Rethinking Orality II

The Mechanisms of the Oral Communication System in the Case of the Archaic Epos

Andrea Ercolani, Laura Lulli, Andrea Ercolani, Laura Lulli

• Publisher: De Gruyter
• Year: 2022
• ISBN:
  9783110752052
• Edition: 1
• Topic: Literature
• Subtopic: Ancient & Classical Literary Criticism
• Index: Literature

This is the second volume on the mechanisms of oral communication in ancient Greece, focused on epic poetry, a genre with deep roots in orality. Considering the critical debate about orality and its influence on the composition, diffusion and transmission of the archaic epic poems, the survey provides a reconsideration and a reassessment of the traces of orality in the archaic epic poetry, following their adaptation in the synchronic and diachronic changes of the communicative system. Combining the methods of cognitive science, and the historical and literary analysis of the texts, the research explores the complexity of the literary message of the Greek epic poetry, highlighting its position in a system of oral communication. The consideration of structural and formal aspects, i.e. the traces of orality in the narrative architecture, in the epic diction, in the meter and the formulaic system, as well as the vestiges of the mixture of orality and writing, allows to reconstruct a dynamic frame of communicative modalities which influenced and enriched the archaic epic poetry, providing it with expressive potentialities destined to a longlasting permanence in the history of the genre.

A Cyclic Theme in the Odyssey: The Oresteia in Zeus’ Speech (1, 28 – 43)

Giampiero Scafoglio

Abstract

This paper focuses on the first mention of the Oresteia-theme (that is the murder of Agamemnon by Aegisthus and the revenge by Orestes) in the Odyssey, notably in the speech of Zeus in the council of gods (1, 28 – 43). I try to prove that this theme, coming from the epic cycle, is a holdover of the oral tradition, and an evidence of the origin and belonging of the Odyssey to this cultural background. The structure of the oral tradition and the rhapsodic practice allowed and even promoted exchanges and cross-references between different stories. Then, the Oresteia-theme is not an example introduced to demonstrate a moral issue (as scholars usually interpret it); on the contrary, the moral issue is deduced a posteriori from the mythological reference that is a part of, and a hint to, the big picture to which the Odyssey belongs.

Keywords: Odyssey , Oresteia-theme, epic cycle, oral tradition, neo-analysis, oral theory,

1 The Homeric Poems and the Epic Cycle

Some preliminary clarifications. When I talk about the epic cycle, I mean the oral tradition, the whole of mythological tales and songs passed on orally from generation to generation by the aeds and rhapsods.¹ Moreover, when I talk about the cyclic poems, I mean the later written texts, the literary works (such as the Cypria and Little Iliad) that are now lost and that we know from ancient evidence and fragments.² If the epic cycle as oral poetry is earlier than the Iliad and the Odyssey, the individual poems arising from the epic cycle came later, from the 7^th century onwards.³ This is why we can say (with an only apparent paradox) that the Homeric poems and the epic cycle influenced each other mutually.⁴ The Iliad and the Odyssey indeed arose from the same cultural substrate as the cyclic poems, which in turn have been influenced by the Homeric poems.

I cannot leave aside the issue of whether the Iliad and the Odyssey are themselves cyclic poems. Most scholars (from Jasper Griffin to Margalit Finkelberg)⁵ answer they aren’t, without any doubt. It is true that the Homeric epics have specific characteristics that distinguish them from the cyclic poems (as everyone knows, from Aristotle onwards). Yet I must confess I have some doubts: maybe the insistence on the specificity of the Homeric poems (specificity that cannot be denied, of course) risks making us lose the perception of the common grounds, what I would call the underlying congeniality of all the archaic epics, as well as the sense of the diversity between the Iliad and the Odyssey. The problem is further complicated by the editorial process carried on over centuries, from Pisistratus to the Alexandrine grammarians, with the result to fix up and regularize the text and structure of the Homeric poems, making them similar to each other and different from the cyclic poems. Moreover, our judgment is affected by the condemnation without appeal expressed by Aristotle on the cyclic poems⁶ and by our very limited knowledge of them.

Anyway, the Iliad and the Odyssey incorporate themes and episodes from the epic cycle. The crossover between the Homeric poems and other parts of the cultural tradition is not at all surprising, if we consider the latter as a long story that includes many other stories, something like a world history that develops through several stages, starting from the birth of the universe. This is exactly the image of the epic cycle we find in the Library of the Byzantine patriarch Photius, who outlines a summary of the Chrestomathy by Proclus: a source believed to be reliable, maybe the most important evidence on the cyclic poems.

Photius, Bibl. 239, 17 – 19⁷

δια­λαμ­βάνει δὲ καὶ περὶ τοῦ λεγο­μένου ἐπι­κοῦ κύκλου, ὃς ἄρχε­ται μὲν ἐκ τῆς Οὐρα­νοῦ καὶ Γῆς μυθο­λο­γου­μένης μίξεως, ἐξ ἧς αὐτῷ καὶ τρεῖς παῖ­δας ἑκα­τον­τάχει­ρας καὶ τρεῖς γεν­νῶσι Κύκλω­πας. δια­πο­ρεύ­ε­ται δὲ τά τε ἄλλως περὶ θεῶν τοῖς Ἕλλησι μυθο­λο­γού­μενα καὶ εἴ πού τι καὶ πρὸς ἱστο­ρίαν ἐξα­λη­θί­ζε­ται. καὶ περα­τοῦ­ται ὁ ἐπι­κὸς κύκλος ἐκ δια­φόρων ποι­η­τῶν συμ­πλη­ρού­με­νος, μέχρι τῆς ἀπο­βάσεως Ὀδυσ­σέως τῆς εἰς Ἰθάκην, ἐν ᾗ ὑπὸ τοῦ παι­δὸς Τηλε­γόνου ἀγνο­οῦν­τος κτεί­νε­ται.

Proclus talks about what is called the epic cycle, which starts from the mythological union between Heaven and Mother Earth. This union generated three children with a hundred hands each and three Cyclops. Proclus examines the legends of the Greek people about the gods and their relationship with the historical truth. The epic cycle, made up by several poets, ends with the arrival of Odysseus in Ithaca, where he dies, killed by his son Telegonus, who does not know him.

In view of the reliability of his source (Proclus’ Chrestomathy), we can trust Photius’ statement about the comprehensiveness of the epic cycle.⁸ We find a confirmation in the remains of a cyclic theogony (or more than one) that constituted the beginning of the endless chain of events leading to the Trojan war and proceeding further with the return journeys of the heroes. Actually, not all scholars agree on the existence of the cyclic theogony, but there are several clues pointing to that direction: Alberto Bernabé collected the evidence on this subjec...