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Formulas
expression in words and phrases that would naturally fall in the same place.
If the diction is kept one expression must be displaced by the other into an
unexpected position: OOTO KpaTEpf^s uauivris by OCTCTE 9aeivcb, 16.645; T °SE
uaKpdv 6EA6cop by EKTETEAEOTOCI, Od. 23.54; irapa T&9pov opvKTTjv by TEIXEOS
IKTOS, 9.67, 20.49. The results are not the most elegant of verses (see also
§xv). A complicated example is OCTCTE KEAaivf] vu£ EKdAuvyE (5.310 = 11.356):
both 6 EpE(3Evvfi vu£ EKdAuyE (3X ).
The relation between metrical units and sense units is complex and,
except in the case of enjambment, 11 has not been exhaustively explored.
The cola of the verse may not define the syntactical units of the sentence,
but syntactical units often coincide with cola. For present purposes it should
be noted that the cola in the second half of the verse are frequently merged
or their separation reduced to mere word-division: £piy8ouTros TTOCTIS "Hprjs,
ITTECC TTTEpoEVTa TrpooT|u5a. However, should the division of the cola coincide
with the bucolic diaeresis, the handling of diction may be strongly
affected. A phrase may terminate, or be continued to verse-end: obx^now
6' dvd Scoua Aios OEOI (oupavicovEs), 'AxpEiSris 6' dv' ouiAov E901TOC (Or|pi
EOIKCOS). Epithets that fall between the caesura and the diaeresis are commonly
generic and may not be juxtaposed with their noun: 8oupiKAuTos,
AEUKCOAEVOS, Ait 91A0S; but noun-epithet formulas that fall between the
middle of the fourth foot and the verse-end regularly have special epithets:
TroAO|ir|Tis 'O8uc7(7£us, etc.
(iii) Phrase patterns
Localization of single words, it is evident a posteriori, is a resource whose
potential is soon overtaken by more immediately useful linguistic habits.
Words are not used alone but in phrases and sentences. Provided that
phrases - any phrases, whether wholly new or wholly ossified - fall into an
appropriate rhythm, they slip into place in the hexameter in the same way
as a single word of the same shape.
Phrases have their internal patterns. In Iliad 1.1 the patronymic
TTr|Ar|id5EGO + 'AxiAfps with single -A- has a congener in AotEpTidSECO
'OSuo-qos with -CT-; in 1.2 the phrase dAyE* EOT|KE (which actually recurs at
22.422) is one out of many 'object — u + verb u —x' phrases, e.g. in
Agamemnon's aristeia (n.91-263) f]Top dTrnupcc, 9T|y6v IKOVTO, UOOOV
Evio"TT£s, Aaov dvcoxOi, TioAAd 6 s E8COKE, XIAI' UTTECTTT|.
Such patterns in the shaping of phrases are formular in the sense of being
11 For enjambment see the monograph of Higbie, Measure and Music. She discusses competi-
tion for localization on pp. 173-80.