by Peter Wright

Page 344, Line 16. hold. Tr. ‘eruxon’: rather ‘draw’.

Page 345, Line 38. i.e. rafters [made] of the pine-tree.

Page 346, Line 91. may stir. Tr. ‘erethedzeo’: I may stir up/arouse

Page 346, Line 97. the settle. Tr. ‘diphron’: rather a stool.

Page 347, Lines 109-14. A reminiscence of the belief, ascribed to primitive peoples, that just rule by their kings would assure the fertility of their lands, and bad rule impair it.

Page 347, Line 121. house-folk. Tr. ’dmoon’: house-slaves.

Page 347, Line 135. henchmen. Tr. 'kerukas': heralds; also among the ’demiourgoi’: cf, Note on Book xvii, lines 383-6.

Page 347, Line 154. The handmaids are called, literally ’kunas’: bitches; cf. line 372.

Page 350, Line 163. from no stone art thou. Possibly a reminiscence of the myth that, after the human race was destroyed in a flood, first clearly recorded by Pindar (Olympian Odes, no. 9, 42-57), on account of its sins, it was recreated by Deucalion (the Greek Adam as well as the Greek Noah) and his wife casting stones behind them which turned into men.

Page 350, Lines 172-8. Crete … Achaans … Eteo-Cretans ... Cydonians … Dorian folk three-folded … Pelasgian folk. Of the peoples here said to live in Crete, the Achaeans’ presence probably derived from the Mycenaean domination of Greece; the Eteo-Cretans (‘True Cretans’) and Pelasgians would belong to an earlier period of settlement; the Cydonians occupied the western end of the island: cf. Note on Book iii, 292; while the Dorians (only here mentioned in Homeric epic), whose communities were traditionally divided into three ‘tribes’, and whose language and culture later prevailed in the island, would have arrived there only following the legendary ‘Dorian invasion‘; two generations after the Trojan war, that overthrew the Mycenaean kingdoms of Southern Greece.

Page 350, Lines 179-84. Minos … Deucalion … Idomeneus. Odysseus, having in his previous tales, placed his ’alter ego’ in Crete and presented himself as a well-born, if once illegitimate, warrior, has now promoted his fictitious self to being a younger brother of the reigning king of the dynasty of Minos, son of Zeus and Europa. For the descent, see also Iliad, Book XIII, 451-4. The Greek of line 179 is usually rendered as saying that Minos was a companion (speech-friend: ’oaristes’) of Zeus for (or every) nine years. Morris’s version that Minos ruled ‘from nine years old’ may derive from that in Butcher & Lang’s  Odyssey translation, that Minos ‘when he was nine years old began to rule

Page 351, Lines 187-8. Malea … Amnisus ... Eleithyia’s den. Amnisus on the north coast of Crete, served as the port for its royal seat at Cnossos (Cnossus).

Eileithyia (‘She who has come’) was a minor goddess who assisted women in childbirth; cf. Iliad, Books XVI, line 187-8; XIX, 103-4. Cretan caves were often sacred: hers, which has been found near Amnisus, contained stalagmites, one, in human shape probably recognized as her image, and received pottery offerings from the Minoan period: Burkert, Greek Religion, 24-6.

For Malea, see Note on Book iii, line 287.

Page 352, Line 242. a long-skirt gaberdine. Tr. ‘termioenta chitona’: a tunic reaching to the ground.

Page 356, Line 339. the long ship of the oar. In Greek it is probably the oars which are long.

Page 356, Line 341. streaked. Straiked. cf. line 599.

Page 357, Line 383. carline. Morris’s frequent word for an old woman, derived from ‘carle’: man

Page 358, Lines 392-490. The insertion at length of the tale of the origin of Odysseus’ scar within an exciting moment of the story was taken by Erich Auerbach, in the first chapter of his Mimesis, as an example of the method of narrative in ancient epic.

Page 358, Lines 393-398. Autolycus  ... Parnassus. Autolycis, supposed son of Hermes, inherited his parent’s skill in theft and trickery: hence Shakespeare borrowed his name for his thief and pedlar in ‘The Winter’s Tale’.

Parnassus is the great mountain above Delphi.

Page 358, Line 409. let him be called Odysseus. The hero’s name was assumed to be derived from a verb, odussomai’: extant only in certain tenses, meaning to be grieved or wrathful.

Page 359, Line 416. Morris has left out the grandmother’s name, Amphithea.

Page 361, Line 473. his chin. Really his beard (’geneios’).

Page 362, Lines 518-23. Pandareus’ daughter … Itylus ... Zethus the king. Pandareus, for stealing a dog made of gold as a plaything for the infant Zeus, was punished with death, probably by being turned to stone.

One of his daughters, married to Zethus, brother of the Theban king Amphion (cf. Note to Book xi, lines 260-5) being jealous of Amphion’s wife Niobe having twelve children when she herself had only one, tried to kill one of Niobe’s sons in their beds, but by mistake, (like giant’s wives in some folk tales), stabbed her own son Itylus instead. Her prolonged grief led Zeus to turn her into the nightingale which bears her name, ’Aedon’, whose song still continues her mourning.

Page 364, Lines 563-5. the wood beast’s tooth ... Ivory. The deceptiveness of dreams that come through the ’ivory gate’, seems, despite the preciousness of its material, ‘elephas’, to be derived from a pun: the word ‘elephairomai’, means ‘I cheat with empty hopes‘.   The Greek word for horn, ‘keras’, may similarly be associated with a verb, ‘kerannumi’, concerned with blending and tempering.

This passage may be near the beginning of the ancient systems for classifying dreams, which descended into the Middle Ages: E.R. Dodds, The Greeks and the Irrational (California U.P., 1963), Ch. IV; A.C. Spearing, Medieval Dream-Poetry (Cambridge U.P. 1976), pp. 9-11.

Page 364, Lines 573-578. the game of the axes. It seems to be still uncertain how the arrow was to be shot through the twelve axe heads, apparently planted in the ground (cf. Book xxi, lines 119-221). One suggestion, reported in The Odyssey, tr. W. Shewring (Oxford U.P. 1980), p. 264, and used in the 18^th century versions of Pope and Cowper, is that the axes had rings, for hanging,  attached to their heads or handles, through which the shaft could pass in succession.