Any scholar who looks at these pages knows all about the proofs of grammar of a late date in the Odysseyand the four contaminated Books of the Iliad. But it may be well to give a few specimens, for the enlightenment of less learned readers of Homer.
The use of {Greek: amfi}, with the dative, meaning "about," when
thinkingor speaking"about" Odysseus or anything else, is peculiar
to the Odyssey. But how has it not crept into the four Odyssean
contaminated Books of the Iliad?
{Greek: peri}, with the genitive, "follows verbs meaning to speak
or know abouta person," but only in the Odyssey. What preposition
follows such verbs in the Iliad?
Here, again, we ask: how did the contaminated Books of the Iliad
escape the stain of {Greek: peri}, with the genitive, after verbs
meaning to speak or know? What phrase do they use in the Iliadfor
speaking or asking aboutanybody? {Footnote (exact placing uncertain):
Monro, Homeric Grammar. See Index, under Iliad, p. 339.}
{Greek: meta}, with the genitive, meaning "among" or "with,"
comes twice in the Odyssey (X. 320; XVI. 140) and thrice in the Iliad
(XIII. 700; XXI. 458; XXIV. 400); but all these passages in the Iliad
are disposed of as "late" parts of the poem.
{Greek: epi}, with the accusative, meaning towardsa
person, comes often in the Iliad; once in the Odyssey. But it comes
four times in Iliad, Book X., which almost every critic scouts as very
"late" indeed. If so, why does the "late" Odysseynot deal in this
grammatical usage so common in the "late" Book X. of the Iliad?
{Greek: epi}, with the accusative, "meaning extent
(without motion)," is chiefly found in the Odyssey, and in the
Iliad, IX., X., XXIV. On consulting grammarians one thinks that there is
not much in this.
{Greek: proti} with the dative, meaning "in addition to," occurs
only once ( Odyssey, X. 68). If it occurs only once, there is little to
be learned from the circumstance.
{Greek: ana} with the genitive, is only in Odyssey, only
thrice, always of going on board a ship. There are not many ship-farings
in the Iliad. Odysseus and his men are not described as going on board
their ship, in so many words, in Iliad, Book I. The usage occurs in
the poem where the incidents of seafaring occur frequently, as is to be
expected? It is not worth while to persevere with these tithes of mint
and cummin. If "Neglect of Position" be commoner—like "Hiatus in the
Bucolic Diaeresis"—in the Odysseyand in Iliad, XXIII., XXIV., why
do the failings not beset Iliad, IX., X., these being such extremely
"late" books? As to the later use of the Article in the Odysseyand
the Odyssean Books of the Iliad, it appears to us that Book I. of the
Iliaduses the article as it is used in Book X.; but on this topic we
must refer to a special treatise on the language of Iliad, Book X.,
which is promised.
Turning to the vocabulary: "words expressive of civilisation" are bound to be more frequent, as they are, in the Odyssey, a poem of peaceful life, than in a poem about an army in action, like the Iliad. Out of all this no clue to the distance of years dividing the two poems can be found. As to words concerning religion, the same holds good. The Odyssey is more frequently religious(see the case of Eumaeus) than the Iliad.
In morals the term {Greek: dikaios} is more used in the Odyssey, also {Greek: atemistos} ("just" and "lawless"). But that is partly because the Odyssey has to contrast civilised ("just") with wild outlandish people—Cyclopes and Laestrygons, who are "lawless." The Iliadhas no occasion to touch on savages; but, as the {Greek: hybris} of the Wooers is a standing topic in the Odyssey (an ethical poem, says Aristotle), the word {Greek: hybris} is of frequent occurrence in the Odyssey, in just the same sense as it bears in Iliad, I 214—the insolence of Agamemnon. Yet when Achilles has occasion to speak of Agamemnon's insolence in Iliad, Book IX., he does not use the word{Greek: hybris}, though Book IX. is so very "late" and "Odyssean." It would be easy to go through the words for moral ideas in the Odyssey, and to show that they occur in the numerous moral situations which do not arise, or arise much less frequently, in the Iliad. There is not difference enough in the moral standard of the two poems to justify us in assuming that centuries of ethical progress had intervened between their dates of composition. If the Iliad, again, were really, like the Odyssey, a thing of growth through several centuries, which overlapped the centuries in which the Odysseygrew, the moral ideas of the Iliadand Odysseywould necessarily be much the same, would be indistinguishable. But, as a matter of fact, it would be easy to show that the moral standard of the Iliadis higher, in many places, than the moral standard of the Odyssey; and that, therefore, by the critical hypothesis, the Iliadis the later poem of the twain. For example, the behaviour of Achilles is most obnoxious to the moralist in Iliad, Book IX., where he refuses gifts of conciliation. But by the critical hypothesis this is not the fault of the Iliad, for Book IX. is declared to be "late," and of the same date as late parts of the Odyssey. Achilles is not less open to moral reproach in his abominable cruelty and impiety, as shown in his sacrifice of prisoners of war and his treatment of dead Hector, in Iliad, XXIII., XXIV. But these Books also are said to be as late as the Odyssey.
The solitary "realistic" or "naturalistic" passage in Homer, with which a lover of modern "problem novels" feels happy and at home, is the story of Phoenix, about his seduction of his father's mistress at the request of his mother. What a charming situation! But that occurs in an "Odyssean" Book of the Iliad, Book IX.; and thus Odyssean seems lower, not more advanced, than Iliadic taste in morals. To be sure, the poet disapproves of all these immoralities.
In the Odyssey the hero, to the delight of Athene, lies often and freely and with glee. The Achilles of the Iliadhates a liar "like the gates of Hades"; but he says so in an "Odyssean" Book (Book IX.), so there were obviously different standards in Odyssean ethics.
As to the Odyssey being the work of "a milder age," consider the hanging of Penelope's maids and the abominable torture of Melanthius. There is no torturing in the {blank space} for the Iliadhappens not to deal with treacherous thralls.