This last unit will focus on how divinity, society and nature and their interrelationships with one another and with humans. Dr. Giannopoulou will talk about nature primarily, but she will also explore these interrelationships. The Bacchae will be the main text of this unit, but we will compare and contrast ideas from this Euripides play and from Homer, Sophocles and Plato.
The Homeric Question. Who is Homer? Homer is the author of The Illiad and The Odyssey, but there is no single historical figure to whom we refer when we talk about Homer. Heroditus, an Ancient Greek historian, said that Homer lived in 850 BCE. Other sources have him living five centuries earlier. We assume that at some point in this period, there was some poem named Homer.
Homer wrote in dactylic hexameter. This means that he wrote phrases that contained six sets of vowel sounds grouped in pairs of long sounds or in groups of three with one long sound and two short sounds. In other words, he wrote lines with six dactyls. A dactyl is a set of two long vowel sounds or one long vowel sound followed by two short vowel sounds. This means that it was very difficult for Homer to compose his prose, as it was all constrained by these parameters. This would have been particularly difficult because the poems were composed orally, meaning that nothing was written down when the poetry was created.
Aoidoi were singers, or bards. Often they were authors of poems, as well, such as Homer. Rhapsodoi replaced aoidoi as a term. They were performers of poetry who would compete. Literally, the term means that they sewed songs together.
Many scholars have tried to solve the Homeric question. Milman Perry and Albert Lord were two important Homeric scholars. Perry, who wrote in the 1930s, provided the idea that Homer's formulas were inherited from predecessors. Formula here means a group of words used regularly under the same conditions in order to express an idea. For example, "the man of twists and turns" is a formulaic description of Odysseus. Another example of a formula is "swift-footed" Achilles. Albert Lord contributed the fact that every time a Homeric epic was performed by a different person, there were changes made. The texts we read are thus the result of a long oral tradition.
Homer's similes are his most interesting references to nature. Metaphors are comparisons without words like "like", "such as" "as", or "similar to". When these words are used, then it is a simile. For example, in Iliad, Eumelus' horses are described as "swift-moving like birds". Humans are also compared to animals. Gods are also able to change their own form into animals and turn humans into animals. Human and animal forms are interchangeable. In Homer, the boundaries between humans and nature are flexible.
In Iliad, Achilles has a dialogue with his horse. He tells a horse to bring him back and shames him by telling him to do better and not to leave him dead as they left Patroclus dead. He also calls his horse "illustrious", which is a term not often applied to horses but only to humans. Achilles' horse responds by bowing his head and is then given a voice by Hera. The horse says that they will do their best, but that the gods ultimately decide who dies. It is significant that the horse in this play has logos, or speech and reason. The horse not only responds with language, but he responds with good reasons and prophesizes Achilles' death. The furies then struck the horse dumb. Achilles responds by asserting his courage and superiority. In short, although the man has the last word, the animal has the capacity to act as the best humans can.
In Odyssey, Odysseus fights the Scylla, a six-headed monster. He also fights a whirlpool, the Charybdis. Both of these monsters are female. Here is an example of a male exercising his ability to make a woman submit. Even monsters such as the Charybdis that are characterized as excessive and grotesque have human characteristics, such as gulping, swallowing and spewing. Scylla, who snatches six men, is described as similar to an angler fishing for little fish. She is also described as having a cavern, referring to her mouth and throat and as being like a fishing rod. The men are described like little fish. Contrast their animalic writhing with Scylla's calculated movements. In sum, animals in Homer are like and unlike human beings. When like humans, the characteristics are extreme and monstrous. IT is the intensification of human characteristics that makes them a monster. Also, they are dominated by human beings.
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