Hanna M. Roisman
In memoriam of my beloved teacher, Zeev Wolfgang Rubinsohn
We generally think of an epic poem as a long narrative poem on a serious subject, featuring heroic deeds and involving events significant to a culture or nation. The ancient Greeks, though, defined poems as epics as much by their meter as by their content. Virtually all poems in dactylic hexameter were termed epics.1 To distinguish epics with different types of contents and purposes, they are classified into sub-genres. This chapter discusses the heroic epic, which relates the deeds of heroes; the didactic epic, which aims at teaching a specific subject matter; and the mock epic, which parodies the heroic epic. More specifically, it discusses the extant epics in each of these sub-genres.2
The fundamental differences in the three sub-genres make it difficult to formulate meaningful generalizations about the Greek epic as a whole, as does the very long time span, ranging from Homer, probably in the eighth century BCE, through Nonnus in the fifth century CE (where the discussion in this chapter will end) and beyond. Compounding the difficulty is that most of the ancient Greek epics are lost to us, leaving large gaps in our knowledge. Moreover, since the didactic epics do not have any heroes, only two subjects, as far as I can tell, link them all and allow for a connected discussion of them: the treatment of the gods, and the development of the epic from the poems attributed to Homer and Hesiod, both of whom left an indelible imprint on ancient Greek and Roman literature and well beyond.
In this chapter, I will focus on the latter subject. My aim is not to ferret out the many allusions and parallels to Homer and Hesiod in the other epics. Reams have been written on this subject, discussing in minute detail the adoptions and adaptations by later epic poets of distinctive features of the Homeric language and style and borrowings from Hesiod. What I am interested in conveying is how the Homeric and, to a lesser extent, the Hesiodic, epics served as points of departure for the epic writers that followed them. By “point of departure” I mean both the place at which one starts and the place one leaves. In particular, I will look at the epics’ movement away from the Homeric model, as each poet wrote in his own voice about the matters that interested him. The discussions are necessarily brief, and leave out a good deal of information and observations about the Greek epic. The aim is to provide a coherent guide to very disparate works and to arouse interest in them.
Only four epics from the Archaic period have survived more or less intact: Homer’s heroic epics Iliad (15,778 lines) and Odyssey (12,109 lines), believed to have taken their present shape in the eighth century BCE and put into writing by the sixth century, and two didactic epics attributed to Hesiod, born in Ascra in Boeotia, probably no earlier than 750 BCE or later than 720 BCE: Theogony (1,022 lines), and Works and Days (828 lines).3
The poet(s) of the Iliad and Odyssey were consummate storytellers. In both epics, plot, character, and theme converge in a cohesive and compelling whole. The Iliad, as announced in line 1, sings the theme of Achilles’ wrath (mēnis),4 and the plot focuses on and develops that theme. The poem starts in medias res, towards the end of the ten-year-long Trojan War. It deals only with a limited period of time (56 days), which enables the depiction of persons and events in detail and depth. It starts with the poet’s plea to the Muse to sing of the wrath of Achilles and its devastation, then quickly moves to the council of the warriors, showing how Agamemnon provokes that anger by appropriating Achilles’ concubine cum spoil of war Briseis. Most of the Iliad’s subsequent events – the foundering of the Greeks as their best fighter nurses his anger; the failed mission to persuade Achilles to rejoin the fighting; the death of Patroclus at the hands of Hector, the Trojans’ best warrior; Achilles’ rage and remorse, which finally bring him back to the battlefield to avenge Patroclus’s death; his furious slaughter of the Trojan warriors, his manhandling of Hector’s corpse, and his initial dishonorable refusal to allow him a proper burial – derive from the wrath that drives Achilles and combine to demonstrate the destructive implications of this character trait which, perhaps more than any other, makes for a good fighter and meets the needs of war.
Achilles’ absence from most of the fighting enables the Homeric muse to depict with nuance and detail a varied band of warrior-heroes, at once great and flawed, whose special abilities complement one another’s. While Achilles is described as the Greeks’ best fighter, Odysseus is drawn as their most eloquent, resourceful, and diplomatic (Il. 3.216–23; Rutherford 2011). Diomedes displays both the enthusiasm and impulsiveness of youth, Nestor the experience and garrulousness of age, although Agamemnon considers him their best counselor (Roisman 2005; Andersen 2011). Agamemnon shows himself as arrogant and easily deluded, but he is nonetheless the respected leader of the band, with more initiative and determination than Menelaus, who shows a measure of kindness that his brother lacks (Roisman 2011; Van Nortwick 2011). On the Trojan side, Hector’s valor and sense of responsibility show up Paris’s dandyism, selfishness, and reluctance to exert himself (Griffin 2011b; Schein 2011). Several of the heroes make mistakes that cost the lives of their comrades. All reveal a degree of complexity: the courageous Odysseus runs from battle (Il. 8.87–98); the angry Achilles utters some of the most tender and moving lines in the entire epic (e.g., 1.160–68; 9.3217; 16.7–19; 18.98–126). All are compelling, larger-than-life figures.
The action is propelled by the interventions of the gods and by the interactions of the characters, who variously plan and improvise, argue with or support one another, and confront their enemies. Tension – and interest – are generated not only by the graphic descriptions of the battles but also, and even more so, by the conflicts or disagreements among the characters, which arouse in one a desire to hear what they have to say, to know what they think, and to see how they will resolve their clash of wills and respond to the challenges they constantly face. The whole is brought to a satisfying end, both in terms of the plot and the theme, after the funeral games for Patroclus and divine intervention, when Achilles, his anger sated, yields to Priam’s pleas to allow Hector a proper burial.
While the Iliad supplied later writers with models of the warrior hero, the Odyssey, probably composed later than the Iliad, provided the model of the daring and resourceful wanderer, the “man of many devices (polytropos),” as we are told in the first line, who emerges triumphant from one fantastic adventure after another. Like the Iliad, the Odyssey focuses only on part of a longer story, forty days in the tenth year of Odysseus’s wanderings, shortly before he returns to Ithaca. Its twin strands, man’s longing for home and the son’s search for his father, are reflected in the interweaving of the stories of Odysseus and Telemachus. The narrative begins simultaneously with Telemachus leaving Ithaca to obtain news of his father and Odysseus’s departure from Calypso’s island, where he had languished for seven years, and draws to a close with their meeting in Ithaca and their cooperation in slaying the suitors, who have despoiled their home and would deprive Odysseus of his wife and Telemachus of his inheritance. In between, Odysseus’s long retrospective narration to the Phaeacians of his adventures leading up to his arrival on their island reveals aspects of his character that warn them not to try to keep him there against his will and persuade them to supply him with the means to return home (Ahl and Roisman 1996, 71–151). Though disparate, the adventures are well connected. Each, more fraught than the previous one, serves as a way-station in Odysseus’s journey home and in his struggle with the forces of nature, represented by the sea that constantly tosses him about and by the witches, monsters, and other entities that tempt him, endanger him, and require him to exercise his wits and self control to overcome them.
The two earliest didactic epics attributed to Hesiod, the Theogony, which tells of the succession of the gods and the battles that led to the pre-eminence of Zeus as the beneficent cum punitive ruler of the world, and Works and Days, which provides counsel on how to live a just and successful life, resemble the above discussed heroic epics in major ways. They, too, were composed in dactylic hexameter, a meter that apparently lent itself to long narrative recitations. And they, too, start with an invocation to the muses. Yet the famous distinction in the Theogony between muses that tell the truth and those that tell lies (26–8) and the poet’s statement at the start of Works and Days that his purpose is to tell his brother Perses the truth (10) set these epics apart from the heroic epics. Given the lack of elaboration, it is impossible to say with any certainty what the poet meant by truth. It is clear, though, from both poems that he considered myth and fable, and the imaginative descriptions of how they unfolded, within its realm. But the distinction neatly fits the difference between the heroic epic, where telling a compelling story is central, and the didactic epic, where the aim is to convey information. With this distinction, the poet implies that his purpose is to tell the truth, not a well-integrated, riveting story, in which the characters, gods and men alike, move the plot forward.
This does not mean that the didactic epics are without beauty. The muses, as described in Theogony, have the double duty of relaying “what will be and what was before” (38) and of doing so harmoniously and melodiously. Far from being a dry succession of “begats,” the Theogony is filled with lines whose music lifts them off the page. It conveys wonder and awe at the beauty of the world and the power of the deities, for good and for ill. The myriad gods and spirits who populate the universe of the poem imbue it with their vitality, while the gods themselves are brought to life through thumbnail descriptions. For example, in the account of Zeus’s birth, the story of how Rhea gets her parents’ advice and help in preventing her husband, Kronos, from swallowing the infant Zeus, as he had his other children, is told vividly and succinctly (467–91).
Moreover, the Theogony is filled with drama and conflict: Earth and Kronos against Uranus, Rhea and her parents; Earth and Uranus against Kronos and Zeus; the conflict between Prometheus and Zeus; and the ten-year war between the Olympians and Titans, which the Olympians win with the assistance of the Hundred-Handers whom they had freed of their chains for the purpose. In its vivid descriptions of the battles, Hesiod’s poem most resembles the Homeric epics. The resemblance is especially prominent in the second half of the poem, which tells how Zeus defeats his enemies and consolidates his governance. The dialogue in which Zeus asks Obriareus, Cottus, and Gyges to fight on his side (644–63) is reminiscent of dialogues between heroes of the Iliad. As in the Iliad, each party is presented with dignity, each sets out his position in a logical manner, and the conclusions they reach issue in the next action and beyond. The account of the battle with the Titans, like the battle scenes in the Iliad, is filled with the terror and noise of clashing armies, as fighters shout, missiles are hurled, and fires scorch the earth. So is the account of the single combat between Zeus and Typhoeus, the storm god, in which the clash of the “warriors” is rendered as a colossal upheaval of nature.
Nonetheless, the Theogony is better in its parts than its whole. The story is secondary. The conflicts that endow it with a measure of tension are inherent in the succession myths on which Hesiod drew (for which see West 1966: 1–16), as is the chronological order which provides the poem with its basic structure; though, in fact, the movement from one episode to the next is sometimes difficult to follow.
Works and Days consists largely of advice on how to lead a just and successful life and focuses on the concerns of ordinary people, farmers and traders and seamen who have to earn their living in uncertain conditions. Neither its contents nor its focus lend themselves to heroic or even dramatic treatment. Nor, as far as Hesiod is concerned, do they require a plot in which the audience, eager to know what will happen, is propelled from one incident to the next. The epic consists largely of disparate elements: an account of the two types of strife, stories of Pandora and the ages of man, the fable of the hawk and the nightingale, an exhortation to justice and to work, advice on being successful, the farmer’s calendar and guide for the merchant sailor, and a collection of social and religious counsels. The fact that all the advice is addressed to Perses, Hesiod’s brother, provides a loose framework, and the motif of Zeus’s justice endows the parts with a certain coherence, as it does the incidents in the Theogony. However, Perses is mentioned or addressed only sporadically (10, 27, 286, 299, 397, 611, 641), with large gaps during which the personal advice to him flows into moral generalizations that pertain to all.
There are three stories in the epic – of Prometheus and Pandora, of the four ages of man, and the brief fable of the hawk and the nightingale – wedged between the preceding account of the two types of strife and the moral and practical counsel that take up the last two-thirds of the work. Each story provides a different perspective on, or explanation for, the suffering and injustice that Hesiod sees as the lot of human beings. But they are discrete stories, with no connection other than the theme of human suffering. Any of them could have been cut without being missed or other stories added without disrupting a non-existent flow. The remainder of the poem reads like a how-to book whose moral and practical precepts were rendered in verse because verse was the medium of instruction.
The next epics that have come down to us in full are of three different sub-genres. Phaenomena or Visible Signs or Appearances is a didactic epic describing the night sky, written by Aratus, a Greek of Soli in Cilicia, written in the third century BCE. The Argonautica by Apollonius Rhodius, is a heroic epic, also written in the third century BCE, telling the story of the Argonauts’ pursuit of the golden fleece. The Battle of the Frogs and Mice (Batrachomyomachia) is a mock epic or “play poem” of unknown authorship and dating. The ancients attributed it to Homer, but modern scholars have dated it anywhere between the sixth and first century BCE (Rotstein 2011). All three poets built upon their predecessors and, in keeping with the fashion of their time, expected their audiences to recognize their allusions and to appreciate the originality of their own renditions (Kidd 1997, 8–10).
The best-regarded in a long tradition of astronomical poems that preceded it, and from which Aratus doubtless gleaned both inspiration and artistry, is Phaenomena (1,154 lines). Its debts to the language and style of Homer and to themes and stories in Hesiod have been exhaustively noted. But Aratus has essentially left the world of Homer behind and, as scholars have noted, outstripped Hesiod both in his ability to move from point to point in an intelligible and compelling manner and within a cohesive structure, and also in the artistry and sophistication of his style (Lesky 1966, 750–52; Kidd 1997, 5–42).
As befits a pupil of Zeno of Citium (335–263 BCE), Aratus incorporates Stoic thinking into the poem. Scholars point especially to the image of Zeus in the Hymn to Zeus by Cleanthes, Zeno’s successor as head of the Stoic school in Athens (Kidd 1997, 10–12). Unlike the punitive and angry Hesiodic Zeus, the Stoic Zeus is the life-force of the universe from which we all gather our existence and the rational power that directs everything for the best. Aratus combines the Zeus of the traditional religion with the Stoic one. As Kidd points out (1997, note on line 1) the entire poem displays the presence of Zeus. Zeus is the sky (e.g. 224, 259), the weather god (e.g. 293, 426), the creator of constellations (11, 265), the pervading life force (e.g. 1–4), the benefactor (e.g. 5–10), but also the mythological god (e.g. 31).
To the modern reader, Aratus’s subject matter, the array of the heavenly bodies and their impact on climatic and weather conditions on earth, is no more dynamic or compelling than that of Hesiod’s Works and Days, and we certainly have more accurate information than Aratus provides. Yet Phaenomena is a work of extraordinary vitality and excitement. In the first part of the epic, Aratus leads his hearers or readers through the night sky like a tour guide, directing their attention to the various sites, describing and explaining what they see, telling the occasional story, and, above all, sharing with them his wonder at the beauty and power of all that he shows them (e.g. 473). In the Theogony, Hesiod had anthropomorphized Night, as he had the other deities. Aratus helps his audience to visualize the constellations by describing them as animals (real or imagined), people, or natural phenomena (e.g. rivers). In doing so, he obviously relied on the names they bore. But he went further, rendering the abstract geographic and mathematical relations among them in pictorial terms and endowing the constellations with motion and will. Thus, the night sky becomes intensely alive. The Bears roll their wagons in opposite directions (26–30) as the Dragon, in between them, reaches over them with the tip of his tail, and a man toiling at some unknown labor has his right foot on the Dragon’s head and his arms raised (45–70). Andromeda is threatened by the approach of the great Sea Monster, as the Fish’s tail chains converge behind the Monster’s back fin (353–66). Examples abound, as the constellations “sweep” across the sky (443).
The tour is a delight and rich with detail. Intermingled with the descriptions of the constellations are climatic, sailing, and agricultural information, along with stories and explanations. We learn about the changes in the position of constellations in different seasons, and when they are and are not visible, their origin and birth, as well as why most of the stars are not named individually (373–6), and a host of other things. The information is provided without a predetermined pattern but always seems pertinent to the stars and constellations being discussed.
The story is also interesting and appealing, brought to life by interjections of the author’s voice and concerns. To take only one example of the latter, after pointing out the impossibility of identifying the moving stars, Aratus expresses the hope that he is adequate to expounding the circles of the fixed stars (460–61). The introduction of the authorial voice goes back to the poet’s account in the Theogony of how he was personally inspired by the Muses (22–5) and to the poet’s address to his brother Perses in Works and Days. Hesiod, however, remonstrated from a position of superiority and his tone was often sour and censorious. Aratus’s voice is amiable, varied, and engaging. Thus, as he moves from describing the sky to explaining how to determine the time of month and to anticipate the weather conditions from the appearance of the sun and moon, his tone shifts appropriately from that of tour guide to that of an eager but gentle instructor who enjoins his students to “take pains to learn” (759), “pay attention” (819, 880), “study” (832, 778), and who cautions them not to neglect signs of a storm (973) or impending fire (983).
The legend of the Argonauts’ pursuit of the golden fleece is one of the earliest known to the Greeks. In the mythic chronology, it took place a generation before the Trojan War (Argon. 1.556–8). Both the Iliad and the Odyssey, assume their audience’s familiarity with it (Il. 2.711–15; 7.467–9; Od. 10.135–9, 11.252–9; 12.3–4, 59–72).
Apollonius was not only a poet, but, like his teacher and friend the influential poet and literary critic Callimachus, also a learned critic of Greek literature.5 His Argonautica conducts a dialogue with the Homeric epics (Carspecken 1952; Hunter 1993 passim).6 The author’s declaration that he will tell the “glorious deeds” (1.1) of men born long ago brings to mind Homer’s account of the closely knit band of Argive warriors in the Iliad. The Argonauts’ adventure-filled sea voyage to bring back the golden fleece recalls Odysseus’s perilous voyage back to Ithaca. Like Odysseus, the Argonauts sail from place to place in treacherous seas, encounter a succession of mythical peoples and monsters, and overcome a variety of temptations and dangers before returning home. There are also parallel incidents. Yet even as the Argonautica clearly sounds its Homeric legacy, it conscientiously diverges from the Homeric model in its structure, characterization, and realization of its theme.
Structurally, where the Homeric epics are dynamic, the Argonautica is linear and static. Both the Iliad and Odyssey open with conflicts (the Iliad with the conflict between Agamemnon and Achilles, the Odyssey with the conflict between Telemachus and the suitors) that create interest and propel the action forward. The Argonautica opens with a catalogue of the Argonauts. This catalogue harkens back to the catalogue of the ships in the Iliad. Both catalogues function to introduce the “armies.” However, while Homer places his catalogue in Book 2, after the action has gotten under way, Apollonius places his right at the start of Book 1, thereby starting his story without the tension and excitement that inform the Homeric epics.7 The catalogue is followed by a series of briefly rendered set scenes—the parting of mother and son, the appointment of Jason to lead the crew, the readying of the ship to sail, and the prophecy of its safe return with the golden fleece – in which everyone says what is required under the circumstances. There are no clashes of will (other than the brief and quickly suppressed outburst of Idas, 1.463–95), or insoluble problems. The narration and dialogues are instrumental, presenting the situation and moving the story from one point to the next. Much of the epic—until Medea enters in Book 3—reads like a series of tableaux.
Jason is cast as an anti-hero. He bears little resemblance to the resourceful, inventive, and ever-ready Odysseus (see also Fantuzzi and Hunter 2004, 107–15, 129), and has nothing of the pride or drive for honor that motivates the warriors of the Iliad. His distinguishing features are his beauty and grace, which win him Medea’s love (3.443–4, 919–26, 956–61). These qualities link him to Paris, the reprobate dandy of the Iliad, whom he resembles not only in his attractiveness to women (e.g. 1.721–68, 3.956–63) but also in his reluctance to put himself at risk. In 3.919–26, the connection is reinforced by the context of Hera’s beautifying Jason before his first encounter with Medea, which recalls Aphrodite’s luring Helen to Paris’ chamber with the statement that he is waiting for her “gleaming in beauty and garments” (Il. 3.390–94).8 It is also reinforced in the account of Jason as he is about to face the bronze-hooved oxen. The description of his gleaming bronze helmet and sword slung over his shoulders (3.1282) recalls the portrayal of Paris striding among the Trojans with his panther skin over his shoulders and his curved bow and sword, as well as the description of his arming before his duel with Menelaus (Il. 3.15–18, 334).
At points early in the epic, Jason’s lack of the warrior’s aggressiveness, his apparent mildness and gentleness, are presented in a favorable light. His readiness to forgive Telamon’s insult is attributed to his understanding that Telamon spoke in grief (1.1290–95, 1331–43). His kindness and compassion for the blind Phineus (2.243) are commendable. His decision to ask Aietes for the golden fleece before trying to steal it (3.178–93), and his efforts to calm Aietes’ wrath with mild words are evidence of his reason and wisdom (3.382–431).
Yet also from the beginning and increasingly in the course of the narrative, he is shown as lacking in both leadership and courage. He doesn’t volunteer to lead the Argonauts, but accepts the post at Heracles’ suggestion (1.345–7). In his first act of fighting, he mistakenly kills a friend under the misapprehension that he’s an enemy (1.961–1035). He repeatedly leaves others to take the initiative in answering aggression and repelling danger. He accepts Aietes’ challenge to yoke his bulls and plow his fields with dragons’ teeth because he is cornered and has no choice (3. 422–5). And he carries out the task only when the drugs Medea gives him to make him invincible assure his success. Above all, his characteristic response to adversity is amēchaniē. Denoting shiftlessness, helplessness, and despair, it is a term rarely used in the Homeric epics.9
Well before the end of the epic it is clear that Jason lacks not only the warrior’s stamina, but is also an egotist who exploits Medea’s love. His soft-spoken speech (3.975–1007), in which he supplicates, flatters, and promises Medea gratitude in exchange for her help, thereby implying that he will take her with him when he leaves, is consistent with his generally non-aggressive, accommodating tone, but here it smacks of hypocrisy and utilitarianism. The impression becomes certainty with his vague and passionless promise to marry her (3.1120–30) and even more so with his nonchalant readiness to sacrifice her to Apsyrtus and his pursuit of the Colchians in exchange for the golden fleece (4.338–409). Increasingly, the epic of the Argonauts’ “glorious deeds” turns into a tale of a man who relies on a woman with magical charms to get him what he wants and who owes his success to his fine looks, good manners, and ability to exploit the feelings of a passionate and initially innocent young girl.
It also becomes the story of Medea, the most, and only, passionate figure in the epic.10 Torn by her love of Jason and duty to her parents, she is the more compelling figure. Her emotions, considerations, and reactions are described more fully than those of any of the males, with the possible, and only partial, exception of her father.
Jason’s passivity and lack of heroism have been noted by generations of scholars (Carspecken 1952, 99–100). It has also been pointed out that the other Argonauts are little better than he (Carspecken 1952, 99–125, passim). Some show greater initiative and readiness to face danger. But they, too, are frequently described as afflicted with amēchaniē 11 – helpless and despairing – and only a few of them object to Jason’s immoral behaviors. The question that arises is why Apollonius chose to create such a weak and tepid hero. This depiction was not necessitated by the legend, which drew Jason as an active hero, though not an admirable one. Pindar’s Jason contends with Pelias, his father’s half-brother, for rule of his father’s land and mobilizes and leads the men who join him on his mission to bring Pelias the golden fleece (Pyth. 4). Euripides’ Jason is a self-righteous cad and social climber who shamelessly justifies his mistreatment of Medea.
Green (1997, 39), commenting on Apollonius’s frequent use of the noun amēchaniē for Jason (1.460, 1286; 2.408–11, 23, 885), suggests that it indicates “a pervasive sense of human uncertainty, shiftlessness, and ignorance in the face of the unknown” and argues that it shows “a realistic acceptance of man’s limitations.” Carspecken (1952, 139) claims that the Argonautica “rejects [the Homeric] ideals of physical strength, courage, love, and honor” as unrealistic and inapplicable to its day. Whatever the explanation, it is hard to see how a weak, tepid, and passive hero and his tepid companions can perform “glorious deeds.” By the end of the epic, if not much earlier, it is clear that the deeds that are related are not heroic and that the central feature of the heroic epic has been turned on its head.
The Battle of the Frogs and Mice (303 lines) parodies the Iliad.12 Telling the story of a “clamorous” day war, it brings to bear key conventions of the heroic epic to mock them. The figures who will become the leaders of the two armies, the frog Puff-jaw and the mouse Crumb-snatcher, boastfully introduce themselves by their lineage and key traits. The cause of the war is a foolish and impetuous act—Puff-jaw gives Crumb-snatcher a ride in the sea on his back—analogous to the abduction of Helen – which ends in betrayal (reminiscent of Paris’ betrayal of Menelaus) when Puff-jaw dives underwater to escape a water-snake and Crumb-snatcher drowns. As in the Iliad, there are councils on two sides, twin scenes of arming, and twin strategy sessions. Zeus calls a council of the gods on Mount Olympus, and there are detailed and bloody battle scenes, in which each blow leads to the next. The poem mocks the values of the Homeric epic and the aggrandizement of war. It also mocks the gods. The council on Mount Olympus ends with Athena’s suggestion that the gods amuse themselves by watching the war from heaven, and the poem ends with Hera and Zeus weighing in on opposite sides, and with the victory of the frogs when Zeus sends a contingent of crabs to bite off the tales of the mice. The poem is fun and, in its very act of parody, a tribute to the Homeric model; but it also constitutes a critique of the Homeric values and conventions, which it reduces to absurdity.
We now skip several more centuries to the Imperial period, with two epics: Quintus of Symrna’s untitled heroic epic of the fourth century CE recounting the events leading up to the fall of Troy and Nonnus of Panopolis’s Dionysiaca, composed in the fifth century.
Quintus’s epic (14 books, 8,772 lines) has been variously titled The Fall of Troy, The Trojan Epic, and Posthomerica.13 It draws its material not from Homer’s epics, but from three epics of the Epic Cycle (Aethiopis, Little Iliad, and Sack of Ilion), which covered the Trojan tale from its start to the death of Odysseus.14 It shares with the Iliad a sense of both the glory and abiding sadness of war, and its aspiration to the grandeur of the Homeric epics is evident in the closeness of its language and style to Homer’s (James 2004, xxii–xxvii). But like the cyclic epics on which it is based, and which Aristotle faulted for trekking without depth through a succession of events (Poet. 1451a16–35, 1452a20–21, 1459a17–59b7), it reads more like a chronicle than a compelling tale in which action is driven by character. Quintus neither achieves nor strives for the integration of character, action, and theme that characterizes the Iliad and the Odyssey.
His epic plunges into the story without the usual introductory appeal to the muses and without a statement of theme.15 Like Homer, Quintus restricts his epic to a short time span (44 days). But while Homer uses the space this gave him to explore the characters of his heroes – Achilles’ wrath, Odysseus’s resourcefulness – and to show their implications in everything they do, Quintus gives us rather flat and idealized heroes. Over the centuries, generations of poets, especially the tragedians, had fleshed out the heroes of the Trojan War and, in many cases, drew them with a critical eye. Thus, for example, Neoptolemus’s cruelty, Odysseus’s sleazy scheming, and Philoctetes’ self-destructive resentment were highlighted, and the implications of their behavior analyzed. Through selective use of the tradition, Quintus simplified these characters and presented them in an unequivocally positive light (James 2004, xxvi–xxvi, xxviii; 2005, 368). Ignoring Neoptolemus’s cruelty, he portrays him solely as the heroic son of a heroic father. In describing his killing of Priam, he doesn’t consider the cruelty of the young warrior killing an old man, but rather offers the moral: “The glory of man is never diminished for long/And disgrace can quickly catch one unawares” (13.248–9, tr. James). He depicts Odysseus as unambiguously honorable. Thus, in Book 5, he tells the story of Ajax’s suicide after Odysseus is awarded Achilles’ armor so as to refute the accusations (made by Menelaus in the text) that Odysseus had obtained the armor dishonestly. In Book 12, he ennobles Odysseus’s ploy of the Trojan horse by presenting the attack from the horse as requiring courage and spirit. In Book 9, he downplays Odysseus’s betrayal of Philoctetes by framing his abandonment of the injured hero on the deserted island of Lemnos as necessitated by fate, and by depicting Philoctetes as accepting the abandonment without anger or resentment. The idealization of the heroes extends to the collective as well, with the Trojans almost always depicted as fearful and cowering before the superior Achaeans or, alternatively, as foolishly and hubristically over-confident. The result is that instead of a war between two worthy opponents forced into a destructive fight by the selfishness of Paris, which we see in the Iliad, we are given a contest between those who are worthy and those who are less so.
It is not only that the heroes are idealized; greater attention is paid to describing the battles than to characterization. For example, Achilles is described as gentle and kind (3.424–6, 550), without ever being shown to be such. Speech is often placed in the mouths of collectives, such as the Argive men, the Danaans, and Trojan people, whereas only specific individuals utter statements in actuality.
Rather than character, what stands out and holds the fourteen books of Quintus’s epic together is an ironic perspective: the sense that nothing ever works out as expected. The epic opens with the Trojans, traumatized by Achilles’ violence, cowering within the city walls, fearful of venturing outside (1.3–17); but they are killed in the end within the walls. Paris, in contrast, is killed after urging the Trojans to go out and fight rather than retreat behind the walls (2.63–80; 10.235–363). Most of the ironies concern the defeat of hubris or over-confidence, the only character flaw exhibited by virtually all the warriors on both sides. The defeat of the Amazon Queen Penthesileia (who came to fight on the Trojan side) at the hands of Achilles is described as the defeat of a proud and overconfident warrior, an overweening woman, who does not know the limits of her strength or the power of her opponent. But Achilles’ own boasting of his strength before he kills her is portentous, and he himself is killed by Apollo for his hubristic defiance (3.40–88, 139–85). All the purported saviors of the Trojans – Penthesileia, Memnon, Eurypylos – boast of their power, promise salvation, are eagerly and hopefully received, only to bring death and destruction on the Trojans and to be killed themselves.
Essentially, character is trumped by two ideas, or ideologies, that Quintus uses his poem to convey. One is the idea, which underpins its ironies, that all is determined by fate. The notion that the war’s end is predetermined is also present in the Iliad, where the gods are the ultimate arbiters of what befalls the human heroes. The difference is that in Homer, the notion of the gods’ power does not undercut the value placed on human deeds and decisions. For Quintus, apparently, it does. If the aim of Homer’s muse is to exalt the human warriors, with all their flaws, Quintus’s is to show that, for all their greatness, their fate is ultimately determined by the gods, and especially by Zeus. Thus, his epic is filled with statement upon statement of the determinant role of fate or the gods in every incident, and the motives and drives of the characters are secondary in shaping events. Given this outlook, character is of little interest and there is no need to explore or develop it in the poem.
The other idea that undermines characterization is the stoic rejection of passion. The text presents repeated admonitions against strong emotions. Calliope rebukes Thetis for her excessive mourning of Achilles and advises her to accept the Fates (3.630–54). Poseidon commands her to cease her mourning and promises that Achilles will live like a god (3.765–83). Nestor calls upon the Achaeans to stop grieving over Ajax’s death and to get on with the practical task of burying him (5.600–611), and urges Podaleirios to temper his grief for his fallen brother (7.37–92). For the reader, such advice undermines the legitimacy of the characters’ grief and undercuts its emotional power. So do statements like “a mother/mourns for her son even if he so much as goes out to a feast” (7.389–90), which follows upon Neoptolemus’s rejection of his mother’s plea that he not join the war after his father’s death. Not only grief and yearning, but also anger, are condemned. Achilles, whose heroism must remain unblemished, is not shown as the angry hero of the Iliad, and the entire account of Ajax’s madness and suicide serves as an object lesson in the disastrous consequences of being carried away by one’s anger. For an author who condemns strong passions, there is little point in depicting heroes who embody them. But their passions are precisely what bring characters alive, make them interesting, and enable us to identify with them. Ultimately, Quintus’s heroes are not only idealized, but also tepid. Without character depth or development, Quintus’s epic resembles a film that offers up a glut of violent scenes for their own sake.
The Dionysiaca, the longest poem of Greek antiquity (48 books, 20,426 lines), celebrates the life of the god of wine, who was regarded, along with Heracles, as a great ambassador and representative of international Hellenism (Bowersock 1994, 157). It is a capacious and compendious work, which incorporates the vast lore on Dionysus that was current at the time and a store of mythological detail, much of it not found elsewhere. It encompasses the entire story of Dionysus’s life on earth, from several generations before his conception through his apotheosis on Mount Olympus, where he joins his father Zeus. The main adventure it relates, Dionysus’s expedition against the Indian king Deriades (13–40), harkens back to the conquests of Alexander the Great (Lesky 1966, 817; Bowersock 1994, 57). In Nonnus’s rendition, the expedition was undertaken on Zeus’s orders to drive out the impious race of Indians and to teach all the nations his sacred rites and viticulture as a condition for earning his place on Olympus. Dionysus’s victory over Deriades in Book 40 is followed by a long and detailed travelogue, recounting his journey to real (e.g., Beroe – Beirut, Tyre; Chuvin 1994, 167–8) and mythological places, in each of which he demonstrates his divine power, whether through fighting or through an act of seduction or rape.
Its narrative is episodic and digressive, its style ornate, full of embellishment and mythological exempla (Shorrock 2005, 376–80). Nonnus’s verse is exuberant, its energy and movement recalling that of Aratus’s astrological epic.
It draws on numerous sources. Homer is the most obvious and most important. Its 48 books, telling first of war and then of Dionysus’s journey to join his father on Mount Olympus, parallel the narrative pattern of the Iliad and the Odyssey, with their 24 books each, telling first of the Trojan War and then of Odysseus’s journey home to Ithaca. The invocations to the Muse, the catalogue of forces joining Dionysus’s expedition, the battle scenes and funeral games, the gods battling for their favorites on either side, and Hera’s deception of Zeus, are among the many echoes of the Iliad (Shorrock 2001, 25–111). The epic uses elements of Homeric diction, such as stock epithets and formulae, and recasts and transforms Homeric episodes (see Hopkinson 1994a).
But this sort of engagement is not limited to Homer. The Dionysiaca may be viewed as an amalgam of authors and genres. It draws on Hesiod (for its cosmogonies), the Greek tragedians, and erotic elegists, on encomiastic and pastoral poetry, and on foundation stories, Hellenistic astrology, and more (Harries 1994).
Moreover, Nonnus explicitly declares his intention to outdo Homer (Hopkinson 1994a; Shorrock 2005, 381–2). In his first proem (1.34–44), he asks his muse to clothe him in the perfumed garments of Dionysus and to leave Homer the stinking seal skin of Menelaus. He further contrasts his lively and jocular music to the tame sweetness of the reed flute, presumably associated with Homer. In his second proem (25.1–270), in the midst of his account of the Indian War, he asks that he might hold the “inspired spear and shield of father Homer” and hear “the ceaseless call of the skilled trumpet in Homer’s verse, that I may destroy what is left of the Indians with my spear of the sprit” (25.265–70, tr. Rouse). In these passages, Nonnus identifies Homer’s consummate poetic skills as valuable tools that he will put to use for superior purposes and in a superior way.
Thus, whereas Homer’s heroes are mortal and, where they are not assisted by the gods, their exploits confined to a human compass, Nonnus chose as his subject the immortal Dionysus, possessed of the god’s protean ability to change shape. Whereas the Homeric epics are tightly structured and their accounts bound within a short space of time, Nonnus’s epic is wide in scope and expansive in detail. It incorporates detailed accounts of myths which can stand on their own, tells more about his hero’s doings than Homer tells about Achilles and Odysseus, and expands on every incident, every description, and every speech at considerably greater length than similar passages in Homer’s poems. There are also more catalogues than in the Iliad, longer funeral games, a seemingly endless number of human and non-human warriors, an array of allegorical participants in the fighting, and detailed and erotic descriptions of sexual exploits, which are absent in the Iliad and much toned down in the Odyssey.
The Dionysiaca’s supra-Homeric exuberance probably goes a long way to accounting for its great popularity in its day and beyond; the poem continued to be read in Constantinople throughout the Middle Ages. It may also contribute to the difficulties that modern readers, unfamiliar with the mythology, not galvanized by the exploits of the god of wine, and lacking the background to appreciate the poem’s variety and virtuosity, experience with the poem. Recent scholars who have sought to revive its reputation have focused on elucidating the poem’s episodic and digressive structure, although the chronological order of events is actually not difficult to follow. Thus, Vian (1994), explaining that its structure is obscured by the poem’s systematic pursuit of variety, points out unifying motifs and then charts the progress of the Indian War and Dionysus’s behavior in it. Shorrock (2001,10–23; 2005, 376–8) argues that the poem’s structure can be viewed as reflecting the intertwined sprigs of the vine and that the poem itself is as intoxicating as wine which alters the reader’s perception of ‘reality’ (Shorrock 2001, 114–16, 207–13).
A more serious obstacle to enjoyment, at least for some readers, may be the poem’s characterization. There are no human characters with whom a reader can identify or much care about. The emblematic, primary quality of the many myths the poem relates does not emerge, as they are reduced to stories in an ever-moving adventure. The emotional and psychological potential in the tale of a junior god who seeks acknowledgement of his divinity and reunification with his father is not even hinted at, never mind developed. Dionysus joins Zeus on Olympus only in the last paragraph of the poem, without even a single verbal or non-verbal exchange. This provides a convenient ending to the lengthy tale, but leaves the reader to work out its meaning.
Lesky 1966 is still an excellent comprehensive reference book to all genres of Greek literature. Lefkowitz 2012 is an excellent clearly written source for what we factually know of the Greek poets. The Homer Encyclopedia, edited by M. Finkelberg 2011, is the most recent and most comprehensive reference book on Homeric epics and relevant epic works. Edwards1987, 2011 offers a good selection of Iliad’s books for discussion. J. Strauss Clay 2003 offers an expert discussion of Theogony and Works and Days with an eye to the overall debate on Hesiod. Green1997 is a comprehensive, accessible, and expertly written commentary on the Argonautika. James 2004 is a good place to start one’s reading about the Posthomerica poem, as is R. Shorrock 2001 on the Dionysiaca.