Foreword Richard P. Martin, Stanford University Warrior, hero, super-male—Achilles should not cry. Not, that is, in the contemporary understanding of the categories he seems to personify, categories that (one might at first assume) have always dominated the imagination of our cultural forefathers, from the earliest epics,… Read more
Translator’s Note: Truchement ≈ Caretaker Nicholas J. Snead I learned the term truchement as a first-year M.A. student studying French language and literature at the University of Virginia, where I had the wonderful good fortune to take a Balzac seminar with Peter Brooks, a visiting professor… Read more
Preface to the English Edition Hélène Monsacré When I wrote this book on Homer, thirty years ago, [1] I tried to grasp the ambiguities of a heroic character: brave, courageous, and yet sensitive. The greatest hero of all time, Achilles,… Read more
Introduction “Since when is it that men (and not women) no longer cry? Why was ‘sensibility,’ at a certain moment, transformed into ‘sentimentality’?” [1] Initially this line of questioning from Roland Barthes referred to the romantic hero. But… Read more
I.1. Proper Relations to Aphrodite: A Criterion in the Definition of Heroic Conduct It might seem paradoxical to approach the question of heroism in the Iliad by way of Aphrodite, thus giving sustained attention to episodes where the majority of the action occurs within the walls of… Read more
I.2. Physical Evidence of the Hero To specify certain masculine values, I will endeavor in this chapter to provide an account of the bodily information that the poet provides about his heroes. This examination will not be a question of prescribing “Homeric medicine,” but of the image… Read more
Abbreviations of Frequently Cited Works ABV = J. D. Beazley, Attic Black-Figure Vase-Painters (Oxford 1956) ARV2 = J. D. Beazley, Attic Red-Figure Vase-Painters, 2nd ed. (Oxford 1963) BKT 5.1 = Berliner Klassikertexte 5: Griechische Dichterfragmente: Teil 1, Epische… Read more
Introduction: Background Authorship T1 Aelian Aelian Varia historia 9.15 (p. 106 Dilts) λέγεται δἑ κἀκεῖνο πρὸς τούτοις, ὅτι ἄρα ἀπορῶν (scil. Ὅμηρος) ἐκδοῦναι τὴν θυγατέρα ἔδωκεν ἀυτῆι προῖκα ἔχειν τὰ ἔπη τὰ Κύπρια. καὶ ὁμολογεῖ τoῦτο Πίνδαρος (fr. 265 Sn.). The further point is… Read more
1. The Origins of the Trojan War From Zeus’ Plan to Eris’ Intervention F1 Scholion on Iliad I 5 Σ Α Iliad I 5 (1.45 sq. van Thiel) Διὸς δ’ ἐτελείετο βουλή· Διὸς βουλὴν οἱ μὲν τὴν εἱμαρμένην ἀπέδοσαν … ἄλλοι δὲ ἀπὸ ἱστορίας τινὸς… Read more
