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The Beginnings of Greek Allegory

Author(s): J. TateSource: The Classical Review, Vol. 41, No. 6 (Dec., 1927), pp. 214-215Published by: Cambridge University Press on behalf of The Classical Association

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214 THE CLASSICAL REVIEW

gods. Agamemnon's first guilt was his

setting out upon it. The eagles would

surely displease Artemis from themoment of beginning their pursuit.That Agamemnon was still at Argos isno objection. Even if this very omen,which should have stayed him, did infact remove his last hesitation and

speed him on, he had already enteredthe way of guilt. The omen is a warn-

ing to withdraw while yet he can. The

anger of Artemis is to be shown at

Aulis, where she will demand the sacri-fice of Iphigenia as a condition of Greeksuccess.

It is to me strange that editors do notsee in this omen of Aeschylus the grandflowering of the germ Z 57-60. Aga-memnon's wish gives form to the portentin the drama. Verse 122 is still withinthe direct influence of this passage ofthe Iliad; in this we see the twain sonsof Atreus, two in temper, but Agamem-non dominating his milder brother.

Furthermore, we see now why Arte-mis is especially concerned. The legendascribed to her the delay at Aulis. But

what was the reason ? Artemis was thegoddess of childbirth. Agamemnon's

T ILTL~7LS

TE'Kb,YOLC~0Z'v 5X pov

Xetp'g 0'yLTzp•pac,

/h?17'6v Trva -yaro-ypL 1-trT7p

Ko0povh6vmaOpotL,-1A' 8Sr6yot

is specifically and atrociously outrageousto Artemis. It was not merely an in-

auspicious expression of passion, but its

execution is involved in the purpose of

Agamemnon from the first.How well, then, the eagles devouring

the pregnant hares symbolise Agamem-non and Menelaus in the Trojan war!The plural meaning of Xaylivav ryvvavis no longer troublesome. The Trojanwomen and their unborn children were

PXa36ira XotoLiowv pozcuov in the fullsense of

Xo••oBov,for Troy almost

escaped. Every detail in the omen andin the interpretation fits perfectly,though we cannot tell how Calchasknew the exact form that the anger ofArtemis would take. That is, in fact,

an independent question, and e'o -rof

There is for us here an instructive

example of Aeschylus' relation toHomer. Aeschylus, most people have

thought, is a lesser poet than Homer.

Perhaps. He is undoubtedly less under-stood and appreciated. He is a verydifferent poet. Rarely does he quoteHomer. But repeatedly Aeschylus finds

in the simple Homeric narrative a sug-gestion which, transformed by his re-

flection and imagination, is given againto us in a beautiful development, originalin every sense possible to nearly all

literature, art, discovery and invention.Literature cannot be understood exceptin its relations. Far more study of

sources and relations is needed for

Aeschylus.HENRY S. DAWSON.

THE BEGINNINGS OF GREEK ALLEGORY.

WAs Theagenes of Rhegium reallythe first Homeric allegorist, as the his-

torians of Greek allegorical interpreta-tion habitually assert ? It is true that,

according to Porphyry on the Theomachy

(Iliad XX. 67), allegory-as a mode of

defending apparently blasphemous pas-sages-dates from Theagenes, 'who was

the first to write about Homer,' and

who is referredby

Tatian(ad

Graec. 48)to the time of King Cambyses (529-522 B.C.).'

But the practice-at any rate in an

embryonic form-can, I think, be tracedback to Pherecydes of Syros (born notmuch later than 600 B.C.). That he

read some kind of new meaning intoHomer would appear from Origen (c.Celsum VI. 42; in Diels, F. der V. II.,

pp. 203 f.), who says: 'Celsus says thatthe words of Zeus to Hera (Iliad XV. 18)are the words of God to matter, and

that they darkly hint that matter beingoriginally in a confused state, God took

I Schrader (Porfhyrii Quaest. Hoom.,p. 384),followed by Gomperz (G.T. I., p. 574), conjec-tures that he defended Homer against strictures

emanating from the school of Pythagoras orthat of Xenophanes. Schrader also (loc. cil.)

points out rightly that the scholiast does not

purport to give any samples of Theagenes' in-

terpretations; Leaf (ad loc.) seems of a different

opinion.

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THE CLASSICAL REVIEW 215

it and bound it by certain proportionsand ordered it. And he says that

Pherecydes, having thus understood' theverses of Homer, said that beneath this

region, Earth, there is the region Tar-tarus, guarded by the Harpies and

Thyella, whither Zeus thrusts downthose of the gods who are rebellious'

(with reference to Iliad I. 59o).Without putting too strict an inter-

pretation on this passage, it is yet clearthat we have here two offending pas-sages of Homer receiving a new andharmless significance by being taken

up into a new cosmology.2 As with

so many philosophers much later thanPherecydes, the process of reading doc-trine into the myths goes on side byside with the process of remouldingand extending the myths for one's own

purposes. Probably it is in this twofold

practice that we should look for the

origin of allegorical interpretation. The

early philosophers who expressed theirdoctrines in mythical language, whichis to be taken as symbolical and alle-

gorical, may well have been the first to

interpret the poetic traditions as thoughthey were conscious allegories.

Some confirmation for this view isafforded by Greek writers on allegory.Maximus of Tyre (IV. 4, ed. Hobein)mentions Pherecydes and Heraclitus as

having expressed philosophic truth bymeans of mythology, which proves (hethinks) that Homer and Hesiod did the

same thing. Perhaps what it does proveis that Pherecydes and Heraclitus (likeMaximus) thought that this was whatHomer and Hesiod had done. 'Hera-

clitus,' the Homeric allegorist (c. 24),justifies allegorical interpretation by asimilar reference to Heraclitus and Em-

pedocles. These philosophers certainlyexpressed themselves in myth and

enigma;3 they gave mythology a new

application, and therefore in some degreea new interpretation. But did theyexplicitly regard the mythical traditionsas allegorical, and interpret them fromthat standpoint ? Pherecydes appar-

ently did. Whether Heraclitus did soor not is not quite clear;4 the Heracli-teans in appealing to allegory may havebeen following their master's example(see e.g. Plato, Theaet. 152e). Empe-docles is also a doubtful case, unless webelieve the scholiast on Plato's Gorgias493, where an allegorical interpretationis ascribed to him.

In any case, the probability is that

allegorical interpretation did not springsuddenly from the brain of the gram-marian Theagenes.5 More probably itgrew up gradually with the gradualgrowth of the more conscious, morescientific use of mythical language to

express religious and philosophic specu-lations. J. TATE.

1 My case is supported by Diels' suggestion

inrovoqo-avraallegorically interpreted) for von-o-avra.

2 Pherecydes also indulged in the fancifuletymology which was the faithful handmaid ofallegory in later times. Diogenes Laertius

(I. 119) quotes a sentence from himwhich turns

Kpdvovnto Xpdvov,and apparently derives yifromyepar cf Zeller,Pre-SocraticPhilosofiky I.,p. 9o,n. 3). Xpo'vov,hatever ts meaning,issomething moredefinite than the father of Zeus;and the change is an allegoryin the Greeksense (see Plutarch, , 363d).

3 Cf. Burnet, E.G.P., p. 217: Empedocles'verse is not much harder to interpret philo-sophically than Heraclitus'prose.

4 Comparefr. 94 (Diels) withIliad XIX. 418.In fr. 32 (Diels) he evidently uses etymology (a

play on supposed derivation of Zeus from i~jv).5 The fact that Anaxagoras (Diog. Laert.

II. ii) is stated to have been 'the first todeclare that the poetry of Homer is on thesubject of virtue and justice,' and Metrodorus,his disciple, the first to work out the suggestionin an allegorical system, leaves us with thesuspicion that the work of Theagenes cannothave been of great importance. He probablyconfined himself to the obvious interpretationsof e.g. Apollo, Hephaestus, Poseidon, in theTheomachy.

NOTES ON CICERO'S LETTERS TO ATTICUS, BOOK II.I. 2. ALIQUID NOSTRIS REBUS LUCIS

ADFERRE. Tyrrell and Purser under-stand this as referring to ' lustre,' '6clat';but lucem adferre is used of bringingsuccour or relief in imp. P. 12. 33 (tan-tamne unius hominis incredibilis ac diuina

uirtus tam breui tempore ucem adferre reipublicae potuit ?), and there seems to beno reason for supposing that the phrasehere bears a different meaning. Cicero

hopes that his pamphlet, dwelling onthe success achieved in 63 B.c. by the

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