The Function of Digressions in the "Iliad" Austin, Norman Greek, Roman and Byzantine Studies; Winter 1966; 7, 4; ProQuest

pg. 295

The Function of Digressions in the Iliad

Norman Austin

ODERN Homeric scholarship is characterized by a greater

sympathy for Homer's style than was accorded it during the
nineteenth century. An important result of the studies
begun by Milman Parry on the nature of oral composition is that
scholars are more cautious about imposing their own aesthetic bias
on Homer and making anachronistic demands of him. There has
been an attempt to measure Homer's achievements by his own
standards, that is, by the standards of oral poetry, rather than by the
standards which may be valid only for later literary productions.
The charges of discursiveness, repetition, expansion and even incongruity no longer seem as damning as they were once considered to be.
A danger of this new receptive attitude, however, is that while
Homer may be vindicated as an historical personage, as an artist he
may be merely excused. Some modem studies, particularly those on
the paratactic style of Homer, have not so much settled the question
of unity in the Homeric poems as evaded the issue by denying the
value of the search for unity, or at least any unity which we could
recognize as such, in an oral poet. Far from disposing of the central
problems of the Homeric Question this approach has only corroborated the misgivings of earlier Analysts. The suggestion implicit
in the oral approach is that we must recognize that there is after all
no artistic unity in Homer, just as many Analysts claimed; moreover,
we must learn not to look for any. What was once seen as a pastiche
by a collective body of poets, rhapsodes and diaskeuasts is now seen
as a loosely tied collection of pastiches, all by the same poet. This
denial of organic unity in Homer would appear to prove the Analysts
right in their questions even if wrong in their methods of pursuing
answers.!
1 Among scholars who deny, or seriously question, organic unity in Homer are: B. A.
van Groningen. Paratactische compositie in de oudste grieksche literatuur [MededAkWetAmst.
Afd. Letterk, ser. A, 83.3] (1937); cf. also "Elements inorganiques dans la composition de
l'Iliade et de l'Odyssee," Revue des Etudes Horrn!riques 5 (1935) 3-Z4, where van Groningen
maintains (p.9) that the composition of oral poetry is subject only to the external control
Z95

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THE FUNCTION OF DIGRESSIONS IN THE ILIAD

The point of view which posits the primacy of the parts over the
whole in Homer has been given wide currency by Erich Auerbach's
explication of the digression on Odysseus' scar in Odyssey 19.2 Auerbach's contention is that the Homeric style is so compulsively paratactic and explicative that when something such as the scar appears in
the narrative, the poet abandons the main narrative entirely in order
to bring that object forward and with it all temporal, spatial and causal
relationships. According to Auerbach, this compulsion to 'externalize'
overrides any other principle in Homer, whether rhetorical, dramatic
or aesthetic. 3
In recent times, the Homeric digression has achieved a certain
respectability by virtue of its becoming the focus of much of the work
devoted to the paratactic style. Once condemned by the Analysts as
irrelevant insertions added by later poets to satisfy personal whims or
demands for local tradition, the digressions have become the hallmark of the oral style, the example par excellence of the poet's amor
pleni.4 But this modem view has not so much acquitted Homer of the
exerted by the demands or interest of the audience; J. Tate, who in his review of van
Groningen's book (CR 51 [1937] 174-5) writes that "Homer's aim is the perfection of the
parts rather than the integrity of the whole"; J. A. Notopoulos, "Parataxis in Homer: A
New Approach to Homeric Literary Criticism," TAPA 80 (1949) 1-23, who states (p.6) that
the digressions "are actually the substance of the narrative, strung paratactically like beads
on a string"; B. B. Perry, "The Barly Greek Capacity for Viewing Things Separately,"
TAPA 68 (1937) 403-Z7, who claims (pAI6) that Homer needed no justification for a digression "other than the delight of his Greek audience in the story per se"; P. Mazon, who in
discussing unity in Homer writes, Introduction Ii l'Wade (Paris 1948) 237, "11 ne faut pas juger
un Chant par rapporte au poeme, il faut Ie juger en lui-meme, com me s'il etait isole." All
these repudiate the attempt to apply to Homer rhetorical principles based on the Platonic
ideal of the living organism. A. B. Lord, The Singer of Tales (Cambridge [Mass.] 1960) shows
some ambivalence. He admits (pp.88fI) that the length and presence of "ornamental"
themes do not depend on the whim of the singer, but yet he says (p.148) that the poet is
not concerned with the relevance of the ornament since the ornament has a value of its
own. Among those who maintain Homeric unity of design is C. H. Whitman in his book,
Homer and the Heroic Tradition (Cambridge [Mass.] 1958), cf especially pp.181-18Z; see also
J. T. Sheppard, The Pattern of the Iliad (London 1922) and S. B. Bassett, The Poetry of Homer
(Berkeley 1938) ch. VII.
I B. Auerbach, Mimesis tr. W. Trask (Garden City [N.Y.] 1957) ch. I. I would not deny
Auerbach's major thesis that the historicity of the Old Testament gives to its narrative a
greater sense of perspective than we find in Homer. Auerbach has, however, based his
argument on only one kind of style in Homer, and it is the purpose of this essay to show
that Homer employs such a style for certain dramatic effects.
a See Perry's similar conclusion on the scar, op.cit. (supra nJ) 412 n.10.
f. J. A. Notopoulos, "Homer and Geometric Art," Athena 61 (1957) 65-93, has used the
term amor p/eni to describe the impulse to decorate which he sees in both Geometric Art
and Homer. Other scholars who have studied the relationship of Homer to Geometric
Art have firmly repudiated the suggestion that Homeric digressions or expansions should
be considered ornaments or mere "space-filler." See Whitman, op.cit. (supra n.l) esp.

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297

charge of irrelevance or incongruity as it has accepted irrelevancy as a

characteristic of the oral style and thereby made of it something close
to a virtue. It is possible, however, to defend the digression on firmer
grounds. I hope to show that the digressions of the Iliad are not

haphazard accretions, but neither are they merely ornamental

decorations subject to the whims of poet or his audience. There is a
consistency in their themes, their occurrence and their degree of
elaboration which indicates an ordering principle in their use. Both
thematically and dramatically they are relevant to the structure of
the whole poem.s
A justification of the integrity of the digressions must start with an
appreciation of the two contrasting styles of narrative in Homer. The
one is that which Auerbach has analyzed so well, in which all details,
however trivial or incidental, are included and nothing is omitted or
left unclarified. The other is a casual, allusive and elliptical way of
presenting information. 6 What is particularly curious in the Iliad is
that for all the importance of the Trojan War as the essential milieu
of the quarrel between Agamemnon and Achilleus, it is always
referred to in the latter oblique style, while legends and myths which
have nothing to do with the War are told in leisurely digressions of
ample detail. It is hardly an exaggeration to say that we know from
pp.95-101, and R. Hampe, Die Gleichnisse Homers und die Bildkunst seiner Zeit (Tiibingen
1952). A few representative analytic interpretations of the digressions may be cited:
W. Leaf, A Companion to the Iliad (London 1892) 214, in discussing Nestor's stories says that
"the character of the garrulous old man is obviously suitable for the interpolation of such
inappropriate episodes." If all Nestor's supposed "interpolations" were removed, Nestor
would of course no longer be garrulous. P. von der Miihll, Kritisches Hypomnema zur Ilias
(Basel 1952) 24 n.29, 198, attributes all Nestor's digressions to a later poet. C. M. Bowra,
Tradition and Design in the Iliad (Oxford 1930) 73ff, believes that the digressions are primitive
elements injudiciously worked into the poem. G. S. Kirk, The Songs of Homer (Cambridge
1962) 178, writes that "where the elaboration becomes excessive there are often grounds
for seeing the operation of declining singers or rhapsodes." The two assumptions basic
to these theories are that the digressions are irrelevant and unnecessarily long. On the
other hand, to say with Notopoulos (supra n.1) that "the digressions ... are actually
the substance of the narrative" is certainly erroneous for the Iliad.
6 In what follows I shall restrict my discussion almost exclusively to the Iliad because
the structure of the Odyssey makes the question of its digressions somewhat more complex.
In fact much of the analysis of Homer's appositional and para tactic style seems to be more
valid for the Odyssey than for the Iliad.
The authenticity of the discursive or "Odyssean" passages in the Iliad has often been
called in question. Wolfgang Schadewaldt, Iliasstudien [AbhSachsAkWiss, phil.-Hist. K1.43.6]
(Leipzig 1938) 82, accepts such "lyric" passages as from the hand of the same poet as the
rest of the Iliad, but argues that they would suggest a date for the Iliad close to that of the
Odyssey.

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THE FUNCTION OF DIGRESSIONS IN THE ILIAD

the Iliad more about Nestor's youthful exploits in Pylos than we do

about the cause and eventual outcome of the Trojan War.
The studies on the para tactic style of Homer have not, I think, taken
sufficient cognizance of this fact, that most of the directly relevant
background material is presented in the briefest allusions in a quite
subordinate manner, often simply included in such indirect ways as
part of a taunt by one character to another, while material which we
might consider not directly relevant is narrated in the full appositional style. If we believe that Homer is led astray by his own mention
of a person or object into a digressional anecdote, his remarkably
laconic treatment of interesting stories which are vital to our knowledge of the Trojan War becomes even more inexplicable. Why are
the border raids in Pylos so much more entertaining than, say, the
judgement of Paris or the rape of Helen? Or conversely, if we are
Analysts we must wonder why the later poets who inserted the
digressions in the Iliad were so partial to Nestor, to women, and to
lesser Trojan heroes, and how they could have so successfully suppressed those poets who might have been partial to the important
Greek heroes. 7
It is well to remind ourselves of how scanty the information on the
War is. In Book 1, although most of the important heroes are brought
on stage, there are only hints rather than facts about the War. We
are hardly given the minimum of facts necessary to identify the
characters and to establish the moment in the legend when the action
of the poem takes place. The only specific reference to the War is
Achilleus' angry reminder that he had no quarrel with the Trojans,
but that he had come to Troy on behalf of some undisclosed point of
Menelaos' and Agamemnon's honor (vv.152-60). Book 2 is equally
cryptic, although the Catalogue of Ships offers an excellent opportunity for a full digression on the purpose of the expedition. The
Catalogue gives us much extraneous information, but of the War it
has little to say. Menelaos is described as longing "to avenge the
agonies and sorrows of Helen" (354-56), and the figures of Protesilaos
and Philoktetes enter to allow brief allusions to the past and future.
In Book 3, when Helen, Paris and Menelaos move into center stage,
7 For one discussion of Homer's suppression of detail see V. Magnien, "La discretion
homerique," REG 37 (1924) 141-63. Magnien does well to call attention to Homer's silence.
but I am not sure that Homer's aesthetic forbade anything but the beautiful, magnificent
or heroic. There is much that is brutal and unheroic in the Iliad, as critics from Plato to
Simone Wei! have amply observed.

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NORMAN AUSTIN

we might expect a detailed account of their role in the War, but what
facts are stated are presented obliquely. It is Hektor who first mentions
the abduction of Helen when he taunts Paris by comparing his present
pusillanimity with his past panache (39-57): "Is this the man you
were when you sailed across the seas to carry off a foreign woman?"
In the Teichoscopeia Helen and Antenor give some background information about the Greek leaders, and Antenor reveals quite
incidentally that Menelaos and Odysseus had come to Troy to discuss
Helen's abduction before the War began. Even this interesting fact is
left unelaborated; it is included only because its narration affords a
chance to depict Odysseus' abilities as orator.
The first books of the Iliad would seem to stand in refutation of
Auerbach's thesis when they show so little concern for externalization. Certainly the poem does not show the historical consciousness
of the Old Testament, but the obliquity of its style with its gradual
revelation of the past and future give a greater depth and perspective
than Auerbach would allow.
In marked contrast to the meagre information given about important characters in Book 1, what digressional material the book contains refers to lesser characters or to almost entirely alien legends.
Kalchas is given a four-line introduction (69-72); Nestor is introduced
in seven lines and then proceeds to a fourteen-line description of how
he fought with the heroes of old against the Centaurs (247-53, 260-73);
Achilleus reminds Thetis of the occasion when she called upon
Briareus to help Zeus against the mutinous Olympians (396-406);
Thetis informs Achilleus that Zeus is away on a twelve-day sabbatical
among the Ethiopians (423-25); and Hephaistos reminds Hera of the
consequences of his having tried to protect her from Zeus's anger in
the past, when Zeus threw him from Olympos (590-94).
These digressional anecdotes are short, but yet we may wonder at
the disparity between the information given in them and the almost
total lack of information about Agamemnon, the other Greek
leaders, and the course of the War itself.
The explanation for this disparity is that almost all the digressional
material in Book 1 is there not for its historical interest but for its
paradigmatic value. Here it is necessary to draw a distinction between
digressions into the past and expansions of other kinds of episodes
which are subordinate within the poem. The word digression' is
inevitably controversial in poetic criticism and perhaps always a
C

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THE FUNCTION OF DIGRESSIONS IN THE ILIAD

misnomer. Certainly it is an error to apply it indiscriminately to the

expanded description of any object, scene or person within a poem.
The word, however, may be used with more justification to refer to
anecdotes which describe action outside the time of the poem. By
this definition, then, the Teichoscopeia, though not in itself a digression,
has much digressional material in it, while Odysseus' embassy to
Chryses in Book 1 is not a digression at all. By this definition four of
the five 'digressional' anecdotes in Book 1 are true digressions, since
they relate to the past. All four, Kalchas' introduction, Nestor's
introduction, and the stories of Briareus' rescue of Zeus and Hephaistos' attempt to help Hera are told as paradigms.
The paradigmatic elements of many of the older myths in the
Iliad have long been noticed, and the obvious instances of the paradigmatic stories which speakers in the Iliad use as protreptic arguments have been discussed by others, so that it is necessary only to
call attention here to their salient features. s The paradigmatic stories
are drawn from personal experience, family history, or myths outside the Trojan legend. They are rhetorical devices whose intention
is always persuasive; they are either hortatory (or dissuasive) or
apologetic. That is, they are a form of argument directed by one
person to another to encourage him to, or to deflect him from, some
action, or they are offered by someone as self defence for his pursuing
a certain course. Some may be both hortatory and apologetic.
The hortatory paradigms are: the story of Briareus against the
Olympians (1.397-406);9 the story of Meleager (9.529ff); Tydeus'
exploits against Thebes, told by Agamemnon to Diomedes (4.3728 For a collection of the major paradigms see R. Oehler, Mythclogische Exempla in der
iilteren griechischen Dichtung (diss. Basel 1925) ; for a good discussion see H. Fraenkel's review
of Oehler in Gnomon 3 (1927) 569-76. J. T. Kakridis, Homeric Researches (Lund 1949), suggests
that in the stories of Niobe and Meleager Homer altered the facts of the old legends to make
them more appropriate paradigms. M. M. Willcock, "Mythological Paradeigma in the
Iliad," CQ N.S. 14 (1964) 141-54, continues Kakridis' investigation to show some degree of
invention in eight paradigmatic stories in the Iliad. See also Werner Jaeger's brief discussion
of paradigms in Homer in his Paideia,2 tr. G. Highet, I (New York 1945) 27-35.
9 This story is intended to be the hypomnesis of Thetis' prayer to Zeus. On hypomnesis
as a formal part of prayers see H. Meyer, Hymnische Stilelemente in der frtlhgriechischen
Dichtung (diss. Koln 1933). The hypomnesis reminds the god of past favors, whether
rendered by the supplicant to the god or vice versa, expressed often in the conditional, "If
ever I pleased you with sacrifices before," or "If ever you heard my prayer in the past."
Chryses' two prayers to Apollo (1.39-41, 453-55) and Thetis' prayer to Zeus (1.503-4) give
three examples of this formulaic statement. Hephaistos uses a hypomnetic story upon
himself when Thetis comes to ask for arms (18.395ff). The point of his story is, "I must
help you because you helped me once before." Hypomnesis in prayers is always an abbreviated form of paradigm.

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301

400); the story of Hephaistos' rescue by Thetis (18.395-405); Phoinix's

mythic conceit of the Prayers to whom gods and men must submit
(9.502-12); Dione's catalogue of human assaults on deities, told as
consolation (5.382ff); and all the personal digressions of Nestor
(1.260-73; 7.124-60; 11.670-790; 23.629-43).
The important apologetic paradigms which justify a certain action,
or defend a right, or offer a rationale for behavior are: the stories of
the personal and ancestral kind, such as the story of Tydeus which
Sthene10s tells as a sequel to Agamemnon's story of Tydeus (4.40510), or Diomedes' story of Tydeus (14.113-25); the genealogical
stories given by Glaukos (6.150ff) and by Aineias (20.208ff). All these
paradigms defend the speaker's honor in war or establish his right to
a voice in deliberative council. Other such paradigms are: the story
of Lykourgos which Diomedes tells to explain why he will not fight
until he knows Glaukos' genealogy (6.128ff); the story of how Ate
was thrown down from Olympos, which Agamemnon tells to explain
how delusion entered the world (19.86ff); the brief allusion to Herakles' death, which Achilleus tells both as apology and as consolation
(18.117-20); the story of Niobe, which is primarily hortatory but also
apologetic (24.602-17). Achilleus tells this story to urge Priam to eat,
but he is also reassuring himself that he has not betrayed Patroklos
by surrendering to his physical needs.10
The digressions of Nestor are both hortatory and apologetic. As
apology they establish the legitimacy of his position in the Greek
hierarchy as the wisest counsellor; as exhortation they offer a challenge to the younger men to live up to the heroic ideal as embodied
in his person. His tales, verbose as they may seem to our more
impetuous temper, are not senile meandering. We may find his
advice inadequate or jejune, but that is not a judgement in which his
peers would have concurred.l l
Nestor establishes the pattern in his first speech (1.254-84); the
later speeches repeat and amplify his theme. When he intervenes in
Book 1 between the two most powerful men in the army, he must
10 Fraenkel, op.cit. (supra n.8) 571-2, offers the interesting suggestion that paradigms
drawn from myths outside the Trojan legend are the poet's personal apologia for allowing
his characters to act in a manner inconsistent with the heroic ideal. This may be true of
the Niobe story, but the Meleager story is given as warning, not as an apology.
11 Kirk, op.cit. (supra nA) 348: "Nestor also gives the oddest kinds of tactical advice."
A. Severyns, Homere III (Brussels 1948) 50, typifies modern condescension when he says
that we pardon Nestor in advance if he talks too much and too often. Nestor's associates
never treated him with such indignity. Achilleus in giving Nestor a prize in the athletic

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THE FUNCTION OF DIGRESSIONS IN THE ILIAD

make a strong appeal for a hearing; he appeals to his right as counsellor, a right which is his due not by virtue of age alone but because
he has actively participated in adventures with the heroes of the past
and they have profited from his advice. The paradigmatic purpose of
his reminiscence is made clear when Nestor concludes by saying
(273-4): "These men of the past listened to me; so you too must
follow my advice." Nestor's advice is critical in the Iliad, and the
Greeks show their appreciation by following it, with this one notable
exception in Book 1. Agamemnon and Achilleus will not settle their
quarrel as Nestor advises, and the whole poem is the story of the
disastrous consequence. Thereafter the Greeks do not make the same
mistake.
Even the long story which Nestor tells to Patroklos of the battles
between the Pylians and the Eleians (11.670-761) is not simply a
lament for his lost youth as Bowra suggests.12 Achilleus, not Nestor,
is the real subject of the speech.13 The first part of the speech is
structured thus: Achilleus-Nestor-digression-Nestor-Achilleus.
The gist is: Achilleus does nothing; if only I were as strong as when I
fought the Eleians. Then follows the long story of the Eleians against
the Pylians, concluded by Nestor's boast "so they glorified Nestor
among men." Nestor immediately returns to Achilleus: "but Achilleus will enjoy his valor all alone, when all the Greeks are dead."
This leads Nestor into another hypomnetic story, the story of the
recruiting mission undertaken by Nestor and Odysseus when Menoitios had sent his son to join the expedition with the command to be
a wise counsellor to Achilleus. Nestor concludes this story with a
direct exhortation to Patroklos to persuade Achilleus to enter the
battle again or to allow Patroklos to enter as his substitute. Beneath
Nestor's vaunts on his own exploits he is giving an oblique diatribe
on honor, how to achieve it and how to enjoy it. What might seem to
be a hybristic boast is in reality a stern warning to Achilleus and an
contests says that he does so because Nestor is past the age of contests (23.618-23), but this is
the only occasion when Nestor cannot compete and show his prowess. In the War itself
Nestor as counsellor is always an active participant. We are expressly reminded of his
preeminence at 11.624-5 when we are told that the Greeks had given the girl Hekamede
to him as recognition that he was the best of them all in counsel.
12 Bowra, op.cit. (supra n.4) 86, writes that "the only point is that Nestor is not the man
he once was, and that Peleus behaved better than his son."
13 Schadewaldt, op.cit (supra n.6) 74-94 has made a careful examination of the structure
of this speech, and has discussed the paradigmatic intent of its two anecdotes. See also
Willcock, op.cit (supra n.8).

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attempt to shame him into action while there is still a chance to win
glory.
Nestor's last paradigmatic story (23.62~50) may seem to have the
least hortatory necessity, but even here Nestor follows his usual
themes. His paradigm first proves that he is worthy of the honor
which Achilleus has shown him and then gives the present application: "I have proved myself in funeral contests; now it is for you to
compete and win in such contests." Again Nestor recalls his own
achievements as the standard against which the younger heroes
should measure themselves.
Nestor's constant claim is that he has lived a hero's life. Having
already proved his worth in heroic encounters, he sets his life before
the young heroes as paradigm. Now it is their turn to prove their
character.14 As paradigms, then, his stories are never told for their
antiquarian interest but because they are his most persuasive form of
rhetoric.
The digressions, whether drawn from distant myths or family
history or from the beginning of the Trojan War, are securely
anchored to the present by their pragmatic intent. They reflect a
pervasive need to justify an action in the present by an appeal to a
past precedent. They go, however, far beyond simple justification of
a present course of action. They are cogent examples of that mode of
thinking which, as van Groningen has remarked, uses the past
occurrence not merely as an edifying example but as the positive
proof of a present possibility.16
Though the paradigmatic elements of the longer digressions in the
Iliad have been noted since ancient times, it has not been sufficiently
noted that even the brief digressions, and indeed almost every
reference to the past, even those made by the poet as narrator, are
prompted by the same impulse to find paradigm in the past. As
historical clarification of the present they are often too allusive to be
satisfactory, so that we must conclude that they are not the product
14 Whitman, op.cit. (supra n.1) 166, discusses Nestor as the repository and guardian of
the heroic ideals, and Nestor's approval of Diomedes as his truest successor in the pursuit
of those ideals.
16 See B. A. van Groningen, In the Grip of the Past (Leiden 1953) 13, " ... an assertion which
formally holds good only for the past, actually acquires a general purport; to state that
something has not yet happened may also mean that it will never happen at all." The
ancestral reminiscences of Diomedes and Aineias ("What our fathers have done we can
also do") and the hypomnesis of prayers ("Since you helped me in the past you can do so
again") are examples of this principle.

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THE FUNCTION OF DIGRESSIONS IN THE ILIAD

of a mind which is interested in historical completeness. The past

intrudes into the present only when it can serve as paradigm.
In Book 1, for example, the poet's introduction of Kalchas is not an
overt paradigm, yet its purpose is surely paradigmatic; by citing past
precedent (Kalchas' seership which had brought the Greeks to Ilium)
it is a guarantee of the reliability of Kalchas' following speech. l6 In
the same book the paradigmatic use of the past pervades Agamemnon's retort to Kalchas and the colloquy between Agamemnon and
Achilleus. A single action in the past becomes indicative of a permanent ethos. Agamemnon reacts to Kalchas' divination by attacking
Kalchas' evil ethos (1O~9): "You have habitually given me bad
oracles (sc. a reference to the sacrifice ofIphigeneia?) and now you are
at your oracles again." Similarly, Achilleus reads Agamemnon's
single outrageous act as proof of a consistent ethos, with which he
contrasts his own ethos (163-9; 225-30): "You have always been a
coward who prefers to stay behind and expropriate other men's
prizes while I have always fought in the front ranks and have been
content with a small prize." This paradigmatic mode of reasoning is
fundamental to the quarrel between Agamemnon and Achilleus,
and an understanding of its cogent appeal for Homer's heroes will
help to explain Achilleus' adamant rejection of Agamemnon's offer
in Book 9. How can Agamemnon change now into an honorable
man when he is a man consistently lacking in honor and honesty?l7
Paradigmatic logic appears in the hypomnesis of prayers on four
occasions in Book 1 alone, three times with positive assertion (39-40,
394-406, 453-4), and once with negative when Hephaistos apologizes
to Hera for his helplessness (58~94): "I could not help you in the
past, so do not expect me to be able to help you now." In Book 3 the
past is constantly introduced as paradigm. We may note Hektor's
taunts of Paris, and the obvious examples in the Teichoscopeia when
Helen and Antenor measure the present against the past as they
identify the Greek heroes. In Helen's reminiscences the unhappy
present is so at odds with the promise of the past that Helen can
16 Bowra's explanation, op.dt (supra n.4) 2ff. for the introduction of Kalchas and Nestor
in Iliad I seems questionable. It is hard to believe that Nestor was any less familiar a figure
in the tradition than Agamemnon or Achilleus, and Kalchas is given the introduction
which is regularly given to seers to establish their credentials; cf Helenos at 6.76; Poulydamas at I8.249fT, Theoklymenos at Od. 15.222ff. The introduction of Chryses at 1.11-15
is analogous; it explains his right to approach Agamemnon and is a warning of the consequence of disregarding his request.
11 On this point see L. A. MacKay, The Wrath ofHttU!T (Toronto 1948) 116.

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305

scarcely believe that she and the blithe young girl she remembers in
Sparta are the same individual, and she is forced to exclaim (180), HIf
this ever happened."
The other digressions which delve into the background of the War
mostly form a complex of stories around Achilleus and are also told
as paradigm. The several allusions to Achilleus' raids on Eetion's
city, Thebe, serve first, as J. W. Zarker has shown, as exemplars of
the future doom of Troy, and secondly as exemplars to contrast the
former chivalry of Achilleus with his present intransigence. IS The
story of the recruiting mission at Phthia likewise recalls incidents
from Achilleus' past to serve as paradigmatic argument.
The reason for the scarcity and allusiveness of the references to the
immediate background of the Trojan War becomes more apparent
in the light of this Homeric attitude towards the past. Most of the
historical digressions are taken from sources outside the Trojan legend
because the Trojan War, being still in progress, offers only limited
opportunities for paradigm. Notopoulos has suggested that retrospection is one of the devices of the oral poet to fill in essential background and to insure continuity.19 This is truer of the Odyssey than
the Iliad, but in the Odyssey retrospection is the principal technique
of narrative and indeed one of the major themes of the poem. In the
Iliad, however, retrospection plays so little part, except when it can
yield a paradigm, that those events which logically belong to the first
years of the War are pushed into the present. It would be no structural problem to present the events of Books 2 through 7 in flashbacks,
but the Iliad, always anticipatory in outlook, eschews the flashback.
In the Iliad the heroes seem to have almost no past at all, unless the
past can provide not just information for its own sake but a persuasive argument for some present action or behavior. In the Odyssey.
where the heroes have only a past and virtually no present, the Trojan
War, now part of the past, becomes the major preoccupation of its
characters and a rich source of paradigm.
To explain the paradigmatic intention of the historical digressions
is insufficient in itself; we may still question their length and detail.
Nestor could say in a simple sentence, once and for all, HI fought with
18 J. w. Zarker, "King Eetion and Thebe as Symbols in the Iliad," CJ 61 (1965) 110-4.
See also Whitman, op.cit. (supra n.l) 189, 198.
18 J. A. Notopoulos, "Continuity and Interconnexion in Homeric Oral Composition,"
TAPA 82 (1951) 92.

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THE FUNCTION OF DIGRESSIONS IN THE ILIAD

the bravest heroes of the past and they used to follow my advice; so
you too should follow my advice." Why a long story to affirm this
every time Nestor speaks? We may find the paradigmatic intention
relevant but the manner of execution inopportune. It is just the
amount of detail, the discursiveness, which has made the digression
the subject of such controversy. The length of the anecdote, however,
is as relevant as its intent. The expansion of the anecdote is a form of
amplificatio, or what later Greek rhetoricians called avg'f}(1ts, a
heightening of the subject, and so itself a form of persuasion. 20
Homer may not have commanded a system of rhetoric as refined
and ordered as that of the Sophists, but in this respect his practice is
unequivocal. For it is a surprising fact in Homer that where the drama
is most intense the digressions are the longest and the details the
fullest. In paradigmatic digressions the length of the anecdote is in
direct proportion to the necessity for persuasion at the moment. The
more urgent the situation, the more expansive the speech and its
illustrative paradigm. The two longest digressions, the story of
Meleager in Book 9 and Nestor's story of the Pylians and Eleians in
Book 11, mark the two most desperate stages in the deteriorating
situation. The Greeks are helpless without Achilleus, and only the
persuasiveness of Phoinix and Nestor can prevent total catastrophe.
In these situations words are the only weapons left; the fighters cannot win without Achilleus, but their warrior skills are powerless to
bring Achilleus back into the War. Only the skills of the orator have
any chance of success. 21
It is a modem literary convention that the mode of expression proper to anxiety and desperation is incoherence. The opposite is often
On amplificatio see C. Kennedy, The Art of Persuasion in Greece (Princeton 1963), index
"amplification." Aristotle, Rhet. 1368a22ff, treats a;;~"1u,s and '7Tap&.8t"f" as two kinds
of logical proof, the one belonging to the sphere of epideictic rhetoric and the other to
that of deliberative rhetoric. E. M. Cope in his Commentary on 1368aZ6 (Cambridge 1877)
1.187, notes that this division makes no pretension to a scientific character, since "CX;;'''1UtS
is not a logical kind of argument at all, and the ... members of the division are not
coordinate." It is true that auxesis is not a mode of reasoning as paradigm is, but it is a
manner of presentation which, by the weight it brings to bear upon a subject, operates as a
rhetorical, i.e. a verbal, argument. Paradigm is a form of lOgic, while auxesis is a means to
increase the persuasiveness of the logic. Thus auxesis need not be restricted to encomiastic
rhetoric but can be effectively used in all branches.
11 As other moderns have denigrated Nestor, so J. A. Scott, "Phoenix in the Iliad," AJP
33 (1912) 75, is scornful of Phoinix, "as if that ineffectual and loquacious individual were
the proper person to present the cause of the despairing Creeks." A comparison of
Achilleus' reply to Odysseus with his reply to Phoinix will show at once which ambassador
was the more ineffectual.
110

S.l'.

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307

true for Homer's heroes. Like the proverbial drowning man, faced
with catastrophe they are gifted with total recall and the rhetoric to
support that recall. Coherence, lucidity, prolixity, expansive reminiscences couched in a more elaborate, even Pindaric rhetoric of ring-

composition, balance, antithesis-these can mark the moment of

despair or consternation in the Iliad as effectively as those stark silences
(as when Achilleus hears the news of Patroklos' death) which strike
us with such force. 22
Paradigmatic digressions, even though they may take us far into
the past, function in this respect just as the descriptions of objects or
the expansions of such stock oral themes as assembly, arming, sacrifice or battlefield encounters. The mere mention of an object often
has a dramatic force, and the expanded description of the object lends
an even greater emphasis. 23 Expansions are not ornaments but an
essential part of the drama.
That an expanded description of an arming scene or a scepter exalts
the character participating in the scene and emphasizes the dramatic
situation may be obvious, since the objects described also become
participants in the action. Every expanded description, however,
whether a genealogy or a myth of by-gone days, follows the same
principle. The oral poets of today may call these expansions ornaments, but their practice shows that they observe a careful propriety
in the use of such 'ornamentation'. There is a hierarchical procedure
in ornamentation; princes receive an amplification different in degree
and kind from that given to squires. There is a similar hierarchy in
the use of expansion to depict dramatic situations. 24
Thus we must recognize that behind the apparent parataxis of
Homeric style is a scrupulous dramatic sense which calls attention to
I I Since the stories in the digressions are highly compressed and their construction
complex, their leisurely style of narrative is deceptive. Their apparent lucidity hides much
confusion and ellipse. On the 'Pindaric' construction of Nestor's speech in Book 11 see
Schadewaldt, op.cit. (supra n.6) 84.
23 F. M. Combellack, "Speakers and Scepters in Homer," C] 43 (1948) 209-17, has shown
that the scepter is always mentioned to indicate the importance of the speech. This is
another device, like the poet's introduction of a character, to enhance the authority of the
speaker. On the dramatic importance of the scepter see also Whitman op.cit. (supra n.1)

160-1.

., See Lord, op.cit (supra n.1) 88ff, for his discussion of ' ornamental' themes in oral poetry;
also his article, "Composition by Theme in Homer and Southslavic Epos," TAPA 82
(1951) 71-80, for the sense of propriety which oral singers maintain in their use of ornamentation. G. M. Calhoun, "Homeric Repetitions," CPCP 12.1 (1933) 1-26, has shown a
fine appreciation of the dramatic significance of thematic amplification.
l-G.ll.B.S.

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THE FUNCTION OF DIGRESSIONS IN THE ILIAD

a particular situation or person by the multiplicity of peripheral

details. There is in Homer a principle which might be called one of
oblique concentration. To praise Achilleus Homer describes his shield.
No expansion of a stock theme is given for its own sake, nor is any
story told for its own charm. Elaboration, whether of a scene in the
present or of a story from Nestor's past, is a sign of crisis. Homer has
too often been considered the exemplar of the clear assertion, the
unambiguous statement. There is a certain direct simplicity in the
narrative which hides the obliquity of the style, the style which marks
the important by evading the explicit statement and glances instead
on all the circumferential details.
The effect of this style is to put time into slow motion and to
create a ritual out of the moment. A. B. Lord has suggested that the
elaboration of certain oral themes may have a significance deriving
from ritual. 25 He is referring particularly to those themes of arming
and preparation which are greatly amplified when the hero of the
poem is about to go to an important encounter. But the arming
themes should not be treated as distinct from the other kinds of oral
themes. All are subject to expansion and for the same dramatic
reason. Though the Homeric poems may derive from mythic sources,
the drama is what is important in Homer rather than mythic rites
of initiation or sacrifice. It is not the survival of an ancient ritual which
dictates the degree of elaboration of an oral theme but the dramatic
sense which determines the need for ritual. Homer creates ritual by
amplification whenever the moment is significant. Thus Helen's conversation with Priam in the Teichoscopeia becomes a ritual as much as
the arming of Patroklos or Achilleus. Ritual in Homer is ancillary to
the drama.
We can see this kind of ritualizing in the description of important
scenes of propitiation. The careful description of the mundane details
of Odysseus' embassy to Chryses is the dramatic representation of the
importance of the mission. The act of propitiation is not merely the
return of Chryseis and the sacrifice but the total ceremony, the whole

11\ Lord, op.cit (supra n.l) 88ff. Lord agrees of course (p.9l) that the arming theme in
oral poetry has its artistic as well as 'ritualistic' Significance. H. Fraenkel, "Die Zeitauffassung in der frilhgriechischen Literatur," Wege und Formen fruhgriechischm Denkens (Mi.inchen
1960) 4ff. says that the sacrifice is described in detail because it is a religious ritual. The
stress. he claims, is on the spiritual replenishment rather than on the physical act of eating.

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day's celebration. 26 In the reconciliation scene between Priam and

Achilleus there is the same attention to practical details, the same
ritualizing of ordinary activity and for the same reason. This too is a
scene of propitiation in which the chances of success remain to the

end precarious. This is not an ordinary dinner, but a ceremony in

which Priam and Achilleus are officiants. Again the narrative moves
slowly to make us experience the ritual, but, more important, the
emotional maelstrom which necessitates such elaborate ritual.
Thetis' visit to Hephaistos to obtain arms for Achilleus shows a
similar ritualized intensity (lS.369ff). All the preliminaries are related
at length: Charis' welcome of Thetis, Charis' appeal to Hephaistos to
receive Thetis graciously, the description of the workshop with its
wheeled tripods and golden automaton handmaidens, Hephaistos'
speech of welcome which includes the hypomnetic story of how
Thetis had saved him when Hera had thrown him from Olympos,
then Thetis' appeal for arms, Hephaistos' promise to provide them,
and finally the making of the arms. The social amenities are played
out at length, and their elaborate execution is Homer's stylized form
of emphasis. When we hear the exchanges between Thetis, Charis
and Hephaistos-a total of five speeches repeating the themes of
hospitality and past indebtedness and slowly advancing to the present
need-we know that the arms must be extraordinary to require such
ceremony and the need for them will be proportionately extraordinary.
Bassett has called the Shield an epic hyporcheme inserted as an
interlude between two outbursts of passion. 27 In spite of its pastoral
tone, however, it is not comparable to the lyric interludes of tragedy,
for it is an integral part of the scene in Hephaistos' workshop, a scene
which can hardly be called an interlude. As the reason for, and the
climax of, that scene it receives the same kind of elaboration as the
rest of the scene but in even greater detail. Where the lyric choruses
of tragedy telescope our vision to place the specific in its proper relation to the general, the Shield, like the other expansions in Homer, is
a microscope to focus more intently on the minutest details of the
specific. Though the field of both instruments may be equally varied,
18 Note vv.472-4: "Throughout the day the sons of the Achaians continued to propitiate
the god as they sang a beautiful paean." Calhoun, op.cit. (supra n.24) 16-7, has discussed the
dramatic force of the expansion of this episode.
27 Bassett, op.cit. (supra n.1) 98.

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THE FUNCTION OF DIGRESSIONS IN THE ILIAD

the one is cosmoramic while the other is panoramic; the difference

in perspective is essential.
The ritualized character of these three scenes, all of a supplicatory
nature, is obvious. The scenes are not themselves digressions, but
two of the three contain paradigmatic digressions (even Odysseus'
embassy scene contains its paradigmatic element in the hypomnesis
of Chryses' prayer), and the digressions become elements in the ritual
and so subject to the same ritualizing description. It is worth noting
that the scenes which include the longest digressions are supplicatory
and give great attention to details of hospitality. Hospitality is stressed
in the Nestoris in Book 11, but it is particularly important in the
embassy scene in Book 9. As in other important supplicatory scenes
there is not the slightest indication of haste, but an unhurried observance of all the traditional courtesies. There is something of the
Oriental habit which marks an important meeting by an extravagant
display of the gestures of hospitality while postponing for as long as
possible any mention of the topic which is uppermost in the minds of
all participants.
A failure to appreciate the fact that the degree of expansion in a
digression into the past is dictated by a sense of urgency in the speaker's
mind or is an expression of the dramatic tension of the moment has
led to a misunderstanding of Homeric style. Homer is not indiscriminate or compulsive about detail. He is quite able to contain
himself; both the Iliad and the Odyssey bear ample testimony to his
ability to release background information sparingly, sometimes too
sparingly for our curiosity, through the course of an extended narrative. The Homeric poems are not nearly as exhaustive historical
source books as they might seem.
Since the digressions always have reference to something beyond
themselves, we must look behind them for their real but implicit
subject. The digression on Odysseus' scar, for example, is not really
on the scar at all. The scar is but the vehicle for the explication of the
real subject, which is the name and identity of Odysseus. 28 Even this
digression into the past has a pronounced paradigmatic tone, although the paradigm is a highly sophisticated one and more indirect
than similar digressions in the Iliad. The whole story is virtually
28 G. Dimock, "The Name of Odysseus," Hudson Review 9 (1956) 52-70, in his understanding of the purpose of this scene to define further the character of Odysseus through his
name, shows his appreciation of the paradigmatic and dramatic reason for the digression.

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Eurykleia's remembrance of Odysseus. The details go beyond

Eurykleia's actual memory to mingle with what only Odysseus could
have known, but it is her character as nurse which dictates the nature
of the digression. She, the nurse who now sees the grown man, projects him back into his childhood and tries to integrate her perception
of the stranger with her knowledge of the youth. She is grappling
with two separate identities, that of the young Odysseus whom she
reared and that of the old and disreputable beggar before her. The
scar is what binds the two disparities together and ultimately her
assurance that this beggar is in fact Odysseus. The paradigmatic
nature of Eurykleia's recollection is very similar to that of Helen's
recollections of her own childhood in the Teichoscopeia.
Even the description of Odysseus' boar's tusk helmet in Iliad 10
has paradigmatic relevance. The helmet is not merely a curiosity
fossilized in the poet's repertoire. Its circuitous line of descent is
significant. Autolykos had gained it by devious means, and now his
grandson, borrowing what the father had stolen, will use it for devious
purposes. Thetis and Hephaistos show us a more civilized way to
obtain arms befitting the heroic use to which the arms will be put.
Then the physical appearance of the helmet has dramatic significance.
The helmet contrasts with the plumes and glitter of heroic arms. The
desperate situation here calls not for heroic gestures but for nocturnal
skulduggery. The boar's tusk helmet in its history and its appearance
thus reflects the urgency of the crisis and the character of its wearer,
who can adapt himself to non-heroic behavior when heroic strategies
prove futile. 29
Auerbach rightly rejects the theory of retardation to account for the
digressions but is wrong to dismiss any dramatic intention in them. so
The digressions do not create suspense in the modern sense but they
do occur at dramatic moments. The Homeric compulsion to bring
everything into the foreground operates most conspicuously at the
high points of the drama. The digressions are not, then, a release from
tension but a concentration of tension.
We are familiar with elaboration as a technique of dramatic
29 The amplificatory and paradigmatic purpose of the genealogies given by heroes before
engaging in battle has also been frequently misunderstood. If. as Bowra claims. op.cit.
(supra nA) 75, the genealogies were included to satisfy the demands of Homer's audiences
for accounts of their own lineage, we might reasonably expect to learn more about Menelaos, Odysseus and Aias, and less about Andromache and Briseis.
30 Auerbach. op.cit. (supra n.2).

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THE FUNCTION OF DIGRESSIONS IN THE ILIAD

emphasis, but our modern tastes are not accustomed to the use of
digressions into the past in this same way. If we criticize the incongruity of Nestor's long reminiscence in Book 11 when Patroklos is in
too much of a hurry even to sit down, we betray the difficulty we
have in freeing ourselves from our conception of the purpose of a
digression. Nestor's anecdote is long precisely because the situation is
desperate. Nestor's prolixity is prompted by the same urgency which
will not allow Patroklos to sit down. It is the same dramatic urgency
which manifests itself in the slow methodical gathering of the leaders
in Book 10, the same urgency which prompts the leisurely hospitable
exchanges between Thetis and Hephaistos in Book 18. In the Iliad
urgency always gives rise to rhetoric whether by the poet or by one of
the dramatis personae.
It is our differing sense of the proper means to depict dramatic
urgency which has led us to reject Homeric digressions as interpolations or, at best, moments of weakness in a great poet, as evidence of
slight loss of control. Yet the digressions occur where the dramatic
and psychological concentration is the most intense. Had he thought
about it in critical terms, Homer would perhaps have considered his
digressions as his most forceful passages. 31 Nestor, that primitive
rhetorician, though not a fighter, is still one of the effective leaders in
the Iliad. The digressions are but one kind of dramatic amplification,
the relevance of which to the whole poem lies first in their rhetorical
argument and secondly in their weight of detail. We think of the
digression as a device to introduce new information, or to show passing
of time, or to create suspense by diversionary tactics at critical moments. The Iliadic digression runs in a completely contrary direction.
It is little interested in adding information, it is not a narrative trick
to gloss over a time lapse, and it is not a diversion of attention. It
brings time to a complete standstill and locks our attention unremittingly on the celebration of the present moment.
UNIVERSITY OF CALIFORNIA, U'>S ANGELES

October, 1966
11 Kirk, op.dt. (supra n.4) 163ff, seems to echo what is a common modern prejudice when
he rates the succinct narrative of the first books of the Homeric poems as superior to the
diffuse narrative of the later books.