 15) the auspices of birds as signs of Telemachus’ royal future. He later (20.351-357) prophesied that Ulixes was already in Ithaca spying in disguise, and at dinner, the evening right before Ulixes’ attack, he had a vision of the death of the suitors. This procedure is also echoed in Vergil. At the core of the Fourth Georgic (4.334-345) the nymph Clymene is sitting in the company of twelve other nymphs, and sings (4.345) of the love affair of Ares and Aphrodite, the same song that was performed by the ƿƴǀƸƹƺDŽǃNjǁ aoidos Demodocus in Odyssey 8. The epithet that distinguishes the bard and denotes his gift for propagating epic fame forms the etymological base of the nymph or muse, who thus, by virtue of her immortal status, awards divine approval to the bard’s special control over tradition, and over the conversion of this tradition into epic. It is worth observing, as Thomas (1986, 193) points out, that Clymene, the only nymph of the group who sings, is also the only one with a Homeric precedent: a nymph Clymene is featured once prior to Vergil, at Il. 12.47. On the contrary, all twelve of the other nymphs surrounding Clymene are ‘Hellenistic’, their names, that is, appear for the first time in Hellenistic literary texts.

138

Facets of Elimination: Killing Achilles

of epic poetry, including the Metamorphoses, and is a sample of epic polemic that emphasizes the malleability of a hero’s fame at the expense of the individual hero who is allotted this shifty fate. After all, it is anything but odd that Nestor’s brother be defined by complex poetics as much as Nestor, the model epic vates.

4. The Death of Achilles As already noted, even though the Iliad does not extend to the death of Achilles, it does close with a death: the concluding lines of the poem narrate the funeral of Hector. From this perspective the end of Homer’s epic is satisfactory, but far from complete. The war is not over; the closure is set amidst a truce, not a peace treaty, anticipating the fighting – and the epic narrative – to continue, likely in a new epic poem. The concurrence of beginning and end, of closure and incompleteness, dominates likewise the final scene of Metamorphoses 12, the narrative of Achilles’ death and funeral. The end of Achilles, though, falls at a dramatic time that postdates the events covered in the Iliad. Its placement immediately after Nestor’s performance that is dated before the opening of the Iliad, may take one by surprise upon realizing that Ovid’s ‘little Iliad’ has ‘silenced out’ Homer’s text altogether, just as Nestor did with Hercules only a few lines earlier.297 And yet, the Homeric narrator does refer extensively to Achilles’ death. When the last book of the Odyssey opens, the action is set in the Underworld (Od. 24.1-14).298 Agamemnon’s soul is engaged in conversation with the souls of the hero’s former fellow combatants who fell at Troy (15-22). The soul of Achilles greets him and inquires about the circumstances of his death (23-34), and Agamemnon begins a lengthy reply where he compares his own deplorable and shameful death at the hands of his wife to the honorable death of Thetis’ son (35-97). A closer reading of Agamemnon’s words, however, reveals that, actually, the great king does not talk about the circumstances of Achilles’ death but about the hero’s funeral. His narration begins at the moment when Achilles has already died and his corpse lies on the battlefield, a bone of contention for the two fighting armies.

297

298

The Achilles-Cycnus duel is set in the first year of the Trojan War, and so is the celebratory banquet afterwards. Suddenly, time cruises through not merely the events in the Iliad, but all ten years of fighting at Troy, before it stops to zoom in again on Achilles. Wittily, Ovid all but implies that Nestor’s loquacity took nearly so long as ten whole years! The presence of Achilles in the Odyssey throughout is more important and prominent than it appears to the cursory reader; see Edwards 1985.

139

4. The Death of Achilles

Hector’s death is certainly a reference model, but it is my belief that the particular treatment of Achilles’ death in the Metamorphoses primarily draws on Agamemnon’s narrative in the Underworld meeting in Odyssey 24. Ovid’s text avoids replicating the details featured already in Homer (mourning, funeral and athla), while alternatively it reports, first, on the actual occasion of the death, and, second, on the contest over Achilles’ armor, namely the two events that chronologically frame the funeral moments reported in Agamemnon’s reply in the Odyssey. There are some good reasons that attracted Ovid to the Odyssey section in question. Achilles’ premature death is anticipated on several occasions in the Iliad, but Agamemnon’s extensive narrative of Achilles’ funeral is the only detailed account of the event in Homer. Granted, the Iliad is not an ‘Achilleid’, but the opportunity to attend the funeral of the ‘director’ of the Iliad plot does offer a much-desired and logical sense of definite closure. Then, the two Homeric poems feature closures developing around narrative situations that are similar, analogous, and complementary. The single combat between Hector and Achilles in Iliad 22 prefigures the outcome of the Trojan War, while their deaths are sequential. Thetis has already forewarned Achilles, soon after Patroclus’ death, that killing Hector would bring about his own death, since the two are connected: μ ưȬǃƮƹư

μ ,

, μ

, ’

’

μ (Il. 18.95-96)

· μ

Then, child, I must lose you to an early death for what you are saying: since, directly after Hector dies, your own doom is certain.

This death, which falls outside the narrative time of the Iliad, is intentionally postponed until the end of the Odyssey, in order to become the closural moment to the unified Homeric epic diptych. The roles and imagery of Hector and Achilles merge in death, reflecting the inevitable cohabitation of all heroes, friends and enemies alike, in Hades for eternity. We shall see that Ovid takes advantage of this fusion of characters and roles, to design his own definite closure to the ‘little Iliad’ in the funeral of Memnon: Ovid’s strategic display of neoteric artistry in his account of Achilles’ death is entwined with the selection of epic death as closure theme. Epic mockery, sustained through a recurrent use of allusion and a fascination with gender, is always the underlying canvas. A close study of the structure, the stylistic choices, and especially the selection and presentation of key themes in Met. 12.580-628, can soundly verify this. The epic ideal of acquiring kleos and securing immortality through it is inseparable from the inevitability of death, if not outright directed by it. A typical epic hero is reconciled with the idea of dying, and this is nowhere more emphatic than in the Iliad, where both Achilles and Hector have fully ac-

140

Facets of Elimination: Killing Achilles

cepted their death. As repeatedly mentioned, Achilles can hardly hold himself back from rushing to avenge Patroclus, even though he is clearly told that taking revenge will cost him his own life.299 Critics have judged his reaction as self-punitive300, but from an alternative standpoint, this eagerness to rejoin the fighting instantly discloses the great hero’s anxiety to amend his own image of the invincible warrior which was damaged when his friend, disguised as Achilles in Achilles’ own armor, lost to Hector. Similarly, this obsession with image directs Hector’s conduct, too. The Trojan hero makes clear to his wife that his choice to engage in pursuing open battle, rather than stick to defensive war, is motivated by his desire for glory (Il. 6.441-446), an immortal posthumous reputation, whatever the consequences (464-465).301 And, like Achilles, he envisions his battlefield conduct as a performance, which is and will be watched by an audience. Hector is certain that he will not survive the Trojan War, but his concern about the survival of his glorious reputation is so strong that it rules the way he thinks about everything, even when he imagines the grim future of his wife as a servant and grieves for her: · «

, μ

,

μ μ μ ». (Il. 6.459-461)

And someone might say, seeing you shedding tears: “This is the wife of Hector, who was the best at fighting of the horse-taming Trojans, when they fought around Ilion”.

According to Hector’s epic worldview, Andromache’s humiliation is as important as the fact that she will be a spectacle, because her image is entwined with Hector’s own image. For the hero this means that his wife’s appearance would elicit his own image in the mind of the ‘spectator’. It is therefore imperative that this image project – in a sense, monumentalize – the most impressive, outstanding and memorable moment in the hero’s career, for, in Hector’s view, future generations will remember the Trojan War only μ ). In accorin relation to who was the best fighter ( dance with the above, the moment of a hero’s death is none other than the concluding scene, an exodus, of a performance – a ‘play’ in constant develop299

300 301

His reply at Il. 18.98-100 to Thetis’ death warnings just prior (Il. 18.95-96) begins with the temporal , ‘directly’, the very term used by his mother, and is indicative of the hero’s urgency to resume the fight. For example, Murnaghan 1999, 211. Redfield 1975, 123-124, discusses Hector’s process of rationalizing his options. Similar is the logical frame of Hector’s most important dilemma at the opening of Iliad 22, when he is standing alone outside the walls of Troy and is about to confront Achilles. In a soliloquy (22.99-130) he weighs the alternatives and concludes again that the only acceptable choice is a face-to-face battle that will bring either glory or death (108-110).

4. The Death of Achilles

141

ment, lasting as long as the hero’s career; and last impressions are always particularly important. The circumstances leading to a hero’s death may determine whether and how a hero will be remembered among future generations. A glorious death may erase past failures or enhance past triumphs as much as a cowardly death may doom an otherwise virtuous career. By Ovid’s time, tradition had redirected the focus of the original Homeric legend regarding the details of Achilles’ death on the Trojan battlefield. In the Iliad, it is merely reported that the son of Thetis is doomed to premature death at Troy, shortly after killing Hector. A second detail is added by Hector, who, in the last moments prior to dying, reveals to Achilles that the latter will die before the Scaean Gates at the hand of Paris and Apollo (Il. 22.359-360). Later tradition, in compartmentalizing and expanding on the various stages of the Achilles legend, tied the hero’s death to the motif of imperfect invulnerability. Briefly, early in his life Achilles had received a special treatment that made his body invulnerable except for a spot in his lower leg, often identified with his heel. It was with a shot to this single weak spot that Paris, aided by Apollo, killed the hero. By Ovid’s time, this tradition had more or less become prevalent. Ovid is not only aware of it but he composes around it a first rate argument on archaic epic mockery in the Cycnus episode, where the two opponents’ invulnerability renders the traditional perception of masculinity inapplicable, and hence irrelevant.302 Nonetheless, in his reporting the death of Achilles, Ovid ignores the long debate on Achilles’ heel, because in this new context, the inglorious death of the ‘best’ hero conveniently furnishes the nucleus around which the Augustan poet will weave, in yet another fashion, his literary debate against Homer. Structurally, Met. 12.580-628 consists of five smaller units: (1) Dooming Achilles. The setting of action has moved upwards, and comprises the discourse between Apollo and Neptune, who decide to initiate the murder of Achilles. Neptune delivers an angry speech in justification of his vengeance against the murderer of his son Cycnus, he declares his determination to take revenge, and he requests from Apollo to take charge of the execution (12.580596). (2) Killing Achilles. Apollo agrees, rouses Paris and directs his arrow to hit its target successfully (597-608). (3) Mourning Achilles. Ovid addresses dead Achilles in the second person with a pathetic expression of lament (608-611). (4) ‘Eulogizing’ Achilles. The poet evaluates the futility of Achilles’ life in the face of death, and seemingly praises the immortality of the hero’s reputation that survives the perishing of his mortal body (612-619). (5) Appropriating 302

A. Kossatz-Deissmann, ‘Achilleus’, LIMC 1.1 (1981), 181-185, King 1987, and Burgess 1995, offer a complete listing of the alternative sources on the death of Achilles; see also my discussion on this topic, in chapter two.

142

Facets of Elimination: Killing Achilles

Achilles. Following Achilles’ death, Ajax and Ulixes both claim the hero’s weapons, especially his shield; the Greek chiefs are called to make a decision, and they all gather together to hear the two rivals present their respective cases in a speech contest (620-628). The last unit serves as the preamble to the wider debate on appropriating Achilles’ persona, which takes up the first four hundred lines of Book 13. In reporting the death of Achilles Ovid uses only information provided in the Iliad, and in particular in Hector’s last words (Il. 22.359-360), where it is stated that Paris and Apollo kill the hero who at the time is raising havoc against his enemies: dixit et ostendens sternentem Troica ferro corpora Peliden, arcus obvertit in illum certaque letifera derexit spicula dextra. (Met. 12.604-606) He spoke and pointing towards Pelides, who was laying low the bodies of the Trojans with his sword, he turned the bow in his direction and guided the well-aimed shaft with his death-dealing hand.

In the Homeric world Paris and Achilles sit at the two opposite ends of the heroic ideal, the former personifying everything that the latter is eschewing. And it represents one of Homer’s most successful ironic touches, that the epitome of archaic epic heroism is killed by the embodiment of the Homeric warrior ideal in its inverted expression. This is precisely the impression Ovid might wish to pass on, as he apostrophizes the unlucky Achilles in the couplet immediately following his fall: Met. 12.608-609 ille igitur tantorum victor, Achille, / victus es a timido Graiae raptore maritae (‘so then, Achilles, you conqueror of the mightiest, you are conquered yourself by the cowardly ravisher of a Greek wife’). Paris’ lethal strike is recorded precisely in the middle of Met. 608-628. In the Roman poetic structuring that observes the principles of Callimacheanism middles are very important, because they often mirror the totality of the unit within which they belong.303 The three-line centerpiece of the ending to Meta303

“Middles might be said to be under-theorized. There is an abundance of work on opening and closure, but very little discussion of the theoretical aspects of what comes in between”. Thus Don Fowler, in his ‘Epic in the Middle of the Wood: Mise en Abyme in the Nisus and Euryalus Episode’, in: A. Sharrock and H. Morales (edd.), Intratextuality. Greek and Roman Textual Relations (Oxford 2000), 109. Fowler’s understanding of a textual ‘middle’ has to do with content not geometry, for his middles are narrative segments that function as thematic epitomes of their context even though they may feature anywhere between the opening and the closural units of a text. Prior work on selective ‘middles’ in Vergil’ poetry, however, most notably by Richard Thomas (‘Virgil’s Ecphrastic Centerpieces’, HSCP (1983), 179-206), proved that the centerpieces in famous Vergilian ekphrases are allusions on the

4. The Death of Achilles

143

morphoses 12 develops around a synthesis of ideas interwoven into the immediate context, and stems out of a double antithesis, primarily, between ‘presence’ and ‘absence’, and secondly, between magnus and parvus. These interconnected but contrasting thematic pairs become in turn the center around which a wider and ever growing network of antitheses takes shape. The target of this sophistication is a comprehensive approach of epic mockery both as effective expression of polemic poetics and as metaphor for the idiosyncratic Ovidian aesthetic. It is possible to observe an instance of this contraposition complex in the aforecited 12.608-609, where Achilles, ‘the conqueror of great men’ (tantorum), was conquered by a timidus raptor maritae. Even further, Achilles IS the greatest of men; literally speaking then, the wife-ravisher Paris who kills him likewise is, ironically, de facto a conqueror not just of great men but of the greatest man of all! Shortly before Paris’ clandestine attack, the readers’ eyes, along with Apollo’s pointing finger (604 ostendens), were transfixed on Achilles slaughtering Trojans. Thus singled out, Achilles’ ‘presence’ becomes the exclusive point of reference for all viewers’ gazes – including the gaze of Paris. Essentially, this achievement of ‘omnipresence’ causes Achilles’ physical death, or his future ‘absence’, from the forefront of the Trojan narrative. The fighting patterns pursued respectively by Achilles and Paris, the ‘heroic’ sword fighting as opposed to the ‘anti-heroic’ bow shooting, outline with additional clarity the conflicting ideologies identified with each of the two opponents. Ovid’s deconstruction methodology, however, overshoots the thematics of this polarity; he zooms in on Achilles and Paris not as the embodiments of this ideological clash but as individuals, and attacks their traditional epic selves as imprinted on specific literary moments. For Neptune, in Ovid’s text, Achilles is ferox belloque cruentior ipso (‘fierce, and more cruel than (cf. 593 operis nostri populator, ‘the pillager of war itself’, 592) and

elaborate poetics of their context. Fowler’s and Thomas’ conclusions are complementary; in a more recent study, on Ovidian middles, Philip Hardie (‘Ovidian Middles’, in: Kyriakides-Di Martino 2004, 151-182), focusing on the central section of the middle book of the Metamorphoses, the conversation at the table of Achelous, tempts the readers, “to see in Achelous the central river-god embodying the poetics of the Metamorphoses, the split divinity who in his swollen water shape represents the most turbid of muddy epic rivers, but in his anthropomorphic shape is the perfect host for some Callimachean story-telling, a paradoxical combination that captures the mixture of Callimachean and non-Callimachean in the poem as a whole” (p. 171). Even closer to home, DeBrohun 2004, in her study of the ‘Kreuzung’ of genres in the Centauromachy, notes (p. 417) that the most representative sample of non-epic genre experimentation in this “narrative variation of the epic convention”, the Cyllarus and Hylonome account, is set “almost exactly in the middle of Nestor’s vivid recollection” [my underlining].

144

Facets of Elimination: Killing Achilles

our work’ [i.e. the walls of Troy]).304 The phrase sternentem Troica ferro corpora PELIDEN, evokes several Homeric scenes in the last quarter of the Iliad, wherein the son of Peleus dominates the battlefield, killing ‘bodies’ of anonymous Trojans305 – the very plebeians, whom Apollo, at 12.601-603, contemptuously orders Paris to shun and focus instead on Achilles! The imagery revives the representation of Achilles riding his chariot and pressing hard on the Trojan masses, on the murals that decorate the walls of the Vergilian Juno’s temple at Carthage (Aen. 1.466ff.). The narrative is technically a verbal representation, a construction of words, which the author’s enargeia will convert into an ‘image’ or monument for the mind. Achilles’ portrayal on this constructed mental monument is the only *actual* physical presence of the hero in the Vergilian epic. Vergil freezes, then, this particular posture of Achilles, implying that it captures the essence of the Homeric hero’s performance: a brutal warrior obsessed with kleos-securing killing. In this respect, Ovid’s acumen endorses the Vergilian assessment and d-evaluation of the Homeric hero, by fashioning his own Achilles image to resemble the monumental depiction of the Greek hero in Vergil. The Ovidian Paris also brings back to life Homer’s stereotype of the cowardly, sneaky archer, with the unerring hand nonetheless. An additional Homeric detail noted in Ovid’s text includes the infallible shooting of Paris, whose arrows are described as certa and his hand that directs them as letifera. Paris may be a timid fighter, but he is a very effective one, and the Homeric Paris always hits his target. He strikes Diomedes in the foot in Il. 11.377 (even though the injury is not a severe one)306, he wounds Eurypylus in the thigh a 304

305

306

The legend reporting that Apollo and Neptune built the walls of Troy during the time they spent in the service of King Laomedon of Troy is told a book earlier (Met. 11.194ff.); see details and relevant bibliography in Bömer 1980, 288. Fenik 1968, 15, remarks that Achilles’ slaying spree, noted for its brutality, is at most times associated with warriors of the second rank, often left nameless. This is typically laid out in the opening section of his aristeia (Il. 20.381-21.135). When, at 20.382-489, Achilles leaps amidst the Trojans after he has been thwarted in his effort to kill Aeneas, he rapidly and brutally kills thirteen Trojans, some named some unnamed, indiscriminately, all but suggesting that even the rare identification of the occasional victim is really pointless. In this passage, from 11.369 onwards, neo-analysis has persistently read a reflection on the death of Achilles; cf. W. Kullmann, ‘Oral Poetry Theory and Neoanalysis in Homeric Research’, GRBS 25 (1984), 313-315; and earlier, J.Th. Kakridis, Homer Revisited (Lund 1971), 293 n. 1; and H. Pestalozzi, Die Achilleis als Quelle der Ilias (Zürich 1945), 17. The parallel has been acknowledged as intentional by more recent important Homeric critics as well, including M.W. Edwards, Homer: Poet of the Iliad (Baltimore 1987), 63-64 and ibid. 1991, 18; C. MacLeod, Iliad, Book XXIV (Cambridge 1982), 36; R. Janko, The Iliad: A Commentary. Volume 4: Books 13-16 (Cambridge 1992), 409; and Alden 2000, 149-151. In the light of the Homeric Diomedes’ systematic projection as an alter Achilles, the presumed preference expressed by the Ovidian counterpart of Thetis’ son to die by a woman rather than Paris, at

4. The Death of Achilles

145

little earlier (Il. 11.581-583), and he kills Euchenor, at Il. 13.671-672, and Mnestheus of Arne, at Il. 7.8-10.307 Achilles’ death becomes the crowning moment in this impressive shooting record. One could argue that in the description of Achilles’ execution Ovid seems to have reversed the characterization between the doomed hero and his Trojan slayer. Paris’ fighting conduct in Ovid’s Trojan battlefield is very similar to that of Achilles. The descriptions, respectively, of Achilles and Paris in action, are very similar and bespeak of the proximity of the two heroes: like Achilles (12.604f. ostendens sternentem Troica ferro / corpora Peliden, ‘[Apollo] pointing towards the son of Peleus who was laying low the bodies of the Trojans with his sword’) Paris stands in the middle of the plain shooting at the anonymous masses of enemy soldiers (12.599-601 mediaque in caede virorum / rara per ignotos spargentem cernit Achivos / tela PARIN, ‘and in the middle of the slaughter of men, he saw Paris taking infrequent shots at the nameless crowd’). Achilles, in turn, given the choice, would rather die at the hand of a woman (610-611 at si femineo fuerat tibi Marte cadendum / Thermodontiaca malles cecidisse bipenni, ‘but if it were your destiny to fall by a woman’s battle stroke, how would you prefer to have fallen by the double-ax of the warrior from Thermodon!’). Achilles’ preference for a death at the hand of a woman rather than Paris seems to downgrade the Trojan further, but in truth the implicit gender inversion undermines Achilles, not Paris. In the Aethiopis, the epic that reports on the encounter between Achilles and Penthesileia, the narrative culminates in the erotic desire that seizes the hero as soon as he looks at the face of the Amazon. Penthesileia had come to Troy after Hector’s death and briefly took over his place as leader, but like Hector, she fell to Achilles in single combat. Quintus of Smyrna, who offers the most detailed account of the story, reports that Achilles dealt Penthesileia a deadly wound. Then, moments before she died, he took off her helmet, looked at her face for the first time, and immediately fell in love with her (Posthom. 1.666-668). This instant transformation of Achilles from warrior to infatuated lover stains Achilles’ perfect epic-hero profile.308 Notably, Thersites, the foul-mouth Greek309, who

307 308

13.611-612, likely plays on Diomedes’ disparaging remarks at Paris’ warrior credentials; specifically, the Ovidian reader might recall Diomedes’ own similar derogatory remarks at Paris, at Il. 11.369ff.; there, after sustaining the surface wound from Paris’ bow, the Argive hero calls his Trojan emeny ‘an archer, wretch, a man of brilliant hair and a ogler of girls’ ( , , , , 385), compares his assult to that of a woman or child (389), and disparages him for using ‘the dull weapon of an unwarlike and worthless man’ ( , 390). On Paris’ faultless striking record, see Fenik 1968, 20-21. The tradition of Achilles’ infatuation with Penthesileia prior to Ovid is rare – as far as extant literature allows us to assess – but nonetheless present. Propertius revives this love story in 3.11, in a passage where he tries to explain to his Cynthia the great power that she

146

Facets of Elimination: Killing Achilles

on a metaliterary level personifies the voice of a vituperative iambic poet in epic, or the anti-epic critic who questions the value of lofty epic poetry and ideology310, makes a point of this weakness on Achilles part – and he pays for his mockery with his own life.311 And so, it is Paris’ triumph the narrative of Achilles’ death ultimately projects, along with a fighting strategy that advocates aloofness and deviousness. In terms of the absence/presence motif, Paris and Achilles in the Iliad are marked alike by a problematic ‘presence’ record. Achilles, the most prominent warrior, is shut up in his tent and keeps aloof from the development of the epic action for nearly two thirds of the Iliad. His withdrawal/‘absence’ redirects the course of the Trojan War312, but his presence in the later books (in

309

310

311

312

exercises over him. Penthesileia is one of the exempla of powerful dominae of love (3.11.1316); cf. King 1987, 176. Thersites, in his appearance in the second book of the Iliad, is called both (‘the basest of the Achaeans’, 2.216) and (‘the most hated of the Achaeans’, 2.220). An early approach to the metaliterary significance of Thersites, the ‘worst’ of the Achaeans, is Nagy 1979, 253-264, who sees the anti-hero as an incarnation of “blame poetry” which he defines as “the institutional opposite” of praise poetry, the parallel to heroic epic. Even though Nagy does not name specific genres, it is obvious that he reads Thersites’ speech as an iambic/comic import. He actually notes the comic effect of Thersites’ verbal attack against Agamemnon, and especially the fact that this attack unravels in words and phrases previously uttered by Achilles in Iliad 1. One could further argue that Thersites derides Agamemnon, and impersonates Achilles through the mastery of different ‘lighter’ literary genres. These genres are part of the texture of his speech and obviously undermine the spirit of the epic narrative. By virtue of his ease with genre-mixing, then, Thersites poses as a liminal character, a misfit inside the rigid environment of the ancient epic genre, and he has to be removed by force (hence Ulixes’ dynamic intervention) from the narrative fore. Achilles’ falling in love with the dying Penthesileia and Thersites’ insults are told in Posthom. 1.654-825; on the Penthesileia legend in the Aethiopis, see Bernabé 65-71; King 1987, 175178, hints, among other issues, at the politics of gender in the poetics infusing Thersites’ role. A notable moment in the discussion of the absence/presence theme in the Iliad centers on Helen, and comprises her third reply to Priam in the Teichoskopia (Il. 3.229-242). The passage reads as a mini-‘Catalogue of Heroes’: it singles out by name the main characters of the Trojan War, while the absence of Achilles from the battlefield results in his exclusion from Helen’s epic list. In this respect, the speech encapsulates the function of the Teichoskopia episode as a leading narrative of metapoetics and an allusion to the composition of epic. On the metaliterary dimension of this crucial episode, with Helen acting out the part of the epic composer in her reporting of what she sees and how she reads what she sees, cf. C. Tsagalis, ‘Viewing from the Walls, Viewing Helen: Language and Indeterminacy in the Teichoskopia’, μ μ 34 (2003), 167-193, esp. 187-191. In the same study, Tsagalis remarks (pp. 178181) that Helen and Achilles in the Iliad are perceived to be liminal characters, of a marked outsider status, “marginal in the sense that they both are secluded and excluded from the main action for the biggest part of the poem”.

4. The Death of Achilles

147

particular 19-21) is overwhelming, an eager effort on the hero’s part to compensate for his earlier voluntary marginalization. Along the same lines of ‘alternative presence’ one justifies the hero’s superior eloquence in his lengthy and elaborate speeches throughout the epic.313 The Homeric Paris’ ‘absent presence’ is similarly intriguing. His favorite combat weapon, the far shooting bow, keeps him physically away from the actual fighting yet still at the scene, an eyewitness to the successful outcome of his shots. He strikes unexpectedly because he does not attract attention during the fighting, thus imposing his presence when in everybody’s mind he is absent. The shot he directs at Diomedes comes readily to mind. Conversely, he tends to disappear, aided by his mother, when he embraces the typical epic hero fighting mode, which demands the actor’s physical presence in combat: this is the case of his duel with Menelaus over Helen. An alternative manifestation of the absent/present clash that typifies the fighting profiles of Paris and Achilles is observed in the magnus/parvus juxtaposition that features in narrative of the circumstances of Achilles’ death. Achilles fights with a ‘big’ weapon, a sword or a spear (ferro, 604), while Paris takes recourse to ‘little’ darts (spicula, 601). It is one of those little darts that eventually kills the great Achilles, causing the legend to collapse mid-field along with the hero. The size and greatness of this legend is the subject of Ovid’s concluding reflections on Achilles’ heroic career. In these comments the poet once again takes on the epic warrior ideology against which his transformed epic strives to define itself: Iam timor ille Phrygum, decus et tutela Pelasgi nominis, Aeacides, caput insuperabile bello, arserat; armarat deus idem idemque cremarat. iam cinis est, et de tam magno restat Achille nescioquid, parvam quod non bene compleat urnam, at vivit totum quae gloria compleat orbem; haec illi mensura viro respondet et hac est par sibi Pelides nec inania Tartata sentit. (Met. 12.612-619) And now that terror of the Phygians, that ornament and bulwark of the Pelasgian name, Aeacides, the leader never defeated in war, was cremated: the very god who armed him, the same one cremated him. Now he is but dust; and of Achilles, once so great, there remains just some bit, which would scarcely fill a tiny urn. But alive is his glory, which could fill the entire globe. This is the measure that meets up to that man,

313

Martin 1989, 197-205, has reached the same conclusion by studying the effusiveness in the language of Achilles, a characteristic which he calls the “expansion aesthetic”; it is as if Achilles tried to make up for his physical presence by “overexpressing” himself verbally.

148

Facets of Elimination: Killing Achilles

and in this the son of Peleus is still his real self, and he does not know the empty Tartarus.

While alive, Achilles is magnus, and his ‘greatness’ refers alike to his physical size and his reputation.314 This double meaning is confirmed in his postmortem two-fold transformation for the hero, into the tangible and visible handful of ashes, on the one hand, and as the indescribable, uncontainable and beyond control, fama, on the other. The humble dust underlines death’s complete control to a point beyond recognition over Achilles’ intimidating size. From a different perspective, the emphasis on Achilles’ superhuman size implied in the use of magnus in this passage is part of an intertextual dialogue with a select few but memorable intertexts from Homer. In the Iliad, there is only one reference to Achilles’ size, when the hero, complaining about his lack of armor, tells Iris that no other Achaean, with the sole exception of Ajax, has armor big enough to fit him (18.192-193). There is, however, a second Homeric instance specifically commenting on Achilles’ size, and this is set in the opening episode of Odyssey 24, in the crucial Underworld meeting mentioned above, where Agamemnon’s soul in a memory flashback remembers the details of Achilles’ funeral. Homer reports Achilles’ death through Agamemnon, and upon describing the battle scene before the Trojan walls and over Achilles’ recently fallen body, he calls Achilles lying dead on the μ (24.40).315 ground μ Ovid’s ironic reduction of the unmanageable warrior to a handful of pitiful, definitely manageable ashes, contrasts with Achilles’ posthumous gloria. ‘Glory’ is usually a positive idea; it is a hero’s reputation as propagated through the epic word, by those who witness his deeds and by the poets who judge these deeds worthy of praise and recollection, and hence commemoration. In this light of Achilles’ inglorious glory, gloria is an apt metonymy for the fama, at once the recipient and disseminator of truth and falsehoods, which coexist in harmonious discord and, often, mutual exclusiveness.316 The 314 315

316

According to King 1987, 134, Ovid uses magnus eight times in all to refer to Achilles, but only at Met. 12.615 is the term surely an attribute to the hero’s physical size. Lycophron’s text records probably the most explicit description of Achilles’ extraordinary physical stature in extant Greek literature, calling the man ‘the nine-cubits one’ ( , Alex. 860); cf. King 1987, 134, who also draws attention to the passage in Il. 18.192f.; yet neither King nor any other critic takes note of Od. 24.40. Vergil is the first Latin author who refers explicitly to Achilles’ size, when at the end of Book 1 he has Dido question Aeneas about the Trojan War, and, among other things, inquire about Achilles’ huge size (1.752 nunc quantus Achilles). Vergil also calls Achilles magnus three times (Aen. 11.397, Ecl. 2.36 and G. 3.91), but none describes explicitly the hero’s physical size. Zumwalt 1977, 217f., was the first to argue that the ‘clash’ of sizes in Achilles’ funeral praise illustrates the “gross, though implicit, discrepancy between Achilles’ virtus and his gloria”, raising simultaneously the issue of credibility on account of the involvement of fama in

4. The Death of Achilles

149

evaluation of an epic hero’s performance, his ‘glory’, is the manipulation of different famae, in their turn no less subjective, unreliable and of unverifiable credibility. Depending on the aspirations of the poetic manipulator, the subjection of these famae to different focalization may bring about a glorious Homeric-type epic or a ‘glorious’ Alexandrian- or neoteric-style expression of the same genre. The ties of the poetics of memorable reputation to immortality are celebrated in the sphragis to the Metamorphoses (15.871-879). There, Ovid’s poetic fama (878) is projected to live forever (878-879), ascend to heaven as high as the stars (875-876) past the physical death of the poet (873-874), and fill the Roman Empire, i.e. the whole world (877). Furthermore, the indelibility of the poet’s name from memory and its immortality through recollection (876 nomenque erit indelebile nostrum, ‘I shall have an undying name’; 878 ore legar populi, ‘I shall have mention in people’s lips’) depends on the power of the epic word, of the vates/epic poets (879 si quid habent veri vatum praesagia, ‘if the prophecies of the bards have any truth’). The epitaph tone of the epilogue and its thematic background, especially the inclusion of the cenotaph theme (875-876 parte tamen meliore mei super alta… astra ferar, ‘the better part of me, however, will be carried off above the lofty stars’), place the fama of Ovid’s epic word next to the fama of the epic word that immortalizes Achilles.317 By analogy, the lack of congruence in qualifying Achilles’ gloria foretells a similar dissonance in assessing the quality of Ovid’s Metamorphoses. Still, Ovid’s grand aspirations for the posthumous course of his poetic fame, when projected backwards onto the post-Homeric reputation of Achilles’ epic career, comments on the process of fame control from the perspective of the effective, skilled and influential vates. In other words, our poet here reflects on the catalytic impact of a powerful bardic authority towards instituting as unequivocal and authentic a literary composition, an intellectual process that is de facto partial since it relies on criticism. Achilles’ immortal glory, which fills the whole world, may ultimately remain immune to obfuscation because of the Homeric narrator’s prestige, which introduces a predominant fama/text over competing famae. In this sense, the post-Homeric Achilles may have been reduced into cinis that can hardly fill an urn, but his Homeric name has retained its luster; as a result, the hero has remained par sibi, ‘equal to himself,’ and in this respect, ‘unchanged’.318

317 318

defining and affirming a hero’s virtus, and subsequently, by dissemination, in advertising it as gloria. Achilles’ posthumous fama and Ovid’s indelebile nomen are seen along similar lines of immortality and recognition worldwide also by Hardie (2002, 86). For Hardie 2002, 86, Achilles in his transformation to incommensurable ashes and his fama/famae contribute to Ovid’s discussion on the absent/present dichotomy in Metamor-

150

Facets of Elimination: Killing Achilles

The centrality of Paris’ role notwithstanding, Achilles’ death and transformation from great hero to unimportant dust would hardly have been enacted had Neptune and Apollo in unison not set their hearts and minds to it. The two gods are the authorial figures in the episode, for they determine, script and bring about the death of Achilles, and so make plain how tragically relevant, or better, irrelevant, the ‘greatness’ of the leading epic hero may actually be at the slightest whim of the gods. Neptune and Apollo are the only gods involved, emotionally and actively, in the plot of the ‘little Iliad’. Their portrayal, as they maliciously conspire to kill Achilles, is closely modeled on the behavior of the Olympians in Homer. A perceptive reader of the Homeric universe, Ovid realizes that Homer’s gods are active in the epic drama in order to facilitate the development of the poet’s narrative and themes. They are literary characters, much like the epic heroes, and their behavior dutifully adheres to the set guidelines of the epic narrative. This justifies their moral elasticity, which at times results in an outright lack of gravity, and explains their constant interference, often malicious and vengeful, in the actions of the mortals. In these cases, the heroes/actors seem little more than pawns acting out prescribed roles.319 The unmitigated grief of a father at the murder of his son, a purely human empathetic situation, is the trigger for the Ovidian Neptune’s ignominious plot to eliminate Achilles, the murderer of his son, even though he is supposedly siding with the Greeks in the Trojan War. Ovid underlines the humanization of the god when he disapproves of Neptune’s excessive wrath, which he dismisses as a reaction “beyond the limits of civility”: mente dolet patria saevumque perosus Achillem exercet memores plus quam civiliter iras. (Met. 12.582-583) The spirit of the father in him was grieving, and hating the cruel Achilles he kept the memory of his wrath unrelenting beyond the limits of civility.

319

phoses 12, and they anticipate Ovid’s panegyric in the sphragis, which declares the survival (presence) of the dead (absent) poet’s work. On the reception of anthropocentrism in Homer’s depicting of the divine, by ancient philosophers, including Xenophanes and Plato, and the ancient scholiasts, see the entire first chapter in Feeney 1991, and especially, pp. 48-55. The literature on the subject of the Homeric gods is vast. Select important studies on the literary function of the gods in Homer, especially the Iliad, and on the literary significance of the Homeric gods’ morality, are listed in J. Griffin, Homer on Life and Death (Oxford 1980), 144-204; and N. Yamagata, Homeric Morality (Leiden 1994). For brief but very influential discussions on the gods’ of the Iliad, see M.M. Willcock, ‘Aspects of the Gods of the Iliad’, BICS 17 (1970), 1-10; and M. Winterbottom, ‘Speaking of the Gods’, G&R 36 (1989), 33-41.

4. The Death of Achilles

151

Literally, only a civis, a member of a human community (civitas) may behave plus quam civiliter. Neptune’s reaction is judged to be not merely comparable but actually lesser than that expected from a human father in a similarly dire emotional state. The oxymoron emphasizes the role-playing on the god’s part, as does also his argument in justification of Achilles’ death, namely the murder of Hector and the destruction of the Trojan walls (12.590-593). Acting all too humanly, Neptune conceals the true reason of his hatred, the death of his son Cycnus, and professes instead that he punishes the inappropriate behavior of Achilles, who desecrated Hector’s body and demolished the Trojan walls, the handiwork of two gods (12.590-593). The role of Apollo320 as chief executioner, on the contrary, directs the reader full circle back to the opening of the Iliad. There, the same god, heeding the appeal of another grieving father, his priest Chryses, made haste to spread death and devastation, likewise leading to the removal of Achilles from the battlefield. In all, Ovid composes a very intelligent closural scene for Metamorphoses 12. The dramatization of the conspiracy between the two gods, much like the description of the house of Fama at the opening of the book, invites the audience to distance themselves from the specific battle scene and to watch the epic action from the all-encompassing vantage point of the heavens. The death of Achilles marks, thematically and structurally, simultaneously an end and a beginning, or rather a nexus of cumulative ends and beginnings, all of which revolve around the vain effort to give shape and permanence to the permanent elusiveness of epic fama, and metaphorically, it captures the multifarious reaction to his paradigmatic epic characterization by different audiences.

320

The Apollo who stands by Paris is called Smintheus, a rare epithet of the god, in all probability a pre-classical one, associated with his worship in Asia Minor. Ovid makes sure that this Apollo is different from his Greek counterpart in the early books of the epic, and that he is the Asiatic, partial to Trojans, Apollo. On the pre-hellenic origin of Apollo Smintheus, see Bömer 1982, 186.

Chapter Five The ‘Judgment of the Arms’: Re-Constructing Achilles 1. Introduction At the end of Metamorphoses 12 Achilles is biologically dead, but the quest for the meaning and form of his true identity continues unabated: the immortality of the hero’s fama, the long and complex legend of his short life, supplants his physical presence. Nagy captures this idea well when he makes the related observation that heroes are untimely during their lifetime and timely in death.321 In truth, the Ovidian Achilles was never in actual control of himself, his own fama. On three different occasions, which epitomize three leading domains of a hero’s epic life – his battlefield performance, which would establish his heroic credentials; his performance the day after, when he communicates to a wider audience, the future storytellers, the desired version of his accomplishments to be remembered; and his exit from the epic stage, the moment of his death – Achilles fails to maintain control of his selffashioning. Instead, his image, his mythos, is property coveted by rival agents who represent conflicting interpretive perspectives. This antagonism corrodes not just Achilles’ aristos model, but the literary text that nourishes the hero’s legend: the story of Homer. In the course of Metamorphoses 12, and as long as he is still alive, Achilles manages to defend his Homeric portrayal against hostile forces empowered either by nature (Nestor) or supernaturally (Cycnus, Paris), which stymie him. 321

“The perfect moment or hora, in all its natural beauty, becomes the ultimate epiphany of the cult hero”; cf. G. Nagy, ‘The Sign of the Hero: A Prologue’, in: J.K.B. Maclean and E.B. Aitken (edd.), Flavius Philostratus Heroikos (Atlanta 2001), 27-28. A “cult hero” is the hero whose postmortem fama has been idealized. Nagy’s article comments on an interesting but little known literary reception of Achilles, namely his representation as a lyric poet and lyre-player, singing a song to Echo (a code name for the Muse) in the company of Helen of Troy. The setting is the island Leuke in the Black Sea (Heroic. 54-56), and the two heroes, now souls distanced from their epic lives/roles, have become bards who sing of their own deeds. Cf. Maclean and Aitken above for a translation of the Heroicus, including Achilles’ ‘Ode to Echo’.

154

The ‘Judgment of the Arms’: Re-Constructing Achilles

Following the hero’s death, the development of his myth enters a new phase, because the propagation of his image-making, the storytelling game, comes under the control of a set of characters from the Trojan legend, who are projected as potential substitutes for the hero. The present chapter will focus on the debate between Ajax and Ulixes, the opening and longest (398 lines-long) episode of Metamorphoses 13. Ostensibly this exchange develops over the possession of Achilles’ arms after the latter’s death, but in reality it is designed as a contest over rival versions of thoughful re-readings of the Homeric Achilles story. In the following chapter, the argument takes on Achilles, by now a ghost, as he makes one final effort to assert his Homeric profile, only to be thwarted by his victim, Polyxena, who subtly assaults the hero’s archetypal identity. Ironically, Polyxena is inspired by the episode that celebrates the Homeric Achilles’ epic triumph, his killing of Hector.

2. The Poetics of Argument From the very beginning, the debate between Ajax and Ulixes is meant to be a performance, a combination of trial and dramatic acting. The bone of contention and catalyst for the controversia, the weapons of Achilles, is only the pretext. In essence, the stakes are much higher: he who wins and inherits the weapons is entitled to access the identity of Achilles; he is authorized to revisit the Achilles legend across the Epic Cycle and alter it radically.322 Ajax and Ulixes in their Ovidian selves are rival embodiments of the ambitious postHomeric epic critic/poet, and they dramatize two different composition strategies. Ajax observes the traditional mechanisms of epic composition. Confident in his credentials, literary talent and solid knowledge of the epic legend as originally told, he seeks to perpetuate ancient storytelling faithfully and accurately. Ulixes, on the contrary, is Achilles’ opposite in the Homeric epic world323 and personifies the Ovidian spirit of epic rivalry, the poet who 322

323

On the evidence regarding the Armorum Iudicium episode in the Epic Cycle, in particular the Ilias Parva, see D. Williams, ‘Ajax, Odysseus and the Arms of Achilles’, Antike Kunst 23 (1980), 137-145. As the Iliad and the Odyssey sing of the glory of Achilles and Ulixes, respectively, they celebrate the contrasting values the two heroes represent (Griffin 1980, 49ff.). Achilles gains unsurpassed fame through his prowess in war, even at the expense of his fellow Achaeans. Ulixes’ epic fame largely stems from his ability to use subterfuge and to pose as someone he is not (Nagy 1979, 45). In Iliadic time, even though Achilles and Ulixes never really cross each other, Achilles expresses outright his profound distaste for people of mêtis, which he assumes to mean deceptiveness. This opinion is voiced in an address to Ulixes, but actually refers to Agamemnon and his proposal for appeasement in Iliad 9: μ μ / μ , ,

3. The Price of the Prize

155

builds his reputation on ingenuity and sophisticated change in dealing with tradition. Both rival narrators compete for the readers’ active and prompt engagement with their texts, but the sly and subtle Ulixes proves a much more aggressive ‘epicist’ (i.e. heir to the tradition of the Achilles legend) than the combative and direct Ajax.324 This much being said, I propose to explore the Ajax/Ulixes conflict over the politics of designing the alter Achilles, a process effected in stages. The poetics behind Achilles’ armor, specifically its reception as an important factor of composition, will be explored first. Given that Achilles frequently identifies with his armor, especially his spear and shield, it is possible to argue that the debate over the possession of these weapons translates into a contest over the great warrior’s heritage. A close reading of the debate will follow next, evaluating the successful employment of rival performance poetics in the arguments brought forth by each side, and defining reconstruction through deconstruction. Further, my discussion will trace the presence in the ‘Judgment’ of other prominent issues already encountered in the earlier episodes, including masculinity and virtus affirmation325, or the absence/presence antithesis. I shall conclude with some thoughts on the extent to which Ulixes’ victory addresses the literary aspirations about succession, and even supersession, which are advanced throughout the Metamorphoses.

3. The Price of the Prize It is rather a commonplace rule in Greek antiquity to consider one’s weapons an extension of their owner, or rather a part of him. This idea is advertised in its negative formulation in Archilochus’ famous fr. 5 (West, Iambi), where the

324

325

‘for as I detest the doorways of death, I detest that man, who hides one thing in the depths of his heart, and speaks forth another’ (Il. 9.312-313). Hopkinson (2000) is the first to read the conflict between Ulixes and Ajax as allegory for the clash between Ovid’s transformed epic poetics and orthodox epic composition as defined by Homer. The following comment (p. 18) is indicative: “Ovid’s works are not written for the vulgus, and his range, cleverness and verbal dexterity make him in some ways a complement to Ulysses. Ajax is characterised as the traditional no-nonsense hero, conservative, die-hard, entrenched, durable and intransigent – not a person to welcome change. Ulysses’ very faults, by contrast, aid his success. Ajax characterises him as changeable, shifty, inconstant, pliable, slippery, and tergiversatory. Who fitter to win victory in a new and sophisticated poem about metamorphosis?” W.S. Anderson, ‘Multiple Changes in the Metamorphoses’, TAPA 94 (1963), 21-23, remarks that even though there is hardly any doubt about Ajax’s virtus throughout the debate, Ulixes’ unorthodox argumentation so subverts ‘manliness’ as a moral value that the judges are totally confused if not outright deceived.

156

The ‘Judgment of the Arms’: Re-Constructing Achilles

poet/speaker announces that he has lost his shield to the enemy (‘the shield that I left behind’) in battle but harbors no regrets because at least he has saved himself (‘but I saved myself’). Archilochus’ passage is, as far as we can presently ascertain, the earliest challenge to the epic warrior ethic of equating one’s weapons, and in particular the shield, with one’s identity, an idea in turn articulated in the song of Hybrias the Cretan (PMG 909 = Athenaeus 695f696a Kaibel): μ

μ ,

μ

. μ

,

, μ μ

μ .

μ ,

μ μ

μ

, ,

.

My great wealth is a spear and a sword, and a beautiful shaggy shield of hide, a protection of my skin. With this I plough, with this I harvest, with this I press the sweet wine out of the vine. With this I am hailed a master of serfs. But those who dare not have a spear and a sword, and a beautiful shield of hide, a protection of the skin, all of them bow and kiss my knee. Lord and great king, they call me.

Hybrias’ song is the earliest literary phrasing of this central epic equation explicitly; for, implicitly, the notion is omnipresent in the Iliad narrative. As , which literNagy has pointed out, the very Homeric word for ‘shield’, ary means ‘shield made of cowhide’, shares the same Indo-European root with its Hittite cognate tweka-, “which is used with the first person possessive in autobiographical contexts to mean ‘my self, myself’”.326 The marriage between a warrior and his shield eases the transition from Metamorphoses 12, the first half of the Ovidian ‘Iliad’, which unfolds along with Achilles’ life, to 13, the second half, which takes places after Achilles’ death. Like its owner, Achilles’ shield, which summarily stands for the hero’s armor, is a source and a cause of war, as much as a substitute for and an embodiment of its owner’s essence. The polyptoton that sets war and arms side-by-side warrants this: ipse etiam… bella movet clipeus, deque armis arma feruntur, ‘his very shield still wages war, and for his arms, arms are taken’ (Met. 12.620-621). This new war, arma, is a civil war, over the possession of the weapons, arma, that signify epic primacy, that is, the rightful claim to the title of the ‘best of the Achaeans’, and, along with it, immortality through epic praise. Achilles’ shield on account of its detailed treatment in Iliad 18 is the most celebrated piece of the hero’s armor. Ovid refers more often to the armor (arma) of 326

G. Nagy, Greek Mythology and Poetics (Ithaca, NY 1990), 264-265.

3. The Price of the Prize

157

Achilles in general than to the shield (clipeus) alone, which receives only three specific references (12.621, 13.110 and 13.291)327, obviously because the contest concerns the entire armor, not only the shield. Nonetheless, the identification of the great hero with his shield is prominently noted in the concluding lines of Metamorphoses 12, which serve as the preamble to the ‘Judgment’. Metamorphoses 12.617-619 confidently declare that Achilles’ reputation will have a posthumous existence, and that the physically absent hero will be everpresent thanks to his immortal gloria: at vivit totum quae gloria compleat orbem; haec illi mensura viro respondet et hac est par sibi Pelides nec inania Tartara sensit. But his glory, to fill the whole globe, lives on: this is the true measure of the man, and by this measure Achilles is equal to himself and is not touched by the emptiness of Tartarus.

The word that opens the line immediately following this passage is ipse, ‘himself’ or ‘that man’, but at the end of the line the reader realizes that the pronoun refers not to Achilles but to his shield: 620-621 ipse etiam, ut cuius fuerit cognoscere posses, / bella movet clipeus, ‘his very shield, however, so that you might know without doubt who his owner was, still wages war’. The shield, itself another orbis, a ‘circle’, immediately fills the void created at the aftermath of the hero’s departure from the epic action, and the identification of the two is marked, not only because the shield has been a piece of (art)work made exclusively for Achilles at the request of his mother, but mainly because, like Achilles, it becomes in turn an agent of war and deadly strife.328 In the tradition of the Epic Cycle, as in ancient Greek poetry throughout, Achilles’ spear and the whole armor alternate, without particular discrimination, as symbolic embodiments of the great hero.329 In the Iliad, Achilles dons two different suits of armor, which in reality reflect each other closely. The hero arrives at Troy with weapons handed over to him by his father, Peleus. 327

328 329

On the contrary, the shield, a distinct identity mark of the Homeric Ajax, is the trademark of Ajax’s epic identity in the ‘little Iliad’, too. The hero’s performance is set in Homeric light, and it opens and closes with references to his famous shield. Thus, Ovid’s Ajax enters the debate at 13.2 as the clipei dominus septemplicis Aiax, ‘Ajax, the lord of the sevenfold shield’, and concludes his speech by contrasting his own overused and battered shield to Ulixes’ untouched one (13.118-119). Ajax refers to his shield twice more (13.75 molem clipei; 13.79 clipeum), when he talks about how his shield protected Ulixes in battle. The poetics of Ajax’s identification with his shield is explored later in this chapter. Hardie 2002, 302-303. On Achilles’ armor as carrier of symbolic values and a “stage prop charged with meaning”, see Michelakis 2002, 120-128, focusing on Achilles’ unarmed appearance on stage in the Iphigeneia at Aulis, which he sees as a “failure” on the hero’s part to act out the role designated to him.

158

The ‘Judgment of the Arms’: Re-Constructing Achilles

The most distinctive piece of this initial armor is the spear, which is made of ) from mount Pelion and becomes the exclusive weapon fraxus wood (μ of Achilles, or more correctly, an extension of himself and a symbol of his essence, because only Achilles can lift it. The Ovidian Achilles likely brandishes the same ash spear (Met. 12.122 fraxinus) when he strives to rehearse the military triumphs of his Homeric counterpart. Patroclus, who borrows Achilles’ armor in Iliad 16.130ff., and poses as Achilles, is forced to leave the spear behind (Il. 16.140-144). As a result, he never fully becomes Achilles, but only a semblance of the hero; the borrowed armor is reduced to a costume and Patroclus to a temporary performer of the character of the real Achilles.330 A similarly bad impersonator of Achilles is Hector. Hector removes Achilles’ weapons from the dead body of Patroclus and wears them, but this act is damning and brings about his doom because it forecasts his failure to meet the requirements of his newly assumed role. It is worth noting that in Iliad 17, shortly after he has killed Patroclus, Hector does not think of wearing Achilles’ armor, and he almost sends it back to Troy. What causes him to change his mind is a rebuke for cowardice from his fellow warrior Glaucus, for not confronting Ajax and Menelaus (17.140-168). Only then Hector decides to act out the role of Achilles – a bad decision and an ill-conceived role, as Zeus declares immediately after Hector has put on his new ‘costume’ (198202). Finally, when Achilles confronts Hector on the battlefield, their duel is a fight between two versions of Achilles, the hero himself and Hector, the aspiring Achilles, who is dressed in Achilles’ armor and acts the part of Achilles.331 The issue of fused but also fuzzy identities develops further. Achilles’ original armor was an imperishable piece of Hephaestus’ workmanship, being 330

331

A role he is encouraged to assume earlier, by Nestor (Il. 11.790-803). In Iliad 15 the Greeks are suffering heavy losses and they are pushed back. Patroclus is sent over by Achilles to review the situation, and he is met by a fitful Nestor who assumes the role of an auctor and reveals before Patroclus’ eyes an alternative script for the ‘Iliad’. In this new ‘Iliad’, Patroclus would act out the role of Achilles should Achilles himself insist on staying away from battle. Patroclus, however, changes the script, by never reporting Nestor’s speech to Achilles and seeking instead to usurp the role of Achilles for himself; cf. Rabel 1997, 144-148. The idea that Patroclus is acting under Nestor’s rather than Achilles’ directions in Iliad 16 has been argued in K. Reinhardt, Die Ilias und ihr Dichter (Göttingen 1961), 258-264. Achilles’ famous spear, notably, is used exclusively against Hector (Il. 22.326-330). Following his return to battle, Achilles confronts several warriors and fights two notable single combats, with Asteropaeus and Aeneas, but when he tries to nail them with his spear, respectively at Il. 21.169-172 and 20.321-325, he fails in both cases. An interesting argument introducing the various occurrences of Achilles’ spear in the Iliad as a recurrent, chain-like, formulaic theme strengthening the compositional unity of the Homeric poem was proposed a while ago by R.S. Shannon, The Arms of Achilles and Homeric Compositional Technique (Leiden 1975), esp. 31-86.

4. ‘Writing Up’ the Contest

159

a wedding present to Peleus from the gods.332 When Achilles reenters the fight he is wearing new armor, made for him once again by Hephaestus. This new armor, like the earlier one, carries the same ominous associations with performance, reconfigured identity and premature death, and Ajax’s experience will confirm this. In the ‘Judgment of the Arms’ Ajax asserts that his kinship to Achilles, his physical strength ranking second only to Achilles’ own and his uncontested valor in battle, qualify him for the armor (and the part) of Achilles.333 His failure to gain recognition as Achilles’ successor stirs up his anger (cf. 13.385 iram), which in turn disturbs his mind and drives him to commit suicide. Thus, Achilles’ armor becomes the cause of Ajax’s death too.334 Achilles’ arms are deadly, and the prize of being or becoming Achilles in the world prescribed by the ethics of the Iliad is death.

4. ‘Writing Up’ the Contest Ajax’s worldview is at odds with the epic ideology of the Metamorphoses, where the underlying theme is mutability, and where one’s character is defined not on the basis of the idiosyncratic traits of one’s own identity, but through one’s aptitude to embrace change. Alternative storytelling is a leading form of literary mutability. In Metamorphoses 12-14, where Ovid’s heroes typically assert themselves in terms of their archetypal, intertextual performance, each unit formation celebrates a successful experiment with the poetics of mutability. The ‘Judgment of the Arms’, staged as an oral debate before an audience of prospective judges, appropriately crowns this layered and multivocal antagonism. Like the rest of the ‘little Iliad’, the Armorum Iudicium has received few truly insightful readings. This is surprising, given the fundamentality of performance in the structure of the exchange, and the opportunity to experiment 332

333

334

All through post-Homeric tradition down to Catullus, the spear was given to Peleus separately from the other pieces of his armor, and the giver was Cheiron. In Homer (Il. 17.194197; 18.82-85), though, the spear was given to Peleus at some unspecified occasion, other than his wedding; on the tradition behind Peleus’ armor and particularly the spear, see Edwards 1991, 80-82 and 155-157 [on Il. 17.194-197 and Il. 18.82-85, respectively]. Here a playfully disposed reader might add that Ajax feels entitled to ask for Achilles’ armor, since Achilles in Iliad 18, eagerly seeking to avenge Patroclus, had considered momentarily borrowing and wearing Ajax’s own, being the only armor which could fit his stature: 18.192-193 ’ ,/ μ μ , ‘I do not know of any other’s glorious armor that I could wear, except of course the shield of Telamonian Ajax’. On death as the essence of the symbolism behind Achilles’ weapons, see M.G. Ciani, ‘Aiace tra epos e tragedia’, SIFC 3rd ser. 15 (1997), 176-187.

160

The ‘Judgment of the Arms’: Re-Constructing Achilles

with literary theory, that an oral contest, wherein Ulixes, the master of deceptive speech, predominates, presents. Thanks to Jefferds Huyck’s in-depth work335, the literary background of the debate between Ajax and Ulixes over Achilles’ arms has been investigated, a linear evolution of the legend has been established and valuable comments on intertextuality have been put forth. Prior to Huyck, some brief, generalizing remarks noted the parallelism, in size and thematics, between the ‘Judgment’ and the Centauromachy – a parallelism allegedly underscoring from a different perspective “the ultimate futility of the reliance on brute force”.336 Dippel’s analysis of the rhetorical finesse of the ‘Judgment’337 is not particularly concerned with poetics; in comparison, the six pages Stanford’s forty-year-old monograph on the literary evolution of the Ulixes figure devotes to the unit are still worth consulting.338 Systematic Quellenforschung is seminal in forging literary arguments centered on elaborate cross-textuality; the Armorum Iudicium sits on top of a particularly rich subtext, using extensively and creatively well-known Greek and Roman models, and Müller’s approach of Ovid’s mind at work in the particular unit is instructive despite its brevity.339 Hopkinson’s brief evaluation of the ‘Judgment’ in the introduction of his commentary on Metamorphoses 13 deserves special mention, because several thought-provoking comments in the volume raise important issues and have virtually recreated the entire episode.340 It is in Hopkinson’s study that metapoetics first comes to the fore as a directive factor in the composition of this narrative unit.341 335 336 337

338

339

340 341

Huyck 1991. Ellsworth 1980, 29; cf. similar comments in Otis 1970, 283, the first to view the ‘Judgment’ in terms of the dichotomy of brute force (Ajax/Centaurs) vs. ingenium (Ulixes). Dippel 1990, 71-101, approaches Ovid’s reading of the contest as the only complete surviving controversia of a popular rhetorical topic; see note 343 below for additional information on the ‘Judgment’ as a leading controversia theme. Stanford 1963, 138-143. Stanford’s work is the principal study consulted by Bömer throughout the 100-odd pages devoted to the Armorum Iudicium in his Kommentar. D.E. Hill’s Aris & Phillips commentary (Hill 2000) is largely an abbreviated version of Bömer’s, but it usefully identifies all the Homeric passages alluded to in Met. 12.620-13.398, though Hill rarely acknowledges his secondary sources. Cf. Müller 1997, 285-305; the discussion centers on the distinct presence of the Philoctetes episode in the debate, which allows for extensive speculation on Ovid’s treatment of his many sources; this process is aided through comparative examination of Quintus’ version of the Ajax vs. Ulixes argument, which largely draws on the same sources as Ovid does, but recasts them differently. Hopkinson 2000, 9-22 (Introduction) and 78-163 (Commentary). Lorenzetti 2001 – a little known, but valuable article originally written a few years earlier (1997) as part of the author’s laurea thesis – suggests that the ‘Judgment’ targets the gravitas of the epic genre. In a close reading she judiciously assesses the deflating tone adopted systematically by the poet throughout the debate and evidenced in the series of adaptations

4. ‘Writing Up’ the Contest

161

At least among the Romans, the attractiveness of the Ajax-Ulixes confrontation seems to have been irresistible. Nearly every Roman tragedian of the Republican era known to date, counting specifically Livius Andronicus, Ennius, Pacuvius and Accius, is reported to have composed a drama inspired by this myth.342 Critics are certainly right when they attribute this popularity to the rhetorical structure of the episode, citing testimonies that hailed it as a first-class controversia, and a prime example of an artful mock-debate in the rhetorical schools of Rome.343 Along similar lines, several recent studies have centered on the notions of competition and performance, which were cultivated in Roman oratory and reflected the culture of antagonism that underlined all aspects of important social and political interaction among members of the Roman elite.344 The Armorum Iudicium exemplifies the combination of high epic and antagonistic oratory of both passionate and artful nature345, while of major importance is the fact that its texture is indebted to the long literary tradition behind the Ajax vs. Ulixes debate. The story of the contest was told repeatedly in the Epic Cycle, specifically in the Aethiopis and the Ilias Parva, it was mentioned in Pindar, and it inspired Aeschylus’ lost Hoplon Crisis, and the famous Ajax of Sophocles, the earliest

342 343

344

345

from Homer and the broader Epic Cycle. Lorenzetti contributes to the deconstruction of the ‘Judgment’ the idea that even though Ovid projects his authorial self on Ulixes, he also displays true sympathy for the falling Ajax, who symbolizes the Homeric epic under attack. On the remains of the relevant Roman tragedies, see Currie 1981, 2721 and 2725-2726. Cf. Bömer 1982, 197-198, citing earlier scholars and numerous ancient sources, including Ad Herenn. 1.11.18, 1.17.27, 2.19.28; Cic. Inv. 1.92; and Sen. Contr. 2.2.8. All these texts attest to the popularity of the Ajax-Ulixes exchange in Rome’s schools of rhetoric. Seneca’s passage from the Controversiae is intimately related to Ovid. It reports that the great poet had heard his teacher M. Porcius Latro deliver the speech of Ajax, and that one of Latro’s sententiae impressed him enough to integrate it into the speech of his own Ajax in the Metamorphoses. On Ovid’s rhetorical education, see Dippel 1990, 72 n. 7. On the tradition of the Armorum Iudicium as a prime controversia subject, see Dippel 1990, 74-75 nn. 14-17b. The literary treatment of the contest as a scripted exchange of opposing arguments also had its Greek expression thanks to the late 5th c. proto-Cynic Antisthenes; cf. R. Radermacher, ‘Der Aias und Odysseus des Antisthenes’, RhM 47 (1892), 569-576. More recently, on the possible influence of Antisthenes on Ovid, see Müller 1997, 304-305 n. 216; Müller himself is doubtful about Ovid’s actual knowledge of Anthisthenes’ Ajax vs. Ulixes agon, and he remains unconvinced of the proposed evidence in defense of this relationship; on Anthisthenes’ Ajax, see also Hopkinson 2000, 15. See E. Fantham, ‘Orator and/et actor’, in: P. Easterling and E. Hall (edd.), Greek and Roman Actors: Aspects of an Ancient Profession (Cambridge 2002), 262-276, on the relationship between Roman oratory and performance that is consciously developed on the basis of professional acting practices. Fantham’s paper also records extensive relevant bibliography. Hopkinson 2000, 16-22, describes the strong rhetorical foundation of the debate.

162

The ‘Judgment of the Arms’: Re-Constructing Achilles

literary treatment of the myth which survives intact.346 Sophocles’ reception of the clashing worldviews in the Ajax is directed by poetics. Specifically, Dolores O’Higgins has read the discourse between the Sophoclean Ajax and Teucer as a joint effort to rewrite the Iliad according to a new design, so as to illuminate the ambivalent status of Ajax’s part in it. O’Higgins further demonstrated that Ajax’s suicide is a carefully scripted act, conveying the hero’s metaliterary ambition: Ajax ‘writes’ his own death as the closure of a combat, such as the one promised to him in Iliad 7 yet ultimately denied.347 Falkner’s approach expands on the poetics of the play348, even though the perspective he espouses is the exact opposite one. He asserts that throughout the play Ajax is actually the object of a spectacle, directed by Athena. Falkner captures well the drama’s metadramatic core when he states that the play is not so much about the hero as a man as about the “reality” of a man, “about the multiple and collective ways in which Ajax is seen and evaluated by others, and about what it means to ‘see’ him theatrically” (p. 181). Athena, the director of Ajax’s acting, “controls him as an author controls his text” (p. 186). This spectacle/creation of Athena, Falkner continues, is presented for appreciation before Ulixes, who nonetheless comes up with a reading that runs contrary to that of the goddess, in celebration of a free and flexible text, which enables its audience to form their own, autonomous reading. The two contrasting but equally persuasive experiments on scripting Ajax realize an early version of a controversia. Falkner’s skepticism about the Sophoclean Ajax’ keenness for ‘writing’ his death notwithstanding, Ovid’s account certainly endorses an authorial

346

347 348

The detailed history of the myth and its individual Greek and Roman sources from the Epic Cycle to Pacuvius and Accius is recorded in Huyck 1991, 10-45. According to Huyck, in nearly all ancient sources, the true cause of the argument between the two heroes is the claim over the title of the ‘best of the Achaeans’ rather than the ownership of the dead Achilles’ weapons. The scholia on Aristophanes Eq. 1056 report that according to the Ilias Parva, “Ajax and Ulixes were quarreling over the prized title of the best warrior ( )”, while in the Aethiopis the contest sought to determine “which man is the best ( )”; cf. Huyck 1991, 14-15. In Od. 11.543ff., the earliest reference to the story, Ulixes recalls before the Phaeacians his encounter with Ajax’s soul in the Underworld and acknowledges in remorse (11.550-551) that Ajax was, after Achilles, the best in might and beauty among the Achaeans. A survey of the extant fragments of the Epic Cycle (and beyond) on the Judgment’ is found in Frazer’s Loeb edition of Apollodorus’ Library (= Frazer 1921, on Apollod. Epit. 5.6). Specifically on the Greek sources of the episode, see Bömer 1982, 196-197, drawing on Lafaye 1904/1971; and Hopkinson 2000, 14-15. D. O’Higgins, ‘The Second Best of the Achaeans’, Hermathena 137 (1989), 43-56. T. Falkner, ‘Madness Visible: Tragic Ideology and Poetic Authority in Sophocles’ Ajax’, in: T. Falkner (ed.), Contextualizing Classics: Ideology, Performance, Dialogue. Essays in Honor of John J. Peradotto (Lanham, MD 1999), 173-201, esp. 181ff.

4. ‘Writing Up’ the Contest

163

Ajax. The Ovidian hero achieves for himself an eternal memorial when his blood inscribes his name on the petals of the hyacinth: rubefactaque sanguine tellus purpureum viridi genuit de caespite florem, qui prius Oebalio fuerat de vulnere natus. littera communis mediis pueroque viroque inscripta est foliis, haec nominis, illa querelae. (Met. 13.394-398) The blood-drenched earth brought forth from the green sod a purple flower, which at some earlier era had come to existence from the wound of Oebalius’ son (sc. Hyacinthus). Its petals at their center are inscribed with letters shared by the boy and the man: for the latter, they map out his name, for the former, they verbalize the lament.

Ajax’s memorial is literally aere perennius, since it has by now become inseparable from the natural world and follows the eternal, inviolable succession of the four seasons. Further, the language in the text is full of terms from the vocabulary of writing: littera, inscriptum and folium, the latter meaning a petal or a tree leaf as well as the folio of a codex. Actually, the lamenting cry AIAI, ‘alas’, inscribed on the petals of the hyacinth, and the Greek vocative form of the name ‘Ajax’, of nearly identical spelling, are paired already once earlier in the Metamorphoses, when Ovid uses the same vocabulary of inscribing to narrate the transformation of Hyacinthus at Met. 10.215-216: ipse suos gemitus foliis inscribit et AI AI / flos habet inscriptum funestaque littera ducta est (‘he himself inscribed the grieving words upon the leaves, and the flower bore the marks, AI AI, letters of lamentation, drawn thereon’). Still, this commitment to writing as a means to immortalize the hero’s memory is the culmination of a long and arduous oral process. In the course of this process, the hero strives for his epic immortality through a self-centered reading of the Trojan War, his own version of the Iliad. Unfortunately, Ajax’s intention to narrate the Iliad aliter is challenged by Ulixes’ superior re-casting of the Homeric story. Like his Sophoclean counterpart the hero of Salamis fails as an author, but through his self-inflicted death he is transformed into a text and spectacle alike. And so, it is the narrative texture of the two rival speeches rather than the agonistic nature of the ‘Judgment’ that comes under scope in the following pages. For my purposes, the speeches of Ajax and Ulixes represent two competing, finely crafted and dramatized instances of mise en abyme, centered on two different conceptions of the ideal aristos, who, in the earliest surviving epic archetype, the Epic Cycle and especially the Iliad, is named ‘Achilles’. Ajax, the imitator, reads the Iliad literally and wishes to become an exact duplicate of the Homeric Achilles, and in his speech he isolates those moments of his acting in the Iliad that readily profile him as an Achilles-like figure. On the contrary, Ulixes, the emulator, is interested not in appearing himself as an alter Achilles, but in proving that he controls the characterization and the epic

164

The ‘Judgment of the Arms’: Re-Constructing Achilles

behavior of Achilles. He lays emphasis, accordingly, on those decisions and actions of his that he considers to have directed Achilles’ conduct in the Trojan War and effected some broader and comprehensive, rather than narrow and imminent impact on the course of the war – that is, the composition of the Iliad.

5. Staging the Mênis, the Arms and the Men First, an assessment of the dramatic dimension of the epic debate is in order. Archaic epic is by conception a performance genre. The epic poet composes impromptu, before an audience, and usually tailors his composition to the particular tastes and prejudices of this audience, in order to ‘succeed’, that is, to please the audience and receive an invitation to perform his work again. Under this scope, the venue that hosts the exchange between Ajax and Ulixes corresponds to a performance setting at the anticipation of an epic recitation contest. The court agon and the dramatic performance intersect at the point that marks the transition from Metamorphoses 12 to 13, and their confluence calls for the employment of terminology that may apply to the act of performing both in court and on stage. This double juncture, simultaneously between two books and two variant performance arenas, is transcribed in the seating arrangement of the Greek chiefs. The close of Book 12 and the opening of Book 13 share the same scene: a picture of the Greek chiefs seated to watch and judge the debate between Ajax and Ulixes. The use of considere to describe the gathering of the chiefs, first at the line next to last of Book 12 (12.626) and then at the opening line of Book 13, stresses the spectacle dimension of a setting that is about to stay frozen for nearly four hundred lines. Finally, the circle of the attending chiefs/judges is itself attended by a wider audience, the Greek troops, the anonymous vulgus, who stand around in a circle (corona) to watch their leaders acting out their roles, some as contestants, others as audience to those contesting: a se Tantalides onus invidiamque removit Argolicosque duces mediis considere castris iussit et arbitrium litis traiecit in omnes. Consedere duces et vulgi stante corona (Met. 12.626-13.1) To keep the responsibility and the resentment away from his shoulders, the descendant of Tantalus summoned the Argive leaders to take their seats in the middle of the camp, and he passed over onto them the decision-making of the strife. The leaders took their seats, while the commoners stood in a circle around them…

5. Staging the Mênis, the Arms and the Men

165

The narrative is a description of a military assembly as typified in Homer and begins by designating the seating of the participants. In Iliad 2, for example, Agamemnon calls an assembly of the Greek leaders and before the meeting begins he designates seats for the elders: Il. 2.53 μ μ , ‘and the king first urged the council of the greatsouled elders to take their seats’.349 Ovid’s considere, which depends on iussit, a strong verb that captures the commanding nature of the seating designation, .350 At the same time, when the carries the same meaning as the Homeric same term considere occurs in the sentence in the vicinity of lis, ‘trial’, as is presently the case, then according to the lexica it bears the technical meaning, ‘to take a seat in court, to be in session’. One is, therefore, encouraged from the beginning to visualize the physical setting of the debate in terms of an agonistic competition. Yet, for the same expression the same lexica offer the equally common alternative interpretation, ‘to sit, take a seat, take one’s place’, while waiting for a theatrical performance to start.351 Of course every trial in ancient Rome, being a public, open-air event, was held in the middle of the Forum (cf. Met. 12.626 mediis… castris). “Behind those directly connected with the case were the bystanders, the corona of the court, anyone and everyone who wished to listen, who frequently showed their response to the proceedings by applause or vociferous objection”.352 This statement comes from Katherine Geffcken’s study on the theatricality of Roman forensic oratory as exemplified in the Pro Caelio, the theatrical lis par excellence, whose distinct dramatic (comic) coloring was inspired by the timing of the event. Cicero had to deliver his speech during the celebration of the Ludi Megalenses, the festival during which the palliatae were performed. Since the trial was taking place inside the radius of the comic performances as well as other spectacles (acrobats, gladiatorial games, etc.), Cicero, projecting himself as a palliatae auctor, comments on the difficult task awaiting him as he is trying to compete with all those entertaining distractions in order to keep an attentive corona. By converting his speech into a comic performance, the great orator transforms by analogy his corona into a cavea.353 The agon between Ajax and

349 350 351 352 353

Cf. Kirk 1985, 120 ad loc., remarking that the verb should be taken as transitive; ibid. 1985, 60 ad 1.68 notes that ( ) in the extended sense of “convene” is a formulaic form. Huyck 1991, 96. LS cites for example Cic. Fl. 7.16: cum in theatro imperiti homines consederant, ‘when people unversed took their seats in the theater’. Geffcken 1973, 11; on corona as the “crowd present at a judicial sitting”, see OLD s.v. 4a. Geffcken 1973, 13: “Cicero treats his corona as if it were the cavea of a theatrical audience”.

166

The ‘Judgment of the Arms’: Re-Constructing Achilles

Ulixes, likewise, is as much an exchange of arguments in a trial as an exchange of competing performances of masterly suasoriae.354 The past history of the two rivals records another incident that pitched them in opposite corners, and inside a setting no less theatical and agonistic. Ajax and Ulixes had already clashed once in Iliad 23, when they had fought in a wrestling contest in the funeral games honoring Patroclus. The result of this fight was a tie (Il. 23.700-39), even though Ajax was much stronger and Ulixes constantly on the defense, because the latter used his intelligence (he kicked Ajax’s knee from behind). Interestingly, neither hero makes the slightest hint at this contest, which the Ovidian reader versed in the Iliad certainly recalls. The contest over the arms of Achilles becomes a replay of that earlier agon in a more nuanced and intellectually – rather than visually and aesthetically – engaging spectacle.355 From a different angle, the contest relates to the opening debate between Agamemnon and Achilles, a debate that, for some reason, is completely silenced in Ovid’s neo-Iliad. Like the two great leaders in Iliad 1, Ajax and Ulixes fight over a prize of largely symbolic value. Two additional leading themes in the Iliad, both of which feature in the proem of the epic, determine in turn the tone of the Ovidian agon. The first is mênis, ‘rage’ (Il. 1.1); the second is algea, ‘pains’, ‘suffering’ (Il. 1.2), a term synonymous to achos, ‘pain’, from which Achilles’ name etymologically originates (Il. 1.1). Both words are observed in Ajax’s reaction following his defeat356, and, as in the Iliad, they appear in the same phrase on successive lines: 354

355

356

The stylistic development of the ‘Judgment’ might additionally draw on the popularity of Ajax with the less formal genres of the Roman stage, which, thanks to their appeal to Augustus, were quite successful in Ovid’s time. There was at least one satura inspired by the episode, Varro’s Aiax Stramenticius, while the opening couplet of Metamorphoses 13 is patently parodied in Juvenal (Sat 7.115 consedere duces, surgis tu pallidus Aiax, ‘the chiefs took their places; then you, pale Ajax, rose’). Cf. Bömer 1982, 197, citing more bibliography on Ovid’s debt to the lesser forms of Roman drama; on Juvenal’s take on Ovid, see E. Thomas, ‘Ovidian Echoes in Juvenal’, in: N.J. Herescu (ed.), Ovidiana. Récherches sur Ovide (Paris 1958), 505-525. There are several critics who in the past fifty years have argued that the wrestling match between Ulixes and Ajax in Iliad 23 foreshadows their contest over the arms of Achilles, e.g., R.C. Whitman, Homer and the Heroic Tradition (Cambridge, MA 1958), 263-264; Kullmann, 1960, 335; M.M. Willcock, ‘The Funeral Games of Patroclus’, BICS 20 (1973), 1-11 (p. 5); Schein 1984, 25; K. Dowden, ‘Homer’s Sense of Text’, JHS 116 (1996), 47-61 (pp. 54-55). The parallelism is aptly phrased in Hopkinson 2000, 12: “Wrestling is a trial of strength in which brain can however overcome brawn”. Hopkinson believes that Achilles interrupted the contest declaring it a draw, because he sensed that Ulixes was gaining ground and wished to avert Ajax’s defeat. The intention in the recollection of mênis, “the basic theme of the Iliad”, along with Il. 1.1, has been noted in Huyck 1991, 206.

5. Staging the Mênis, the Arms and the Men

167

Hectora qui solus, qui ferrum ignesque Iovemque sustinuit totiens, unam non sustinet iram, invictumque virum vicit dolor. arripit ensem (Met. 13.384-386) He who so many times all alone had confronted great Hector, so many times the sword, fire, and Zeus, he could not endure the one and only anger, and suffering conquered the unconquered hero. He seized his sword…

Ovid’s Ajax, ironically, becomes the most Achilles-like not at the beginning but at the very end of his literary performance. Otherwise, the two heroes succumb alike to anger (ira, dolor 357) for having been wronged and disgraced before the entire Greek army. The world of anger they both inhabit358 is to be understood in the Aristotelian definition of anger offered in the second book of the Rhetoric. For Aristotle anger is “a desire, accompanied by pain, for a perceived revenge, on account of a perceived slight on the part of people who are not fit to slight one or one’s own” (Rh. 2.2.1378a31-33).359 Both Achilles and Ajax grow angry because they believe that they have been slighted, by being deprived unjustly of a marker of status and honor, a prize which they think they righteously deserve. Achilles believes that he is a victim of hybris, Aristotle’s third type of slight360, because, in his opinion, Agamemnon seized Briseis from him to make a statement before the entire Greek army that he truly is the most powerful leader, the basileutatos, and so, superior to Achilles. To dishonor someone, that is to deprive one of his timê, is for Aristotle equal to slighting and offending someone’s dignity and superior status in the eyes of one’s fellow soldiers or citizens. Ajax’s anger is part of a more complex situation. The Salaminian hero experiences two different types of anger, for his ira at the beginning of his speech (13.3) and the ira that leads him to commit suicide at the end (13.385) are of a different nature. The cause of his initial anger is a mixture of kataphronêsis, ‘contempt’, and epêreasmos, ‘spite’, which correspond, respectively, to the first and second categories of 357 358

359

360

For ira and dolor as synonyms, see ThLL, s.v. dolor under the subheading, “i.q. ira”. On anger in the Iliad in general, see principally A.W.H. Adkins, ‘Threatening, Abusing and Feeling Angry in the Homeric Poems’, JHS 89 (1969), 2-21, and more recently J. Shay, Achilles in Vietnam. Combat Trauma and the Undoing of Character (New York 1994), especially chapters three and five; F. Manakidou, ‘ ,μ , , in den Argonautika des Apollonios Rhodios’, Philologus 142 (1998), 242-244, offers a valuable brief description and an updated bibliography. On Achilles’ anger in particular, see Muellner 1996. My analysis of the similar development of anger in Achilles and Ajax in the light of Aristotle’s perception of anger-development is based on Konstan 2003, 99-120; the translation of the Aristotelian definition of anger quoted here is Konstan’s, and is recorded on p. 100. On Aristotle’s categorization of slight into kataphronêsis, epêreasmos and hybris, see Konstan 2003, 108-109; pp. 112-114 discuss the feud between Agamemnon and Achilles as an exemplary case of slight-ignited anger in the purely Aristotelian conception of the emotion.

168

The ‘Judgment of the Arms’: Re-Constructing Achilles

the Aristotelian “slight”. Ajax, in other words, believes that Ulixes’ contesting of Achilles’ arms is motivated by spite, a desire, that is, not to acquire the weapons for himself in order to use them in battle, since he cannot really lift them, but to hinder Ajax from getting them. Spite, however, does not usually drive one to suicide. Ajax dies because at the end he translates the decision of the Greek chiefs in Ulixes’ favor as a statement of contempt, a dismissal of his services and his deeds as worthless.361 Ajax’s reaction to the insult of his fellow warriors is similar to that of the Homeric Achilles: withdrawal from fighting in order to prove to his slanderers how indispensable his presence is. Unlike Achilles, however, who expects and is reassured by his mother that the Greeks will suffer from his absence and will restore his honor (timê) to him, Ajax receives no reassurance of status reinstatement. In this respect, the suicide, the permanent removal of his services, appeals to him as a logical means to inflict upon the Greeks an irreversible punishment. Ajax’s name, which determines the transformation of the hyacinth into the hero’s eternal memorial, signifies pain much more emphatically than Achilles’ name does: it literally transcribes pain into writing, as the inscription on the hyacinth petals denotes, and when it is read aloud it produces the sound of lamentation (13.397-398).362 Then, even though both heroes experience immense rage upon being deprived of the prizes they claim as theirs, only Achilles is graced with instant supernatural assistance. Thanks to the epiphanic presence of Athena, who physically intervenes and prohibits the hero from drawing his sword against Agamemnon, Achilles regains control of his temper and his role in the epic narrative. In addition, the goddess’ intervention in Homer is crucial because she promises that Agamemnon will pay for his insults, reassuring Achilles that he will eventually receive due compensation. Ovid’s Ajax, on the contrary, is emphatically left alone. When the entire Greek army refuses to acknowledge his superiority and instead hands the 361 362

On contempt and spite, see Konstan 2003, 108, along with the exact Aristotelian citations. Ulixes’ name ( ) also supports a pain-related etymology from , ‘pains’, which makes his name to mean ‘the man of pains’; cf. Segal 1994, 90-91, himself indebted to N. Austin, ‘Name Magic in the Odyssey’, CSCA 5 (1972), 1-19; see also the alternative etymology by R. Pfeiffer, History of Classical Scholarship from the Beginnings to the End of the Hellenistic Age (Oxford 1968), 4, from μ , ‘wail, complain, lament’, and μ , ‘hate’. This etymological possibility was well known to Ovid who implicitly refers to it in the Judgment’ when he asserts that the painful rage (dolor) that debilitated Ajax energizes Ulixes most positively: Met. 12.228f. dolor ipse disertum fecerat, ‘his very rage had made him quite eloquent’; cf. Huyck 1991, 205. Notice also that this double etymological possibility behind Ulixes’ name, from ‘pain’ and ‘hate’, mirrors a similar wordplay underlying Ajax’s identification with dolor, a term which literally means ‘pain’, but the actual meaning in the particular context is ‘rage’.

6. Scripting the Mêtis and the Arms as the Man

169

weapons to Ulixes, the hero internalizes his anger and bitterness at this injustice, and identifies with them.363 Ajax, who always did everything alone (solus)364, reads in his defeat the beginning of a greater fall. And suicide emerges as the only solution to stop the collapse of his epic stature – as the ‘heroic’ way to take and keep control of the manner and the time of his death (13.391 ne quisquam Aiacem possit superare nisi Aiax, ‘so that no man save Ajax ever conquer Ajax’).365 Focusing on ends is always enticing but distracting: the appreciation of the two aspiring ‘new-Iliad’ composers’ rival opera demands that we revert back and follow the development of the ‘Judgment’ from the beginning.

6. Scripting the Mêtis and the Arms as the Man The variety of rhetorical techniques at work in the Ajax vs. Ulixes controversia develops around the ideological clash of brain and persuasion (mêtis) vs. physical might, force (biê).366 This couldn’t have been otherwise, since the

363 364

365

366

In Odyssey 11, his ghost is still mad at Ulixes as the two meet in the Underworld, and refuses to talk to the hero, even though the latter pleads for reconciliation (11.541-565). Achilles, too, when ordered by Athena to check his anger, withdraws to the solitude of the sea-shore, weeping and complaining about injustice, and accuses Zeus for consenting to his being robbed of all honor (timê); cf. Il. 1.348-356. Overall, Met. 13.384-386 toys with the language of Ovid’s eulogy for the dead Achilles at Met. 12.612-614. Both heroes are Aeacides, ‘descendants of Aiacus’, the first point Ajax will make in his speech (Met. 12.25ff.). Both are praised for martial excellence against the Trojans (13.384 Hectora qui solus… sustinuit totiens, ‘he who alone stood so often against Hector’ ~ 12.612 timor ille Phrygum, ‘the very terror of the Phrygians’) and for their invincibility (13.386 invictum virum, ‘the unconquered hero’ ~ 12.613 caput insuperabile bello, ‘the leader invincible in war’). This is expressed in the last line of the contest, which encapsulates the nature of the entire debate: 13.383 fortis… viri tulit arma disertus, ‘the eloquent man carried away the arms of the brave man’; cf. Zumwalt 1977, 218. For Anthony Edwards, who has devoted a book-long study to the discussion of the Achillean aspects of the Homeric Ulixes (Edwards 1985), there is evidence that in the Epic Cycle a rivalry revolving around the biê vs. mêtis contrast arose between Ulixes and Ajax over who was the aristos Achaion after Achilles. The rivalry turned into open conflict in the episode of the Hoplon Crisis. The judge appointed to determine which of these two heroes will receive the armor of Achilles is a Trojan prisoner of war, and he declares Ulixes as the winner because in his opinion the hero’s cunningness has done more damage to Troy, than Ajax’s biê. On the ‘Judgment’ in the Epic Cycle generally, see Kullmann 1960, 81-84; on the widely accepted version of the appointment of the war prisoner as the judge, cf. A. Severyns, Le Cycle épique dans l’école d’Aristarque (Liège 1928), 328-331; Wüst, ‘Odysseus’, RE XVII.2, 1935-37 [1905-96]. Edwards, also, remarks that the consideration of Ulixes’ mêtis as no less perilous than biê is supported by Hector’s com-

170

The ‘Judgment of the Arms’: Re-Constructing Achilles

protagonist of the Iliad, Achilles, embodies the ideal fusion of these two opposites, famously recorded in Il. 9.438-443, when Phoenix states that he came to Troy in order to teach Achilles how to become ‘a great orator and an ac’ μ complished leader in action’ (μ ).367 Reflecting its chief hero, the Iliad narrative traces a continuous rivalry between might and persuasion: it shows, interchangeably, what happens when sensibility instilled by persuasion fails, and then what happens when brute force fails. The epic values system, notably, does not prioritize between the two. The ‘best of the Achaeans’ has to excel in both. This need for perfection in both spheres explains the portrayal of Ulixes in the embedded narratives of the Phaeacia unit. When Ulixes introduces , himself to Alcinous in Od. 9.19-20 ( μ’ / μ , μ , ‘I am Ulixes, the son of Laertes, who am of [epic] concern to all men on account of my wiles, and my kleos [epic fame] reaches the heavens’), he brings together three major , his epic fama, which is epic issues. Foremost, he declares outright his , ‘glorious deeds’. Second, typically earned upon the accomplishment of this epic hero status is captured by the grand opening formula ‘I am X, the son of Y’, and is underscored by the proclamation ‘my kleos reaches the heavens’. This is a rare phrase, attested twice more in Homer, and in one of these cases it describes the epic bard, the agent authorized to transform martial deeds into klea. Ulixes poses as a bard of his own glory also when he uses the , which can mean ‘I am the subject of a song [a melos]’. Through verb μ ), transforming this melos, his deeds will be made known to everybody ( him into a worthy subject of heroic poetry. Third, Ulixes’ accomplishments ), but dolos here is taken absolutely, are described as doloi, ‘wiles’ ( meaning ‘elaborate and ingenious thinking’, not in its more common, pejorative sense of ‘guileful, deceitful planning’. For the king of Ithaca superior in-

367

ment, at Eur. Rhes. 497-509, that the king of Ithaca has done the Trojans more harm than any other Greek. This is one of the several recurrences of this seminal idea throughout the Iliad, the first of which occurs as early as Il. 1.76-77, when Calchas, prior to revealing the true cause behind the plague, asks Achilles to protect him both ‘with his words and his hands’, ). The most thorough examination of this theme is C. Brock, Wort und Tat bei Homer (Hildesheim 1976).

7. The Iliad vs. the ‘little Iliad’

171

telligence is the equivalent of physical strength368: both bring about the accomplishment of klea.369 Ulixes’ equation of mêtis and biê is seconded by Demodocus. In the first of his three songs, the bard sings of an argument during the Trojan War between , Achilles and Ulixes: Od. 8.75ff. / , ‘A strife between Ulixes and Achilles, the son of Peleus, how once during a banquet honoring the gods they fought with furious words’. This argument is not part of the Iliad narrative, but according to the Homeric narrator it was a wellknown episode of the broader Trojan legend (74 μ , ‘of the story’).370 Since no posterior literary sources for this strife – presumably a part of some apocryphal ‘Iliad’ – survive, one can only speculate on its motivation. The ancient commentators, however, argue that an alternative Iliad opened with a quarrel between Achilles and Ulixes, on whether mêtis or biê may prove more effective in winning the Trojan War, reflecting the two heroes’ opposing ideologies on defining aristeia and judging the ‘best of the Achaeans’.371 The metaliterary debate against the text of the Iliad inside the Odyssey dates the anxiety over succeeding Homer as early as the Homeric epics themselves. With respect to the above, it is only logical to read the Armorum Iudicium as Ovid’s initiative to emulate the rival ‘Iliad’ alluded to in Demodocus’ song.

7. The Iliad vs. the ‘little Iliad’ Ajax’s ‘neo-Iliad’ script develops along two lines of argument. Principally, the hero wishes to establish himself as a duplicate Achilles, by stressing their 368

369 370

371

Actually, deeds accomplished alike through intelligence and might are already equated in the opening of the Odyssey: Ulixes is referred to as ‘the man of many turns’, but also as the one who ‘sacked the holy city of Troy’. The verbal phrase is synonymous with the noun , ‘sacker of cities’, which typically describes Achilles in the Iliad. The above paragraph is based on the analysis in Segal 1994, 85-109. For μ as the Iliad legend, see already W.W. Merry, Homer, Odyssey Books I-XII (Oxford 1870; rev. & rpt. 1887; rpt. 1966), ad loc. This Trojan War μ identifies with the second Homeric subject to be granted ‘kleos that rises high to the broad heavens’ (Od. 8.73-74). Heubeck-West-Hainsworth more recently translate μ as ‘tale’, in the sense of a long narrative trail. They further correlate it with μ , ‘path, road’, citing as parallel the phrase μ , ‘the path of the song’ from the Homeric hymn to Hermes (Hym. 4.451); cf. A. Heubeck, S. West and J.B. Hainsworth (edd.), A Commentary on Homer’s Odyssey, vol. I. Introduction and Books 1-8 (Oxford 1990), 351. See Nagy 1979, 20-25, for full discussion of Demodocus’ possible allusion to a cryptic rival ‘Iliad’ that conveys Ulixes’ transformed definition of the epic aristos.

172

The ‘Judgment of the Arms’: Re-Constructing Achilles

common genealogy from Aeacus and Zeus, and by isolating those moments in the Iliad narrative that celebrate his skill as a superior fighter of irreplaceable service. Subsequently, he discredits and undermines the image of Ulixes, whom he views as his own ethical antipode, and so as the typical anti-hero. Ajax’s speech, however, seriously misreads the Homeric heroic culture it supposedly endorses, because he severs martial performance from oratorical performance. From the very beginning, Ajax translates the debate as a case of words, which he dismisses outright as false (13.9 fictis… verbis; 10 dicere), versus deeds (13.10 pugnare; 11 facere; 13 facta).372 The objective of his first point (at Met. 13.5-20) is to emphasize his outstanding martial performance and convince others of his uncontested virtus (21). He accentuates his belief in the mutual exclusion of words and deeds by introducing a second pair of contrasting values, eyewitness testimony vs. hearsay evidence. By analogy, his deeds have no need for words to be made known because they are visible to everybody (14 vidistis enim), and therefore real – literally, facts (13 facta). Ulixes’ deeds, on the other hand, mostly nocturnal enterprises (15 quorum nox conscia sola est, ‘only the night has knowledge of them’), are inconspicuous, therefore their existence depends on oral speech, words (13.14-15 sua narret Ulixes, / quae sine teste gerit, ‘let Ulixes report his own deeds, which he accomplished without witness’). The genealogical evidence brought up next (13.21-33) introduces epic criteria that corroborate the fundamental difference between the two opponents.373 Ajax is Achilles’ nearest kinsman at Troy, a first cousin, and himself also a descendant of Zeus.374 Kinship ties are paired with allusions to an in372

373

374

A. Ortega, Die Reden in Ovids Metamorphosen (Doctoral Dissertation, Freiburg 1958), 137, labels Ajax a “Heldentyp”, a “Held voll kriegerischer Kraft” for whom one’s hero status is proven only through warfare. The Homeric heroes typically introduce themselves to their opponents by referring to their famous ancestors, because they view the genealogy competition as the preamble to the single combat that usually follows. As a rule, genealogical listing in Homer is short and does not extend backwards very far – rarely beyond two generations (on the brevity of Homeric genealogies, see Thomas 1989, 174 n. 41). This is to be expected of family traditions that tend to emphasize both the immediate predecessors and the most important ancestors, especially the hero or god regarded as the founder of the family (Thomas 1989, 158). The employment of genealogical material operates paradigmatically: the career of a famous ancestor invites comparison with the career of a character in the poem. As shown in chapter two, the verbal exchange between Achilles and Cycnus touches upon the issue of the epic hero’s emotional pressure to meet the standards set by a glorious ancestor. On genealogy as paradigm in the Iliad, see Alden 2000, 153-178. In listing his ancestors Ajax follows after the example of Achilles, in the latter’s reply to the challenge over ancestry by Asteropaeus in Iliad 21 (discussed earlier, on pp. 57-58, in association with the Achilles-Cycnus duel). Achilles traces his descent back one generation be-

7. The Iliad vs. the ‘little Iliad’

173

herited nobilitas (22) in epic performance: Ajax is the son of Telamon, the hero who in the company of Hercules led the Greeks to the first sack of Troy a generation earlier (22-24).375 In his own mind, then, Ajax combines the heroic promise of an Achilles-like battlefield performance with the promise of leading a second successful sack of Troy. Confirmed and widely acknowledged primacy is another prerequisite for the heir to Achilles’ unmatched excellence, and Ajax hastens to address this issue, too (34-42). He announces that he was the first to join the Trojan campaign (34 in arma prior nulloque sub indice veni, ‘I was the first to answer the call to arms, at nobody’s suggestion’); Ulixes, instead, entered the cause too late (36 ultima [arma] qui cepit, ‘he took up arms dead last’). The same adjective, ‘first, foremost’, qualifies the hero’s prompt participation in the epic action (42 obtulimus… nos ad prima pericula, ‘I was the one to confront the first danger’). The coward Ulixes (38 timidi), on the contrary, covets excellence only when it concerns first prizes (40 optima num sumat, quia sumere noluit ulla? ‘shall he take the first [armor], because he desired to take none?’). Homer’s Agamemnon in Iliad 1 sits at the receiving end of a similar accusation of greed and undeserved prizes hurled at him by Achilles, at Il. 1.149-171, especially 161ff.: μ

…

… μ μ

μ ’· μ

μ’

μ ,

,

,

’ μ μ . (Il. 1.163; 165-168)

But the honors I receive never equal yours… my arms carry through most of the brutal, savage fighting, indeed, but when it comes to dividing up the plunder, the share that goes to you is by far the largest, while I go back to my ships and with only a little something in my hands, which I love, when I have fought to exhaustion.

375

yond his opponent: he is the son of Peleus, grandson of Aeacus, and great-grandson of Zeus (Il. 21.184-99). Genealogy is used in this case to determine social hierarchy, which in turn serves to predict success on the battlefield: the river Axius, Asteropaeus’ grandfather, could not rival Zeus; accordingly, no descendant of a river could be a match for a descendant of Zeus. By and large, in conflicts between the descendants of mortals, the winner is the son of the more important individual; when the contestants are scions of immortals, the victor is the son of the most important god; cf. F. Létoublon, ‘Défi et combat dans l’Iliade’, RÉG 96 (1983), 34-36, noting Sarpedon’s defeat by mortal Patroclus as the only exception. An episode related once before in the Metamorphoses (11.194-220); cf. Bömer 1980, 290-294 ad loc.

174

The ‘Judgment of the Arms’: Re-Constructing Achilles

There is little doubt that Ajax has the celebrated conflict in Iliad 1 in mind when he refers to himself as ‘unhonored’ and ‘deprived’ of the gifts that are due to him (41f. nos inhonorati et donis patruelibus orbi… simus? ‘shall I go unhonored and deprived of my cousin’s gifts?’). His complaints clearly echo the Homeric Achilles’ protest that Agamemnon is depriving him of his ‘prize’ (Il. μ , ‘and you are threat1.161 ening me to take away yourself my prize of honor’).376 This intertextual flashback seems part of Ajax’s plan to stress his proximity to the Achillesmodel; on the other hand, the suggestive comparison of Ulixes to Agamemnon in the presence of Agamemnon himself, ironically, could jeopardize Ajax’s chances to gain favor with the head of his judges. Furthermore, Ajax’s dismissal of the timid Ulixes, who feigned insanity to evade the draft (13.3739), is used against him a little later (13.296ff.), when Ulixes notes that Achilles entered the Trojan War late as well, because, like Ulixes, he was detained by a beloved female relative and was hiding in disguise. The juxtaposition between the indispensability of an Achilles-like Ajax and Ulixes’ disastrous presence becomes particularly pronounced in the remainder of Ajax’s speech. There lies the hypothetical scenario of a different ‘Trojan War’, in the absence of Ulixes: Philoctetes, the carrier of Hercules’ weapons, would be present and Palamedes, Ulixes’ double in mêtis, alive (13.42-62). Yet, the choice of the particular examples is not a fortunate one for Ajax. The decision to abandon Philoctetes was actually initiated by Agamemnon, with Ulixes only executing the commander’s orders, while the murder of Palamedes was a decision enacted collectively by the Greek army; Ulixes merely suggested the penalty. The Argive leaders, therefore, and Agamemenon, especially, are reminded for the second time of two grave injustices they committed, while on the second occasion they are led to admit that they were manipulated.377 Next, Ajax accuses Ulixes directly of having run away in the heat of the Trojan attack neglectful of Nestor who was crying out to him for help (6370), but his reading is once again forced. The Homeric incident in question, recorded in Iliad 8.80-98, literally reports that Ulixes ‘did not give an ear to the ’ ) – a call that came not from Nestor himself, but from call’ (97 Diomedes (Il. 8.90-92) – as he swept by on his way to the ships. Since this 376

377

Ironically, Agamemnon expresses a similar protest a few lines earlier, that by losing Chryseis he is left ‘dishonored’, without a gift: (Il. 1.119); cf. Lorenzetti 2001, 228 n. 26. For example, the part in Ajax’s speech referring to Ulixes’ abandonment of Philoctetes (Met. 13.45-54) is modeled on the text of Accius’ Philocteta, not the tragedy of Euripides; cf. Müller 1997, 285-286; see also Müller 1997, 260-286, for more details on Accius’ drama, including a thoughtful reconstruction of the plot on the basis of the surviving fragments.

7. The Iliad vs. the ‘little Iliad’

175

comment comes from the omniscient narrator and not from a homodiegetic witness, a definite answer to whether Ulixes actually heard Nestor and consciously ignored him is practically impossible to offer. Nonetheless, the probability to read Ulixes’ negligence as deliberate is invaluable for Ajax who strives to portray his opponent as cowardly and disrespectful of the oldest Greek warrior’s appeals.378 The ‘corroboration’ of Ulixes’ cowardice379 is next outlined in the recollection of another battle scene from the Iliad, the rescue of Ulixes by Ajax’s timely intervention (71-81). Here, Ajax recalls the great battle before the Greek ships in Iliad 11, when Ulixes along with most Greek leaders, with the exception of Diomedes and Ajax, were shot and left the battle wounded. Ajax was the man who helped him withdraw safely from the heat of the fighting (Il. 11.459-488). The re-presentation of the events in the Metamorphoses, however, is again manipulated and tendentious. Ajax, not satisfied to extol his own role as Ulixes’ savior, debases his opponent’s morality as much as possible. Initially, he contests Ulixes’ masculinity in the latter’s panic-stricken, nearly hysterical calls for help: Ulixes ‘screams out to his comrades’ (conclamat socios, 13.73). The verb conclamat is employed four additional times in Ovid’s epic, and in three of them it describes the reactions of desperate females in “fairly hysterical contexts”.380 Then, Ajax takes advantage of Ulixes’ fame for tall tales and lies, to imply that Ulixes was not actually wounded but, rather, he was faking his wound to attract immediate assistance and reach safety faster (80-81). Contrary to the Homeric ‘reality’ where Ulixes is both … … wounded (Il. 11.458f. μ μ’ …, ‘he pulled [the spear] out and blood came gushing forth; and the Trojans, when they saw the blood of Ulixes…’) and fighting effectively against numerous attackers (Il. 11.482-484), the Ovidian Ajax’ portrayal of Ulixes as a natural deceiving coward is provocative. 378

379

380

It is worth noting that nowhere in Homer is Ajax reported to have been physically close to this incident. Through this subtle piece of information the Ovidian narrator notifies his readers that he is deliberately misreading the Iliad. Ulixes’ faintheartedness is a recurrent theme throughout Ajax’ speech, as one might expect in the light of Ajax’s building the case for himself on the bravery vs. cowardice antithesis: timidi… animi, 38-39; trepido amico, 69; trementem / pallentemque metu et metuentem, 73-74; solitum timorem, 78; timidae sinistrae, 111; timidissime, 115. The examples are listed and commented upon in Hill 2000, 131 ad 13.73; they concern, in order, the chained Andromeda (4.691), the spear-struck Procris (7.843), and Myrrha’s nurse (10.385); and the only non-female victim is Niobe’s eldest son (6.227), who is still a boy. The image of a screaming Ulixes is accentuated in the serial placement of four words denoting fear and terror: trementem / pallentemque metu et trepidantem (73-74 ‘trembling and pale with fear and shaking’; cf. also 78 tuum solitumque timorem, ‘and your habitual fear’: for Ajax, fear is Ulixes’ natural trait).

176

The ‘Judgment of the Arms’: Re-Constructing Achilles

Ajax’s reading of the Iliad peaks at Met. 13.82-94, in a combined reminiscence of his most heroic moments: his single combat against Hector (Il. 7.66310) and his defense of the ships against a god-driven Hector (Il. 15.65316.123). Through the recollection of these incidents Ajax comes full circle to the beginning of his speech and his primary objective to appear in Achilles’ light. Ajax was the only other Greek warrior next to Achilles to confront Hector without losing, and he might have been the one to conquer Hector, had not Zeus intervened when Ajax was clearly winning (Il. 11.283-312).381 Additionally, the Hector vs. Ajax duel and the fight before the ships were both public spectacles, attended by crowds of warriors. The dichotomy of ostentatious visibility vs. stealth and discretion, further marks the closure of Ajax’s speech, where Ulixes’ spy missions are revisited (98ff.), to highlight the ring composition just noted in Ajax’s reasserting his Achillean side.382 The last bit of Ajax’s speech is devoted to the motive behind the Judgment’, and comments broadly on the issue of arms and the men, like himself and Achilles, who can hold or are entitled to claim them (103-122). Arms belong to those who actually wear them – Ulixes doesn’t (103f. semper inermis / rem gerit, ‘he always does things unarmed’; 117f. iste tuus, tam raro proelia passus, / integer est clipeus, ‘that shield of yours [sc. here Ajax apostrophizes Ulixes], so rarely used in battle, is quite untouched’); his expertise lies in nocturnal spy missions (104 furtis, ‘with tricks’). Arms belong to those who are able to lift them – Ulixes can’t (107f. nec… pondera tanta feret, ‘neither will he be able to bear so great a weight’); Achilles’ weapons, especially the crucial paternal spear (Pelias hasta, ‘the spear from Pelion’, with the name of the Thessalian mount temptingly evoking the name of Achilles’ father, Peleus), are too heavy for the king of Ithaca (108-111 onerosa gravisque… hasta… nec clipeus… conveniet, ‘the spear is onerous and heavy…; and the shield will not become [his timid hand]’). Arms belong to those who deserve and can defend them – Ulixes doesn’t, nor is he able to keep them from falling into the hands of the enemy (114-116).383 In short, Achilles’ armor is an unsuitable costume 381 382

383

See full discussion of the Homeric subtext behind Met. 13.82-94 in Bömer 1982, 225-228, and Hill 2000, 132-133. This second reference to Ulixes’ nocturnal enterprises anything but silences the role of Ulixes’ accomplice, Diomedes (13.100-102); rather, it gives him full credit for all martial action during these campaigns (100 nihil est Diomede remoto, ‘take away Diomedes, and there is nothing left!’). The capture of Helenus at line 99 is not Homeric in origin; cf. Hill 2000, 134 ad 13.99, citing the full story as recorded in Apollodorus (Epit. 5.9-13). According to Bömer (1982, 230), the capture of Helenus was told in the Ilias Parva: chronologically, that is, it took place after Ajax’s suicide! M. Labate, ‘Ulisse, Eurialo e le armi di Achille (Ov. Met. XIII 98ff.)’, A&R 25 (1980), 2832, notes that Ajax’s closing arguments presuppose superior intertextual knowledge, as they combine the Dolonia with recollections of the Nisus and Euryalus expedition recorded

7. The Iliad vs. the ‘little Iliad’

177

for Ulixes, and by analogy the hero of Ithaca is not the best candidate for the role of Achilles’ successor. Ulixes’ reply (Met. 13.123-381), which is twice as long, answers and refutes Ajax’s allegations, and so represents a different appreciation of the dynamics of Achilles’ character. It offers a different reading of the Iliad, which at once rivals and enhances the one produced by Ajax. In fashioning Ulixes’ response, Ovid revisits the Homeric poem guided by different motives, interests and perspectives.384 Ulixes now personifies the suspicious and sophisticated reader, who discerns more than one way to understand a single text – and specifically the great Homeric text – and more than one objective and level of interpretation served by it.385 Hence, in defending his right to Achilles’ weapons, and therefore to the role of Achilles as the embodiment of great epic, Ulixes does not strive, as Ajax did, to prove himself an excellent actor, and specifically, Achilles’ perfect replacement in a faithful reproduction of the Iliad. Instead, he introduces himself as Achilles’ auctor, the agent who brought Achilles into the Trojan legend in the first place, and made possible the composition of the particular Iliad. Ajax claimed that he deserves the weapons because he is the best Achilles-substitute inside the epic worldview as defined by the Homeric narrator. Ulixes argues that the weapons should be his, for, without his initiatives in the narrative time prior to the Iliad, there would be no Achilles to join the Trojan War, and therefore no Iliad for Homer to write about – and for Ajax to act in!386

384

385

386

in Aeneid 9, suggesting that ultimately Ulixes will have the same fate as the two young Trojans. Dippel 1990, 80 n. 40, finds Ovid’s discourse with two epic models simultaneously ‘absurd’. This ‘absurdity’, nonetheless, must have had effectively impressed Ajax’s argument on the readers of the Metamorphoses, who were well aware of the Vergilian model. Otis 1970, 285, is an early reading of Ovid’s take on Ulixes’ defense of ingenium over virtus from a poetics-defined angle: “Ulysses’ facundia and ingenium are at bottom much like Ovid’s own, and Ovid is saying not only that brain is better than brawn but that the traditional respect for brawn – the heroic and epic code in short – is itself rather ridiculous”. In this light the notions of ‘true’ and ‘false’, as in the famous characterization of Ulixes in Od. 19.203 as the man who ‘knew how to say many false things that were like true sayings’, are deliberately resistant to a fixed definition. Ajax’s rigid, straightforward performance and, on the other side, the more flexible, less predictable act of Ulixes correspond to the two possible models of elite competition outlined in the Iliad, according to D. Wilson, Ransom, Revenge and Heroic Identity in the Iliad (Cambridge 2002). These models (analyzed in the fifth chapter of Wilson’s study) represent, respectively, a fluid, honor-based system and a fixed, hierarchy-based system. The parameters behind the former model dictate that it is Achilles, the warrior constantly seeking out competition to validate his status, who embodies the essence of the ‘best of the Achaeans’. The hierarchy-based system, on the contrary, rules that the aristos is appointed once and for all by Zeus, and in this respect, he should identify with Agamemnon, the au-

178

The ‘Judgment of the Arms’: Re-Constructing Achilles

By inserting bold allusions suggestive of action, and gestures throughout his speech, Ulixes affirms the theatricality of the physical setting, denoted already, as aforeseen, in the double meaning of key terms (corona, considere, consedere etc.) at the end of Book 12 and the beginning of Book 13. Much more explicitly than Ajax did, he projects their debate as a competition between discordant views on acting over a common role, that of the ‘best of the Achaeans’: donec Laertius heros adstitit atque oculos paulum tellure moratos sustulit ad proceres exspectatoque resolvit ora sono, neque abest facundis gratia dictis. (Met. 13.124-127) Next the heroic son of Laertes stood, and his eyes, which dwelt on the ground for a little while, he raised to the chiefs, and began speaking with the words they expected to hear, nor was grace lacking in his eloquent speech.

As Gross has recently suggested387, in the first two lines of the passage above Ulixes is imitating his Iliadic self and is alluding to a specific passage, Il. , 3.216-223, and especially line 217 ( μμ , ‘he would stand there, and stare down, eyes fixed on the ground beneath him’) which describes his typical stance prior to speaking. His posture is outright dignified, and outright theatrical, a detail the Homeric narrator does not miss.388 In Stanford’s view, Ovid found appealing the deliberate rhetorical significance of this passage, designed to gain favor with the audience and to emphasize the hero’s skills in persuading.389 Nonetheless, Ovid’s Ulixes raises his eyes (126 sustulit), and this move announces his intentions to review critically the act of his Homeric counterpart.390

387 388

389 390

thenticity of whose office is never to be challenged. Ovid’s Ulixes, whose authorial essence relies so completely on flexibility, corresponds to Wilson’s conception of the Iliadic Achilles, while Ajax in his predictability poses as a variant of the ‘fixed’ Agamemnon. Gross 2000, 56f. The theatrics of Ulixes’ address causes the Homeric narrator to break the narrative illusion, at Il. 2.218-220, and revert to a second-person apostrophe of wonder: ’ ’ μ ,/ ’ μ , ·/ ’ μμ ’ , ‘nor would he move the staff bringing it backward and forward, but held it tight right there in front of him, like a man who knows nothing. Yes, you would call him a sulky man, and a fool, too’). The rhetorical effectiveness of the lines as a reason for Ovid’s alluding to them was noted already in Stanford 1963, 14-15 and 71-71. There is no reason to condemn Ovid’s sidestepping the Homeric posture of the pensive Ulixes, as Gross seems to do (2000, 56), stating that the unexpected appearance of sustulit at 126 undermines the allusion intended towards the Homeric text.

7. The Iliad vs. the ‘little Iliad’

179

The new Ulixes maintains an ideal balance between evoking the crux of his Homeric past and advancing through it his envisioned new literary self; and this he makes plain very early in his delivery. As soon as he first mentions Achilles’ name, he pretends to cry and wipe away tears: Met. 13.132f. manuque simul veluti lacrimantia tersit / lumina, ‘and at the same time with his hand, as if weeping, he rubbed his eyes’. This simple act of pretense, which barely covers one line, enacts a poetic discourse that develops simultaneously on two levels, because it involves two different intertexts.391 The image of a crying Ulixes is alien to the Homeric setting of the Iliad, where he is never seen to weep, but it finds itself at home in the much more explicitly theatrical space of the Odyssey. Stanford notes sixteen occasions of a tearful Ulixes in the Odyssey, additionally remarking that on all sixteen the hero’s tears are sincere, an observation particularly useful in the light of the enforced tears ostentatiously acted out in the Ovidian portrayal of the hero of Ithaca.392 Among these sixteen moments of extreme emotion perhaps the most memorable concerns an effort to have those tears concealed from public view. When Demodocus’ song in Book 8 fills Ulixes’ eyes with tears, the latter raises his cloak and conceals his face (Od. 8.88f.), until Alcinous catches notice of it and orders the singing to stop. These tear-stirring songs extol Ulixes’ leadership in the Trojan War and the victory of the alternative hero-portrait, of the leader who relies foremost on his superior intelligence, even though his martial excellence is not in dispute. In Metamorphoses 13, Ulixes fakes tears to elicit comparison with his counterpart in the Odyssey, and in this way to adjust the narrative focus on his more advanced deconstruction of the typical aristos model. A second intertext enforces the issues alluded to in Ovid’s debating against the Homeric model, by assisting Ovid to turn the tables on Homer’s Ulixes and his acclaimed sincerity. Few Ovidian readers would have been unfamiliar with the image of Vergil’s tearful Sinon in Aeneid 2, the character who acts out a role fitted for Ulixes – a role, in fact, designed for him by Ulixes. This Sinon deceives the Trojans, ‘with treachery and enforced tears’, dolo lacrimisque coactis (Aen. 2.196), into believing that he is not a duplicate Ulixes, and so, into receiving the Trojan Horse, the major Ulixean dolus, inside their walls. Ironically and ingeniously, Ovid’s Ulixes is ‘rehearsing’ the tactics of Vergil’s Sinon, his own disciple, in order to deceive his fellow Greeks into judging his arguments more convincing. In this respect, the element of plotting, in its literal sense of strategic design, which causes the defeat of Ajax, the ‘bulwark 391

392

The explicit theatricality of this combination of drama and oratory is outlined in Huyck 1991, 137-138 ad 13.132f., where Cicero and Quintilian are cited in corroboration of the orator’s own tears as a highly effective strategy to rouse emotions in the corona to win over one’s audience. Stanford 1963, 122 n. 9, lists all sixteen references in question.

180

The ‘Judgment of the Arms’: Re-Constructing Achilles

of the Achaeans’393, and his literal fall upon his sword in Ovid’s ‘little Iliad’, calls to mind the deceptive plot of the Wooden Horse. The fall of Troy was facilitated by a suicidal decision to trust Sinon, but the planned argumentation of the Ovidian Ulixes’ speech should not be seen as parallel to the treacherous plot at the core of the Vergilian Ulixes’ tutoring of Sinon.394 Adhering to the pattern of Ajax’s delivery, Ulixes’ speech follows two separate lines of argument. Foremost, in professing that his own intelligence has been more effective than Ajax’s brawn, Ulixes stresses the importance of his contribution to the formative and most decisive stages of the Trojan campaign, and he discusses it on the basis of cause and effect. Expectedly, the speech advertises Ulixes’ relation to Achilles, introducing Achilles’ participation in the war as Ulixes’ exclusive accomplishment. Subsequently, the king of Ithaca is most delicate with his treatment of Achilles’ character. Even though his victory over his opponent depends on the devaluation of the model of the mighty hero, idolized by Ajax and exemplified by Achilles, Ulixes during his disparagement of biê abstains from even the slightest reference to Achilles. He is not preoccupied with defending himself against specific accusation, but directs instead his fire at Ajax, whose speech he takes apart by arguing that the Salaminian hero’s strategy of incrimination is based on a bad understanding of the Iliad and the broader Trojan legend. Realizing that Ajax’s speech was actually a masterly piece of suasoria395, Ulixes begins his reply by stressing the power of his acumen (137 ingenium). This, he explicitly contrasts to Ajax’s slow wit (135 quod, ut est, hebes esse videtur, ‘that he seems to be, as he indeed is, slow of wit’). He acknowledges his superior eloquence only indirectly, as a quality deserving attention on account of its beneficial impact upon the entire Greek army: 137f. meaque haec facundia, si qua est, / quae nunc pro domino, pro vobis saepe locuta est, / invidia careat (‘and let this eloquence of mine, if I have any, which now speaks on behalf of his master, but has often spoken also for your sake, incur no enmity’). The second important point in the opening section of Ulixes’ speech (13.128-139) involves,

393

394

395

Ajax’s typical characterization in Homer is (Il. 3.229, 6.5, 7.211, etc.), while his seven-fold shield is called a ‘tower’, (Il. 7.219). The only other individual described as in the Iliad is Achilles (Il. 1.284). Ulixes’ calling Achilles murus Graium, ‘the bulwark of the Greeks’ (Met. 13.281), capitalizes on this association, on which see also note 423 below. Once again Gross (2002, 57) misses the point here when he claims that by faking tears Ulixes is “removing himself from the realm of the heroic to the rhetorically manipulative and absurd”. The contribution of terms such as facundia and ingenium in underscoring the theatricality of Ulixes’ opening has been noted in Lorenzetti 2001, 234.

7. The Iliad vs. the ‘little Iliad’

181

naturally, the claim to Achilles’ weapons as leadership symbol: after all, Ulixes’ initiatives brought Achilles and these arms to Troy (13.133-134): ‘quis magno melius succedat Achilli, quam per quem magnus Danais successit Achilles?’ “Who would better follow after/receive [the weapons of] the great Achilles than the man through whom the great Achilles followed/was received by the Greeks?”

The double employment of succedere here, with the meaning of ‘follow after someone’, both in its metaphorical sense, of following someone’s example and becoming the recipient of someone’s heritage (succedat Achilli), and literally (Danais successit), produces a deliberately ambiguous wordplay.396 The phrase identifies Achilles with his weapons397, proving that the debate over the arms reflects broadly the leadership controversy in the aftermath of Achilles’ death.398 Also, the introductory section of Ulixes’ speech echoes the beginning of the Ovidian Nestor’s speech. This allusion features in lines 160-161, which justify Ulixes’ decision to label his debate with Ajax an operum… certamen (160), a performance contest of ‘deeds’ in the broader sense399: plura quidem feci quam quae comprendere dictis in promptu mihi sit; rerum tamen ordine ducar.

396

397

398

399

Cf. Bömer 1982, 239 ad 12.134, for the double meaning of the terms (“(1) ‘nachfolgen’ sc. im Besitz, als Erbe… und (2) ‘sequi’ (sc. exercitum)”). Bömer himself, following G. Lafaye (Ovide. Les Métamorphoses, Texte établi et traduit [Paris 1928]), who labels a comparable Ovidian wordplay at 13.227 “un jeu de mots intraduisible”, does not see Ovid’s initiative as a challenge to the readers’ comprehension as much as an exhibit of playfulness for its own sake. On Achilles’ identification with his weapons, see H-E ad loc., and especially their translation of Met. 13.133-134; Dippel 1990, 82, admires Ovid’s stylistic ingenuity in this couplet, which he calls a “phantastische[s] Wortspiel”. The revision of the genealogy argument produced by Ajax can be read along the same poetically defined lines. Blood kinship, the least contested proof of the righteous claim of an inheritance (here, the epic heritage embodied in the Achilles character), becomes the starting point and, so to speak, the foundation of Ajax’s claim. Ulixes wisely begins his deconstruction with the genealogy factor (13.140ff.). Identifying ancestral nobility and blood ties as the two foci of Ajax’s acclaimed genealogical superiority, Ulixes, who knows that he is not a kinsman of Achilles, cleverly splits the two in two different arguments. He bolsters his nobility by tracing his ancestry back to Zeus (142-144), as Ajax did, and by introducing a more prestigious set of ancestors. Then he brings up the existence of Pyrrhus, Achilles’ son (155), whom Ajax had silenced so that he might appear himself as the next of kin. Thus, the noble heir Ajax is transformed into a cheater, who manipulates well-grounded tradition to advance his own literary agenda. Bömer 1982, 245 ad 12.159ff., for certamen as vox propria for both artistic and athletic competitions.

182

The ‘Judgment of the Arms’: Re-Constructing Achilles

I have certainly accomplished more that I can capture with words offhandedly; nonetheless, I shall relate them in their due order.

Ulixes narrates before his audience his deeds, all the while pretending that he feels uncertain about the effectiveness of his unparalleled speech aptitude. Nestor, when invited by Achilles to tell the story of Caeneus begins by remarking that his mental faculties have been hampered on account of his advancing age400: quamvis obstet mihi tarda vetustas multaque me fugiant primis spectata sub annis, plura tamen memini (Met. 12.182-184) Though slow old age is standing as an obstacle to me [sc. my memory], though many things that I saw in my early years have left me, still I can remember much [sc. more than the ‘multa’ one might expect].

Nonetheless, both Ulixes and Nestor relate in impressive detail the things they consider difficult to handle, producing the two lengthiest direct discourses in the ‘little Iliad’. In fact, the characterization of Ulixes’ speech as facunda dicta (127) clearly pairs the king of Ithaca with Nestor, the only other warrior so labeled in the ‘little Iliad’ (12.178 o facunde senex). One might further note that ‘eloquence’ rounds up both Ulixes’ speech and the ‘Judgment’ overall, appearing again at 13.382 quid facundia posset, ‘what eloquence might be capable of doing’. It is reasonable, then, to assume that Ovid intended a comparison between the two great speakers, and by this association, to project Ulixes as the embodiment of the poetics of Ovidian epic. In one phrase, the two most accomplished speakers in the Epic Cycle are conceived as variants of the non-conventional profile of the epic poet adopted by Ovid. The dramatic time during which the action of the Iliad unravels barely covers a two-month period of the tenth and last year of the war, a total of 52 days to be exact, even though most of the action unfolds in just four days. Ajax draws on the events during that time to put together his Achillean image, and to reproduce the Iliad in an effort to persuade others of his skills as literary critic and auctor. Ulixes on his part, following the Ovidian Nestor’s precedent, plunges into a much larger and chronologically broader pool of incidents, availing himself of the entire Epic Cycle, and so he promises the composition of a more complex and comprehensive portrait of Achilles. Met. 13.162-215, the opening section of his speech, is particularly illuminating on this. Here, Ulixes revisits four crucial incidents, all set prior to the events re400

Gross 2000, 57, who does not seem to realize that facundia here is not the end but only the means to an end, reads Ulixes’ use of eloquence to present his deeds as the “antithesis” of a captatio benevolentiae.

7. The Iliad vs. the ‘little Iliad’

183

ported in Homer’s epic, the first two of which are, additionally, tied to Achilles’ participation in the Trojan War and are selected to comply with a linear chronological sequence of the Trojan story. In these episodes, certain highlights of the pre-Homeric action at Troy are retold to introduce the Iliad in terms of a script conceived by Ulixes and executed at his own direction. Achilles is the leading actor; but he was assigned the part only because this enhances the profile of the auctor Ulixes. The tale begins with the uncovering of Achilles, who was hiding in disguise among the daughters of the king of Skyros (13.162-180). Next follows the resolution of the Aulis stalemate (13.181-195), and immediately afterwards, Ulixes’ leading role as a member of the embassy that negotiated with the Trojans prior to the official declaration of war (13.196-204). The final episode sums up in ten lines Ulixes’ activity during the nine years of war prior to the events reported in the Iliad (13.205215).401 The extrication of Achilles from Skyros represents the cornerstone of the Trojan legend: the great hero may now join the Greek war at Troy and allow Homer to compose his Iliad. In this respect, the story bolsters Ulixes’ right to Achilles’ weapons. Ulixes laconically affirms his power of control over Achilles’ overall conduct at 13.170-171: iniecique manum fortemque ad fortia misi. / ergo opera illius mea sunt, ‘and I laid my hand on him and sent the brave man off to brave deeds. Accordingly, the deeds of his are mine’. The phrase inieci manum corresponds to a legal term, the manuminiectio, which signifies an owner’s uncontested and legally justified claim over an individual. This claim entitles the owner to firm and absolute possession over the human subject as if over a piece of property. By ‘appropriating’ Achilles, at 170-171, Ulixes rules that Achilles’ accomplishments – specifically, the Telephus adventure, the fall of Thebes, the capture of various cities and islands along the coast of Asia Minor and, finally, the death of Hector – should be credited to his own genius (171180).402 The individuals subject to ownership are usually slaves or women, and Ovid had already used this phrase with this specific legal content in his ama401

402

Excepting the fourth occasion, which does not correspond to a specific event, the other incidents were featured originally in the Cypria but only Iphigeneia’s story has survived in extant literary form. Apollodorus provides the earliest narrative on Achilles at Skyros (3.13.8), and the same author reports on Ulixes leading the Greeks’ diplomatic effort to negotiate the return of Helen without going to war (3.28-29). On the relevant traditions behind these early Trojan War episodes, see briefly Hill 2000, 137-138, and Bömer 1982, 248251. Ulixes’ eagerness to show his total appropriation of the Achilles character as an acting role is transcribed in the recurrent use of the first person possessive and personal pronouns seven times in eight lines (170-178); cf. Bömer 1982, 249.

184

The ‘Judgment of the Arms’: Re-Constructing Achilles

tory works.403 What is more, a feminine disguise in terms of performance transforms the cross-dresser into a woman: one needs only think of the male actors performing the female roles in plays by wearing female costumes. Achilles at Skyros is such a male actor playing a female role successfully at the direction of his mother, until Ulixes uncovers him by appealing to his masculine hero identity. Yet, in describing his ‘groping’ of Achilles as if the latter were indeed a woman, Ulixes implies that appearances do matter, that Thetis’ son was *technically* a woman when seized because he was dressed in female clothes. Ironically, only a few hundred lines earlier, still in the ‘little Iliad’, and distinctively in the character of the Centaur Latreus, Ovid advocates precisely the opposite idea (Met. 12.470ff.). Neither the divinely initiated sex transformation to male nor the hyper-masculine performance in battle convinced the Centaur of Caeneus’ masculinity. The Lapith’s gender at birth remained a stigma that accompanied the hero to the moment of his exit from the epic world. In Caeneus’ case, the transformation from female to male is a real and permanent one, but for his opponent it is just a temporary disguise. This view is epitomized at 12.470-471: nam tu mihi femina semper, / tu mihi Caenis eris, ‘for, a woman shall you always be to me, Caenis I shall hold you to be’. In reality, the conflict is illusory: ‘female’ Achilles and ‘male’ Caeneus(is) address the same idea from two diametrically opposed corners: in the world of traditional epic, once a female is always a female. In Ovid’s metamorphic epic universe, on the contrary, impermanence and flux, and the incessant shifting of identity, are the rule; and appearances, ‘costumes’, are usually all that matters. The feminine attire (167 virgineos habitus, ‘a maiden’s clothing’) donned by Achilles as his disguise costume404, as every attire that alters one’s identity, is an act of deception (163f. et deceperat omnes, in quibus Aiacem / sumptae fallacia 403

404

The legal content of the phrase is noted in F. Bömer, Die Fasten. Vol. 2 (Heidelberg 1958), 374-375; also, ibid. 1982, 248 ad 13.170, but here Bömer dismisses more serious deliberation in suggesting that we read Ulixes’ gesture symbolically, as an expression of friendliness (“kameradschaftliche Geste”). Habitus signifies at the same time one’s facial expression and physical demeanor or posture and one’s clothing, the attire that distinguishes a given posture. The term, a hapax in the Metamorphoses, is used, according to Bömer (1982, 248 ad 13.167), with the same theatrical meaning as in Aen. 1.315 virginis os habitumque gerens (‘[Venus] wearing both the semblance and the bearing of a maiden’), where it has obvious theatrical meaning of programmatic function. There, in acting the part of the maiden huntress, Venus is anticipating the theatrical performance, the drama within which Aeneas is about to participate upon entering the theatrical space of Carthage. On the two meanings of habitus discussed here, see OLD s.v., 2.b and c; on the dramatic dimension of Venus’ act in Aeneid 1, see E.L. Harrison, ‘Why Did Venus Wear Boots? Some Reflections on Aeneid 1.314ff’, in: P.R. Hardie (ed.), Virgil: Critical Assessments of Classical Authors. v. 4 (London/New York 1999), 59-75 [originally in PVS 12 (1972/3), 10-25].

7. The Iliad vs. the ‘little Iliad’

185

vestis, ‘the trick of the clothes that he wore deceived them all, including Ajax’). Achilles, then, albeit involuntarily, embraces deception no differently than Ulixes, the master of disguise; and an absolution of Ulixes’ many disguises, or better, the acceptance of disguise as a legitimate part of an epic hero’s conduct, is likely a target behind this underhanded parallelism. This comparison Ulixes will advance at a later stage of his speech, when he comes around to addressing the accusation of cowardice because he acted the madman – a fallacia, a role (296-305) – in an attempt to stay away from the war. The resolution of the Aulis standoff represents perhaps the most decisive moment in the preliminary course of the Trojan expedition (181-195). As with the ‘discovery’ of Achilles, Ulixes’ contribution to it was the catalyst for the smooth progression of the Trojan plot: his presence at Aulis guaranteed that the Greek fleet would cross to Troy. From a different perspective, the sacrifice of Iphigeneia is presented by Ulixes as an exemplary demonstration of diplomatic skill in combination with deception (of Clytemnestra): 193f. quae non hortanda, sed astu / decipienda fuit, ‘she would not be talked into it [sc. the sacrifice], but she ought to be deceived with cleverness’. The deception of Clytemnestra is mentioned also because it was designed with Achilles as the bait: the queen of Mycenae was lured to Aulis along with her daughter on the pretext of an arranged marriage between Iphigeneia and Achilles. Notably, Achilles was never consulted about this plan – at least according to the treatment of the story accounted in Euripides’ Iphigeneia at Aulis; rather, he became instead a tool for Ulixes to carry out his own plans, the material for a manipulative argument. Achilles drops out of the picture for a good part of the remaining speech, as Ulixes reverses Ajax’s accusations. This absence is deliberately planned, to dissociate the son of Thetis from his cousin who introduces himself as the Aeacid’s heir and duplicate. Indeed, when Achilles resurfaces towards the end of the oration, he is readily seen as the logical parallel of Ulixes. In the meantime, Ulixes is concerned to persuade his audience about the complexity of the Trojan War, and of the many and diverse strategies employed to bring about a victory for the Greeks. The successful perpetuation of the Iliad tradition is the production of a well-wrought plot.405 This presupposes the versa405

It is conventional to read the Iliad plot as relatively straightforward, void of the elaborateness that distinguishes the Odyssey. See, for instance, M. Bennett, Belted Heroes and Bound Women (Lanham, MD 1997), 97: “The plot of the Iliad is simple and direct; the Odyssey’s is complex and indirect – qualities that characterize the way their respective protagonists, Achilles and Odysseus, overcome adversities”. On the juxtaposition of the two Homeric poems in terms of plot sophistication, see J. Griffin, Homer (Oxford 1980), 45-78. It could be argued that Ulixes’ undertaking to ‘revise’ the Iliad narrative improves the sophistication of the text, for its development depends on the authorial initiatives of Ulixes, the protago-

186

The ‘Judgment of the Arms’: Re-Constructing Achilles

tile power of ingenium, an innate gift that the speaker obviously possesses, while his dull opponent does not. Ulixes’ remaining deeds in the early part of his Trojan activity are such that one would hardly label ‘epic’. Following a reference to his ‘risky’ mission to Troy just prior to the outbreak of the fighting (196-204) – an incident recorded in the Cypria –, the hero focuses on the nine, less celebrated, earlier years of the war (205-215), seeking epic credit for acts that took place off the battlefield (13.207-209). This period of relative inactivity on the war front was a time of feverish activity on the sidelines and backstage, the very field of action where Ulixes traditionally dominates. Sustaining an expedition involves a great deal of less glorious and mundane issues, day-to-day problems, such as feeding the army, building fortifications and digging trenches to tighten security – ‘deeds’ (211 facta), which nonetheless the epic bards never label as such and never extol in their songs. Acknowledgment of these un-glamorous, unpoetic, ‘deeds’ infuses with a wave of pragmatism the ethereal universe of the bards and their heroic subjects, calling into question the broader meaning of ‘epic’. Ulixes’ alternative ‘Iliad’ promises to give a new twist to legendary, but unexciting and certainly non-heroic, material previously ignored by the bards. As he moves forward into the more familiar, Homeric narrative time, Ulixes contests Ajax’s epic image (13.216-295) as recorded throughout the Iliad. He zooms in on ambiguities or omissions in the narration of certain events wherein Ajax’s participation is seminal, and these, by virtue of some inspired twist, he manipulates to his own advantage. Thus, first, at 13.216-237 (esp. 13.223f. quid quod et ipse fugit? vidi, puduitque videre / cum tu terga dares, ‘what of the fact that he, too, took to flight? I saw you, and I was embarrassed to see you fleeing away’), Ajax ‘joins’, in self-conscious embarrassment, the disorderly flight towards the ships in the incident reported in Iliad 2, even though Homer never actually specifies this. Next, the narrative focus of the Dolonia is readjusted. The nocturnal spy mission was principally the undertaking of Diomedes, who chose Ulixes of all Greeks to join him in a murderous raid (13.238-267). In the post-Homeric tradition Diomedes had been promoted to a ‘best Achaean’, developing character traits reminiscent of both Achilles and Ulixes. This was largely the result of his Achilles-like performance in Iliad 5 and of his ‘Odyssey’ at sea following his expulsion from his fatherland after the end of the Trojan War. By the time of Vergil’s Aeneid, Diomedes would be the surrogate not only of the Homeric-type epic heroism, but also of the Homeric poet himself, declaring the superiority of Aeneas’

nist of the Homeric Odyssey, and even its mastermind, in his embodiment of the Homeric bard.

8. Polemic En-listing

187

epic credentials (Aen. 11.252ff.).406 By introducing, then, his attachment to Diomedes as an invitation at the Argive hero’s request, Ulixes partakes of the epic poetics tied to Diomedes across literary tradition. The original Dolonia episode and, by analogy, its mirror narrative in Aeneid 9, exemplify epic metapoetics. Don Fowler successfully argued not too long ago that the Nisus and Euryalus episode in Aeneid 9, which is modeled on the Dolonia, reads as an ingenious mise en abyme of the Vergilian epic.407 An analogous precedent, with respect to the interaction among the texts of the Epic Cycle, should not be precluded; and it is actually appealing to read the Dolonia as a proto-fall of Troy, a mise en abyme of the (or at least, ‘an’) Iliou Persis.

8. Polemic En-listing As he goes over his exploits in the company of Diomedes, Ulixes revises certain details to enhance his heroic status. For instance, he credits himself with the execution of Dolon (13.245) and he introduces himself as the sole killer of Rhesus (13.249-252).408 And yet, a mere four lines later he constructs an epic list by transliterating nearly verbatim a series of hexameters from the Iliad that record the Homeric Ulixes’ actual killings. The list of enemy soldiers at 256262 is a typical archaic epic catalogue. Catalogues in general, and catalogues of conquered foes in particular, belong among the oldest and most traditional structural characteristics of heroic epic, and the presence of one in this particular segment of Ulixes’ selfportrayal, which promotes a stereotypical model of an ‘old-epic’ warrior, is

406

407 408

On Diomedes as heir to the Achilles heritage, in terms of epic characterization, and as embodiment of the evolving epic genre as expressed in the relationship of the Aeneid to the Homeric epic, see S. Papaioannou, ‘Homeric Diomedes Revisited: The Re-interpretation of the Iliad’, Mnemosyne 53 (2000), 193-217. The metaliterary prospects of the Vergilian Diomedes were not lost on Ovid, who develops them further. First, in Met. 14.454-511, the transformation of Diomedes’ companions into poetic swan-like birds adds a new twist to the definition of heroic epic. Then, in the Remedia amoris, Diomedes, already once reformed in the Vergilian epic universe, goes through a new poetic transformation, into an adulterous lover (Rem. 151-167). On the poetics involved in Ovid’s Diomedes and his swan-like friends, see Papaioannou 2005, 146-166; on the transformation of the lover Diomedes, see A. Michalopoulos, ‘The Intertextual Fate of a Great Homeric Hero: Diomedes in Vergil (Aen. 11.252-293) and Ovid (Rem. 151-167)’, Act. Ant .A. Sc. Hung. 43 (2003), 77-86. Fowler 2000. Met. 13.245 interimo, ‘I slay [him]’; contra Il. 10.455, where – as also in Aen. 12.351ff. – the slayer is Diomedes, and, likewise, in the lines immediately following Diomedes’ role in the slaying of Rhesus and his comrades is completely silenced.

188

The ‘Judgment of the Arms’: Re-Constructing Achilles

especially fitting.409 At the same time, the study of the rules of composing epic lists and catalogues, in the light of recent research that stresses the fundamentality of the oral character of archaic epic and consequently the element of performance that is entwined with orality, becomes a decisively literary activity. Plainly speaking, the learning and the composition of a superior list or catalogue requires above all special mnemonic powers. This means that, the stronger the bard’s memory, the more complex, ornate and long a list or catalogue becomes, and the more detailed the traditional material this bard can retain and use creatively. Additionally, the performance character of ancient (oral) epic meant that the synthesis of any list or catalogue was dictated by the specific circumstances under which the performance was to be held. Finally, a list-performance is itself a type of performance and it is evaluated as such; its success depends on how well the content of the list or catalogue appeals to the audience’s tastes or prejudices, as much as on how artfully the performance is executed.410 Unlike the Homeric (or any archaic) epic bard, however, Ovid is not an oral performer. This means that the oral debate between Ajax and Ulixes in the Metamorphoses is really only a simulation of a competition of orality between two performing bards, each advocating the composition of a different kind of epic genre. Rather, Ovid’s/Ulixes’ superiority is about to manifest itself in his appropriation of the mechanics of composing an epic list in the pattern of the dead-foes lists of the archaic, oral epics. The Ovidian list, we shall see, is an extraordinary synthesis, because it conspicuously employs the composition theory of oral poetics, in order to compose a self-conscious written epic narrative, which, further, relies upon deep but also selective memory. Met. 13.257-260, the epic list in question, represents one of those passages where Ovid purposely transcribes Greek epic most closely. The first two lines transfer into Latin the couplet at Il. 5.677-678, and lines 259-260 condense the text of Il. 11.422-426.411 On both occasions the Latin revisions are mini409

410

411

C. Bowra, Tradition and Design in the Iliad (Oxford 1930; rpt. 1950), 76-80, held the catalogues of slain foes to be among the fundamental and probably the most ancient structural components of traditional epic. On setting an archaic epic list or catalogue in the context of oral performance, see Minchin 1996), 3-20. I also follow Minchin (1996, 4) in distinguishing between list (a sequence of personal or place names, for example, accompanied by little or no modification at all) and catalogue (a list in which items “are supplemented with enlivening description or comment, often rendered through narrative”). In Met. 13.256-262, the concatenation of dead-foes names is obviously a list. My own position on the poetic superiority and the manipulatory character of an orally delivered list over a written one is presented on the following page, and develops Minchin’s ideas further. On the transference, see Hopkinson 2000, 134-136; also Hill 2000, 143, and Lorenzetti 2001, 238.

8. Polemic En-listing

189

mal, but they warrant judicious study of the criteria behind Ovid’s specific improvements on his very specific models. The Latin transcription is listed below, with the four verses that correspond clearly to the Greek text placed in indented italics; the two Homeric excerpts that inspired the ‘translation’ follow immediately afterwards: Quid Lycii referam Sarpedonis agmina ferro devastata meo? cum multo sanguine fudi Coeranon Iphitiden et Alastoraque Chromiumque Alcandrumque Haliumque Noemonaque Prytaninque exitioque dedi cum Chersidamante Thoona et Charopem fatisque immitibus Ennomon actum, quique minus celebres nostra sub moenibus urbis procubuere manu. (Met. 13.255-262) Why should I mention the Lycian Sarpedon’s ranks, which my sword cut to pieces? I laid low in bloody slaughter Coeranus, the son of Iphitus, Alastor and Chromius, Alcander, Halius, Noemon, Prytanis, I slew Thoon and Chersidamas, Charops, Ennomos who was driven by the merciless fates; and others less renowned fell by my hand beneath their city’s walls. ’

μ ’

μ (Iliad 5.677-678)

And then he slew Coeranus, Alastor and Chromius, Alcander, Halius, Noemon and Prytanis μ μ

’

,

.

’

... μ

’,

’

’

’ , . (Iliad 11.422-423; 426-427)

Then again he cut down in their blood Thoon and Ennomos, and next Chersidamas, as he was vaulting down from his chariot … Ulixes left them dead and skewered Hippasos’ son Charops, the direct brother of wealthy Socus

On both occasions the Latin revisions are noticeable, because it is Ovid’s intention that the readers identify immediately the intertextual dialogue with the Iliad. The poetics of competition is heralded at Metamorphoses 13.255, with a rhetorical question (‘quid… referam?’) that likely acknowledges Ovid’s reading of the Iliad as a paradigmatic display of his referre idem aliter strategy; a mixed

190

The ‘Judgment of the Arms’: Re-Constructing Achilles

product of inspiration (from the narrative proper) and recollection (from some other source, probably a collection of names readily stored in ‘memory’).412 Nonetheless, Ovidian criticism has not accepted Ovid’s list of Ulixes’ conquered foes as a literarily conscious passage. Hopkinson voices the scholarly consensus when he dismisses Metamorphoses 13.256ff. as nothing more than “a bare list of names… with a humorous touch” because it refers to no distinguished moment of Ulixes’ martial performance, and accordingly, it undermines rather than bolsters the profile of an epic warrior who foremost delights in fighting. The mock-heroic spirit behind the Ovidian translation is extracted, in Hopkinson’s view, from the realization that the two reproduced Homeric passages belong to narratives that record incomplete efforts on Ulixes’ part to prove himself an epic hero.413 It is my contention that here Ovid is not simply undercutting the Homeric Ulixes’ failure but is, more broadly, taking on the poetics of manipulating, first, the transmitted order of (the Homeric) epic narrative, and, second, the epic list structuring. By poeticizing the actual process of epic-list composition he emphasizes the selfconsciousness of the epic-list trope, a quality that is appreciated only in terms of literacy. Thus, apart from unintentionally embracing neoanalysis, Ovid’s dynamic integration of the function of the epic list redefines, revises, and ultimately, appropriates and ‘transforms’ the structural objectives of an archetypal oral-epic trope. Ovid’s narrative refers to Ulixes’ attack against Sarpedon in Iliad 5. In the course of the fighting, Ulixes kills many (otherwise anonymous) Lycian warriors, but Hector’s intervention prevents him from confronting and conquering their leader. Ovid’s readers should recall the Homeric Ulixes’ battle against the Lycians not simply because this is required in order to identify the provenance of Metamorphoses 13.255-262. More to the point is the realization that Ulixes’ fighting spree in Iliad 5, comprising the narrative in 5.668-680, belongs inside the broader narrative context of a book that is devoted primarily to the aristeia of Diomedes, Ulixes’ usual fighting companion in Homer. The evocation of this distinctly and, most importantly, genuinely heroic combat moment amidst Diomedes’ aristeia in Iliad 5 is invaluable for Ulixes: it represents the infallible evidence for his Homeric counterpart’s combat appearance along the prescripts of the archetypal epic hero and independently from Di-

412 413

See Minchin 2001, esp. 79-80, on the prefabricated pool of lists stored in a bard’s memory. See Hopkinson 2000, 134-135; the “humorous touch” applies to the diction at 261 quique minus celebres, ‘and others less famous’, for, admittedly, “there hardly could be heroes less well known than these”.

8. Polemic En-listing

191

omedes; as such, it may counterbalance his manipulation of the Dolonia less than ten lines earlier. The rationale behind the construction of Ovid’s list is the key to ascertain Iliad 5.668-680 as the principal hypotext. Nonetheless, the Homeric scene of Ulixes’ attack against the Lycians stands behind only the earlier half of the aforecited Ovidian list of dead foes, and specifically, of Met. 13.257-258: the structure of this couplet, a concatenation of seven names connected to each other with the same conjunction –que, renders in Latin a nearly verbatim transference of Iliad 5.677-678. Sarpedon’s mention by name only two lines prior, at the opening verse of the list (13.255), pinpoints exactly the Homeric reference text. The second group of slain enemies, listed at 13.259-260, doubles the numbers of Ulixes’ conquests and by analogy uplifts his martial profile. Even further, the too ready identification of the Homeric hypotext of Iliad 5 behind 13.257-258 likely excites the curious reader to consider with renewed interest both the list in question inside its Ovidian context, and the remaining dead foes and their own special Homeric provenance. The Ovidian Ulixes, operating under the pressure of very strict textual boundaries, uses the Homeric recordings of his exploits in combat as raw material to dissert on the metapoetics of deliberately recognizable intertextuality. The recollection of his encounter with the Lycians is explicit: it includes specific reference to Sarpedon by name and records almost word-for-word two particularly memorable lines, a list of dead foes. The transformation of the second Homeric model is less easily identifiable. Met. 13.259-262 draws on a notable moment from the battle narrative in Iliad 11. This book culminates in the gradual retreat of the Greek troops before Hector’s assault and the wounding of several major Greek leaders in the process, including Ulixes and Menelaus. Prior to this, it records the (only) aristeia of Ulixes in the Iliad, which is reported at 11.396-488. Ulixes enters the epic action at 11.310, and initially he shares the spotlight with Diomedes, but in the course of the fighting the latter is injured and forced to withdraw (368400), allowing the king of Ithaca to dominate alone the battlefield through a series of klea. These reach their zenith in a succession of killings (five in total) reported in close proximity (11.420-427), before they stop abruptly at 434, when the Trojan fighter Socus attacks and injures Ulixes in revenge for the death of his brother Charops reported immediately before.414 The transformation of this second Homeric model has been subjected to a more complex treatment. From the total five names of Trojans killed by Ulixes in Iliad 11, only four names are reported in Ovid’s list. These names, 414

See Hopkinson 2000, 135-136, for more details on the broader narrative frame of the two Homeric contexts that inspired the text at Met. 13.255-262.

192

The ‘Judgment of the Arms’: Re-Constructing Achilles

further, are drawn from a larger passage (11.420-427), and are reassembled in different order. Ovid begins, at 13.259, by listing side-by-side, by name only, Chersidamas and Thoon, the characters least important for his purposes, even though in the Iliad the two were not killed as a pair. Ovid is interested in these two Trojans merely as bodies; they have been included to append two additional names to his Ulixes’ conquests. On the contrary, the other two Trojan casualties, Charops and Ennomus, are killed separately, and are listed on the following line (13.260). And each of these two becomes the focus of nuanced study. Ennomus is ranked fourth and last: this makes him the last victim in the entire four-line catalogue, and as such, it singles him out. The emphasis is enhanced further, because the hero is modified by the phrase fatis immitibus… actum, ‘driven [sc. to his doom] by the implacable fates’, in sharp contrast to his Homeric counterpart, who is not distinguished by some similar phrase – or by any appositive at all. There is, however, a second Ennomus in the Iliad, ), who enjoys a similar ponderous description when, at a seer (2.858 Il. 2.859-860, it is forecast that ‘he was not able to keep off dark fate by his ’ μ ), for he was omens’ (859 doomed to be killed by Achilles. Hopkinson (2000, 136) is certain that Ovid has conflated the two different characters. I would suggest that this conflation is justified as part of the Ovidian Ulixes’ effort to bolster his ‘Achillean’ selfprofiling and project himself as the deserving recipient of Achilles’ weapons. The death of the seer Ennomus in Iliad 2 by Achilles is a unique detail. The Ovidian Ulixes who remembers that both his Iliadic counterpart and Achilles killed a Trojan named Ennomus, fuses the two into the performance of his new Iliadic’ self, and so he construes a new character, in which Achilles and Ulixes converge. Finally, Ovid has edited out Socus, the Homeric Charops’ brother at Il. 11.426-427, and the character who wounded Ulixes and forced him to cut short his aristeia. The motive behind this silencing lies in the nature of the wound that Ulixes received from Socus – a superficial injury that did not threaten the hero’s life but stymied his performance all the same, because it caused Ulixes’ withdrawal from epic fighting. It is the memory (or rather, the remembrance) of this wound that Ulixes wishes to stave off, when immediately after his list of dead foes he continues with a passage (Met. 13.262-265) describing the frontal wounds that the hero received during the fighting. Yet, these wounds, which the Ovidian character proudly and with a demonstration of dramatic skill415 puts on display by divesting his breast, are nowhere re415

Cf. Hopkinson 2000, 137: “revealing battle scars… was a common device in Roman courts to gain the jurors’ sympathy”.

8. Polemic En-listing

193

corded in Homer. In fact, the only wound that the Homeric hero reportedly bears in the Iliad is the lateral scratch caused by Socus. The ‘reality’ as established by the epic tradition does not allow the Ovidian Ulixes to initiate drastic plot innovations, but the latter can always take recourse to manipulation. The elimination of Socus and the upgrading of the superficial side wound into multiple breast injuries bespeak precisely the desire to lift one’s epic profile inside a closely monitored literary space, and they represent a first successful step on Ulixes’ part to use his talent as auctor to rewrite his Trojan performance. The second step entails the rearrangement of the Trojan warriors Ulixes killed right before his wounding, who are now positioned next to a nearly twice as long list of warriors lifted out of Iliad 5 – a list which these implanted Homeric warriors numerically augment and enrich in denotation. Most importantly, however, it is Ovid’s authorial aim to best the Homeric narrator precisely by simulating the circumstances of archaic epic oral performance that the polutropos Ulixes’ epic rebirth observes and advertises. As opposed to a text, that is, a written recording of epic tradition, an oral composition is not subject to revisiting on the part of the audience. This is a major reason why the archaic bard could get by with structural inconsistencies, such as ‘resurrections’ in later sections of a lengthy poem of characters who earlier had been witnessed dying. The absurdity in the case at hand is that the Ovidian Ulixes, and by extension Ovid, is not an oral bard but a producer of a written poem, which draws on a written model that also happens to be the most widely read literary text. Furthermore, the text of the Metamorphoses is fully selfconscious of its artistry and specifically its textuality, its de facto existence as a product of high quality best appreciated only through multiple readings. If we accept, then, that Ovid was aware that recognition of his epic talent could only follow many readings, which ultimately would shed light on his tampering with Ulixes’ deeds in Iliad 11, then we have to conclude that our poet expected – if not planned – to be caught. By means of his simulation of an *oral* reproduction of a specific Homeric narrative, vicariously through Ulixes in order to project this crucial element of *orality* in the performance, Ovid acts out his written ‘Iliad’ by posing as a Homeric-type bard/composer of oral poetry. In sum, by allowing, even encouraging, his (reading) audience to assess critically his manipulation of the epic subtext, Ovid exposes the great, uncontrolled liberty of oral poetry in terms of memory/tradition sanctioning, and problematizes its objectivity and credibility. And he may even poke fun at the repetitiveness, formulaic or otherwise, that is entrenched in the narration of archaic epic and constitutes its most distinguished structural characteristic – in opposition to the posterior epic products of the literacy-conscious culture. As mentioned at the beginning of this section, the epic list and its more advanced form, the catalogue, are a particularly prominent means of advertis-

194

The ‘Judgment of the Arms’: Re-Constructing Achilles

ing orality – or, more precisely, the combination of superior mnemonic strength, performance talent and intelligence on the part of the archaic epic bard. The sequential presentation of personal names or items as part of a written account is considerably less appealing to its audience compared to an orally delivered version of it. The texture of the list or catalogue being the same in both a written and oral version, the appeal that each version exercises is different and springs from different motives, which are naturally tied to the respective cultures of literacy and orality. The audience/recipients of a written catalogue have visual, at once physically and mentally, access to the entire list as a complete unit: they know, that is, immediately where the list begins and ends, and taking this detail as a given they usually forego the form(ation) in favor of the content. Attached to this content-based approach is the separation of the list-author from the list. This fundamental severance rarely takes place when a list is delivered orally, for in the oral delivery of a list, the attention of the audience/recipients is focused above all on the narrator, the listauthor. This is because the sequential presentation of the individual list items is felt as such. These items are disclosed one by one, and it is possible that each is pronounced in a different voice-tone and coloring, faster or more slowly, embellished with gestures or facial expressions, etc. In so many words, an orally rendered list is not itself the center of the performance, but instead it is only part of a more comprehensive performance that primarily centers on the list-author. During the first oral performance/‘reading’ of a list, the audience’s attention is directed to the author’s lips, and the words-items that are verbalized are appreciated individually, in the exact order they come out, and independent from each other, for, after all, they do not have a context yet. As long as a list is still unraveling the audience’s attention is divided between the content of the list and the performer of the list. The more numerous, exotically sounding, difficult to pronounce, or, contrariwise, renowned and familiar, for example, the items on the list, the more intense the audience’s feelings of admiration, respect and approval for the list-author and performer. A very long and elaborate list may even replace the list’s content with the performer himself as the epicenter of the audience’s attention, with many wondering when and how he will ever stop, and admiring the strength of his memory and improvisation faculties.416 Comparable admiration may generate an epic poet’s experimentation with an earlier list or a combination of lists. And when the literary provenance of this model list or web of lists is identifiable, this experimentation becomes a 416

Minchin 1996, 16, describes the performance situation during the delivery of a long list, and the emotional participation, the mixed feelings of anxiety and delight, of the audience, and she calls the presentation of a longer list “a performance within a performance”.

8. Polemic En-listing

195

public declaration of poetic antagonism – since an audience’s ability to penetrate a ‘text’, a netting of narrative material, depends principally on the author’s desire to provide an accessible text. The architecture of the list of dead enemies put in the mouth of the Ovidian Ulixes provides such an exemplary case. Because this list results from the fusion of two earlier lists, and because the process of composition behind this list is accessible since the main subtexts are detectable, Ovid’s readers may reflect on the fashioning of listmaking as a trope of artistry encountered in written rather than oral poetry. The same readers are, then, in the position to appreciate how Ovid poeticizes the mechanics behind this recurrent, standard epic feature, and how he appropriates it to advertise his own alternative epic credos. It is, finally, worth focusing on the slight revision that Ovid initiated upon transliterating Il. 5.677-678 as Met. 13.257-258. The Latin transcription of the Homeric passage excludes the opening words of the couplet: Ovid distinguishes his own Coeranus with a patronymic, Iphitides.417 This patronymic Ovid took from elsewhere in the Iliad, from 8.128, where it refers to Archeptolemus, Hector’s charioteer. Ovid’s motive for borrowing the same patronymic for his Coeranus is Archeptolemus’ charioteer status, especially since there is one other Coeranus reported in the Iliad, at 17.611ff., and he is identified as the charioteer of the hero Meriones.418 The emphasis on the charioteer is justified in the light of antagonistic epic poetics, and specifically, of the allegorical association of the character of the charioteer to that of the director of the epic narrative, either the epic poet himself explicitly, or more often the poet’s projection onto someone of his heroes. The motif of the charioteer thematizes a large number of ideas in epic poetry: the transition from the world of the gods to that of the mortals; the male-initiation rite of passage, the core theme of the Telemacheia; and, more broadly, the education of the younger and logically less experienced warrior under the guidance of a seasoned leader.419 The case of Archeptolemus / Coeranus Iphitides represents an interesting variation of the third idea. 417 418 419

Hopkinson 2000, 136, identifies this other Iphitides, though he erroneously introduces him as Nestor’s – rather than Hector’s – charioteer. See Bömer 1982, 266. The multifacetedness of the epic charioteer theme in archaic poetry has been frequently noted but a full discussion of its significance as a literary motif with respect to this great complexity is still awaited. My argument about the Homeric charioteer as a poeticsdetermined figure was greatly aided by a recent exploration of the literary appropriation of the charioteer theme in philosophic discourse, in S. Slaveva-Griffin, ‘Of Gods, Philosophers, and Charioteers: Content and Form in Parmenides’ Proem and Plato’s Phaedrus’, TAPA 133 [2003], 227-253. Slaveva-Griffin argues how Plato appropriated the charioteer allegory initially developed in Parmenides’ prologue to his own presentation of the myth of the soul as a charioteer in the Phaedrus – or, how a first literary and philosophical appro-

196

The ‘Judgment of the Arms’: Re-Constructing Achilles

The erudite reader will likely note that the names of Coeranus and Ar, a word first cheptolemus are semantically synonymous. The noun and mostly attested in Homer, means ‘master, ruler, leader’, just like its synoand μ (e.g. Il. 2.204; 487; Od. 18.106; cf. the verb nyms , in Il. 2.207; 4.250; 5.332; 824; 12.318).420 On his part, Archeptolemus , ‘beginning’, but also ‘lead’, and μ , ‘war’, is the compound of thus meaning both ‘he who initiates a war’ and ‘the leader in a war’. The epic , ‘by might or force’, finally, furnishes the stem of Iphitides, the adverb, common patronymic of the two chariot ‘leaders’, who, thus, are projected at once as literary brothers and offspring of epic ‘might’. Naturally, the detection and appreciation of this intricate etymological web is possible only within the parameters of memory that govern a written epic. The closure to the intellectual effort which Ovid via his Ulixes forces upon his audience, might comprise a dialogue with a Vergilian passage, since Ovid’s contemporaries would identify the unique intertextual overlapping that occurs between Metamorphoses 13.258 and Aeneid 9.767, a line that likewise belongs to an epic list, recording dead Trojan warriors killed by Turnus: addit Halyn comitem et confixa Phegea parma, ignaros deinde in muris Martemque cientis Alcandrumque Haliumque Noemonaque Prytanimque. (Aen. 9.765-767) He [Turnus] sends Halys to join them [sc. those killed earlier], and Phegeus, his shield transfixed, and subsequently, Alcander and Halius, Noemon and Prytanis, who were ignorant of walls and stirred up the fighting.

Ovid catches Vergil’s tampering with the Homeric text, as the poet of the Aeneid ‘borrows’ verbatim the Homeric verse recording the names of four of Odysseus’ conquered foes in order to decorate his own Turnus with the same conquests, and ‘corrects’ the ‘error’, and he naturally stirs up a whole new debate on the poetics of epic appropriation inside the Vergilian context. This debate is clearly different: it comes from a different war-narrative, thus calling for a different set of principles to explain this unique, precisely verbatim, and hence provoking Iliadic appropriation.421 On top, it is Ovid’s Ulixes who points out this error and demands that the record be set straight again, notwithstanding that he himself freehandedly rewrites the Homeric text in

420 421

priation of an earlier literary allegory becomes the ‘charioteer’/driver for a second and more advanced one. See LSJ s.v. , for full list of literary attestations of this predominantly epic term, including its adjectival form. Cf. Hardie 1994, 236-237, on Ovid’s ‘correction’ of Vergil’s purposeful misidentification, at Aen. 9.767, as Turnus’ own deed the slaughtering of the same four Trojans already killed by Odysseus in the Iliad.

9. Daedalean Poetics

197

EVERY ONE of the other three lines that comprise his catalogue of dead foes – and needless to say, throughout his whole speech. The study of Ovid’s dense textuality is particularly resistant to conclusive assessments, simply because it eschews them deliberately. The Ovidian Ulixes’ epic conquests put together a passage that exemplifies the interminable challenge against the formidable poetic memory of a demanding, sophisticated and foremost, literacy-imbued audience. The terse four-verse passage, despite its modesty in length and verbal structure, exposes the practice of literary memory manipulation at its best: a slightly altered Homeric list, lines 257-258, is doubled through the addition of a second list; this new list is the product of complex reworking that involves familiarity with four different intertexts in order to produce a text that both relies faithfully on tradition and clearly severs itself from it – a dense, diminutive model of Ovid’s overall epic narrative.

9. Daedalean Poetics With similar attention to accuracy, Ulixes takes on Ajax’s one-dimensional reading of the Iliad narrative and corrects his rival who misreads’ the Homeric text in his attempt to impose an image of himself as sole defender and savior of the Greeks (13.268-279).422 On the other hand, the witty hero of Ithaca does not hesitate to distort tradition himself, too, when his own epic interests dictate so: he steps away from the canonical account when he refutes Ajax’s pivotal role in rescuing the dead Achilles by carrying on his shoulders the body, arms and all, away from the battlefield.423 Instead, the Ovidian readers now learn that it was Ulixes who stepped in and safely carried off the dead Achilles (13.280-285)424; and they certainly notice the anxiety of the elo422

423

424

Contrary to Ajax’s claim, it was Patroclus who pushed the Trojans back and away from the Greek ships at Il. 16.291ff. Besides, Ajax did not exactly rush to come forward and fight Hector, as the Ovidian Ajax eagerly and falsely contends, Ulixes reminds us; rather, Ajax stepped forward only after eight other heroes had already volunteered to fight (13.275278); cf. the original text in Il. 7.162-186; all relevant passages are noted in Bömer 1982, 270. At 13.281, Ulixes refers to Achilles here as murus Graium, ‘the bulwark of the Greeks’; this phrase in Homer describes the son of Thetis just once, at Il. 1.284; otherwise it refers exclusively to Ajax. Bömer 1982, 271, remarks that Ulixes intends to bring Achilles and Ajax together, for the particular use of murus in Latin is very rare (cf. also OLD s.v. murus 1.d). A connoisseur of the Iliad, the Ovidian Ulixes disputes Ajax’s exlusive claim to his traditional formulaic characterization, by suggesting that the original ‘bulwark of the Greeks’ in the Homeric text was Achilles, described as such already in the epic’s opening book. In doing so, he follows Sophocles, who first altered the record in Ulixes’ favor. According to the earliest iconography that dates prior to the composition of Sophocles’ Ajax, and

198

The ‘Judgment of the Arms’: Re-Constructing Achilles

quent hero to appear strong enough to lift on his shoulders the body and the armour of Achilles (13.286-287), and by extension, the leadership symbolism tied to both, and so, to disprove Ajax’s damaging comments about his limited physical might and weightlifting ability (13.107ff.). A prominent position in this section of Ulixes’ argument is reserved for a brief description of Achilles’ shield, a miniature ekphrasis: artis opus tantae, rudis et sine pectore miles indueret? neque enim clipei caelamina novit, Oceanum et terras cumque alto sidera caelo Pleiadasque Hyadasque immunemque aequoris Arcton, diversosque orbes425 nitidumque Orionis ensem. postulat ut capiat quae non intellegit arma. (Met. 13.290-295)

425

most likely originates in the literary version recorded in the Aethiopis, nobody else but Ajax is the man who carried Achilles’ body away from the battlefield (a detail not mentioned explicitly by Ovid’s Ajax, obviously because it is considered too well-known, and hence common property). Burgess 2001, 184-187, notes 47 pictorial representations on pottery of episodes taken from the Trojan Cycle, that date from the earliest period of iconography (from the end of the 8th c. to ca. 600); among these, the picture of Ajax carrying the corpse of Achilles is the most popular, depicted on six of them. Quintus of Smyrna likewise introduces Ulixes priding himself for carrying on his shoulders away from the battlefield the body of Achilles, but he does so in different narrative circumstances, unrelated to the ‘Judgment’ (his addressee is Neoptolemus, not Ajax and the Greek judges); cf. Müller 1997, 303-304 n. 212, on Ovid vs. Quintus’ independent but often similar treatment of a common pool of literary sources, specifically on the detail of the rescue of Achilles’ dead body. Bömer (1982, 274 ad 13.294) agrees silently with the majority of the manuscripts in favoring diversas… urbes, implying the two cities at war described on the Shield. Urbes is the preferred form in Anderson’s 1972 OCT edition. Goold, who tended the 1988 revised edition of the Metamorphoses in the Loeb series, and, more recently, both Hill (2000, 146) and Hopkinson (2000, 144-145 [294n]) opt for orbes. Hill, moreover, assertively considers “unlikely that Ovid would interpose the two cities before the end of the astronomical elements”. This might be so, but not because it would be “odd if the sun and the moon were omitted”, as Hill seems to believe, but because they provide a fitting centerpiece for a pictorially represented composition of heavenly bodies. The two cities in the midst of the description of the heavens would have clearly been out of tune. Hopkinson’s argument is even more commonsensical: “But even an Ajax could recognize cities, which would in any case be oddly placed between Arctos and Orion”. In his 2004 OCT edition, Tarrant prints orbes in the text, but he brackets verse 294 off, along with the following line. The authenticity of these two verses is not contested in the manuscript tradition, but both have been denounced as spurious (13.294 by Lejay; 13.295 by Bentley), though Tarrant is the only modern editor who sides with Lejay’s emendation. Hopkinson’s sound arguments (2000, 144146), however, illustrate well the indispensability of both contested verses in promoting important thematic issues in the unit, and convince us that 13.294-245 should be read as part of the original text. See also my discussion in the pages immediately following.

9. Daedalean Poetics

199

Is the work of such sublime art to be worn [appropriated] by a crude and stupid soldier? For he does not know a thing about the sculptures on the shield, the Ocean and the lands, and the stars on the lofty sky, the Pleiads and the Hyads and the Bear that is blocked from the sea, and contrasting orbits [sc. the sun and the moon] and the shiny sword of Orion: he requests to take in his hands an armor that he does not comprehend.

For Ulixes, Achilles’ shield should be given only to the man able to ‘read’ and understand it, because the shield, and by extension the whole armor, represents something more than a mere piece of weaponry. The original ekphrasis on the Shield of Achilles is hardly studied or even remarked upon by its owner, who scurries to wear it and reenter the war as soon as he receives it at Il. 19.18ff. Rather, the decipherment of the various modes in which the , ‘cunning artworks’, the high-quality product of Hephaistus’ ‘special , Il. 18.481f.) is articulated on material accessible genius’ ( to mortals, is primarily a call addressed to the Homeric audience. Ironically, Ulixes asks Ajax – who as a matter of fact seeks to do nothing more than what the great Achilles did – to step outside the boundaries of his epic character, and to stand in the place of the epic audience. Or alternatively, he openly throws at him the gauntlet of epic authorship, by demanding that the hero of Salamis prove his competence to become an epic auctor, to champion his own aptitude with poetics. To do justice to the quality of the detailed narrative art of the that take up 130 lines (Il. 18.478-608) on the Homeric Shield would require much more textual space than the six-odd lines provided for this in the Metamorphoses. Ovid, nonetheless, reciprocates admirably in the display of superior craftsmanship, by drawing on the fineries of linguistics. Specifically, he transwith a verbal ‘artwork’ of his lates the verbally represented Homeric own, the coinage caelamina.426 Set right next to caelamina, and in the vicinity (next line) of caelo, clipeus toys with the association all three terms share earlier, at 13.110, being parts of the same phrase (clipeus… caelatus imagine mundi, ‘a shield… engraved with the image of the world’). Hopkinson in his discussion of the shared semiotics and the semantic interaction between the passages at 13.110 and 13.290-294, remarks that caelatus, the term commonly used to denote the technical process of engraving, sits at the head of a double wordplay. First, it shares with clipeus the same connotations to sculpting, since clipeus in its alternative spelling clupeus stems linguistically from the Greek glyphein, ‘to sculpt, engrave’. Second, the Latin term mundus is a synonym to caelum in more

426

Thus LS s.v., marking this as the first attestation of the term in Latin literature, and citing just two additional, much later occurrences, both featured in Apuleius.

200

The ‘Judgment of the Arms’: Re-Constructing Achilles

than one way: mundus, here ‘world’, may often mean both ‘sky’ and ‘ornament’, just like caelum toys with caelare, ‘to sculpt’.427 Confident that his rival cannot understand the caelamina on the shield428, pictorial or verbal, Ulixes eagerly lists one by one the images that the shield depicts, and as Bömer and others have observed, he accurately summarizes the ekphrasis of the Homeric artwork. At places, he carefully follows even the diction of the original description. In this way, his audience of fellow-warriors who have the shield in front of them, and next to them his super-addressees, those readers familiar with the diction of the Iliad 18 narrative, will be assured that the hero does report the ‘truth’.429 This recollection of the Homeric language brings Ulixes closer to the ideal of the literary narrator, the epic bard, despite the fact that a detailed commentary on the ekphrasis, which would confirm the hero’s familiarity with the mechanics of poetics-based analysis, is not offered.430

10. The Logic(al) Fashioning of the Epic Hero The last section of Ulixes’ speech counterattacks Ajax’s strategy of character denigration. Here Ulixes identifies the most with Ovid, because his argument is ruled by the politics of the referre idem aliter: he revisits and effectively ‘rewrites’ the very incidents previously solicited by his opponent as bearing incriminatory evidence against the character of the king of Ithaca. He begins 427 428

429 430

See the discussion in Hopkinson 2000, 103-104 [110n] and 142 [291n]. In light of his inability to appreciate the artistic quality of the shield (artis opus tantae, ‘a work of such great artistry’), Ajax’s disqualifying characterization rudis (‘crude, rough, unpolished’) proves particularly fitting, since it is often used in artistic contexts to denote a roughly made piece of craftsmanship. It is worth noting that the same adjective, rudis, which here describes an individual, is used twice early in Metamorphoses 1 to describe the crude and shapeless globe of the earth in the early stages of the cosmogony, the most wonderful product of divine artwork: 1.7 rudis indigestaque moles, ‘a rough and undigested mass’; 1.87 rudis et sine imagine tellus, ‘earth crude and without any form’. See Bömer 1982, 272, for more examples, which actually follow the same grammatical pattern, proving this structure a favorite one of Ovid’s; the verbal reminiscence between Met. 13.290 and Met. 1.7 has been noted by Hopkinson (2000, 146), who thus ties Ajax to the confusion and the flux of the early stages of the cosmogony, and pits him against Ulixes, who is associated, in turn, with “the intelligent artificer who dispenses order and reason”. Cf. Bömer 1982, 274f., on the verbal echoes between the Iliad and Ovid’s text. Ulixes’ and Ajax’s association with literary poetics – in Ajax’s case from a negative perspective – is corroborated also by the recollection of Aeneas’ reaction before his newly made divine shield, at Aen. 8.729ff. Aeneas is unlike Achilles, because he does pay close attention to the ekphrasis. But he is also unlike Ulixes, because he is unable to comprehend what he actually sees on the shield.

10. The Logic(al) Fashioning of the Epic Hero

201

with the accusation that he cowardly feigned madness to stay away from the Trojan campaign, and he overrules it by comparing the circumstances of his evasiveness to those of Achilles’ hiding in feminine disguise. Inevitably, the two heroes’ warrior careers are seen to mirror each other (13.296-305), while it is slyly suggested that the incrimination of Ulixes for desertion might elicit a similar reproach for Achilles. Taking next on the death of Palamedes and the abandonment of Philoctetes (13.306-332), Ulixes plays down his masterminding role, and he presents instead the prejudiced and incriminating decisionmaking as a communal initiative, agreed upon by the entire Greek army (314f. factum defendite vestrum / (consensistis enim), ‘Defend your own deed: for you consented to it’). Tongue-in-cheek, the Ovidian Ulixes exposes the Greek leaders’ imperfect reading skills, in portraying them as careless or too eager readers, who thoughtlessly translated mere indications, albeit too deceptively convincing, as if they were hard proofs. At the same time, he introduces a politically keen proposal, when, implicitly, he invites the chiefs to uphold their initial, damning consensus, and with it the gravity of their judgment: should Ajax press further the guilty version, or reminisce about other cases subjected to similar ‘misreadings’, he would risk turning against him not merely Ulixes but the Greek leaders in unison. The aliter readings of Philoctetes’ return and the Palladium enterprise, two events that have not yet actually taken place, contribute two more scripts. Both make up intelligent metaphors for the (impending) capture of Troy, and in both Ulixes projects himself as auctor and sole actor of the recorded action. Philoctetes’ participation in the war, a prerequisite for the successful conclusion of the Trojan adventure, is projected as the goal of a delicate mission, which will be carried out by Ulixes alone (333-336). In terms of epic symbolism, moreover, Philoctetes, the carrier of the bow and arrows of Hercules, that is, of weapons as meaningful as the contested armor of Achilles, not only embodies the ‘geist’ of the great son of Zeus, but alludes to the first Greek capture of Troy. By securing the presence at Troy of Philoctetes, a substitute Hercules and by analogy an Achilles replacement, Ulixes contends that his control over the Achilles character extends to include every surrogate of Achilles. Also, since at the time of the ‘Judgment’ the return of Philoctetes has not yet taken effect, Ulixes’ overconfidence about its successful accomplishment is less a mark of arrogance than a solid proof that our speaker here is not the homodiegetic contestant Ulixes, but the meta-poet Ulixes, who is gifted with comprehensive knowledge of the Trojan legend in the oral epic tradition. The surreptitious removal of the Palladium from the hearth of Troy represents a second exclusive Ulixean athlon thematically kindred to the Philoctetes story because it refers to a situation whose fulfillment is required to pave the road towards the fall of Troy. Ulixes tampers again with tradition

202

The ‘Judgment of the Arms’: Re-Constructing Achilles

when he eliminates Diomedes’ participation in the act431 and Helen’s important help from the inside, and, instead, proclaims as a one-man athlon the theft of Minerva’s statue from the citadel of Troy (337-339). The violation of Troy’s innermost site is obviously anticipatory of the Trojan Horse machination. Moreover, in the light of the mise en abyme poetics this first invasion of Priam’s city is another auctorial rehearsal of the dramatic epilogue to the Trojan War. Ulixes would actually go as far as to declare the fall of Troy a completed deed, and refer to it in the simple past tense: 349 Pergama tum vici, cum vinci posse coegi, ‘at that moment I conquered Pergama, when I made it possible to conquer them’. The testimony of a solid precedent, an earlier judgment by a respectable and identifiable audience is crucial in persuading the chiefs to decide in Ulixes’ favor. The hero names selective famous Homeric characters, including Diomedes, the lesser Ajax, Eurypylus, Thoas, Idomeneus, and Meriones, who witnessed Ulixes’ deeds and hailed Ulixes’ superior leadership (Met. 13.350ff.). These ‘judges’, now likely seated themselves among the chiefs, are asked to uphold their earlier, officially recorded (inscribed in the text of the Iliad), verdict and so, by declaring Ulixes’ victory, to advertise their own skill as judicious epic readers.

11. Epigrams, Epitaphs, and Epigraphs: Sealing the Closure In his peroratio (13.370-380) Ulixes moves forward in Epic Cycle time to the conclusion to the Trojan War, and he predicts the fall of Troy by enlisting it as proof of the effectiveness of his inconspicuous type of warfare strategy: 13.373-375 iam labor in fine est; obstantia fata removi / altaque posse capi faciendo Pergama cepi.… casura… moenia Troum, (‘Now my labor has reached the end; I have removed the obstructing fates and I have captured Pergama by making it possible to be captured… the Trojan walls that are about to fall’). The two successive similes that liken Ulixes to a ship’s governor and a general, while 431

As aforementioned, Ulixes does not think twice about altering the Homeric record on his behalf, even though a few lines later he responds to Ajax’s protesting on the sidelines, and so he admits that he was not alone, after all, in the theft of the Palladium (350ff.). Likewise, Ulixes exaggerates his part in Dolon’s execution at the expense of Diomedes, and he appropriates the murder of Rhesus and his companions (250), even though in the Iliad the actual executioner is Diomedes (cf. Il. 10.480ff.; Eur. Rh. 624; and Aen. 1.471). Huyck 1991, 156, makes the interesting observation that Ovid manipulates Ulixes’ epic record, always in the hero’s favor, not only in the Metamorphoses, but on any occasion where he employs Ulixes as an example. This favoritism speaks strongly for Ovid’s self-projection as an advocate of intelligence, versatility and, for his particular literary purposes, manipulation of tradition after the paradigm of the Homeric hero.

11. Epigrams, Epitaphs, and Epigraphs: Sealing the Closure

203

confining Ajax to the absolutely subordinate part of the oarsman and the common soldier (366f.), dismiss Ajax’s leader credentials. A leader who lacks acumen, as Ajax is repeatedly noted to do (e.g. 13.135 hebes, ‘slow-witted’; 290 rudis sine pectore, ‘rough and stupid’), is hardly superior to the common soldiers (290 miles; 367 milite), who are put on the epic battlefield only to be killed. In anticipating his preeminence in the Greek victory at Troy, Ulixes in an elaborate final appeal nearly dictates the verdict on the debate himself, and he does so in meaningful language. Met. 13.372-374 in particular may even be read as a terse but eloquent advertisement of the ‘little Iliad’ and its redefined epic poetics: hunc titulum meritis pensandum reddite nostris. iam labor in fine est; obstantia fata removi altaque posse capi faciendo Pergama cepi. Grant me this prize/honor as the reward for my worthy services. Now our task has reached the end: I have removed the opposing fates, and by making it possible to capture the lofty Pergama, I have captured them.

The word titulus, which in the above text is best translated as ‘prize’ – if we agree that the object to which the term refers is the armor of Achilles – is otherwise, and actually more often, interpreted as ‘honorary title, reputation, prize of victory’.432 But it is also a literary term referring to the ‘title’ of a book or a literary piece, or even the index of a larger literary collection.433 Finally, it often means the inscription, or more accurately the heading of an inscription, which is usually a memorial inscription, a thanksgiving dedication, or an epitaph, that decorates and designates a monument, and even serves as its mouthpiece proclaiming its status as a memorial.434 Occasionally, the ‘title’ refers to the whole epitaph.435 All these uses occur repeatedly in Ovid’s literary corpus; and quite often the item that receives a titulus is an entire poetic collection. Thus, in AA 3.342 Ovid refers to the ‘title’, or more correctly the tag bearing the title of his collection, Amores, with the term titulus: deve tener libris titulus quos signat AMORUM, ‘or [choose] from the books that the tender tag of AMORES marks out’.436 Gibson’s emendation, tener, to modify titulus, 432 433 434

435 436

This is also the translation favored by Bömer 1982, 291; cf. LS s.v. titulum, II.A and II.B. LS s.v. titulum, II.E. LS s.v. titulum, I. Elsewhere in the Metamorphoses, Iphis, the girl who became a boy on her/his wedding day as a result of Isis’ intervention, dedicates to Isis a memorial with a thanksgiving inscription, which is referred to as titulus (Met. 9.793). A distinctive example is Plin. Ep. 6.10.3: cinerem sine titulo, sine nomine iacere, ‘ashes lying without an epitaph, without a name’. The two first words of AA 3.342 are corrupt beyond hope, and the emendation printed here is the one accepted recently by Gibson; the translation of AA 3.342 is taken from Gibson as well; cf. details in Gibson 2003, 237-238.

204

The ‘Judgment of the Arms’: Re-Constructing Achilles

transfers onto the tag the tenderness, the erotic spirit of the entire collection. Consequently, the little titulus comes to embody and represent the entire Amores corpus, becoming a double-folded seal, a sphragis, the physical one, which records its identity, the name of the title, and the literary one, which informs one about the nature of the collections’ content – love poetry. More programmatically explicit is the placement of titulus on the first line of the Remedia, right next to the word nomen: Rem. 1 legerat huius Amor titulum nomenque libelli, ‘Love himself had read the heading and the name of his book’. The position of titulus next to nomen is intentional, and so is the fact that here they are meant to be synonyms437, as fitted to a sphragis, the epigraphic passage where the author sings the praises of himself and/through his work. It is not implausible, in view of the above, to argue that Ulixes’ employment of titulus to refer to his ‘prize’, the arma, could carry a second meaning, that of ‘title’ or ‘heading’ to a literary composition. The interpretation of titulus as both ‘prize’ and ‘title’ or ‘heading’ refers to the same object, the weapons of Achilles, the arma, both the subject and the title – unofficial in Ovid, but official in earlier literary authors – of the Ajax vs. Ulixes contest, namely, the ‘Armorum iudicium’. The opening half of the following line, iam labor in fine est, ‘and now my work is done’, affirms the poetics in Ulixes’ concluding words, which now put together a phrase which, in slightly altered form, figures in crucial poetically conscious passages. Ovid’s very iamque opus egexi, ‘and now my work I have finished’, the opening line of his own sphragis at the conclusion of the Metamorphoses (15.871), is the first passage that comes to mind, and the proximity is so close that it is doubtlessly intentional.438 Ovid brilliantly ‘lends’ Ulixes, the character through whom he reassesses the dynamics of the Iliad texture, the most distinguishing verse of his own sphragis. Consequently, the king of Ithaca can project his literary persona as an alternative, Ovid-type, epic poet, so that in turn he may empower Ovid to claim as his own property all the literary associations that Ulixes forged in the course of his poetic debate against Ajax. From this perspective, Ulixes’ triumphant reference to his conquest of Pergama in the past tense (cepi) would sound more genuine had it come out of Ovid’s mouth. The auctor of the Judgment’ acknowledges that in 437

438

So that the stylistic grandeur of the opening line will be properly noticed, although when titulus applies to a book elsewhere in Ovid, it “usually signifies index, namely, the titlebearing tag attached to the outside of a papyrus roll”; cf. A.A.R. Henderson, P. Ovidi Nasonis, Remedia Amoris (Edinburgh 1979), 29 (Gibson 2003, 238, erroneously writes that titulus occurs at Rem. 55 instead of the correct Rem. 1). A programmatically poetic phrase of similar structure also appears in the conclusion to Fasti 1 (1.723): prima mei pars est exacta laboris [i.e. poematos, Bömer 1982, 291, supplies, albeit without the link to the Metamorphoses sphragis], ‘the first part of my work is precisely done’.

11. Epigrams, Epitaphs, and Epigraphs: Sealing the Closure

205

Ulixes’ victorious performance, he has reconstructed the Trojan legend in an atypical, neo-epic fashion; he has rewritten the Iliad without Achilles.439 Ultimately it comes as no surprise that Ulixes wins the contest and receives the prize of the armor and his poetic symbolism. Ulixes’ ‘eloquence’ (facundia) convincingly conveys the message that a great epic is above all an epic whose success depends on its ability to be rewritten and reinterpreted, a narrative that may always reinvent itself. The closure to the Armorum Iudicium with the description of Ajax’s suicide (13.384-393) revisits the high moments of the heroes’ rivalry and positions them inside the frame of Ovid’s theory of redefined epic poetics. I discussed earlier in the chapter how the suicide scene thematically and linguistically mirrors the beginning of the Iliad, and how Ajax interprets it metapoetically. In conclusion I would like to argue a bit further on the rich nuances behind this parallel, by noting that Ovid reproduces the Iliad opening, but does not copy it. Achilles’ rage (mênis) and his anger (cholos) at having been deprived of his timê, the prize that was given to him as a reward for his services in the war, are in Ajax’s mind, when in his own rage (ira) the hero of Salamis cannot control his anger (dolor) at the slight that he, too, suffered, since he was deprived of the timê, the prize that ought to be given to him as reward for his services in the war. Both heroes react similarly at the injustice inflicted on them: they withdraw into seclusion. Still, Achilles, who in Iliad 1 is so blinded by anger that were it not for the presence of Athena, he would have murdered Agamemnon, has the opportunity to work on his anger, even though this process of character change lasts as long as the poem itself. To be sure, even then, in Iliad 24, the hero does not become a different man, since he still experiences the same emotions; but he ‘changes’ in the sense that he learns to understand and manage these emotions, instead of being controlled by them. Only in the final scene, where he encounters another suppliant, Old Priam, does Achilles appear capable of restraining himself from acting upon his anger. When Priam, a bit too impatient, urges that he be given the body of Hector, Achilles gets mad, but manages to control his temper, and instead of attacking Priam, he leaves the hut to vent his rage elsewhere (Il. 24.559-570). When he comes back in, he is ready to do what Priam has asked of him (Il. 24.572ff.). By the end of the Iliad Achilles, the brave man, has learnt to respect and even yield to the eloquent man, embodied in Priam.440 439

440

In the same spirit of memorializing one’s literary accomplishment, often by likening it to an imperishable monument, one may interpret Ulixes’/Ovid’s appeal at 13.380: este mei memores, ‘remember of my deeds’. The evolving course of Achilles’ anger management from the outbreak of the mênis in Iliad 1 to the hero’s display of genuine pity in his encounter with Priam is traced recently in G.

206

The ‘Judgment of the Arms’: Re-Constructing Achilles

Ajax, however, by killing himself, does not have the chance to evolve, to learn how to control his anger. Ajax, a literal and hence a superficial reader, dies as a brave man, misunderstanding, or rather never truly comprehending, what change means, and in this way he edits himself out of the epic tradition, whose dynamism derives precisely from an ongoing respect for incessant evolution. Ulixes, the articulate (disertus) man, wins over the judges albeit serving them a fictitious and ‘transformed’ image of his Homeric self441, and inherits Achilles’ weapons along with the right to transform the character of the brave man (Met. 13.383 fortisque viri tulit arma disertus, ‘and the eloquent man carried off the arms of the brave man’).

441

Most, ‘Anger and Pity in Homer’s Iliad’, in: S. Morton-Braund and C. Gill (edd.), Ancient Anger: Perspectives from Homer to Galen (Cambridge 2003), 50-75. It is worth remarking that Ulixes’ eloquence is seen in negative light as early as the beginning of the debate: Ajax opens his speech by warning the judges explicitly about the fictitiousness of Ulixes’ words (Met. 12.9 fictis… verbis); yet, the Greek chiefs either fail to take the warning into serious consideration, or, more likely, are lured by the charm of Ulixes’ elusive suasoria.

Chapter Six Fe/Male Sacrifice: Performing the Poetics of Genre- and Gender-Crossing in the ‘Fall of Troy’ (Met. 13.399-575) 1. Introduction The drama of Ajax’s suicide ideally presages a new narrative cluster that raises questions about alternative expressions of deconstructing the ideology of Homeric epic, further articulated through controversial modes of theatricality. As in the aftermath of Nestor’s sweeping performance at Achilles’ dinner party, narrative time following the conclusion of the Armorum Iudicium moves forward with dizzying speed442, and the fall of the ‘bulwark of the Achaeans’ leads to the ultimate epic fall, the capture of Troy (Met. 13.404-575). In the Ovidian narrative, the latter event is entwined primarily with the fate of Hecuba, but it is also mirrored in the tragic deaths of her two youngest children, Polydorus and Polyxena. The two dramas are reported, respectively, at 13.429-438 and 13.533-564, in brief but dense treatments; they are embedded in the Hecuba story which forms their outer frame, and they both contribute significantly to the poetics debate that permeates the composition of the ‘little Iliad’. Metapoetics anxiety and gender-inversion discourse occupy the two cores around which revolve respectively the two parts of the present chapter. In the first part I approach the fall of Troy as an allegory for dynamic and flexible experimenting with epic composition. The narratives of the deaths of Polydorus and Polyxena, and of Hecuba’s revenge on Polymestor, Polydorus’ murderer, are all to be read as variations of the fall of Troy. All three narratives presuppose familiarity with an anthology of intertexts of different gen442

Musgrove 1991, 12-52, following Genette’s theory – as developed in Narrative Discourse: An Essay on Method, transl. J. Lewin (Ithaca 1990) – on temporality in a given narrative, especially the three levels of temporality and the distinction between “internal” and “external” anachronies, rationalizes the idiosyncratic conception of narrative time in Metamorphoses 1214. Musgrove’s special focus on the erratic chronological order of both the ‘little Iliad’ and the ‘little Aeneid’ is the first exclusive study on the construction of time in this crucial cluster where Ovid confronts the great epics.

208

Fe/Male Sacrifice

res, but mostly epic (the Iliad and, to a less conspicuous but still considerable extent, the Aeneid; and certainly the sadly irrecoverable Epic Cycle) and dramatic (Euripides’ Trojan tragedies). The triple possibility to consider the capture of Troy in ways that complement or elaborate on each other reflects the competing efforts by Ulixes and Ajax to retell the story of the Trojan War through their separate and disparate approaches to the ‘epic Achilles’. Hecuba, Polydorus, and Polyxena, all experience the fall of Troy, but each in his/her peculiar way, and in consequence, they represent variant embodiments of the city’s destiny, and their respective plights correspond to different acts of the same tragedy of the ‘fall of Troy’. Since two of the agents of this dramatized epic reconstruction are women who are fighting against formidable men (a fight which certainly in Hecuba’s case, and to a lesser extent in Polyxena’s own, is fought on top in the sphere of poetics), it is imperative to assess the dynamics of gender polarity as a second impetus behind plot development and its enactment. Hecuba’s struggle against Polymestor challenges the authorial credentials of a character that has already authored his own version of the fall of Troy. Polyxena’s contest is more difficult, since her opponent is the great Achilles, who has come back to haunt the Greeks’ nostos and the Ovidian audience’s scope for appreciating a ‘different’ epic. In order to curb Achilles’ authorial aspirations, Polyxena traverses earlier tradition, seeking inspiration and exemplary acting models among Achilles’ earlier contestants. Polyxena’s performance is set in a context that is indebted to the Homeric prosopography of Achilles in Iliad 1 – the bloodthirsty hero who is obsessed with his timê – and his mênis. In cyclical, quasi-closural correspondence to the hero’s initial appearance in the Cycnus episode, the grim characterization of Achilles in his epiphanic speech in the Polyxena episode restates the hero’s insecurity about his epic profile. Polyxena’s sacrifice, however, recorded in language that goes back to those Iliadic episodes essential for the characterization of Achilles and his heroic status, strikes another blow at the archetypal epic Achilles, by reversing the gender roles between the warrior and his female victim. On its part, Hecuba’s lament over the fate of her children and fatherland considers from a fresh perspective the enactment of another important, and exclusively female, epic act: the epic mourning. An intelligent assessment of the poetics and politics of the Ovidian transcription of the lamenting epic female takes up the closing section of this chapter, inducing the transition to Aurora’s mourning for Memnon and the alternative literary service the epic lament fulfills in the ‘little Iliad’ epilogue.

2. The Falls of Troy

209

2. The Falls of Troy Aware that the debate between Ulixes and Ajax may have lingered a bit too long for his audience to stay focused and interested, the Ovidian narrator sweeps through the remaining days of the ten-year-long fighting. In only five lines (Met. 13.399-403) Troy lies in ruins, and Ovid ‘apologizes’ for the length of the Trojan War by humorously tying together authorial self-consciousness and narrative fact (13.403 imposita est sero tandem manus ultima bello, ‘the final blow was at last given to the long-drawn war’). The final episode in the Troy series challenges the critical taste of the Ovidian readers by stirring up a new, even more animated discussion on authorial revisiting and self-reinvention. The narrative independence of the broader ‘Survivors’ cluster is highlighted by means of a ring composition: Met. 13.404-575 opens and closes with reference to the same marvel of Hecuba’s transformation into a bitch (404-407 ~ 567-571).443 The ring composition figure forges a distinct frame that accentuates the episodic character of the sequential, triple reenactment of Troy’s destruction and stresses the importance of narrative design. Specifically on the level of recurrent themes, ring composition becomes an important tool in the hands of the writer who is determined to effectively convert auctorial talent and deep knowledge of the traditional subtleties behind the Trojan legend into narrative sophistication. 2.1. The Fall of Troy and the Iliad The account of the capture of Troy in the Epic Cycle is the central theme of an entire epic, Arctinus’ Iliupersis, written no later than the 6th c.444 The irrecoverable status of this epic text poses serious limitations for the modern critic, who is unable to appreciate the direct dialogue between Ovid’s reception of the aftermath of the fall of Troy and Arctinus’ prototype. Nonethe443

444

Since Bentley, Met. 13.404-407 have been considered spurious because they sound repetitive, and are bracketed off even though there is no evidence in the manuscript tradition in support of the athetesis. Both Anderson and Tarrant embrace Bentley’s suggestion. Similarly, Hopkinson 2000, 164 [404-7n], opines that the lines in question are an addition, an alternative draft possibly noted in the margin by a learned reader, which was later incorporated in the text. Bömer 1982, 299-300, on the other hand, sees no problem with retaining them, and his stylistic analysis corroborates his view. For Bömer it is logical to treat a theme briefly mentioned earlier in greater detail at a later section of a given narrative. The integration of the extrapolated passage may also be defended in light of the ring composition pattern of narration proposed here. On the long, diverse literary and artistic tradition on the fall of Troy starting with Arctinus, see Anderson 1997.

210

Fe/Male Sacrifice

less, it may be possible to identify in Homer a plausible model for Ovid’s recurrent allegorical ‘falls’. The last four books of the Iliad read as a climactic metaphor for the fall of Troy. The identification is most prominent in the dramatization, first, of the action leading to Hector’s death and its immediate aftermath in Iliad 22, and, later, of Priam’s ransom and the burial of Hector’s body in Iliad 24.445 No sooner has Iliad 22 related Hector’s death than it fast-forwards to the tragedy of Troy’s people and especially its royal house, the embodiment of the city. The composition of the book observes a well-balanced structure, as it is divided into five units, all of which allude to the doomed fate of Troy. Iliad 22 opens with two speeches by Priam and Hecuba respectively, who entreat Hector not to face Achilles (25-89). Particularly in Priam’s speech at 61-65, there is a moving description of Troy as a fallen city with its women dragged into captivity and its young children dashed onto the ground.446 In a third monologue, Hector briefly contemplates alternatives to fighting, but ultimately decides in favor of the duel (98-130). The death of Hector, at 22.248366, opens and closes with two exchanges between the victor and the dying victim over the fate of the latter’s body, which forecasts the mutilation of Hector’s corpse soon afterwards and projects forwards onto the comparable devastation of the city of Troy.447 Symmetrically balancing the opening, the book closes with three speeches, three laments for the dead Hector. Once again, Priam and Hecuba lament the death of their son (405-436), leading the chorus of the entire Trojan populace, which mourns in high tones of unrestrained grief. The book closes with the wailing of Hector’s wife, who earlier already described in foresight (Iliad 6.411-440 and 447-465) the fall of Troy as an immediate consequence of Hector’s death – a wailing that is echoed again in her third and final lament for Hector in the epic (24.725-745). In this moving speech Andromache laments her own dismal fate and the fate of her son in the aftermath of the war, and she integrates into the dramatic time of the Iliad recordings that probably draw on the broader Epic Cycle. And of course her declared intent to burn Hector’s clothes as a staging of a substitute funeral in the hero’s honor, the statement with which Iliad 22 concludes (510-514), 445 446 447

The next paragraph relies on observations made in Richardson 1993, 104-163 and 272-361. With these lines “[Priam] anticipates the fall of Troy”, according to the Scholia A; cf. Richardson 1993, 112. Richardson 1993, 132: “Throughout [the duel] we are constantly aware… of the issues behind the action, in terms of the future fate of Hektor’s body and the fate of Troy itself”. In his reply to Hector’s dying words Achilles suggests that he should attack and capture Troy immediately (22.381-383), not really meaning to initiate on the spot an actual fullscale attack, but rather comprehending the broader impact of the connection between Hector’s death and the fall of the city.

2. The Falls of Troy

211

parallels precisely the actual funeral for Hector’s body at the very end of Iliad 24 (788-801).448 The allegory of Troy’s demise in the serial falls – literal and metaphorical, physical and emotional – of its leaders completes its full course, as expected, in Iliad 24. Here, among other things, we witness Priam’s falling to his knees before Achilles and begging for his son’s body by offering a ransom, the gold and precious treasures of Troy (24.469-484). Inside this metaphorical frame it makes perfect sense for the Homeric narrator to have employed the adjective μ , ‘great’ (477), to describe Priam, the only time our poet uses it as a modifier for the Trojan king. The momentous scene, at 477-479, of the ‘great Priam’, the embodiment of magna Troia, falling to his knees and kissing the ‘formidable, man-slaughtering’ hands of Achilles, stuns the immediate audience of Automedon and Alcimus standing by, and projects a similar experience of awe onto the readers of the epic. The fall of Troy is sealed at the end of the book with the description of an official funeral ceremony for Hector. The solemnity of the ritual is underlined by the structure of the lamentations over the hero’s body (718-761), where the mourning is led by professional singers, against whose cries are performed the individual laments of the closest female relatives, Hecuba and Andromache.449 To these, a third lament, by Helen of all people, is added, and it constitutes the very last speech of the epic, situated right before the cremation of Hector’s body (762-775). Homer applies the definite closural touch to his work by bringing together the symbolic beginning and end to the Trojan War, the woman who brought war and destruction to Troy, and the death of the man who stood for Troy. There is even mention of Astyanax, Hector’s son and successor, whose gloomy destiny is already envisioned by his mother as an inevitable consequence to his fa448

449

The triple mourning of Andromache, chronologically set before, during and after the death of Hector, respectively, with a focus on the significance of the recurrence, in conjunction with the consistency of its thematic structure, is laid out in detail in D. Lohmann, Die Andromache-Szenen in der Ilias (Hildesheim 1988), 70-74. On the conscious differentiation between the professional women’s mourning and the female relatives’ lament, by means of employing different terminology (called, respectively, and ), see Alexiou 2002, 102-103. On the structure of the funeral songs in the Greek tradition, and the continuity of form and structure in these laments from antiquity to modern times, see Alexiou 2002, 131-160 (pp. 132-133 discuss the laments over Hector in Iliad 24); also J.M. Foley, Homer’s Traditional Art (University Park, PA 1999), 168-174. On the theme of epic mourning in the Iliad, see now Tsagalis 2004, and specifically pp. 2-8, on the initial distinction between and ; and p. 21 for the definition of the Iliadic . On pp. 27-28, Tsagalis lists all twelve laments ( ) in the Iliad, and on pp. 28-51, he follows their thematic development and details their internal structure. Tsagalis devotes a whole chapter to Andromache’s three laments for Hector (pp. 118-136); see also pp. 154161 and 161-165, respectively, on Hecuba’s and Helen’s laments over Hector.

212

Fe/Male Sacrifice

ther’s death.450 Most notably, finally, the concluding laments over Hector and Troy are themselves epic poems. They sing the praises of Hector, his accomplishments in war, his piety and kindness at home, they sing of klea andros, ‘the man’s deeds’, already surrendering the post-Homeric literary career of Hector to the hands of professional singers and oral poets.451 There is little doubt that the self-consciousness of the epic lament452 is a major reason for the dominant presence of lamenting women in a series of great poetic texts, including the works of the tragedians of the classical era. The latter were measuring themselves against the genius and influence of ‘Homer’, and archaic epic in general, when they recontextualized the poetics of the epic cosmos in a post-epic world.453

450

451

452

453

In Il. 6.402-403, we are first told that Hector’s son was nicknamed Asty-anax, ‘city-ruler’, by the people of Troy because ‘Hector alone guarded Ilion’; later Plato would read hector as a common noun, a synonym to anax, ‘king’; cf. Cratyl. 393A ( μ ). In accordance with the rule of succession from father to son, Astyanax’s name was intended to function as a self-reflection for Hector, but also commented on the similar role that is reserved for the boy in the future, as the successor to his father’s heritage. A little further down in the same passage (Il. 6.494ff.), where Hector meets his wife and son for the last time, the hero’s parting speech is a prayer in which the father looks into the future and envisions his son as a mirror image of himself. Tragically, the death of Hector dooms Astyanax; and what Andromache utters as a sad prediction (at Il. 24.734-735) is realized in the other poems of the Epic Cycle (Iliupersis and Ilias Parva) and recorded in the Ovidian (13.415-417) account of the fall. Vergil does not mention Astyanax in his own version of the fall of Troy. The language in Ovid’s text refers back directly to Andromache’s sorrowful forecast in Iliad 24. Bömer 1982, 304-305, traces the full tradition on Astyanax’s death; also, Richardson 1993, 354-355; and Frazer 1921, on Apollod. Epit. 5.23. On epic laments as poems of praise, miniature epics in the making, see Tsagalis 2004, 6874, arguing that the mourners (whom Tsagalis calls the “unprivileged chorus”), and in particular the female mourners of Hector, are acquiring the notoriety of the bards, since their gooi are really epics, klea-songs. On the metaliterary texture of the encomiastic laments at the end of the Iliad, see also E. Reiner, Die rituelle Totenklage der Griechen (Stuttgart/Berlin 1938), 62-67, 116-160, cited in Richardson 1993, 350-351. Cf. Tsagalis 2004, 26, on an epigrammatic encapsulation of the poetic self-consciousness of the Homeric laments, mainly on the laments as miniature ‘Iliads’: “By using external analepses and prolepses, the draw a circle that surpasses the epic and encompasses larger parts of the Epic Cycle. In terms of poetics, the reproduce the Iliad and, by and large, summarize it”. Famous is Aeschylus’ rhesis that his works are ‘slices from the banquets of Homer’ (Athenaeus 8.347e, as quoted in R. Lamberton, ‘Homer in Antiquity’, in: I. Morris and B. Powell (edd.), A New Companion to Homer (Leiden 1997), 40, employing the venerable name of the poet of the Iliad to refer to the entire Trojan Cycle. On Homer’s early – mainly among his contemporaries and the poets of the generation immediately following – reception, see B. Graziosi, Inventing Homer: The Early Reception of Epic (Cambridge 2002).

2. The Falls of Troy

213

The same limitations regarding the proper appreciation of the lost epics of the Epic Cycle that treat the Fall of Troy and its various related traditions, confront the student of the fifth-century dramatic receptions of these texts. Ovid’s predilection for the Euripidean interpretation of the Trojan survivors’ suffering has much to do with the regularity of transformation, usually the reversal and deconstruction of the Homeric epic, as well as with the thematic recurrence and compactness of the tragic word. The accretion within a single literary piece of three interconnected but different mythical allegories for the fall of Troy (Hecuba, Polydorus, Polyxena) inspires, and probably challenges, the poet of the Metamorphoses. Aware, moreover, that Euripides’ Trojan tragedies derive mostly from the Epic Cycle, “Ovid puts a tragedy of epic origin back within the framework of epic” as “one more example of the all inclusiveness of the Metamorphoses, a work which on a poetic level provides a fittingly changeful complement for its subject-matter”.454 At the same time, the denial, and often rejection, of epic ideology in the tragedies of Euripides makes the plays a good source of inspiration for an ambitious literary epigone who defines his epic artistry through finessing the structural politics of epic post-deconstruction. Euripides’ advanced treatment of gender and female psychology comprises an additional criterion favoring Ovid’s open turn to a tragic model in this unit, which revolves primarily around epic gender deconstruction. The resonance of the Homeric text455 in Euripides’ tragic narrative is vivid, since few poets outside the Epic Cycle read the archaic epic tradition overall so perceptively. Euripides’ Hecuba in particular, which is set in the dramatic time of the Trojan War and features the same protagonists as the Iliad, re-frames

454 455

Thus Hopkinson 2000, 24. The term epic ‘resonance’ principally refers to the reception of the Homeric poems and the other archaic epics by their contemporary audiences. These audiences were also rival epic poets. The transmission of the poems was based on oral speech, so the idea of resonance has much to do with cultural ideas and themes, in particular the archaic understanding of the Homeric world as a reflection of the cosmos. To a lesser extent, the reception of cultural ideas may be projected onto poetic structure, translating the patterns of characterization into memory-enhancing structural mechanisms and technicalities of narrative speech. For a sensible recent discussion of the archaic notion of epic resonance, see B. Graziosi and J. Haubold, Homer: The Resonance of Epic (London 2004), whence the definition of the term as a poem’s “ability to evoke a web of associations and implications by referring to the wider epic tradition” (p. 9). See especially their understanding of the world of heroes (chapter 5, pp. 121-149) as analogous to the cosmic universe, and yet evolving and multifarious, for it filtered through the archaic, every-day pragmatism of the poets’/audiences’ lives. Logically, then, within the newly formed culture of literacy that brought about the tragedies of the 5th c. B.C., the notion of resonance gradually develops into an author’s literary consciousness, or what Conte has named ‘poetic memory’.

214

Fe/Male Sacrifice

values and ideas that play a dominant role in the characterization of the leading Homeric heroes. 2.2. The ‘Fall’ of Polydorus The Ovidian version of the ‘Survivors’ relies on Euripides’ treatment of the legend of the fall of Troy, primarily in his Hecuba, and to a lesser extent in the Trojan Women.456 The Metamorphoses account of Polydorus (Met. 13.429-438) is further indebted to Vergil’s version of the young Trojan’s murder, reportedly related to Aeneas by the very ghost of the dead hero in Aeneid 3.49-57, a text that also follows closely the account originally developed in Euripides’ Hecuba.457 The Ovidian story on Polydorus runs as follows: Est, ubi Troia fuit, Phrygiae contraria tellus Bistoniis habitata viris. Polymestoris illic regia dives erat, cui te commisit alendum clam, Polydore, pater Phrygiisque removit sub armis, consilium sapiens, sceleris nisi praemia magnas

456

457

On the literary sources and the relevant bibliography behind the Ovidian account of the Trojan ‘Survivors’, see more recently Hopkinson 2000, 22-27; in detail, Dippel 1990, 102119, and Bömer 1982, 308-322. On the Hecuba intertextual backdrop, see P. Venini, ‘L’ Ecuba di Euripide e Ovidio (Met. XIII 429-575)’, Rend. Ist. Lomb. 85 (1952), 364-377; Mossman 1995, 29-42, and particularly 247-253 (specifically on the treatment of Polydorus and Polyxena in post-Euripidean ancient literature); Michelakis 2002, 58-83 (on the inversion of Achilles’ epic portrayal in the Hecuba); and Casali 2007, 182-188 (arguing that Ovid follows Euripides’ version instead of Vergil’s own, all the while explicitly alluding to the Vergilian myth he has discared; this conscious rejection of a certain source by specifically acknowledging familiarity with it, is, for Casali, a “quintessensially Vergilian technique”, and Ovid toys on it). My reference text for Euripides’ Hecuba is the most recent edition by C. Collard, Euripides. With Introduction, Translation and Commentary (Warminster 1991). Bömer 1982, 309, lists the traces of the Roman sources – the titles of four Latin dramas – that might have exercised additional influence on Ovid. The Polydorus mythos recorded in Euripides, and embraced later by Vergil and Ovid, must have been the Greek tragedian’s invention, perhaps the fusion of different epic stories not necessarily all of them linked to Polydorus (cf. Il. 11.221, referring to a certain Trojan Iphidamas, son of Antenor, who, as a child, was sent off to Thrace and was brought up there by his grandfather, Cisseus, a name elsewhere identified with that of Hecuba’s father), or his incorporation of a Thracian local legend. Both views have drawn strong critical support, and for full bibliography see Th. K. Stephanopoulos, Umgestaltung des Mythos durch Euripides (Athens 1980), 78-82, who opts for the latter possibility. In the Iliad Polydorus dies in battle during the Trojan War, and his killer actually is Achilles. Homer names a certain Laothoe rather than Hecuba as his mother, but, as in Euripides, we are told that he was the youngest son of Priam, much beloved by the king, who would not let him enter the fight; cf. Il. 20.407ff.; 22.46ff.; cf. Mossman 1995, 29-30.

2. The Falls of Troy

215

adiecisset opes, animi inritamen avari. ut cecidit fortuna Phrygum, capit impius ensem rex Thracum iuguloque sui demisit alumni et, tamquam tolli cum corpore crimina possent, exanimem scopulo subiectas misit in undas. (Met. 13.429-438) Just opposite Phrygia, where Troy used to stand, there is the land that is inhabited by the Bistonians. In that land stood the wealthy royal residence of Polymestor, to whom your father Priam entrusted you, Polydorus, to be reared secretly, taking you away from Troy and the war, a wise plan, if he had not sent along great wealth, a prize crying for a crime, a temptation for a greedy soul. When the fortunes of the Phrygians fell, the impious king of the Thracians seized his sword, and drove it into the throat of his ward, and, as if the crime could be removed together with the murdered body, he threw the corpse from a cliff into the waves below.

Observing closely the Euripidean storyline, both Vergil and Ovid agree that Polydorus was the youngest son of Priam, whom the aged king secretly sent away from Troy when he sensed that the fall of the city was drawing close. The young prince was sent to Thrace, to King Polymestor, who was related by kinship to the royal house of the Priamids since he had married Priam’s eldest daughter, Ilione. Polydorus, true to the etymological signifi+ , ‘many-gifts’),458 was accompanied by a great cance of his name ( amount of gold. Nonetheless, when Polymestor realized that Troy was falling, he killed his ward, threw his body into the sea to keep the murder a secret, and appropriated the wealth. Polydorus’ corpse was later found by the Trojan women and Hecuba, who in turn plotted revenge on Polymestor and extracted it with her own hands. Vergil, however, steps away from Euripides when he comes to narrate the murder of the youngest Trojan prince. In Aeneid 3.49-57 the ghost of Polydorus appears before Aeneas as the latter is digging on the shore to draw the foundations for a new city, and he urges the terrified hero to stop because he is violating Polydorus’ tomb. He next reveals that Polymestor did not throw his body into the sea after all, but pierced it with several spears and buried it on the Thracian shore. These spears were left into Polydorus’ body, where they took root and retrieved their original form as myrtle branches, the wood traditionally used to make shafts for spears. In directing his first detailed allegorical ‘fall of Troy’, with Polydorus representing the fallen city while Polymestor stands for the conquering Greeks, Ovid builds on a combination of both the Euripidean and the Vergilian versions. Specifically, the ‘official’ account of Polydorus’ death follows Euripides, 458

For Eustathius (on Il. 16.175) Polydorus received his name ‘because of his natural gifts’ ( ); cf. Mossman 1995, 29.

216

Fe/Male Sacrifice

but the narrative texture is informed by the peculiar story in the Aeneid, too. The Vergilian influence is subtle, but deliberately detectable, expressing Ovid’s wish that his conscious divergence from Vergil’s innovations in favor of the mainstream story of the myth be noticed.459 Within the broader ‘little Iliad-little Aeneid’ cluster, Ovid includes a second reference to Polydorus, when he begins his ‘Aeneid’ story with the Trojans’ departure from Thace: fertur ab Antandro scelerataque limina Thracum et Polydoreo manantem sanguine terram linquit (Met. 13.628-630) [Aeneas] set sail from Antandros, and left behind the criminal homes of the Thracians and the land dripping with Polydorus’ blood

The passage closely recalls the Vergilian narrative, the part in which the voice of the dead Polydorus addresses Aeneas, who has been trying to break the branches and the foliage off Polydorus’ tumulus: quid miserum, Aeneas, laceras? iam parce sepulto, parce pias scelerare manus. non me tibi Troia externum tulit aut cruor hic de stipite manat. heu fuge crudelis terras, fuge litus avarum (Aen. 3.41-44) Why, Aeneas, do you tear me apart, the poor wretch? Spare me now in my tomb; spare your pious hands from the crime. Troy did not bring me up a stranger to you, nor does this gore drip from a stalk. Alas, flee this cruel land, flee this greedy shore…

Both passages refer similarly to the Thracian shores as ‘criminal’ and ‘cruel’; and for Bömer, Ovid’s scelerata limina is a “typical Vergilian” phrase.460 The strongest evidence that Ovid here has before him Vergil’s text is the use of the same verb manare when he describes the blood-soaked Thracian beach – particularly so, since the dead body of the victim is buried in it.461 459

460

461

Casali 2007, 184-188, argues that Ovid’s narrative of Polydorus’ death proper, positioned in the Hecuba unit (reported at Met. 13.429-438; 536-537), offers an “interesting example of Vergilian exegesis”, because it simultaneously recapitulates the Euripidean prologue to the Hecuba and alludes to Vergil’s narrative of Polydorus at the opening of Aeneid 3, by incorporating vocabulary clearly taken from the Aeneid. Ovid engineers this fusion because he slyly criticizes Vergil’s Polydorus narrative which produces a story by combining together two versions on the youth’s death that obviously contradict each other. Note, moreover, the mention of Antandros at Aen.3.6 as the departure point of the Trojan fleet. Servius, in fact, associates etymologically the location with the death of Polydorus; cf. V. Cova, Virgilio. Il Libro Terzo dell’ Eneide (Milan 1994), 28: “‘a prezzo di un uomo’, cioè di Polidoro”. The confirmation of the emulation, however, requires in-depth familiarity with the entire Metamorphoses poem, for the pathetic narrative of the Vergilian Polydorus’ plight has furnished the model for the lament and subsequent transformation of the Heliades into pop-

2. The Falls of Troy

217

According to Paschalis, Vergil’s innovative take on the standardized version of the myth was motivated by an etymological ingenuity the poet of the Aeneid is proposing, which toys with a distorted etymology of the Trojan hero’s name. This etymology is inspired by the Latin spelling, ‘Poly-dorus’, which does not differentiate between omicron and omega in the writing of the second compound, and so makes it possible to transcribe it in Greek also . The form, which is, of course, unattested and impossible, as * being the Greek word for literally translates as ‘the man of many spears’, spear. What could be Vergil’s incentive behind the invention of this peculiar etymological wordplay? The answer, which Paschalis endorses, too, has to do, among other things, with an intention on the part of the author of the Aeneid to toy with a link between the death of Polydorus and the fall of Troy.462 The interlocking destinies of Troy and Polydorus are laid out early in Aeneid 3 (13-68), as Aeneas relates his ghost encounter on the coast of Thrace. Polydorus is identified specifically as Priam’s youngest son463, that is, the last hope of the royal house of the Priamids for survival and resurrection, and for this reason, a safe exit from Troy is sought for him. Polydorus, however, fell victim to treachery and his father’s credulity: similarly, the Trojans were too eager to believe Sinon and fall into the trap of the Greeks’ lies about the Trojan Horse; and Priam believed that Polymestor, his son-in-law and the husband of his eldest daughter464, was a trustworthy ally (Aen. 3.16). Both the

462

463

464

lars, in Met. 2.349-363. On the patterning the Heliades story after the Vergilian narrative on Polydorus, see Smith 1997, 104-115. Notice also the inclusion of the same verbal form, manare, at Met. 2.360 (sanguineae manant tamquam de vulnere guttae, ‘drops of blood drip down as if from a wound’). Bömer (1982, 369-370), via a list of textual parallels, confirms the Vergilian influence on Met. 13.628-630. For Paschalis the ‘etymology’ of Polydorus’ name from doru, ‘spear’, is just one of the many manifestations of the ‘spear’ theme, especially in Aeneid 2 which records the fall of Troy, but also in the rest of the epic. The ‘spear’ theme on several occasions is tied to the ‘gift’ (doron) and the ‘treachery’ (dolus) themes. All three are major motifs in the Trojan Horse story, and they operate interconnectedly. In this respect, the fall of Polydorus and the demise of Troy represent parallel situations. How this odd parallelism works in the Aeneid is analyzed in Paschalis 1997, 24 and passim. See also Paschalis’ introduction on how thematic clusters operate as a mechanism for the development of a plot that relies on linearity as much as on recurrence, analogy and symmetry. This is declared in the opening of the Hecuba (ll. 14-15), where the ghost of the dead hero notes that he was sent to Thrace when he was still too young to carry the heavy weapons of war on his shoulders. Ilione partakes of the broader thematics of the fall of Troy, too. According to the etymology of her name (from Ilion), she embodies Troy, but she is also, without her knowing, a carrier of deception, for her scepter along with the peplos of Helen are among the gifts that Aeneas offers to Dido in Aen. 1.653-654. Dido’s downfall has been seen to mirror the fall of Troy, with Aeneas acting the part of the Greeks, while the particular gifts, which seal the trust between the queen and Aeneas at the end of Aeneid 1, replace the Trojan Horse, the

218

Fe/Male Sacrifice

Greeks and Polymestor were motivated to commit their crimes by their ‘greed’ (avaritia) for gold.465 A mirror image of Troy and her riches, Polydorus arrives at Thrace loaded with ‘gifts’ of gold, auri… cum pondere magno (‘with gold that weighted heavily’), not unlike a new bride466 or a miniature embodiment of Troy. The ‘gifts’ ignite the greedy Polymestor just as the treasures of Troy are the coveted prizes for the Greek army. Stressing the association between Polymestor and the Greeks, Vergil specifies that the king of Thrace allied himself to the Greeks towards the end of the war (Aen. 3.54 victricia arma secutus, ‘followed the winning arms’), imitating even their impiety (3.55 fas omne abrumpit, ‘he broke all sacred law’). His greed is reflected onto his entire country (Aen. 3.44 fuge litus avarum, ‘flee the greedy shore’). Just as the Greeks take Troy and her real ‘gifts’ deceitfully, by offering a false ‘gift’ and a false story, similarly, Polymestor murders Polydorus treacherously by entrapping him and buries his body in a tumulus. The cruelty of the youth’s murder (3.55 Polydorum obtruncat, ‘he butchers Polydorus’) points to the mutilated body of Priam at Aen. 2.557-558: a headless truncus lying nameless on the shores of Troy.467 The employment of tumulus, a term with two meanings, ‘mound’ and ‘tomb’, reflects the murderer’s desire to keep his crime a secret, so that he may take possession of the youth’s golden ‘gifts’.

465 466

467

dolus that opened the doors to Troy; cf. details in S. Frangoulidis, ‘Duplicity and GiftOfferings in Vergil’s Aeneid 1 and 2’, Vergilius 38 (1992), 26-37. A Roman tragedy by Pacuvius, titled Iliona, evidently promoted a Romanized reading of the Polydorus myth, which formed the core theme of the narrative in the play; cf. G. Manuwald, ‘Pacuvius’ Iliona: eine römische Version des Polydorus-Mythos’, in: G. Manuwald (ed.), Identität und Alterität in der frührömischen Tragödie (Würzburg 2000), 301-314. Michalopoulos 2001, 41-42, s.v. avarus, defines avaritia as lust exclusively for aurum. The word as an adjective occurs in the Iliad to refer to Andromache, at 6.394 and again, at 22.88, on the particular occasion of her arrival at Troy as Hector’s new bride. According to the Scholia A, she is the bride who brings with her many gifts from her parents; cf. Richardson 1993, 115. Another suggestive and certainly tempting truncus is that of Polyxena, in the Latin account of her sacrifice recorded in Catullus 64.362-370. Polyxena’s sacrifice in Catullus is the apex of Achilles’ ‘superb accomplishments of bravery’ (348 egregias virtutes) as prophesied by the Fates in their famous song at the wedding of Peleus and Thetis. Incidentally, the Catullan Polyxena’s death is deliberately compared to an animal sacrifice (369 victima), “for horrific and pathetic effect” (D.F.S. Thomson, Catullus. Edited with a Textual and Interpretive Commentary [Toronto 1997], 433 ad loc.), while the image of her slaughtered body, described at 370 as truncum… corpus, clearly prefigures Vergil’s Polydorus (Aen. 3.55 Polydorum obtruncat); both slaughters, alike baptized obtruncationes, ‘beheadings’, even though they are not (cf. the comment by Servius Danielis at Aen. 3.46, as noted in Zwierlein 2000, 78 n. 4), toy with the beheaded body of Priam; more is said on Catullus’ presence in the subtext of Ovid’s Polyxena narrative later in this chapter, as the argument moves on from Polydorus to Polyxena.

2. The Falls of Troy

219

The many spears, furthermore, that are driven into Polydorus’ body evoke the recurrence of the spear motif in Aeneid 2, in various instances during the fall of Troy, the most conspicuous and yet the least detectable being althe Trojan Horse itself. A structure of wood, the Horse is called a ready in the Odyssey, at 8.507, an association that has even inspired an etymo(Od. 8.493).468 Finally, Polydorus’ logical explanation for its name ghost urging Aeneas to flee Thrace (3.44), a location of crime, replicates the epiphany of another princely ghost before Aeneas, that of dead Hector, Polydorus’ brother and the archetypal incarnation of Troy (Aen. 2.270-297). Hector’s mutilated apparition, groaning deeply (2.288 graviter gemitus imo de pectore ducens, ‘drawing heavily a groan from the depth of his heart’ ~ 3.39f. gemitus lacrimabilis imo… tumulo, ‘a mourning groan [is heard] from the depths of the mound’), shakes Aeneas out of his sleep – and, as in Polydorus’ episode, out of his ignorance – and orders him to flee immediately (2.289 heu fuge, nate dea, teque his… eripe flammis, ‘flee, son of the goddess, and snatch yourself out of these flames’). The reminiscence of the mourning of the Trojan women, the Iliades, around the tomb of Polydorus with their hair loose calls to mind the professional mourners who lead the lament in Hector’s funeral at the end of the Iliad (24.718ff.). And as Hector’s body is ‘recovered’, restored, to his people for proper burial, likewise ‘recovered’, identified, is Polydorus’ body, which receives in turn its customary (de more) burial (3.62-68). It is perhaps coincidental, but nonetheless worth noting, that Vergil does not name Polymestor, but refers to him by his title, Threicius rex, ‘the Thracian king’ (3.51). This makes it easier to compare Priam’s son-in-law to the earlier, infamous Thracian king, Lycurgus, whose name featured at the opening of the Thrace episode, implicitly entwining the locale with the name of its legen, ‘wolf’, connotes a dary king. The etymological origin of Lycurgus from character who, like a wolf, is distinguished by his violent and murderous instincts, and by his rapaciousness – his greed.469 Vergil’s play on the Trojan legend themes, with the assistance of etymological or para-etymological figures, determines Ovid’s rewriting of the Poly468

469

Euripides at Tr. 11-14 offers a complementary etymology for , from the spears carried by the Greeks who hid themselves inside the belly of the structure; cf. W. Biehl, Euripides Troades (Heidelberg 1989), 103. Discussing line 11, Biehl notes that Vergil acknowledges the two different etymologies linking the spear and the Trojan Horse, at 2.112 (the Horse is made of trabibus… acernis, ‘beams of maple-wood’, the wood used also for spears) and 2.237 (the Horse is ‘a deadly machine… pregnant with spears’, a fatalis machina… feta armis). On the mention of Lycurgus’ name at the opening of the Polydorus episode as an allegory for the principal themes of carnage and greed, see principally S. Casali, ‘La vite dietro il mirto: Lycurgus, Polydorus e la violazione delle piante in Eneide 3’, SIFC 4th ser. 3 (2005), 233-250; also Paschalis 1997, 114-115.

220

Fe/Male Sacrifice

dorus episode. In his reception of it, Vergil’s successor displays his mastery of metanarrative, but on top stresses the importance of metanarrative towards a more comprehensive and thoughtful appreciation of the reception of literary tradition. The extensive wordplay with the semantics of Polydorus’ name and the enmeshing of etymology with broader themes in the Aeneid470 become the core around which develop several elaborate narratives, all allegorical rereadings of the fall of Troy.471 Ovid’s inclination to direct the storyline and the tone of his narrative of the demise of Troy on the basis of the recurrence of avarice and greed is well understood inside the frame of his systematic unmaking of the quintessential epic heroism. When the greed theme is repeatedly projected in a variety of contexts as the principal motive of the Greek army and its leadership, the conquest of Troy no longer appears a heroic accomplishment, an act of righteous retribution against a crime, but is ‘transformed’ into a crime (433 sceleris). Polymestor’s greed in the Metamorphoses is accentuated as a result of a specific reference to his already great wealth (430-431 Polymestoris illic regia dives erat, ‘there was the luxurious court of Polymestor’). The detail of Polymestor’s alliance with the Greeks, present in the Aeneid, is here removed: Polydorus’ death in Ovid is due exclusively to the fact that the prince was carrying with him too much wealth. Polymestor is tempted by the gold (434 opes, animi inritamen avari, ‘riches, a temptation to a greedy soul’) even before the defeat of the Trojans; his greed is thus projected as inherent vice. Later, Polymestor’s pathological obsession with avarice is spelled out as such: 554 praedae… †adsuetus† amore472, ‘led by his customary lust for spoil’. It occurs at the point 470 471

472

This semantics network, shared by Vergil and Ovid alike, is based on the ideas of ‘gift’ and ‘giving’ (and their opposites); see Paschalis 2003, 142-159. Already Vergil had in mind the fall of Troy when he produced his atypical account on Polydorus; cf. S. Döpp, Virgilischer Einfluß in Ovids Werk (Doctoral Dissertation, Munich 1968), 129: “Wie bei Vergil stellt aber Polydorus’ Schicksal ein Beispiel für das furchtbare Los dar, das Troja betroffen hat”. The obvious association between the Vergilian and the Ovidian versions of the greedy Polymestor, and Ovid’s even stronger emphasis on avarice and its tie to deviousness and the fall of Troy, make an appealing case for retaining – even with Tarrant’s caution – adsuetus on 13.554, and all the more so, since none of the various alternative emendations offered so far has been considered to be fully satisfactory; Hopkinson (2000), 184 [554n], accepts this reading as reasonably suitable (in terms of Polymestor’s receiving regularly wealth from Priam and becoming accustomed to this), but he would welcome as a more appropriate alternative a more “forceful participle showing that Polymestor was urged on or stimulated to act as he did”, and he considers Magnus’ emendation accensus as the most likely. Zwierlein (per litteras) is inclined to follow Heinsius’ suggestion to read allectus, ‘compelled, attracted’, a form common in Latin prose, especially in Cicero, according to the OLD (s.v. allicio), and rare elsewhere, but one of these rare verse attestations is found in Ovid’s erotic poetry, likewise next to amor (AA 3.510 comibus est oculis adliciendus amor).

2. The Falls of Troy

221

when Hecuba, in her determination to avenge Polydorus’ death, uses the Thracian king’s vice to her advantage, and she designs her revenge in the pattern of the ‘fall’ scenario, that is, on the basis of deception. In her plot she inverts the ‘fall of Troy’ motif when she briefly abandons her character of the queen of ‘conquered’ Troy, to become herself the ‘conqueror’ of her son’s ‘conqueror’. Two additional details steer Ovid away from Vergil’s text. Ovid’s Polymestor does not employ the spear to kill Polydorus, but cuts his throat with a sword (435-436). This divergence from the Aeneid text is deliberate. A little later, when Hecuba discovers the dead body, Polydorus is still reported to have been thrown off a cliff into the sea, a convenient disposal without record, and a detail first present in Euripides (Hec. 27). Yet, the narrator mentions explicitly that the weapons used to kill the youth were spears: 13.536537 adspicit eiectum Polydori in litore corpus / factaque Threiciis ingentia vulnera telis, ‘she saw the body of Polydorus, tossed off upon the shore, covered with gaping wounds made by the Thracian spears’).473 The reason why Polymestor is portrayed in the former case to use a sword and to slaughter his ward by cutting off his throat is dictated once again by the details of Priam’s murder. These actually vary in the literary tradition, but in both Euripides (Hec. 23-24) and Vergil (Aen. 2.506-558), as in the early, lost Iliupersis, the king of Troy is slaughtered by Neoptolemus at the altar of Zeus Herkeios.474 In the Metamorphoses, moreover, the Thracian king is identified by name. Polymestor, a compound word, directs the formation of its own thematic net, which partly interconnects with Polydorus’ subtext but principally advances a new and subtler approach to the ‘fall of Troy’ theme. The second compound -μ ), is the verb μ μ , ‘I improvise, I of Polymestor’s name ( plan cleverly, I plot [with the intention to deceive]’, the same verb that forms the etymological basis for Medea’s name, as well as for the name of Clytem(n)estra, Agamemnon’s spouse, who construed an elaborate plot to murder

473

474

Hopkinson 2000, 182 [537n], following Bömer 1982, 335, reads Ovid’s use of telis, an attested poetic plural for ‘sword’, as allusion to the different account of Polydorus’ death in Vergil, “where [the Trojan prince] is said to have been killed by many tela, ‘javelins’”. Zwierlein 2000, 78, has likewise noted the inconsistency, as well as the odd use of obtruncare to signify death by either arrows (in Vergil) or the sword (in Ovid, who toys on Vergil), rather than ‘to decapitate’ – a use, nonetheless, not unprecedented, for there is at least one passage, Sall. Hist. fr. 4.67, where obtruncare refers to death by arrow shooting. EpGF 62.9-10; West Iliuper. arg. 4; on the tradition behind Priam’s death, see Austin 1964, 199-212 ad 2.506-558. The altar of Zeus ‘of the Household’ represented the heart of the palace, and in Vergil’s Romanized ‘translation’ the seat of the penates, and as such, another symbol for Troy. The identification of the particular altar with the site of Priam’s death means that the altar and the king operate similarly as representations of the great city.

222

Fe/Male Sacrifice

her husband.475 Ovid comments explicitly on the etymology of the king’s name towards the end of the episode and ties it to the nature of his character. At 13.551, Polymestor is referred to as artifex, ‘a schemer’, in the pejorative sense of the term – an insidious deceiver: vadit ad artificem dirae, Polymestora, caedis, ‘she [Hecuba] goes up to meet Polymestor, who had crafted the cruel murder’. And only a few lines later (555), he receives the characterization callidus, ‘cunning’.476 The passage is part of Hecuba’s revenge, her deceitful counterattack against the Thracian’s original murderous plot. The other famous artifex in the Trojan legend is, of course, Ulixes, the mastermind behind the Wooden Horse, the engineer of the plot/‘machine’ (machina) that captured Tory, and which Vergil aptly labels an artificis scelus, ‘crime by a crafty man’ (Aen. 2.125). In casting Polymestor, then, through Hecuba’s words, a parallel to Ulixes in deception, Ovid reads the murder of Polydorus, the objective behind Polymestor’s scheme, in the light of the fall of Troy.

3. The ‘Fall of Troy’ and Hecuba Ovid’s story of Hecuba, the sequel to the Polydorus episode, focuses on the same key themes but subjects them to a treatment that is considerably more sophisticated. The prototype story in Euripides’ homonymous tragedy, Paschalis notes, “is underpinned by the interweaving of the semantic fields of and , either independently or as components of the names and ”.477 The development of the fall of Troy motif, which is explicit here, lies at the center of another thematic interweaving. Hecuba, as the queen of Troy witnessing the tragic deaths of her two youngest children, personifies the image and destiny of Troy. This is nowhere stated more expressly than at Met. 13.483-485, where a devastated Hecuba has just received the dead body of her sacrificed daughter and is ready to embark on her lament. Interestingly, the queen opens her wailing with an apostrophe to herself: o modo regia coniunx, / regia dicta parens, Asiae florentis imago, / nunc etiam praedae mala sors (‘you, who only now were called royal consort and queen mother, you once the representation (or simile) of proud Asia, but now suffering a hard lot even for a captive’). Hecuba’s symbolism as a reflection of Troy is projected in the appositive imago, a celebrated term from the vocabu475 476

477

In essence both mêstor and mêtis derive etymologically from μ μ , “to deliberate, plan, machinate, invent”; cf. Chantraine and Frisk, s.v. Hopkinson 2000, 184, on artificem: “probably alludes to the etymology of Polymestor, whose name means ‘much-devising’”; and again, on the same page, on callidus: “perhaps another allusion to the etymology of Polymestor’s name”. Paschalis 2003, 153, explaining subsequently how the two themes interlock.

2. The Falls of Troy

223

lary of art, often applied to statues as tangible expressions of verisimilar representations of life. Yet, an imago does not just refer to any ‘image’ similar to its original, but to that special ‘image’ which best captures the likeness of the original. This original may equally be a single physical object and a thematic unit of many objects, or even abstractions in complex interaction.478 A recent paper by Harrison has come to endorse the metaphorical effect of the catalytic term ‘imago’ in sealing the parallel between Hecuba and the fallen Troy. For Harrison, the word imago in Latin epic is sometimes found within, or in the immediate context of, a simile, and it functions cross-referentially. It may allude to similes in previous epics, it may operate intratextually and thus link the content of the relevant unit with material treated previously in the same work, and it may even engage in meta-literary games, taking advantage of the multi-faceted association between poetics and the semantics of ‘imago’.479 It should be noted, too, that Ovid’s language in his passionate apostrophe to Hecuba is evocative of Vergil’s eulogy for Priam’s headless body on the shore of Troy, at Aen. 2.557-558. This detail encourages a parallel viewing of Hecuba and her murdered husband, who more than anybody else personifies the fate of Troy, but more than that, it corroborates the goal of intertextual cross-referencing through the employment of imago as part of a simile context. Not least, the Ovidian epicization of the tragic female Hecuba is heavily poeticized as it patently antagonizes the Vergilian dramatization of the epic male Priam. Hecuba’s identification with her city is strongly suggested to the Ovidian readers, before whose eyes the queen first appears seated amidst the graves of her dead children (13.423 in mediis Hecube natorum inventa sepulcris, ‘Hecuba was found in the midst of the graves of her sons’). All these sons embodied the hope for survival for the dynasty and the city – and most prominently of all, Hector, whose sepulchre logically occupies the epicenter of the queen’s lament (13.426-428). The mother is so attached to him that she even carries his ashes with her480, and leaves behind locks of her hair on the empty tomb, not as an offering to the dead warrior, but as a replacement for his ashes. A bit later in her mourning for Polyxena, the queen implicitly confesses that with every new discovery of a dead royal offspring she lives through a reenactment of the same drama of the fall of Troy: 478 479

480

On imago in the Metamorphoses, and its various meanings, including ‘representation or simile’, ‘reenactment’, ‘recognizable appearance’, even ‘disguise’, see Solodow 1988, 205-210. S.J. Harrison, ‘Meta-imagery: Some Self-reflexive Similes in Latin Epic’, in: A.S. Basson and W.J. Dominik (edd.), Literature, Art, History: Studies on Classical Antiquity and Tradition, in Honor of W.J. Henderson (Frankfurt am Main 2003), 9-16. A detail that was not part of the Hecuba legend prior to Ovid, according to Bömer 1982, 307.

224

Fe/Male Sacrifice

iacet Ilion ingens, eventuque gravi finita est publica clades, sed finita tamen; soli mihi Pergama restant: in cursuque meus dolor est (Met. 13.505-508) Great Ilion lies low, and with a solemn exit the slaughter of the people has reached an end; but at least it did reach an end. Only for me (or, ‘in me’?) Troy is still standing, and my pain is still developing.

In employing phrases from the vocabulary of drama (eventu… gravi) and colloquialisms (in cursuque meus dolor est)481, Hecuba perceives her fall from her original title as queen of Troy in terms of an active and evolving role, and as an act in a performance that has not been completed yet. One further realizes that she is integrating into her act moments of earlier literary laments, not necessarily all of them her own. This explains why her dirge for Polyxena (Met. 13.487-532) is accompanied with typical gestures of self-mutilation – notably disheveled hair and, especially, breast-beating and tearing. These two are actually mentioned twice in three lines (13.491 and 13.493), in a context open to a poetics-oriented reading. First, the gesture of breast-beating is defined as consueta, ‘habitual’. This characterization may refer to the act itself as a standardized part of a mourner’s acting, and it underscores the excessiveness of Hecuba’s mourning, as the pathos in expressing it, usually by tearing and beating her breasts in lament, is combined with too many references to its display, as if the queen tries to squeeze into her lament for Polyxena as many additional dirges as the children she has previously buried and mourned (cf. 489 totiens! 494 dolor ultime [sc. implying a long series of earlier similar occasions]; 496 ne quemquam meorum… tu quoque; 499 totque; 505 fecunda; 509 tot; 514 tot).482 Then, the queen’s own words are introduced with a phrase that bespeaks the heterodiegetic narrator’s intervention: plura quidem, sed et haec laniato pectore dixit, ‘the following, and much more, she said after tearing her breast’ (13.493). Hecuba’s lament, in other words, has been edited – and consciously so, by Ovid and Hecuba alike483 – and includes only the parts that her current, Ovidian role requires. More conspicuously, in the actual text of the lament, the section immediately following Hecuba’s confession (13.508) that her pain 481 482

483

Bömer 1982, 328 ad 13.506, where the commentator explains eventus as ‘tristis exitus’, a reference to the exit of actors from the stage. Addressing Hecuba’s recurrent presence in the posterior reproductions of Homeric material, Mossman 1995, 25, notes: “It might be argued that Hecuba mourning for her children is such a large theme in the second half of the epic and in this play that it is difficult for any audience well-acquainted with Homer not to make a special link between the works”. An observation put forth by Rosati 2002, 290; later in the chapter I discuss this verse as part of a different take on the poetics of the female lament in epic.

4. The Anger of Hecuba

225

is still far from complete, stands out. This excerpt, at 13.508-513, echoes the lament of Andromache in Iliad 6.410-413, especially 450-463, and later in Iliad 24.731-732. Both mourners explicitly foresee the slavery in store for themselves, and they deplore it. Hecuba, having the additional knowledge of her destiny as a servant in the household of Ulixes, can be more specific, and thus more dramatic. As noted earlier in the chapter, the queen’s mastery of metapoetics is in full display in the conclusion of her tragedy, where she sets up a reversed version of the fall of Troy theme, in which she is now the conqueror. In plotting her revenge on Polymestor, she espouses deception and becomes an embodiment of the Greeks’ treachery, relegating the artifex Polymestor to the place of the slaughtered and deceived Trojans. The catalyst that inspires her with the particular deception plan is Polymestor’s greed. Pretending, at 13.552-553, that she carries with her a quantity of gold secretly smuggled away from Troy (latens… aurum, ‘hidden gold’), and professing ignorance about Polydorus’ sad destiny, she asks to see Polymestor in order to transfer through him this gold to her son. The desire for gold is so ingrained in the king of Thrace that it numbs his ability to think clearly. And so Polymestor lacks the clairvoyance to detect the trap inside which he is about to fall: Met. 13.554-555 credidit Odrysius praedaeque †adsuetus† amore / in secreta venit, ‘the Odrysian trusted her, and led by his customary lust for loot, went to the secret place’. Now the king is the gullible one, eagerly following Hecuba’s directions which arrange for him to assume a Polydorus-like role, while greed is becoming the ‘Trojan Horse’ that brings about his own undoing.

4. The Anger of Hecuba The epic dichotomy of gender roles is subject to revision and reversal in the ‘transformed’ recollection of the Trojan War in the Metamorphoses. In the ‘Survivors’ narrative, the theme of gender reversal is articulated in a sophisticated fashion in the Polyxena narrative. Priam’s enslaved daughter descends to absolute objectification in being sacrificed to honor a dead man’s ghost. The situation evokes a comparable Homeric passage of the later part of the Iliad, in which Achilles sacrifices twelve captives en masse, like cattle, to honor and avenge the death of Patroclus (Il. 23.166-176). The Homeric commentators unanimously note about this passage that this is a unique funeral scene in Homer; no other dead warrior in the epics is honored with human sacri-

226

Fe/Male Sacrifice

fices.484 Probably conscious of this outstanding passage, and the immediate association with reinstating epic virtus its imitation elicits, Ovid presents his dead Achilles to place a request for a human sacrifice. Polyxena’s performance before the altar, however, brings out an implicit attack against the heroic ideal as patronized by Achilles’ symbolism and overturns the male-centered dynamics of the epic genre. The preamble to Ovidian Polyxena’s disparagement of epic virtus is found principally in Hecuba’s act. Prior to Polyxena, the development of Hecuba’s escalating anger already addresses the politics of masculinity in the epic genre from a female standpoint, which is informed of key Homeric themes that already received prominent treatment in earlier sections of the ‘little Iliad’. Hecuba’s assumption of a series of masculine roles to avenge her son’s murder, roles that specifically include the parts of Ulixes, Polymestor himself, and the commander/executioner in the exacting of Polymestor’s punishment, is spurred on, notably, by rage (ira). This emotion, being the catalyst for the progression of the Iliad plot, is the directive force behind the conduct of the Ovidian Achilles in his encounter with Cycnus and, later, it removes Ajax from Ovid’s alternative epic stage. The mock treatment of the epic ‘rage’ theme peaks with Hecuba and controls the heroine’s anti-epic performance. One should note that the raging anger breaks out in Hecuba’s heart only when she discovers the dead body of Polydorus and realizes that her son’s death was a murderous act: obmutuit illa dolore et pariter vocem lacrimasque introrsus obortas devorat ipse dolor, duroque simillima saxo torpet et adversa figit modo lumina terra, interdum torvos extollit ad aethera vultus, nunc positi spectat vultum, nunc vulnera nati, vulnera praecipue, seque armat et instruit ira. qua simul exarsit, tamquam regina maneret, ulcisci statuit poenaeque in imagine tota est, … sic Hecabe, postquam cum luctu miscuit iram, non oblita animorum, annorum oblita suorum, vadit ad artificem… (Met. 13.538-546; 549-551) She was dumb with grief, and that very grief devoured alike her voice and her tears rising from inside. And exactly like a hard rock she stood immovable, and now held her gaze fixed upon the ground, and from time to time she lifted her contorted face to 484

Richardson 1993, 185-190, offers good comments on this unparalleled Homeric passage. He explains the excessive brutality of this uniquely murderous ritual of funeral honors as the result of Achilles’ desire to demonstrate “his intense grief at Patroklos’ loss” (p. 189).

4. The Anger of Hecuba

227

the skies, now she gazes upon the features of her son who was lying there, now upon his wounds, especially upon the wounds, and arms and fortifies herself with rage. As soon as she flared up in rage, as if she still were a queen, she decided to take revenge and she gave herself over completely to the process of visualizing with her imagination her punishing revenge. … so Hecuba, as soon as her wrath mingled with her sorrow, forgetful of her age, not of her spirit, she walked straight to the schemer…

Neither the destruction of her city and the murder of her husband and sons, nor the sacrifice of Polyxena at the demands of a ghost, make Hebuca angry. Her rage is stirred only when she is confronted with Polydorus’ tragedy, because this murder was plotted and executed by a kinsman, someone considered trustworthy. This type of treachery is different from the treacherous plots of the Greeks, which, after all, were part of the war game. A kinsman’s attack is unsuspected and unmanly, and it violates the epic code; in fact, it is anti-epic. Inside this inverted epic environment Hecuba’s embrace of a role traditionally prohibited to her being female is now fully authorized. Accordingly, as soon as the queen discovers the dead body of her son and realizes the cause and circumstances of his death, she experiences the same extreme emotions of rage and angry grief that took possession of Ajax immediately following his defeat in the ‘Judgment’. When the hero loses the prize, his anger, until then expressed only as indignation towards Ulixes for daring to enter a competition against him, now becomes rage, a different ira, exacerbated by emotions of grievance and bitterness. Ajax is persuaded that he was treated unjustly; in his view, he did not just lose a contest, but was robbed of a righteously deserved epic prize. His status as male epic hero is assaulted and insulted.485 Hecuba’s rage is even more intense: the term ira features an unprecedented four times in less than twenty lines (544 ira; 549 iram; 559 ira; 562 ira); it doesn’t just frame the episode, as in Ajax’s case, but it thoroughly dominates it. Its presence, moreover, is enforced through the inclusion of additional vocabulary of extreme suffering. Upon identifying Polydorus’ body she is filled with dolor, ‘grief’, ‘intense pain’ (538 and 540) (cf. Ajax’s similar experience of dolor, at 13.385, with ira featuring in the line immediately before). Her prolonged, intense gazing at Polydorus’ face and wounds at once allows her to process the circumstances of the murder in her mind and steels her spirit with anger as if with weapons. She organizes into an army (agmina) the other female captives, and then she deceives and destroys Polymestor through a plot similar to the one that destroyed both Troy and her son. Note particularly line 544, seque armat et instruit ira, a phrase that might be considered a 485

See the discussion in the previous chapter, on Ajax’s anger, which in turn reflects Achilles’ great anger in the Iliad.

228

Fe/Male Sacrifice

hendiadyoin, since instruere in its primary meaning, like armare, is a military term referring to an army’s preparation for battle. The same term, however, occurs elsewhere with a different meaning, that of, ‘to devise’, ‘to plot’486, which may apply to Hecuba’s situation. It describes the queen’s scheme of revenge (546 ulcisci… poenae), a plot that is inspired and sustained by anger, but is prepared with the diligence of a military campaign. The recurrence in Hecuba’s emotional description of vocabulary previously associated with the imagery of the angry Achilles further marks the new profile of Hecuba, the avenger. At 13.545, Hecuba’s growing anger has peaked, and the heroine is in flames: exarsit (cf. exaestuat ira, at 559, for the queen’s boiling hot rage). The particular term is used elsewhere in the Ovidian ‘Iliad’ only once, to describe the frustrated Achilles during his combat against Cycnus (Met. 12.102 haud secus exarsit, ‘hardly differently did he flare up’). To define the analogy further, both these texts are parts of similes in which the two enraged characters, Hecuba and Achilles, are likened to enraged wild animals, respectively, a lioness whose cub has been stolen (13.547-548) and a bull chasing the red cloth (12.102-104).

5. Staging Polyxena Ovid’s serious concern with gender in the definition of epic assumes its fullest and most systematic expression in the narrative of Polyxena’s death, where gender differentiation and gender conflict are analyzed all the while they are deftly and often inextricably blurred. The study of the epic genre in Rome had been ab initio self-conscious and purposeful, and it centered on the poeticized exempla virorum illustrated in the portrayal of the great heroes as cultural icons, rather than on the artistic value of the poetry that extols these heroes.487 The presence of women in an epic, by definition ‘masculine’, narrative is always a statement of alterity, regarding the true politics inside these localized circumstances and its relation to epic culture in general. In pursuing a different expression of epic reversal, the performance of Hecuba experiments with the masculine empowerment of the female characters.488 In Polyxena gender in486 487

488

LS s.v. instruo A and 2.II, respectively, for ‘prepare’ (sc. a battle formation) and ‘devise, plot’. Cf. G.B. Conte, Latin Literature: A History, transl. J.B. Solodow; rev. D. Fowler & G. Most (Baltimore 1994), 83, where the early epics of Livius and Ennius perceived on the grounds of their educational purpose, are labeled “poetry that trains men”. In confirmation, so to speak, of Hecuba’s gender inversion, the Thracian troops of Polymestor begin to shoot at her with arrows and stones (Met. 13.565-567) – the stoning of a female, in particular an elderly female, is a rather unprecedented reaction in epic poetry;

5. Staging Polyxena

229

version is realized in a much more explicit, but also complex fashion, which as in Hecuba is enhanced through metapoetics.489 On the same line (13.451), the maiden is addressed as ‘brave’, fortis – an adjective attributed to men much more frequently than to women – and ‘more than a woman’, plus quam femina. She meets her death with the defiance of a male hero, and she is given a speech, in which she implicitly likens herself to Hector, to Priam, and primarily to Achilles. The parallelisms to these epic models are articulated indirectly and allusively; and in the most prominent of them, the heroine’s assimilation to Achilles, they are inverted, through her direct and close comparison to Iphigeneia.490 In stark opposition to the furtive death of Polydorus, the sacrifice of Polyxena, at 13.439-532, is a public act, an actual performance. This juxtaposition in the character of the two siblings’ roles is of major significance. We never hear Polydorus speaking for himself; instead, we constantly see him through the eyes of others, that is, his mother and the king of Thrace. For both viewers the youth symbolizes Troy – the specific, subjective image of Troy each has in mind. Polyxena, on the other hand, does appear on the Ovidian stage, and she is given a powerful speech and an act that comprises

489

490

Bömer (1982, 543) notes that this reaction is at least unreasonable and unjustified, and lacking a better suggestion, he accepts it as an awkward initiative on Ovid’s part to conclude the particular segment after realizing that he has been going on for too long. In this perspective, the immediate attainment of closure is more important than the logical sequence between this closure and the narrative preceding it. Earlier studies listed in Bömer embraced similarly unsatisfactory arguments in their effort to justify this unexpected ending. Unlike the details on Polydorus, the story of Polyxena’s sacrifice at Achilles’ tomb was already part of the Epic Cycle, with little variation in the evolution of the legend prior to Euripides. Euripides was the first who brought together under a single plot, in his Hecuba, two episodes that until that time belonged to two different myths. On the tradition behind Polyxena, see primarily Mossman, 1995, 31-37 (on the sources prior to Euripides) and 247250 (on Polyxena’ sacrifice in post-Euripidean ancient literature, especially its reception in Rome). Even though Polyxena never makes an appearance in the Iliad, Mossman observes that Euripides’ portrayal of the heroine, especially the angry ghost of Achilles demanding the sacrifice, almost certainly goes back to Homer. Among other important surveys on Polyxena, King 1987 (especially pp. 184-195, which focus on Ovid’s reception of Polyxena) is seminal; King interprets the story from Achilles’ perspective. On Euripides’ Polyxena, see also Collard 1991, 32-34, and now Michelakis 2002, 66-73, whose discussion I have found particularly relevant to mine, since he approaches Euripides’ Polyxena as a double of Euripides’ Iphigeneia attacking Achilles’ portrayal as the ideal hero. On Ovid’s Polyxena as a combined expression of femininity and the aesthetic, undermining the epic death motif of the maiden sacrifice as exemplified in Iphigeneia, see Keith 2000, 122-124. Keith’s reading of Iphigeneia (2000, 107-111) relies on Lucretius’ version of the myth. For Dippel (1990, 24-25 n. 8) the detailed treatment of Polyxena’s sacrifice compensates for Ovid’s terseness in reporting the similar fate of Iphigeneia.

230

Fe/Male Sacrifice

explicit physical movement. In this respect, Hecuba’s lament over Polyxena’s body represents a first critical reception of the princess’ sacrifice as performance. Intriguingly, it has barely been noticed that Polyxena’s literary role in extant literature is not just very limited, but specifically restricted to the episode of her being offered as a sacrifice to Achilles.491 Consequently, her whole existence throughout Antiquity is strictly prescribed and controlled: the lack of a deeper literary context ‘deprives’ Polyxena of a ‘former life’, a collection of experiences and personal moments. This dearth of an individualized ‘life story’ makes it very difficult to envision the heroine as a real character with a multi-dimensional personality. The already scant epic tradition on Polyxena was further edited down as a result of Euripides’ treatment of her sacrifice in the Hecuba, which virtually condemned to oblivion all prior extensive literary appearances of the heroine. Nonetheless, scattered evidence, consisting mostly of ancient commentaries and artistic representations, has survived, and it points to a certain tradition that Achilles was aware of Polyxena while he was still alive, and that he actually fell in love with her. On one occasion the hero is reported to have asked her hand in marriage shortly before he died.492 This tradition of Achilles as the lover of Polyxena is altered drastically in Euripides, who embraces a methodical deconstruction of the image of the epic Achilles and produces a character decisively anti-Homeric and full of contradictions in the arrogant, unsympathetic ghost of a dead and essentially powerless man.493 Ovid, a superb reader of earlier literature, is inspired by Euripides’ staging of Polyxena to speak her mind in her own voice. Set inside a self-conscious literary environment with characters that switch roles and even identities, Polyxena in the Metamorphoses develops into a convincing personality, standing on a ‘borrowed’ past of diffused but intelligently enmeshed origins, and like her Euripidean counterpart, she appropriates Achilles’ values and Achilles’ heroic personality. The demand for a maiden sacrifice by the apparition of Achilles’ ghost presents Ovid opportunely with another outstanding episode 491

492 493

The tradition is as old as the Epic Cycle, recorded in Proclus’ summary of the Iliupersis (108.6-8 Allen; see Bernabé 89; Davies 1989, 62). By contrast, the apparition of Achilles’ ghost, also reported in the Epic Cycle (Nostoi 108.24-26 Allen; Bernabé 94.9-11), is not related to Polyxena. It is difficult to ascertain when the two episodes came together for the first time; according to A.C. Pearson, The Fragments of Sophocles (Cambridge 1917), vol. 2, 162 [quoted in Michelakis 2002, 75 n. 43], Nauck speculated that this was first portrayed in Sophocles and that Euripides in the Hecuba strives against his rival’s inspiration. King 1987, 184ff. On Euripides’ deconstruction of Achilles, I follow the analysis in Michelakis 2002; the hero’s characterization in the Hecuba is the topic of Michelakis’ third chapter (pp. 58-83).

5. Staging Polyxena

231

in Achilles’ biography to make the great hero once again the butt of anti-epic mockery. The Polyxena episode is reported shortly after the fall of Troy. The Greeks have already set out on their return journey, making their first stop at Thrace, the site of Polydorus’ grim murder (13.429ff.). While the fleet is moored at Thrace, the ghost of Achilles makes an impressive and demanding epiphany: litore Threicio classem religarat Atrides, dum mare pacatum, dum ventus amicior esset. hic subito, quantus cum viveret, esse solebat, exit humo late rupta similisque minanti temporis illius vultum referebat Achilles, quo ferus iniusto petiit Agamemnona ferro, ‘immemores’ que ‘mei disceditis’ inquit, ‘Achivi, obrutaque est mecum virtutis gratia nostrae? ne facite! utque meum non sit sine honore sepulcrum, placet Achilleos mactata Polyxena manes.’ (Met. 13.439-448) On the coast of Thrace the son of Atreus had anchored his fleet until the sea would quiet down and the wind become more favorable. Here suddenly the earth gaped wide and Achilles sprang, as large as he was while still alive, and with as threatening an expression as in that former time when he fiercely challenged Agamemnon with his unrighteous sword in hand. “So, are you leaving, Achaeans”, he said “forgetting me? Has your gratitude for my virtus [‘manliness’, sc. epic hero identity] been buried with me? You will do no such thing! So that my tomb should not lack its honor, let Polyxena be sacrificed and so satisfy Achilles’ soul!”

Achilles’ ghost here is modeled on its counterpart in the Hecuba: the verbal and thematic echoes that the two texts share are crucial and ample.494 But so are the allusions to other famous hypotexts – and most notably the Homeric poems. A single but cautious reading might suffice to realize that the portrayal of Achilles’ enraged ghost (ferus), resembling the hero about to draw his sword (petiit … ferro) and resolve his argument against Agamemnon, revisits the image of the enraged hero of Iliad 1.188ff. Ovid’s Achilles is angry, too, over a ) that he believes his fellow warriors owe him ‘prize of honor’ (honore ~ as an expression of thanks (gratia) for the deeds his virtus accomplished – deeds that benefited them. In the Homeric text, however, Achilles is not demanding a prize; rather, he is defending the one he was already awarded, the slave Briseis. On the contrary, Agamemnon is the one who demands a (Il. 1.115, 118), Achilles’ own, so that he may not remain ‘without a prize of 494

See Paschalis 2003, 150-151, on the verbal parallels between the two texts.

232

Fe/Male Sacrifice

honor’ (Il. 1.119 ). Ovid is portraying his Achilles in the light of the Homeric Agamemnon so that Achilles’ demand for a ‘prize of honor’ may appear not as a righteous, well-deserved claim, but, instead, as an act of excessive greed: the qualification of the Ovidian hero’s sword as ‘unrighteous’ (444 iniusto… ferro) subtly but tellingly confirms this portrayal transformation. A closer look at Euripides’ Hecuba informs us that Achilles’ resemblance to the Homeric Agamemnon preceded Ovid. In the one and only phrase in direct discourse that encapsulates his demands, the Euripidean Achilles refers (Hec. 113-115), the term Agamemnon in Homer uses to himself as to refer to his own self; a Homeric hapax occurring for a second time in the Hecuba. Euripides’ advertisement of his affinity to the famous argument in Iliad 1 serves an ulterior goal, namely to forewarn his readers that he has switched the roles of Achilles and Agamemnon.495 For Euripides, Achilles assumes Agamemnon’s Homeric conduct, which he soon surpasses in selfishness and assertion of authority: he becomes brutal, even monstrous, since he decrees that his virgin-geras be actually murdered over his tomb.496 The extraordinariness of the demand, underlined via the comparison to the Homeric Agamemnon, the ‘most greedy man of all for prizes’ ( , Achilles calls him in Iliad 1.118), acquires its full meaning in Ovid, as a result of the specific placement of Polyxena’s story. Framed by Polydorus’ story of betrayal and murder motivated by excessive greed, and a text overrun with the vocabulary of “giving” and “taking” “prizes” in great quantities, one more outrageous murder of an innocent victim to satisfy the greed for prizes of a monstrous executor evidently proves anything but extraordinary.497 From a different perspective, behind this surface of brutality it is possible to argue for a deeper concern that haunts the ghost of the hero in Ovid, and this concern resembles the one that ruled his conduct while he was still alive: the pursuit of epic immortality. While focusing on Euripides’ ghost of Achilles, King and, especially, Michelakis have noted that the demand for a virgin sacrifice to honor a hero’s ghost corresponds to religious practices tied to various so-called hero-cults.498 Yet, in Euripides and, later in Ovid, the tomb 495

496 497

498

See Mossman 1995, 32-33, on this important echo of a Homeric hapax in Euripides, as part of the broader theme of role reversal portraying Achilles in the light of the Homeric Agamemnon and vice versa; also King 1987, 190. Mossman 1995, 32; K.C. King, ‘The Politics of Imitation: Euripides’ Hekabe and the Homeric Achilles’, Arethusa 18 (1985), 51-52. See Paschalis 2003, 153ff., who discusses how Polyxena enhances the semantic relations, and outlines more finely certain important narrative patterns introduced in the framing Polydorus story. Michelakis 2002, 72-76, who nonetheless argues that Achilles is not meant to be seen as a cult hero, since Euripides’ poetry utilizes but does not replicate contemporary practices and tradition about funerary rituals. Most importantly, though, cult heroes receive sacrifices

5. Staging Polyxena

233

of Achilles, which was traditionally located at Sigeum in the Troad, was moved with the Greek fleet across the sea to Thrace. This is unprecedented in hero-cult legends. More importantly, neither Euripides nor Ovid offers any explanation for the reasons that might have justified this move. With respect to Euripides, an intelligent answer is possibly attached to the amphisemy beμ , which could mean, ‘signal, sign, hind the Greek word for ‘tomb’, meaning’ – the meaning that the term acquires within the Euripidean context, rather than the meaning that the term itself might signal.499 This etymological wordplay is not adopted in Ovid’s transportation of the tomb (sepulcrum), but an explanation may suggest itself, should the Metamorphoses narrative be viewed against the Homeric rather than the Euripidean background, and especially against Achilles’ earlier imagery in the ‘little Iliad’. Two additional important factors concur with this. First, the Ovidian Achilles, in addition to demanding his prize, accuses his former fellow combatants as immemores (‘forgetful’). This complaint goes beyond the specific tribute of Polyxena as some one-time geras, and reflects back on the hero’s obsession with his fama, the pursuit of immortal praise and commemoration. In the ghost’s complaint about the short memory of the Greeks, Achilles’ self-conscious anxiety about his postmortem image is still unappeased, since it obviously haunts the hero even beyond his grave. Met. 13.446, obrutaque est mecum virtutis gratia nostrae (‘gratitude for my deeds of manliness has died with me’), captures the hero’s emotions, a mixture of indignation and bitterness, but above all, agony for his epic memory: one’s own hero identity relies on receiving praise for one’s own virtus or manly klea, the prerequisite for an epic composition. Second, Polyxena’s fate had received one other famous literary treatment among the Romans, which had a prominent place in Ovid’s subtext, but which modern critics have somewhat overlooked.500 In Catullus 64, the Song of the Fates that celebrates the union of Peleus and Thetis by listing a brief summary of the ‘glorious’ career awaiting their only son, concludes with the sacrifice of Polyxena (64.362-370).501 Catullus’ narrative of the event capital-

499

500 501

regularly, which obviously is not the case with Achilles; King 1985, 49ff. On the hero-cult of Achilles in the Black Sea, see Michelakis 2002, 2-4, with full bibliography in the notes. Thus Michelakis 2002, 70, the only critic to have sought a reason behind the transposition of Achilles’ tomb across the sea, and away from a location within the premises of the Greek camp rather, than on the periphery, as was the established custom. The presence of Catullus behind Ovid’s Polyxena receives, for example, an one-sentence footnote acknowledgment in Keith 2000, 123 n. 72. For an illuminating approach to Catullus’ Polyxena in the light of the anti-epic spirit of poem 64, see now M. Schmale, Bilderreigen und Erzähllabyrinth. Catulls Carmen 64 (Munich/Leipzig 2004), 244-251. Not everybody would see the “explicit sexuality” in the Catullan Polyxena’s portrayal argued in this study, or the parallelism between Catullus’ Polyx-

234

Fe/Male Sacrifice

izes on irony, which consistently undermines epic heroism throughout the poem. The story is told in less than ten lines, but the tone is overly grim and the imagery soaked in blood (368 alta Polyxenia madefient caede sepulcra, ‘the lofty sepulchre will be drenched in blood following Polyxena’s slaughter’). The profusion of blood frames anew the image described in the couplet immediately above (359-360 cuius iter caesis angustans corporum acervis / alta tepefaciet permixta flumina caede, ‘whose way, made narrow on account of the piles of slaughtered bodies, he will warm up by deep streams of waves mixed with gore’). The blood of Polyxena pours into the gory Skamander river and mingles with the blood of all other victims of Achilles’ aristeia. Polyxena is likened to a sacrificial animal (369 quae, velut ancipiti succumbens victima ferro, ‘who, like an animal for sacrifice kneels forward towards the double-edge knife’). Her body is being described as ‘truncated’, further engrossing the cruelty of her execution (370 proiciet truncum summisso poplite corpus, ‘her butchered body takes a dive forwards as soon as the knees let loose’).502 Already at the beginning of the brief narrative of her doom, it is clear that in the eyes of Achilles the princess is a precious commodity, a piece of loot (praeda, 362). As Catullus in his own voice ironically admits, Polyxena’s sacrifice caps Achilles’ egregias virtutes (64.348), ‘excellent deeds of manliness’. Virtus and praeda are entwined, as are praeda and femina in Catullus’ miniature anti-epic celebration of Achilles. In this context, the Ovidian Achilles’ apparition emerges most intimidating, but nonetheless profiles the great hero just as he wishes to be remembered in the epic tradition. The sacrifice of Polyxena is certainly a cruel and heartless act, but at least for the Homeric Achilles in rage, it is also a display of fully deserved honor, and a promise of immortality. It is instructive to recall the sacrifice of the twelve ‘valiant sons of the great-souled Trojans’ that

502

ena and Eurpides’ Iphigeneia, which in reality is rather tenuous; still, Schmale’s observations reveal a new, wider perspective through which a much-studied text may be creatively reassessed. The particular selection of words in the narrative of Polyxena’s death points to Vergil’s use of the verb obtruncare to describe the death of Polydorus in Aen. 3.55 (Polydorum obtruncat), a passage already echoed once a few lines earlier, as aforeseen, in Ovid’s close appropriation of the Vergilian Polydorus episode in Metamorphoses 13; further, Danielis Servius commenting on Aen. 3.55 notes a semantic inconsistency since obtruncare literally means ‘to decapitate’, rather than simply ‘to kill’, and Vergil’s overall description of Polydorus’ murder does not refer, at least at first sight, to a decapitation. The decapitation theme, however, is in the background (cf. also Zwierlein 2000, 78 n. 4, discussing the confusion amidst Vergil’s commentators on the passage in question); it transmigrates along with Polydorus in Ovid’s text, and by analogy makes a prominent appearance also in the death of Polyxena, Polydorus’ feminine twin, in the episode, in more than one respect; Ovid’s text twice, at 13.457459 and 13.476, clearly talks about a death by stabbing the maiden in the breast; cf. Bömer 1982, 318 ad 13.457ff., and 322 ad 13.476.

5. Staging Polyxena

235

the son of Thetis performs over the pyre of Patroclus at Il. 23.175-176, as the culmination of the funeral honors he offers to his dearest friend, even though this act is condemned outright even by the poet of the Iliad: (‘he schemed evil deeds in his mind’, 176). Achilles’ conception μ of a human sacrifice, either in Patroclus’ honor or in honor of himself, is a ). The Homeric precedent anticipates the poste‘scheme,’ a ‘device’ (μ rior conception of Achilles as a scheming and greedy ghost, and makes a comparison to other notorious anti-epic characters, such as the notoriously greedy, ‘many-schemer’ Poly-mestor, appear not just plausible but even reasonable. It might also be worth remembering here that the complaining ghost of the Ovidian Achilles has a precedent in the Homeric Patroclus’ ghost. The apparition of the dead Patroclus had appeared in Achilles’ dream and rebuked μ … , ‘you his friend for forgetting him (Il. 23.69f. sleep and you have forgotten me’; cf. Met. 13.345 immemores… mei disceditis). Then he demanded his funeral, which Achilles, absorbed by his insatiable rage for revenge, had neglected, but once reminded immediately brings about (Il. 23.62-108). Commenting on Il. 23.69-92, Richardson observes that “Patroclus’ ghost gives an extra impulsion to what is already Akhilleus’ own wish […], as often with supernatural motivation”.503 The apparition and the sacrifice are placed right next to each other in the Homeric narrative. Granted, the Homeric text does not proceed so far as to state explicitly that the human sacrifice at the tomb of Patroclus has been ordered by the dead hero’s ghost. Still, Patroclus’ epiphany does speak of death, the death of Achilles, which he actually foretells soon after referring to his own death, thus suggesting that their deaths are interdependent. Achilles’ demanding the death of Polyxena right after he has referred to his own death appears temptingly indebted to the particular Homeric model. As soon as he prophesies Achilles’ death, Patroclus delivers instructions that the bones of the two friends be buried together in the same coffin, so that they may be together in death as they were together in life. It is possible to read Achilles’ demand for Polyxena’s life along similar lines in acknowledging a conscious allusion to Achilles’ love for Polyxena and even a marriage proposal shortly before his death, themes dealt with in the lost Cyclic poems. In fact, Polyxena’s sacrifice, at least as conceived by Euripides, is meant to evoke Achilles’ first Homeric bride, or more correctly, his intended bride, Iphigeneia.504 Like Homer’s Patroclus, the Ovidian Achilles wishes to be 503 504

Richardson 1993, 172-173. For example, Keith 2000, 122. Even though the Ovidian account of Iphigeneia is too brief to allow for comparison with earlier literary models, the influence of Euripides’ Polyxena

236

Fe/Male Sacrifice

joined in the Underworld with his beloved – and all too ironically for his Homeric lover and intertextual inspiration, a female bride!

6. Fe/Male Virtus and Sacrifice The explicit sexuality of the Polyxena legend in all its variations was as weighty for Ovid as was the thematic proximity with the leading threads of deception and greed that substantiated her presence in Metamorphoses 13. Ovid begins by casting Polyxena in an expressly sensual light. The eroticized description as she offers herself to the sword of sacrifice, a motif that Ovid has imported from Euripides505, is integrated inside the compass of a broader theme, which dominates Latin epic literature and ties female death to politics. Commenting on this blatantly politicized treatment of female death in Latin epic, Keith remarks that as early as Ennius, “female death is pervasively sexualized in Latin epic, and… the violence and sexuality of the male heroes of epic are consistently displaced onto the female body, which is represented at the site where sexuality and violence coincide…. The sight of a beautiful female corpse often serves as the prelude to the action… and the political order which emerges… is established over her dead body”.506 The objectification of the female, often culminating in a murder that is either sexually motivated or sexually explicit, energizes the males to undertake action that would allow

505

506

on Ovid’s portrayal of the maiden may also draw on Euripides’ Iphigeneia at Aulis. This appears likely since both Polyxena and Iphigeneia, in Euripides as in Ovid, are conceived as foils to Achilles’ heroic character. Euripides climactically pictures both heroines in the light of a male hero, and by this contrast he divests Achilles from his Homeric glory. For full analysis of the Euripidean deconstruction, see Michelakis 2002, 76-83 (on Polyxena) and 106-113 (on Iphigeneia). On verbal echoes between Euripides’ Iphigeneia at Aulis, and the sacrifice of Iphigeneia as briefly summarized early in Ovid’s Metamorphoses 12, see H-E 236 ad Met. 12.29f. On the sensually charged details of Polyxena’s sacrifice in Euripides, see full bibliography in Mossman 1995, 144 n. 8, and R. Scodel, ‘ μ μ : Virgin Sacrifice and the Aesthetic Object’, TAPA 126 (1996), 121-126. On the literary tradition behind Polyxena, see A. Kossatz-Deissmann, ‘Achilleus’, LIMC 1.1 (1981), 181-185; conveniently all literary sources are listed together in G. Schwarz, ‘Achill und Polyxena in der Römischen Kaiserzeit’, Mitteilungen des Deutschen Archaeologischen Instituts, Römische Abteilung 99 (1992), 265 n. 1. Keith 2000 devotes an entire chapter (pp. 101-131) to all female heroines who die violent and always explicitly sexual deaths in Latin epic poetry. All of them are subject to literal or metaphorical rape, but they also face death with the defiance of a male hero. The combination of the two energizes the male viewers either attending the murder or observing the body afterwards, and it typically becomes the catalyst that motivates them to action, to the confirmation of their ‘maleness’, which materializes in the accomplishment of some major political deed.

6. Fe/Male Virtus and Sacrifice

237

them to display their maleness (virtus). The treatment of this motif receives a decisive twist in Ovid’s approach of Polyxena. Generally speaking, it is widely known that in the Metamorphoses there is a pattern of violence, and in particular sexual violence, against Ovid’s female heroines throughout the poem.507 In Metamorphoses 12-14, the complex politics behind the serialization of violence against females are colored by the specific politics of the epic genre. The fusion of transformed epic politics and antiepic polemics forges the frame inside which Ovid’s ‘epic’ heroines, female characters who have already appeared in earlier epics, are contextually reborn. These females die violent deaths because this is directed by a long tradition that Ovid would not alter. Polyxena’s death is singled out for a more politicized treatment because it integrates inside the Metamorphoses section that is written in direct contrast to the Homeric poems, the epic politics of a maiden’s death for the sake of the restoration of male order. At the same time, Ovid’s reading of the episode is based on the co-dependence of different perspectives, because it draws on several literary models. As a result, the newly-produced composition is original, as well as a conscious effort to illustrate, and simultaneously benefit, from the poetics of the polemic against the poet’s most influential predecessors. Unlike the female murders in earlier epics or even in other genres such as Livy’s history, which are caused by a supernatural factor, a divinity, or an evil tyrant, Polyxena’s death is best appreciated through the lens of the Iliad and an alternative reading of the Homeric Achilles’ behavior. Deprived of his geras, Achilles in Iliad 1 withdraws from the battlefield and begs his mother to intervene so that Zeus will punish the Greeks by making them suffer. The Homeric Achilles expresses no remorse whatsoever for the sufferings of the Greeks – insensitivity for which he is rebuked later, most notably by his best friend Patroclus – but rather uses it as means to confirm and extol his own kleos. The Ovidian Achilles’ ghost acts along the same parameters, and this is likely suggested by the thematic allegiance of his speech to the circumstances in Iliad 1. He, again, blackmails Agamemnon and his fellow soldiers by making them suffer. The ghost ‘remembers’ the literary tradition reporting on the beginning of the war and the incident at Aulis: the stilling of the winds that required the offering of a maiden for resolution.508 The ghost seems to ‘know’ 507

508

On the seminality of rape and sexual violence in the Metamorphoses, its various levels of expression, and its structural function, see especially A. Richlin, ‘Reading Ovid’s Rapes’, in: ibid. (ed.), Pornography and Representation in Greece and Rome (Oxford 1992), 158-179. Achilles’ detainment of the Greek fleet at Thrace (13.38, 111) is noted in the Cyclic tradition (Nostoi 108.24-26 Allen; Bernabé 94.9-11). The evidence in Proclus’ summary, however, mentions nothing about the stilling of the winds prior to the hero’s epiphany. This information, the first clear detail that draws Polyxena close to Iphigeneia, is first recorded in

238

Fe/Male Sacrifice

of the famous epic female sacrifices, which combine death and femininity, and offer aesthetic pleasure to the audience along with the restoration of order (the continuation of the narrative plot as desired). Thus, the dead hero directs a reenactment of the Aulis episode by causing the winds to stop and hold the Greek fleet stranded at Thrace (13.439-440), confident that the Greeks will likewise recall the events at Aulis and take action to avert their revival, by satisfying his demands. On her part, Polyxena is not merely self-conscious of her exuding sexuality, but she actually perceives it as a role, and even as a means to project authorial ambitions of her own. And she is particularly aware of the importance of ‘seeing’ in the Metamorphoses, a text where the reader is regularly directed to visualize various lengthy ekphrastic pieces including whole narrative units.509 More specifically, Priam’s daughter takes over the direction of her own sacrifice and becomes the controller of her staging and the manipulator of an entire army’s vision. The likeness of her death to ‘rape’ is projected from the very beginning, when she is first snatched from her mother’s embrace (rapta sinu matris, 13.450). This rape theme becomes the epicenter around which Achilles’ prospective victim plans her performance: as she enters the epic stage to act out the role Achilles designated for her and reaches the altar, she

509

Euripides’ Hecuba (900). Yet, just as in the Metamorphoses narrative (440 dum mare pacatum, dum ventus amicior esset, ‘until the sea should quiet down and the winds become friendlier’), the absence of the winds relates only implicitly to the intervention of Achilles’ ghost; see J. Gregory, Euripides’ Hecuba. Introduction, Text and Commentary (Atlanta 1999), xxix-xxxi. This act is attributed to Achilles because of the similarity of his situation (righteous anger at Agamemnon) to Artemis’ holding back the winds because Agamemnon neglected her divinity in the Iphigeneia story (cf. Achilles’ ghost chastising the Greeks at Met. 13.445 as immemores, ‘forgetful’). The similar deaths of Polyxena and Iphigeneia render in retrospect as certain and even self-understood what is at first only vague and suggestive. G. Rosati, Narcisso e Pigmalione. Illusione e spettacolo nelle Metamorphosi di Ovidio (Florence 1983), 129-152, who calls this pattern of regulated focus on visualizing a “poetics of spectacularity” (p. 152). Rosati comments extensively on the language of artistic description or ekphrasis that is often used in the Ovidian narration of episodes where special attention is paid to vision, and he encourages their reception as spectacle. The epiphany of Achilles’ ghost, moreover, encapsulates what in Hardie 2002 is defined as poetics of “illusion”. “Illusion”, along with “ekphrastic narrative” and “spectacularity”, is effected through the power of enargeia, ‘ekphrastic vividness’, the narrative talent that allows a reader to visualize a verbal description of something which in reality may or may not exist. Dreams, but also ghosts, are considered a form of artistic representation, because they are described in detail normally reserved for works of art and in the vocabulary of artistic creation. On the ekphrastic potential of ghost performances, see Hardie 2002, 137-137, discussing the ghost of Protesilaus; on enargeia in ancient poetry, see Hardie 2002, 5-6. Likewise, the language of simile in the description of Achilles’ ghost (442 similis), which explicitly likens Achilles to his Homeric counterpart in Iliad 1, fashions the hero’s image in Ovid through the lens of the original Homeric description.

6. Fe/Male Virtus and Sacrifice

239

reveals her breasts with a sexually suggestive gesture and ‘offers’ her body to her audience. The latter is led by Neoptolemus, who ‘penetrates’ Polyxena’s body both figuratively, as he fixes his eyes upon her (456 inque suo vidit figentem lumina vultu, ‘she sees him transfixing her countenance with his eyes’), and literally, as he prepares to stab her with his sword (455). Next to Neoptolemus stand the rest of the Greek army, their identities as individuals obliterated, absorbed by Neptolemus, for they are there to share his gaze – and by sharing, to stress the irresistible enchantment of this gaze: 458-459 ‘nulla mora est. at tu iugulo vel pectore telum / conde meo’ (iugulumque simul pectusque retexit), ‘“don’t linger, but bury your weapon either in my throat or in my breasts” and as she was saying this she uncovered her throat and her breasts’. The temptation is equally compelling for Ovid’s readers, who are, in a way, similarly ‘forced’ to watch Polyxena uncovering her breasts before an army of males, as they follow the unfolding of the narrative. This dramatic exposure to multiple audiences is accompanied by gestures that harmonize speech act with body language, and it is suggestive of Polyxena’s successful effort – memor ipsa sui (453 ‘mindful of her own part she was’) – to gain some control over the role that has been prescribed for her by Achilles’ ghost in the episode of her dramatized execution (a scripted ceremony enacted at a fixed setting around the tomb of Achilles); a role which introduces the princess as the innocent maiden, the bride of death and a rape victim.510 At the outset of the performance, in her disrobing gesture and the invitation she extends to Neoptolemus to bury his sword into her body, Polyxena observes Achilles’ directions. She still follows the male script at Met. 13.465469, when, excited, she describes the sacrifice of her virginal self to Achilles in the light of a marriage to death.511 All the while, Ovid repeatedly underscores the princess’ virginal status (451 virgo; 466-467 tactu… virgineo; 483 virgo; 523 510

511

Mossman 1995, 142-147, with ample bibliography, traces this complex theme in Euripides’ Polyxena and, more broadly, in Greek tragedy where virginal sacrifices abound. Also, N. Rabinowitz, Anxiety Veiled. Euripides and the Traffic in Women (Ithaca, NY 1993), 244, s.v. ‘marriage-sacrifice link’ (the reference is quoted in Keith 2000, 123 n. 73). On virginal sacrifices as performance acts, appealing, by virtue of their sexual suggestiveness, to the predominantly male audience of the Greek tragedies, see D. Fowler, ‘Virgil on Killing Virgins’, in: Whitby-Hardie-Whitby 1987, 185-198. Addressing specifically Polyxena, W. Burkert, Homo Necans. The Anthropology of Ancient Greek Sacrificial Ritual and Myth, transl. P. Bing (Berkeley 1983), 67, would go as far as to propose a possible sexual etymology of her name (see his discussion of Polyxena on pp. 58-72). On the fusion of the erotic and the heroic in Polyxena’s act, see Loraux’s analysis of the Euripidean Polyxena’s death (Loraux 1987 56ff.). Mossman acknowledges the sexual overtones of Polyxena’s disrobing but cautions against misreading “the suppressed sexual excitement created by all violent acts… as overt erotic appeal in Euripides’s account of Polyxena’s death” (1995, 145). Keith 2000, 123.

240

Fe/Male Sacrifice

regia virgo). In the same words, Polyxena complies with her death-marriage and appears extremely concerned about modesty, by ordering all male physical contact away (466-467 ite procul… tactuque viriles / virgineo removete manus! ‘go away… and keep your male hands from touching a virgin’) with the striking juxtaposition-cum-enjambment viriles virgineo. Is Polyxena toying with her male audience, now ‘teasing’ them with a full view of bare breasts, now yelling at them (it is tempting to envision the mesmerized Greeks, advancing towards her and stretching out their hands to touch the semi-nude maiden) to go away?512 As she approaches the end of her speech it becomes clear that she has moved in a new direction: Si quos tamen ultima nostri verba movent oris (Priami vos filia regis, non captiva rogat), genetrici corpus inemptum reddite, neve auro redimat ius triste sepulcri, sed lacrimis; tum, cum poterat, redimebat et auro. (Met. 13.469-473) But if my last words move any of you – it is the daughter of King Priam and not a captive who asks this – restore my body to my mother without ransom; and let her pay in tears and not in gold for the sad right of a sepulchre. She did pay in gold also when she could.

The text above is steeped in irony and double-entendres, and the intended addressee is the Homeric Achilles of Iliad 24, for Polyxena revisits the incident of Hector’s ransoming and effects its complete rewriting. In introducing herself almost defiantly with the grandiloquent ‘the daughter of Priam, and not a captive’513, she invites Priam into the narrative, but only in order to contrast the nominal ‘presence’ of the king against his physical ‘absence’.514 This evocation enables Polyxena to combine etymology and thematics and to manufacture a double play on Priam’s Homeric performance. The Ovidian readers versed in Greek mythology would have known that Priam’s given name was actually a different one, Podarkes. He assumed the name ‘Priam’ because as a youth he was captured and reduced to slavery at the first fall of Troy, until his sister Hesione, who was given as geras to Telamon but later 512 513

514

Cf. also Eur. Hec. 548f. And she likely toys with the inconstancy of her Euripidean counterpart, who at Hec. 357 deplores her enslavement ( ’ μ ), but two hundred lines later declares herself and her spirit untouchable and altogether free (cf. Eur. Hec. 548f. μ / μ , ‘let no one touch my skin’; 550f. μ’, , ‘I am a free woman and I shall die a free woman’); see Mossman 1995, 152, on these passages; also Hopkinson 2000, 174-174 [470-1n]. Cf. Hardie 2002, 239-249, on the ‘presence/absence’ theme, where the substitution of names for bodies is recorded among the various instances of its manifestation in Latin poetry.

6. Fe/Male Virtus and Sacrifice

241

became his favorite consort, ‘purchased’ ( -ƿǀƮư- < ) her brother’s freedom.515 So, Priam was once himself a praeda, booty, and a ‘gift’, a (from Telamon to Hesione), just like his children are now, Polydorus for Polymestor, and Polyxena for Achilles. The etymology behind Priam’s name is almost certainly at play here, especially in combination with Polyxena’s reminiscing on Priam’s ransoming of Hector’s body from Achilles, the most famous ‘purchase’ in Homer, which the maiden outspokenly uses as a direct parallel to her own situation. Yet, in Polyxena’s aspiring appropriation of the dead Hector’s role, the body – her body – has to be restored by ransom. Priam, however, is dead – ironically, recently executed upon the altar of Zeus by Neoptolemus, who is going to slaughter Polyxena upon another sanctified spot, the tomb of Achilles – and of course unable to ransom Polyxena’s body.516 The last surviving offspring of Priam and Troy’s royal dynasty, a woman, will not be ransomed in exchange for gold and gifts, while Priam, being dead, has to be replaced, in this new ransoming transaction, by another woman, Hecuba. In short, the transportation of this seminal Homeric episode, the luxurious payment of ransom by the (living) king of Troy to the (living) Achilles, in exchange for the body of Hector, the king’s successor and champion of Troy, metastasizes in Ovid’s narrative, completely reversed. Hector and Polyxena are both murdered by Achilles, but the former falls on the battlefield to an Achilles very much alive, while the latter falls upon the tomb of Achilles at the request of the hero’s ghost. In the character of her brother Hector, Polyxena finds the ideal male body through which to realize her own masculinization. She further draws herself closer to Hector in requesting that her dead body be restored to her mother, which calls to mind the plea addressed by the dying Hector to his slaughterer Achilles, at Il. 22.338-343, to have his body restored to his parents. Polyxena’s remark, at Met. 13.472-473, that Hecuba is not in a position to ransom her body with gold points to Il. 22.340-341, where Hector prom515

516

Even though the true etymological meaning of ‘Priam’ is obscure and conjectural, the etymology of the Trojan king’s name from was popular in antiquity, attested firmly in Lykophron (Alex. 335ff. with Tzetzes’ comments at 335 and 337) and Apollodorus (2.136 and 3.146), and certainly known to Ovid; see, for example, M. Stoevesandt, s.v. ‘Priamos’, DNP 10 (2001), 305. The shared doom of both Priam and Polyxena, a sacrifice upon an altar at the hand of Achilles’ son, adumbrates the Greeks’ conquest of Troy that Priam’s murder represents, because it suggests that it be understood not only as a sacrilege (violation of a suppliant), but also as a corrupt form of sacrifice; cf. M.J. Anderson, The Fall of Troy in Early Greek Poetry and Art (Oxford 1997) 238 (also pp. 59-61, on the sources for the death of Polyxena). Eventually, however, in Ovid the sacrifice of Polyxena is performed, as is Iphigeneia’s, by a lamenting and reluctant priest (13.475 ipse etiam flens invitusque sacerdos, ‘the priest, himself also weeping and remorseful’).

242

Fe/Male Sacrifice

ises Achilles that his parents will pay handsomely in gold for his body. Both these clear references to the Homeric episodes of Hector’s death and ransom target the portrayal of Achilles’ character therein. Polyxena’s quasi-scripted speech, that is, her identifiable reproduction of Hector’s dying request for respect517, extends to the immediate context that consists of two speeches by Achilles (at 331-336 and 345-354). These two speeches record an extreme expression of Achilles’ brutality, vindictiveness and lack of compassion. The Greek’s only concern is to see the body of Hector torn apart by vultures and dogs, a desire spelled out thrice in less than 20 lines (335-336, 348, 353). Achilles’ dehumanization is further evident in the way he addresses Hector as ‘dog’ (22.345), and in his regret that he cannot tear his flesh apart and eat it raw (346-347). In these very powerful and violent speeches the Achaean leader becomes himself a predatory animal, preferring the literal praeda of the human flesh to the praeda of the gold that would ransom the body. This rapaciousness on Achilles’ part, when combined with Polyxena’s self-introduction in the light of Hector’s corpse and the ransom scene of Iliad 24, undercuts the spirit of reconciliation that is forged there between the Greek and the Trojan leader. For Polyxena, Achilles never really learned how to control his anger. In portraying his ghost as initiating repetition of the Hector murder-andransom incident, Ovid, through the Trojan princess, disrobes the epic Achilles of his heroic qualities and the nobility of his character, declaring mênis to be the Greek warrior’s leading inherent trait, and his lust for praeda a very close second. Hecuba’s dirge corroborates Polyxena’s embrace of the circumstances of Homeric Hector’s death as the backdrop for staging her own death. As she mourns over her daughter’s corpse, Hecuba constantly draws parallels to the death of Hector, and also to the deaths of her other male children in the Iliad,

517

It is tempting to view Polyxena’s conscious echoing the dying words of Hector in the light of Bassi’s epic ‘scripted speech’, referring to the repetition of speeches in the Iliad’s message-sending episodes, and the inevitable performance associations tied to it (a ‘scripted speech’, that is an order for reproducing a specific text, and a dramatic performance, belong to similar communicative categories). In Bassi’s definition, a ‘scripted speech’ requires the clear designation of a primary speaker, whose words are reported – depending on the narrative politics or the interested parties at the moment, word-for-word or slightly altered; in first- or third-person narrative – to an addressee by an intermediary; cf. details in K. Bassi, ‘Orality, Masculinity, and the Greek Epic’, Arethusa 30 (1997), 323-338. In Polyxena’s appropriation of the dying Hector’s word there is, of course, no official acknowledgment of the primary speaker, but the intertextual provenance of the speech is meant to be identified; there is, in other words, conscious acknowledgment, by Polyxena, but not explicit statement of the Iliadic model, and this is why I refer to this appropriation as a ‘quasiscripted speech’.

6. Fe/Male Virtus and Sacrifice

243

and she emphasizes the physical violence enacted upon Polyxena’s body at the execution of the sacrifice: nata, iaces, videoque tuum, mea vulnera, vulnus. en, ne perdiderim quemquam sine caede meorum, tu quoque vulnus habes. at te, quia femina, rebar a ferro tutam; cecidisti et femina ferro, totque tuos idem fratres, te perdidit idem, exitium Troiae nostrique orbator, Achilles. (Met. 13.495-500) My child, you lie dead, and I see your wound, my wounds. Behold, so that I might not lose any of my children without murderous violence, you also have your wound. But you, because you were a woman, I thought safe from the sword: yet, even though a woman, by the sword you have fallen, and that same Achilles, who has bereft Troy and me alike, who has destroyed so many of your brothers, has killed you, too.

Upon entering the Underworld, Achilles becomes even more brutal, because he has ceased to discriminate between the sexes in his quest for booty.518 Hecuba mindfully acknowledges the unacceptable mode of winning kleos, in the placement of the word femina next to the term ferro, which, like arma, is a frequent synecdoche for war and a substitute for vir, the bearer of weapons and agent of war. These two juxtaposed terms, femina and ferro, representing not only opposite genders but also opposite genres, recur twice in two successive verses and underline the incongruity of their combination. The oxymoron is pointed up through the alliteration of ‘f’, the initial letter of both words, and of the nearby fratres, Polyxena’s brothers (male siblings), whose death bestowed kleos upon Achilles in the first place. Powerful alliteration in 497-500 ties together the royal maiden, her brothers, and their common tragic destiny: aT Te, quia Femina, RebaR / a FeRRo TuTam: cecidisTi eT Femina FeRRo, / ToTque Tuos idem FRaTres, Te peRdidiT idem, / exiTium TRoiae nosTRique oRbaToR, Achilles.519 The combined assonances of F, T, and R, the anaphora of ferro, and the alignment of Polyxena the femina with her fratres, make her partake of the same symbolism as Troy, not merely effecting her masculinization, but even tying her fate to the fate of the city. This bond is acknowledged further, when Hecuba assimilates herself to her city (500 exitium Troiae / nostrique orbator, Achilles, ‘Achilles, the ruin of Troy and the bereaver of my children’) and introduces Polyxena’s wound as one of her own many wounds (495). Not least, the sound play with the recurrence of F and R 518

519

Keith 2000, 124, argues that Hecuba’s emphasis on the wound of Polyxena brings the maiden right next to her brothers who died in war, thus assimilating their deaths and so, also their genders. The wordplay in referebat, ferus, and ferro, by which Achilles’ wrath is emphasized, has been also noted in Hopkinson 2000, 170 [443-4n].

244

Fe/Male Sacrifice

reaches back to 444, where a similar assonance is at work, ferus… petit Agamemnona ferro, in which the FeRRum, the sword/war, and FeRus Achilles, its agent and often incarnation, are effectively brought together. “By drawing attention to her daughter’s wound”, Keith (2000, 124) notes, “Hecuba openly exposes that which Polyxena herself is represented as attempting to conceal”. As a matter of fact, Polyxena’s effort to fall with her body covered properly, that is, completely, clashes against the earlier emphatic self-exposure of her breasts, and tinges the conscious theatrics of her final and ‘proper’ act of her performance with irony. tunc quoque cura fuit partes velare tegendas, cum caderet, castique decus servare pudoris. (Met. 13.479-480) Then, too, when she fell, she took care to conceal the parts which must be covered, and to preserve the glory of her chaste modesty.

A completely covered, chaste death posture deprives the eyes of the Greek male audience from enjoying the ‘touch’ and ‘violation’ of the female body, a touch that the maiden’s cries had prevented them from enjoying physically. Polyxena’s eager and titillating self-unveiling at the beginning follows a regressive course, towards female chastity (pudor), and unexpectedly, her ‘rape’ by Neoptolemus’, repeatedly reenacted in the minds of countless male spectators, is suddenly ‘undone’ in the last line.520 The maiden falls in the glory of preserving her chastity. Pudor is the last word of the Polyxena episode, a provocative title for a provocative performance.

7. The Poetics of Lamentation Ovid’s bold reading of Polyxena’s death, which works against the thematization of the female sacrifice in Latin epic for the sake of empowering the male and his interpretation of the world, is paired with a similarly inspiring experimentation on another female epic activity, the ritual lament. Hecuba, the leadin the Metamoring voice of Homeric lamentation, delivers a model epic

520

The presence of pudor, like pudicitia, might point to the actual fashion of female dress in public. This called for complete coverage of the body, including the head, the adoption of a narrow body posture, with the arms often held close to and across the body, drapery that fell in multiple folds, and the dress always long enough to trail over the feet. K. Fittschen and P. Zanker, Katalog der römischen Porträts in den Capitolinischen Museen und den anderen kommunalen Sammlungen der Stadt Rom. III. Kaiserinnen- und Prinzessinnenbildnisse, Frauenporträts (Munich 1983), 97, no. 141, pl. 168, depicts a typical example of a portrait statue of a female in this so-called ‘Pudicitia’ pose.

7. The Poetics of Lamentation

245

phoses. Her lament highlights the centrality of the inaudible female in the composition of an epic poem. Death and its reception represent an essential theme of epic poetry. An epic hero’s kleos depends directly on the magnitude and spectacularity of the devastation he inflicts on his opponents. The epic lament verbalizes an impressive manner of appraising epic death. Since there is no epic without loss of life, there is no epic without lamentation. In archaic epic lamentation is particularly significant, because the verbal expression of grief was a predominantly female activity, and even more importantly, it represented the chief avenue through which a woman was entitled to speak in direct discourse in the epic narrative. In the Homeric poems, the expression of lament receives various forms and has its own, special, terminology and respective metalanguage.521 On this basis, mourning can be categorized, roughly, into verbalized and non-verbalized, while each form is subject to further distinction depending primarily on the gender of the mourner. The Homeric poet uses different terminology for the mourning and grief expressed, respectively, by males and females, as male and female verbalized laments are set in different performance settings, address different themes, and are distinguished by different μ / , ‘cries’, when nonmetaliterary objectives. The female laments, / , when verbalized, are grouped into “spontaneous” and verbalized, and “ritual” laments.522 The performance of the second category, the “ritual” lament, is limited to female agents, while a “spontaneous” mourner can be either male or female. Both types of laments are poetically colored; they represent different genres, because they both involve the weaving of a narrative 521

522

Homeric lament has inspired three important studies in recent years. Tsagalis 2004, the most recent of the three, is the first monograph exclusively on the lamentations of the Iliad and the latest thorough study on epic lament. The other two lengthy treatments of mourning in the Homeric poems are Derderian 2001, 15-62, and Crotty 1994. Both Tsagalis (pp. 22-26) and Derderian (especially on pp. 10-12) offer full bibliography on earlier discussions of the Homeric lament. Derderian is the first to discuss at any length the poetics of lamentation, distinguishing various genres of mourning. Lament as performance, a “sort of proto-elegy, incorporated into epic”, as mirrored in the lament of Briseis over Patroclus in Iliad 19, is the focus of C. Dué, Homeric Variations on a Lament by Briseis (Lanham, MD 2002), 1-89 (the quote from p. 5). For Dué, Briseis’ performance is both mirrored and expanded in the performances of the Trojan women, Hecuba, Andromache and Helen. On the typology of the language of lament, being a performance language, see also Martin 1989, 10-12. Derderian 2001, 32: “the lament… becomes the linguistic and generic inverse of heroic in the larger frame narrative of the epic… As part of the referential tradition with which historical memorials likewise engage, the Homeric representation of lament provides evidence… for a thematic and structural model against which the inscribed grave epigram will define its own function and authority as written text”; see in full her discussion on pp. 31-52.

246

Fe/Male Sacrifice

about the dead and about the living affected by the loss. In Derderian’s categorization of lamentation poetics, there is a decisive difference between laments performed exclusively by females, and private or spontaneous laments or male expressions of grief; the former are designed to serve only as ephemeral performances, addressing a singular occasion of a specific funerary ritual. There is no concern on behalf of the mourner that her dirge should survive beyond the occasion of its original performance. On the contrary, male forms of mourning generate action, which results in the creation of “durable… artifacts such as the μ or the orally transmitted epic” (p. 15). Derderian’s analysis is partly flawed, for even though she acknowledges the female lament as a performance genre, which moreover observed a very precise compositional structure, she denies literary self-consciousness to the women performers of a ritual lament. She, further, denies that lament has any explicit connection with kleos.523 The shortcomings in Derderian’s argument have now been effectively revised by Tsagalis. Tsagalis’ assertions are validated by the Homeric Achilles’ opinion on the issue. When Thetis tells him that he will die soon after the death of Hector, Achilles responds that he is resigned to predestination (Il. 18.114-121), yet he is anxious about establishing his kleos by causing some Trojan or Dardanian woman to lament over the loss of a loved one (Il. 18.121-123). Achilles clearly articulates here that female suffering and its expression in the Iliad are prerequisites for the acquisition of kleos, meaning that an official performance of lament is a ritual in itself, but more that that, it is a criterion determining whether a martial accomplishment qualifies as kleos.524 It is important, besides, to be aware that being a type of song, and hence an artistic performance, a lament, like an epic narrative, is compartmentalized into fixed, standardized units and relies considerably on formulaic phrases and the repetition of certain themes.525 The susceptibility to compositional precepts obviously clarifies that the spontaneity of the lament, 523

524

525

Derderian 2001, 42-43; her argument, however, develops on the premise that the object of kleos is primarily the deceased. Also, in the course of this argument she accepts that a lament is a “kind of an inverse epic”, contradicting her earlier statement that professes the opposite. In the Odyssey, Penelope turns to lamentation even at the hearing of klea andron (Od. 1.337342). For the connection between glory and lament, see Nagy 1979, 94-117; also Martin 1989, 144. For attention to the dynamics of gender in this relationship, see Murnaghan 1999, 203-220; P. Easterling, ‘Men’s kleos and Women’s goos: Female Voices in the Iliad’, JMGS 9 (1991), 145-171; and most recently, C. McNelis, ‘Mourning Glory: Callimachus’ Hecale and Heroic Honors’, MD 50 (2003), 155-161, establishing the metapoetics of female lament also in the Hellenistic epic. Tsagalis 2004, 9-14, reassesses the formulaic element in the language of the Iliadic lament, which he compares directly to intertextuality and allusion, since all three are necessitated by repetition.

7. The Poetics of Lamentation

247

as of every song, is compromised.526 Additionally, the function sine-qua-non of the gender parameter in the epicization of ritual lament also comes under the scope of Ovid’s systematic reappraisal of ancient epic. In the transmigration of lamenting Hecuba, a leading mourner in the Homeric narratives527, into the Metamorphoses, female lamentation draws attention to its contribution to epic commemoration, to the forging of poetic memory. Furthermore, it stresses from a metaphorical perspective the indispensability of the female in the survival of the male. Female laments immortalize, in the solemnity of their ritual delivery, male heroes, and by extension, extol, and eventually perpetuate the male worldview and system of values.528 The revolutionary in the Ovidian Hecuba’s deconstruction of the ritual lament as conducted in Homer is found not in some drastic change in the structure of the performance of the lament, which is observed very closely, but in its content, for this depends on the lamented subject at hand. Quite simply, and unprecedented within the context of an archaic epic, being lamented in the transformed epic universe is no longer the exclusive prerogative of the male. Polyxena’s masculinization in the Metamorphoses receives official confirmation in the heroine’s becoming the epicenter of a ritual lament. This gender reversal nullifies the strict gender dichotomy of the epic praise system. Subsequently, it becomes the mechanism that paves the road for further transgressions to occur, all of which in one way or another attack Achilles and block, often in provoking fashion, his last effort to resist the Ovidian reconstruction of his epic self. The formal, goos-type texture of Hecuba’s lament over Polyxena is already anticipated at Met. 13.481ff., when an early stage of lamentation breaks out immediately after Priam’s daughter falls dead: Troades excipiunt deploratosque recensent Priamidas et quot dederit domus una cruores; teque gemunt, virgo, teque, o modo regia coniunx, … quae corpus complexa animae tam fortis inane, quas totiens patriae dederat natisque viroque huic quoque dat lacrimas; lacrimas in vulnera fundit 526

527

528

On the relationship between speech/song and the song of the poet/narrator, see Martin 1989, 89-146; on Hecuba’s self-consciousness of performance see the pages immediately following. On the poetics of the Homeric Hecuba, see Tsagalis 2004, 157, commenting on the variation of form that characterizes Hecuba’s laments for Hector in Iliad 22 and 24. In the former case, the lament is “harsher in tone and more fluid in rhythm”, while in the latter, it is “highly formal”. This distinction is evidence of the poem’s flexibility to keep the “subgenre of the gooi bound by its structure and content”. An issue treated nicely in Tsagalis 2004, 68-74.

248

Fe/Male Sacrifice

osculaque ore tegit consuetaque pectora plangit canitiemque suam concreto in sanguine verrens plura quidem, sed et haec laniato pectore dixit (Met. 13.481-483; 488-493) The Trojan women receive her body and count one by one the lamented children of Priam and how many victims this house has given. You, royal maiden, you they mourn – and you, who only yesterday were called royal consort… She, embracing the (now) empty body of that brave spirit, gives to it also the tears – the tears that she had shed so many times for her country, her husband and her sons. The tears she pours into her daughter’s wounds, covers her lips with kisses and, and beats the breasts that have been accustomed to beating. And dragging her gray locks amids much caked blood and tearing her breasts, she said much more, and also the following…

As in traditional epic529, the dead body about to become the object of a lament is received and transported by a group of women (Troades) in mourn). This mourning, as in Homer, initially, when it is a ing (deploratos ~ group performance, is non-verbalized, but rather, prefaces direct speech. Mourning soon becomes verbalized, or alternatively, verbalization is substituted by gesturing and self-mutilation, when lamentation is undertaken by an individual, Hecuba; yet, it does not exit the collective context of the anonymous mourners, the Trojan women, who are surrounding, chorus-like, their queen. As in the female sequence of mourning, first the mourner catches sight of the dead and then bursts into tears and cries, which are shortly followed by an embrace of the corpse (quae corpus complexa… huic quoque dat lacrimas, ‘she, embracing the body… gives to it also the tears’). The disfiguring of the mourner’s appearance comes next, which symbolizes the identification of the mourner with the deceased (consueta… pectora plangit / canitiemque suam concreto in sanguine verrens / … laniato pectore, ‘she beats the breasts that have been accustomed to beating, and dragging her gray locks amids much caked blood… tearing her breasts’). This identification in Hecuba’s case is explicitly noted again in the opening phrase of her speech (13.495 nata, iaces videoque tuum, mea vulnera, vulnus, ‘my daughter, you lie dead, and I see your μ , before wound, my wounds!’).530 The concluding lines of Hecuba’s , the verbalization of her ritual lament, follow the she moves on to her Homeric closing formula: 493 plura quidem, sed et haec… dixit, ‘these and 529

530

On the typology of the Homeric ritual and verbalized lament, see Tsagalis 2004, 28-51, analyzing the internal structure and thematic development of all 12 Iliadic ; and Derderian 2001, 27-31; my comments in the following paragraph are indebted to both these studies. This identification is facilitated by the emphatic personal deixis, the juxtaposition of the mourner’s “I” and the “You” of the deceased who receives the lament; on deixis in the Homeric lament, see Tsagalis 2004, 90-102.

7. The Poetics of Lamentation

249

much more she said’; cf. ’, ‘as soon as she finished speaking in tears… ’ (e.g. Il. 24.776, Helen’s ending her lament over Hector).531 The close observance of the Homeric typology only accentuates the two important differences, which thus infuse the whole mourning scene with irony, and undermine the whole process of emulating the Homeric text. These two points of divergence may also be read as two subtle confessions of literary self-awareness. First, Ovid, by comparing Hecuba’s lament over Polyxena to her numerous other laments over the bodies of her other, male, children and her spouse (489 quas totiens patriae dederat natisque viroque, ‘which [sc. tears] she had shed so many times for her country, her husband and her sons’; cf. 491 consueta pectora, ‘the breasts that have been accustomed to beating’), in a way illustrates the queen as a professional ritual mourner. She is cast in the light of the women singers, ‘leaders of the laments’, who open the over the body of Hector in Iliad 24.720-722, and she shares their expertise in the performance of an epic lament, and no less their association to the Muses. The latter, interestingly, are the singers of an antiphonal dirge performed at Achilles’ funeral which is aptly set in the last book of the Odyssey (Od. 24.5561) in analogy to Hector’s funeral.532 The similarity of Hecuba’s lamenting performance to the act of a ritual mourner, in short, pictures her deservedly as a professional singer, a bard. Ovid’s summation of the verbalization process of the queen’s lament likewise acknowledges the poetics in the texture of her dirge. At 13.493, the poet addresses the performance of Hecuba by noting that he is not going to record in direct discourse the entire content of his own Hecuba’s lament (‘she said… much more, and also the following’). The metapoetically sensitive subtext of this line has been commented on by Rosati: “[s]ometimes we have only the admission that the narrator’s report is not full, as in the introduction of Hecuba’s words at 13.493 plura quidem, sed et haec laniato pectore dixit, or in the recurrent concluding formula, without parallel in classical epic, talibus atque aliis (7.661; 13.228; 13.675; 15.479). In cases like these, we are made aware that the narrative is the product of a selection, and we are therefore invited to consider the hypothesis that this process may not be objective, but is the result of personal choices on the part of the narrator”.533 Markedly, similar words were put earlier in the mouth of Nestor, the most conspicuous impersonation of the aoidos figure in the ‘little Iliad’. In the same pattern of the epic poet, or Nestor, Ovid’s Hecuba intends to produce

531 532 533

Hopkinson 2000, 176-177 [494-503n], also notes several repetitions and antitheses in the opening lines of Hecuba’s mourning, a typical feature of ritual laments. Richardson 1993, 351-352. Rosati 2002, 290.

250

Fe/Male Sacrifice

in the carefully edited text of her lament a comparable demonstration of metapoetic memory, a new epic poem with a new, anti-epic content. An epic lament has two addressees, direct and indirect. The direct one is the deceased, whose death has generated the lament, and, to a lesser degree, those affected directly by the death, who see their fates tied to it and expect major consequences as a result of it. The indirect one is the warrior who killed the deceased, because killing one’s opponent earns kleos for the killer. And as already seen on more than one occasion, the recognition of this action of killing as kleos does not come from the hero himself, but from a third party. A mourning song is at the same time an epic and an anti-epic. It is, foremost, a eulogy for the deceased, for it enumerates his accomplishments in war and the finest sides of his character in everyday life, including his conduct with fellow humans and his devotion to the gods. The praise of his deeds elevates them to klea, granting the dead hero his coveted kleos. As these klea are sung in the technical, formulaic language of the epic, they become public property, and they are freely repeated in commemoration and praise of the dead. At the same time, indirectly, the praise of the dead confers praise upon the conqueror of such a fine warrior and great man. The greater the qualities and accomplishments of the dead, the higher the kudos for the victor, who, in a way, appropriates these accomplishments. What is more, the mourners refer to the impact the loss of the deceased will have upon the living staying behind, including the mourners themselves, who are usually the female relatives of the deceased. This confession of bereavement translates as indirect kleos for the victor, the cause behind this; for instance, this is precisely what Achilles has in mind in the passage at Iliad 18 mentioned earlier, when he connects directly his kleos to the lament of the Trojan women. A lament is, however, an anti-epic song as well, because it focuses on the immortality of fama – directly the deceased’s, indirectly the victor’s – as it does on mortality and humanity, the fragility and temporary status of human life in general, and the human side of the dead. A lament always deplores the loss of life’s joys and the eternal confinement of the deceased to the gloomy surroundings of the Underworld, and thus reminds the listeners, and no less the conqueror, of their own mortality. Hecuba’s dirge for Polyxena structurally and thematically qualifies as a ritual lament, but essentially it is an anti-epic lament, which in turn produces an anti-epic, because, quite simply, the object of the mourning is not a warrior and a male, but a maiden, a female. In the first section of the dirge, the mourner addresses the dead, expresses their relationship and identifies herself with the dead (495). Then she states the fact of the death and relates it to the death of other members of the same family (496-497). This comparison brings the dead maiden alongside her brothers but principally highlights the incongruity of the situation: Polyxena is a female.

7. The Poetics of Lamentation

251

Hecuba’s perception of the situation is even more surprising. According to the queen, her performance of a ritual lament for Polyxena, a daughter, does not seem to be viewed as unusual, nor is Polyxena’s death inferior in terms of value to the death of her sons. What the queen considers extraordinary is, first, the fact that her daughter, a woman, died a man’s death, by the sword (497-498 femina… ferro… femina ferro), and, second, that Polyxena’s killer is Achilles, who is already dead (498-505).534 Polyxena’s death is more unexpected, as a thematic detail out of place in an epic context, than unjustified, because Polyxena is a woman. This poetically unbecoming pattern of epic acting the queen confronts and undermines, by delivering, at Met. 13.506ff., a which she models on the pattern of the Homeric Androlament or for Hector in Iliad 24.535 The reminiscence of Andromache’s mache’s casts Polyxena even more brightly in Hector’s epic light, and complements Polyxena’s own Hector-like performance before the altar and her ‘manly’ death by the sword. In this way, Hecuba confirms the gender inversion of her daughter, while she is allowed to recapitulate from her own, antiepic perspective major themes of the war, the fall of Troy and its consequences.

534 535

This crucial paradox has also been noted by Hopkinson (2000, 177 [497-504n]). This lament is already anticipated in Iliad 6 and 22; cf. pp. 224-226, 240 above, on the Homeric hypotext behind the latter part of Hecuba’s mourning. On the structural proximity between Andromache’s two laments, respectively at 6.407-439 and 22.477-514, see now Tsagalis 2004, 94-99. In the same study, Tsagalis initiates a detailed analysis of the structure of Andromache’s closural lament in Iliad 24 (pp. 133-136).

Chapter Seven Memnon’s Fate and Fame: Impersonating Achilles 1. Introduction The multiple reenactments of the fall of Troy reach an end with Hecuba’s transformation into a dog (Met. 13.567-575), a bizarre and inglorious dark closure to her climactic tragedy, which becomes the last act of the ‘little Iliad’. This is suggested at Met. 13.577, cladibus et casu Troiaeque Hecabesque (‘[for] the destruction and the fall of Troy and Hecuba alike’), where the ruined city and her fallen queen are featured, twice conjoined, side-by-side on a single line. And yet, Ovid’s peculiar perception of what should qualify as ‘fitting’ in conjunction with his habitual inclination to antagonize his readers, rounds off the ‘little Iliad’ with a narrative appendage (13.576-622) that, apart from being eccentric in content, communicates details previously unreported. This coda consists of the goddess Aurora’s plea before Jupiter to honor the premature death of her son, Memnon, who died by the hand of Achilles (Met. 13.576599), and Jupiter’s fulfillment of her request in the subsequent marvel of the Memnonides. These, according to Ovid, were a pack of birds that rose miraculously from the ashes of the dead hero as his body was consumed by fire, they fought among themselves and, perishing, they fell back into Memnon’s pyre (Met. 13.600-622). The mourning of Aurora carries the themes of funeral lament and parental loss finessed by Hecuba in a new direction. Her appeal to Jupiter reaches backwards to the opening of the Iliad and Thetis’ plea before Zeus to honor her own son, Achilles, Memnon’s murderer. The intertextual dialogue between the closure of the ‘little Iliad’ and the opening of the Homeric epic encapsulates Ovid’s ambition to crown his anti-‘Iliad’ with a sophisticated rereading of the most important scene of the Homeric epic in terms of epic narrative dynamics, since, Zeus’ decision to satisfy Thetis’ request materializes into a plan, the Dios boule, which essentially determines the structure and course of the plot in the Iliad. Aurora’s mirror pleading recontextualizes the thematic core of the Iliad, the principal Ovidian target. The association to the Homeric text becomes more complex: in the Epic Cycle Memnon is virtually the most proximal alter

254

Memnon’s Fate and Fame: Impersonating Achilles

Achilles character, and so, his miraculous plight finds a most appropriate hosting place at the closure of Ovid’s serial deconstruction of the Homeric Achilles. The miracle of Memnon’s birds shows Memnon not only as a duplicate of the great Achaean protagonist, but also as a Hector figure, and even a Patroclus figure, both of whom in the last section of the Iliad embody a side of Achilles. The subject of a prism-filtered gaze, then, Memnon’s miraculous funeral tribute allows Ovid to flex his critical muscle by taking on the Homeric funeral as a mechanism of epic closure. In the second half of this final chapter, and in lieu of an epilogue to the book overall, I reflect on the thematics of epic death and epic memorializing. Every episode in the ‘little Iliad’ closes with death, either an actual one or a presumed one, and on several occasions Ovid appears fixated on the commemoration of death. The construction of the right memorial is a core theme of Ovidian poetics, reaching conspicuously forwards to the famous sphragis at the end of the Metamorphosis, the most celebrated memorial in the epic. In this respect, the serial epitaphic monumenta in the ‘little Iliad’ thematize the poetics of epic death commemoration, in effect transferring the immortal fame of the epic hero onto the epic poet.

2. Memnon and/as Achilles Memnon’s story was one of the celebrated episodes in the Trojan legend beyond the Iliad, being the central theme of a major epic, the poet Arctinus’ Aethiopis, as extracted from the evidence recorded in Proclus’ résumé of the epic.536 The hero, king of the Ethiopians, was the son of Aurora and a kinsman (nephew) of Priam. Following the death of the Amazon Penthesileia, he took over the leadership of the Trojan army against the Greeks in Hector’s place, but like his predecessor, he died on the battlefield in single combat with Achilles. Despite the scarcity of the surviving fragments of the Aethiopis, it is easy to trace a pattern of similarities underlining the biographies of Memnon and Achilles. Proclus’ synopsis is an obvious starting point537: μ μ . μ μ μ , 536

537

Cf. the complete fragmentary evidence in English translation in the most recent (2003) edition of the Epic fragments by West; see also Bernabé 67-71; on the presumed plot of the Aethiopis, see Davies 1989, 53-61. The text is quoted from Bernabé 68.10-69.1.

255

2. Memnon and/as Achilles

μ μ

μ

-

.

And Memnon, the son of Eos, wearing armor made by Hephaestus, arrives to help the Trojans; and Thetis foretells to her son the things about Memnon. Then a battle encounter takes place in which Antilochus is killed by Memnon, whereupon Achilles kills Memnon. Then Eos, having asked from Zeus immortality for her son, bestows it on him.

Notwithstanding Memnon’s epic role as a substitute Hector, Proclus’ text makes clear that the Aethiopis narrative promoted the proximity of Eos’ son to Achilles. Both heroes are the sons of overprotective divine mothers, and both are in possession of magnificent armor made by Hephaestus following their mothers’ requests.538 Later literary evidence enhances the parallelism. Plutarch, following earlier writers, alleges that Aeschylus’ lost Psychostasia (Aeschylus fr. 279-280a Radt, pp. 374-376) unravels around a scene where the souls of Achilles and Memnon are weighed on scales held by Hermes in the presence of Thetis and Aurora, each of whom pleads on behalf of her son.539 ) This scene, it is generally agreed, was modeled on the kêrostasiê ( ) of Achilles and at Il. 22.209-213, the weighing of the ‘death fates’ ( Hector, just prior to their duel. What is more, the posthumous fates of both heroes involved immortality and burial ceremonies alike. According to the Aethiopis, after his death, Memnon is granted immortality from Zeus at Eos’ request and his body is carried away from the battlefield in the arms of his mother.540 Thetis does not need Zeus to grant her son postmortem immortality, but snatches Achilles away from the pyre herself and transports him to the White Island (Bernabé 69.21-22) or, according to Apollodorus (Epit. 5.21.3542 = 5.5), the Greeks buried Achilles’ bones together with Patroclus’ bones in the White Island, while the hero’s immortal soul lived eternally in the Island 538

539

540

Vergil’s Venus, the divine mother of another Achilles-like hero, Aeneas, ‘recalls’ both these pleas as a precedent when she brings a similar request to her husband on behalf of her son (Aen. 8.383f. te filia Nerei, / te potuit lacrimis Tithonia flectere coniunx, ‘you the daughter of Nereus, you the spouse of Tithonus were able to move with their tears’). Davies 1989, 57, adding that Aeschylus’ tragedy is reflected in the paintings of a series of large vases that depict the weighing of the two heroes’ souls before their grieving mothers. The psychostasia was a popular theme in ancient art; on its long tradition in iconography, see A. Kossatz-Deissmann, ‘Memnon’, LIMC 6.1 (1992), 451-453 (E); also K. Friis Johansen, The Iliad in Early Greek Art (Copenhagen 1967), 261. Or according to a different version, by Hypnos and Thanatos, in the fashion of the Homeric Sarpedon (Il. 16.671-673), who was killed by Patroclus when the latter was dressed in Achilles’ armor, in conscious duplication of Achilles’ role. On the Memnon-Sarpedon parallelism, see M.E. Clark and W.D.E. Coulson, ‘Memnon and Sarpedon’, MH 35 (1978), 6573; and E. Simon, ‘Neues zu den Mythen von Aineias, Sarpedon und Itys in der etruskischen Kunst’, Archäologischer Anzeiger 1992, 233-242.

256

Memnon’s Fate and Fame: Impersonating Achilles

of the Blessed in the company of Medea. Finally, Achilles’ body received a grand funeral from the Greeks, and his remains were removed from the pyre to a mound on the headland of Sigeum at the Hellespont; this mound would become a landmark for future generations. Memnon’s body, also buried at Aesepus by the Hellespont541, received its own great honor, as Ovid’s narrative of the Memnonides miracle attests.542 In the text of the Metamorphoses the analogies in the biographies of Memnon and Achilles have been deflected, metastasized in the parallel destinies of the two heroes’ mothers. The portrayal of the suppliant Aurora in Ovid’s Metamorphoses 13 is modeled on Thetis’ plea to Zeus in Iliad 1. Like Achilles’ mother, Aurora throws herself before Jupiter’s knees (Met. 13.585f. magni genibus procumbere non est / dedignata Iovis, ‘she did not disdain to throw herself at ’ , the knees of the mighty Jove’; cf. Il. 1.500 , ‘she crouched down at his [Zeus’] feet and grasped his knees’), alludes to the services she offered to him (Met. 13.591 si tamen adspicias, quantum tibi femina praestem, ‘nonetheless, should you consider of what service I, μ ’ even though just a woman, have been to you’; cf. Il. 1.503 , ‘If I ever served you well among the immortals’), and in return, asks the god to honor her son (Met. 13.598 da, precor, huic aliquem… honorem, ‘Grant then, I beseech you, some honor to him’; cf. Il. 1.505 μ μ , ‘Honor my son!’), who is doomed to die young (Met. 13.596 μ , primisque sub annis, ‘in his early years’; cf. Il. 1.505 ‘doomed to the shortest life of all other men’; and Achilles’ own self, ‘short-lived’).543 characterization a little earlier, at 1.352, as μ The verbal parallels are striking, and inspiring for a creative undertaking in adaptation poetics. The Aurora-Thetis pairing effectively closes Ovid’s miniature ‘Iliad’ with an unequivocal allusion to the opening of the Iliad, and particularly, its episode-catalyst for the narrative development of the Homeric epic, Thetis’ plea to Zeus. Second, Memnon’s similarities, to Achilles and to Hector alike, sustain a different set of thematic parallels and especially the correspondence with the funeral of the Trojan leader. Foremost, however, 541

542

543

Even though the sources on the location of Memnon’s tomb are far from unanimous, the earliest testimony, Hes. fr. 353 M-W, identifies it with the site by the Hellespont. n the much later Aelian, Nat. 5.1, it is added that the tomb at Aesepus was actually a cenotaph, a detail which Scherf (J. Scherf, ‘Memnon’, DNP 7 [1996], 1202-1204) associates directly with the immortality conferred upon Memnon by Dawn after she prevailed on Zeus (Bernabé 68.12-69.1; also West Aeth. arg. 2). On the literary tradition and artistic evidence behind the Memnon legend, see A. KossatzDeissman, ‘Memnon’, LIMC 6.1 (1992), 448-461, with bibliography; and for a good abridgement, Scherf (see the previous note). For the similarities of the pleas of Aurora and Thetis, see Bömer 1982, 351-352.

3. The Power of Aurora

257

Memnon’s Achilles-like image revisits from an epilogical, comprehensive perspective the poetics of the epic narrative – and specifically the Iliad narrative – and the hero’s anxiety over securing immortality. Cross-textual interaction is as prominent as the sharing of recurrent intertexts. It takes only a cursory reading to realize that the avian miracle is one other form of transubstantiation of a dead hero. In this respect, it becomes the final ring of the chain of tombs and cenotaphs that steadily apply the closure to every unit of the ‘little Iliad’, and compel the reader to review the entire cluster through the lens of its most elusive, yet omnipresent theme, an epic hero’s fama.

3. The Power of Aurora A few years ago in a much-cited study, Laura Slatkin argued that exploring how Thetis is received in the Iliad leads one to comprehend more deeply an essential aspect of Homeric poetics. The treatment of Thetis in the Iliad represents “a crucial instance of the way in which the particular epic’s narrative incorporates traditional material from mythology” whose resonance “contribute[s] a wider context and meaning to the Iliad’s central themes”. In accommodating a broader mythological tradition revolving around Thetis, especially her role in the theogonic myth of succession, within the Iliad, a poem of “superbly overdetermined economy”, the Homeric narrator shapes the goddess “as thoroughly from the perspectives of [the epic’s] hero’s response and ultimate mortal concerns as [his narrative] delineates [Achilles’] human dilemma against the dimension of a particular divine genealogy…. In defining Thetis, therefore”, Slatkin concludes, “the poem defines itself”, because simply put, Thetis’ role is a reflection of Achilles’ role in the Iliad.544 In the context of Iliad 1, Thetis’ appearance before Jupiter and her request that he honor Achilles by causing the Greeks to lose have been prompted by her earlier meeting with her embittered son on the shore of Troy shortly after Achilles has decided to withdraw from battle. Furious at Agamemnon, Achilles in tears asks that his mother take advantage of her unique influence over Zeus, and request that the god punish the Greeks with defeat in war to make them beg for the hero’s return and restore his honor. Thetis’ immediate reaction is to mourn for her son, who allows bitterness to overwhelm his life even though he is aware of his swiftly approaching death, before she promises to satisfy his wish. Achilles’ death belongs outside the narrative frame of the Iliad; nonetheless, critics agree that the hero’s with544

Slatkin 1991, 6-7; the following two paragraphs summarize the core of Slatkin’s argument.

258

Memnon’s Fate and Fame: Impersonating Achilles

drawal from battle in Iliad 1 should be read as an allegory to his impending death. In this light, Thetis’ tears over Achilles’ decision to abstain from fighting and exit the heroic world, anticipates her mourning for the actual loss of her son. The main theme of the Iliad, the course of Achilles’ anger, is interlocked with the hero’s personal struggle to come to terms with his mortality. Achilles needs to accept that, even though he is the best of the mortal heroes and son of a goddess who enjoys Zeus’ greatest respect, he is unable to avert death and, even worse, he will die prematurely. Thetis’ presence in the poem allows us to view the hero’s tragedy from a different perspective. Like her son, Thetis possesses unique powers: even though the text of the Iliad never mentions explicitly Thetis’ role in the myth of succession that ultimately brought Zeus to power, the clear allusions to her role and to the larger myth are a constant reminder. Even so, the goddess is unable to avert the death of her son. While she has the power to talk Zeus into fulfilling all her requests, like Zeus, she cannot reverse the fates. Precisely because she was destined to be the mother of the son who would dethrone Zeus if Zeus should sleep with her, she was forced to become the mother of a mortal, short-lived son, whose death, tragically, she is able to foresee without being able to avert. She neared access to the cosmic power, when she rescued Zeus and made him eternally indebted to her (Il. 1.393-412), yet, she does have to come to terms with her son’s mortality. All these intense and conflicted emotions are mirrored in Achilles’ frustration, his mênis and ensuing achos as developed in Iliad 1: both mother and son are uniquely powerful, yet impotent before death.545 Through the above reading, the mortality of Achilles emerges as the price of stability in the universe, and the Iliad is the kleos that Zeus owed and granted to Achilles in return. Thetis’ plea to Zeus initiates the Dios Boule, the god’s decision to alter the course of the war in favor of the Trojans. Thetis’ appeal and Zeus’ acquiescence join the two other forces dominant in Iliad 1 and driving forward the Iliad plot, namely, the anger of Achilles and the hero’s susceptibility to suggested models of behavior. 545

On the emotional state of Thetis as a reflection of Achilles’ wrath, see Slatkin 1991, 85-105, esp. 98ff. Slatkin further compares what she calls ‘Thetis’ wrath’ – even though, notably, there is not evidence for that wrath in the text of the Iliad, and under this consideration, one should approach Slatikin’s argument with heed – to the wrath and achos, ‘grief’, of another deity with comparable cosmic power, Demeter. Thetis’ tragic struggle to come to terms with her son’s mortality is captured in a number of traditions; cf. a complete overview on the theme of Achilles’ immortality in Burgess 1995. According to tradition Thetis tried to make Achilles immortal by dipping him into fire, but Peleus found out about it. His intervention led the goddess to abandon her husband and his mortal world; see, for example, Apollodorus (3.13.6), Lycophron (Alex. 178ff.), and the Homeric Scholia on Il. 24.37.

4. Memnon’s ‘Hectorean’ Side

259

The interrelated biographies of Thetis and Aurora enable Slatkin to confirm and subsequently expand her conclusions on Thetis’ poetically empowered role.546 By bringing the parallel fates of the two goddesses under the scope of her “poetic archaeology”, Slatkin demonstrates how the details surrounding the legend of Eos and Memnon offer the broader perspective required for a “deeper comprehension of Homeric poetics” and “a richer appreciation of the specific themes associated with Achilles’ divine origin”.547 Transported within the Ovidian ‘Iliad’, the goddess of the Dawn duplicates the Homeric Thetis’ character in Ovid’s re-telling of the Epic Cycle, but more importantly, she revives Thetis’ indispensable role in setting the factors that fashion the Iliad plot-line. And in striking contrast to the Homeric decision to mute Thetis’ function in determining the course of the cosmogony and the shape of the world order, Ovid is not shy about portraying his Aurora extolling her own indispensability in sustaining the universal equilibrium.548

4. Memnon’s ‘Hectorean’ Side While Memnon’s biography draws him next to Achilles,549 the hero’s original intention, and after all the justification for his inclusion in the Epic Cycle, sprang from his desire to replace Achilles’ great opponent, Hector. The details that pair the Trojan champion and the Ethiopian king are numerous and pointed. The son of Aurora, who led of the Trojan army after the death of Hector, was Hector’s cousin. This relationship calls to mind Ajax’s earlier claim to the weapons (and the leadership role) of Achilles on account of the same kinship ties to Thetis’ son (Met. 13.31). Memnon particularly identifies with Hector when he kills Antilochus, Nestor’s youngest son and a surrogate

546 547 548

549

Slatkin 1991, 17-52, esp. 21ff. Slatkin 1991, 21. The comments by Due (1974, 157) on Aurora’s speech accurately transcribe the goddess’ psychology as much as they disclose Ovid’s playfulness in taking on a leading structural theme of the Iliad: “Her address to Jupiter is revealing: of its thirteen lines she uses the first eight to complain about the fact that she has not received a number of temples, feasts, and altars which she feels she ought to have in consideration of the fine show she produces every morning. […] It is sufficiently evident that what she really cares for is her own prestige”. Edwards 1991, 15-19, 62, 139-141, argues for the chronological primacy of the Aethiopis over the Iliad and the modeling of numerous themes in the last third of the Homeric poem on the epic of Arctinus. Among other things, Edwards contends that the development of Achilles’ Homeric prosopography is indebted to the biographical portrayal of Arctinus’ Memnon.

260

Memnon’s Fate and Fame: Impersonating Achilles

for Patroclus as Achilles’ best friend in the Aethiopis.550 The death of Antilochus causes Achilles to target Memnon and wish fervently for his death in revenge, just as the death of Patroclus in Homer signaled the beginning of Hector’s undoing.551 Aurora’s mourning for Memnon reaches beyond the grieving Thetis to recall the lament of the Trojan women over the body of Hector; the Memnon episode begins and ends with the mention of Aurora next to Hector’s mother, who is the leader of the lamenting chorus at Hector’s death and funeral, respectively in Il. 22.429ff. and 24.710ff. Not least, the placement of Memnon’s pyre at the conclusion of Ovid’s ‘little Iliad’ looks back to Hector’s funeral, the catalectic scene of the Iliad.552 In Memnon, her last champion, Troy falls for one final time, and in this respect, the Memnon episode appears as the natural continuation of the serial ‘falls’ of the Trojan ‘Survivors’. At the same time, Ovid constructs Hector’s funeral anew, by replacing Hector also in death with his successor and kin, but most importantly, by planting this reenactment in the exact same structural crux, the epilogue of the entire narrative.553 This thematic nexus behind the Ovidian Memnon’s funeral alludes at once to the opening and the closing books of the Iliad, and recapitulates the story and the structure of the Homeric poem.554 The ideal 550 551 552

553

554

Memnon is identified as Antilochus’ slayer already in Od. 4.188. Davies 1989, 56; Bernabé 68. This association between Memnon and Hector introduces a new series of parallels that both share with the Vergilian Turnus. On the modeling of the duel between Aeneas and Turnus in Aeneid 12 on that between Achilles and Hector in Iliad 22, see, for example, G.N. Knauer, Die Aeneis und Homer (Göttingen 21979), 289-292, 486-488; and P. Schenk, Die Gestalt des Turnus in Vergils Aeneis (Königstein 1984), passim; also K.W. Gransden, Vergil’s Iliad: An Essay on Epic Narrative (Cambridge 1984), 192-217, and D. West, ‘The Deaths of Hector and Turnus’, in: I. McAuslan and P. Walcot (edd.), Virgil (Oxford 1990), 14-23. The webbing of the exactly same themes, including a leader’s death, a funeral pyre, a falling city and an epic closure, also distinguishes Ovid’s narrative of Turnus’ death in Metamorphoses 14. The Rutulian champion dies, and his demise is identified with the fall of his city, Ardea (Met. 14.573-574 Turnusque cadit; cadit Ardea Turno / sospite dicta potens, ‘Turnus falls; Ardea falls, too, which was called the powerful one while Turnus was alive’). The projection of the burning Ardea in the light of the burning Troy, and their direct linkage to the death of their champions, seals the resemblance of Turnus’ death to the funerals of Hector and Memnon. Thus, by emphasizing characterization and structural function, Ovid robs Turnus’ models of their individuality, and inadvertently – or is it deliberately? – brings Hector and Memnon more closely to each other, but ironically also more closely to becoming variants of a single stereotype. The death of Turnus at the conclusion of the ‘little Aeneid’ is likewise followed by a bird transformation, of the hero’s city Ardea into the homonymous bird. Ardea the bird emerges from the flames that consumed Ardea the city, just like the avian Memnonides emerge miraculously from the pyre of Memnon. On the thematic and verbal overlaps between the finale of the ‘little Iliad’ to the end of the recast Aeneid, see my ‘Birds, Flames and Epic Closure in Ovid, Met. 13.600-20 and 14.568-80’, CQ 53 (2003), 620-624.

4. Memnon’s ‘Hectorean’ Side

261

closural function of Memnon, in view of the above, may even justify Ovid’s tampering with traditional chronology, in transposing Memnon’s death after the death of Achilles and the fall of Troy.555 Memnon’s immortality, albeit bestowed posthumously, is the one detail that distinctly differentiates him from Hector. The Memnonides marvel in its annual recurrence guarantees the immortality of the hero’s fama and by extension, of Troy’s fama, too. In this respect, the avian fighting over the tomb of Memnon may seemingly commemorate the reenactment of the battle between Achilles and Memnon556, but the true honoree is fama in its literary form of epic narration. There are no pre-set winners and losers among the birds, nor are there pre-drawn battlelines, since all fighters eventually die. Fire, a leading symbol of war, is both the giver and taker of life, and death in war marks for the short-lived Memnonides the end of their lives – precisely as it did for the short-lived Achilles.557 Finally, the ritual repetition of the annually staged honorary fighting among these avian epigones of Memnon and Achilles revisits the scope of epic composition from the perspective of performance.558 Along these new parameters, the avian fighters may stand for the poeticized subjects of the numerous self-proclaimed epic poets who aspire to succeed the great Homer. Surrounded by the originality and incessant variation of Ovid’s epic universe, the literary efforts of the other aspiring epic successors of Homer look, and are meant to be, commonplace, dry, and poetically and aesthetically uninspiring and unsatisfying.

555

556 557

558

Mythological anachronisms abound in the last section of the Metamorphoses (Met. 11.194end), intentionally, according to Wheeler 1999, 116-139, and they suggest a predilection for toying with alternative mythological histories. Hopkinson 2000, 29. Dippel 1990, 125, reads the fight of the birds as an ironic allegory to the various great fights that dominate every single episode of the ‘little Iliad’ (the duel between Achilles and Cycnus, the Centauromachy, the ‘Judgment of the Arms’, and, finally, the Achilles vs. Memnon combat). The emphatic last line of the Memnonides story, 619 signa, parentali moriturae voce rebellant, which features the term moriturae exactly in the middle and next to parentali, projects, for some, the avian fight as a performance, for it refers covertly to gladiatorial performances. Apart from the evocation of the famous cry ‘morituri te salutant’ of the arena fighters, the term parentali recalls the Roman festival of the Parentalia, that was held annually and included gladiatorial games in honor of the dead; cf. H-E 327; Due 1974, 157; Bömer 1982, 347, 360; Dippel 1990, 124f.; and Hopkinson 2000, 29.

262

Memnon’s Fate and Fame: Impersonating Achilles

5. Avian Allusion and Illusion 5.1. Allusion: The Birds of Meleager The creation of birds from the hero’s ashes as honorary tribute to Memnon has no parallel in the Achilles legend. The miraculous birth of these birds, further, received no literary treatment prior to Ovid.559 Ideally then, this unusual incident serves the Augustan poet with the transformation needed to legitimize the inclusion of the Memnon episode inside the ‘little Iliad’, while the absence of literary models (at least, in surviving literature) provides a unique opportunity for the composition of an epic episode originally and distinctly Ovidian. It is rewarding for the reader, and revealing of Ovid’s craftsmanship, to access the logic, in terms of both structure and poetics, behind Ovid’s decision to devote the last twenty lines of his Trojan narrative to the Memnonides aition (Met. 13.600-619), a narrative fusion of hero cult, hero transsubstantiation, avian metamorphosis and epitaph memorializing. The mourning of Aurora and the story of the Memnonides observe the details of a narrative pattern that is found behind an entire group of stories in ancient myth. These stories relate how beloved relatives and companions mourning by the tomb of a dead hero are transformed, in their majority into birds, but they continue to reside by, and take care of, the hero’s place of rest. Perhaps the best known of these stories is the transformation of the Meleagrides, the sisters of Meleager, who stood in mourning by their brother’s pyre and were eventually transformed into guinea-fowls. The story is told in detail earlier in the Metamorphoses (Met. 8.515-546), and most likely originates in some Hellenistic text, probably Nicander.560 The stories of the Meleagrides and the Memnonides discuss similar themes within parallel contexts, and a comparative examination will show that they serve similar narrative goals. In a snapshot, both tales are set at the conclusion of a long, epically colored narrative. Meleager’s death and the transformation of the Meleagrides conclude the 559

560

Forbes Irving 1990, 246f., confesses the lack of earlier literary evidence on the Memnonides prior to Ovid, but hesitates to call the Roman poet the inventor of the story on the grounds that Polygnotus’ painting of the Underworld at Delphi depicted birds on the cloak of the hero, according to Pausanias (10.31.6). Cf. also Hopkinson, 2000, 28-29, on the evolution of the Memnonides in the post-Ovidian tradition. Hopkinson suspects that Ovid draws on Hellenistic sources, didactic poems such as the Ornithogonia by Boeo or Boeus, or Callimachus’ epic On Birds. The absence of hard evidence in favor of a Hellenistic or other source on the Memnonides at least suggests that one should not exclude Ovidian intervention in the transmitted version of the legend. Forbes Irving 1990, 245-246, believes that Ovid’s source was Nicander’s Heteroioumena; also Hollis 1970, ad loc. Both note, however, that a vague reference in Pliny (NH 37.40) may push back the original appearance of the avian sorores to as early as Sophocles.

5. Avian Allusion and Illusion

263

Calydonian hunt, “perhaps the most strictly epic passage in all the Metamorphoses”.561 The death of Memnon and the tale of the Memnonides are placed at the very end of Ovid’s adaptation of the Iliad. The Memnonides, following the pattern of the Meleagrides, are named after the dead hero whom they mourn and honor (Met. 13.617-619). The closeness of the two mourning groups is further noted in the designation of the feminine gender for Memnon’s birds through their description as sorores, ‘sisters’ (13.608), even though they resemble warrior birds engaged in deadly fighting and, according to other versions of the story, they originally were Memnon’s fellow warriors.562 A closer look at the phraseology of the two relevant passages illustrates their proximity – even though the fire that consumes Meleager is not a literal funeral pyre. The bodies of both heroes are given over to flames (Met. 13.600602 cum Memnonis arduus alto / corruit igne rogus, nigrique volumina fumi / infecere diem… , ‘when Memnon’s lofty pyre, wrapped in high-leaping flames, crumpled to earth, and the day was darkened by the thick black smoke…’; cf. 8.515-517; 522-525 flamma Meleagros ab illa / uritur et caecis torreri viscera sentit / ignibus… ; crescunt ignisque dolorque / languescuntque iterum; simul est exstinctus uterque, / inque leves abiit paulatim spiritus auras / paulatim cana prunam velante favilla, ‘Meleager burns with those flames, and he feels his vitals scorching with hidden fire… ; the fire and his pains grow stronger, and then die down. The two of them go out together; his spirit gradually slides away into the thin air as white ashes gradually spread over the glowing coals’). Their closest relatives also surrender themselves to mourning that is stopped only by divine intervention. Like the face of Meleager’s father, Aurora’s face is ‘darkened’ (Met. 13.581-582 color… palluerat, ‘grew dark’ in Miller’s translation; cf. 8.529-530 canitiem genitor vultusque seniles / foedat, ‘the father defiles his white hair and his aged countenance’). The goddess’ hair, loosened in mourning (13.584 crine soluto, ‘with loose hair’), resembles that of the people, especially the mothers, of Calydon (8.526-528 lugent iuvenesque senesque, / vulgusque proceresque gemunt, scissaeque capillos planguntur matres Calydonides…, ‘young men and old, chieftains and commons, lament and groan; and the Calydonia mothers… tear their hair and beat their breasts’). No less, Meleager’s sisters consume themselves in 561 562

Hollis 1970, 68. The explicit description of the birds as female puzzles Hopkinson 2000, 29, because this contrasts later versions of the legend; according to Hopkinson, Ovid has either slipped into some “ornithological mistake” or is following some other source now lost. The allusion to the legend of Meleager’s sisters is a plausible explanation for the female gender and the use of the epithet sorores modifying Memnon’s avian warriors. And, as I have suggested elsewhere (Papaioannou 2005, 187-197), the revival of the Memnonides in the metamorphosis of the female avian ardea, at Met. 14.573-580, offers a second possible lead to justify this small but intriguing thematic incongruity.

264

Memnon’s Fate and Fame: Impersonating Achilles

mourning and self-beating (8.536 immemores decoris liventia pectora tundunt, ‘disregardful of decency, they beat their bruised breasts’),563 while it is worth noting that the fight among the Memnonides is similarly described as plangor (13.611). The Meleagrides and the Memnonides are both hero birds honoring the death of a warrior, and they are named after him. The renewal of their fight and subsequent death every year at Memnon’s tomb duplicates the behavior of the Meleagrides, who, in the story of their transformation told by Nicander (cf. Antoninus Liberalis 2), ‘are said to mourn over Meleager’ each year following the hero’s death. Whether this detail means that they actually flew back each year to their brother’s tomb in Aetolia is unclear. Finally, in Pliny’s version of the story, the Meleagrides again fight around a tomb (NH 10.74), reinforcing the assumption that the two groups of mourner-birds were seen as variations of the same model. It is obvious that Ovid’s manipulation of the available traditions has added details that have strengthened the similarities between the two tales. The story of Meleager was as old and famous as the Trojan story, and the thematic kernel of an earlier, independent line of epic tradition.564 The Meleager paradigm as told by Phoenix to Achilles in Iliad 9 dramatizes an extreme situation of a hero’s resignation from epic fighting, obviously mirroring Achilles’ angry departure from the battlefield.565 Briefly, the Homeric version of Meleager is divided into two parts, of which the first, at Il. 9.529-549, reviews summarily the quarrel that broke out over the spoils of the Calydonian hunt and brought about the war between the Aetolians of Calydon, Meleager’s people, and the neighboring Couretes that were led by the hero’s maternal uncles. The second, by far more detailed (Il. 9.550-599) part traces the course and consequences of Meleager’s anger and subsequent departure from battle, when, upon killing one of his uncles, he is cursed by his mother to die. As Phoenix goes through the story it appears that his primary goal is to present Achilles with an example of a hero who, like Achilles, let his fellow warriors down and departed in anger, but who later laid this anger aside, as Achilles is 563 564

565

Bömer 1977, ad 8.533, expresses doubts on whether the mourning of the Meleagrides was part of the original transformation legend. Alden 2000, 179-290, esp. 229ff., with massive bibliography in the notes, represents the most detailed up-to-date discussion of the Meleager episode. For a full study of the Meleager legend, see now P. Grossardt, Die Erzählung von Meleagros. Zur literarischen Entiwicklung der Kalydonischen Kultlegende (Leiden 2001). On the Homeric Meleager, see also J. Bremmer, ‘La plasticité du mythe: Méléagre dans la poésie homérique’, in: C. Calame (ed.), Métamorphoses du mythe (Geneva 1988), 37-56. The parallels between Phoenix’s Meleager and Achilles are outlined in A.I. Voskos, ƝƵƻƭƱƳǁƿǂ-ƒLJƹƻƻƵǍǂ ƺƱɔ Ʀƿʮƽƹƾ (Nicosia 1974) [= Méléagre-Achille et Phénix (Besançon 1997)]; for a brief listing see Alden 2000, 235ff.

5. Avian Allusion and Illusion

265

now urged to do. On a closer look, Phoenix’s take on the story emphasizes not Meleager’s ultimate comeback at his wife’s entreaties when the city is about to fall, but the hero’s loss of the gifts that were offered to him in earlier pleas. Tongue-in-cheek, Phoenix seems to suggest that, lest Achilles yield, he will lose the gifts offered to him now, and along with them the opportunity to restore his epic self, his kleos as dictated by epic poetics, through the reception of due honors. The long-term consequences of embittered Achilles’ withdrawal will, thus, affect the prospects of his own epic fama as gravely as it will influence the turnout of the Greek cause in the war. Achilles, however, reads the paradigm differently. He interprets action around him not simply through his personal experience, but mainly on the basis of his idiosyncratic rationalization of this experience, and searches in Meleager’s behavior for signs that would address and justify his own anxieties. In judging the situation of the Calydonian hero to be a narrative about honor assaulted, and in need of being restored through satisfactory offerings before it is confirmed and augmented on the battlefield, Thetis’ son is taken with the climactic course of the Calydonian appeals to Meleager.566 The repeated and climatic supplication at the core of the Homeric Meleager episode identifies with a theme that determines the progression of the epic action in the whole Iliad. Specifically, there are sixteen verbal supplications throughout the Iliad, and, in addition, a total of 27 references to supplication. Of these sixteen supplications, Thetis’ appeal to Zeus (Iliad 1) is referred to seven times and Priam’s supplication to Achilles six times (Iliad 24).567 The Ovidian Memnon’s unit is built around the supplication of Aurora, which in turn echoes the appeal of Thetis in Iliad 1. In embracing Meleager in his treatment of Memnon, Ovid comments on the structural pri566

567

This reading of Meleager as a positive paradigm of reaction for Achilles is favored by Rabel 1997, 115-134. Rabel opines that the story serves a crucial narrative function, since Achilles’ decision to reject the plea determines the progression of the plot in the rest of the Iliad; had Achilles yielded, the course of the epic would have been different. Rabel further contends that Achilles’ propensity for alternative models of behavior leads him to read the Meleager story in a peculiar way that suits his egotistic expectations. Meleager’s stubbornness to prolong his withdrawal until all hope for a return would evaporate gains, according to Rabel, Achilles’ approval as a most effective form of psychological manipulation to elicit more and richer gifts. Crotty 1994, makes the case for supplication as the leading plot mechanism of the Iliad, distinguishing and determining the outcome of every major decision on the part of Homer’s heroes, and principally, Achilles and Hector. For Alden 2000, 185-191, the embedded epic of Meleager is the centerpiece in a series of rebuffed entreaties that form a horizontal thread all through the Iliad, starting with Chryses and closing with Priam. The comprehensive tabulation of the various supplications outlined by Alden on pp. 186-188, is particularly helpful in pointing this out.

266

Memnon’s Fate and Fame: Impersonating Achilles

macy of this theme. And yet, ironically, he also undercuts it, by preferring – as the Memnonides transformation suggests, and Ovid’s own ‘Meleagris’ recollection in Metamorphoses 8 spells out – the more famous version of the Meleager legend, which is markedly different from the one in the Iliad. The second half of the Meleager story in Ovid centers on Althaea, Meleager’s mother, who possesses a firebrand that is the life-token of her son’s life. Upon hearing that her son killed her brother(s), Althaea curses the hero and throws the brand into the fire; as a result, Meleager falls down dead.568 Ovid’s decision to distance himself from the Homeric text in preference for the earlier, better known version, accentuates the similarity between Meleager and Achilles. The motif of the stick dating as early as the archaic epics – the earliest detailed account of the firebrand story is Bacchylides 5.136-155569 – deals with the issues of immortality and invulnerability, both of which regulate Achilles’ epic conduct, the leitmotif in the development of the ‘little Iliad’. Meleager will die only if the brand entrusted to his mother by the Fates is destroyed. Like Thetis, Meleager’s mother has full and exclusive knowledge of this fact, which Meleager, unlike Achilles, seems to ignore. Unlike Thetis, however, Althaea has the power to avert her son’s death, by keeping the brand and its secret safely hidden, while Meleager, unlike Achilles, is completely unaware of his own star-crossed fate. In addition, Althaea does not remain within the boundaries of her Thetis-like role, but crosses over to embrace distinct aspects of the Homeric Achilles’ character, and, specifically, the hero’s most distinguished trait, his anger. As soon as Althaea finds out about the death of her brother(s), her role as enraged, avenging sibling (Met. 8.478-516), which until that moment was suppressed, clashes with her identity as a loving, all-forgiving mother (Met. 8.445-478), and ultimately wins. Meleager dies unsuspecting and helpless, his metaphorical transformation into the brand that represents his existence expressed in the vivid description of the burning sensation that overwhelms his agonizing dy-

568

569

See Alden 2000, 238f. nn. 148-149, for a full list of the literary sources and ample secondary literature on this version, which is generally considered the older and more widely known, and originates, according to J.Th. Kakridis, Homeric Researches (Lund 1949), 127148, in folk tradition. Critics generally agree that Homer is aware of the earlier version of Meleager’s death through the conflagration of the wooden stick, and he readily adapts its themes; see complete bibliography in S.C.R. Swain, ‘A Note on Iliad 9.524-99: The Story of Meleager’, CQ 38 (1988), 271-276. On Bacchylides’ treatment of Meleager, see A.P. Burnett, The Art of Bacchylides (Cambridge, MA 1985). Ovid’s allegiance to Bacchylides, where Meleager’s story, set in the Underworld, is presented as a first-person narration by the dead hero to Hercules, may have inspired the Roman poet, according to Otis (1970, 198-199), to move on, in Metamorphoses 9, with a cluster of tales centered on Hercules.

5. Avian Allusion and Illusion

267

ing experience.570 The objectification of the epic protagonist is the culmination of a systematic deflation of the epic spirit and a parallel deconstruction of male virtus that traditionally distinguishes the Meleager legend571, an archetypal male initiation ritual narrative.572 And yet, even though Ovid has forgone the Homeric Meleager as a model for the great hero, the thematic anatomy behind the account of the Calydonian hunt in Metamorphoses 8 is fundamentally Homeric. The shifting of focus in the Ovidian text, from the battle in defense of Calydon that is central to the archaic Greek version of the legend, onto the argument over the trophy of the boar, is entwined with the erotic infatuation of the hero for Atalanta. As in Homer, the anti-epic action of Ovid’s ‘Meleagris’ originates from an argument over a woman. Meleager’s love-at-first-sight, a typical Hellenistic and elegiac motif, spearheads a climactic gender- and, concomitantly, genrereversal; as the Ovidian narrative of the Calydonian hunt culminates, however, the leading female character and epicenter of the epic narrative, is Althaea.573 Meleager’s mother in her torturous emotional conflict is reminiscent of Hecuba mourning Hector574, a Homeric model manipulated and already subjected to gender reversal just prior to the Memnon episode. The deconstruction of masculine heroism575 becomes complete in the mockery of the female epic lament. This is articulated in the excessive mourning, first of Althaea the sister, alone (Met. 8.447ff.), and then of Althea the 570

571

572

573

574 575

On the formation of Ovid’s Meleager narrative, including the poet’s conscious diversion from the Homeric text, see now the relevant section in the most recent commentary on Metamorphoses 8 by Ch. Tsitsiou-Chelidoni, Ovid. Metamorphosen, Buch VIII. Narrative Technik und literarischer Kontext (Frankfurt am Main 2003), 182-297, with special emphasis on the rhetorical character of the episode. See also the studies by Segal 1999, 301-312, and C. Tsagalis, ‘The Power of Puns. Traditionality and Innovation on the Meleager Tale in Ovid’s Metamorphoses’, Platon 50 (1998), 172-189; both include substantial secondary literature. On the deflation of epic heroism in the Calydonian hunt, see Anderson 1972, 376-380 ad 8.359 and 8.363f.; and mainly N. Horsfall, ‘Epic and Burlesque in Ovid, Met. viii. 260ff.’, CJ 74 (1979), 319-332, and, more recently, Segal 1999, 322-338. On the Calydonian hunt as a mythological projection of standardized archaic Greek male initiation rituals, see, for example, A. Schnapp, Le chasseur et la cité (Paris 1997), 271-277, including full bibliography. On the reversal of epic gender roles first in Atalanta’s portrayal and subsequently in Althaea’s performance, in combination with the grand failure of masculinity and virtus in the comic ineffectiveness of the male hunters, see Segal 1999, 312-321; also Paschalis 1984, which deals with the deflation of epic virtus in Ovid as encapsulated in the Meleager treatment (M. Paschalis, ‘ μ Virtus μ ( , μ )’, μ [Ioannina 1984], 51-65). Met. 8.529-530 echoes Il. 22.406-407; cf. Bömer 1977, ad loc. Or, according to Segal 1999, 321, the shifting from “male to female epic roles and from heroic killers to mourning mothers and sisters”.

268

Memnon’s Fate and Fame: Impersonating Achilles

mother, in the company of the other women of Calydon, including the sisters of Meleager (Met. 8.526ff.).576 Hecuba’s mourning over Polyxena epicizes the death of her daughter, who, in turn, has already cast herself in the role of Hector in her dying speech. The same incongruity with respect to genre, which is effected by means of gender reversal and mocking exaggeration, marks the staging of the lament that Meleager’s female kin performs over his pyre. The pathetic lamentation driven to the extreme sounds ironically commonplace, even clichéd, and strongly reminiscent of the similar, equally ironic wail and the transformation of the Heliades, Phaethon’s sisters, into poplars by the river Po that received the falling body of their lightning-struck brother. Not fortuitously, the traditional epic subtext deconstructed through the Heliades act, is again present and, markedly, it is modeled on the episode of the discovery of Polydorus’ body in Aeneid 2.577 The detection of this new set of corresponding and recurring subtexts produces new strings of thematic unity between the ‘Survivors’ and the Memnonides narrates, and corroborates the structural sophistication behind the overall architecture strategy of the ‘little Iliad’. One could point out, finally, that the phraseology of Althaea’s mourning for her brothers and, later, of the Calydonian women grieving for Meleager578 is fully developed in the fall of Ardea, the avian that embodies the essence of Turnus’ capital at the close of the ‘little Aeneid’. The relevant passages are the following: (of Althaea’s mourning her brothers) quae plangore dato maestis clamoribus urbem inplet et auratis mutavit vestibus atras. (Met. 8.447-448) She filled the city with lamentation, beating her breasts, and exchanged her goldtinged clothes with black.

576

577

578

Commentators of the Memnonides episode dismiss the possibility that the transformation of Meleager’s sisters is seriously involved in the structural architecture or the poetics of the Ovidian narrative; cf. Bömer 1977, 166-167, characterizing the Meleagrides transformation a “Pflichtübung”, while Anderson (1972, 378) justifies the insertion of the story as a “convenient way of completing the story of Meleager’s family”. On the pathetic performance of the Heliades as mockery of the grotesque narrative of the ghost of Polydorus (Aen. 3.26-33 and 3.41-45), see Smith 1997, 104-115. The proximal texture of the respective mournings of the Meleagrides (Met. 8) and the Heliades (Met. 2) over their dead brothers, is traced closely a few pages below. Also for Segal 1999, 321, Althaea mourning her brothers and the Calydonian women lamenting Meleager exemplify on two different occasions the motif of “the public and maternal grieving” that frames the concluding section of the Meleager story.

5. Avian Allusion and Illusion

269

(of the Calydonian people mourning at the fall of Calydon and Meleager) alta iacet Calydon: lugent iuvenesque senesque, vulgusque proceresque gemunt, scissaeque capillos planguntur matres Calydonides Eueninae; pulvere canitiem genitor vultusque seniles foedat humi fusus spatiosumque increpat aevum. (Met. 8.526-530) Lofty Calydon falls: young men and old, nobles and common folk, lament and groan, and the Calydonian women dwelling at the banks of the Euenus river beat their breasts and tear their hair. The father strewn on the ground defiles his white hair and aged face with dirt, and he laments for his life that lasted too long. (of Ardea the bird beating itself in lamentation) Turnusque cadit; cadit Ardea, Turno sospite dicta potens. quam postquam barbarus ensis abstulit et tepida patuerunt tecta favilla, congerie e media tum primum cognita praepes subvolat et cineres plausis everberat alis. et sonus et macies et pallor et omnia, captam quae deceant urbem, nomen quoque mansit in illa urbis, et ipsa suis deplangitur Ardea pennis. (Met. 14.573-580) And Turnus fell. Ardea, counted a powerful city while Turnus was alive, fell. But after the foreigner’s sword destroyed it and its ruins stood open amidst warm ashes, from the confused mass a bird flew forth of a kind never seen before and beat the ashes with its flapping wings. Its sound, its meager look, its deathly paleness, all things which become a captured city, even the city’s name, remained in the bird. And Ardea’s self is beaten in lamentation by its wings.

The motifs of self-mutilation, specifically the beating of breasts that distinguishes the epic females’ lament and mourning over the death of kin, are present in all three passages.579 In the second and third passages, the death of the hero is entwined with the fall of a city, because the city identifies with the hero. In the first and third passages, the names ‘Althaea’ and ‘Ardea’ sound temptingly similar. All these motifs occur in a fourth passage, in Aurora’s mourning the loss of Memnon at Met. 13.578-586. Once again, the reader is confronted with the lamenting parent (578 luctus… domesticus angit, ‘a grief in her own family strangles her’; 584 crine soluto, ‘with loosened hair’; 586 lacrimis, ‘in tears’), whose grief is typically expressed in the change (pallor and darkening) of her facial colors (581-582 vidit, et ille color, quo matutina rubescunt / tempora, palluerat, latuitque in nubibus aether, ‘she saw and that bright color by which 579

Hopkinson 2000, 190 [611n], notes that plangor, the term featured in all three passages above, conveniently refers to the flapping of the birds’ wings, and it also means ‘lamentation’ (OLD s.v. plangor, 2).

270

Memnon’s Fate and Fame: Impersonating Achilles

the time of the first morning flushes rosy red grew pale, and the sky was covered with clouds’). Aurora’s divine identity, particularly her status as personification of the natural phenomenon of the dawn, raises, to a macrocosmic and universal level, an epic moment, the lament, which humanizes the epic actors and briefly bridges the gap that distances their world from the everyday reality of the epic audience. Nonetheless, the serialization of this female lament theme eventually stymies creative repetition, the referre idem aliter, which drives the Metamorphoses plot forwards. Furthermore, clichés that develop inside the frame of an assortment of different epic, or more correctly, mockepic contexts (the Meleagris, the Iliupersis, the Aethiopis and the *Ardeaspersis*) undermine the gravity of the theme. The account of the Meleagrides miracle is announced with a grandiloquent adaptation of a famous Homeric theme, the proclamation that not even a hundred tongues suffice to cover it: Met. 8.533-535 non mihi si centum deus ora sonantia linguis / ingeniumque capax totumque Helicona dedisset, / [tristia persequerer miserarum fata sororum], (‘not if some god had given me a hundred mouths, each with its tongue, a master’s genius, and all Helicon’s inspiration, [could I describe the sad fate of those poor sisters]’). In the rephrasing of this muchrevisited epic topos of the bard’s presumed self-effacement580, the spirit of mockery, which enhances the de-epicizing of the Calydonian hunt and Meleager’s death (Met. 8.515-525), is dominant. The couplet at 533-534 alludes both to Homer’s hundred-mouth epigraph and to the Muses’ visitation on Hesiod’s mount Helicon, and Ovid’s narrative, as it usually happens, embraces creatively the spirit of the two great epicists’ most explicit poetologic statements. On account of its placement precisely in the middle of the whole poem, with 5,986 lines preceding it and exactly 6,000 – minus the sphragis – coming after it, the Meleager episode partakes directly of the poetics attached to poetic middles. Philip Hardie has recently discussed Ovid’s middles in some detail581, and he discerns a general tendency throughout the Ovidian poetic corpus against architectural precision, and hence, predictability; still, he endorses a reading of Metamorphoses 8 as a blueprint of Ovid’s epic poetics. Hardie’s own focus narrows in on the cluster of tales in the Achelous episode (pp. 169-173). Since these tales also belong to Book 8, and are set immediately after Meleager, Hardie implicitly acknowledges the centrality of the ‘Meleagris’, yet, not in its own right, but as a preamble to the broader and more complex Achelous narrative. Stephen Hinds, on the other hand, in a much 580 581

The various treatments of the motif across epic literature are listed in Hollis 1970, ad 533534, and Hinds 1998, 42-45. Hardie 2004; Hardie’s article identifies several middles in the carefully and purportedly compartmentalized structure of the Metamorphoses and proposes to view them as rings along a well-rought, intricate chain that guarantees the epic’s structural coherence.

5. Avian Allusion and Illusion

271

earlier piece, already drew attention to the centrality of the Meleager story much more explicitly, by noting that the episode is “the middle myth of the very middle of the book”.582 In the same study, Hinds notes that Ovid would use the fate of Meleager to hint at his attempt to burn his Metamorphoses upon hearing the news of his banishment. It follows from the above that, by employing in his exilic Tristia 1.7.20 the term viscera, ‘vitals’, to refer to the Metamorphoses, our poet elicits the epic’s identification with the burning ‘vitals’ of Meleager (Met. 8.516), the account of whose doom he smartly ensconces in the exact middle of the Tristia (poem 1.7).583 Logically, then, the mourning for Memnon, followed by the Memnonides’ transformation, and their subsequent fraternal fight and collective death, becomes a powerful sequel to a series of avian transformations and excessive laments that declare, in their respective contexts, Ovid’s innovative metamorphic poetics. The two are preceded by the pathetic mourning and metamorphic fate of the Heliades in Book 2 (Met. 2.329-380) at the close of the Phaethon episode, while the poetics of the mourning mother and sisters of the dead hero is accentuated through the addition of the Ligurian Cygnus to their chorus.584 Indeed, the epic character of Ovid’s Phaethon, the longest single narrative in the poem (Met. 1.747-2.400), received critical acknowledgment as early as the days of Rohde.585 The text is full of echoes of Vergil’s Aeneid, but also of lengthier Homeric intertexts, which it pointedly deflates.586 In this spirit of epic devaluation Ovid construes a close intratextual bond between the Heli582

583

584 585

586

S. Hinds, ‘Booking the Return Trip: Ovid and Tristia 1’, PCPS 31 (1985), 22 [13-32]. The Meleager episode was already acknowledged as the middle of the Metamorphoses in Crabbe 1981. Hardie 2004, who acknowledges Hinds, briefly adds his own observations on the centrality of Metamorphoses 8, by referring to the concentration in this book of themes from Aeneid 6, 7, and 8, the three middle books of Vergil’s epic; cf. Hardie 2004, 161-163. Keith 1992, 137-146. “hic... Ovidius... fabulam quandam tam fuse atque diligenter enarrat, ut per se exiguum carmen epicum” (A. Rohde, De Ovidi arte epica capita duo [Diss. Berlin 1929] 28.); cf. also the observations by Galinsky 1975 49-52, and the epigrammatic characterization of the story by Otis (1970, 109) as “one of the most epically conceived”. Cf. Bömer 1969, 220-341, and Anderson 1996, 221-277, on Ovid’s linguistic borrowings from the Aeneid throughout the Phaethon episode. The interplay with the description of the cosmos on Achilles’ shield is also seen in the figuration of the universe on the Sun’s doors at the opening of Metamorphoses 2; cf. R. Brown, ‘The Palace of the Sun in Ovid’s Metamorphoses’, in: Whitby-Hardie-Whitby 1987, 211-220. M. von Albrecht Die Parenthese in Ovids Metamorphosen und ihre dichterische Funktion (Hildesheim 1963), 61, 66, notes that Phaethon’s averting his gaze from his father’s face blinded by the brightness of the god’s helmet forces the latter to remove it (Met. 2.31-32; 41-42) in the fashion of Hector’s similar gesture before his frightened baby son at Il. 6. 467-473.

272

Memnon’s Fate and Fame: Impersonating Achilles

ades and the Meleagrides. Both Phaethon and Meleager are buried in tombs that bear inscriptions with their names on them (2.325 corpora dant tumulo, signant quoque carmine saxum, ‘they [the Naiads] surrender the body to the tomb, and on top they mark the stone with the sign of an epigram’; 2.338 [Clymene] incubuit… loco, ‘she prostrates herself upon the tomb’ ~ 8.540-541 iacent tumulo signataque saxo nomina conplexae, ‘they [Meleager’s female kin] prostrate themselves on the tomb, and they embrace tightly the stone on which his name has been engraved’). Both Clymene, Phaethon’s mother, and the Meleagrides ‘bathed’ the funerary monuments of their beloved with tears (2.338-339 nomenque in marmore lectum / perfudit lacrimis, ‘she drenches the name engraved on the marble with her tears’ ~ 8.541 lacrimas in nomina fundunt, ‘they drench the name with their tears’). The Sun god and Meleager’s father demonstrate their grief in similar ways, by assuming ‘dark’ and gloomy facial expressions (2.329330 pater obductos luctu miserabilis aegro / condiderat vultus, ‘the poor father, sick with grief, hid his face’; 2.381, squalidus… genitor Phaethontis, ‘Phaethon’s father, in gloomy mourning garb…’ ~ 8.529-530 pulvere canitiem genitor vultusque seniles foedat, ‘the father [of Meleager] defiles his white hair and his aged head with dust’). The verb lugere, ‘mourn, lament’, is repeatedly employed to underline the grief of Phaethon’s relatives, respectively his father, mother and sisters: luctu (2.329), lugubris (2.334) and lugent (2.345). Likewise a single verb, fundere, appears at the center of the lament of Oeneus and the Meleagrides: fusus humi (‘spread out on ground’, 8.530) and adfusae… tumulo (‘spread themselves out… on the tomb’, 8.540), lacrimas… fundunt (‘pour out tears’, 8.541). Clymene’s condition, ‘distraught’ (amens, 2.335) is ‘echoed’ in the ‘negligence’ of the Meleagrides (immemores, 8.536). And both sets of sisters surrender themselves to excessive lament and self-mutilation: dant lacrimas (‘shed tears’, 2.341), miseras… querellas… vocant (‘release pitiful cries of woe’, 2.342-43) ~ lacrimas… fundunt (‘pour out tears’, 8.541); adsternuntque sepulcro (‘they prostrate themselves upon the sepulchre’, 2.343) ~ adfusaeque iacent tumulo (‘they prostrate themselves on the tomb’, 8.540); caesae pectora palmis (‘with bruising hands beating their breasts’, 2.341), plangorem dederant (‘they have been beating themselves in mourning’, 2.346) ~ liventia pectora tundunt (‘they pummel their bruised breast’, 8.536). Finally, Clymene’s role as grieving mother is reflected in the entire community of Calydonian matrons (2.335 [Clymene] laniata sinus, ‘Cl. tearing her bosom’ ~ 8.527-528 scissaeque capillos planguntur matres Calydonides Eueninae, ‘the mothers of Calydon that lies by the Euenus river were beating themselves in mourning and tearing her hair’; cf. cum [Lampetie] crinem laniare pararet (‘when L. was preparing to tear her hair’, 2.350).587 The 587

W. Clausen, Vergil: Eclogues (Oxford 1994), 198, further notes that in Ecl. 6.62, Vergil coined the patronymic Phaethontiadas for Phaethon’s sisters, inspired by its resonance to the

5. Avian Allusion and Illusion

273

Memnonides’ textual affinity to the Meleagrides transforms the pairing process into a diligently composed nexus of intratexts in discourse, which become at once each other’s commentary and the regularly recurring structural signposts that trace the narrative line of the Metamorphoses. 5.2. Illusory Sêmata Memnon’s death and funeral honors, as reported in Ovid, are conveniently and suggestively vague about the location, or rather the concept, of Memnon’s tomb. The description of the burial offered to Memnon’s body in the Metamorphoses (13.583), Aurora’s Thetis-like grief, and the reference to an annual ‘return’ of the fighting Memnonides (13.617-619), suggest a heroic burial in the Troad by his fellow warriors, in the pattern of the Homeric heroic burials. The absence of some specific reference to a tomb, however, is suspect, and bespeaks conscious, deliberate decision. The finale to the ‘little Iliad’, like virtually every unit in the cluster, comprises an unconventional and elusive hero death. These serial deaths are all associated with significant, though unorthodox, sêmata, memorial tombstones that likely signify (sêmainein) more than what is extracted therefrom when their viewer pays only a cursory glance at them (‘reading’). Yet, paradoxically, even though a literal sêma becomes the common thematic marker of closure of every ‘little Iliad’ episode, the reality of the physical existence of each sêma is paired with illusion, an elusive content. The sêma-tic chain of illusion through elusiveness gives shape to a metaphorical puzzle, and to solve it, one simply has to acknowledge and accept the very idea of elusiveness, which the persistent resistance to prescription, topographically or semantically, in all these sêmata, signifies (sêmainein). The fluidity that distinguishes the sêmata and the framework of their linear articulation are discussed presently. Apart from a narrative mechanism effecting connection, the irresolution underwriting the closure to each segment of the ‘little Iliad’ also becomes an interpretive mechanism, for it encapsulates the philosophy of Ovid’s experimentation with reinventing epic; as such, it constitutes the ideal epilogue to my book. The outright contradiction of a memorial that is also a grave monument is as old as the Homeric narrative. In Iliad 7.89-90, Hector imagines a tomb that will be set up for the warrior he kills, which will stand as a reminder of his glory for the ‘men to come’. Bouvier, in a recent study of this passage, observes that the language of this speech resurfaces again in the Iliad, in term Meleagridas.

274

Memnon’s Fate and Fame: Impersonating Achilles

23.331-332, where it applies to a marker that may be either someone’s unmarked gravesite or a horos, a boundary stone. In Bouvier’s understanding, the identity of the monumentum as such is jeopardized, precisely because there is no epitaph on it to reveal the identity of the dead or at least, to identify the site as a tomb. Bouvier’s reading is particularly useful for the purposes of understanding the complex significance of Ovid’s sêmata, because it clearly perceives the Iliad text as independent, free from the control of its creator. It places at opposite ends Homer, who envisions a story (a hero’s memory or a standardized version of an oral fama) which will be repeated down through the generations to come, and the poem itself which envisions a ‘transformation’ of the story such that seeks to obliterate rather than memorialize this past.588 The association between the effort to affix a diachronic definition to the epic genre and the imagery of the monumentum is suggested already at the opening of Bouvier’s second chapter. There, it is reported that the manufacturing of a successful (that is, lasting) heroic profile (or epic composition) requires transcendence of time, and this can be accomplished only through memory, or language that translates as memory, such as oral epic or memorial epitaphs. Yet, when Bouvier compares Hector’s speech in Iliad 7 to its recurrence in the different context of Iliad 23, he realizes that repetition, the backbone of archaic epic poetry, does not guarantee the desired transcendence. Rather, it is an indication that the Homeric bard is as much interested in ‘remembering’, and so, in preserving and immortalizing, or ‘monumentalizing’, a stable tradition, as he is in reinventing that tradition. In turn, Ovid keenly capitalizes on an intellectual process that was already at work in the literary self-portrayal of the Homeric poet. The inquiry about the vagueness, that marks the tradition on Memnon’s burial and the location of his tomb, becomes the starting point of my closure. In ancient Greek literature Memnon’s burial site was an issue of wide dispute. The earliest testimony, a fragment attributed to Hesiod, locates a tomb for the hero at Aesepos on the coast of the Troad (Hes. fr. 353 M-W). Subsequently, however, the sources report that, following the hero’s death at the hand of Achilles, Eos snatched her son’s body from the battlefield and transported it back to his fatherland, Aethiopia.589 Ovid’s position is curiously ambiguous: a crafty compromise between the two traditions. It is my contention that the 588 589

See, D. Bouvier, Le sceptre et la lyre. L’ Iliade ou les héros de la mémoire. Collection Horos (Grenoble 2002), Chapter 2: “L’invention d’une langue de la mémoire”. Depending on the location of Ethiopia, Memnon’s tomb is situated at Susa (e.g. Diod. 2.22; Hdt. 5.54; Strabo 15.3.2, p. 728), in Syria (Simonides fr. 539 Page), or in Egypt (e.g. Aeschylus fr. 300 Radt); there are also several references to monuments mentioned in relation to an actual site of Memnon’s tomb. Hesiod, for his part, is followed at least by Quintus of Smyrna; see A. Kossatz-Deissman, ‘Memnon’, LIMC 6.1 (1992), 449.

5. Avian Allusion and Illusion

275

Roman poet builds an argument which, among other things, would both use and toy with the simultaneity of an actual and a fictional tomb. Ovid’s literary objectives are easy to comprehend, in light of the serial cenotaphs that close nearly every story in his ‘Iliad’.590 These cenotaphs, or near-cenotaphs, are different only in appearance, in the different names and settings of the heroic, or rather mock-heroic, deaths they treat. In reality, they revisit from multiple angles the single core idea of the powerlessness that embraces the biological death of an epic hero. More abstractly, in the perennial emptiness of their lasting presence they celebrate the superior, diachronic power of illusions and impressions over the temporary power of a specific individual, the hero – a power that is not necessarily expected to last beyond the hero’s death or displacement. A cenotaph represents the memory, the symbolism of a tomb, rather than the reality of an actual burial monument. Since a memory is formulated and controlled through speech, and is not always identified with a single source or traced to a single origin, it defies containment and regulation. In this respect, a cenotaph, a tomb of tangible and visible structure but of elusive content, becomes the ideal metaphor, not merely for Ovid’s strange epic voice, but for the fluidity and ongoing manipulation of the conventionally defined ‘epic fama’ in its evolution over time. In the ‘little Iliad’, the elusiveness in shape (metamorphosis) that makes the Ovidian epic narrative read as non-epic, and the unpredictability in the forma, or design, of the narration, which distinguishes an epic narrative without a single plot-line, determine the regularity with which the cenotaph motif recurs throughout. With respect to Ovid’s epic universe, any physical memorial is an entrapment, a promise of immortality impossible to fulfill: material monuments are perishable and hence temporary, but, more importantly, they are subject to manipulation, deliberate misidentification and misappropriation. Aesacus’ empty tomb is the image that welcomes the reader to the metamorphosed story of the Trojan War; by virtue of its programmatic placement, it sanctifies the cenotaph theme. Not fortuitously, then, this first monumentum, 590

On Ovid’s investing in the metaliterary value of the cenotaphs as substitute monumenta, which both affirm and deceive about the identity and the worth (fama) of the deceased they host, see Hardie 2002, 84-91. Hardie views the cenotaph as a more realistic (“the purest”) version of the funerary monumentum; the latter, he considers a marker of the emptiness, a signifier to the absent presence of the dead. The presence of the monument purports to retain alive the remembrance of the dead, to argue that the biologically dead body through memorialization has transcended the boundaries of tomb and time alike. A cenotaph is the apex of this process of transcendence, the most sincere form of honorary memorializing in its exclusive devotion to the abstractness of the epic fama that an epic hero briefly entraps in the concretion of its [the cenotaph’s] ephemeral mortality.

276

Memnon’s Fate and Fame: Impersonating Achilles

the empty memorial that the sons of Priam erect to honor the memory of their vanished brother, attempts to record, visually and verbally, the impossibility of containing the elusive Ovidian fama. The Trojan princes memorialize their brother even though they do not have his body, because they believe that he is dead. Their belief is so strong as to displace knowledge, hard evidence, the body itself. Yet, Aesacus is not dead; the narrative of his life has not reached closure. In this respect, the cenotaph is a memorial not to Aesacus’ life, but to a fragment of Aesacus’ life. Aesacus’ family memorializes THEIR memory of Aesacus, and in doing so, they already commence their manipulation of the hero’s fama. Iphigeneia’s rapture only a few lines later resumes the debate on the limits vs. the limitations of commemoration. Iphigeneia vanishes moments before her life reaches its ‘epic’ closure – a sacrifice for the sake of her fatherland, and a female death that propels the most celebrated collective male accomplishment. The deer that reportedly takes her place on the altar supplants the sacrificial offerings that, under normal circumstances, would honor the death of a princess. The tradition of Diana’s intervention in the miraculous abduction of Agamemnon’s daughter is itself a memorial, a monument in the guise of a legend, a fama, which the vates Calchas, a substitute Muse, conceives and circulates. A reversal of Aesacus’ monumentum in its signification, Iphigeneia is denied a literal memorial. Unlike the compulsion to prescribe and project the normalcy of death for the male prince which brings about the construction of Aesacus’ cenotaph, Iphigeneia, the victimized female, because she serves the epic narrative best as an abstraction, is honored with an unmarked and intangible ‘memorial’, and a story of transformation. The narrative monumenta that take the place of the thematically analogous ‘deaths’ of Cycnus and Caeneus, in the impermanence of their avian shape redefine the elusiveness of death through their defiance all effort to control epic death. Both Cycnus and Caeneus, like Iphigeneia and Aesacus, are misfits in a typical epic narrative, because they are invulnerable to weapons; yet, both are cast in roles that require their vulnerability and, specifically, their death through spear penetration. And as their removal from the epic narrative is not marked by conventional death, the capitalization over their memory becomes a tantalizing, pressing issue causing much anxiety and soul-searching. But unlike the memorials that honor Aesacus and Iphigeneia, the ‘cenotaphic’ narratives of Cycnus and Caeneus are monumenta to the heroic memory of Achilles. A fixed record of Cycnus’ conquest is the prerequisite to ascertain Achilles’ epic status and sanctificy the ‘epic’ dimension of the Ovidian tale of Troy. Caeneus’ fate disserts more vociferously on the same set of genre-tied preoccupations: few narrative units are as distinctly epical as the Centauromachy, or as profoundly undercutting of the traditional epic genre. Caeneus the epic warrior is buried underneath a pile of trees but he is reportedly re-

5. Avian Allusion and Illusion

277

born as the phoenix, the sui generis, self-propagating and unique bird – an obvious allusion to the extraordinary epic voice of Ovid. The elusiveness of the Ovidian epic hero and the deconstruction of the Homeric leader whom Achilles exemplifies merge, and surface anew in Achilles’ own, semantically compact ‘cenotaph’, a burial monument that reverses the dynamics of the epic cenotaph as observed throughout Metamorphoses 12. Unlike every other tomb in the ‘little Iliad’ prior to Achilles’ death, Achilles’ tomb is an actual burial site. Unlike his rivals, who strive to bring about his epic deconstruction in the Metamorphoses, Achilles does die a conventional, biological death. Furthermore, the effort to ‘freeze’ the ‘ideal’ or ‘desirable’ memory of the unburied entombed does not apply to Achilles’ case. The Greek leader’s epic reputation resists the immortality of a monumentum that is fixed, tied to a particular location, or, speaking in terms of poetics, to a single and prescribed narrative version. The danger this limitation may harbor for such an uncontested fama is the impermanence that is attached to a physical, and so, perishable, monument, whose subjection to future ruin dooms the survival of the fama that is solely and exclusively dependent on it. On the other hand, an uncontainable and ever-evolving fama usually escapes control, often with outcomes less than desirable. While the first reader might see in the chronologically and topographically omnipresent fama of Achilles proof of the survival of the hero’s legend, questions about the possible intervention and manipulation of the Achilles legend are expected to arise sooner or later. Ovid’s spirited eulogy for Achilles’ death is too enthusiastic to be taken literally. Situated at the exact middle of Met. 12.1-13.622, at the closing lines of Book 12 (580-620), the death of Achilles is reported exactly 580 lines after the opening of the Ovidian version of the Trojan legend, and exactly 580 lines prior to the miraculous funeral of Memnon, Achilles’ closest double in the Trojan tradition. My analysis of the dialogue between Memnon and Meleager a few pages earlier touched upon the poetics and politics of textual middles in Augustan literature. Specifically, it was remarked that a ‘middle’ section of a text – although what critics define as ‘middle’ does not always correspond to the actual middle section of a narrative – on several occasions directs the interpretation of the enveloping narrative.591 Ovid’s language, which ingeniously sways between eulogizing solemnity and subtle mockery verging on irony, typifies a successful mock-epic narrative. The concurrence and combination of the metaphorical and the literal, marks the next manifestation of the cenotaph motif. Following his suicide, 591

On the definition of a ‘narrative middle’, see Hardie’s ‘Don Fowler and Middles’, in Kyriakides – De Martino 2004, 25-26.

278

Memnon’s Fate and Fame: Impersonating Achilles

Ajax’ blood, a symbol of elusiveness in the fluidity of its liquid nature, nonetheless leaves a permanent mark on the petals of the hyacinth flower. Even more than that, the traces of permanence are vociferously individualized: the petals of the flower are not only colored but inscribed with letter characters, AI AI. This inscription indelibly declares the origin of the coloration, its metaphoric function as a memorial, but also its literal function as an epitaph. Ajax’ memorial, so to speak, revisits the thematics tied to the tomb of Achilles; and its own peculiar structure is a deliberate effort to challenge and transform creatively that ‘rival’ monument. Achilles’ widely spreading fama in theory may be both the monster and the muse, and lacking Ovid’s clear stance on the issue, Achilles’ tomb is subject to analogous discordance in its assessment. In Ajax’ case, however, an inscription is provided. This is not a literal inscription, cut on an architectural construction conventionally corresponding to a ‘monument’, but is similarly successful in guaranteeing Ajax’s immortality and an individualized fama, a story, about it. The inscribing on the petals of a ubiquitous flower reverses the semantics of Achilles’ fixed tomb at Sigeion, which likewise carries a memorial ‘text’ or fama that is ubiquitous but also volatile, being regularly subjected to revision. Still, even that very mark of monumental permanence, the traditional location of Achilles’ tomb, comes under attack. When the hero’s ghost appears to demand that Polyxena be sacrificed on his tomb, the setting of the action is not Sigeion but the coast of Thrace. Polyxena’s ‘memorial’ follows along the same path of anti-epic reversal, by stressing gender reversal. The heroine is granted a memorial, a burial and a ritual lament, honors typically, if not exclusively, reserved for male heroes in the epic tradition. In her departure speech she resuscitates the dying moments of the Homeric image of her brother and Achilles’ rival duplicate, Hector, whose actual monumentum appears at the closing scene of the Iliad. The implicit revision of the Vergilian account in Ovid’s version of Polydorus reenacts the dilemma over the double symbolism behind Hector’s remark, in Iliad 7.89-90, on the complex signification of an unknown opponent’s burial monument. For Hector, an anonymous dead warrior in the Homeric text has epic value (that is, he deserves a presence in the epic narrative of a bard) only as a monumentum to sustain and propagate Hector’s own epic fama. Polydorus’ monumentum, once discovered and identified as such, confirms his slayer’s infamy, a monstrous fama, and so, justifies the latter’s tragic punishment about to follow – and ‘monumentalizes’ it, too, for the future generations of epic readers. Indirectly, Ovid warns that the identification of an anonymous tumulus-‘mound’ as tumulus-‘tomb’ does not always benefit the hero-conqueror. The unique status, finally, of Memnon as a duplicate Achilles renews the debate over the struggle to control the epic fama, which the son of Thetis per-

5. Avian Allusion and Illusion

279

sonifies. The epilogue to the ‘little Iliad’ does not seem to offer a resolution – or, does it? Indeed, it is likely that the proper appreciation of a monumentum depends precisely on how often it is revisited. The art of decoding demands deep, persistent reflection, and an ongoing effort that examines the problem from different angles and inside different contexts. Memnon’s funeral pyre and the cultic honors of the Memnonides annual sacrificial rite recontextualize the pyre of Achilles. Simultaneously, they reach across the epic tradition to the end of the Iliad, the pyre and the monumentum of Hector. The undisputed authority of the Homeric text sanctions the monumentum as the ideal closural moment, but the containment and the control of an epic fama defy structural axioms.592 5.3. Sema-ntic Nomina Nomenclature and etymology are inherent in the development of Alexandrian poetics – and an equally serious preoccupation among their Roman emulators. In Ovid’s text one witnesses numerous examples of highly sophisticated engagement with linguistics. The inscription of Ajax’s name on the hyacinth, which ‘transforms’ the flower into a symbolic monument, is actually part of a thematic pattern where nomenclature governs monumentalizing. The combination of a cenotaphic monumentum, either a literal one (a monument set up in reminiscence of a body) or a symbolic one (a marker set up literally in the place of a body, in the place, that is, where that body was last observed standing), and an epigraph, the written text that identifies the cenotaph as such, and thus as a monumentum, comment in their particular ways on the interplay between ‘presence’ and ‘absence’, two sets of ideologies that appear mutually exclusive but in reality are closely tied to the idea of transformation, itself a metaphoric expression of this mutual displacement. The cenotaph motif and the epigraph thereupon, which transforms the empty tumulus, first, into a tomb and then, into a monumentum, are part of the 592

Hardie 2002, 243, on the similar case of Meleager’s association with birds named after him. For Hardie, this is a metamorphosis from corpus, body, into nomina, and, further, it is an alternative expression of the transformation of the body of the hero into a tomb. Meleager and Phaethon are exemplars of this process (discussed in relation to each other by Hardie on pp. 82-83), but Memnon does not stand too far off. Hardie does not discuss Memnon’s transformation in detail, because in Memnon’s case the written text that confirms the identification of the monument and the dead is missing. One could argue, though, that it is ‘replaced’ by the annual cultic rehearsal of the Memnonides, who share the same etymology as the honoree, and by the annual rite of their fighting, which supplants the missing epitaph required to metamorphose Memnon’s tomb into a memorial.

280

Memnon’s Fate and Fame: Impersonating Achilles

narrative imagery as early as the opening verses of the ‘little Iliad’: Met. 12.2-3 tumulo quoque nomen habenti… inferias dederat… inanes, ‘[Hector] offered empty honors at the tomb that carried the name [of the lost Aesacus])’. The honors are empty because the tomb is empty.593 Ovid’s Aesacus is considered a literary invention. To this date, criticism has proferred no argument to justify Ovid’s predilection for that particular nomen. In light of the inseparability between the name and the empty tomb required, to establish the deceased’s actual existence along with his heroic status and immortality, it is tempting to suggest a derivation from the Homeric aisa, ‘[one’s] fate, lot, or destiny’. Aesacus’ peculiar destiny, or aisa, is to be presumed dead without dying, but especially, it is to be honored as dead without definite proof of his death. This completely manipulated aisa is a construction, a human adaptation, of the macrocosmic Aisa or ‘Moira’, the universal destiny, which is not subject to any form of control. In the paradoxical clash between Aesacus’ name, which stems from (divine) predestination, and Aesacus’ post-tranformation destiny, which is the outcome of personal (human) interests, in an intelligent and humorous way Ovid introduces a leitmotif for the understanding of the antagonistic objectives behind his ‘Iliad’ narrative. Aesacus’ cenotaph monumentalizes the hero’s fate, which nonetheless is a ‘fate’ not directed by the great Aisa, but, instead, by mortal initiative seeking acceptance by means of imposing itself in the name and the guise of an aisa.594 Cycnus’ name, like Ajax’s own, would live forever, even past the hero’s death, because it became the name of an avian, which, like the hyacinth, exists entwined with the memory of the hero, who is responsible for its naming and so, for its very existence. The emptiness of Caeneus’ cenotaph, the ‘tomb’ made up of trunks that simultaneously inflict and receive death, is predicated, once again, in the etymology behind the hero’s name. Caeneus may be both ) and, para-etymologically, the ‘Empty Man’ ( ). the ‘New Man’ ( The former designates his metastasis, first, into a male and then, into an avian, while the latter alludes to the emptiness, the failure of the ‘monumentalizing’ that the Centaurs strive to effect. The linguistic game in the etymology of Polydorus’ name – the tautochronous recollection of the cause (dora, ‘gifts’) and the instrument (doru, ‘spear’) that brought about the youth’s death – is an essential part of the subtext in the episode. The tumulus/monumentum to Polydorus is marked, and so 593

594

Bömer 1982, 12, by preferring the least popular script, inani, over the widely favored, inanes, at Met. 12.3, successfully transforms the logical attribution of the ‘emptiness’ to the tomb into a literal one, but he clashes against the text adopted in the standard critical editions of the Metamorphoses, since both Tarrant 2004, and, earlier, Anderson 1972, print inanes. See the opening of chapter one (pp. 27-28), for details on Aesacus’ potential etymological linkage to aisa and the thematic associations that this relationship produces.

5. Avian Allusion and Illusion

281

‘identified’, for the reader versed in Vergil, by the dorata, ‘spears’, which transformed the youth into a dead body in need of a memorial. A comparable play centering on the theme of xenia is tied to the etymology of Polyxena’s name, for the ‘hospitable’ treatment awaiting the princess, a death sentence clothed as sacrifice to memorialize the fama of Achilles, distorts the idea of the Homeric xenia. This crucial idea of xenia, importantly, marked Achilles’ conduct in the hero’s last appearance in the Iliad: it restored his humanity and completed his reintegration into the world of the heroic epic. On the contrary, his Ovidian counterpart’s final appearance in the ‘little Iliad’, even though one more imposing and intimidating, severs his fama from the essence of epic heroism. In Memnon’s memorial, finally, etymology and monumentalizing become inseparable. The memorializing of the hero’s fama, his own ‘monumentum’, is effected through the annual ritual of a pilgrimage to his tomb, a typical memorial service, and, through the theatrics of an internecine fight, apparently in reminiscence of the heroic status of the deceased. The pilgrims and fighters are avian, the Memnonides, whose name is the epigraph that is missing from Memnon’s physical monumentum. But the complete fusion of semantics – distinct from etymology this time – and monument is reserved appropriately for the end. Memnon’s cultic honoring is framed by the canine metamorphosis of Hecuba. The permutation theme, and Hecuba’s one in particular, is the finale to the ‘Survivors’ unit: Hecuba’s hatred, her passion to exact revenge on Polymnestor, gradually takes complete hold over her humanity. Her feral emotional status, initially expressed through the execution of her revenge, which involves the blinding of the Thracian king with her own bare hands, is ultimately imprinted permanently on her appearance. She feels and behaves like an enraged bitch, which means that she feels and thinks like one; it is only logical that she be turned into one: clade sui Thracum gens inritata tyranni Troada telorum lapidumque incessere iactu coepit; at haec missum rauco cum murmure saxum morsibus insequitur rictuque in verba parato latravit conata loqui (locus exstat et ex re nomen habet), veterumque diu memor illa malorum tum quoque Sithonios ululavit maesta per agros. (Met. 13.565-571) The Thracian people incensed by their ruler’s disaster began to attack the Trojan woman by throwing at her spears and stones, but she with a hoarse growl bit at the stones they hurled at her and, while her jaws were readied for words, she barked when she tried to speak (the place is still standing, and it carries its name from this incident), and long remembering her ancient ills, she kept on howling mournfully across the Sithonian plains.

282

Memnon’s Fate and Fame: Impersonating Achilles

Like Aesacus and Caeneus, Hecuba in Ovid is transmogrified while she is still alive, with the difference that in the Trojan queen’s case, the fact that she is truly alive is not disputed by anyone.595 And most importantly, she, alone of all other shape-shifters in the ‘little Iliad’, becomes automatically a sêma declared as such in the etymology of its nomen, Cynos-sêma, ‘the dog’s mark or burial monument’. In her new form, as a landmark or sêma, the queen ascertains that her memory and the memory of her tragic plight will be perpetuated and her immortality will be secured.596 Hecuba’s automatic memorialization confirms the metaphorical gender transformation she underwent in the aftermath of the Trojan disaster. Hecuba, in the absence of a male avenger, herself orchestrates and executes the punishment of Polymestor. This role reversal breaks the Homeric epic code even more profoundly, for, in the end it is recognized officially: it is celebrated with a sêma, an honor reserved only for males because it presupposes the accomplishment of klea, the deeds of men. Finally, by virtue of its positioning, Hecuba’s most explicit sêma – the only sêma spelled out as such in the long series of monumenta in Met. 12.113.622 – also becomes a literary trademark sign, the carrier of Ovid’s signature of epic alterity.597 The ‘little Iliad’, Ovid’s direct confrontation with the Epic Cycle and the Homeric poems, in bestowing the status of the monumentum and the marker of immortality on a female, breaks away from the most fundamental rule of epic composition. The paradox of the female sêma gazing at the open sea presents an irresistible image, and no less, a suggestive literary symbolism, at the outset of the ‘little Aeneid’. It is hardly surprising, then, that Met. 13.620-623, the cynosure of the Cynosema, indirectly revisits the canine Hecuba when it bestows upon Aurora, another grieving mother, the imagery

595

596 597

In Euripides’ version, Hecuba’s transformation does not take place on stage or during the dramatic time of the play, and it follows a different course. Polymestor prophesies (Hec. 1270-1273) that the queen will jump off Ulixes’ ship on their way to Greece. She will drown at sea and then change into a dog, whose body will be carried back to the promontory of the Trojan coast, which henceforth will be named Cynossêma; cf. Hopkinson 2000, 24-25. Michalopoulos 2001, 65, notes that Ovid is not alone in stepping away from Euripides in preferring a different aetiology for the Cynossêma; one of the sources that he cites, a passage from the Inscriptiones et hypothesis in Odysseam t, reports the same story as does the Metamorphoses. Mossman 1995, passim, on Hecuba’s metamorphosis and its association with perpetuation and immortality. The profound breach with tradition and the impact on the definition of the epic genre are only underlined by the emphasis on the universal sadness at Hecuba’s plight, at 13.572-575. Especially the assertion on the last verse, that ‘Hecuba did not deserve such an end’ (eventus Hecaben meruisse negaverit illos), is both true and ironic: indeed, according to the gender code of traditional epic, a female does not deserve either a sêma or a placement at the final, especially powerful section of an epic poem.

5. Avian Allusion and Illusion

283

and thematics that distinguish the Trojan queen throughout her long literary life. The reader of the Metamorphoses does leave Troy and the Trojan War behind, and the move forwards, or rather westwards, on board Aeneas’ ships, relocates the struggle over the containment and shaping of the epic fama as well. The transformation of Ardea, the epilogue to Aeneas’ own epic labor, which revives aliter the same debate, only confirms that the containment of a literary fama is an ever-elusive quest, and perhaps, for this very reason, one of undiminished popularity and uncontested greatness.

Bibliography The bibliography lists items that have been noted more than once in the book. Books and articles cited only once are recorded in full in the references throughout. Adams 1982 Adkins 1969 Alexiou 2002 Alden 2000 Anderson 1972 Anderson 1996 Anderson 1997 Austin 1964 Baier 1999 Baldo 1995 Barchiesi 1984 Barchiesi 2001 Barchiesi 2002 Boyd 2002 Brookes 1994 Burgess 1995 Burgess 2001 Casali 2007 Collard 1995

J.N. Adams, The Latin Sexual Vocabulary (London 1982) A.W.H. Adkins, ‘Threatening, Abusing and Feeling Angry in the Homeric Poems’, JHS 89 (1969), 2-21 M. Alexiou, The Ritual Lament in Greek Tradition (Lanham, MD/Boulder/New York/Oxford 2002); 2nd rev. edition by P. Roilos and D. Yatromanolakis M. Alden, Homer Beside Himself. Paranarratives in the Iliad (Oxford 2000) W.S. Anderson, Ovid’s Metamorphoses Books 6-10 (Norman, OK 1972) W.S. Anderson, Ovid’s Metamorphoses Books 1-5 (Norman, OK 1996) M.J. Anderson, The Fall of Troy in Early Greek Poetry and Art (Oxford 1997) R.G. Austin, P. Vergili Maronis Aeneidos Liber Secundus. Edited with a Commentary (Oxford 1964) T. Baier, ‘Die Wandlung des epischen Erzählers. Apologe bei Homer, Vergil und Ovid’, Hermes 127 (1999), 427-454 G. Baldo, Dall’ Eneide Alle Metamorfosi: Il Codice Epico di Ovidio (Padova 1995) A. Barchiesi, La traccia del modello: Effetti omerici nella narrazione virgiliana (Pisa 1984) A. Barchiesi, Speaking Volumes: Narrative and Intertext in Ovid and other Latin Poets. Edited and translated by M. Fox and S. Marchesi (London 2001) A. Barchiesi, ‘Narrative Technique and Narratology in the Metamorphoses’, in: P.R. Hardie (ed.), The Cambridge Companion to Ovid (Cambridge 2002), 180-199 B.W. Boyd (ed.), Brill’s Companion to Ovid (Leiden 2002) I. Brookes, ‘The Death of Chiron: Ovid, Fasti 5.379-414’, CQ 44 (1994), 444-450 J.S. Burgess, ‘Achilles’ Heel: the Death of Achilles in Ancient Myth’, Classical Antiquity 14 (1995), 217-243 J.S. Burgess, The Tradition of the Trojan War in Homer and the Epic Cycle (Baltimore/London 2001) S. Casali, ‘Correcting Aeneas’s Voyage: Ovid’s Commentary on Aeneid 3’, TAPA 137 (2007), 181-210 C. Collard, M.J. Cropp, and K.H. Lee (edd.), Euripides: Selected Fragmentary Plays, Volume I (Warminster 1995)

286 Crabbe 1981 Croisille 1985

Crotty 1994 Currie 1981 Davies 1989 De Brohun 2004 Depew-Obbink 2002 Derderian 2001 Dickson 1992 Dickson 1995 Dippel 1990 Du Bois 1982 Due 1974 Edwards 1985 Edwards 1991 Ellsworth 1980 Farrell 1991 Feeney 1991 Fenik 1968 Forbes Irving 1990 Fowler 1989 Fowler 1997

Fowler 2000

Bibliography

A. Crabbe, ‘Structure and Content in Ovid’s Metamorphoses’, ANRW II.31.4 (1981), 2274-2327 J.M. Croisille, ‘Remarques sur l'épisode troyen dans les Métamorphoses d’Ovide (Met. XII-XIII, 1-622)’, in: J.M. Frécaut and D. Porte (edd.), Journées Ovidiennes de Parménie. Actes du Colloque sur Ovide (24-26 juin 1983) (Brusseles 1985), 57-72 K. Crotty, The Poetics of Supplication: Homer’s Iliad and Odyssey (Ithaca, NY 1994) H.M. Currie, ‘Ovid and the Roman Stage’, Aufstieg und Niedergang der römischen Welt 2.31.4 (1981), 2701-2742 M. Davies, The Epic Cycle (Bristol 1989) J.B. DeBrohun, ‘Centaurs in Love and War: Cyllarus and Hylonome in Ovid Metamorphoses 12.393-428’, AJP 125 (2004), 417-452 M. Depew and D. Obbink (edd.), Matrices of Genre. Authors, Canons, and Society (Cambridge, MA 2000) K. Derderian, Leaving Words to Remember. Greek Mourning and the Advent of Literacy (Leiden 2001) K. Dickson, ‘Kalkhas and Nestor: Two Narrative Strategies in Iliad 1’, Arethusa 25 (1992), 327-358 K. Dickson, Nestor: Poetic Memory in Greek Epic (New York 1995) M. Dippel, Die Darstellung des trojanischen Krieges in Ovids Metamorphosen (XII-XIII 622) (Frankfurt am Main 1990) P. Du Bois, Centaurs and Amazons (Ann Arbor 1982) O.S. Due, Changing Forms. Studies in the Metamorphoses of Ovid (Copenhagen 1974) A.T. Edwards, Achilles in the Odyssey: Ideologies of Heroism in the Homeric Epic (Königstein 1985) M.W. Edwards, The Iliad: A Commentary. Volume 5: Books 17-20 (Cambridge 1991) J.D. Ellsworth, ‘Ovid’s Ilias (Metamorphoses 12.1-13.622)’, Prudentia 12 (1980), 23-29 J. Farrell, Vergil’s Georgics and the Traditions of Ancient Epic: The Art of Allusion in Literary History (Oxford/New York 1991) D. Feeney, The Gods in Epic (Oxford 1991) B. Fenik, Typical Battle Scenes in the Iliad (Wiesbaden 1968) P.M.C. Forbes Irving, Metamorphosis in Greek Myths (Oxford 1990) D. Fowler, ‘First Thoughts on Closure: Problems and Prospects’, MD 22 (1989), 75-122 [= D. Fowler, Roman Constructions: Readings in Postmodern Latin (Oxford 2000), 239-283] D. Fowler, ‘Second Thoughts on Closure’, in: D. Roberts, F. Dunn, and D.P. Fowler (edd.), Classical Closure: Reading the End in Greek and Latin Literature (Princeton 1997), 3-22 [= D. Fowler, Roman Constructions: Readings in Postmodern Latin (Oxford 2000), 284-307] D. Fowler, ‘Epic in the Middle of the Wood: Mise en Abyme in the Nisus and Euryalus Episode’, in: A. Sharrock and E.

Bibliography

Frazer 1921 Galinsky 1975 Galinsky 1990 Geffcken 1973 Gibson 2003 Griffin 2001 Gross 2000 Hardie 1986 Hardie 1992 Hardie 1993 Hardie 1994 Hardie 1999

Hardie-Barchiesi-Hinds 1999 Hardie 2002 Hardie 2004 Harrison 1991 Havelock 1963 Henderson 1995 Hill 1999 Hill 2000 Hinds 1998 Hollis 1970 Hopkinson 2000 Horsfall 1990

287

Morales (edd.), Intratextuality: Greek and Roman Relations (Oxford 2000), 89-113 J.G. Frazer (ed.), Apollodorus: The Library, II, Book 3.10-End. Epitome. Loeb Classical Library (Cambridge, MA 1921) K. Galinsky, Ovid’s Metamorphoses: An Introduction to the Basic Aspects (Berkeley/Los Angeles 1975) K. Galinsky, ‘Ovid and the Greco-Roman Myth’, Augustan Age 10 (1990), 19-25 K. Geffcken, Comedy in the Pro Caelio (Leiden 1973) R. Gibson, Ovid: Ars Amatoria Book 3. Edited with Introduction and Commentary (Cambridge 2003) J. Griffin, Homer (Oxford 1980; rpt. Bristol 2001) N. Gross, ‘Allusion and Rhetorical Wit in Ovid, Metamorphoses 13’, Scholia 9 (2000), 54-65 P.R. Hardie, Virgil’s Aeneid: Cosmos and Imperium (Oxford 1986) P.R. Hardie, ‘Augustan Poets and the Mutability of Rome’, in: A. Powell (ed.), Poetry and Propaganda in the Age of Augustus (Bristol 1992), 59-82 P.R. Hardie, The Epic Successors of Virgil (Cambridge 1993) P.R. Hardie, Virgil: Aeneid Book IX. Edited with an Introduction and Commentary (Cambridge 1994) P.R. Hardie, ‘Metamorphosis, Metaphor, and Allegory in Latin Epic’, in: M. Beissinger, J. Tylus and S. Wofford (edd.), Epic Traditions in the Contemporary World. The Poetics of Community (Berkeley/Los Angeles/London 1999), 89-107 P.R. Hardie, A. Barchiesi and S. Hinds (edd.), Ovidian Transformations: Essays on the Metamorphoses and its Reception (Cambridge 1999) P.R. Hardie, Ovid’s Poetics of Illusion (Cambridge 2002) P.R. Hardie, ‘Ovidian Middles’, in: S. Kyriakides and F. Di Martino (edd.), Middles in Latin Poetry (Bari 2004), 151-182 J.S. Harrison, Vergil: Aeneid 10. With Introduction, Translation, and Commentary (Oxford 1991) E.A. Havelock, A History of the Greek Mind I: Preface to Plato (Oxford 1963) J. Henderson, The Maculate Muse: Obscene Language in Attic Comedy (New Haven/London 1975) D.E. Hill, Ovid: Metamorphoses IX-XII. Edited with an introduction, translation and notes (Warminster 1999) D.E. Hill, Ovid Metamorphoses XIII-XV and indexes. Edited with and introduction, translation and notes (Warminster 2000) S. Hinds, Allusion and Intertext: Dynamics of Appropriation in Roman Poetry (Cambridge 1998) A.S. Hollis, Ovid: Metamorphoses Book VII (Oxford 1970) N. Hopkinson, Ovid: Metamorphoses Book XIII (Cambridge 2000) N. Horsfall, ‘Numanus Remulus: ethnography and propaganda in Aeneid 9.598ff.’, Latomus 30 (1971), 1108-1116 [= rpt.

288

Huyck 1991 Keith 1992 Keith 1999

Keith 2000 Kenney 1986 King 1987 Kirk 1985 Konstan 2003

Kullman 1960 Kyriakides-De Martino 2004 Lafaye 1904/1971 Latacz 1995 Loraux 2001 Lorenzetti 2001 Martin 1989 Michalopoulos 2001 Michelakis 2002 Minchin 2001

Möller 2003

Bibliography

in: S.J. Harrison (ed.), Oxford Readings in Vergil’s Aeneid (Oxford 1990), 127-144] J.R. Huyck, A Commentary on Ovid’s Armorum Iudicium, ‘Metamorphoses’ 12.612-13.398 (Doctoral Dissertation, Harvard University 1991) A.M. Keith, The Play of Fictions. Studies in Ovid’s Metamorphoses Book 2 (Ann Arbor 1992) A.M. Keith, ‘Versions of Epic Masculinity in Ovid’s Metamorphoses’, in: P. Hardie, A. Barchiesi and S. Hinds (edd.), Ovidian Transformations: Essays on Ovid’s Metamorphoses and Its Reception (Cambridge 1999) 214-239 A.M. Keith, Engendering Rome: Women in Latin Epic (Cambridge 2000) E.J. Kenney, ‘Introduction, Historical Sketch, and Explanatory Notes’, in: A.D. Melville, transl., Ovid. Metamorphoses (Oxford/New York 1986) K.C. King, Achilles. Paradigms of the War Hero from Homer to the Middle Ages (Berkeley/Los Angeles/London 1987) G.S. Kirk, The Iliad: A Commentary. Vol. 1: Books 1-4 (Cambridge 1985) D. Konstan, ‘Aristotle on Anger and the Emotions: The Strategies of Status’, in: S. Morton-Braund and C. Gill (edd.), Ancient Anger: Perspectives from Homer to Galen. Yale Classical Studies v. 32 (Cambridge 2003), 99-120 W. Kullmann, Die Quellen der Ilias (Wiesbaden 1960) S. Kyriakides and F. De Martino (edd.) Middles in Latin Poetry (Bari 2004) G.L. Lafaye, Les métamorphoses d’Ovide et leurs modèles greces (Paris 1904/Hildesheim 1971) J. Latacz, Achilleus. Wandlungen eines europäischen Heldenbildes (Stuttgart/Leipzig 1995) N. Loraux, Tragic Ways of Killing a Woman, transl. A. Forster (Cambridge, MA 1987) E. Lorenzetti, ‘L’ Armorum Iudicium di Ovidio Appunti sulla Tradizione Epica nelle Metamorfosi’, Università di Macerata. Annali della Facolta di Lettere e Filosofia 25 (2001), 221-247 R. Martin, The Language of Heroes: Speech and Performance in the Iliad (Ithaca, NY 1989) A. Michalopoulos, Ancient Etymologies in Ovid’s Metamorphoses (Leeds 2001) P. Michelakis, Achilles in Greek Tragedy (Cambridge 2002) E. Minchin, ‘The Performance of Lists and Catalogues in the Homeric Epics’, in: I. Worthington (ed.), Voice into Text: Orality and Literacy in Ancient Greece (Leiden 1996), 3-20 [rpt. slightly revised in: E. Minchin, Homer and the Resources of Memory (Oxford 2001), 73-99] M. Möller, ‘Der staunende Achill: eine poetologische Lektüre der Cygnus-Episode (Ov. Met. 12, 64-167)’, Göttinger Forum für Altertumwissenschaft 6 (2003), 51-66

Bibliography

Mossman 1995 Moulton 1977 Muellner 1996 Müller 1997 Murnaghan 1999

Musgrove 1991 Musgrove 1997 Musgrove 1998 Nage 1979 Nage 1990 Nage 1992 Nage 2003 O’Bryhim 1989 Otis 1970 Papaioannou 2000

Papaioannou 2002 Papaioannou 2005 Paschalis 1997 Paschalis 2003

Preiser 2000

289

J. Mossman, Wild Justice: A Study of Euripides’ Hecuba (Oxford 1995) C. Moulton, Similes in the Homeric Poems (Göttingen 1977) L. Muellner, The Anger of Achilles: Mênis in Greek Epic (Ithaca, NY 1996) C.W. Müller, Philoktet. Beiträge zur Wiedergewinnung einer Tragödie des Euripides (Stuttgart/Leipzig 1997) S. Murnaghan, ‘The Poetics of Loss in Greek Epic’, in: M. Beissinger, J. Tylus and S. Wofford (edd.), Epic Traditions in the Contemporary World: The Poetics of Community (Berkeley 1999), 203-220 M.W. Musgrove, Narrative Experimentation in Ovid’s Metamorphoses, Books 12-14 (Doctoral Dissertation, The University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill 1991) M.W. Musgrove, ‘Change of Perspective in Ovid, Metamorphoses 12.11-23’, AJP 118 (1997), 267-283 M.W. Musgrove, ‘Nestor’s Centauromachy and the Deceptive Voice of Poetic Memory (Met. 12.182-535)’, CP 93 (1998), 223-231 G. Nagy, The Best of the Achaeans (Baltimore 1979) G. Nagy, Pindar’s Homer: The Lyric Possession of an Epic Past (Baltimore 1990) G. Nagy, ‘Mythological Exemplum in Homer’, in: R. Hexter and D. Selden, (edd.), Innovations of Antiquity (London/New York 1992) 311-331 G. Nagy, Homeric Responses (Austin 2003) S.D. O’Bryhim, ‘Nestor: Wit or Windbag at Metamorphoses 12’, Augustan Age 9 (1989), 49-53 B. Otis, Ovid as an Epic Poet. 2nd ed. (Cambridge 1970) S. Papaioannou, ‘ƋƽƫƫơƱƯƲ ƪơƩ ‘Cyllarus and Hylonome: A Tale of Romance and its Function in the Middle of a MockEpic’. in: Th. Kakrides, G. Sifakis, O. Tsagarakis (edd.), ƋƔƆƒƊƓƍƂƔƂ: ƖƩƫƯƫƯƣƩƪƜ ƍƥƫƥƴƞƬơƴơ ƂƶƩƥƱƹƬƝƭơ ƳƴƯƭ ƊƹƜƭƭƧ Ɠ. ƋơƬưƟƴƳƧ (Herakleion 2000), 183-199 [in Greek, with summary in English] S. Papaioannou, ‘Poetische Erinnerung und epische Dichtung. Nestors Rede in Ovid Metamorphosen, Buch 12’, Gymnasium 109.3 (2002), 213-234 S. Papaioannou, Epic Succession and Dissension. Ovid, Metamorphoses 13.623-14.582, and the Reinvention of the Aeneid (Berlin/New York 2005) M. Paschalis, Vergil’s Aeneid: Semantic Relations and Proper Names (Oxford 1997) M. Paschalis, ‘Name, Semantics, and Narrative in Ovid’s Polydorus and Polyxena Episodes and Their Intertexts (Euripides’ Hecuba and Virgil’s Aeneid)’, SIFC ser. 4, 1.1-2 (2003), 142-159 C. Preiser, Euripides: Telephos. Einleitung, Text, Kommentar (Hildesheim 2000)

290 Pucci 1987 Rabel 1997 Redfield 1975 Richardson 1993 Rosati 2002 Schmidt 1991 Schein 1984 Segal 1994 Segal 1997/98 Segal 1999 Sistakou 2004

Slatkin 1991 Smith 1968 Smith 1997 Solodow 1988 Stanford 1968 Thomas 1986 Thomas 1989 Tissol 1997 Tissol 2002 Tsagalis 2004 Wills 1996 Wheeler 1999

Bibliography

P. Pucci, Odysseus Polytropos: Intertextual Readings in the Odyssey and the Iliad (Ithaca 1987) R.J. Rabel, Plot and Point of View in the Iliad (Ann Arbor 1997) J.M. Redfield, Nature and Culture in the Iliad (Chicago 1975) N. Richardson, The Iliad: A Commentary. Vol. VI: Books 21-24 (Cambridge 1993) G. Rosati, ‘Narrative Techniques and Narrative Structures in the Metamorphoses’, in: B.W. Boyd (ed.), Brill’s Companion to Ovid (Leiden 2002), 271-304 E.A. Schmidt, Ovids poetische Menschenwelt: Die Metamorphosen als Metapher und Symphonie (Heidelberg 1991) S. Schein, The Mortal Hero: An Introduction to Homer’s Iliad (Berkeley 1984) C.P. Segal, Singers, Heroes and Gods in the Odyssey (Ithaca, NY/London 1994) C.P. Segal, ‘Ovid’s Metamorphic Bodies: Art, Gender, and Violence in the Metamorphoses’, Arion 5.3 (1997/98) 9-41 C.P. Segal, ‘Ovid’s Meleager and the Greeks. Trials of Gender and Genre’, HSCP 99 (1999), 301-340 E. Sistakou, ƈ ŹƱƭƧƳƧ ƴƯƵ ŻưƯƵƲ. žƸƥƩƲ ƴƯƵ ƔƱƹƩƪƯƽ ƍƽƨƯƵ ƳƴƧƭ ƆƫƫƧƭƩƳƴƩƪƞ ƑƯƟƧƳƧ [= The Repudiation of Epic. Aspects of the Trojan Legen in Hellenistic Poetry] (Athens 2004) L. Slatkin, The Power of Thetis. Allusion and Interpretation in the Iliad (Berkeley/Los Angeles 1991) B.H. Smith, Poetic Closure: A Study of How Poems End (Chicago/London 1968) R.A. Smith, Poetic Allusion and Poetic Embrace in Ovid and Vergil (Ann Arbor 1997) J. Solodow, The World of Ovid’s Metamorphoses (Chapel Hill/London 1988) W.B. Stanford, The Ulysses Theme: A Study in the Adaptability of a Traditional Hero (Oxford 1936/21968) R.F. Thomas, ‘Virgil’s Georgics and the Art of Reference’, HSCP 90 (1986), 171-198 R. Thomas, Oral Tradition and Written Record in Classical Athens (Cambridge 1989) G. Tissol, The Face of Nature. Wit, Narrative and Cosmic Origins in Ovid’s Metamorphoses (Princeton 1997) G. Tissol, ‘The House of Fame: Roman History and Augustan Politics in Metamorphoses 11-15,’ in: B.W. Boyd (ed.), Brill’s Companion to Ovid (Leiden 2002), 305-335 C.C. Tsagalis, Epic Grief: Personal Laments in Homer’s Iliad (Berlin/New York 2004) J. Wills, Repetition in Latin Poetry: Figures of Allusion (Oxford 1996) S.M. Wheeler, A Discourse of Wonders: Audience and Performance in Ovid’s Metamorphoses (Philadelphia 1999)

Bibliography

Wheeler 2000 Whitby-Hardie-Whitby 1987 Zissos-Gildenhard 1999

Zumwalt 1977

291

S.M. Wheeler, Narrative Dynamics in Ovid’s Metamorphoses (Tübingen 2000) M. Whitby, P. Hardie and M. Whitby (edd.), Homo Viator: Classical Essays for John Bramble (Bristol/Oak Park, IL 1987) A. Zissos & I. Gildenhard, ‘Problems of Time in Metamorphoses 2’, in: P.R. Hardie, A. Barchiesi and S. Hinds (edd.), Ovidian Transformations: Essays on the Metamorphoses and its Reception (Cambridge 1999), 31-47) N. Zumwalt, ‘Fama Subversa. Theme and Structure in Ovid, Metamorphoses 12’, CSCA 10 (1977), 209-222

Indexes I. Index of Cited Passages The fragments from the Epic Cylce are not listed. The parentheses record the pages of the book where the various passages are mentioned. The pages in bold elements indicate longer textual units. Literary works are cited in abbreviated form, following after the table prefacing the OLD. Ad Herennium 1.11.18, 1.17.27, 2.19.28 (161 n. 343); 3.28-40; 4.28.39 (113 n. 249) Aelian Nat. 5.1 (256 n. 541) Aeschylus fr. 44 (73 n. 155); fr. 279-280a (255); fr. 300 (274 n. 589) Apollodorus 2.136, 3.146 (241 n. 515); 3.12.5 [= 3.147] (28); 3.13.8 (183 n. 401; 258 n. 544); 3.28-29 (183 n. 401); 5.5 [= 5.21.35-42] (255); 5.6 (162 n. 346); 5.913 (176 n. 382); 5.23 (212 n. 450) Archilochus fr. 5 (156); fr. 247 (104 n. 230) Aristotle Poet. 8, 23 (3); 1460a 7-11 (19 n. 50) Metaph. 1.5.986a (19) Rhet. 2.2.1378a31-33 (167)

Cicero Div. 2.63-64 (32) Fl. 7.16 (165 n. 351) Inv. 1.92 (161 n. 343) Diodorus 2.22 (274 n. 589) Euripides Hec. 14-15 (217 n. 463); 23-24, 27 (221); 113-115 (232); 357, 548f., 550f. (240 n. 513); 900 (237 n. 508); 1270-1273 (282 n. 595) Rh. 497-507 (170 n. 366); 624 (202 n. 431) Tr. 11-14 (219 n. 468) Hesiod Theog. 31-32, 38 (36); Op. 148 (133) Fragmenta: 96 (134 n. 285); 237 (51; 82 n. 178); 353 (256 n. 541; 274) Herodotus 2.73 (120 n. 258); 5.54 (274 n. 589); 7.33 & 9.116 (49 n. 99)

Athenaeus 8.347e Kaibel (212 n. 453)

Horace Ars Poetica 151-152 (47 n. 95)

Bacchylides 5.136-155 (266)

Hyginus Fab. 10 (135 n. 289); 107 (64)

Catullus 64.348 (218 n. 467; 234); 362-370 (218 n. 467; 233); 359-360, 368 (234); 369 (218 n. 467; 234); 370 (234)

Hymns, Homeric 4.451 (171 n. 370); 21.4 (95 n. 204); 21.146-152, 160-161, 169-176 (96 n. 208); 25.5; 32.2 (95 n. 204)

294

Indexes

Juvenal 7.115 (166 n. 354)

Pliny Jounger Ep. 6.10.3 (203 n. 435)

Livy 8.7.1ff. (39); 34.7.8-9 (73 n. 136)

Propertius 2.6.15-23 (98 n. 212); 3.11.13-16 (145 n. 308)

Lucretius DRN 1.85, 87, 89-90 (43) Lycophron Alex. 178ff. (258 n. 544); 335ff. (212 n. 450); 860 (148 n. 315) Macrobius Sat. 7.1.14. (90 n. 190) Nicander fr. 62 GS (16 n. 45) Ovid (other than the Metamorphoses) AA 3.101ff.; 342; 510 (220 n. 472) Am. 2.12.17-26 (98 n. 212) Fasti 1.723 (204 n. 438); 5.379-414 (134 n. 286) Her. 15.249-252 (98 n. 212) Rem. 1 (204); 55 (204 n. 437); 151-167 (187 n. 406) Tristia 1.7.20 (271) P.Oxy. 4711 (16 n. 44) Pausanias 10.31.6 (262 n. 559) Petronius 134.11 (104 n. 230) Philostratus Heroic. 54-56 (153 n. 321) Pindar I. 5.38-42 (77 n. 165); 39 (52 n. 104); O. 2.83-88 (136 n. 291) Plato Cratyl. 393A (212 n. 450) Pliny NH 10.74 (264); 11.261 (104 n. 230); 37.40 (262 n. 560)

Quintus of Smyrna 1.666-668 (145); 4.469 (51 n. 102) Sallust Hist. fr. 4.67 (221 n. 473) Scholia AbT on Il. 1.1 (10 n. 35) Seneca Contr. 2.2.8 (161 n. 343) Simonides fr. 539 (274 n. 589) Strabo 15.3.2 (274 n. 589) Theocritus 16.48-50 (73 n. 156) Theognis 993-996 (96 n. 208) Vergil (other than the Aeneid) Ecl. 2.36 (148 n. 315); 6.62 (272 n. 587) G. 3.91 (148 n. 315); 4.334-345, 345 (137 n. 296) Homer, Iliad 1.1, 2 (166); 68-73 (35f.; 38); 70 (36; 38; 46); 75 (38; 69); 76-77 (170 n. 367); 76 (38); 115 (231); 118 (231; 232); 119 (174 n. 376; 232); 147-252; 149-171 (173); 161ff.; 161 (174); 163, 165-168 (173); 188ff. (231); 247-252 (94-96); 247-249 (95); 259-273 (98; 100); 263265, 266-267 (102); 268, 270, 271-273 (100); 272 (102); 273 (108 n. 238); 274277 (100); 275 (101); 284 (197 n. 423); 286 (101); 348-356 (169 n. 364); 352 (256); 393-412 (258); 500, 503, 505 (256)

I. Index of Cited Passages

2.46 (63); 53 (165); 186 (63); 204, 207 (195); 216 (146 n. 309); 218-220 (178 n. 388); 220 (146 n. 309); 235 (72); 298ff. (36; 63); 299-329 (34); 305-317 (33); 308-316 (35 n. 75); 317-329 (83 n. 179); 318-319, 319 (41); 484-487 (62 n. 125); 485-486 (94 n. 200); 485 (36); 487 (195); 594-600 (97 n. 208); 858, 859-860, 859 (192) 3.216-223, 217 (178); 229-242 (146 n. 312); 229 (180 n. 393); 361-363, 369ff. (80); 371f., 449 (81) 4.250; 323 (108 n. 238); 370-399 (128 n. 273) 5.332 (195); 529-532 (71 n. 150); 633642 (129); 639 (133 n. 280); 668-680 (190); 677-678 (188-190; 195); 824 (195) 6.5 (180 n. 393); 167 (57 n. 114); 394 (218 n. 466); 402-403 (212 n. 450); 407-439 (251 n. 535); 410-413 (225); 411-440 (210); 416-417 (56); 417 (57 n. 114); 434ff.; 441-446 (140); 441-442 (71 n. 150); 447-465 (210); 450-463 (225); 459-461 (140); 464-465 (140); 467-473 (271 n. 586); 490-493 (72); 494ff. (212 n. 450) 7.8-10 (145); 66-310 (176); 89-90 (273; 278); 132-156 (100 n. 218); 162-186 (197 n. 422); 211 (180 n. 393); 219; 228 (133 n. 280); 245 (67 n. 137) 8.80-98, 90-92, 97 (174); 128 (195) 9.186-191 (92f.); 189 (93); 312-313 (154f. n. 323); 410-416 (62-63); 432434 (60); 438-443, 438-439 (170); 524599 (99 n. 215); 524 (20 n. 53); 529549, 550-599 (264) 10.455 (187 n. 408); 480ff. (201 n. 431) 11.221 (214 n. 457); 283-312 (176); 310 (191); 369ff. (145 n. 306); 369 (144 n. 306); 377 (144); 385, 389, 390 (145 n. 306); 396-488, 420-427 (191); 422-426 (188); 422-423 (189); 426-427 (189; 192); 434 (191); 458f., 459-488 (175); 482-484 (175); 516ff. (99); 581-583 (145); 605-803 (100 n. 218); 690-693 (130 n. 275; 135 n. 288); 691, 694, 761 (130 n. 275); 786-789 (13); 790-803 (158 n. 330); 791 (99 n. 216) 12.47 (137 n. 296); 318

295

13.43-65 (36 n. 79); 121-125 (71 n. 150); 611-612 (145 n. 304); 671-672 (145) 14.238ff. (63) 15.479 (67 n. 137); 561-567, 661-667 (71 n. 150); 653-16.123 (176); 690-692 (136) 16.7-10 (13); 130ff., 140-144 (158); 143144 (59 n. 119); 175 (215 n. 458); 291ff. (197 n. 422); 338-354 (56); 492501; 671-673 (255 n. 540) 17.140-168 (158); 174 (65); 194-197 (65; 159 n. 332); 198-202 (158); 202 (65); 611f. (195) 18.82-85 (159 n. 332); 84-85 (65); 95-96 (125; 139; 140 n. 299); 98-100 (140 n. 299); 114-121 (246); 117-125 (133); 117 (133); 121-123 (246); 192-193 (148; 159 n. 333); 317 (134 n. 286); 369-370 (63); 478-608, 481f. (199) 19.18ff. (199) 390-391 (59 n. 118) 20.164-175 (70 n. 146); 188-195 (57); 20.381-21.135 (144 n. 306); 321-325 (158 n. 331); 382-489 (144 n. 306); 407ff. (214 n. 457) 21.22-24 (71 n. 152); 34ff. (14); 150-150 (57); 166-167 (64); 169-172 (158 n. 331); 184-199 (58; 173 n. 374); 252253 (137); 315 (69 n. 143); 568-570 (64) 22.25-89 (210); 46ff. (214 n. 457); 61-65 (210); 88 (218 n. 466); 98-130 (210); 99-130, 108-110 (140 n. 301); 209-213 (255); 248-366 (210); 308-310 (136); 326-330 (158 n. 331); 331-336, 335336 (242); 338-343, 340-341 (241); 345-354 (242); 345-347 (71 n. 152); 345, 346-347, 348, 353 (242); 359-360 (141; 142); 367-369 (56); 381-383 (210 n. 447); 405-436 (210); 405-411 (107 n. 237); 406-407 (267 n. 574); 429ff. (260); 477-514 (251 n. 535); 510-514 (210) 23.62-108, 69-92, 69f. (235); 166-176 (225); 175-176, 176 (234); 331-332 (274); 630-642 (100 n. 219); 700-739 (166) 24.40 (148); 41-43 (70 n. 148); 469-484, 477, 477-479 (211); 478-479 (134 n. 286); 511-512 (13); 559-570 (205); 572ff. (83 n. 179; 205); 572, 578-579 (70 n. 148; 83 n. 179); 589 (56; 83 n.

296

Indexes

179); 602-617 (83 n. 179); 710ff. (260); 718ff. (219); 718-761 (211); 720-722 (249); 725-745 (210); 731-732 (225); 734-735 (212 n. 450); 762-775 (211); 776 (249); 788-801 (211) Homer, Odyssey 1.154 (137 n. 295); 325-359 (92 n. 195); 337-342 (246 n. 523); 351-352 (92 n. 195; 97f. n. 208) 4.188 (260 n. 550) 8.45, 64, 67-68 (90 n. 189); 73-74 (171 n. 370); 73 (90 n. 189); 74, 75ff. (171); 88f. (179); 300, 349, 357, 367 (137 n. 295); 492-498 (91 n. 194); 493, 507 (219) 9.19-20 (170); 73-75 (97f. n. 208); 75-82 (11) 10.391-394 (114 n. 252) 11.541-565 (169 n. 363); 543ff., 550-551 (162 n. 346) 16.351-352 (1); 461 (62 n. 125) 17.261-263 (90 n. 189) 18.106 (195) 19.203 (177 n. 385) 20.351-357 (137 n. 295) 24.1-14, 15-22, 23-34, 35-97 (138); 40 (148); 55-61 (249); 538 (136) Vergil, Aeneid 1.315 (184 n. 404); 457 (60); 461 (61); 466ff. (144); 466-468, 469-493 (53); 471 (201 n. 431); 653-654 (217 n. 464); 742-746, 748ff., 750-752 (90); 752 (90; 148 n. 315) 2.112 (219 n. 468); 125 (222); 196 (179); 270-297 (219); 237 (219 n. 468); 288, 289 (219); 311 (71 n. 150); 316 (71 n. 150; 221); 506-558 (221); 540-543, 547-550 (57 n. 115); 557-558 (218; 223) 3.6 (216 n. 460); 13-68 (217); 16 (217); 26-33 (268 n. 577); 39f. (219); 41-45 (268 n. 577); 41-44 (216); 44 (218; 219); 46 (218 n. 467); 49-57 (214-215); 51 (219); 54 (218); 55 (218, 218 n. 467; 234 n. 502); 62-68 (219); 62-63, 65-67, 67-68, 68 (123f. n. 266); 301-305 (29) 4.101 (71 n. 150); 173-190, 188-190 (46f.) 5.277, 455-456 (71 n. 150)

6.448-449 (118); 448 (123); 767 (123 n. 265) 7.371-381 (84); 445, 623-625 (71 n. 150); 645 (94 n. 200) 8.184-275, 219f. (81 n. 175); 219-220 (71 n. 150); 383f. (255 n. 538); 448 (67 n. 137); 729ff. (200) 9.77ff., 120, 123, 156 (127 n. 271); 603620 (72); 603, 614ff. (43); 614-620 (73 n. 156); 618 (43); 765-767, 767 (196); 774-777 (90 n. 189); 787-789 (71 n. 150) 10.398 (71 n. 150); 491-500 (56 n. 111); 491-494 (56); 492 (56); 495-500 (56); 500-505 (56 n. 113); 825-830 (56 n. 111); 825-826, 827-828 (55); 828 (56); 829-830 (55); 830-832 (56); 871 (71 n. 150) 11.252ff. (187); 397 (148 n. 315); 688689 (57 n. 115) 12.101-106 (71 n. 151); 351ff. (187 n. 408); 924-925 (67 n. 137) Ovid, Metamorphoses 12.1-13.622 (1-23 passim; 277; 282) 13.623-14.608 (1) 1.1-2 (42); 7, 87 (200 n. 428); 747-2.400 (271) 2.31-32, 41-42 (271 n. 586); 252-253 (84); 325 (272); 329-380 (271); 329330, 334, 335, 338, 338-339, 342-343, 343, 345, 346 (272); 349-363 (217 n. 461); 350 (272); 360 (217 n. 461); 368380 (84); 381 (272) 3.347, 511 (36 n. 76) 4.691 (175 n. 380) 5.1-235 (96 n. 210; 108 n. 240); 425ff. (85) 6.227 (175 n. 380) 7.661 (249); 371-381 (84); 843 (175 n. 380) 8.316 (118 n. 255); 365-368 (95 n. 203); 378-379 (78 n. 168); 445-478 (266); 447ff. (267); 447-448 (268); 478-516 (266); 515-546 (262); 515-525 (270); 515-517 (263); 516 (271); 522-525 (263); 526ff. (268); 526-530 (269); 526528 (263); 527-528 (272); 529-530 (263; 272); 530 (267 n. 574; 272); 533535 (270); 533-534 (270); 536 (264;

I. Index of Cited Passages

272); 540-541 (272); 540 (272); 541 (272) 9.793 (203 n. 434) 10.207ff. (83 n. 180); 215-216 (163) 11.25-27 (71 n. 153); 194ff. (144 n. 304); 194-220 (173 n. 375); 749-751, 749795 (25); 754-758 (29); 758-761 (86); 758-760 (27); 759-760 (122); 791f (27) 12.1-6 (25); 1 (29); 2-3 (27; 86; 280); 3 (280 n. 593); 5-6 (32 n. 66); 5 (100 n. 220); 6-7 (34); 7-38 (25-45); 8-17 (34); 9 (206 n. 441); 11-23 (4; 32); 11-17 (33); 13ff. (40); 13-18 (35 n. 75); 18-21 (34; 35); 22-23 (34; 41); 24-34 (34); 2438 (37-45); 25ff. (169 n. 365); 24-34 (37f.); 27-29, 28-29 (38); 28 (43); 29-30 (39); 30 (39 n. 82; 43); 31 (43); 34 (42); 37-63 (5); 39-63 (5; 22; 34; 45-48); 3940, 41-42 (46); 44-46, 54-58 (47); 56, 57-58 (49); 62-63 (46); 64-145 (22; 4985; 50); 67f. (51 n. 103); 67-68 (49); 68-77 (50ff.); 68-71, 69-75, 69 (52); 70 (75); 72-73 (52); 74 (59 n. 118); 79 (59 n. 118; 75); 80-82 (54); 80f. (55); 80-81 (54; 55); 80 (67 n. 137); 81 (54); 82 (58; 104); 83-85 (58); 83 (104); 85 (58); 8694 (59ff.); 86 (60); 87ff. (72); 87, 88 (58); 89 (74 n. 161); 90, 91f. (73); 9394 (66); 95-97 (67); 95 (59 n. 118); 98f., 100f. (75); 100-101; 100 (59 n. 118; 67); 102-114 (67-72); 102-104 (108 n. 240; 112; 228); 102 (70; 71; 228); 105 (104); 106ff. (68 n. 138); 106-114 (89); 106 (74; 75); 106-107 (104); 108ff. (77); 108-112 (74; 74 n. 159); 108-111 (77); 108 (74; 75); 112 (59 n. 119; 104; 158); 114 (74; 75); 115 (104); 116 (76); 117-121 (76f.); 118 (59 n. 118); 122 (59 n. 119; 158); 120 (75); 127 (77); 128 (71 n. 150; 79; 89); 129f. (79); 129 (80); 130f., 131 (79); 132 (89); 135, 136f., 137f. (80); 138-143 (80f.); 143 (81; 88; 115); 144-145 (81; 84; 117); 146-579 (22; 51); 146-535 (87124); 146-167 (87-93); 146f. (88); 150167 (77); 150 (89); 157-163 (89ff.; 91 n. 192); 159-160 (90); 160 (91); 161 (102); 162-163(77); 164-167 (117); 164f. (89); 164-165 (90f.); 165, 168 (91); 167 (89); 169 (120 n. 259; 127); 172f. (106), 172 (127); 174-175 (117);

297

175 (101f.); 178 (127; 182); 179-181 (102); 182-184 (182); 182f. (131); 183 (107); 184 (94); 186-188 (103); 186-187 (107); 187f.(94); 188-208 (104); 189535, 189-209 (87); 201-202 (104); 210535 (87; 96 n. 210); 219-535 (108ff.); 223 (100 n. 220); 225 (106; 108 n. 240); 228f. (168 n. 362); 242-243 (104 n. 227); 248-249, 274, 276-279 (108 n. 240); 285-289 (114 n. 252); 327 (106); 345-349 (110); 380-392 (110f.); 380382 (112); 389, 390-391 (113); 393-403 (96); 393 (110 n. 246); 402 (108 n. 240); 409-411 (114); 414-415 (114); 429 (106); 432 (114); 439-441, 439, 440 (115); 444 (106); 466 (104; 115); 470ff. (104), 470-471 (184); 476, 478 (104); 480, 481 (108 n. 240); 482-483, 485489, 490-493 (115); 498ff., 499-509 (68 n. 138); 502 (106); 520-521 (108 n. 240); 522-532 (97; 116-124); 522f. (117); 522 (127); 523 (119); 524-525 (120; 123); 525 (127); 526 (116; 120; 123); 527-528 (120); 529, 531 (122), 532 (119; 127); 533-535 (127); 536-577 (87; 126-137); 537f. (127); 539-541 (128); 542-576 (130); 547f. (130); 549554 (135 n. 288); 550 (135); 554-555 (133); 555-560 (137); 556-558 (135); 556f. (137); 556 (135); 559f. (137); 560-573 (135); 575-576 (131); 580-628 (138ff.); 580-620 (277); 580-619 (22; 262); 580-596 (141); 582-583 (150); 590-593 (151); 592 (143); 593 (143f.); 597-608 (141); 599-601 (145); 601-603 (144); 601 (147); 604-606 (142); 604f. (145); 604 (143; 147); 608-611 (141); 608-609 (142; 143); 609 (32 n. 66); 610-611 (145); 612-619 (141; 147f.); 612-614 (169 n. 365); 612, 613 (169 n. 365); 615-616 (50); 615; 617-619 (157); 617 (31 n. 65; 50); 620-13.398 (22; 160 n. 338); 620-628 (142); 620-621 (156; 157); 621 (157); 626-13.1 (164); 626 (164; 165) 13.1-399 (153-206); 2 (67 n. 137; 157 n. 327); 3 (167); 5-20, 9, 10, 11, 13, 14-15, 21-33 (172); 22-24, 22 (173); 31 (259); 34-42, 34, 36 (173); 37-39 (174); 38-39 (175 n. 379); 38 (173; 237 n. 508); 40 (173); 41f., 42-62 (174); 42 (173); 45-

298

Indexes

54 (174 n. 377); 63-70 (174); 71-81 (175); 69 (175 n. 379); 73-74 (175 n. 379, 380); 73 (175); 75 (157 n. 327); 78 (175 nn. 379, 380); 79 (157 n. 327); 8081 (175); 82-94 (176); 98ff. (176); 99, 100-102, 100 (176 n. 382); 103-122 (176); 103f., 104 (176); 107ff. (198); 107f., 108-111 (176); 110 (157; 199); 111 (175 n. 379; 237 n. 508); 112 (74 n. 161); 114-116 (176); 115 (175 n. 379); 117f. (176); 118-119 (157 n. 327); 123-381 (177); 124-127 (178); 126 (178); 127 (182); 128-139 (180); 132f. (179); 133-134 (181); 135 (190; 202); 137f., 137 (180); 140ff., 142-144, 155 (181 n. 398); 160-161 (181); 162-215 (182); 162-180 (183); 163f. (184); 164; 167 (184); 170-178 (183 n. 402); 170171, 171ff. (74 n. 159); 171-180 (183); 181-195 (183; 185); 187 (39 n. 82); 193f. (185); 196-204 (183); 200 (32 n. 66); 205-215 (183); 207-209, 211, 216295 (186); 216-237 (186); 217 (39 n. 82); 223f.; 227 (181 n. 397); 228 (249); 232 (39 n. 82); 238-267 (186); 245 (187; 187 n. 408), 249-252 (187); 250 (201 n. 431); 255 (189; 191); 256-262 (187-197); 257-260 (188); 257-258 (188; 190-191; 195; 197); 258 (196); 259-262 (191); 259-260 (188; 191); 259, 260 (191); 261 (190 n. 413); 262265 (192); 268-279 (197); 275-278 (197 n. 422); 276 (39 n. 82); 280-285 (197); 281 (180 n. 393; 197 n. 423); 286-287, 290-295 (198); 290-294 (199); 290 (200 n. 428; 202); 291 (157); 294-295 (198 n. 425); 296ff. (174); 296-305 (185; 200); 306-332 (200); 314f. (200); 328 (39 n. 82); 333-336 (201); 337-339 (202); 345 (235); 349 (202); 350ff. (201 n. 431; 202); 366f., 367, 370-380 (202); 372-374 (203); 373-375 (202); 380 (204 n. 439); 382 (182); 383 (169 n. 366; 206); 384-393 (205); 384-386 (167; 169 n. 365); 384 (169 n. 365); 385 (167; 227); 386 (169 n. 365); 391 (169); 398ff. (40); 394-398 (83 n. 180; 163); 397-398 (168); 399-575 (23; 207ff.); 399-403, 403 (209); 404-575 (207ff.); 404-407 (209; 209 n. 443); 415-417 (212 n. 450); 423, 426-428 (223); 429ff.

(231); 429-438 (207; 214-216); 430431, 433, 434 (220); 435-436 (221); 439-542 (229); 439-448 (231); 439-440 (238); 440 (237 n. 508); 442 (238 n. 509); 444 (232; 243); 445 (238); 446 (233); 450 (238); 451 (229; 239); 453, 455 (239); 456 (238); 457-459 (234 n. 502); 458-459 (239); 465-469, 466-467 (239); 469-473 (240); 472-473 (241); 475; 476 (234 n. 502); 479-480 (244); 481ff. (247); 481-483 (248); 483-485 (222); 483 (239); 487-532 (224); 488493 (248); 489, 491 (224; 249); 493 (224; 248; 249); 494 (224); 495-500 (243); 495 (243; 248), 496-497 (250); 496 (224); 497-500 (243); 497-498, 498-505 (251); 499 (224); 500 (243); 505-508, 505 (224); 506ff. (251); 508513 (225); 508, 509, 514 (224); 523 (239); 533-564 (207); 536-537 (216 n. 459; 221); 538-546 (226); 538, 540, 544 (227); 545, 546, 547-548 (228); 549551 (226); 549 (227); 551 (222); 552553, 554-555 (225); 554 (220; 220 n. 472); 555 (222); 559, 562 (227); 565571 (281); 565-567 (228 n. 488); 567575 (253); 567-571 (209); 572-575 (282 n. 507); 576-622 (253ff.); 576-599, 577 (253); 578-586, 578 (269); 579 (26); 580-620 (279); 581-582 (263; 269); 583 (273); 584 (26; 263); 585f. (256); 586 (26; 269); 591, 596, 598 (256); 600-622 (253); 600-619 (262); 600-602 (263); 603 (26); 608 (263); 611-612 (144f. n. 306); 611 (264); 615 (260; 617-619 (263; 273); 618f. (27); 619 (261 n. 558); 620-623 (283); 623ff. (15 n. 43); 628630 (216; 217 n. 461); 675 (249) 14.454-511 (187 n. 406); 496-509 (84); 573-580 (263; 269); 573-574 (260 n. 553) 15.60-478, 392-407, 392, 393 (120-121); 431 (121 n. 264); 436 (121 n. 264); 479 (249); 871-879 (149); 871 (204); 873874 (149); 875-876 (31; 149), 876, 877, 878-879, 878, 879 (149)

II. General Index

299

II. General Index The page numbers printed in bold typeface indicate that they cover extensive discussion of the relevant item. Also, when an item is discussed both on the main text and the footnotes of a single page, it is indexed only by the number of the main page. absens/presens dichotomy, 40, 52f., 86, 129, 147f., 155, 158, 221, 227, 240, 255, 258, 275, 279 Achilles, 5ff. passim and Cycnus, 50-84 and epic poetics, 9ff. passim as text, 9-17, 159-187 as healer/artist, 79 as lyreplayer-aoidos, 92f. and Meleager, 264f. and Hercules, 132-134 the mênis of, 10f., 13, 39, 67-72, 125, 167-169, 205, 242, 258f., 264f., 277 fama of, 12, 31, 50-64 passim, 138f., 233, 265, 274-283 etymology of name, 54f. n. 108 and Agamemnon in the Underworld, 138f., 148 and Polyxena, 17, 13, 40, 42, 208, 239-244 and Paris, 98, 141-147 and Hector, 20, 22, 158, 205, 239242, 253-256 and propensity to paradigms of behavior, 9, 99-102, 132-134, 264f armor of, 13, 22, 63-65, 155-159, 176f., 197-200 shield of, 67, 156f., 176, 197-200 spear, of, 52, 54, 58f. 74-79, 104, 147, 155-159, 176 death of, 13f., 17, 22, 50, 64f., 125151 passim, 153f., 156, 159, 235f., 253-261, 277 invulnerability of, 3, 64f., 141, 266 as wild beast, 70f. 81, 133f., 228, 242 as raging bull, 67, 71-74, 107, 112f., 228 and Memnon, 139, 254-259, 264f., 278f. and Nestor, as poetic rivals, 88, 9598, 103f., 108f., 117 and the Centaurs, 97-134 passim

and the politics of gender, 14f., 19f., 72-81, 88, 96f., 102-107, 122, 145f., 209, 241-244 and damnatio memoriae, 58, 182 n. 279 Aeneid, 1-23 passim, 33, 56f., 196 Aesacus, 22, 25-31, 34, 40, 42, 52, 86, 97, 120, 122f., 275f., 280, 282 story/tradition of, 25f., 28-30, 122 etymology from aisa, 280, 27f. as vates, 28f. and Caeneus, similarities, 120, 122f. and Memnon, similarities, 26f. cenotaph/monumentum of, 27, 30f., 40, 42, 52, 86, 122, 275f. 280 as embodiment of the Ovidian poetics of illusion and fluidity, 30f., 42, 97, 275f. and/as Hector, 25-30, 52, 86 Aethiopis, 3, 14, 23, 64 n. 134, 145, 146 n. 311, 161, 162 n. 346, 198 n. 424, 254-260, 270 Agamemnon, 11, 13, 34, 37-40, 42, 44, 68f., 98, 100f., 138f., 148, 165-168, 173f., 205, 221, 231f., 237, 244, 257, 276 in the ‘little Iliad’, 39-40 and Achilles in the Underworld, 138f., 148 aition, 27, 83-85, 262 Althaea, 266-269 Ajax, 6, 11, 17, 19-22, 142, 148, 154187, 197-206, 277-280 as successor of Achilles, 171-177 as epic poet/performer, 164-167 as imitator of Achilles, 163f., 167169, 171-177, 205 as defender of archaic epic poetics, 154f. vs. Ulixes, 154-187, 197-206 and the armor of Achilles 155-159, 176f., 197-200 name etymology and immortality of, 163, 168

300

Indexes

epitaph of, 163f., 277f. suicide of, poetics, 205f. allusion, 3, 5 n. 15, 26, 29, 30 n. 54, 32f., 50, 65, 71 n. 153, 78 n. 168, 79, 83 n. 179, 90 n. 190, 94ff., 127 n. 270, 134, 142f. n. 303, 139, 146 n. 312, 152, 171 n. 371, 178, 181, 221 n. 473, 222 n. 476, 231, 235, 246 n. 525, 256, 258, 262-273 appropriation, of earlier epic sources, 1-23 passim, esp. 4, 7; 79, 178, 188, 196, 241, 275 Archilochus, song of Hybrias the Cretan, 155-156 Armorum Iudicium, 6, 14, 18 n. 49, 65, 74 nn. 157 & 159, 83 n. 180, 153-206 in the pre-Ovidian tradition, 159-162 as rivaling poetic performances, 154f. 171-187 passim as court agon and theatrical spectacle, 18, 164-166 as a biê vs. mêtis contest, 169-171 and gender politics therein, 175f., 184f. as clash of different epic readings, 171-187, 197-206 and the mênis theme, 167-169 and the aristos definition, 153, 163f., 169 n. 366, 171 n. 371, 177f. n. 386, 179 Aulis omen, 5, 8, 17, 32-37, 40f. in Homer vs. Ovid, 34-37 and victimization of innocence, 40f. Aurora, 19, 23, 26, 208, 253-259, 260, 262, 265, 273, 282 and/as Thetis, 253-259, 265-273 appeal of, and the Dios Boule, 253, 259-259 avian metamorphosis, 85f., 97, 117-127, 135-138 157, 261, 262ff., 276, 288f. as symbolism of poetics and maker of closure, 119, 83-86, 117-123, 135, 257, 261, 262, 271, 276, 280f. banquet celebration, 17, 87, 89ff., 90 n. 190, 138 n. 297,101, 103 and praise/epic poetry, 189-193 Bienor, 110-114 caelamina/caelatus/caelum/caelare, 198-200

Caeneus, 20, 87f., 96f., 102-105, 115124, 126f., 131, 135, 182, 184, 276, 280, 282 legend of, 102, 116-118 in Vergil vs. Ovid, 117f. and epic gender politics, 96-98, 102105, 115, 118 as Achilles double, 103f. and the cenotaph theme, 276, 280, 282 metamorphosis of, 116-124 and Ovidian poetics, 96f, 119f., 276, 280, 282 Calchas, 22, 31-37, 38, 40, 44-48, 83 n. 179, 95 n. 207, 118 n. 255, 170 n. 367, 276 in the Iliad, 34-36, 38, 40f., performer, 36f. vates/epic poet, 36f., 46-48, 276 and Fama, 44-48 and Ovid’s poetics, 36f., 44-48 cenotaph, 25-31, 40, 42, 52, 86, 122, 127, 149, 257, 275-282 theme and poetics of, 27, 257, 275ff. as illusory monumentum, 275-282 of Aesacus, 27, 30f., 40, 42, 52, 86, 122, 275f. of Caeneus, 122f., 127, 280f. Centauromachy, 5, 8, 10 n. 34, 17, 20, 50, 68 n. 138, 73 n. 158, 87f., 94, 96124, 125-134, 136, 142f n. 303, 160, 184, 276, 280 as allegory for the Trojan war, 10 n. 34, 68 n. 138, 88, 109, as Iliad vs. Metamorphoses, 98-107 passim, 125-134 passim as performance (spectacle), 97f., 105116, 117-134 passim as mock-epic, 97, 276 and Ovidian poetics, 88, 97f., 100102, 136, 276 as mise en abyme of the ‘little Iliad’, 97 and the gender dichotomy, 68 n. 138, 96, 73 n. 158, 103-105, 109-116, 122f., 142f n. 303, 184 Centaurs, as hybrids, 97, 109f. as model/foil for Achilles, 88, 97134 passim

II. General Index

brutality of, 103-105, 109, 133f., 160 hypermasculinity of, 96, 103-105, 109-116, 184 Cycnus, 5, 10 n. 34, 14, 17, 20, 22, 5086, 87-91, 93, 96f., 101-105, 107, 112, 115, 117, 120, 126f., 135, 141, 151, 153, 226, 228, 276, 280 as Hector, 50-53 as double/foil for Achilles, 50-84 passim and Caeneus, 101-104, 107, 112, 115, 117, 120, 126f., 135, 276-280 as performer, 60, 72, 76, 80f. and epic fama deconstruction, 50-86 passim, 103f., 117, 120, 141 transformation of, 80-86 invulnerability of, 104, 115, 117 and the swan motif in Ovid, 83-85 and the cenotaph motif, 276, 280 and gender, 20, 50-86 passim, esp. 72-79, 103f. Cynosema, 282f. Cyllarus, also Hylonome, 5, 19, 96-98, 105, 107, 109f., 113, 115, 134 poetics of hybridity, 5, 19, 97f., 109f., 113 fusion of opposites, 97f., 109f. as spectacle/ecphrasis, 107, 109f. and epic gender politics, 96f., 105, 110 foil to Centaurs/Achilles, 97f. and Cheiron, 134 Cypria, 31, 14, 34, 49 n. 98, 51, 59 n. 119, 77, 78 n. 166, 79 n. 169, 183 n. 401, 186 death, epic, as closure theme, 125-127, 138f., esp. 209ff., 273ff. debilis hand, 74-76 of Achilles (gender politics), 74f. of Ovid (poetics metaphor), 75f. Demodocus’ song and epic poetics, 11, 90-92, 171, Diomedes, 82, 84, 90, 114, 144, 147, 174f., 179f., 186f., 190f., 202 Dolonia, 186f., 191 as mise en abyme of the Fall of Troy, 186f. Dorylas, 110-113

301

dramatization, 18ff. passim also performance eagle, 135f. as poetics symbolism in Ovid, 136 ekphrasis, 47, 53, 60, 107f., 114, 198-200 enargeia 109, 113, 144, 238 n. 509 Ennomus (and Charops), 192 Epic Catalogue/List, 187-197 oral vs written, 188, 190, 193-195 and the politics of orality, 188, 193f. as advertisement of superior epic performance, 188, 193f. in Ovid vs. Homer, 190-197 Epic List structuring politics, 187-197 manipulated by Ovid, 189-197 as case study of neo-analysis mechanics, 188, 190-193 and Ovid’s simulation of epic orality, 188, 193 Epic Cycle, 3f., 10, 14, 21, 26, 61, 154, 157, 161, 164, 182, 187, 202, 208-210, 213, 253, 259, 282 epitaph and the poetics of memory Fall of Troy, 17, 23, 28, 31, 33, 35, 40, 53, 107, 180, 187, 201f., 207-251, 253261, 265f., 268 Fama, (and house of), as allegory for Ovid’s poetics, 5, 145148 fama/kleos, 12, 21f., 30f., 50-64, 148153, 250, 257, 261, 265, 274ff. control and manipulation of, 21f., 30f., 51, 148f., 151, 153, 233, 250 and the cenotaph motif, 30f., Achilles’ obsession with, 12, 63f., 233, 265, 274ff. genealogy epic politics of, 66, 171-173, 257 gods in Ovid’s epic, 150-152 Hecuba, the, 18, 213f., 231f., Hecuba, 6, 17, 18f. 23, 28, 207-251, 253, 267f., 281f. in Euripides, 213f. anger of, 225-228, and the politics of the epic lament, 211f., 267f., 247-251

302

Indexes

and gender politics, 207f., 225-229, 242-244, 247-251 as embodiment of Troy, 28, 222-225, 253, 207f., transformation of, 209, 253, 281f. Hector, 10, 14, 20, 22, 25-30, 50-53, 55f., 58, 70, 72, 84-86, 90, 122, 125, 130, 133, 138-142, 145, 151, 154, 158, 167, 176, 183, 190f., 195, 205, 210-212, 219, 223, 229, 239-242, 246, 249, 251, 253f., 253-256, 259-261, 267f., 273f., 278-280 funeral and/or monumentum of, 210212, 239-242, 278-280 and Achilles, 20, 22, 158, 205, 239242, 253-256 and Aesacus, 25-30, 52, 86 and Cycnus, 50-53 and Memnon, 139, 259-261, 267 as Troy, 138-142, 145, 210-251 passim Hercules, 81 n. 175, 96 n. 210, 125-134, 135 n. 288, 266 n. 569 and epic memory, 125-130 paradigm for Achilles, 132-134 Hodites, 113, 115f. hybridity, 5, 59f. n. 121, 97f., 105-116, 121 definition of, 5, 97, as characteristic of Ovidian poetics, 5 personified in the Centaurs, 97f., 105, 110, 113f., 115f. personified in Cyllarus/Hylonome, 5, 97f., 109, 113f. Iliad, 2ff. passim Ilias Parva, 14, 78 n. 166, 154 n. 322, 161, 162 n. 346, 176 n. 382, 212 n. 350, Iliupersis, 14, 209, 212 n. 450, 221, 230 n. 491, 270 imago in Latin epic, 106f, 122f. impenetrability, 73 n. 157, 75, 117f., 120 n. 259 invention literary, of Ovid, 26f., 76, 82, 93, 217, 280 and passim Iphigeneia at Aulis, the, 18, 23, 157 n. 329, 185, 236 n. 504 Iphigeneia, 17f., 22f., 32, 34, 37-45, 52, 185, 219, 235, 276

sacrifice of, 37-45 and Polyxena, 40, 42, 185, 219, 235 and gender politics, 42f. as thematic sequel to Aesacus, 42, 276 ‘Judgment of the Arms’, see Armorum Iudicium lament, epic, 19, 23, 168, 208, 210-212, 219, 222-225, 230, 244-251, 253, 260, 263, 267-272, 276 of Hecuba, 222-225, 244-251 for Hector, 210-212, 224, 245-250 politics of, 245ff. categories of, 245-246 and gender, 245-251, 267-272 and Polyxena, 247-251, 267f. as performance, 224-225, 230 as affirmation of kleos, 211, 244-246 as metapoetics expression, 249-251 Latreus, 104, 115, 184 Meleager of Calydon, 262-273 as paradigm for Achilles, 264-265 birds of (Meleagrides), 262-264, 270273 Memnon, 6, 14, 17, 23, 26f., 53, 124, 139, 208, 253-283 and Aesacus, 26f. and/as Achilles, 139, 254-259, 264f., 278f. and/as Hector, 139, 259-261, 267 Memnonides, 17, 21, 27, 97, 262-273 and the epic lament motif, 139, 267ff. and epic death/memorializing thematics, 273, 281 and the Meleagrides, 267-273 memory, epic, 13, 21f., 77, 87-124 passim, 153-206 passim, 273-283 Nestor, master of, 87-124 in the Ulixes-Ajax debate, 153-206 and monumentalizing, 273-283 Menoetes, 76-77 metamorphosis, 14ff. passim of Aesacus, 25-31 of Iphigeneia, 41-42 of Cycnus, 82-86 of Caeneus, 116-124

II. General Index

of Periclymenus, 135-138 of Hecuba, 282-283 as metaphor for the Ovidian text, 17f., 22, 45, 48, 83, 137f., 273, 275 ‘middle’, epic, 142f., 270f., 277 the Meleager episode as, 270f. mise en abyme, 97 n. 211, 142 n. 303, 163, 187, 202 feature of the Metamorphoses narration, 163, 187, 202 mock-epic, 16, 19, 22, 125, 270, 277 monumentum, 31, 140, 144, 203, 254, 272-283 monstrum, 22, 46, 97, 191, 106, 109, 114 n. 252, 127 n. 271, 232 product of hybridity, 97, 106 n. 235 Mopsus vates, 115-124 witness to phoenix birth, 116-122 conquest of Hodites, 115f. as intradiegetic self-projection of Nestor, 118f. mythos (epic), 91-95, 99, 153 Nestor, 5, 8, 11, 17, 22, 28, 32 n. 67, 45 n. 93, 50, 62 n. 125, 87-124, 125-134, 135 n. 288, 138, 143 n. 303, 153, 158 n. 330, 174f., 181f., 195 n. 415, 207, 249, 259 longevity and long memory, 94f., 119 as epic vates/bard, 28, 94f., 105f., 108f., 119, 249f. and epic mythos, 91-95 master of epic memory, 93-102, 125134 as parallel to the Muses, 94f. and manipulation of kleos/fama, 87134 passim as Achilles’ poetic antagonist, 88, 9598, 103f., 108f., 117 as allegory for Ovid, 87-134 passim, 182 ‘forgetfullness’ of Hercules, 125-134 Numanus Remulus, and epic gender politics, 43, 72f. Odyssey, 3, 10f., 14, 25 n. 56, 61 n. 125, 83 n. 179, 90-92, 114 n. 252, 136 n. 290, 137 nn. 295-296, 138f., 148, 154 n. 323, 168 n. 362, 169 n. 363, 171, 179, 185 n. 405, 186, 219, 246 n. 524, 249

303

Palamedes, 174, 201 and Ulixes, 174 Paris, 25, 28f., 31, 64, 80f., 98, 141-147, 150, 153 the great archer in Homer, 144f., 147 and Thersites, 146 n. 310 and anti-epic poetics, 80f., 142f., 144-146 as anti-Achilles, 80f., 142f., 147 Patroclus as alter Achilles, 13, 65, 99, 140, 158, 254 Penthesileia, 53, 145-146, 254 performance, see dramatization Periclymenus, 22, 87, 135-138 as metaphor for Ovid’s text, 136-138 mock-epic death of, 135f. Philoctetes, as an alter Achilles, 201f. Phaeocomes, 113-115 phoenix, 97, 116-122, 127, 277 as allegory for Ovid’s epic, 120-122, 277 and Pythagoras, 120-122 Polydorus, 6, 17, 123f. n. 266, 207f., 213, 214 n. 456, 214-222, 225-227, 229, 231f., 242, 268 etymology of name, 215, 217f. 280 legend of, in Ovid vs. Vergil, 214222, 234 n. 502 tomb of, as sêma-monumentum, 278, 280f. Polymestor, 207f., 214-221, 225-227, 241, 281f. as perverted Ulixes, 220f., 226, Polyxena, 6, 14, 17-23 passim, 40, 42, 154, 207f., 213f., 218 n. 467, 222-225, 228-251, 268, 278, 281 in pre-Ovidian literature, 229 n. 489, 230-234 in Ovid vs. Catullus, 233f. and Iphigeneia, 40, 42, 229 n. 490, 235f. n. 504, death of, as rape, 238f., 243f. as Achilles’ prize, 231f. as manipulator of male gaze (auctor), 239f. as performer (actor), 229f., 238-244

304

Indexes

and gender-role reversal, 208, 236f., 243f., 240-244, 247-251 and politics of memorializing, 278 similarities with Hector, 20, 154, 240f., 247-251 metaphor for falling Troy, 207f., 222f., 240 pudicitia of, 244 Priam, 9, 14, 25, 28-33, 52f, 56, 57 n. 115, 70 n. 148, 90, 107 n. 237, 122, 146 n. 312, 202, 205f., 210f., 215, 217-223, 225, 229, 240-243, 265, 276 as ‘doron’, 440f. prophecy, 22, 50 a trope of literary allusion, 32 Protesilaus, 49f., 51 n. 102, 238 n. 509 as proto-/anti-Achilles, 49f. as epic beginning and closure, 49f. tomb/momumentum of, 49f. Sêma, 273, 279-283 topographic vs. semantic, 273, 277 and monumentum, 279-283 vs. fama, 281-283 solacium mortis, 56 succession, 9f. passim of Achilles, 9f. passim poetics of, 9f. passim swan, 81-85, 117, 122, 187 n. 406 as poetics metaphor, 83-85, 187 n. 406 motif in the Metamorphoses, 84f. Telephus, 67f., 77-79 legend (in Euripides), 77f. as foil to Achilles, 78f. as performer; metamorphosis, 78f. as anti-hero, 78 as symbol for Ovid’s alternative epic, 79 Thersites, 39 n. 82, 72, 145f., 146 nn. 309-311 as symbolism of anti-epic poetics, 145f., 146 n. 310 Thetis, 23, 63-67, 85, 125, 139, 233, 246, 253-259 and Aurora, 255-259 titulus, as ‘prize’/‘title’/sphragis, 203-204 Tlepolemus, 125-132

antagonizing Nestor’s veracity, 128f. and epic memory politics, 129-132 Ulixes, 6, 11, 17, 20, 22, 34, 36, 78, 91f., 142, 154-206, 208f., 222, 225-227 and the glorification of mêtis, 164171, 225-227 vs. the Homeric poetics and politics, 171-187 as embodiment of Ovid’s craftsmanship at work, 187-197, 200-206 as creator of the Homeric Achilles, 171-187, 200-206 vs. Ajax, 154-187, 197-206 virtus (Achilles’ anxiety over), 58 n. 117, 72, 82 n. 176, 103 n. 226, 108, 125, 148 n. 316, 155, 172, 177 n. 384, 226, 231, 233f., 236-244, 267 and the female, 236-244, 267 n. 573