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Book Eleven
8.3.7, an d for modern discussion HSL Catalogue 82-90 and S. R. West on
Od. 3.46°. Strabo, who argued for the northern Pulos, noted the former
existence of a Messenian Pulos under Mt Aigaleon (8.4.1). Triphylia was
once the country of the Kaukones {Od. 3.366), who, however, do not enter
Nestor's narrative.
The Olenian Rock and the Hill of Alesion are listed in the Catalogue
(2.615-17) but their location is unknown. Bouprasion, however, whether
town or region (see 756- 711.) lies in north-western Elis well to the north of
the Alpheios. Its mention here introduces a single note of incoherence into
an otherwise remarkably plausible narrative.
The story clearly belongs to the same cycle as 7.132-57 (how Nestor
slew the Goliath Ereuthalion, UTJKIOTOV KOC! K&pTiorov av8pcc) and 23.629-
42 (how Nestor carried off prizes at the funeral games of the Epean
Amarunkeus). The existence of a corpus of Pylian heroic poetry would go
some way, as Bolte argues, towards explaining the prominence of Nestor
in the Iliad. As examples of pure heroic poetry celebrating what could
well be historical events these tales represent one extreme of the subject
matter of doi6f|, as the lightly heroized folktale of Bellerophon (6.152-95)
represents the other.
The ethos of the tale - raiding, battle, booty and its division - is like that
of the background to the Iliad itself and similar to that of Odysseus' raid on
the Kikones {Od. 9.39-61), and the stories told to Eumaios {Od. 14.199-
359), and Penelope {Od. 19.172-307). Those stories, however, interweave
the theme of dTaaOaAirj with that of heroic action, in contrast to the
triumphalism of Nestor's narrative. In both cases of course the theme is
suited to the context and purpose of the tale. The triumphant tone depends
on statements of fact, for Nestor tells his tale generally in the same manner
as the narrator of the Iliad. Like the poet he knows what the gods did
(714-15, 721, 753 - contrast Od. 12.389), and unlike speakers in the Iliad
he avoids subjective language except in the short passage (689-95) describing
the plight of the Pylians and the aggression of the Epeans, n.b. Traupoi,
EKCCKCOCTE, UTTEPT^OCVEOVTES, 0|3pi£ovT£s, dTdaOaAa.
670 = 7.157, 23.629, Od. 14.468, cf. also 4.313, all in the Iliad spoken by
or with reference to Nestor.
671-707 The background to Nestor's exploit. bT (at 671) come close
to recognizing the principle of ring-composition: the poet states the main
facts (671-689), then goes back to the causes (690-702). He then returns
at 703-7 to the Pylian booty.
671 'HAeioicji: the country, T HAis, is mentioned at 2.615 and 5X in
the Odyssey, but this is the only point in the Iliad where this tribe (the
FOCAETOI in their own dialect) is mentioned. The epic consistently ignores
the digamma, see 686n. In the epic the inhabitants of the north-western