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Book Nine
(19.42-5) supernumeraries as well as fighting men. At 17, 'Apysicov f)yf|-
Topes f)5e ueSovTes, Agamemnon ignores the Accos, but that is not unparalleled,
cf. Od. 8.26 (Alkinoos to the Phaeacian assembly). The formula for
addressing the rank and file is cb 91A01, f|pco£s Accvaoi, Oep&irovTes "Apr|os
(4X) (cf. i7n.). auTos ... TTOVEITO reflects Agamemnon's anxiety, as at
10.69-70. — There are four dyopd-scenes on the Achaean side in the Iliad,
in books 1, 2, 9, and 19, discussed by Lohmann, Reden 214-27, who argues
for a direct relation between them. It is assumed here that the relation is
indirect, the poet having a pattern for such scenes which gives rise to the
parallels in content and structure (cf. 12.61-79^).
13-31 The scene is set with some repeated verses: 14-15 = 16.3-4,
16 = the first hemistich of 18.323 + the second of 2.109, 18—25 = 2.111 —18,
26-8 = 2.139-41, 29-31 = 9.693 + 695-6. As is usually the case in such
passages there was omission and athetesis ev£Ka TOU KOCT' OCAAOUS TOTTOUS
cpepecrOai. Zenodotus (Arn/A) read laexd 6' 'Apyeioiciiv Eeiirev for the second
hemistich of 14 and omitted the simile 14-15 and 23-5; 23-5 were also
athetized by Aristophanes (Did/A) and Aristarchus (Arn/A), as being better
at 2.116-18. For 26-31 Zenodotus read TJTOI 6 y' cos ebrcbv KOCT' ap' !£ETO
Ouuov &XSUCOV I Tolai 6' avio-Tccuevos ueTEcpri Kporrepos Aiour)8ns. Zenodotus
normally sought a shorter text and was reputedly severe on repeated passages
(TOIOUTOS EOTIV ETTI Tcov 6i9opouuEvcov (Arn/A on 23-5). Omission by
Zenodotus followed by a more cautious athetesis on the part of Aristophanes
and Aristarchus is a common pattern; nineteen instances in the Iliad are
listed by Ap thorp, MS Evidence 80.
14-15 These verses (simile of the fountain in the rock) = 16.3-4 (°f
Patroklos). Aristarchus countered Zenodotus' omission of the simile here
with the argument that the simile was necessary for the amplification
(au£nc7is) of Agamemnon's grief. (Aristarchus identified two functions of
similes, au^ncris and iijupacns, 'graphic effect', e.g. 11.297-8.) Acute distress
at imminent disaster to the army causes floods of tears in both cases. No
other connexion between the passages is made explicit and it is hard to
imagine that an audience would make one, unless it were well trained in the
nuances of the epic style. For the concept of the 'experienced audience' (the
corollary of the 'well-rehearsed composer'), see M. M. Willcock, AJP 96
(1975) 107—10, and V. Leinieks, Class, et Med. 37 (1986) 5—20. For the
similar difficulty presented by Agamemnon's words at 18-28 see n. ad loc.
There is indeed a contrast between the tears of Agamemnon, who is concerned
for his reputation, and those of Patroklos, which express his distress
at others' sufferings, but that may do no more than illustrate the versatility
of the epic's traditional diction and the diverse uses to which it may be
put. — Agamemnon's tears are not unheroic in themselves, cf. bT to 1.349
ETOIUOV TO fjpcoiKov TTpos S&Kpua and Odysseus' tears at Od. 5.82-4, 8.86,
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