Wikiquote

Homer

reputed author of the Iliad and the Odyssey

Homer (Ancient Greek: Ὅμηρος) is best known as the author of the Iliad and the Odyssey. He was believed by the ancient Greeks to have been the first and greatest of the epic poets. Author of the first known literature of Europe, he is central to the Western canon.

For a friend with an understanding heart is worth no less than a brother.

Quotes

edit

Iliad (c. 750 BC)

edit
 
Μῆνιν ἄειδε, θεά, Πηληϊάδεω Ἀχιλῆος.

[Menin aeide, thea, Peleiadeo Achileos.]

Rage—Goddess, sing the rage of Peleus' son Achilles.
Main article: Iliad
Book I
  • Μῆνιν ἄειδε, θεά, Πηληϊάδεω Ἀχιλῆος
    οὐλομένην, ἣ μυρί᾽ Ἀχαιοῖς ἄλγε᾽ ἔθηκε,
    πολλὰς δ᾽ ἰφθίμους ψυχὰς Ἄϊδι προΐαψεν
    ἡρώων, αὐτοὺς δὲ ἑλώρια τεῦχε κύνεσσιν
    οἰωνοῖσί τε πᾶσι.
    • Rage—Goddess, sing the rage of Peleus' son Achilles,
      murderous, doomed, that cost the Achaeans countless losses,
      hurling down to the House of Death so many sturdy souls,
      great fighters' souls, but made their bodies carrion,
      feasts for the dogs and birds.
    • I. 1–5 (tr. Robert Fagles).
 
Διὸς δ’ ἐτελείετο βουλή.

[Dios d'eteleieto boule.]

The will of Zeus was accomplished.
  • Διὸς δ’ ἐτελείετο βουλή.
    • The will of Zeus was accomplished.
    • I. 5 (tr. Richmond Lattimore).
 
Παρὰ θῖνα πολυφλοίσβοιο θαλάσσης.

[Para thina polyphloisboio thalasses.]

Along the shore of the loud-roaring sea.
  • Παρὰ θῖνα πολυφλοίσβοιο θαλάσσης.
    • Along the shore of the loud-roaring sea.
    • I. 34.
    • Note: Ezra Pound referred to this Homeric phrase as a "magnificent onomatopoeia, as of the rush of the waves on the sea-beach and their recession", and described it as "untranslatable" (in Literary Essays, p. 250).
  • Καὶ γάρ τ' ὄναρ ἐκ Διός ἐστιν.
  • Ἔπεα πτερόεντα.
    • Winged words.
    • I. 201; Iliad and Odyssey, passim.
  • Ὅς κε θεοῖς ἐπιπείθηται μάλα τ' ἔκλυον αὐτοῦ.
    • If any man obeys the gods, they listen to him also.
    • I. 218 (tr. Richmond Lattimore).
  • Οἰνοβαρές, κυνὸς ὄμματ' ἔχων, κραδίην δ' ἐλάφοιο.
    • You wine sack, with a dog's eyes, with a deer's heart.
    • I. 225 (tr. Richmond Lattimore); Achilles to Agamemnon.
  • Τοῦ καὶ ἀπὸ γλώσσης μέλιτος γλυκίων ῥέεν αὐδή.
    • From whose lips the streams of words ran sweeter than honey.
    • I. 249 (tr. Richmond Lattimore); of Nestor.
  • Οὐδέ τι οἶδε νοῆσαι ἅμα πρόσσω καὶ ὀπίσσω.
    • He lacks the sense to see a day behind, a day ahead.
    • I. 343 (tr. Robert Fagles).
  • Ῥοδοδάκτυλος Ἠώς.
    • Rosy-fingered Dawn.
    • I. 477 (tr. Samuel Butler).
  • Ἦ καὶ κυανέῃσιν ἐπ' ὀφρύσι νεῦσε Κρονίων·
    ἀμβρόσιαι δ' ἄρα χαῖται ἐπεῤῥώσαντο ἄνακτος
    κρατὸς ἀπ' ἀθανάτοιο· μέγαν δ' ἐλέλιξεν Ὄλυμπον.
    • He spoke, the son of Kronos, and nodded his head with the dark brows,
      and the immortally anointed hair of the great god
      swept from his divine head, and all Olympos was shaken.
    • I. 528–530 (tr. Richmond Lattimore).
  • Ἄσβεστος δ' ἄρ' ἐνῶρτο γέλως μακάρεσσι θεοῖσιν
    ὡς ἴδον Ἥφαιστον διὰ δώματα ποιπνύοντα.
    • And uncontrollable laughter broke from the happy gods
      as they watched the god of fire breathing hard
      and bustling through the halls.
    • I. 599–600 (tr. Robert Fagles); whence the expression "Homeric laughter".
Book II
  • Οὐκ ἀγαθὸν πολυκοιρανίη· εἷς κοίρανος ἔστω,
    εἷς βασιλεύς.
    • Lordship for many is no good thing. Let there be one ruler,
      one king.
    • II. 204–205 (tr. R. Lattimore).
  • Μένεα πνείοντες.
    • Breathing fury.
    • II. 536 (tr. Robert Fagles).
Book III
 
Ah, no wonder the men of Troy and Argives under arms have suffered years of agony all for her, for such a woman. Beauty, terrible beauty!
  • Μή μοι δῶρ' ἐρατὰ πρόφερε χρυσέης Ἀφροδίτης·
    οὔ τοι ἀπόβλητ' ἐστὶ θεῶν ἐρικυδέα δῶρα
    ὅσσά κεν αὐτοὶ δῶσιν, ἑκὼν δ' οὐκ ἄν τις ἕλοιτο.
    • Yet do not bring up against me the sweet favours of golden Aphrodite.
      Never to be cast away are the gifts of the gods, magnificent,
      which they give of their own will, no man could have them for wanting them.
    • III. 64–66 (tr. Richmond Lattimore).
  • Αἰεὶ δ' ὁπλοτέρων ἀνδρῶν φρένες ἠερέθονται·
    οἷς δ' ὁ γέρων μετέῃσιν ἅμα πρόσσω καὶ ὀπίσσω
    λεύσσει, ὅπως ὄχ' ἄριστα μετ' ἀμφοτέροισι γένηται.
    • Always it is, that the hearts in the younger men are frivolous,
      but when an elder man is among them, he looks behind him
      and in front, so that all comes out far better for both sides.
    • III. 108–110 (tr. Richmond Lattimore).
  • Οὐ νέμεσις Τρῶας καὶ ἐϋκνήμιδας Ἀχαιοὺς
    τοιῇδ' ἀμφὶ γυναικὶ πολὺν χρόνον ἄλγεα πάσχειν·
    αἰνῶς ἀθανάτῃσι θεῇς εἰς ὦπα ἔοικεν.
    • Who on earth could blame them? Ah, no wonder
      the men of Troy and Argives under arms have suffered
      years of agony all for her, for such a woman.
      Beauty, terrible beauty!
      A deathless goddess—so she strikes our eyes!
    • III. 156–158 (tr. Robert Fagles); of Helen.
    • Richmond Lattimore's translation:
      Surely there is no blame on Trojans and strong-greaved Achaians
      if for long time they suffer hardship for a woman like this one.
      Terrible is the likeness of her face to immortal goddesses.
  • Ἀλλ' ὅτε δὴ ὄπα τε μεγάλην ἐκ στήθεος εἵη
    καὶ ἔπεα νιφάδεσσιν ἐοικότα χειμερίῃσιν,
    ἂν ἔπειτ' Ὀδυσῆΐ γ' ἐρίσσειε βροτὸς ἄλλος·
    οὐ τότε γ' ὧδ' Ὀδυσῆος ἀγασσάμεθ' εἶδος ἰδόντες.
    • But when he let loose that great voice from his chest
      and the words came piling on like a driving winter blizzard —
      then no man alive could rival Odysseus! Odysseus...
      we no longer gazed in wonder at his looks.
    • III. 221–224 (tr. Robert Fagles).
  • Ἠέλιός θ', ὃς πάντ' ἐφορᾷς καὶ πάντ' ἐπακούεις.
    • Helios, Sun above us, you who see all, hear all things!
    • III. 277 (tr. Robert Fagles).
Book IV
 
The day will come when sacred Troy must die.
  • Ἔσσεται ἦμαρ ὅτ' ἄν ποτ' ὀλώλῃ Ἴλιος ἱρὴ
    καὶ Πρίαμος καὶ λαὸς ἐϋμμελίω Πριάμοιο.
    • The day will come when sacred Troy must die,
      Priam must die and all his people with him,
      Priam who hurls the strong ash spear!
    • IV. 164–165 (tr. Robert Fagles); spoken by Agamemnon.
  • Τῷ μὲν κλέος, ἄμμι δὲ πένθος.
    • Glory to him, but to us a sorrow.
    • IV. 197 (tr. R. Lattimore).
  • Ἀλλ' οὔ πως ἅμα πάντα θεοὶ δόσαν ἀνθρώποισιν.
    • But the gods give to mortals not everything at the same time.
    • IV. 320 (tr. R. Lattimore).
  • Τὸν δ' ἄρ' ὑπόδρα ἰδὼν προσέφη πολύμητις Ὀδυσσεύς·
    Ἀτρεΐδη ποῖόν σε ἔπος φύγεν ἕρκος ὀδόντων.
    • Then looking at him darkly resourceful Odysseus spoke to him:
      "What is this word that broke through the fence of your teeth, Atreides?"
    • IV. 350–351 (tr. R. Lattimore).
  • Ἥ τ' ὀλίγη μὲν πρῶτα κορύσσεται, αὐτὰρ ἔπειτα
    οὐρανῷ ἐστήριξε κάρη καὶ ἐπὶ χθονὶ βαίνει.
    • She who is only a little thing at the first, but thereafter
      grows until she strides on the earth with her head striking heaven.
    • IV. 442–443 (tr. R. Lattimore).
Book V
  • Ὅττι μάλ' οὐ δηναιὸς ὃς ἀθανάτοισι μάχηται,
    οὐδέ τί μιν παῖδες ποτὶ γούνασι παππάζουσιν
    ἐκ πολέμοιο καὶ αἰνῆς δηϊοτῆτος.
    • No man who fights with gods will live long or hear his children prattling about his knees when he returns from battle.
    • V. 407–409 (tr. Samuel Butler).
 
Think not to match yourself against gods, for men that walk the earth cannot hold their own with the immortals.
  • Μηδὲ θεοῖσιν
    ἶσ' ἔθελε φρονέειν, ἐπεὶ οὔ ποτε φῦλον ὁμοῖον
    ἀθανάτων τε θεῶν χαμαὶ ἐρχομένων τ' ἀνθρώπων.
    • Think not to match yourself against gods, for men that walk the earth cannot hold their own with the immortals.
    • V. 440–442 (tr. Samuel Butler).
  • Τοίω τὼ χείρεσσιν ὑπ' Αἰνείαο δαμέντε
    καππεσέτην, ἐλάτῃσιν ἐοικότες ὑψηλῇσι.
    • So here the twins were laid low at Aeneas' hands,
      down they crashed like lofty pine trees axed.
    • V. 559–560 (tr. Robert Fagles).
  • Στέντορι εἰσαμένη μεγαλήτορι χαλκεοφώνῳ,
    ὃς τόσον αὐδήσασχ' ὅσον ἄλλοι πεντήκοντα.
    • In form of Stentor of the brazen voice,
      Whose shout was as the shout of fifty men.
    • V. 785–786 (tr. Lord Derby).
Book VI
  • Εἰ δέ τίς ἐσσι βροτῶν οἳ ἀρούρης καρπὸν ἔδουσιν,
    ἆσσον ἴθ' ὥς κεν θᾶσσον ὀλέθρου πείραθ' ἵκηαι.
    • But if you're a man who eats the crops of the earth,
      a mortal born for death—here, come closer,
      the sooner you will meet your day to die!
    • VI. 142–143 (tr. Robert Fagles).
 
As is the generation of leaves, so is that of humanity.
  • Οἵη περ φύλλων γενεὴ τοίη δὲ καὶ ἀνδρῶν.
    φύλλα τὰ μέν τ' ἄνεμος χαμάδις χέει, ἄλλα δέ θ' ὕλη
    τηλεθόωσα φύει, ἔαρος δ' ἐπιγίγνεται ὥρη·
    ὣς ἀνδρῶν γενεὴ ἣ μὲν φύει ἣ δ' ἀπολήγει.
    • As is the generation of leaves, so is that of humanity.
      The wind scatters the leaves on the ground, but the live timber
      Burgeons with leaves again in the season of spring returning.
      So one generation of men will grow while another dies.
    • VI. 146–149 (tr. R. Lattimore); Glaucus to Diomed.
    • Alexander Pope's translation:
      Like leaves on trees the race of man is found,
      Now green in youth, now withering on the ground:
      Another race the following spring supplies,
      They fall successive, and successive rise:
      So generations in their course decay;
      So flourish these, when those are past away.
 
Always be the best, my boy, the bravest, and hold your head up high above the others.
  • Αἰὲν ἀριστεύειν καὶ ὑπείροχον ἔμμεναι ἄλλων.
    • Now always be the best, my boy, the bravest,
      and hold your head up high above the others.
    • VI. 208 (tr. Robert Fagles).
  • Ὣς ἄρα φωνήσαντε καθ' ἵππων ἀΐξαντε
    χεῖράς τ' ἀλλήλων λαβέτην καὶ πιστώσαντο·
    ἔνθ' αὖτε Γλαύκῳ Κρονίδης φρένας ἐξέλετο Ζεύς,
    ὃς πρὸς Τυδεΐδην Διομήδεα τεύχε' ἄμειβε
    χρύσεα χαλκείων, ἑκατόμβοι' ἐννεαβοίων.
    • So they spoke, and both springing down from behind their horses
      gripped each other's hands and exchanged the promise of friendship;
      but Zeus the son of Kronos stole away the wits of Glaukos
      who exchanged with Diomedes the son of Tydeus armour
      of gold for bronze, for nine oxen's worth the worth of a hundred.
    • VI. 232–236 (tr. R. Lattimore).
  • Ἀνδρὶ δὲ κεκμηῶτι μένος μέγα οἶνος ἀέξει.
    • When a Man's exhausted, wine will build his strength.
    • VI. 261 (tr. Robert Fagles).
 
Victory passes back and forth between men.
  • Νίκη δ᾽ ἐπαμείβεται ἄνδρας.
    • Victory passes back and forth between men.
    • VI. 339 (tr. R. Lattimore); Paris contemplates the fickleness of victory as he prepares to go into battle.
  • Καί ποτέ τις εἴποι πατρός γ' ὅδε πολλὸν ἀμείνων.
    • And some day let them say of him:
      'He is better by far than his father.'
    • VI. 479 (tr. R. Lattimore).
 
Smiling through tears.
  • Δακρυόεν γελάσασα.
    • Smiling through tears.
    • VI. 484 (tr. Lord Derby); of Andromache.
  • Μοῖραν δ' οὔ τινά φημι πεφυγμένον ἔμμεναι ἀνδρῶν,
    οὐ κακὸν οὐδὲ μὲν ἐσθλόν, ἐπὴν τὰ πρῶτα γένηται.
    • And fate? No one alive has ever escaped it,
      neither brave man nor coward, I tell you—
      it's born with us the day that we are born.
    • VI. 488–489 (tr. Robert Fagles).
Book VII
  • Αἴδεσθεν μὲν ἀνήνασθαι, δεῖσαν δ' ὑποδέχθαι.
    • Ashamed to decline the challenge, yet fearing to accept it.
    • VII. 93 (tr. Samuel Butler).
  • Ἀλλ' ὑμεῖς μὲν πάντες ὕδωρ καὶ γαῖα γένοισθε
    ἥμενοι αὖθι ἕκαστοι ἀκήριοι ἀκλεὲς αὔτως.
    • May you be turned every man of you into earth and water as you sit spiritless and inglorious in your places.
    • VII. 99–100 (tr. Samuel Butler).
Book VIII
  • Μήκων δ' ὡς ἑτέρωσε κάρη βάλεν, ἥ τ' ἐνὶ κήπῳ
    καρπῷ βριθομένη νοτίῃσί τε εἰαρινῇσιν,
    ὣς ἑτέρωσ' ἤμυσε κάρη πήληκι βαρυνθέν.
    • He bent drooping his head to one side, as a garden poppy
      bends beneath the weight of its yield and the rains of springtime;
      so his head bent slack to one side beneath the helm's weight.
    • VIII. 306–308 (tr. R. Lattimore); the death of Gorgythion.
    • Alexander Pope's translation:
      As full-blown poppies, overcharged with rain,
      Decline the head, and drooping kiss the plain, —
      So sinks the youth; his beauteous head, depressed
      Beneath his helmet, drops upon his breast.
  • Ἐν δ' ἔπεσ' Ὠκεανῷ λαμπρὸν φάος ἠελίοιο
    ἕλκον νύκτα μέλαιναν ἐπὶ ζείδωρον ἄρουραν.
    • Now down in the Ocean sank the fiery light of day,
      drawing the dark night across the grain-giving earth.
    • VIII. 485–486 (tr. Robert Fagles).
 
As stars in the night sky glittering
round the moon's brilliance blaze in all their glory
when the air falls to a sudden, windless calm...
  • Ὡς δ' ὅτ' ἐν οὐρανῷ ἄστρα φαεινὴν ἀμφὶ σελήνην
    φαίνετ' ἀριπρεπέα, ὅτε τ' ἔπλετο νήνεμος αἰθήρ·
    ἔκ τ' ἔφανεν πᾶσαι σκοπιαὶ καὶ πρώονες ἄκροι
    καὶ νάπαι· οὐρανόθεν δ' ἄρ' ὑπεῤῥάγη ἄσπετος αἰθήρ,
    πάντα δὲ εἴδεται ἄστρα, γέγηθε δέ τε φρένα ποιμήν.
    • As stars in the night sky glittering
      round the moon's brilliance blaze in all their glory
      when the air falls to a sudden, windless calm...
      all the lookout peaks stand out and the jutting cliffs
      and the steep ravines and down from the high heavens bursts
      the boundless, bright air and all the stars shine clear
      and the shepherd's heart exults.
    • VIII. 551–555 (tr. Robert Fagles).
    • Alexander Pope's translation:
      As when the moon, refulgent lamp of night,
      O'er heaven's clear azure spreads her sacred light,
      When not a breath disturbs the deep serene,
      And not a cloud o'ercasts the solemn scene;
      Around her throne the vivid planets roll,
      And stars unnumbered gild the glowing pole,
      O'er the dark trees a yellower verdure shed,
      And tip with silver every mountain's head;
      Then shine the vales, the rocks in prospect rise,
      A flood of glory bursts from all the skies.
Book IX
 
Who dares think one thing, and another tell,
My heart detests him as the gates of hell.
  • Ἀφρήτωρ ἀθέμιστος ἀνέστιός ἐστιν ἐκεῖνος
    ὃς πολέμου ἔραται ἐπιδημίου ὀκρυόεντος.
    • Cursed is the man, and void of law and right,
      Unworthy property, unworthy light,
      Unfit for public rule, or private care,
      That wretch, that monster, that delights in war:
      Whose lust is murder, and whose horrid joy
      To tear his country, and his kind destroy!
    • IX. 63–64 (tr. Alexander Pope).
  • Ἐχθρὸς γάρ μοι κεῖνος ὁμῶς Ἀΐδαο πύλῃσιν
    ὅς χ' ἕτερον μὲν κεύθῃ ἐνὶ φρεσίν, ἄλλο δὲ εἴπῃ.
    • Who dares think one thing, and another tell,
      My heart detests him as the gates of hell.
    • IX. 312–313 (tr. Alexander Pope).
    • A. H. Chase and W. G. Perry, Jr.'s translation:
      Hateful to me as the gates of Hades is the man who hides one thing in his heart and speaks another.
  • Κάτθαν' ὁμῶς ὅ τ' ἀεργὸς ἀνὴρ ὅ τε πολλὰ ἐοργώς.
    • Alike the idlers and the active die.
    • IX. 320 (tr. Lord Derby).
  • Ἀνδρὸς δὲ ψυχὴ πάλιν ἐλθεῖν οὔτε λεϊστὴ
    οὔθ' ἑλετή, ἐπεὶ ἄρ κεν ἀμείψεται ἕρκος ὀδόντων.
    • But a man's life breath cannot come back again—
      no raiders in force, no trading brings it back,
      once it slips through a man's clenched teeth.
    • IX. 408–409 (tr. Robert Fagles).
 
Be both a speaker of words and a doer of deeds.
  • εἰ μέν κ᾽ αὖθι μένων Τρώων πόλιν ἀμφιμάχωμαι,
    ὤλετο μέν μοι νόστος, ἀτὰρ κλέος ἄφθιτον ἔσται.
    • If I hold out here and I lay siege to Troy,
      my journey home is gone, but my glory never dies.
    • IX. 412-413 (tr. Robert Fagles); spoken by Achilles.
  • Μύθων τε ῥητῆρ' ἔμεναι πρηκτῆρά τε ἔργων.
    • Be both a speaker of words and a doer of deeds.
    • IX. 443 (tr. Andrew Lang).
  • Καὶ γάρ τε λιταί εἰσι Διὸς κοῦραι μεγάλοιο
    χωλαί τε ῥυσαί τε παραβλῶπές τ' ὀφθαλμώ,
    αἵ ῥά τε καὶ μετόπισθ' ἄτης ἀλέγουσι κιοῦσαι.
    • Prayers are Jove's daughters, of celestial race,
      Lame are their feet, and wrinkled is their face;
      With humble mien, and with dejected eyes,
      Constant they follow where Injustice flies.
    • IX. 498–500 (tr. Alexander Pope).
Book X
  • Ἐπὶ ξυροῦ ἵσταται ἀκμῆς
    ...ὄλεθρος...Ἀχαιοῖς ἠὲ βιῶναι.
    • Life and death are balanced as it were on the edge of a razor.
    • X. 173–174 (tr. Samuel Butler).
Book XI
  • Ἰητρὸς γὰρ ἀνὴρ πολλῶν ἀντάξιος ἄλλων
    ἰούς τ' ἐκτάμνειν ἐπί τ' ἤπια φάρμακα πάσσειν.
    • A physician is worth more than several other men put together, for he can cut out arrows and spread healing herbs.
    • XI. 514–515 (tr. Samuel Butler).
Book XII
 
Bird-signs!
Fight for your country—that is the best, the only omen!
  • Εἷς οἰωνὸς ἄριστος ἀμύνεσθαι περὶ πάτρης.
    • Bird-signs!
      Fight for your country—that is the best, the only omen!
    • XII. 243 (tr. Robert Fagles).
 
Man, supposing you and I, escaping this battle, would be able to live on forever, ageless, immortal, so neither would I myself go on fighting in the foremost, nor would I urge you into the fighting where men win glory. But now, seeing that the spirits of death stand close about us in their thousands, no man can turn aside or escape them, let us go on and win glory for ourselves, or yield it to others.
  • Ὦ πέπον εἰ μὲν γὰρ πόλεμον περὶ τόνδε φυγόντε
    αἰεὶ δὴ μέλλοιμεν ἀγήρω τ' ἀθανάτω τε
    ἔσσεσθ', οὔτέ κεν αὐτὸς ἐνὶ πρώτοισι μαχοίμην
    οὔτέ κε σὲ στέλλοιμι μάχην ἐς κυδιάνειραν·
    νῦν δ' ἔμπης γὰρ κῆρες ἐφεστᾶσιν θανάτοιο
    μυρίαι, ἃς οὐκ ἔστι φυγεῖν βροτὸν οὐδ' ὑπαλύξαι,
    ἴομεν ἠέ τῳ εὖχος ὀρέξομεν ἠέ τις ἡμῖν.
    • Man, supposing you and I, escaping this battle,
      would be able to live on forever, ageless, immortal,
      so neither would I myself go on fighting in the foremost,
      nor would I urge you into the fighting where men win glory.
      But now, seeing that the spirits of death stand close about us
      in their thousands, no man can turn aside or escape them,
      let us go on and win glory for ourselves, or yield it to others.
    • XII. 322–328 (tr. R. Lattimore); Sarpedon to Glaukos.
Book XIII
  • Φράξαντες δόρυ δουρί, σάκος σάκεϊ προθελύμνῳ·
    ἀσπὶς ἄρ' ἀσπίδ' ἔρειδε, κόρυς κόρυν, ἀνέρα δ' ἀνήρ.
    • Locking spear by spear, shield against shield at the base, so buckler
      leaned on buckler, helmet on helmet, man against man.
    • XIII, 130–131 (tr. R. Lattimore).
  • Τοὶ δ' ἔριδος κρατερῆς καὶ ὁμοιΐου πτολέμοιο
    πεῖραρ ἐπαλλάξαντες ἐπ' ἀμφοτέροισι τάνυσσαν
    ἄῤῥηκτόν τ' ἄλυτόν τε, τὸ πολλῶν γούνατ' ἔλυσεν.
    • Both gods knotted the rope of strife and leveling war,
      strangling both sides at once by stretching the mighty cable,
      never broken, never slipped, that snapped the knees of thousands.
    • XIII. 358–360 (tr. Robert Fagles).
  • Ἄλλῳ μὲν γὰρ ἔδωκε θεὸς πολεμήϊα ἔργα,
    ἄλλῳ δ' ὀρχηστύν, ἑτέρῳ κίθαριν καὶ ἀοιδήν,
    ἄλλῳ δ' ἐν στήθεσσι τιθεῖ νόον εὐρύοπα Ζεὺς
    ἐσθλόν, τοῦ δέ τε πολλοὶ ἐπαυρίσκοντ' ἄνθρωποι.
    • To some the powers of bloody war belong,
      To some, sweet music, and the charm of song;
      To few, and wondrous few, has Jove assigned
      A wise, extensive, all-considering mind.
    • XIII. 730–733 (tr. Alexander Pope).
Book XIV
  • Οὐ γάρ τις νέμεσις φυγέειν κακόν, οὐδ' ἀνὰ νύκτα.
    βέλτερον ὃς φεύγων προφύγῃ κακὸν ἠὲ ἁλώῃ.
    • No shame in running,
      fleeing disaster, even in pitch darkness.
      Better to flee from death than feel its grip.
    • XIV. 80–81 (tr. Robert Fagles).
    • Richmond Lattimore's translation:
      There is no shame in running, even by night, from disaster.
      The man does better who runs from disaster than he who is caught by it.
 
There is the heat of Love, the pulsing rush of Longing, the lover's whisper, irresistible—magic to make the sanest man go mad.
  • Ἔνθ' ἔνι μὲν φιλότης, ἐν δ' ἵμερος, ἐν δ' ὀαριστὺς
    πάρφασις, ἥ τ' ἔκλεψε νόον πύκα περ φρονεόντων.
    • There is the heat of Love,
      the pulsing rush of Longing, the lover's whisper,
      irresistible—magic to make the sanest man go mad.
    • XIV. 216–217 (tr. Robert Fagles).
    • Alexander Pope's translation:
      In this was every art, and every charm,
      To win the wisest, and the coldest warm:
      Fond love, the gentle vow, the gay desire,
      The kind deceit, the still reviving fire,
      Persuasive speech, and more persuasive sighs,
      Silence that spoke, and eloquence of eyes.
  • Ἔνθ' Ὕπνῳ ξύμβλητο κασιγνήτῳ Θανάτοιο.
    • There she encountered Sleep, the brother of Death.
    • XIV. 231 (tr. R. Lattimore).
  • Ὕπνε ἄναξ πάντων τε θεῶν πάντων τ' ἀνθρώπων.
    • Sleep, universal king of gods and men.
    • XIV. 233 (tr. Lord Derby).
Book XV
 
A glorious death is his
Who for his country falls.
  • Ῥεῖα δ' ἀρίγνωτος Διὸς ἀνδράσι γίγνεται ἀλκή.
    • Easily seen is the strength that is given from Zeus to mortals.
    • XV. 490 (tr. R. Lattimore).
  • Οὔ οἱ ἀεικὲς ἀμυνομένῳ περὶ πάτρης
    τεθνάμεν.
    • A glorious death is his
      Who for his country falls.
    • XV. 496–497 (tr. Lord Derby); spoken by Hector.
  • Αἰδομένων δ' ἀνδρῶν πλέονες σόοι ἠὲ πέφανται·
    φευγόντων δ' οὔτ' ἂρ κλέος ὄρνυται οὔτέ τις ἀλκή.
    • On valour's side the odds of combat lie,
      The brave live glorious, or lamented die;
      The wretch who trembles in the field of fame,
      Meets death, and worse than death, eternal shame.
    • XV. 563–564 (tr. Alexander Pope).
  • Ἀλλ' εἰ δή ῥα τότε βλάπτε φρένας εὐρύοπα Ζεὺς
    ἡμετέρας, νῦν αὐτὸς ἐποτρύνει καὶ ἀνώγει.
    • Oh but if Zeus's lightning blinded us those days,
      it's Zeus who drives us, hurls us on today!
    • XV. 724–725 (tr. Robert Fagles).
Book XVI
  • Ἐν γὰρ χερσὶ τέλος πολέμου, ἐπέων δ' ἐνὶ βουλῇ.
    • The proof of battle is action, proof of words, debate.
    • XVI. 630 (tr. Robert Fagles).
  • Πέμπε δέ μιν πομποῖσιν ἅμα κραιπνοῖσι φέρεσθαι
    ὕπνῳ καὶ θανάτῳ διδυμάοσιν, οἵ ῥά μιν ὦκα
    θήσουσ' ἐν Λυκίης εὐρείης πίονι δήμῳ.
    • Then give him into the charge of swift messengers to carry him,
      of Sleep and Death, who are twin brothers, and these two shall lay him
      down presently within the rich countryside of broad Lykia.
    • XVI. 671–673 (tr. R. Lattimore).
  • Ἀλλ' αἰεί τε Διὸς κρείσσων νόος ἠέ περ ἀνδρῶν.
    • But the will of Zeus will always overpower the will of men.
    • XVI. 688 (tr. Robert Fagles).
  • Ὃ δ' ἐν στροφάλιγγι κονίης
    κεῖτο μέγας μεγαλωστί, λελασμένος ἱπποσυνάων.
    • He in the turning dust lay
      mightily in his might, his horsemanship all forgotten.
    • XVI. 775–776 (tr. R. Lattimore).
  • I am foremost of all the Trojan warriors to stave the day of bondage from off them; as for you, vultures shall devour you here.
    • XVI (tr. Samuel Butler); Hector to Patroclus.
  • I say further, and lay my saying to your heart, you too shall live but for a little season; death and the day of your doom are close upon you, and they will lay you low by the hand of Achilles son of Aiakos.
    • XVI (tr. S. Butler); Patroclus to Hector.
Book XVII
 
Among all creatures that breathe on earth and crawl on it
there is not anywhere a thing more dismal than man is.
  • Ῥεχθὲν δέ τε νήπιος ἔγνω.
    • Once a thing has been done, the fool sees it.
    • XVII. 32 (tr. R. Lattimore).
  • Οὐ μὲν γάρ τί πού ἐστιν ὀϊζυρώτερον ἀνδρὸς
    πάντων, ὅσσά τε γαῖαν ἔπι πνείει τε καὶ ἕρπει.
    • Among all creatures that breathe on earth and crawl on it
      there is not anywhere a thing more dismal than man is.
    • XVII. 446–447 (tr. R. Lattimore); Zeus.
    • Robert Fagles's translation:
      There is nothing alive more agonized than man
      of all that breathe and crawl across the earth.
  • Ἥσω γὰρ καὶ ἐγώ, τὰ δέ κεν Διὶ πάντα μελήσει.
    • I'll fling a spear myself and leave the rest to Zeus.
    • XVII. 515 (tr. Robert Fagles).
Book XVIII
  • Ὡς ἔρις ἔκ τε θεῶν ἔκ τ' ἀνθρώπων ἀπόλοιτο
    καὶ χόλος, ὅς τ' ἐφέηκε πολύφρονά περ χαλεπῆναι,
    ὅς τε πολὺ γλυκίων μέλιτος καταλειβομένοιο
    ἀνδρῶν ἐν στήθεσσιν ἀέξεται ἠΰτε καπνός.
    • If only strife could die from the lives of gods and men
      and anger that drives the sanest man to flare in outrage—
      bitter gall, sweeter than dripping streams of honey,
      that swarms in people's chests and blinds like smoke.
    • XVIII. 107–110 (tr. Robert Fagles); spoken by Achilles.
  • Ἀλλ' οὐ Ζεὺς ἄνδρεσσι νοήματα πάντα τελευτᾷ.
    • But Zeus does not bring to accomplishment all thoughts in men's minds.
    • XVIII. 328 (tr. R. Lattimore).
Book XIX
  • Θεὸς διὰ πάντα τελευτᾷ.
    • It is the god who accomplishes all things.
    • XIX. 90 (tr. R. Lattimore).
  • Οὐ γὰρ ἀνὴρ πρόπαν ἦμαρ ἐς ἠέλιον καταδύντα
    ἄκμηνος σίτοιο δυνήσεται ἄντα μάχεσθαι.
    • For a man will not have strength to fight his way forward all day
      long until the sun goes down if he is starved for food.
    • XIX. 162–163 (tr. R. Lattimore).
Book XX
  • Στρεπτὴ δὲ γλῶσσ' ἐστὶ βροτῶν, πολέες δ' ἔνι μῦθοι
    παντοῖοι, ἐπέων δὲ πολὺς νομὸς ἔνθα καὶ ἔνθα.
    • The tongue of man is a twisty thing, there are plenty of words there
      of every kind, the range of words is wide, and their variance.
    • XX. 248–249 (tr. R. Lattimore).
Book XXI
  • Ἀλλ' ἔπι τοι καὶ ἐμοὶ θάνατος καὶ μοῖρα κραταιή·
    ἔσσεται ἢ ἠὼς ἢ δείλη ἢ μέσον ἦμαρ
    ὁππότε τις καὶ ἐμεῖο Ἄρῃ ἐκ θυμὸν ἕληται
    ἢ ὅ γε δουρὶ βαλὼν ἢ ἀπὸ νευρῆφιν ὀϊστῷ.
    • There shall be a dawn or an afternoon or a noontime
      when some man in the fighting will take the life from me also
      either with a spearcast or an arrow flown from the bowstring.
    • XXI. 110 (tr. R. Lattimore); spoken by Achilles.
  • Ἐννοσίγαι' οὐκ ἄν με σαόφρονα μυθήσαιο
    ἔμμεναι, εἰ δὴ σοί γε βροτῶν ἕνεκα πτολεμίξω
    δειλῶν, οἳ φύλλοισιν ἐοικότες ἄλλοτε μέν τε
    ζαφλεγέες τελέθουσιν ἀρούρης καρπὸν ἔδοντες,
    ἄλλοτε δὲ φθινύθουσιν ἀκήριοι.
    • Shaker of the earth, you would have me be as one without prudence
      if I am to fight even you for the sake of insignificant
      mortals, who are as leaves are, and now flourish and grow warm
      with life, and feed on what the ground gives, but then again
      fade away and are dead.
    • XXI. 462–466 (tr. R. Lattimore); Apollo to Poseidon.
Book XXII
 
There can be no covenants between men and lions, wolves and lambs can never be of one mind.
  • Ὡς οὐκ ἔστι λέουσι καὶ ἀνδράσιν ὅρκια πιστά,
    οὐδὲ λύκοι τε καὶ ἄρνες ὁμόφρονα θυμὸν ἔχουσιν.
    • There can be no covenants between men and lions, wolves and lambs can never be of one mind.
    • XXII. 262–263 (tr. Samuel Butler); Achilles to Hector.
  • Νῦν αὖτέ με μοῖρα κιχάνει.
    μὴ μὰν ἀσπουδί γε καὶ ἀκλειῶς ἀπολοίμην,
    ἀλλὰ μέγα ῥέξας τι καὶ ἐσσομένοισι πυθέσθαι.
    • So now I meet my doom. Well let me die—
      but not without struggle, not without glory, no,
      in some great clash of arms that even men to come
      will hear of down the years!
    • XXII. 303 (tr. Robert Fagles); spoken by Hector.
    • Richmond Lattimore's translation:
      But now my death is upon me.
      Let me at least not die without a struggle, inglorious,
      but do some big thing first, that men to come shall know of it.
  • Μή με κύον γούνων γουνάζεο μὴ δὲ τοκήων.
    • No more entreating of me, you dog, by knees or parents.
    • XXII. 345 (tr. R. Lattimore); Achilles to Hector.
Book XXIII
  • Ὢ πόποι ἦ ῥά τίς ἐστι καὶ εἰν Ἀΐδαο δόμοισι
    ψυχὴ καὶ εἴδωλον, ἀτὰρ φρένες οὐκ ἔνι πάμπαν.
    • Oh, wonder! Even in the house of Hades there is left something,
      a soul and an image, but there is no real heart of life in it.
    • XXIII. 103–104 (tr. R. Lattimore); Achilles after seeing Patroclus' ghost.
  • Μήτι τοι δρυτόμος μέγ' ἀμείνων ἠὲ βίηφι·
    μήτι δ' αὖτε κυβερνήτης ἐνὶ οἴνοπι πόντῳ
    νῆα θοὴν ἰθύνει ἐρεχθομένην ἀνέμοισι·
    μήτι δ' ἡνίοχος περιγίγνεται ἡνιόχοιο.
    • The woodcutter is far better for skill than he is for brute strength.
      It is by skill that the sea captain holds his rapid ship
      on its course, though torn by winds, over the wine-blue water.
      By skill charioteer outpasses charioteer.
    • XXIII. 315–318 (tr. R. Lattimore).
Book XXIV
  • Τλητὸν γὰρ Μοῖραι θυμὸν θέσαν ἀνθρώποισιν.
    • The Fates have given mortals hearts that can endure.
    • XXIV. 49 (tr. Robert Fagles).
 
I have endured what no one on earth has ever done before—
I put to my lips the hands of the man who killed my son.
  • Ἄγχι δ' ἄρα στὰς ...
    χερσὶν Ἀχιλλῆος λάβε γούνατα καὶ κύσε χεῖρας
    δεινὰς ἀνδροφόνους, αἵ οἱ πολέας κτάνον υἷας.
    • The majestic king of Troy slipped past the rest
      and kneeling down beside Achilles, clasped his knees
      and kissed his hands, those terrible, man-killing hands
      that had slaughtered Priam's many sons in battle.
    • XXIV. 477–479 (tr. Robert Fagles).
  • Ἔτλην δ' οἷ' οὔ πώ τις ἐπιχθόνιος βροτὸς ἄλλος,
    ἀνδρὸς παιδοφόνοιο ποτὶ στόμα χεῖρ' ὀρέγεσθαι.
    • I have endured what no one on earth has ever done before—
      I put to my lips the hands of the man who killed my son.
    • XXIV. 505–506 (tr. Robert Fagles); Priam to Achilles.
    • Richmond Lattimore's translation:
      I have gone through what no other mortal on earth has gone through;
      I put my lips to the hands of the man who has killed my children.
  • Ἄλγεα δ' ἔμπης
    ἐν θυμῷ κατακεῖσθαι ἐάσομεν ἀχνύμενοί περ·
    οὐ γάρ τις πρῆξις πέλεται κρυεροῖο γόοιο·
    ὡς γὰρ ἐπεκλώσαντο θεοὶ δειλοῖσι βροτοῖσι
    ζώειν ἀχνυμένοις· αὐτοὶ δέ τ' ἀκηδέες εἰσί.
    • Let us put our griefs to rest in our own hearts...
      What good's to be won from tears that chill the spirit?
      So the immortals spun our lives that we, we wretched men
      live on to bear such torments—the gods live free of sorrows.
    • XXIV. 522–526 (tr. Robert Fagles).
  • Καὶ σὲ γέρον τὸ πρὶν μὲν ἀκούομεν ὄλβιον εἶναι.
    • And you, old sir, we are told you prospered once.
    • XXIV. 543 (tr. R. Lattimore); Achilles to Priam.

Odyssey (c. 725 BC)

edit
Main article: Odyssey

Misattributed

edit
  • Men grow tired of sleep, love, singing and dancing, sooner than of war.
    • A misquotation of:
      • Πάντων μὲν κόρος ἐστὶ καὶ ὕπνου καὶ φιλότητος
        μολπῆς τε γλυκερῆς καὶ ἀμύμονος ὀρχηθμοῖο,
        τῶν πέρ τις καὶ μᾶλλον ἐέλδεται ἐξ ἔρον εἷναι
        ἢ πολέμου· Τρῶες δὲ μάχης ἀκόρητοι ἔασιν.
        • Men get
          Their fill of all things, of sleep and love, sweet song
          And flawless dancing, and most men like these things
          Much better than war. Only Trojans are always
          Thirsty for blood!
          • Iliad, XIII, 636–639 (tr. Ennis Rees)
      • The misquotation implies that an overweening love of war was the norm, whereas the real quote decries the Trojans as inhumane for keeping the war going.

Quotes about Homer

edit
 
Homer, the sovereign poet.
—Dante Alighieri
 
Finally, he is eminently noble.
—Matthew Arnold
 
Seven cities warred for Homer, being dead,
Who, living, had no roof to shroud his head.
—Thomas Heywood
 
Sometimes even excellent Homer nods. —Horace
 
We acknowledge him the father of poetical diction, the first who taught that language of the gods to men.
—Alexander Pope
 
Learned commentators view
In Homer more than Homer knew.
—Jonathan Swift
  • τυφλὸς ἀνήρ, οἰκεῖ δὲ Χίῳ ἐνὶ παιπαλοέσσῃ,
    τοῦ πᾶσαι μετόπισθεν ἀριστεύουσιν ἀοιδαί.
    • A blind man; he dwells on the rocky Chios; and his songs are the first among men.
    • Homeric Hymn to Apollo, lines 172–173 (tr. G. Bancroft, 1824)
    Line 172 also quoted by Thucydides, III.104.
  • O fortunate adolescens, qui tuae virtutis Homerum praeconem inveneris!
  • ὥσπερ δὲ καὶ τὰ σπουδαῖα μάλιστα ποιητὴς Ὅμηρος ἦν (μόνος γὰρ οὐχ ὅτι εὖ ἀλλὰ καὶ μιμήσεις δραματικὰς ἐποίησεν), οὕτως καὶ τὸ τῆς κωμῳδίας σχῆμα πρῶτος ὑπέδειξεν, οὐ ψόγον ἀλλὰ τὸ γελοῖον δραματοποιήσας· ὁ γὰρ Μαργίτης ἀνάλογον ἔχει, ὥσπερ Ἰλιὰς καὶ ἡ Ὀδύσσεια πρὸς τὰς τραγῳδίας, οὕτω καὶ οὗτος πρὸς τὰς κωμῳδίας.
    • As, in the serious style, Homer is pre-eminent among poets, for he alone combined dramatic form with excellence of imitation, so he too first laid down the main lines of comedy, by dramatizing the ludicrous instead of writing personal satire. His Margites bears the same relation to comedy that the Iliad and Odyssey do to tragedy.
    • Aristotle, Poetics, 1448b34–1449a2 (tr. S. H. Butcher, 41922)
  • δεδίδαχεν δὲ μάλιστα Ὅμηρος καὶ τοὺς ἄλλους ψευδῆ λέγειν ὡς δεῖ.
  • The translator of Homer should above all be penetrated by a sense of four qualities of his author:—that he is eminently rapid; that he is eminently plain and direct both in the evolution of his thought and in the expression of it, that is, both in his syntax and in his words; that he is eminently plain and direct in the substance of his thought, that is, in his matter and ideas; and, finally, that he is eminently noble.
  • Homer, for his astonishing variety, animation, and sublimity, has not a warmer admirer than myself; he has been for three thousand years, like a reigning sovereign, applauded as a matter of course, whether from love or fear; for no man with safety to his own character can refuse to join the chorus of his praise. I never can express (and his other admirers have not done it for me) the pleasure I receive from his poems; but in a view of philanthropy, I consider his existence as having been a serious misfortune to the human race. He has given to military life a charm which few men can resist, a splendor which envelopes the scenes of carnage in a cloud of glory, which dazzles the eyes of every beholder, steals from us our natural sensibilities in exchange for the artificial, debases men to brutes under the pretext of exalting them to gods, and obliterates with the same irresistible stroke the moral duties of life and the true policy of nations. Alexander is not the only human monster that has been formed after the model of Achilles; nor Persia and Egypt the only countries depopulated for no other reason than the desire of rivalling predecessors in military fame.
    • Joel Barlow, Advice to the Privileged Orders in the Several States of Europe, Resulting from the Necessity and Propriety of a General Revolution in the Principle of Government. Part I. (1792), pp. 76-77
  • One of the earliest- and perhaps the first-rivals of the hymnology of war, hatred, and revenge made immortal by Homer was the poetry of an Aeolian woman called Sappha by her people but uniformly known to later times as Sappho... Much of Sappho's poetry was of a plaintive tenderness but she had a fervid feeling for love as a saving grace. Several of her feminine disciples also sang of the beauty and healing force of love. Solon the law-giver and Plato the philosopher were deeply affected by her hymns to the great idea of a social power unrecognized by "the Bible of the Greeks": Homer.
  • Homer is the most simple in his style of all the great poets, and resembles most the style of the poetical parts of the Old Testament. They can have no conception of his manner, who are acquainted with him in Mr. Pope's translation only. An excellent poetical performance that translation is, and faithful in the main to the original. In some places, it may be thought to have even improved Homer. It has certainly softened some of his rudenesses, and added delicacy and grace to some of his sentiments. But withal, it is no other than Homer modernised. In the midst of the elegance and luxuriancy of Mr. Pope's language, we lose sight of the old bard's simplicity. I know indeed no author, to whom it is more difficult to do justice in a translation, than Homer.
    • Hugh Blair, Lectures on Rhetoric and Belles Lettres (1784), Lecture XLIII: 'Homer's Iliad and Odyssey—Virgil's Aeneid', p. 407.
  • They say no woman could possibly have written the Odyssey. To me, on the other hand, it seems even less possible that a man could have done so. As for its being by a practised and elderly writer, nothing but youth and inexperience could produce anything so naïve and so lovely.
  • Homer's poems were writ from a free fury, an absolute and full soul; Virgil's out of a courtly, laborious, and altogether imitatory spirit: not a simile he hath but is Homer's; not an invention, person, or disposition but is wholly or originally built upon Homerical foundations, and in many places hath the very words Homer useth; ... all Homer's books are such as have been precedents ever since of all sorts of poems; imitating none, nor ever worthily imitated of any.
  • Of all books extant in all kinds, Homer is the first and best.
  • Somewhere along the Ionian coast opposite Crete and the islands was a town of some sort, probably of the sort that we should call a village or hamlet with a wall. It was called Ilion but it came to be called Troy, and the name will never perish from the earth. A poet who may have been a beggar and a ballad-monger, who may have been unable to read and write, and was described by tradition as a blind, composed a poem about the Greeks going to war with this town to recover the most beautiful woman in the world. That the most beautiful woman in the world lived in that one little town sounds like a legend; that the most beautiful poem in the world was written by somebody who knew of nothing larger than such little towns is a historical fact.
  • Homer is a world; Virgil, a style.
    • Mark Van Doren, as quoted in Allen Mandelbaum, trans., The Aeneid of Virgil (1971), p. vi.
  • I have found by trial Homer a more pleasing task than Virgil... For the Grecian is more according to my genius than the Latin poet. [...] Virgil was of a quiet, sedate temper; Homer was violent, impetuous, and full of fire. The chief talent of Virgil was propriety of thoughts, and ornament of words; Homer was rapid in his thoughts, and took all the liberties, both of numbers and of expressions, which his language and the age in which he lived allowed him.
  • It is hardly possible to overestimate the importance for Western Literature of the Iliad's demonstration that the fall of an enemy, no less than of a friend or leader, is tragic and not comic. With the Iliad, once for all, an objective and disinterested element enters into the poet's vision of human life. Without this element, poetry is merely instrumental to various social aims, to propaganda, to amusement, to devotion, to instruction: with it, it acquires the authority that since the Iliad it has never lost, an authority based, like the authority of science, on the vision of nature as an impersonal order.
  • The Homeric epics are the oldest poems in Greek that survive, but certainly not the oldest there were. It is not merely that their structure is too complicated and that we can point to contradictions in their contents; the legend of Homer himself contains many features incompatible with the portrait of the poet which we should construct from the sophisticated, sceptical and even frivolous spirit of the poems. The traditional picture of the blind old singer of Chios is largely made up of memories that go back to the time when a poet was a vates— a priestly and God-inspired seer. His blindness is merely the outward sign of the inward light that fills his being and enables him to see things others cannot see. This bodily infirmity expresses— as does the lameness of the divine smith Hephaestus—a second idea that was current in primitive times, that a maker of poems, ornaments and other products of handicraft can only come from the ranks of those who are unfit for war and foray. But apart from this feature, the legendary ‘Homer’ is an almost perfect example of the mythical poet who was still half-divine, a wonder-worker and a prophet. We find the clearest embodiment of this idea in Orpheus, the primeval singer who had his harp from Apollo and instruction in the art of song from the Muse herself; with his music he could move not merely men and beasts but even rocks and could reclaim Eurydice from the bonds of death. ‘Homer’ no longer boasts such magical power, but still retains the features of an inspired seer and remains conscious of a mysterious and sacred intimacy with the Muse whom he so confidently invokes.
    • Arnold Hauser, The Social History of Art, Volume I: From Prehistoric Times to the Middle Ages (1951)
  • Seven cities warred for Homer, being dead,
    Who, living, had no roof to shroud his head.
  • The poems of Homer purported to describe events of the early heroic golden age of Mycenaean Greece, but many of the economic customs Homer described were more characteristic of the late barbaric period, just before 800 B.C.(?), when the epics were supposed to have been written. The forms of government and the economy they describe were feudal, and in some respects resembled Europe's Dark Ages. ..."Gifts" often took the place of royal revenues, taxes, and payments. ...Even craftsmen were often paid for their services in "gifts". Royal revenues also were derived from the king's personal estate, the duty of personal service, tribute, the spoils of war, piracy, and cattle raids. Armies lived off plunder; conquerors were free from taxation.
  • Indignor quandoque bonus dormitat Homerus.
    • I'm aggrieved when sometimes even excellent Homer nods.
    • Horace, Ars Poetica (c. 18 BC), line 359.
  • The Homeric poems were to the Greeks more than national poems have ever been to any people.
  • The Iliad and the Odyssey belong to the end, not to the beginning, of a poetical epoch. They mark the highest point reached by a school of poetry in Ionia, which began by shaping the rude war-songs of Aeolic bards into short lays, and gradually developed a style suited to heroic narrative.
  • Oft of one wide expanse had I been told
    That deep-browed Homer ruled as his demesne;
    Yet never did I breathe its pure serene
    Till I heard Chapman speak out loud and bold:
    Then felt I like some watcher of the skies
    When a new planet swims into his ken.
  • Once the diction has been established it works of itself. Almost anything the poet wants to say, has only to be turned into this orthodox and ready-made diction and it becomes poetry. 'Whatever Miss T. eats turns into Miss T.'
  • ἐν τῇ Ὀδυσσείᾳ παρεικάσαι τις ἂν καταδυομένῳ τὸν Ὅμηρον ἡλίῳ, οὗ δίχα τῆς σφοδρότητος παραμένει τὸ μέγεθος.
    • In the Odyssey one may liken Homer to the setting sun, of which the grandeur remains without the intensity.
    • 'Longinus', On the Sublime, 9.13
  • I finished the Iliad to-day... I never admired the old fellow so much, or was so strongly moved by him. What a privilege genius like his enjoys! I could not tear myself away. I read the last five books at a stretch during my walk to-day, and was at last forced to turn into a by-path, lest the parties of walkers should see me blubbering for imaginary beings, the creations of a ballad-maker who has been dead two thousand seven hundred years. What is the power and glory of Caesar and Alexander to that?
    • Thomas Babington Macaulay to his niece Margaret (August 1851), quoted in George Otto Trevelyan, The Life and Letters of Lord Macaulay, Volume II (1876), pp. 186-187
  • No international enterprise as yet has taken the initiative in collecting the hundred most dangerous books ever written. No doubt some time this collection will be made. When it is done, I suggest that Homer's Iliad and Tacitus' Germania should be given high priority among these hundred dangerous books. This is no reflection on Homer and Tacitus. Tacitus was a gentleman and, for all that I know, Homer was a gentleman too. But who will deny that the Iliad and the Germania raise most unholy passions in the human mind? ... [I]f I am going to speak about causes of war in ancient historiography I cannot pass over all the nefarious consequences of that great epic model – the Iliad. Not only did the Iliad create the model of all those Achilleses and Agamemmnons who have troubled the world ever since, but all the bad historians have learnt from Homer to attribute silly causes to earnest wars.
    • Arnaldo Momigliano, 'Some Observations on Causes of War in Ancient Historiography', Acta Congressus Madvigiant, Proceedings of the Second International Congress of Classical Studies 1954, vol. I (1958), pp. 199-211, quoted in A. D. Momigliano, Studies in Historiography (1966; 1969), pp. 112-113
  • I should never overlook that it is from Homer, his guide and his teacher, that Virgil derives his skill, nor that one single incident in the Iliad supplied the bulk of the material for that great and divine Aeneid. But that is not the way I do my sums. I marshal other qualities, ones which make that great Homer amazing to me, as though he were above our human condition. And in truth I am often struck with wonder that he, who by his authority created so many gods and made them honoured in this world, has not himself been deified. Poor and blind, living as he did before learning had been codified into rules and definite precepts, he had mastered it all so well that those who have subsequently undertaken to establish forms of government, to conduct wars or to write on religion and on philosophy — no matter what School they belong to — or about the arts and crafts, have accepted him as their master, most perfect in all things, and taken his books as a seed-bed for every kind of knowledge.
    • Michel de Montaigne, 'On the most excellent of men', The Complete Essays, translated by M. A. Screech (1991; 2003), pp. 850-851
  • It was against the order of Nature for Homer to have brought forth the most excellent work there can ever be. In Nature's order things are imperfect at birth: they grow up, and become stronger as they grow. He made the childhood of poetry and of several other arts to be adult, complete and mature. That is why, following that beautiful testimony to him which Antiquity has bequeathed to us, he can be called "the first poet and the last": since before him there was none whom he could imitate: after him, none who could imitate him.
    • Michel de Montaigne, 'On the most excellent of men', The Complete Essays, translated by M. A. Screech (1991; 2003), pp. 851-852
  • Besides, what renown can be compared with his? Nothing lives like his fame and his works on the lips of men... Homer provides a noble farce in which over the centuries Kings, Republics and Emperors all play their parts and for which this great universe serves as the theatre.
    • Michel de Montaigne, 'On the most excellent of men', The Complete Essays, translated by M. A. Screech (1991; 2003), pp. 852-853
  • Poetry changes with every generation, but it does not improve or progress. It just changes its styles, trappings and some of its obsessions, but we can still enjoy Sappho and Homer; they are today's news as much as when they were written or recited.
    • Marge Piercy "WHY SPECULATE ON THE FUTURE?" in My Life, My Body (2015)
  • Τί οὖν ποτε περὶ μὲν Ὁμήρου δεινὸς εἶ, περὶ δὲ Ἡσιόδου οὔ, οὐδὲ τῶν ἄλλων ποιητῶν; ἢ Ὅμηρος περὶ ἄλλων τινῶν λέγει ἢ ὧνπερ σύμπαντες οἱ ἄλλοι ποιηταί; οὐ περὶ πολέμου τε τὰ πολλὰ διελήλυθεν καὶ περὶ ὁμιλιῶν πρὸς ἀλλήλους ἀνθρώπων ἀγαθῶν τε καὶ κακῶν καὶ ἰδιωτῶν καὶ δημιουργῶν, καὶ περὶ θεῶν πρὸς ἀλλήλους καὶ πρὸς ἀνθρώπους ὁμιλούντων, ὡς ὁμιλοῦσι, καὶ περὶ τῶν οὐρανίων παθημάτων καὶ περὶ τῶν ἐν Ἅιδου, καὶ γενέσεις καὶ θεῶν καὶ ἡρώων; οὐ ταῦτά ἐστιν περὶ ὧν Ὅμηρος τὴν ποίησιν πεποίηκεν;
    • Socrates: But how did you come to have this skill about Homer only, and not about Hesiod or the other poets? Does not Homer speak of the same themes which all other poets handle? Is not war his great argument? and does he not speak of human society and of intercourse of men, good and bad, skilled and unskilled, and of the gods conversing with one another and with mankind, and about what happens in heaven and in the world below, and the generations of gods and heroes? Are not these the themes of which Homer sings?
    • Plato, Ion, 531c–d
  • ἔοικε μὲν γὰρ τῶν καλῶν ἁπάντων τούτων τῶν τραγικῶν πρῶτος διδάσκαλος τε καὶ ἡγεμὼν γενέσθαι.
  • Ὅμηρον ποιητικώτατον εἶναι καὶ πρῶτον τῶν τραγῳδοποιῶν.
  • Our author's work is a wild paradise, where, if we cannot see all the beauties so distinctly as in an ordered garden, it is only because the number of them is infinitely greater. It is like a copious nursery, which contains the seeds and first productions of every kind, out of which those who followed him have but selected some particular plants, each according to his fancy, to cultivate and beautify. If some things are too luxuriant it is owing to the richness of the soil; and if others are not arrived to perfection or maturity, it is only because they are overrun and oppressed by those of a stronger nature.
  • We acknowledge him the father of poetical diction, the first who taught that language of the gods to men.
  • Hic enim [. . .] omnibus eloquentiae partibus exemplum et ortum dedit. Hunc nemo in magnis rebus sublimitate, in parvis proprietate superaverit. Idem laetus ac pressus, iucundus et gravis, tum copia tum brevitate mirabilis, nec poetica modo sed oratoria virtute eminentissimus. [. . .] Quid? in verbis, sententiis, figuris, dispositione totius operis nonne humani ingenii modum excedit?—ut magni sit viri virtutes eius non aemulatione, quod fieri non potest, sed intellectu sequi.
    • Homer provides the model and the origin of every department of eloquence. No one surely has surpassed him in sublimity in great themes, or in propriety in small. He is at once luxuriant and concise, charming and grave, marvelous in his fullness and in his brevity, supreme not only in poetic but in oratorical excellence. [. . .] Does not Homer transcend the limits of human talent in his words, his thoughts, his Figures, and the Disposition of his whole work? It takes a great mind, I will not say to rival, for that is impossible, but simply to appreciate his virtues.
    • Quintilian, Institutio Oratoria, X.1.46–50 (tr. D. A. Russell, 2002)
  • Each time I put down The Iliad, after reading it again in some new translation, or after reading once more the somber splendor of the Greek, I am convinced, as one is convinced by the experiences of a lifetime, that somehow, in a way beyond the visions of artistry, I have been face to face with the meaning of existence. Other works of literature give this insight, but none so powerfully, so uncontaminated by evasion or subterfuge. If the art of poetry is a symbolic criticism of virtue, The Iliad is the paramount classic of that art. Its purity, simplicity, definition, and impact reveal life and expose it to irrevocable judgement, with finality and at the beginning of European literature.
  • Read Homer once, and you can read no more,
    For all things else will seem so dull and poor,
    You'l wish 't unread; but oft upon him look,
    And you will hardly need another book.
  • The poems of Homer and his contemporaries were the delight of infant Greece; they were the elements of that social system which is the column upon which all succeeding civilization has reposed. Homer embodied the ideal perfection of his age in human character; nor can we doubt that those who read his verses were awakened to an ambition of becoming like to Achilles, Hector, and Ulysses: the truth and beauty of friendship, patriotism, and persevering devotion to an object, were unveiled to the depths in these immortal creations.
  • As learned commentators view
    In Homer more than Homer knew.
  • Are vitality and creativity somehow connected with bellicosity? Could there have been Greek civilisation without this restless obsession with fighting? The place of Homer, especially the Iliad, in Greek culture accentuates these disturbing questions. While the cliché that Homer was "the Bible of the Greeks" is misleading – his was in no way a sacred or unquestionable text – he was central to their basic education, and at least as familiar as Shakespeare is to us, if not more so.
  • Greek tragedy could never have flowered without Homer as its pioneer.
  • Facilius esse Herculi clavam quam Homero versum subripere.
    • It is easier to steal the club of Hercules than a line from Homer.
    • Virgil, quoted by Aelius Donatus, Vita Vergili, 46.
  • Notwithstanding the veneration due and paid to Homer, it is very strange, yet true, that among the most learned, and the greatest admirers of antiquity, there is scarce one to be found who ever read the Iliad with that eagerness and rapture which a woman feels when she reads the Novel of Zaïda... The common part of mankind is awed with the fame of Homer, rather than struck with his beauties.
  • His gods are perhaps at once absurd and entertaining.
  • It was Homer who gave laws to the artist; it was Homer who inspired the poet.
    • Francis Wayland, The Iliad and the Bible, reported in Hoyt's New Cyclopedia Of Practical Quotations (1922), pp. 45 & 609.

See also

edit

Translations

edit

The following translations into English have been used for the quotations:

edit
 
Wikipedia
Wikipedia has an article about:
 
Wiktionary
Look up Homer in Wiktionary, the free dictionary
 
Commons
Wikimedia Commons has media related to:
 
Wikisource
Wikisource has original works by or about:
Retrieved from "https://en.wikiquote.org/w/index.php?title=Homer&oldid=3967196"