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Book Eleven
B. Schweitzer (Stuttgart 1954) 11-12), see also Webster, Mycenae to Homer 33,
112, A. Heubeck, Die homerische Frage (Darmstadt 1974) 222; and four
handles are represented on Linear B ideograms depicting a vessel called
di-pa, discussed by Ventris and Chad wick, Documents 326-7. The 80co TTUO-
[xeves may refer to a double or false bottom as found in many household
pots from Crete (so Webster, op. cit. 112), but are usually taken either as
'supports' to the handles as in the cup from Mycenae, or as legs, cf. 18.375,
where TruO|jf|v denotes the leg of a tripod. The Ischia skyphos (e.g. L. H.
Jeffery, The Local Scripts of Archaic Greece (Oxford 1961) 235, pi. 47), though
describing itself as 'Nestor's', sheds no light on the shape of the Homeric
cup. Aristarchus (ex A) was much exercised by this vessel, explaining the
TTUOUEVES as oux 8T6pov e£ 6T8pou dAA' SKOCTepcoOev and the handles as arranged
in pairs on opposite sides, a convenient setting for lifting and drinking.
Special cups appear also at 16.225-8 (Akhilleus) and 24.234-5 (Priam),
where the introduction of such treasures serves to mark the gravity or
solemnity of the moment. The elaborate description, like the anecdote of
Pandaros' bow (4.105-11), could as easily be understood to imply that the
cup is invented for this episode as that it was a well-known object {contra
Kullmann, Quellen 257).
633 xP uo " g i° l S f|Aoiai TTETrapiJiEvov (= 1.246, where the phrase is applied
to Akhilleus' staff): gold rivets signify a luxurious object, but not so luxurious
as the gold cups wielded by gods (4.3, 24.101) or favoured mortals
(6.220, 23.196, 24.285, and 5X Od.).
635 VEUSOOVTO, 'were feeding', is hapax legomenon like the noun vspios (480),
from which it is evidently derived by means of the -eO- suffix on the pattern
e.g. of 90COS > 9ae0GO.
636-7 In spite of the excitements of books 12-13 Nestor is still drinking at
14.1. The strength of the ancient hero's elbow is surprising. Schol. (Arn/A)
sensibly takes it as a conventional compliment, TOUTO TOOV eiraivcov Aeyo-
H6VCOV Neoropos eori, which is better than Leaf's suggestion that 637 is
intrusive from 24.456. The motif 'only X could do something' is applied,
more reasonably, to Akhilleus' equipment, his horses (10.404 etc.), his spear
(19.389), and his door-bar (24.456). It is more understandable that a hero
should have a cup reserved for his sole use, as does Akhilleus at 16.225.
638-41 This interesting potage has long attracted puzzlement and censure,
cf. Plato, Rep. 405E (9Aey|iOCTcb8r|S, so also Porphyry 1.167.11), 'stimulating
porridge' (Leaf). But it is not an aberration; the Odyssey knows the
same concoction {Od. 10.234-5), c ^- frumenty or furmity, 'a mixture of corn
in the grain, flour, milk, raisins, currants, and what not' to which alcohol
was added for a consideration (Hardy, The Mayor of Casterbridge, ch. 1).
KUKECOV was also the designation of the sacred potion drunk by the initiates
at Eleusis, see Richardson, The Homeric Hymn to Demeter (Oxford 1974)
293