analysis of formulaic variation of Od. XI.114, Od. XII.141. Homer substitutes derivative form of νοστήσεις. Context of prophesy almost absent as a result of Homer’s modification of traditional diction

The storytelling of Odysseus has come to an end, and he will now be sent home to Ithaca by his hosts, Alkinoos and the Phaeacians. Sailing through the night in a ship provided by king Alkinoos, Odysseus is in a deep sleep, which is compared to death itself. At the precise moment when the ship reaches the shores of his homeland, Ithaca, Odysseus will ‘come to’, experiencing a mystical return to light and life.

“Ulysses Asleep Laid on his Own Coast by the Phaeacian Sailors” (1805). John Flaxman (English, 1755–1826). Purchased as part of the Oppé Collection with assistance from the National Lottery through the Heritage Lottery Fund 1996. Image via the Tate.

Here at O.13.256–286 we see the first example of “Cretan lies” told by Odysseus in the context of his re-entry into the kingdom of Ithaca. The concept of “Cretan lies” was introduced in the anchor comment at O.01.284–286 on a Cretan Odyssey.

The goddess here formally declares to Odysseus her support for the hero, which leads ultimately to his success in his final confrontation with the suitors. But there is an undercurrent of antagonism between the goddess and the hero, insofar as they are both exponents of mētis ‘mind, intelligence’. Here it is Athena who boasts of her own poetic glory for possessing qualities of mētis ‘mind, intelligence’, O.13.299.

analysis of the formulas with a dative after eukhesthai where it is not explicitly a god/a collection of gods, and the irony present when hōs theōi (as in these verses, Odysseus addressing disguised Athena) is used

analysis of the attestations of sacral eukhesthai in the present tense and comparison of variant formulas with eukhetasthai for eukhesthai in formulas with enjambed, present tense, sacral eukhesthai, in the context of analyzing Allen’s text of I.08.526

anomaly of the formula in this verse, namely, the complement to eukhomai is not a noun (e.g. name of divinity) but a pronoun

in a list of examples of eukhesthai + dative (sacral), and in a list of anomalous attestations (divergent inflection of eukhesthai, other imperative)

comment on Odysseus’ characteristic duplicity (mētis and deceptive communication), in the context of analyzing his speech in I.09 [MRBTP: 'ff']

When Odysseus arrives back in Ithaka in Odyssey 13, he encounters Athene in the shape of young shepherd. After Odysseus lies to her about his identity, Athene reacts with a smile and another transformation:\r\n\r\nὣς φάτο, μείδησεν δὲ θεὰ γλαυκῶπις Ἀθήνη,\r\n\r\nχειρί τέ μιν κατέρεξε· δέμας δ' ἤϊκτο γυναικὶ\r\n\r\nκαλῇ τε μεγάλῃ τε καὶ ἀγλαὰ ἔργα ἰδυίῃ·\r\n\r\n \r\n\r\nSo he spoke, and the goddess gray-eyed Athene smiled,\r\n\r\nand she stroke him with her hand. And she took on the shape of a woman\r\n\r\nbeautiful and tall and skilled in beautiful handiworks,\r\n\r\nand speaking to him she addressed him in winged words.\r\n\r\n \r\n\r\nSome scholars have interpreted this transformation as the goddess revealing herself to the hero in her true form (e.g., Stanford 1948, ad 13.289; Heubeck 1988-1992, ad 13.288), but as Pucci argues, it is unlikely that Odysseus sees the goddess as she really is (Pucci 1986:7-28). The diction of the passage makes clear that Athene’s appearance “in the shape of a beautiful woman” is as much a disguise as the others she adopts elsewhere: as the poet tells us, “she took on (ἤϊκτο) the shape of a woman.”\r\n\r\nThe formulaic language to describe the goddess’ reaction and transformation has both erotic and maternal connotations. The formula “and she/he stroked him/her with her/his hand” appears seven times in Homeric epic, always to describe intimate moments between mother and child or between lovers. In the Iliad, the phrase is mostly used to described mother and child (1.361, 5.372, 23.127) and once of husband and wife (6.484-5). In the Odyssey the phrase occurs two other times: Menelaos smiles and strokes Telemachos in a fatherly manner (4.610), and there is perhaps a maternal aspect to Athene’s concern for Odysseus, but the encounter is not without sexual undercurrents, which are also present in the only other Odyssean instance of the phrase, which involves Kalypso smiling and stroking Odysseus (5.180-1).\r\n\r\nWhen Athene strokes Odysseus, the erotic tenor of her gesture is made evident in both her physical transformation and the conversation that follows, which centers on the like-mindedness of the goddess and the hero, a quality Odysseus praises as the basis of a good marriage (Odyssey 6.183). Athene chooses an appearance that is particularly appropriate to this moment of intimacy between goddess and her mortal protégé: the shape of a seductive woman, beautiful and skilled at handiworks, or in short and as the Greek gunê also denotes, a perfect wife endowed with the most desirable qualities. The encounter between goddess and hero in Odyssey 8 is thus replete with motifs—an encounter with a beautiful female divinity in the countryside, a shrine of the nymphs—usually associated with stories of love between goddesses and men, and Odysseus in this scene is depicted as the notional lover of the goddess, or as a nympholept (numpholeptos).\r\n\r\n \r\n\r\nReferences\r\n\r\nHeubeck, A. et al. 1998-1992. A Commentary on Homer’s Odyssey. Volume 2. Books 9-16. Oxford.\r\n\r\nPache, C. 2011. ‘A Moment’s Ornament’: The Poetics of Nympholepsy in Ancient Greece. Oxford.\r\n\r\nPucci, P. 1986. “Les figures de la Mêtis dans l’Odyssée.” Mètis 1:7-28.\r\n\r\nStanford, W.B. 1948. Homer. Odyssey XIII-XXIV. Edited with Introduction and Commentary. London.

analysis of Athena’s reminding of Hermes in O.13.221ff.