From: Nichael Cramer (nichael@sover.net)
Date: Tue Jan 23 1996 - 07:38:53 EST
Carl W. Conrad wrote:
> Timothy Tow wrote:
> > I'm posting this question to this list on the advice of a friend.
> >I'm not on this mail list so please reply to me directly.
> >
> > I was re-reading the Odyseey and the Iliad, and I recall reading
> >from some literary source that the expression of '10 years' in Homeric
> >Greek was a colloquialism for "a long period of time."
> > I asking this because if Homer's use of the expression '10 years'
> >for the duration of siege of Troy is taken figuratively then his stories
> >makes more sense chronologically then if it were taken literally.
> > Then the Trojan War and all of its assorted aftermath events may
> >not have taken over 20 years after all. Should I take the '10 years'
> >expression literally or figuratively.
> > Was '10 years' a common colloquialism for a "a long time" even in
> >other Greek dialects?
> I have never seen or heard anything like this. It is ironic for one not
> overly inclined to be especially literal in interpreting the gospel to have
> to insist the strong likelihood that ten years in Homer means nothing else
> but ten years: [...]
> Sorry, I didn't mean to rant and rave, but the 20 years is underscored
> repeatedly in the Odyssey.
More to the point, isn't it also the case (sorry, my Homer is my other
office so I'm doing this from memory) isn't it also the case that the
Iliad opens after _nine_ years of fighting. The war and subsequent
mopping up goes on for a year or so after Akhellius' death (i.e. after the
end of the Iliad) making a total of ten years. So unless "nine years" is
also taken to be a colloquialism for a long time it would seem that Homer
meant 10 years.
But the original point --that of the "problems" of chronology-- is still
an interesting one. When I took Homer in Gregory Nagy's course you can
bet we asked about these things (my personal favorite was Akhellius
leaving an infant son when he set off for Troy and by the end of the siege
the son is leading troups into battle; for that matter if you work out the
various personal ancestries and who-knew-whose-father at various times,
the fact that Akhellius himself is present means that some of the other
main charcters must be leading charges into the heat of battle well into
their seventies and eighties).
Nagy's response was that basically we are in Mythic time, something akin
to the "dream time" of the Australian aborigenes. Literalness is
something that can only be pushed so far in these cases. So perhaps
there is something to learn here w.r.t. NT studies.
Nichael
This archive was generated by hypermail 2.1.4 : Sat Apr 20 2002 - 15:37:36 EDT