ARIADNEDaughter of Minos and sister of Phaidre (Phaedra), mentioned by H. in the Odyssey only as an old-time heroine in the Underworld (11.321-25) who is killed by Artemis on the testimony of Dionysos, an outcome unmentioned elsewhere. H. has no reference to her better-known relationship with Theseus in connection with the Minotaur and the Kretan Labyrinth.
ARTEMISThe virgin daughter of Zeus and Leto, and twin sister of Apollo. She plays a minor part only in the Iliad, being, like her mother and brother, very much on the side of the Trojans, and she does not appear directly in the Odyssey at all. Here Penelope is compared to her for beauty; we get a glimpse of Artemis as a mountain huntress (6.102-4), but most often she is mentioned as a source of death; her arrows are often invoked as a kind of euthanasia. It is hard to forget that in the Iliad (24.602-9), she and Apollo, for the benefit of their mother, dispatch all of Niobe's brood of twelve children, Apollo shooting the boys and Artemis the girls. A similar division of victims is recorded by Eumaios (Od. 15.410).
ASOPOSThe eponymous god of the largest river in Boiotia (Il. 4.383, 10.287, described, correctly, as "deep in reeds" and "with grassy banks"). Asopos is mentioned in the Odyssey (11.260) as the father of Antiope.
ATHENEFamous daughter of Zeus, born, according to myth, from his head, without a mother (Gantz, 51-52, with refs.), but H. avoids mentioning this. Early established, she is very probably present in the Linear B tablets, and some of her puzzling epithets (e.g., glaukopis, which can be plausibly translated as either "grey-eyed", "bright-eyed", or "owl-eyed") also testify to her antiquity. As Laura Slatkin remarks in a percipient survey (HE, 1: 109-12), in the Iliad no less than the Odyssey, "Athene is known for keeping a vigilant eye on her proteges" (110). But her relationship with Odysseus in the Odyssey is something special. According to Nestor (3.218-22), this was already apparent during the Trojan War, when she showed him greater favor than any other Greek hero (she was throughout vigorously pro-Greek, having been mortally offended by being passed over in favor of Aphrodite at the Judgment of Paris). Athene's anger at the Achaeans for unspecified offenses at the time of the sack of Troy (probably the rape of Kassandre (SI, arg. 3.; West 2003, 146-47) is not stressed in the Odyssey, which throughout emphasizes her loyalty to Odysseus, and where Odysseus' troubles are primarily ascribed to Poseidon. She manifests herself in the likeness of various characters, both male and female, magically ringing the changes on Odysseus' own appearance, from decrepit ragged old beggar to handsome hero and back, as well as comforting and beautifying Penelope (4.795-837, 18.187-96). Again and again, it is her actions that develop the epic's narration and drive its plot: her intrusive divine intervention in human affairs is a dominant theme throughout, and at times can become an irritant, sorely testing the reader's will to suspend disbelief in the reality of H.'s narrative. She even helpfully delays the coming of dawn when Odysseus and Penelope are finally reunited and retire to bed (23.243-46). Slatkin is right: Athene "is the divinity of the Odyssey. . . . Insofar as she and Zeus are entirely likeminded in this epic, no other Olympian, so to speak, is needed." And that despite the hostility of her uncle Poseidon.
ATLASA Titan, son of Iapetos by Klymene, Prometheus' brother, and the father of Kalypso (7.245). He "knows the depths of every sea" and "shoulders those lofty pillars that keep earth and firmament apart from each other" (1.52-54).
ATREUSKing of Mykenai (q.v.), son of Pelops, from whom he inherited his royal scepter, and brother of Thyestes, to whom he passed it on, and who in turn bequeathed it to Agamemnon (Il. 2.104-9). H. is well aware of Agamemnon's murder by his cousin Aigisthos (q.v.), but he is either ignorant of, or, more probably, chooses to ignore (ibid.), the deadly feud between Atreus and Thyestes, still very much alive in Aigisthos' generation, and at least a contributory cause of his killing Agamemnon. Atreus himself is known in the Odyssey only by a formulaic phrase in which he is commemorated as the father of Agamemnon and Menelaos.
AULISA small harbor on the coast of Boiotia, facing Euboia; famous from the Epic Cycle (Cypr., arg. 6, 8; West 2003, 72-75) as the assembly point for the Achaian armada that sailed against Troy and the site of the sacrifice of Iphigeneia to placate Artemis and obtain a favorable wind.
AUTOLYKOSThe maternal grandfather of Odysseus (father of his mother, Antikleia), notorious for trickery and fraud (and thus identified in some sources as a son of Hermes). Characteristically, we learn that the boar's-tusk helmet lent to Odysseus by Meriones for his night raid in bk. 10 of the Iliad (261-71) was stolen from its original owner by Autolykos. His main appearance in the Odyssey is in bk. 19 (392-412), in connection with the visit to his home by the young Odysseus (whom he had named at birth), and the expedition of the latter on Mount Parnassos with his sons, where he is gashed in one thigh by a boar, leaving a scar that, years later, lets Eurykleia (q.v.) recognize him on his much-delayed return from Troy.
BEAR, THEThe constellation known to the Greeks as Arktos, comprising in H.'s day the seven brightest stars of Ursa Major. In the Odyssey (5.270-77), the Bear, also known as the Wagon (hamaxa) from its shape, is mentioned in connection with the sailing instructions given to Odysseus by Kalypso. It is a circumpolar constellation, never sinking below the horizon (cf. Il. 18.489). How far it could in fact be used for navigation is uncertain; but H.'s passage (and others like it) testify that it was so used, and the belief (see, e.g., Hannah in HE, 1: 96-97) that "the north celestial pole was crucial to ancient navigation" suggests how.
CHALKISOne of the two main cities, with Eretria, on Euboia: listed in the Catalogue of Ships (Il. 2.537), mentioned in the Odyssey (15.295) as a landmark, and prominent in early Mediterranean colonization.
CHARYBDISThe violent whirlpool in the narrow strait across from the cave of Skylle (12.101-26, 235-43, 431-46), described as having a powerful movement three times daily, spewing up a mass of water and, more dangerously, sucking it back down, something against which, H. tells us, no ship was proof. In accordance with the growing tradition of placing much of Odysseus' wandering in the west, later sources (e.g., Thucydides 4.24.5), locate Charybdis in the Straits of Messina.
CHIOSOne of three large islands off the eastern coast of the Aegean Sea, between Lesbos and Samos: Nestor tells, in his account of the voyage home from Troy, of having to decide whether to sail north or south of Chios (3.170-72). One famous tradition has the blind Homer living there (HHAphr. 172-73, quoted by Thucydides 3.104.3).
CYPRUS, CYPRIOTThe third largest Mediterranean island (BA, 72 and 1 J 3-4), located in that sea's NE corner. H. refers (8.362-63) to a precinct and altar of Aphrodite' there, on the SW coast of the island (see s.v. Paphos). The goddess was thus sometimes referred to (though not by H.) as Cypris.
DANAANSOne of the three (metrically variant) terms--"Achaians" (q.v.) and "Argives" (q.v.) being the other two--used by H. to describe the Greek invaders at Troy. Though they are associated in tradition with the Pelasgians (q.v.) and the Argolid, and their existence is attested in Egyptian sources, their precise historical provenance remains obscure.
DAWN (EOS)Goddess notable for her erotic encounters with mortals, e.g., with Tithonos (5.1), by whom she has Memnon, and Orion (5.121). She plays a leading role in the Epic Cycle as the mother of Memnon (Aeth., arg. 2; West 2003, 110-13; Od. 5.1-2; cf. Currie in HE, 1: 253). H. clearly knows her myths, but his references to her are mostly limited to a formula combining sunrise with "rosy-fingered" Dawn.
DEIPHOBOSSon of Priam and Hekabe, and a leading fighter in the Iliad (see, e.g., 12.94; 13.156-64, 402-539). In the Epic Cycle, he marries Helen (? a levirate marriage) after the death of Paris (LI, arg. 2; cf. schol. Od. 8.517), but is killed by Menelaos at the sack of Troy. The marriage to Helen was disputed by some Hellenistic scholars, but the two references to Deiphobos in the Odyssey (4.276, 8.517) suggest that H. knew the tradition.
DELOSA small barren rocky island between Mykonos and Rheneaia, renowned as the birthplace of Apollo (it was the only place that offered refuge to the pregnant Leto). H. refers to it once only (Od. 6.162), when
Odysseus, talking with Nausikaa (q.v.), compares her to a young palm tree he once saw there, en route to Troy.
DELPHIOne of the four great Panhellenic sanctuaries (the others being located at Olympia, Nemea, and the Isthmus of Corinth). Delphi, on the southwestern slope of Mount Parnassos (BA, 55, D 4), was also, from about 800 b.c.e., the site of a prestigious oracle of Apollo. H. mentions it twice (8.80, 11.581) but never by name: instead he refers to the shrine as Pytho (q.v.), a term (to judge by the number of explanations offered for it in antiquity) as obscure then as today.
DEMETERMajor goddess of agriculture and fertility, but almost completely absent from H.'s epics: the single reference in the Odyssey (5.125-28) occurs in a list designed to illustrate the resentment of male deities at goddesses having sexual relations with mortals. H. reports that Demeter lay with a mortal named Iasion on Krete "in thrice-plowed fallow soil," which suggests some kind of fertility ritual. The product of this coupling was Ploutos, the god of wealth (Hes., Th. 969). Zeus, however, killed Iasion with a thunderbolt. Cf. Currie in HE, 2: 390. Similar mortal victims of divine displeasure include Orion (q.v.) and Tithonos (q.v.).
DEMODOKOSThe blind minstrel who is shown performing at the Phaiakian court of King Alkinoos on Scheria. Alkinoos summons him to perform for Odysseus (8.43-47). He is treated with great respect: both his blindness and his artistic skill are described as gifts of the Muse, who loves him. He performs three lays: an otherwise unknown episode (8.72-82) of how Odysseus and Achilles quarreled at a feast of the gods, to the delight of Agamemnon, who recalled a Delphic oracle about such a quarrel between "the best of the Achaians"; the famous episode of Ares and Aphrodite being caught in adultery by Aphrodite's husband, Hephaistos (8.266-366); and, at Odysseus' request, the lay of the Wooden Horse (8.487-520). Unlike Phemios (q.v) on Ithake, Demodokos plays no part in the narrative, but is simply there to perform. There are various theories, none especially cogent, of how these episodes may perhaps allude to Odysseus' own predicament.
DEUKALIONSon of Minos and father of Idomeneus (q.v.): Il. 13.450-55. In one of his fictitious accounts (Od. 19.180-81), Odysseus claims to Penelope to be his son.
DIOMEDESSon of Tydeus, and one of the leading Achaian warriors in the Iliad, with a contingent of eighty ships from his domain of Argos and Tiryns. In the Odyssey, however, Diomedes only rates mentions for his safe postwar return home (3.167, 3.180-81) and as one of the warriors sent to Troy in the Wooden Horse (4.280-84).
DIONYSOSSon of Zeus by Semele. Like Demeter (q.v.), Dionysos is used far less by H. than one might expect; the Odyssey contains two references only (11.325 and 24.74) to him, and though wine is a constant topic, this major attribute of Dionysos gets no mention. We are given one otherwise unknown version of the myth concerning his dealings with Ariadne (q.v.), in which, rather than rescuing and marrying her, he brings a mysterious indictment against her, on the basis of which she is slain by Artemis; the second, equally unfamiliar, claims that the golden two-handled jar provided by Thetis (q.v.) to hold Achilles' bones was "a present from Dionysos."
DIOSKOUROI (DIOSCURI)See s.v. Kastor.
DODONESite of the famous oracle of Zeus in Thesprotia (Homeric Epiros), where responses were given by way of the rustling of the leaves of sacred oaks, interpreted by priests of the oracle known as Selloi (14.327-28, 19.296-97). In both these passages, Odysseus is describing, first to Eumaios (q.v.) and then to Penelope (q.v.), a visit that he supposedly made to consult the oracle about his return home.
DOLIOSAn old servant of Penelope's, originally belonging to her father, Ikarios, but sent with her on her marriage to join the household of Odysseus (4.735-36). His duties include agricultural labor (with his six sons), inter alia looking after Laertes' garden (24.387-88, 4.735-37). He and his sons join Odysseus and Telemachos to fight the relatives of the dead suitors (24.397, 409-11, 492-99). But he is also the father of the goatherd Melanthios (17.212, 22.159) and the handmaid Melantho (18.322), both of whom side with the suitors and are killed as a result.
DOULICHIONDescribing his homeland to Alkinoos (9.21-26), Odysseus speaks of a group of islands situated close to Ithake: "Doulichion, Same, and forested Zakynthos." Same is Kephallenia, modern Kefallinia, or Cephalonia, and Zakynthos is normally identified with today's island of the same name (known earlier as Zante); but Doulichion remains a puzzle. Both the Catalogue of Ships in the Iliad (2.625-26) and Strabo (8.2.2, 10.2.10, 19) connect it with the Echinades, and place it across from Elis. In the Odyssey (14.336, 16.247), it is ruled by one Akastos, and furnishes no fewer than fifty-two of Penelope's suitors, as well as being grassy and rich in grain; but the description to Alkinoos is, as has often been remarked (see, e.g., Haller in HE, 1: 219), very hard to equate with a position in the vicinity of the Echinades and seems to refer to a far larger, less rugged island. Of the various suggestions for a location, part of Kephallenia (q.v.) is perhaps the likeliest; but the possibility that the poet was simply offering a vague description of an area with which he was personally unfamiliar should not be dismissed out of hand.
ECHINADESA group of small islands at the mouth of the Acheloos River in western Greece. Strabo (8.2.2, 3.26) claims that the "Sharp" Islands of Od. 15.299 are the southernmost Echinades. Thucydides (2.102.3-5) noted that already in his time some of these islands were silting up, becoming part of the Acarnanian mainland.
EGYPT, EGYPTIANSThere is both Egyptian and Greek Linear B evidence for contacts between Egypt and Bronze Age Mycenaean Greece as far back as the Egyptian Old Kingdom (c. 2600-2100). Mycenaean warriors in boar's-tusk helmets (already obsolete) feature in papyrus illustrations from Amarna c. 1400 (Powell in HE, 1: 240). Communication was not completely severed during the Dark Age (c. 1150-800). There are references in the lying tales told by Odysseus (see, e.g., 14.199-359, 17.415-44) to raids on wealthy Egypt ("Aigyptos" is used to signify both the land of Egypt and the Nile River, which H. never names). Heroes such as Menelaos (q.v.) trade there (3.300-303, 4.125-32, 14.240-386). For H., Egypt is a land of advanced medicine and mood-enhancing drugs (4.220-34). His vague knowledge is exactly right for an age when regular Greek trade with Egypt was slowly beginning to recover under the pharaoh Psammetichos (Psamtek) I (c. 664-610).
EILEITHYIAAncient goddess of childbirth, already mentioned in the Linear B tablets: her sacred cave at Amnisos is referred to by Odysseus (19.188).
ELISThe coastal plain (BA, 58, A-B 1-2) in the northwest Peloponnese, bordered at its eastern extremity by the great mountains of Achaia and Arcadia, and to the south by Messenia. Elis is bisected horizontally by two major rivers, the Peneios in the north, where the eponymous city of Elis, home of the Epeians (q.v.), lies in the valley near where the river emerges from the mountains, and the Alpheios in the south, marking off the district of Triphylia. All mentions in the Odyssey are casual: it is not always clear whether region or city is meant.
ELYSIUM, ELYSIAN FIELDSThe earliest mention of this paradise at "the furthest ends of the earth" for the privileged few--exceptional heroes or, later, the exceptionally virtuous--as an alternative to Hades, is in the prophecy of Proteus (q.v.) to Menelaos (4.561-69). There is no bad weather there, but a sunny, easy existence, peaceful and temperate, fanned by cool breezes. Elysium is clearly a parallel to the Isles of the Blest in Hesiod's Works and Days (167-73).
EPEIANSA quasi-mythical ethnic group associated by H. in the Odyssey with the region of Elis (q.v.): 13.275, 15.298, 24.431.
EPEIOSIdentified as the builder of the Wooden Horse in both references in the Odyssey (8.492-93, 11.523-24; cf. LI, arg. 4; West 2003, 122-23). Epeios does well as a boxer at the funeral games for Patroklos, but fails at the shot put (Il. 23.664-99, 839-40). Though a great-grandson of Aiakos (q.v., Il. 23.695), he is undistinguished in battle.
EPHIALTESSee s.v. Pelion.
EPHYREA city in Thesprotia twice mentioned in the Odyssey (1.258-62, 2.328-30), both times as a source of drugs or poison: Odysseus is reported as going there to obtain poison for his arrows, while Antinoos jeeringly suggests tha
t Telemachos was looking for drugs with which to poison the suitors' wine.
EREBOSFor H., the dark and gloomy area region to the west (12.81, 20.356) under the earth, populated by the ghosts of the dead (11.37, 564) and closely associated with Hades (10.528). For Hesiod (Th. 123), Erebos is personalized as a son of Chaos.
ERECHTHEUSAn early mythical king of Athens. In the Catalogue of Ships (Il. 2.547-51), he is described as "earthborn" and cared for by Athene (q.v.) in her temple. In the Odyssey (7.80-81; cf. Plut., Thes. 25.3), Athene leaves Scheria for Marathon and Athens, where she enters the "house of Erechtheus," that is, the Erechtheion, on the Acropolis. Both passages (whether genuine or not) suggest a false claim to autochthony.
ERIPHYLEOne of the mythical "heroines" observed in the Underworld by Odysseus (11.326-27; cf. 15.247). She was the wife of the seer Amphiaraos (q.v.). She knew (as did he) that he was fated to die in the expedition against Thebai, but nevertheless, bribed by Polyneikes with the promise of a golden necklace, persuaded him to join it. He did so, and duly died. Eriphyle was afterwards murdered in revenge by their son Alkmaion (q.v.).
ERYMANTHOSMountain range in the NW Peloponnese (6.102-5), between Elis and Arkadia (BA, 58, B 2), famous in antiquity for its plentiful large wild game, in particular boar and deer, and thus as a hunting venue for Artemis.
EUBOIAThe next-largest Aegean island after Krete, some ninety miles in length, but no more than thirty at its widest, lying directly off the east coast of Attika, from which it is divided by a channel of varying width. Nestor refers to it as a landmark on his homeward voyage (3.174); Alkinoos (who has not himself been there) reports it, on information given, as "the most remote of islands" (7.321, with n. 5 ad loc.), a curious piece of misinformation, since it could hardly have been more central to the Aegean world. But Scheria (later identified with Kerkyra, modern Corfu) is described as remote, and thus marginal, even if not mythical.
EUMAIOSThe loyal swineherd, prominent from bk. 14 on: he offers the still-unrecognized Odysseus hospitality (after calling off the farmstead's dogs), takes him into town, and joins Odysseus in the attack on the suitors after learning who he is. As Thalmann says (HE, 1: 270-71), he "condenses many of the moral and social issues that are central to the poem." He highlights the abuses of the suitors' regime by his need to supply them with hogs for their feasts. His deeply felt memories of Odysseus as a good and kindly master emphasize how much has been lost by that master's long absence. He also seemingly offers a paradigm of the "virtuous slave"--until, that is, it transpires at 15.413-14 that before enslavement, he was of noble, indeed of royal, lineage, thus changing the paradigm at a stroke to the hierarchical upper-class belief, so popular in myth, that blue blood implies an innate noble character, which will always reveal itself in the end.