The Center for Hellenic Studies

Victim of the Muses: Poet as Scapegoat, Warrior and Hero in Greco-Roman and Indo-European Myth and History

  Compton, Todd M. 2006. Victim of the Muses: Poet as Scapegoat, Warrior and Hero in Greco-Roman and Indo-European Myth and History. Hellenic Studies Series 11. Washington, DC: Center for Hellenic Studies. http://nrs.harvard.edu/urn-3:hul.ebook:CHS_Compton.Victim_of_the_Muses.2006.

Chapter 3. Archilochus: Sacred Obscenity and Judgment

The vita of Aesop is something of a prototype, both in its fullness and in its ringing the changes on the “sacred” scapegoat theme. The lives of many Greek poets include similar themes. They will be surveyed in this and subsequent chapters, concentrating on poets whose vitae have been assimilated to the scapegoat in some way, or who have been exiled, executed, or adversely tried. These vitae are sometimes clearly legendary, though there will be historical elements woven into some vitae, and some may be almost entirely historical. The patterns in archaic Greece will be considered first; then remnants of the same patterns will appear in later times, as traditions grow up around an author’s reputation in the centuries after his death. The ahistoricity of a vita will not prevent it from being mythically valuable. As we will see, archaic themes will attach themselves to historical, or quasi-historical, or perhaps nonhistorical, poets. Documents from the Hellenistic age or late antiquity may reflect early tradition; in fact, colorful vitae of later poets derive in part from the mythical vitae of earlier poets.

Lefkowitz and others have pursued the theory that lives of poets derive from learned extrapolation from the received poetic corpus; this phenomenon clearly took place, but traditional legends of poets and heroes were also applied to prominent poets, sometimes no doubt by early oral tradition. Hero cult also served to solidify the poet’s reputation and legacy; thus we often find an extraordinary emphasis on the poet’s death in the legends.

The life of Archilochus, as has been noted, shares a number of themes with the life of Aesop. [1] An examination of the scattered but telling details from his biographical tradition will show that his vita sometimes fits closely into the pattern found in Aesop’s life, that of the sacral blame poet who is rejected by society. The case of Archilochus is especially interesting because we are dealing here with a biographical tradition of putative historicity; debate concerning the historical reliability of many details of his life still continues. [2]

As a boy, Archilochus receives his commission from the Muses, according to the inscription at Archilochus’ shrine in Paros: [3]

Λέγουσι γὰρ Ἀρχίλοχον ἔτι νεώτερον
ὄντα πεμφθέντα ὑπὸ τοῦ πατρὸς Τελεσικλέους
εἰ]ς ἀγρόν, εἰς τὸν δῆμον, ὃς καλεῖται Λειμῶνες,
ὥ]στε βοῦν καταγαγεῖν εἰς πρᾶσιν, ἀναστάντα
π]ρωΐτερον τῆς νυκτός, σελήνης λαμπρούσης,
ἄγ]ειν τὴμ βοῦν εἰς πόλιν· ὡς δ’ ἐγένετο κατὰ τὸν
τ]όπον, ὃς καλεῖται Λισσίδες, δόξαι γυναῖκας
ἰδ]εῖν ἀθρόας· νομίσαντα δ’ ἀπὸ τῶν ἔργων ἀπιέναι
αὐτὰς εἰς πόλιν προσελθόντα σκώπτειν, τὰς δὲ
δέξασθαι αὐτὸν μετὰ παιδιᾶς καὶ γέλωτος καὶ
ἐ]περωτῆσαι, εἰ πωλήσων ἄγει τὴμ βοῦν· φήσαντος δέ,
εἰ]πεῖν ὅτι αὐταὶ δώσουσιν αὐτῶι τιμὴν ἀξίαν·
ῥη]θέντων δὲ τούτων αὐτὰς μὲν οὐδὲ τὴμ βοῦν οὐκέτι
φα]νερὰς εἶναι, πρὸ τῶν ποδῶν δὲ λύραν ὁρᾶν αὐτόν·
κα]ταπλαγέντα δὲ καὶ μετά τινα χρόνον ἔννουν
γεν]όμενον ὑπολαβεῖν τὰς Μούσας εἶναι τὰς φανείσας
καὶ] τὴν λύραν αὐτῶι δωρησαμένας· καὶ ἀνελό-
με]νον αὐτὴν πορεύεσθαι εἰς πόλιν καὶ τῶι πατρὶ
τὰ γ]ενόμενα δηλῶσαι …

They recount that Archilochus, when he was still a young man, was sent by his father Telesicles to the fields, to the district called the Meadows, to bring a heifer down for sale. He got up at night before sunrise, while the moon was still bright, to lead the heifer to the city. As he came to the place called Slippery Rocks, they say that he thought he saw a group of women. And, since he thought that they were leaving work for the city, he approached them and made fun of them [skōptein]. [4] But they greeted him with good humor and laughter [meta paidias kai gelōtos], and asked him if he intended to sell the cow he had in tow. When he answered that he did, they said that they would give him a good price. But, once they had said this, neither they nor the heifer could be seen, but lying before his feet he saw a lyre [luran]. He was dumbfounded and, after he had the time to regain his wits, he realized that the women who had appeared to him were the Muses and that it was they who had given him the gift of the lyre. And he picked up the lyre and went to the city and told his father what had happened.

Archilocheion E1 col. II (test. 4T) [5]


As in the poetic initiation of Hesiod (Theogony 22ff.), the poet receives a theophany of the Muses while engaged in tending animals; the goddesses mock him gently (perhaps a charter for the poet’s future mockery), and give him a physical token of their inspiration and his future poetic gifts. [6]

Telesicles travels to Delphi and asks about the missing cow. He receives an answer to the effect that the first of his children who will greet him when he reaches home will be “immortal [athanatos] among men and famous in song [aoidimos].” [7] Though the inscription breaks off before the story is completed, it is obvious that Archilochus is the child referred to. In another source, Apollo at Delphi tells the poet’s father that he will engender a child who will be immortal. [8]

Though the association of god and blame poet may seem odd at first, considering the negative associations of the blame poet generally and Archilochus specifically, we must remember that the “good” archaic blame poet was homo sacer, expressing the will of the gods to a corrupt audience. [9]

This sacral side of Archilochus is reflected in several of his poems. He writes,

εἰμὶ δ’ ἐγὼ θεράπων μὲν Ἐνυαλίοιο ἄνακτος
καὶ Μουσέων ἐρατὸν δῶρον ἐπιστάμενος.
I am a servant [therapōn] of lord Ares [10]
and of the Muses, and am skillful in their lovely gift.

1W/1T


These lines may not be paradoxical, as some have interpreted them; [11] Archilochus may be referring to an archaic commonplace, the complementary duality of war and poetry in archaic Greece and related cultures. [12] Archilochus was also known as “servant of the Muses” (Mousōn therapōn) in his death legend, in which he dies in battle. [13] Archilochus’ name means ‘leader of a company’. This “may simply be an aristocratic assumption of warrior caste,” or it may express the father’s expectations for the son. [14] Both poetry and war are concerned with a kind of frenzy, poetic inspiration and battle fury. [15]

In another famous poem, Archilochus stakes a claim to other aspects of archaic spirituality. He states,

ὡς Διωνύσου ἄνακτος καλὸν ἐξάρξαι μέλος
οἶδα διθύραμβον οἴνωι συγκεραυνωθεὶς φρένας.
Thus I know how to lead off the dithyramb, fair song of lord Dionysos,
when my wits are thunderstruck with wine.

120W/117T


In this mere couplet, Archilochus touches on a number of interrelated themes: Dionysiac religion and rite, the call and response of archaic musical and poetic performance, art and madness, art and (literal and spiritual) intoxication, even the sacrality of the thunderbolt. [16]

Leonidas asserts that “Indeed, the Muses and the Delian Apollo loved him [Archilochus].” “Longinus” describes Archilochus’ poetry as carrying much ill-arranged matter in its flood, but as having an “outburst of the divine spirit” (τῆς ἐκβολῆς τοῦ δαιμονίου πνεύματος) which gives it its greatness, hard as the outburst is to control. [17] Like Aesop, Archilochus was known, at least by some, as pious. [18] He referred to himself once as a prophet, though the context for this fragment is difficult to ascertain. [19]

Archilochus was also a blame poet par excellence, the first great Greek satirist. Pindar writes of him,

… ἐμὲ δὲ χρεὼν
φεύγειν δάκος ἀδινὸν κακαγοριᾶν.
εἶδον γὰρ ἑκὰς ἐὼν τὰ πόλλ’ ἐν ἀμαχανίᾳ
ψογερὸν Ἀρχίλοχον βαρυλόγοις ἔχθεσιν
πιαινόμενον …

But I must flee the deep bite [dakos] of evil-speaking [kakagorian]. For though I am far, I have seen Archilochus, full of blame [psogeron], very much in want [amaxaniai], fattening himself on grimly worded hatreds.

Pythian Odes 2.54–56 [20]

A poem from the Palatine Anthology, a supposed tomb inscription, speaks of Archilochus wielding a poisonous art; it also associates him with wasps. “This tomb by the sea is the grave of Archilochus, who first dipped a bitter Muse [pikrēn Mousan] in snake-venom [ekhidnaiōi … kholōi] and stained gentle Helicon with blood. Lycambes knows it, mourning the hanging of his three daughters. Pass by quietly, wayfarer, or you’ll arouse the wasps that settle on his tomb.” [21] Horace writes of him that “Rage [rabies] armed Archilochus with her own iambic.” [22] Plutarch speaks of Archilochus’ “bitter” or “spiteful” art. [23] Lucian says that Archilochus “did not hesitate at all to use insulting language [oneidizein], no matter how much pain he was going to inflict upon the victims of the bitterness [kholēi] of his iambics.” [24]

The archaic genre of the curse, with its religious and magical overtones, is found in Archilochus’ poetry. [25] Rankin would remove Archilochus’ blame from the sphere of magic: “Greek poetry that is known to us has none of this true primitive magic about it. It has been secularized of magic … We cannot deny that there may have been earlier more magical forms, but they are not available to us.” [26] Rankin argues from assumptions that need to be carefully considered: for example, “magic” is “primitive”; a piece of culture, literary or otherwise, can be purely secular or purely magico-religious, with no gradations in between; the “magico-religious” use of the poetic formula cannot be a work of literary art. Actually, magic can shade imperceptibly into religion, which is not necessarily primitive. Thomas writes, “Anthropologists today are unsympathetic to the view that magic is simply bad science. They stress its symbolic and expressive role rather than its practical one.” [27] Early Greek poetry—and nearly all Greek poetry and philosophy—combines the secular and the sacred. [28] The “magical” formula, even when used for blame, can be part of a sophisticated religious and literary tradition. The curse is a form of prayer, and has important ethical dimensions. Watson writes that “perhaps the most constant motive for pronouncing a curse was the attaining of δίκη ‘justice’.” [29]

An element of Archilochus’ blame that links him closely to Aesop is his tendency to use fables. “The animal tale was in fact one of Archilochus’ favorite weapons when he wished to be abusive,” writes Anne Pippin Burnett. [30] Just as the legendary Aesop told animal fables denouncing his Delphic persecutors before his death (G 132–142), so Archilochus used animal fables to accuse his archenemy, Lycambes. [31] Fragments 172–181W/166–174T, directed against Lycambes, retell a fable that is shared with Aesop (1 Perry), the fable of the fox and the eagle, in which a fox is victimized by an oath-breaking eagle, curses it, and gains revenge. [32]

Archilochus’ most famous poetic victims were the previously mentioned Lycambes and his daughters, all of whom were said to have committed suicide after having been satirized by the poet. Archilochus wrote his poem after Lycambes had promised him his daughter, then broke his word. Thus satire, like the curse, is used to avenge broken oaths. [33] Horace speaks of Archilochus as the “son-in-law spurned by faithless Lycambes” (Lycambae spretus infido gener, Epode 6.11). A scholiast comments:

Lycambes habuit filiam Neobulen; hanc cum Archilochus in matrimonium postulasset, promissa nec data est a patre. Hinc iratus Archilochus in eum maledicum carmen scripsit, quo Lycambes tanto est dolore compulsus, ut cum filia vitam laqueo finiret.

Lycambes had a daughter, Neobule; when Archilochus had asked for her hand in marriage, she was promised to him by her father, but was not given. Therefore, Archilochus was enraged [iratus], and wrote an abusive poem [maledicum carmen] against him, by which Lycambes was driven to such great agony that he ended his life with a noose, and his daughter did the same with him.

“Acro” ad Epode 6 [34]


Horace also knows the story of the fiancée hanging herself because of Archilochus’ invective. [35] He speaks of Archilochus’s “words attacking Lycambes” (agentia verba Lycamben) and points out that Alcaeus “does not seek a father-in-law whom he may besmear [or “pollute”—oblinat] with black verse neither does he tie a noose for his fiancée with an infamous song” (nec socerum quaerit quem versibus oblinat atris, / nec sponsae laqueum famoso carmine nectit). Here we see the blame poet as a polluter, as well as a killer.

Scholars continue to debate the possible historicity or ahistoricity of this story. [36] I am inclined to see a mythic/legendary development of a historical incident, with an admixture of ritual. But the story should not be automatically rejected as impossible. In a culture in which shame is a dominant value, suicide is an entirely reasonable (so to speak) reaction to public humiliation. [37] In some cultures, shame is used “as a principal external sanction.” “Among the cultures with a strong development of the ego, the exercise of the sanction may result in suicide.” Probably no culture is completely a shame or guilt culture, but some cultures certainly have a pronounced “shame” component. [38] It should be kept in mind that such sophisticated cultures as the modern Japanese can have a significant “shame” component.

Lycambes was evidently an official of some sort, and Archilochus’ attack on him may have had political overtones, just as Lycambes’ rejection of the poet may have had a political dimension. The comic dramatist Cratinas speaks of a Lycambean magistracy. [39]

Critias tells us that Archilochus left his native Paros because of financial difficulties (dia penian kai aporian [40] ), went to Thasos, then quarreled with the Thasians when he got there. [41] A scholiast tells us that Archilochus “was sent into exile because of the wickedness of his speech.” [42] His financial difficulties may have been caused by his free speech, [43] which would neatly harmonize the two traditions.

An Ovid scholiast describes a persecution following Archilochus’ attack on Lycambes, carried out by Lycambes’ friends; the poet responds by killing himself. [44] The persecution by Lycambes’ friends is notable, and this might have contributed to Archilochus’ misfortunes and exile if these two notes can be understood together. However, they are probably reporting divergent traditions.

A fragmented passage in the Mnesiepes inscription tells a more complex story that places Archilochus directly in the Aesopic tradition of sacral blame poet, societal rejection, oracle, and cult, and may also supply the background for an exile. I follow the reconstruction and translation of Treu. [45] There is a festival (tei d’ heor[tei, E1.III.17, test. 4T) at which Archilochus improvises (auto]skhedias[anta, 19–20) on traditional themes (paradedom[ena, 23). An obscene song to Dionysus, [46] mentioning barley groats, unripe grapes, figs, and a Screwer (oipholiōi, 35, perhaps a cult title for Dionysus), is quoted. Despite the obscenity, the religious, cultic setting of this performance is clear. [47] The inscription continues:

Λεχθέντων [δὲ τούτων …
ὡς κακῶς ἀκ[ουσα …
ἰαμβικώτερο[ν
* * *
ἐν τεῖ κρίσει· Μ[ετὰ δὲ …
χρόνον γίνεσθ[αι ἀσθενεῖς]
εἰς τὰ αἰδοῖα …

When these things had been recited … [they thought] /that it had been said evilly [concerning the god, and that Archilochus had composed these verses] / too satirically [iambikōtero[n, 38] …

[On the following day they arraigned him before the court and condemned him] / in the legal proceedings [en tei krisei, 42]. [Because of god’s wrath, not much] / time elapsed … [the men became weak] / in the genitals.


They send to Delphi to discover the cause for this ailment and find a remedy; the Pythia accuses the Parians of having judged unjustly (Tipte dikais an[omois, 47), and tells them there will be no [healing] until they [honour] Archilochus. Perhaps a new form of Dionysiac worship (Dion[us-, 55) is then introduced.

There is a close parallel to this story in a cultic tale found in scholia on Aristophanes: [48] the Athenians, not honoring the introduction of a statue of Dionysus, are afflicted by a plague “in the genitals” (eis ta aidoia, the same phrase found in the Mnesiepes inscription), and must seek an alleviation of the plague through oracle consultation and phallic cult awarded to the god. Both this and the Archilochus story are in the genre of Dionysiac vengeance myth. [49] Also in the genre is the story of Icarius and Erigone. [50] Icarius acts as a wine-apostle for the god, but then is clubbed to death by Attic shepherds inebriated for the first time, as they fear that the drink is a malum medicamentum (according to Hyginus). When his daughter, Erigone, hangs herself in grief, [51] the enraged wine god causes the daughters of the Athenians to die in the same way; the townspeople consult Delphi and a cult centered around Erigone is prescribed to allay the curse. [52] It is easy to see how close the poet’s biographical tradition is to such “pure” myth.

Archilochus’ association with Dionysiac cult myth reminds one of the possible Dionysiac associations of the pharmakoi, their name sumbakkhoi, and their apparent possession by divinity at the moment of expulsion. [53] This leads one to view 120W/117T as a poem that might fit into the pharmakos context somewhat.

H. D. Rankin connects the trial described here with the poet’s exile; [54] this is an entirely reasonable possibility—it fits neatly with the Ovid scholiast who saw the wickedness of the poet’s speech as the cause of an exile. Be that as it may, we see that Archilochus, despite his blasphemous tendencies, ended up with cult honors on his native island, as the Archilocheion itself shows. [55] Alcidamus, quoted by Aristotle, tells us that “The Parians honored [tetimēkasin] Archilochus, even though he was a slanderer [blasphēmon].” [56]

In the story of Archilochus’ death we have a similar gathering of motifs: crime, oracles, propitiation, and hero cult. [57] A man named Calondas, but nicknamed Corax (the Crow) kills the poet in war; [58] he repairs to the Delphic oracle (for an unspecified reason, but one may suppose that he had been struck by some misfortune, perhaps a disease, and went to the oracle to find out why this had happened), and though he protests that he killed Archilochus in war, in a fair fight, and is innocent of guilt, the priestess, or Apollo in one account, drives him from the temple, [59] as he has slain “a man holy to the Muses” or the “servant [therapōn] of the Muses.” [60] But “he was instructed to travel to the dwelling of the cricket [tettix] to propitiate the spirit of Archilochus.” [61] The connections between Corax, Apollo, the Muses, and Archilochus here are complex: first, Corax, “the crow” can perhaps be identified with Apollo. [62] If this association is correct, “Apollo,” through Corax, kills Archilochus, a poet whom he had patronized, [63] blames Corax for killing a sacred poet, and prescribes hero cult for the poet to propitiate his spirit. Furthermore, Archilochus in his own poetry had likened himself to a cricket being tortured by a human. [64]

Another Aesopian fable (470) explicitly links the cicadas with the Muses. Plato (Phaedrus 262d) tells us that crickets are “prophets of the Muses” (tōn Mousōn prophētai). Apollo is known as the “leader of the Muses” (Mousarkhos or Mousagetēs); the first major gods listed on the Paros inscription are the Muses, Apollo Mousagetes, and Mnemosyne. [65] Thus Archilochus, therapōn of the Muses, is tied even more closely to Apollo as patron, who must be viewed virtually as part of the group of the Muses. [66] As in the case of Aesop, the god Apollo ordains the poet’s future fame and immortality; gives him his poetic commission; kills him (perhaps) by means of a human or humans; sends a plague to punish his killers; and ordains his hero cult as a means of allaying the plague. We remember Apollo engineering Aesop’s death, then ordering his cult.

As we turn to Archilochus’ poetry, we find an important theme that perhaps shows us that Archilochus himself—or his poetic persona—felt like a victim. In 223W/167T, Archilochus is a cricket whose wing is pulled, which forces him to retaliate by singing louder. [67] The fable of the fox and the eagle (174W/168T; (177W/174T) is exactly parallel in theme. In Archilochus’ eyes, society, those who attack him, are sadistic—like the kind of person who would torture a beautiful singer—perhaps an archetypal image of the poet’s relationship with society. The punishment of the poet’s persecutors, through the poet’s blame poetry, is just and moral (as Archilochus the cricket becomes Archilochus the wasp or poisonous snake). Most importantly, for our purposes, we see the persona of the poet as victim—weak, tortured, hated, and outraged by injustice—expressed in this passage, a fragment of the fearsome invective directed against Lycambes. The legend of the poetic victim and the victimizing as a poetic theme are closely connected. [68]

From the typology in chapter 1, we find the following themes in the life of Archilochus:

1a1. Impiety of hero: offensive verbalizing (introducing obscene phallic worship to Paros, he is called a blasphēmos).

2. Communal disaster (plague after dishonoring of the poet).

3. Oracle (telling how to remove plague through cult for the poet).

4. The Worst. Critias accuses him of being “an adulterer,” “lecherous,” “wantonly violent”—and “worst of all” he deserted his shield. [69]

4a. He is penurious; he leaves Paros because of lack of resources. [70]

4b. He is the son of a slavewoman.

4c. He is judged to be a criminal in his trial.

4f. Poison/medicine imagery. Archilochus’ blame poetry is compared to snake venom, to the sting of a wasp.

5. The Best. Archilochus is preeminent as a satiric poet. He was frequently associated with Homer and Hesiod (e.g. Plato Ion 531a) as one of the “great originators who founded the Greek poetic tradition.” [71] Plato has a character refer to him as “most wise” (sophōtatos, Republic 365c). Horace writes that he is following the meter and spirit of Archilochus, as did Sappho and Alcaeus; Quintilian judges him the best of the iambic poets. According to the Paros cult myth, Delphi tells the poet’s father that Archilochus will be “famous in song among men” and “deathless.” [72] This evidence, while not contemporary, shows that a strong tradition of the poet surpassing other satirists followed after him.

5a. Sacred. Archilochus is closely identified with the Muses (cf. the consecration motif), Apollo, and Dionysus; he is therapōn of the Muses; he writes with divine inspiration. See on his death.

7. Public meeting. Archilochus is judged guilty at a trial.

10a. Exile. We know that Archilochus left Paros “because of poverty and helplessness.” However, his satiric, obscene poetry also caused the exile, according to some traditions. Perhaps the two traditions are related.

11. Death. The poet is killed by a warrior who is possibly associated with Apollo.

13. Hero cult. This is richly attested, especially by the Mnesiepes inscription, and also in Archilochus’ death legend. Now Diskin Clay’s recent book, Archilochus Heros: The Cult of the Poets in the Greek Polis, provides exhaustive documentation for and insightful discussion of this theme. [73]

13a. Immortality through hero cult; also through poetry, as the oracle to the poet’s father promised.

18. Divine persecutorpatron. We possibly have a version of the divine persecutor/patron theme in the story of Corax.

22. Blame poet.

22a. Killing through blame. Archilochus is, of course, famous for this theme.

22c. Animal fables used for blame.

22e. Curse as theme.

23. Poet is sacred, superhuman.

23a. Consecration of poet.

23e. Immortality through poetry.

Though Archilochus’ vita is more fragmentary than Aesop’s, it still contains a convincing configuration of pharmakos / hero cult themes. The hero cult is, of course, clear, and the important theme of the trial for ritual pollution (along with the striking cicada fable) sets it firmly in the sphere of the pharmakos, even if stoning or ejection from a cliff are absent. It is significant that, as in the case of Aesop, it is Archilochus’ poetry, Dionysiac iambs (the standard medium for blame poetry), that sets in motion the ritual mechanism of arrest, trial by the people, punishment, exile (perhaps), plague upon the people, and hero cult for the punished hero.

One is struck by the similarities to the life of Aesop. In some way, it is as if one life is being used for two men (just as some of Archilochus’ blame fables appear in the Aesop tradition). We have a consecration at the start of the poet’s career; killing through blame; animal fable used for blame; a poet brought to trial for his satire, and convicted; the people punished by god after his conviction; and ritual institutionalized as recompense. After the poet is killed, his killer(s) (associated somewhat with Apollo) are instructed by the Delphic oracle to help found the poet’s cult.

Archilochus adds an important new theme to our list:

26. Poet as warrior. Archilochus, though certainly not living by any Homeric military ethic, was a soldier, and took war as an important theme in his poetry. [74] It is true that nearly every well-to-do Greek man was also a soldier, but not every poet wrote as much about war as did Archilochus. Pindar is a point of comparison. Many modern poets are an even more stark comparison—it is hard to think of Keats, Wordsworth, Yeats, or Robert Frost as soldiers, though war has been a theme of some poets of the first rank in the twentieth century.

Furthermore, Archilochus as soldier is part of his legend; he is killed in battle.

Thus the combination “follower of Dionysus/Muses/Ares” (as evidenced in the fragments of his poetry) is basic for Archilochus. A man used to handling weapons (2W/2T) also used his word as a weapon. Aggression would drive both skills. A madness/possession is also a common denominator for Dionysus/Muses/Ares. Somewhat comparable is the riddle warfare of Aesop, theme 25. We also remember that Aesop is surrendered to an invading army to save a city.

26a. Martial paraenesis is one of Archilochus’ poetic themes, as some critics interpret his poetry.

In addition, Oemomaus, quoted by Eusebius, lists two main targets of the poet, one of whom is, not surprisingly, Lycambes—but curiously, Lycambes is mentioned second. The Sapaeans, the Thracian tribe who fought with the poet and the Parians when they settled Thasos, are listed first. “For surely there is no lack even now of Sapaeans or Lycambes ready to be caricatured.” [75] Thus in some of Archilochus’ lost poems he apparently made his actual warring opponents his satirical targets—combining verbal and physical attack. [76]

Footnotes

[ back ] 1. For Archilochus’ poetry, see West 1989; poetry and testimonia in Tarditi 1968, Treu 1959; Gerber 1999b.

[ back ] 2. Rankin 1977 would see a real poet in the Archilochus fragments rather than just a poetic persona. West (1974:33–39) and Nagy (1979:243–252) tend to see in Archilochus’ invective the stock “characters” (such as Lycambes or Enipo) who function as ritualized personifications or types. For the Archilochus cult legend as found in fragmentary form on the Archilocheion, see Müller 1985; Clay 2004. Cf. Rösler 1985; Burnett 1983:29n43; below, chapter 8 (Sappho).

[ back ] 3. For the Archilocheion, see test. 4T; Treu 1959:40–54. On the dating of the legends found on the Archilocheion, see Müller 1985:141–146; Kontoleon 1964:60. It appears that they derive from archaic (sixth- or fifth-century) Paros tradition.

[ back ] 4. For this key word for blame poetics, see above, chapter 2 (Aesop at Delphi).

[ back ] 5. Trans. Clay 2004:109. Text from Tarditi 1968:5. Cf. Clay 2004:14–16; Nagy 1979:303–304. For the consecration theme in Greek literature, see above, chapter 2 (Aesop); Kambylis 1963; Miralles and Portulas 1983:61–80. For the association of the lyre with satire, see the Hymn to Hermes 54–56, where Hermes, as soon as he invents the lyre, begins to sing satirically (kertomeousin)—see Burnett 1983:56n8; Miralles and Portulas 1983:81–126. Cf. the oracular associations of the lyre, Hymn to Apollo, 131–141, 514–519, Hymn to Hermes 471–474; Bergren 1982:91, 94, 97. For this association of blame poetry and the mantic, we may compare the persistent associations of Aesop and Archilochus with Delphi—for Aesop, see chapter 2; for Archilochus, cf. text below and Rankin 1977:111n69; Burnett 1983:19; Podlecki 1974:12.

[ back ] 6. Cf. Breitenstein 1971. Also, below, chapter 17, the poet gains inspiration by supernatural food or drink, then receives a gift, e.g. Finn.

[ back ] 7. E1 col. II 50 (test. 4T). Ἀθά]νατός σοι παῖς καὶ ἀοίδιμος, ὦ Τελεσίκλεις, / ἔ]σται ἐν ἀνθρώποισιν.

[ back ] 8. Dio Chrysostom 33.11–12 (test. 50T), translation by Edmonds, “He proclaimed to the poet’s father when he came to consult the oracle before the birth that his son would become immortal [athanaton]” (Τῷ πατρὶ δὲ αὐτοῦ χρωμένῳ πρὸ τῆς γενέσεως ἀθάνατόν οἱ παῖδα γενήσεσθαι προεῖπεν). Cf. Archilocheion E1 col. II.50 (test. 4T); Palatine Anthology 14.113 (test. 9T); Oenomaus ap. Eusebius Preparation for the Gospel 5.32–39.9 (test. 115T); Theodoretus Remedy for the Diseases of the Greeks 10.36 (141) (test. 179T). Cf. below, chapter 13 (Euripides).

[ back ] 9. For moral and immoral blame poets, see Elliott 1960:11; Snell 1953:54–55; Jaeger 1945 1.121–124; Hendrickson 1925b:114–115. The theme of the poet punishing the oath breaker is important, if the Strassburg epode (193T/Hipponax fragment 115W) is Archilochean, though it is probably by Hipponax—cf. 174W; see below. For the poet punishing the oath breaker, see below, chapters 4 (Hipponax), 8 (Sappho), 9 (Alcaeus), 10 (Theognis); chapter 17, the ambiguous poet as upholder of law.

[ back ] 10. Literally, Enyalios.

[ back ] 11. Burnett 1983:33–34.

[ back ] 12. See further chapters and below, this chapter.

[ back ] 13. Dio Chrysostom 33 (test. 50T); Müller 1985:135; see below, on Archilochus’ death. For therapōn as ritual substitute, see chapter 1, on pharmakos as therapeia; chapter 17 (Tamun and DoDera), and chapters 18 and 27, the warrior as substitute for king.

[ back ] 14. Rankin 1977:15.

[ back ] 15. See Guépin 1968:20; Mattes 1970; cf. the following note and chapter 17 (Cuchulainn’s battle frenzy), chapter 18 (Starkaðr’s battle frenzy). For the association of the spheres of Dionysos (see following note) and of Ares, see Hutchinson 1985:124 (on Aeschylus Seven Against Thebes, lines 497f.); 99 (on lines 343f.); Dodds 1953:109 (on Euripides Bacchae, line 302), 170 (on lines 761–764); Plutarch Table Talk 7.10.2 (715E), the Seven Against Thebes brimming with Ares (see Aristophanes Frogs 1021) and with Dionysos; Guépin 1968:43–45. Cf. the epitaph of Aeschylus, which reputedly mentioned his role in the battle of Marathon, but not his poetry (Pausanias 1.14.5; see below, chapter 12); and on other poets in this chapter, Alcaeus, chapter 9; Socrates, chapter 15; Tyrtaeus and Solon, in chapter 11. Eratosthenes (Constellations 24) tells us that Thracians used to go to war drunk. Cf. chapter 16 below, on Orpheus’ death. [[insert paragraph here]]For Archilochus’s poetry that has been interpreted as protreptic, see the Sosthenes inscription A col. 1, line 3–4 (Treu 1959:54, test. 5T); 93W/120T 94W/121T; Burnett 1983:34; Jaeger 1945 1.121 (the satirically critical and paraenetic are often identical); Martin 1983:48. For Archilochus and war generally, Rankin 1977:80–82; Podlecki 1974:9 and Podlecki 1969; West 1985a:10–13; Burnett 1983:33–54; Parke 1933:4; Graham 2001:188–210; Clay 2004:23–24. Cf. chapter 17 below on Ireland’s warrior-satirists.

[ back ] 16. For the Dionysiac context of iambic poetry, see West 1974:23–25. Drunkenness may here be a metaphor for poetic inspiration (cf. Murray 1940:147, on the testimonia that report Aeschylus as composing in a state of drunkenness), though actual drinking need not be ruled out. See also Scheinberg 1979:19–23. See below, chapter 8 (Sappho); Gil 1967:170–173; Coffey 1976:25 for Ennius, Horace, and wine. On the sacral nature of the thunderstruck person, cf. Artemidorus 2.9, p. 94, 26, “he who has been struck by lightning is honored [timatai] as a god” (ὁ κεραυνωθεὶς ὡς θεὸς τιμᾶται), my translation; Rohde 1925 2:581–582; Guépin 1968:93; 47–51; Nagy 1979:190; Mendelsohn 1992. For the madness of the poet, see previous note; see below, chapter 11 (Tyrtaeus); chapter 16 (Thamyris); chapter 17 (Dubthach Chafertongue; Séafra O’Donnchú); and chapter 18 (Starkathr’s rage; Suibhne).

[ back ] 17. Leonidas, in Palatine Anthology 7.664, translation by Edmonds. ἦ ῥά νιν αἱ Μοῦσαι καὶ ὁ Δάλιος ἠγάπευν’ Ἀπόλλων … “Longinus” On the Sublime 33.5, my translation Cf. Mattes 1970:39.

[ back ] 18. “Demeas [wrote] an account not only of [the fame of others, but of the virtues of] our fellow citizen Archilochus, [his outstanding] piety [eusebeias], the love he bore to his country, Paros …” Sosthenes Incription, A col. 1, lines 1–4 (test. 5T). ἀναγέγραφεν] δ[’ ὁ Δ]ημέας οὐ μόνον περὶ τ[ῆς Πάρου / ἀλλὰ * *]σιλυ.π.λλλ πολίτης Ἀρχίλο[χο / [ * * ]εὐσ<εβ>είας καὶ τῆς περὶ τὴν πατ[ρίδα σπου-]/δῆς. Edmonds’s translation is based on supplying different words in the lacunae in the inscription.

[ back ] 19. See 25W/55T, “mantis.” See below, chapters 6, 16, on poet as prophet.

[ back ] 20. My trans. For commentary, see Kurke (1991:100), who translates amaxaniai as “resourcelessness.” Oddly enough, in this recusatio of blame poetry, Pindar is blaming Archilochus. Cf. Nemean Odes 8.37–39. For further on Pindar and blame, see Kirkwood 1984; Nagy 1979:222-228. For the belly and blame, Burnett 1983:59n17; and above, chapter 2, potbellied Aesop.

[ back ] 21. Gaetulicus (first century AD), in Palatine Anthology 7.71 (test. 66T), translation by W. R. Paton, modified (σῆμα τόδ’ Ἀρχιλόχου παραπόντιον, ὅς ποτε πικρήν / μοῦσαν ἐχιδναίῳ πρῶτος ἔβαψε χόλῳ / αἱμάξας Ἑλικῶνα τὸν ἥμερον. Οἶδε Λυκάμβης / μυρόμενος τρισσῶν ἅμματα θυγατέρων. Ἠρέμα δὴ παράμειψον, ὁδοιπόρε, μή ποτε τοῦδε / κινήσῃς τύμβῳ σφῆκας ἐφεζομένους). Eustathius (Commentary on the Iliad and Odyssey 851.53) speaks of “scorpion-tongued Archilochus” (ὁ σκορπιώδης τὴν γλῶσσαν Ἀρχίλοχος).

[ back ] 22. Ars Poetica 79 (translation by Edmonds): “Archilochum proprio rabies armavit iambo.” Cf. Epode 6:13 (translation by Edmonds): “Beware, beware! For I’m an extremely harsh man, and I bear horns ready for wicked men, like [Archilochus] …” (Cave, cave; namque in malos asperrimus/ parata tollo cornua,/ qualis [Archilochus] …) Cf. Apostolius Proverbs, 4.2 (test. 17T); Diogenianus Proverbs 2.95 (test. 56T), who refers to the poet as one of those who revile, “tōn loidorountōn.” However, Horace’s statement bears witness to a tradition of the blame poet as righteous, attacking only those who are wicked. See below, app. B; also on oath-breaking, both in this chapter and Hipponax, chapter 4.

[ back ] 23. Cato Minor 7.2, 762e (test. 139T). An angry man writes insulting iambic verse, “employing the venom [pikrōi] of Archilochus …” τῷ πικρῷ προσχρησάμενος τοῦ Αρχιλόχου.

[ back ] 24. The Liar 1–2 (test. 101T), translation by A. M. Harmon, modified: … μηδὲν ὀκνοῦντα ὀνειδίζειν, εἰ καὶ ὅτι μάλιστα λυπήσειν ἔμελλε τοὺς περιπετεῖς ἐσομένους τῇ χολῇ τῶν ἰάμβων αὐτοῦ. The supposed mother of Archilochus is the slave woman Enipo (Critias 88 B 44 (test. 46T)), and this name means ‘abuse’. One remembers Ainos, the son of Aesop, see chapter 2. For the fable as weapon of the slave, see below and chapter 24 (Phaedrus), and Aesop as slave in chapter 2. Müller, 1985:106, argues that the Enipo detail derives from the legend; Lefkowitz 1981:26, typically would have it a late invention. Cf. Nagy 1979:247; Burnett 1983:28n34.

[ back ] 25. E.g. 26W/30T; cf. 107W/101T; 108W/115T; 329W (spuria)/170T; 177W.4/174T; 200W/194T. 193T = Hipponax 115W/194Dg is possibly by Hipponax, possibly by Archilochus, see Treu 1959:224–228; Kirkwood 1961; Koenen 1977; Rankin 1977:106n1; Watson 1991:60; further bibliography in Degani 1983 ad loc. The directness and immediacy of 193T make it tempting to consider it Archilochean, but it will be discussed in the Hipponax section. See further Rankin 1977:50; Elliott 1960:8–9; Hendrickson 1925b:104, 112, 115–117; Watson 1991:63; Gerber 1995. [[insert paragraph here]]For the curse and satire generally, Elliott 1960:285–292, 294 s.v. “curse”; Watson 1991:46–47. For Aristophanes’ use of the curse, Elliott 1960:93, Watson 1991:140–141; for Horace and the curse, Rankin 1977:50; Watson 1991:154–155. The poetess Moiro (born ca. 300 BC) wrote a poem called Curses, Arai, see Powell 1925:22; Hendrickson 1925b:109; Watson 1991:90, 167, as did Euphorion of Chalcis (born ca. 276/275 BC), see Powell 1925:8; Lesky 1966:757; Watson 1991:83, 223. Watson’s Arae: the Curse Poetry of Antiquity (1991) provides a good general introduction to the curse in antiquity, and is especially good on Hellenistic curse poems. Cf. chapters 4 (Hipponax); 9 (Alcaeus); 10 (Theognis).

[ back ] 26. 1977:52n36: See also Rankin 1974, “Archilochus was no magician.”

[ back ] 27. Thomas 1971:667.

[ back ] 28. See Easterling 1985, cf. Robertson 1985.

[ back ] 29. Watson 1991:38, cf. Gager 1992:175–199. For the curse in prayer, Pulleyn 1997:70–95. It is also worth noting that Archilochus had apparent associations with the priesthood of Demeter, see below. Cf. chapter 17, for the “magical” power of the word in folkore.

[ back ] 30. Burnett 1983:60; cf. 59n18; 61n25; West 1984:107–108; West 1974:132n4; Nagy 1979:238–239; Holzberg 2002:12.

[ back ] 31. For the luk– root in this name, cf. the symbolism of the wolf discussed at 2.7 (Alcaeus). For the possible ritual significance of the names in this narrative, see above, on the historicity or ahistoricity of Archilochus.

[ back ] 32. For this fable, Irwin 1998, in the Lefkowitz school of biography interpretation. See also 185–187W/188–189T and Aesop 81 Perry, cf. Aristophanes Birds 651–653. In Julian Orations 7.207C, (test. 58 Perry) Aesop, as a slave, had no free speech (parrēsia), so had “to shadow forth his wise counsels” (ἐσκιαγραφημένας τὰς συμβουλὰς); Philostratus Images 1.3 (test. 131T, cf. West 1989:172). See below chapter 24 (Phaedrus), and app. A. Lasserre 1984:63–64, counts six certain and eight probable fables in Archilochus. For the cricket, see below, this chapter; and app. B. Also, Callimachus Aetia prologue, fragment 1.29ff. Boedeker 1984:81–83, discusses the poet as cicada in Greece, and the cicada’s association with the Muses.

[ back ] 33. Cf. 173W/179T: “And have you turned your back on a great oath made by salt and table?” (ὅρκον δ’ ἐνοσφίσθης μέγαν / ἅλας τε καὶ τράπεζαν).

[ back ] 34. Quoted in Lasserre and Bonnard 1968:cix, test. 18, my trans. See other scholiast references, test. 154–160T. Ovid, in his own curse poem, Ibis 53 (test. 119T), speaks of tincta Lycambeo sanguine tela, “arrows imbued with the blood of Lycambes,” which liber iambus, “free iambic,” will give to him for attacking his foe. Fragments of Archilochus’ attacks on Lycambes are collected in fragments 172–181W/166–175T; 172/166T: “Father Lycambes … now you appear a big laugh to your fellow citizens,” my translation, πάτερ Λυκάμβα … νῦν δὲ δὴ πολὺς / ἀστοῖσι φαίνεαι γέλως. For further references and discussion, Lasserre 1950:28–52; Rankin 1977:47–56; Burnett 1983:19–23; Rose 1960a:90n23; Hendrickson 1925b. For the theme of hanging, see below; chapter 6 (Hesiod); chapter 9 (Alcaeus).

[ back ] 35. Epistle 1.19. The Cologne papyrus (196aW) offers us an example of the abuse directed at Neoboule, who is named, line 25. Cf. 118W/111T; Gentili 1988:185–188; Miralles and Portulas 1983:127–157; Aloni 1981:18–28. For all the daughters hanging themselves, Gaetulicus, in Palatine Anthology 7.71 (test. 66T): “Lycambes … mourning the hanging of his three daughters,” text quoted above. Also, Eustathius, Commentary on the Odyssey, 11.277, 1684.45 (test. 64T): “It should be noted that literature has many cases of self-hanging for grief, and this was the death, according to the old story, of the daughters of Lycambes, who could not withstand the onslaught of the satires [skōmmatōn] of Archilochus,” translation by Edmonds (ἰστέον δὲ ὅτι πολλῶν προσώπων ἁψαμένων βρόχους ἐπὶ λύπαις ἔπαθον οὕτω κατὰ τὴν παλαιὰν ἱστορίαν καὶ αἱ Λυκαμβίδαι ἐπὶ τοῖς Ἀρχιλόχου ποιήμασι, μὴ φέρουσαι τὴν ἐπιφορὰν τῶν ἐκείνου σκωμμάτων). See also Julianus Aegyptius, in Palatine Anthology 7.70 (test. 89T). For the theme of the broken engagement, see below, chapter 4 (Hipponax); chapter 16 (Philip of Croton); this is a standard topos for misery. For the broken oath, see below, chapter 4 (Hipponax); chapter 9 (Alcaeus).

[ back ] 36. See bibliography in Rankin 1977:131. For the possible historicity of the story, see Carey 1986.

[ back ] 37. See Mead 1937:494; O’Leary 1991:24.

[ back ] 38. See the discussion of Aesop as satirist, chapter 2.

[ back ] 39. Fr. 138 K-A/130 Kock (test. 45T); cf. Gentili 1988:192; Rankin 1977:50.

[ back ] 40. See also Oenomaus, ap. Eusebius Preparation for the Gospel 5.31 (test. 114T)—Archilochus consults with the Delphic oracle because he has thrown away his possessions “in political foolishness,” ἐν πολιτικῇ φλυαρίᾳ. Cf. Wiechers 1961:35. This motive for exile (poverty) also appears in other biographical traditions, see below, this chapter; chapters 4 (Hipponax); 5 (Homer); 6 (Hesiod).

[ back ] 41. Critias fragment 44 ap. Aelian Historical Miscellanies 10.13 (test. 46T), translation by Edmonds: “… if Archilochus had not slandered himself in his poems, we wouldn’t have known that he was the son of the slave-woman Enipo, nor that through poverty and perplexity [aporian] he left Paros for Thasos, nor that when he arrived there he quarrelled with the inhabitants; … and more, we should not know, had he not told us himself, that he was an adulterer, nor lecherous and wantonly violent …” (οὐκ ἂν ἐπυθόμεθα ἡμεῖς οὔτε ὅτι Ἐνιποῦς υἱὸς ἦν τῆς δούλης, οὔθ’ ὅτι καταλιπὼν Πάρον διὰ πενίαν καὶ ἀπορίαν ἦλθεν ἐς Θάσον, οὔθ’ ὅτι ἐλθὼν τοῖς ἐνταῦθα ἐχθρὸς ἐγένετο … οὔτε ὅτι μοιχὸς ἦν, ᾔδειμεν ἄν, εἰ μὴ παρ’ αὐτοῦ μαθόντες, οὔτε ὅτι λάγνος καὶ ὑβριστής …). On the theme of exile, see fragment 185W/188T, where an ape is banished by his fellow animals; Burnett 1983:62. Cf. this chapter, below, “worst.” For Archilochus’ mother, Enipo, see above, this chapter.

[ back ] 42. Archilochus inuentor iambi, propter linguae suae prauitatem, missus est in exilium, ad Ibis 521, C (test. 160T). (My translation) Cf. for the exile, Ellis 1881:151. In Plutarch On the Ancient Customs of the Spartans 34 (239b) (test. 143T) we find a strange account of the Spartans expelling Archilochus because they thought the shield poem disgraceful. Ἀρχίλοχον τὸν ποιητὴν ἐν Λακεδαίμονι γενόμενον αὐτῆς ὥρας ἐδίωξαν. “Archilochus the poet, when he arrived in Sparta, they ordered to depart that very instant …” translation by Babbitt. Cf. a Spartan expulsion of the poet’s books “because he had attacked a home he hated with obscene curses,” quia domum sibi invisam obscenis maledictis laceraverat, Valerius Maximus 6.3 ext. 1 (test. 182T), translation by Ellis 1881:151; cf. Hendrickson 1925b:122n31; Rankin 1977:42n49.

[ back ] 43. This is the suggestion of Gentili 1988:193.

[ back ] 44. Scholia ad Ovid Ibis 521 (test. 160T). “Archilochus … after he had forced Lycambes to hang himself, was persecuted by Lycambes’ friends and killed himself,” my translation, Archilochus … postquam Lycamben coegerat ad suspendium, ab amicis eius persecutus se ipsum interfecit.

[ back ] 45. See also Clay 2004:16–23.

[ back ] 46. Cf. on Dionysus above, this chapter. For possible connections of Archilochus and his iambics with the cult of Demeter, see Pausanias 10.28.3 (test. 121T) (Archilochus’ grandfather, Tellis, is pictured by Polygnotus in a boat in the underworld with a woman who first introduced the rites of Demeter to Thasos); Paros is listed immediately after Eleusis as a cult center of Demeter in the Homeric Hymn to Demeter (491), see Richardson 1974 ad loc.; cf. Stephanus of Byzantium, s.v. Paros; Clay 2004:18; Rankin 1977:111n74; 17; 57; Nagy 1979:248 #7n2; Miralles and Portulas 1983:72; Burnett 1983:25; 56–57n9. West 1974:24 shows that the cults of Dionysus and Demeter can be related, connects Lycambes with Demeter cult, and sees cultic significance in the name of Archilochus’ father. [ back ] These facts may be important for an understanding of the origins of archaic Greek satire, which appears to stem, in part at least, from forms of ritual license. See app. A. Cf. Iambe “the eponymous heroine of iambic verse,” who “as an inspiration to her poets … was said to have hanged herself” as did the Lycambids, Burnett 1983:20n10; Scholiast on Hephaestion, 281/154T, Olender 1985. The woman hanging herself has definite cultic associations—see below, chapter 6 (Hesiod); Plutarch Theseus 20.1; Burkert 1983:64n26; 82n40; Lefkowitz 1981:4n10; Loraux 1987a:13–17; Loraux 1984; Clader 1976:70; Dietrich 1961; King 1983:118–124; Guépin 1968:97; Foley 1994: 45–46, 65–75. See below, this chapter, on Erigone.

[ back ] 47. For cultic obscenity, aischrologia, see Collins 2004:225–230 and app. A below.

[ back ] 48. Scholia on Aristophanes Acharnians 243.

[ back ] 49. See McGinty 1978.

[ back ] 50. Callimachus Aetia fragment 178.3–4, Hyginus Fables 130; Apollodorus Library 3.14.7; Scholiast on Iliad XXII 29; Aelian Nature of Animals 7.28; Hesychius s.v. Aiōra, Alētis.

[ back ] 51. Cf. the Lycambids, above, this chapter. They remind one of the father-daughter combination in Larson’s pattern of father-daughter cult links, Larson 1995:99.

[ back ] 52. Athenaeus 14.618E. Cf. Kearns 1989:167, 172; Larson 1995:99. See also the cult of Charila at Delphi. An orphan girl, she pleaded for food from the king during a famine, but he kicked her then threw a shoe at her. She hanged herself from shame and when the famine continued, an oracle prescribed cult for her. Plutarch Greek Questions 293cf; Suda s.v. eidōlon; Harrison 1922:106–107 (who sees this as a pharmakos rite); Larson 1995:140. Larson regards hanging as “a particularly feminine form of death in the Greek mind.” The children in Caphyae, on the other hand, pretend to hang a statue of Artemis, and are stoned by the angered townspeople. But when the women of the town are struck with miscarriages, and Delphi is consulted, the Pythia prescribes cult sacrifice to the children. Pausanias 8.23.6–7.

[ back ] 53. See above, chapter 1.

[ back ] 54. Rankin 1977:119n25; his main evidence is the scholiast on Ovid’s Ibis 521, quoted above. For further on the Archilochean trial story, cf. Treu 1959:46–49 (text), 208–209; Müller 1985:123; West 1974:25; Webster in Pickard-Cambridge 1962:10; Rankin 1977:5; Rowland 1980:33–34. Iambikōtero[n (lit., ‘too iambically’) may be interpreted as “too satirically.” See Rankin 1977:119n25.

[ back ] 55. Mnesiepes Inscription E1 col.II 16–19 (test. 4T). Cf. Clay 2004; Nagy 1979:304, 308; Rowland 1980:34.

[ back ] 56. See Aristotle Rhetoric 2.23, 1398b (test. 6T), trans. Edmonds: Πάριοι γοῦν Ἀρχίλοχον καίπερ βλάσφημον ὄντα τετιμήκασι … Alcidamas was a fourth-century BC rhetorician. The same word was applied to Aesop, Vita G 132, see above chapter 2, at Aesop’s death. Cf. Rankin 1977:50. For the relationship of the word timē to cult, heroic or divine, see Hymn to Demeter 311, 261–263 (cf. Richardson 1974 ad loc.); Herodotus 1.168; 1.118.2; Rudhardt 1970:6–7; Ekroth 2002:199–206; below, chapter 8 (Sappho); chapter 11 (Tyrtaeus).

[ back ] 57. Sources: Heraclides On Politics 8 (test. 73T); Plutarch On the Delays of Divine Vengeance 17 (560e) (test. 141T); Dio Chrysostom Orations 33.11 (test. 50T); Suda s.v. Archilochus I (test. 170T); Oenomaus ap. Eusebius Preparation for the Gospel 5.32–39 (test. 115T); Pliny Natural History 7.29 (test. 136T); Libanius Orations 1.74 (test. 95T); Aristides Orations 46.293–294 (test. 21T). See also Fontenrose 1978:287; Clay 2004:25–26.

[ back ] 58. For Archilochus’ “historical” death, see the Sosthenes inscription, C Vb, Clay 2004:117.

[ back ] 59. Dio Chrysostom: τὸν … ὁ Ἀπόλλων ἐξελαύνων ἐκ τοῦ νεὼ. For the theme of death in war, see above, chapter 1 (Codrus, Androgeus); below chapter 9 (Alcaeus); chapt 17 (Bleddyn Fardd); chapter 18.

[ back ] 60. E.g. Dio Chrysostom: Mousōn theraponta (also in Aristides and Origen Against Celsus 3.25 [test. 117T]). Plutarch On the Delay of Divine Vengeance 17 (560e) (test. 141T): hieron andra tōn Mousōn.

[ back ] 61. Plutarch On the Delay of Divine Vengeance 17 (560e) (test. 141T), translation by Edmonds: ἐκελεύσθη πορευθεὶς ἐπὶ τὴν τοῦ Τέττιγος οἴκησιν ἱλάσασθαι τὴν τοῦ Ἀρχιλόχου ψυχήν. Also, Suda s.v. Archilochus. For the cricket, see above, this chapter.

[ back ] 62. See Nagy 1979:302, who cites Aesopic fables. One (323, Perry) seems somewhat ambiguous in this context, but in other fables (125, 236) the crow is explicitly associated with prophecy. He “gave men omens, foretold the future to them, and was therefore consulted by them as an authority” (ἐπὶ τῷ διὰ οἰωνῶν μαντεύεσθαι ἀνθρώποις καὶ τὸ μέλλον προφαίνειν καὶ διὰ τοῦτο ὑπ’ αὐτῶν μαρτυρεῖσθαι … [125]) In Herodotus 4.15, Aristeas accompanies Apollo in the form of a crow. The crow often helps fulfill mantic purposes in Delphic oracles, see Plutarch On the Failure of Oracles 5 (412c); Pausanias 9.38.3–4; Fontenrose 1978: 330 (Q191), cf. p. 73. Cf. Fürtwangler 1884 1.1, 444; Williams 1978:64; Bremmer 1983a:35; Burnett 1983:19n9; Keel 1977:79–91.

[ back ] 63. We remember that the Delphic oracle, an Apolline institution, predicted the poet’s immortality to his father, Dio Chrysostomus 33.

[ back ] 64. 223W/167T = Lucian The Liar 1. This is probably part of the Lycambes invective fragments, Lasserre 1950:28–32.

[ back ] 65. Archilocheion, E1 col. 1.3–4 (test. 4T) (Μούσαις καὶ Ἀπόλλ[ω]ν[ι / Μουσαγέται καὶ Μνημοσύνει); fragment adesp. 941 Page; Hesiod Theogony 94–95; further references in Nagy 1979:291.

[ back ] 66. Cf. Nagy 1979:304. For the relationship of Archilochus with Delphi, see above.

[ back ] 67. See above, this chapter. For “defensive” satire, see below, chapter 4 (Hipponax); chapter 17 (Séafra O’Donnchú); chapter 18 (Starkaðr mocked); chapter 22 (Cicero); app. B.

[ back ] 68. For a fuller discussion of this theme, with a very limited survey of its literary Nachleben, see app. B.

[ back ] 69. Ap. Aelian Historical Miscellanies 10.13 (test. 46T), see quotation above. For the positive and negative lines of Archilochus’ reputation in antiquity, see Rosen 1988c:12–13.

[ back ] 70. Critias, dia penian kai aporian; Pindar (Pythian Odes 2.54) sees Archilochus en amakhaniai, in helplessness, want of means, hardship, cf. LSJ s.v. Lesky 1966:113 treats the theme of helplessness in archaic lyric.

[ back ] 71. See Rankin 1977:2nn5–7.

[ back ] 72. Cf. Horace Epistles 1.19.23ff. (test. 86T); Quintilian 10.1.59.

[ back ] 73. Clay 2004. Cf. Alcidamas, above; Konteleon 1964:44–54; Treu 1959:40–63; Nagy 1970 chapter 18n1; Nagy 1990b:47–51.

[ back ] 74. See above, and many well-known fragments: 1W, 3W, 5W, 6W; also 114W, 110W, 111W, 91W, 93W, 94W, 96W, 98W.

[ back ] 75. Oenomaus The Detection of Impostors, ap. Eusebius Preparation for the Gospel 5.33, translation by E. H. Gifford: οὐ γὰρ δὴ οὐκ εἰσὶ καὶ νῦν ἕτοιμοι κωμῳδεῖσθαι καὶ Σαβαῖοι καὶ Λυκάμβαι … For Sapaeans, see the “robber Sapaeans” (λῃστὰς Σάπας) in the Sosthenes inscription, A1 51 (test. 5T); fragment 5W; Strabo 12.550.

[ back ] 76. For Archilochus in Thasos, see Graham 2001:188–222; Tsantsanoglou 2003.