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Book Ten
418*20 According to Leaf OCTCTOU [xsv Tpcocov m/pds eaxapoa is equivalent
to Ecpeorioi ocraoi eacn at 2.125, i.e. true Trojans as opposed to allies, eaxocpai
is not a natural word for watchfires, but cf. 8.562-3 Trap 8s 8K&OTCO (m/pi)
I f|aTO 7T6VTT)KOVTa3 to which it is tempting to refer this obscure expression.
The [lev is answered by dnr&p in 420, the 8' of 419 being apodotic.
419 iypriyopOacji, cf. 67n., a notorious monstrum. Such forms arise from
false analogies and would usually be rejected by vernacular dialects; within
the Kunstsprache, however, such misbegotten formations could find acceptance
as poeticisms, cf. 12.43m. (eppd5onro). For a '6-perfect' cf. (3e(3pcb0ois
(4.35) and such forms as Pe(3pi6a and yeyr|6a; see also Wyatt, ML in.
cpuAacrcreuEvai: see 9.257^ The use of the -nevai form here is doubtless
brought about by the previous occurrences of the same word at 312 and
399-
420 TTOAUKAT|TOI: the Trojan allies are 'summoned from many places'.
The same epithet occurs as a predicate at 4.438 (see n.). There is an aural
similarity to other epithets of the allies, e.g. (TnAs-) KAEITOI (v.l. TnAsKAr|TOi),
for which the poet used TTOAUKAT|TOI as a metrical variant.
422 The point appears to be that, though their allies may enjoy a carefree
sleep, the Trojans have everything at stake and therefore will keep a
good watch. The wives and children of losers are, of course, the victors'
prize of war, a bait held out before his men by Nestor (2.354-6) and feared
by Hektor (6.448-63). As the staple of eve-of-action rhetoric (cf. Thuc.
5.69), the thought of hearth and home naturally heartens the Trojans
(15.494-9) and could even encourage the Achaeans (15.662-6).
428-31 The Trojan order of battle extends from a point 'on the side
towards the sea' (Trpos with genitive, cf. vf|aoiai Trpos "HAt8os at Od.
21.347), presumably the Hellespont, to a point 'on the side towards
Thumbre'. Thumbre, or rather the temple of Thymbraean Apollo, was
known to the epic tradition from the stories of the deaths of Troilos and
Akhilleus himself. Classical Thumbre was on the Skamandros 50 stades
from Ilium (Strabo 13.1.35). The Trojan dispositions therefore lie roughly
on a north-south line, as if the poet of this passage held the view of
those modern investigators (among whom Dorpfeld) that the Achaean
vocucjTCxOjiov lay at Besika Bay opposite Tenedos, on which see M. Korfmann
in M. J. Mellink (ed.), Troy and the Trojan War (Bryn Mawr 1986) 6-13, or
rather as Hestiaia of Alexandria Troas (apud Strabo 13.1.36) supposed, that
in heroic times the sea formed a bay extending southward between Sigeion
and Rhoiteion, so that the Achaean camp lay not to the north of Troy but
to the west. As part of her argument Hestiaia also held that Priam's Troy
was sited at the 'Village of the Ilians' 30 stades east of Hisarlik, so as to leave
space for the ships and battlefield. For the actual topography in prehistoric
times see G. Rapp and J. A. Gifford (edd.), Troy: the Archaeological Geography
195