The Odyssey - 24

Total number of words is 4758
Total number of unique words is 1256
47.1 of words are in the 2000 most common words
65.2 of words are in the 5000 most common words
72.8 of words are in the 8000 most common words
Each bar represents the percentage of words per 1000 most common words.
no better than they should be. The final drink-offering should have
been made to Jove or Neptune, not to the god of thievishness and
rascality of all kinds. In line 164 we do indeed find Echeneus
proposing that a drink-offering should be made to Jove, but Mercury is
evidently, according to our authoress, the god who was most likely to
be of use to them.]
[62] [ The fact of Alcinous knowing anything about the Cyclopes
suggests that in the writer’s mind Scheria and the country of the
Cyclopes were not very far from one another. I take the Cyclopes and
the giants to be one and the same people.]
[63] [ “My property, etc.” The authoress is here adopting an Iliadic
line (xix. 333), and this must account for the absence of all reference
to Penelope. If she had happened to remember “Il.” v. 213, she would
doubtless have appropriated it by preference, for that line reads “my
country, _my wife_, and all the greatness of my house.”]
[64] [ The at first inexplicable sleep of Ulysses (bk. xiii. 79, etc.)
is here, as also in viii. 445, being obviously prepared. The writer
evidently attached the utmost importance to it. Those who know that the
harbour which did duty with the writer of the “Odyssey” for the one in
which Ulysses landed in Ithaca, was only about 2 miles from the place
in which Ulysses is now talking with Alcinous, will understand why the
sleep was so necessary.]
[65] [ There were two classes—the lower who were found in provisions
which they had to cook for themselves in the yards and outer precincts,
where they would also eat—and the upper who would eat in the cloisters
of the inner court, and have their cooking done for them.]
[66] [ Translation very dubious. I suppose the {Greek} here to be the
covered sheds that ran round the outer courtyard. See illustrations at
the end of bk. iii.]
[67] [ The writer apparently deems that the words “as compared with
what oxen can plough in the same time” go without saying. Not so the
writer of the “Iliad” from which the Odyssean passage is probably
taken. He explains that mules can plough quicker than oxen (“Il.” x.
351-353)]
[68] [ It was very fortunate that such a disc happened to be there,
seeing that none like it were in common use.]
[69] [ “Il.” xiii. 37. Here, as so often elsewhere in the “Odyssey,”
the appropriation of an Iliadic line which is not quite appropriate
puzzles the reader. The “they” is not the chains, nor yet Mars and
Venus. It is an overflow from the Iliadic passage in which Neptune
hobbles his horses in bonds “which none could either unloose or break
so that they might stay there in that place.” If the line would have
scanned without the addition of the words “so that they might stay
there in that place,” they would have been omitted in the “Odyssey.”]
[70] [ The reader will note that Alcinous never goes beyond saying that
he is going to give the goblet; he never gives it. Elsewhere in both
“Iliad” and “Odyssey” the offer of a present is immediately followed by
the statement that it was given and received gladly—Alcinous actually
does give a chest and a cloak and shirt—probably also some of the corn
and wine for the long two-mile voyage was provided by him—but it is
quite plain that he gave no talent and no cup.]
[71] [ “Il.” xviii. 344-349. These lines in the “Iliad” tell of the
preparation for washing the body of Patroclus, and I am not pleased
that the writer of the “Odyssey” should have adopted them here.]
[72] [ see note [64] : ]
[73] [ see note [43] : ]
[74] [ The reader will find this threat fulfilled in bk. xiii]
[75] [ If the other islands lay some distance away from Ithaca (which
the word {Greek} suggests), what becomes of the πόρθμος or gut between
Ithaca and Samos which we hear of in Bks. iv. and xv.? I suspect that
the authoress in her mind makes Telemachus come back from Pylos to the
Lilybaean promontory and thence to Trapani through the strait between
the _Isola Grande_ and the mainland—the island of Asteria being the one
on which Motya afterwards stood.]
[76] [ “Il.” xviii. 533-534. The sudden lapse into the third person
here for a couple of lines is due to the fact that the two Iliadic
lines taken are in the third person.]
[77] [ cf. “Il.” ii. 776. The words in both “Iliad” and “Odyssey” are
[Footnote Greek]. In the “Iliad” they are used of the horses of
Achilles’ followers as they stood idle, “champing lotus.”]
[78] [ I take all this passage about the Cyclopes having no ships to be
sarcastic—meaning, “You people of Drepanum have no excuse for not
colonising the island of Favognana, which you could easily do, for you
have plenty of ships, and the island is a very good one.” For that the
island so fully described here is the Aegadean or “goat” island of
Favognana, and that the Cyclopes are the old Sican inhabitants of Mt.
Eryx should not be doubted.]
[79] [ For the reasons why it was necessary that the night should be so
exceptionally dark see “The Authoress of the Odyssey” pp. 188-189.]
[80] [ None but such lambs as would suck if they were with their
mothers would be left in the yard. The older lambs should have been out
feeding. The authoress has got it all wrong, but it does not matter.
See “The Authoress of the Odyssey” p. 148.]
[81] [ This line is enclosed in brackets in the received text, and is
omitted (with note) by Messrs. Butcher & Lang. But lines enclosed in
brackets are almost always genuine; all that brackets mean is that the
bracketed passage puzzled some early editor, who nevertheless found it
too well established in the text to venture on omitting it. In the
present case the line bracketed is the very last which a full-grown
male editor would be likely to interpolate. It is safer to infer that
the writer, a young woman, not knowing or caring at which end of the
ship the rudder should be, determined to make sure by placing it at
both ends, which we shall find she presently does by repeating it (line
340) at the stern of the ship. As for the two rocks thrown, the first I
take to be the Asinelli, see map facing p. 80. The second I see as the
two contiguous islands of the Formiche, which are treated as one, see
map facing p. 108. The Asinelli is an island shaped like a boat, and
pointing to the island of Favognana. I think the authoress’s
compatriots, who probably did not like her much better that she did
them, jeered at the absurdity of Ulysses’ conduct, and saw the Asinelli
or “donkeys,” not as the rock thrown by Polyphemus, but as the boat
itself containing Ulysses and his men.]
[82] [ This line exists in the text here but not in the corresponding
passage xii. 141. I am inclined to think it is interpolated (probably
by the poetess herself) from the first of lines xi. 115-137, which I
can hardly doubt were added by the writer when the scheme of the work
was enlarged and altered. See “The Authoress of the Odyssey” pp.
254-255.]
[83] [ “Floating” (πλωτῇ) is not to be taken literally. The island
itself, as apart from its inhabitants, was quite normal. There is no
indication of its moving during the month that Ulysses stayed with
Aeolus, and on his return from his unfortunate voyage, he seems to have
found it in the same place. The πλωτῇ in fact should no more be pressed
than θοῇσι as applied to islands, “Odyssey” xv. 299—where they are
called “flying” because the ship would fly past them. So also the
“Wanderers,” as explained by Buttmann; see note on “Odyssey” xii. 57.]
[84] [ Literally “for the ways of the night and of the day are near.” I
have seen what Mr. Andrew Lang says (“Homer and the Epic,” p. 236, and
“Longman’s Magazine” for January, 1898, p. 277) about the “amber route”
and the “Sacred Way” in this connection; but until he gives his grounds
for holding that the Mediterranean peoples in the Odyssean age used to
go far North for their amber instead of getting it in Sicily, where it
is still found in considerable quantities, I do not know what weight I
ought to attach to his opinion. I have been unable to find grounds for
asserting that B.C. 1000 there was any commerce between the
Mediterranean and the “Far North,” but I shall be very ready to learn
if Mr. Lang will enlighten me. See “The Authoress of the Odyssey” pp.
185-186.]
[85] [ One would have thought that when the sun was driving the stag
down to the water, Ulysses might have observed its whereabouts.]
[86] [ See Hobbes of Malmesbury’s translation.]
[87] [ “Il.” vxiii. 349. Again the writer draws from the washing the
body of Patroclus—which offends.]
[88] [ This visit is wholly without topographical significance.]
[89] [ Brides presented themselves instinctively to the imagination of
the writer, as the phase of humanity which she found most interesting.]
[90] [ Ulysses was, in fact, to become a missionary and preach Neptune
to people who knew not his name. I was fortunate enough to meet in
Sicily a woman carrying one of these winnowing shovels; it was not much
shorter than an oar, and I was able at once to see what the writer of
the “Odyssey” intended.]
[91] [ I suppose the lines I have enclosed in brackets to have been
added by the author when she enlarged her original scheme by the
addition of books i.-iv. and xiii. (from line 187)-xxiv. The reader
will observe that in the corresponding passage (xii. 137-141) the
prophecy ends with “after losing all your comrades,” and that there is
no allusion to the suitors. For fuller explanation see “The Authoress
of the Odyssey” pp. 254-255.]
[92] [ The reader will remember that we are in the first year of
Ulysses’ wanderings, Telemachus therefore was only eleven years old.
The same anachronism is made later on in this book. See “The Authoress
of the Odyssey” pp. 132-133.]
[93] [ Tradition says that she had hanged herself. Cf. “Odyssey” xv.
355, etc.]
[94] [ Not to be confounded with Aeolus king of the winds.]
[95] [ Melampus, vide book xv. 223, etc.]
[96] [ I have already said in a note on bk. xi. 186 that at this point
of Ulysses’ voyage Telemachus could only be between eleven and twelve
years old.]
[97] [ Is the writer a man or a woman?]
[98] [ Cf. “Il.” iv. 521, {Greek}. The Odyssean line reads, {Greek}.
The famous dactylism, therefore, of the Odyssean line was probably
suggested by that of the Ileadic rather than by a desire to accommodate
sound to sense. At any rate the double coincidence of a dactylic line,
and an ending {Greek}, seems conclusive as to the familiarity of the
writer of the “Odyssey” with the Iliadic line.]
[99] [ Off the coast of Sicily and South Italy, in the month of May, I
have seen men fastened half way up a boat’s mast with their feet
resting on a crosspiece, just large enough to support them. From this
point of vantage they spear sword-fish. When I saw men thus employed I
could hardly doubt that the writer of the “Odyssey” had seen others
like them, and had them in her mind when describing the binding of
Ulysses. I have therefore with some diffidence ventured to depart from
the received translation of ἰστοπέδη (cf. Alcaeus frag. 18, where,
however, it is very hard to say what ἰστοπέδαν means). In Sophocles’
Lexicon I find a reference to Chrysostom (l, 242, A. Ed. Benedictine
Paris 1834-1839) for the word ἰστοπόδη, which is probably the same as
ἰστοπέδη, but I have looked for the passage in vain.]
[100] [ The writer is at fault here and tries to put it off on Circe.
When Ulysses comes to take the route prescribed by Circe, he ought to
pass either the Wanderers or some other difficulty of which we are not
told, but he does not do so. The Planctae, or Wanderers, merge into
Scylla and Charybdis, and the alternative between them and something
untold merges into the alternative whether Ulysses had better choose
Scylla or Charybdis. Yet from line 260, it seems we are to consider the
Wanderers as having been passed by Ulysses; this appears even more
plainly from xxiii. 327, in which Ulysses expressly mentions the
Wandering rocks as having been between the Sirens and Scylla and
Charybdis. The writer, however, is evidently unaware that she does not
quite understand her own story; her difficulty was perhaps due to the
fact that though Trapanese sailors had given her a fair idea as to
where all her other localities really were, no one in those days more
than in our own could localise the Planctae, which in fact, as Buttmann
has argued, were derived not from any particular spot, but from
sailors’ tales about the difficulties of navigating the group of the
Aeolian islands as a whole (see note on “Od.” x. 3). Still the matter
of the poor doves caught her fancy, so she would not forgo them. The
whirlwinds of fire and the smoke that hangs on Scylla suggests allusion
to Stromboli and perhaps even Etna. Scylla is on the Italian side, and
therefore may be said to look West. It is about 8 miles thence to the
Sicilian coast, so Ulysses may be perfectly well told that after
passing Scylla he will come to the Thrinacian island or Sicily.
Charybdis is transposed to a site some few miles to the north of its
actual position.]
[101] [ I suppose this line to have been intercalated by the author
when lines 426-446 were added.]
[102] [ For the reasons which enable us to identify the island of the
two Sirens with the Lipari island now Salinas—the ancient Didyme, or
“twin” island—see The Authoress of the Odyssey, pp. 195, 196. The two
Sirens doubtless were, as their name suggests, the whistling gusts, or
avalanches of air that at times descend without a moment’s warning from
the two lofty mountains of Salinas—as also from all high points in the
neighbourhood.]
[103] [ See Admiral Smyth on the currents in the Straits of Messina,
quoted in “The Authoress of the Odyssey,” p. 197.]
[104] [ In the islands of Favognana and Marettimo off Trapani I have
seen men fish exactly as here described. They chew bread into a paste
and throw it into the sea to attract the fish, which they then spear.
No line is used.]
[105] [ The writer evidently regards Ulysses as on a coast that looked
East at no great distance south of the Straits of Messina somewhere,
say, near Tauromenium, now Taormina.]
[106] [ Surely there must be a line missing here to tell us that the
keel and mast were carried down into Charybdis. Besides, the aorist
{Greek} in its present surrounding is perplexing. I have translated it
as though it were an imperfect; I see Messrs. Butcher and Lang
translate it as a pluperfect, but surely Charybdis was in the act of
sucking down the water when Ulysses arrived.]
[107] [ I suppose the passage within brackets to have been an
afterthought but to have been written by the same hand as the rest of
the poem. I suppose xii. 103 to have been also added by the writer when
she decided on sending Ulysses back to Charybdis. The simile suggests
the hand of the wife or daughter of a magistrate who had often seen her
father come in cross and tired.]
[108] [ Gr. πολυδαίδαλος. This puts coined money out of the question,
but nevertheless implies that the gold had been worked into ornaments
of some kind.]
[109] [ I suppose Teiresias’ prophecy of bk. xi. 114-120 had made no
impression on Ulysses. More probably the prophecy was an afterthought,
intercalated, as I have already said, by the authoress when she changed
her scheme.]
[110] [ A male writer would have made Ulysses say, not “may you give
satisfaction to your wives,” but “may your wives give satisfaction to
you.”]
[111] [ See note [64].]
[112] [ The land was in reality the shallow inlet, now the salt works
of S. Cusumano—the neighbourhood of Trapani and Mt. Eryx being made to
do double duty, both as Scheria and Ithaca. Hence the necessity for
making Ulysses set out after dark, fall instantly into a profound
sleep, and wake up on a morning so foggy that he could not see anything
till the interviews between Neptune and Jove and between Ulysses and
Minerva should have given the audience time to accept the situation.
See illustrations and map near the end of bks. v. and vi.
respectively.]
[113] [ This cave, which is identifiable with singular completeness, is
now called the “grotta del toro,” probably a corruption of “tesoro,”
for it is held to contain a treasure. See The Authoress of the Odyssey,
pp. 167-170.]
[114] [ Probably they would.]
[115] [ Then it had a shallow shelving bottom.]
[116] [ Doubtless the road would pass the harbour in Odyssean times as
it passes the salt works now; indeed, if there is to be a road at all
there is no other level ground which it could take. See map above
referred to.]
[117] [ The rock at the end of the Northern harbour of Trapani, to
which I suppose the writer of the “Odyssey” to be here referring, still
bears the name Malconsiglio—“the rock of evil counsel.” There is a
legend that it was a ship of Turkish pirates who were intending to
attack Trapani, but the “Madonna di Trapani” crushed them under this
rock just as they were coming into port. My friend Cavaliere
Giannitrapani of Trapani told me that his father used to tell him when
he was a boy that if he would drop exactly three drops of oil on to the
water near the rock, he would see the ship still at the bottom. The
legend is evidently a Christianised version of the Odyssean story,
while the name supplies the additional detail that the disaster
happened in consequence of an evil counsel.]
[118] [ It would seem then that the ship had got all the way back from
Ithaca in about a quarter of an hour.]
[119] [ And may we not add “and also to prevent his recognising that he
was only in the place where he had met Nausicaa two days earlier.”]
[120] [ All this is to excuse the entire absence of Minerva from books
ix.-xii., which I suppose had been written already, before the
authoress had determined on making Minerva so prominent a character.]
[121] [ We have met with this somewhat lame attempt to cover the
writer’s change of scheme at the end of bk. vi.]
[122] [ I take the following from The Authoress of the Odyssey, p. 167.
“It is clear from the text that there were two [caves] not one, but
some one has enclosed in brackets the two lines in which the second
cave is mentioned, I presume because he found himself puzzled by having
a second cave sprung upon him when up to this point he had only been
told of one.
“I venture to think that if he had known the ground he would not have
been puzzled, for there are two caves, distant about 80 or 100 yards
from one another.” The cave in which Ulysses hid his treasure is, as I
have already said, identifiable with singular completeness. The other
cave presents no special features, neither in the poem nor in nature.]
[123] [ There is no attempt to disguise the fact that Penelope had long
given encouragement to the suitors. The only defence set up is that she
did not really mean to encourage them. Would it not have been wiser to
have tried a little discouragement?]
[124] [ See map near the end of bk. vi. _Ruccazzù dei corvi_ of course
means “the rock of the ravens.” Both name and ravens still exist.]
[125] [ See The Authoress of the Odyssey, pp. 140, 141. The real reason
for sending Telemachus to Pylos and Lacedaemon was that the authoress
might get Helen of Troy into her poem. He was sent at the only point in
the story at which he could be sent, so he must have gone then or not
at all.]
[126] [ The site I assign to Eumaeus’s hut, close to the _Ruccazzù dei
corvi_, is about 2,000 feet above the sea, and commands an extensive
view.]
[127] [ Sandals such as Eumaeus was making are still worn in the
Abruzzi and elsewhere. An oblong piece of leather forms the sole: holes
are cut at the four corners, and through these holes leathern straps
are passed, which are bound round the foot and cross-gartered up the
calf.]
[128] [ See note [75] : ]
[129] [ Telemachus like many another good young man seems to expect
every one to fetch and carry for him.]
[130] [ “Il.” vi. 288. The store room was fragrant because it was made
of cedar wood. See “Il.” xxiv. 192.]
[131] [ cf. “Il.” vi. 289 and 293-296. The dress was kept at the bottom
of the chest as one that would only be wanted on the greatest
occasions; but surely the marriage of Hermione and of Megapenthes (bk,
iv. _ad init_.) might have induced Helen to wear it on the preceding
evening, in which case it could hardly have got back. We find no hint
here of Megapenthes’ recent marriage.]
[132] [ See note [83].]
[133] [ cf. “Od.” xi. 196, etc.]
[134] [ The names Syra and Ortygia, on which island a great part of the
Doric Syracuse was originally built, suggest that even in Odyssean
times there was a prehistoric Syracuse, the existence of which was
known to the writer of the poem.]
[135] [ Literally “where are the turnings of the sun.” Assuming, as we
may safely do, that the Syra and Ortygia of the “Odyssey” refer to
Syracuse, it is the fact that not far to the South of these places the
land turns sharply round, so that mariners following the coast would
find the sun upon the other side of their ship to that on which they’d
had it hitherto.
Mr. A. S. Griffith has kindly called my attention to Herod iv. 42,
where, speaking of the circumnavigation of Africa by Phoenician
mariners under Necos, he writes:
“On their return they declared—I for my part do not believe them, but
perhaps others may—that in sailing round Libya [i.e. Africa] they had
the sun upon their right hand. In this way was the extent of Libya
first discovered.
“I take it that Eumaeus was made to have come from Syracuse because the
writer thought she rather ought to have made something happen at
Syracuse during her account of the voyages of Ulysses. She could not,
however, break his long drift from Charybdis to the island of
Pantellaria; she therefore resolved to make it up to Syracuse in
another way.”
Modern excavations establish the existence of two and only two
pre-Dorian communities at Syracuse; they were, so Dr. Orsi informed me,
at Plemmirio and Cozzo Pantano. See The Authoress of the Odyssey, pp.
211-213.]
[136] [ This harbour is again evidently the harbour in which Ulysses
had landed, i.e. the harbour that is now the salt works of S.
Cusumano.]
[137] [ This never can have been anything but very niggardly pay for
some eight or nine days’ service. I suppose the crew were to consider
the pleasure of having had a trip to Pylos as a set off. There is no
trace of the dinner as having been actually given, either on the
following or any other morning.]
[138] [ No hawk can tear its prey while it is on the wing.]
[139] [ The text is here apparently corrupt, and will not make sense as
it stands. I follow Messrs. Butcher & Lang in omitting line 101.]
[140] [ i.e. to be milked, as in South Italian and Sicilian towns at
the present day.]
[141] [ The butchering and making ready the carcases took place partly
in the outer yard and partly in the open part of the inner court.]
[142] [ These words cannot mean that it would be afternoon soon after
they were spoken. Ulysses and Eumaeus reached the town which was “some
way off” (xvii. 25) in time for the suitor’s early meal (xvii. 170 and
176) say at ten or eleven o’ clock. The context of the rest of the book
shows this. Eumaeus and Ulysses, therefore, cannot have started later
than eight or nine, and Eumaeus’s words must be taken as an
exaggeration for the purpose of making Ulysses bestir himself.]
[143] [ I imagine the fountain to have been somewhere about where the
church of the _Madonna di Trapani_ now stands, and to have been fed
with water from what is now called the Fontana Diffali on Mt. Eryx.]
[144] [ From this and other passages in the “Odyssey” it appears that
we are in an age anterior to the use of coined money—an age when
cauldrons, tripods, swords, cattle, chattels of all kinds, measures of
corn, wine, or oil, etc. etc., not to say pieces of gold, silver,
bronze, or even iron, wrought more or less, but unstamped, were the
nearest approach to a currency that had as yet been reached.]
[145] [ Gr. ἐς μέσσον.]
[146] [ I correct these proofs abroad and am not within reach of
Hesiod, but surely this passage suggests acquaintance with the Works
and Ways, though it by no means compels it.]
[147] [ It would seem as though Eurynome and Euryclea were the same
person. See note 156]
[148] [ It is plain, therefore, that Iris was commonly accepted as the
messenger of the gods, though our authoress will never permit her to
fetch or carry for any one.]
[149] [ i.e. the doorway leading from the inner to the outer court.]
[150] [See note 156]
[151] [ These, I imagine, must have been in the open part of the inner
courtyard, where the maids also stood, and threw the light of their
torches into the covered cloister that ran all round it. The smoke
would otherwise have been intolerable.]
[152] [ Translation very uncertain; vide Liddell and Scott, under
{Greek}]
[153] [ See photo on opposite page.]
[154] [ cf. “Il.” ii. 184, and 217, 218. An additional and well-marked
feature being wanted to convince Penelope, the writer has taken the
hunched shoulders of Thersites (who is mentioned immediately after
Eurybates in the “Iliad”) and put them on to Eurybates’ back.]
[155] [ This is how geese are now fed in Sicily, at any rate in summer,
when the grass is all burnt up. I have never seen them grazing.]
[156] [ Lower down (line 143) Euryclea says it was herself that had
thrown the cloak over Ulysses—for the plural should not be taken as
implying more than one person. The writer is evidently still
fluctuating between Euryclea and Eurynome as the name for the old
nurse. She probably originally meant to call her Euryclea, but finding
it not immediately easy to make Euryclea scan in xvii. 495, she hastily
called her Eurynome, intending either to alter this name later or to
change the earlier Euryclea’s into Eurynome. She then drifted in to
Eurynome as convenience further directed, still nevertheless hankering
after Euryclea, till at last she found that the path of least
resistance would lie in the direction of making Eurynome and Euryclea
two persons. Therefore in xxiii. 289-292 both Eurynome and “the nurse”
(who can be none other than Euryclea) come on together. I do not say
that this is feminine, but it is not unfeminine.]
[157] [ See note [156]]
[158] [ This, I take it, was immediately in front of the main entrance
of the inner courtyard into the body of the house.]
[159] [ This is the only allusion to Sardinia in either “Iliad” or
“Odyssey.”]
[160] [ The normal translation of the Greek word would be “holding
back,” “curbing,” “restraining,” but I cannot think that the writer
meant this—she must have been using the word in its other sense of
“having,” “holding,” “keeping,” “maintaining.”]
[161] [ I have vainly tried to realise the construction of the
fastening here described.]
[162] [ See plan of Ulysses’ house in the appendix. It is evident that
the open part of the court had no flooring but the natural soil.]
[163] [ See plan of Ulysses’ house, and note [175].]
[164] [ i.e. the door that led into the body of the house.]
[165] [ This was, no doubt, the little table that was set for Ulysses,
“Od.” xx. 259.
Surely the difficulty of this passage has been overrated. I suppose the
iron part of the axe to have been wedged into the handle, or bound
securely to it—the handle being half buried in the ground. The axe
would be placed edgeways towards the archer, and he would have to shoot
his arrow through the hole into which the handle was fitted when the
axe was in use. Twelve axes were placed in a row all at the same
height, all exactly in front of one another, all edgeways to Ulysses
whose arrow passed through all the holes from the first onward. I
cannot see how the Greek can bear any other interpretation, the words
being, {Greek}
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Next - The Odyssey - 25
  • Parts
  • The Odyssey - 01
    Total number of words is 5064
    Total number of unique words is 1335
    49.7 of words are in the 2000 most common words
    68.3 of words are in the 5000 most common words
    76.1 of words are in the 8000 most common words
    Each bar represents the percentage of words per 1000 most common words.
  • The Odyssey - 02
    Total number of words is 5438
    Total number of unique words is 1138
    59.5 of words are in the 2000 most common words
    76.3 of words are in the 5000 most common words
    81.6 of words are in the 8000 most common words
    Each bar represents the percentage of words per 1000 most common words.
  • The Odyssey - 03
    Total number of words is 5301
    Total number of unique words is 1194
    57.0 of words are in the 2000 most common words
    72.3 of words are in the 5000 most common words
    80.1 of words are in the 8000 most common words
    Each bar represents the percentage of words per 1000 most common words.
  • The Odyssey - 04
    Total number of words is 5434
    Total number of unique words is 1223
    55.8 of words are in the 2000 most common words
    73.3 of words are in the 5000 most common words
    80.1 of words are in the 8000 most common words
    Each bar represents the percentage of words per 1000 most common words.
  • The Odyssey - 05
    Total number of words is 5388
    Total number of unique words is 1240
    55.6 of words are in the 2000 most common words
    71.8 of words are in the 5000 most common words
    79.0 of words are in the 8000 most common words
    Each bar represents the percentage of words per 1000 most common words.
  • The Odyssey - 06
    Total number of words is 5491
    Total number of unique words is 1211
    56.2 of words are in the 2000 most common words
    74.2 of words are in the 5000 most common words
    80.6 of words are in the 8000 most common words
    Each bar represents the percentage of words per 1000 most common words.
  • The Odyssey - 07
    Total number of words is 5297
    Total number of unique words is 1249
    55.3 of words are in the 2000 most common words
    72.6 of words are in the 5000 most common words
    80.3 of words are in the 8000 most common words
    Each bar represents the percentage of words per 1000 most common words.
  • The Odyssey - 08
    Total number of words is 5367
    Total number of unique words is 1288
    53.9 of words are in the 2000 most common words
    72.4 of words are in the 5000 most common words
    80.9 of words are in the 8000 most common words
    Each bar represents the percentage of words per 1000 most common words.
  • The Odyssey - 09
    Total number of words is 5579
    Total number of unique words is 1209
    54.3 of words are in the 2000 most common words
    72.8 of words are in the 5000 most common words
    80.3 of words are in the 8000 most common words
    Each bar represents the percentage of words per 1000 most common words.
  • The Odyssey - 10
    Total number of words is 5553
    Total number of unique words is 1137
    57.3 of words are in the 2000 most common words
    72.7 of words are in the 5000 most common words
    79.8 of words are in the 8000 most common words
    Each bar represents the percentage of words per 1000 most common words.
  • The Odyssey - 11
    Total number of words is 5480
    Total number of unique words is 1300
    53.6 of words are in the 2000 most common words
    70.7 of words are in the 5000 most common words
    77.3 of words are in the 8000 most common words
    Each bar represents the percentage of words per 1000 most common words.
  • The Odyssey - 12
    Total number of words is 5447
    Total number of unique words is 1246
    53.4 of words are in the 2000 most common words
    71.2 of words are in the 5000 most common words
    79.1 of words are in the 8000 most common words
    Each bar represents the percentage of words per 1000 most common words.
  • The Odyssey - 13
    Total number of words is 5467
    Total number of unique words is 1238
    56.6 of words are in the 2000 most common words
    73.2 of words are in the 5000 most common words
    81.5 of words are in the 8000 most common words
    Each bar represents the percentage of words per 1000 most common words.
  • The Odyssey - 14
    Total number of words is 5435
    Total number of unique words is 1154
    59.0 of words are in the 2000 most common words
    74.5 of words are in the 5000 most common words
    81.8 of words are in the 8000 most common words
    Each bar represents the percentage of words per 1000 most common words.
  • The Odyssey - 15
    Total number of words is 5459
    Total number of unique words is 1138
    59.9 of words are in the 2000 most common words
    76.5 of words are in the 5000 most common words
    82.9 of words are in the 8000 most common words
    Each bar represents the percentage of words per 1000 most common words.
  • The Odyssey - 16
    Total number of words is 5406
    Total number of unique words is 1118
    60.0 of words are in the 2000 most common words
    74.5 of words are in the 5000 most common words
    81.9 of words are in the 8000 most common words
    Each bar represents the percentage of words per 1000 most common words.
  • The Odyssey - 17
    Total number of words is 5359
    Total number of unique words is 1130
    59.7 of words are in the 2000 most common words
    75.8 of words are in the 5000 most common words
    82.8 of words are in the 8000 most common words
    Each bar represents the percentage of words per 1000 most common words.
  • The Odyssey - 18
    Total number of words is 5399
    Total number of unique words is 1242
    56.0 of words are in the 2000 most common words
    72.6 of words are in the 5000 most common words
    80.6 of words are in the 8000 most common words
    Each bar represents the percentage of words per 1000 most common words.
  • The Odyssey - 19
    Total number of words is 5353
    Total number of unique words is 1212
    56.1 of words are in the 2000 most common words
    72.6 of words are in the 5000 most common words
    79.8 of words are in the 8000 most common words
    Each bar represents the percentage of words per 1000 most common words.
  • The Odyssey - 20
    Total number of words is 5400
    Total number of unique words is 1130
    56.4 of words are in the 2000 most common words
    75.4 of words are in the 5000 most common words
    81.8 of words are in the 8000 most common words
    Each bar represents the percentage of words per 1000 most common words.
  • The Odyssey - 21
    Total number of words is 5310
    Total number of unique words is 1090
    60.3 of words are in the 2000 most common words
    76.4 of words are in the 5000 most common words
    82.1 of words are in the 8000 most common words
    Each bar represents the percentage of words per 1000 most common words.
  • The Odyssey - 22
    Total number of words is 5410
    Total number of unique words is 1247
    53.4 of words are in the 2000 most common words
    72.2 of words are in the 5000 most common words
    79.2 of words are in the 8000 most common words
    Each bar represents the percentage of words per 1000 most common words.
  • The Odyssey - 23
    Total number of words is 4900
    Total number of unique words is 1372
    48.5 of words are in the 2000 most common words
    65.5 of words are in the 5000 most common words
    73.4 of words are in the 8000 most common words
    Each bar represents the percentage of words per 1000 most common words.
  • The Odyssey - 24
    Total number of words is 4758
    Total number of unique words is 1256
    47.1 of words are in the 2000 most common words
    65.2 of words are in the 5000 most common words
    72.8 of words are in the 8000 most common words
    Each bar represents the percentage of words per 1000 most common words.
  • The Odyssey - 25
    Total number of words is 1114
    Total number of unique words is 477
    62.6 of words are in the 2000 most common words
    76.6 of words are in the 5000 most common words
    83.3 of words are in the 8000 most common words
    Each bar represents the percentage of words per 1000 most common words.