The Scholia on the Iliad are the anonymous notes on Homer's Iliad written in the margins and between the lines of medieval manuscripts, above all the tenth-century codex at Venice known as the Venetus A, with a number of older notes from papyri. They are compilations: Byzantine copyists abridged and combined the commentaries of ancient grammarians, so that one line may carry several notes of different ages, sometimes disagreeing. A subscription in the Venetus A names four of its sources: Aristonicus on Aristarchus' critical signs, Didymus on his readings, Herodian on accents and Nicanor on punctuation.
Through these the scholia report the readings of Zenodotus, Aristophanes of Byzantium and Aristarchus, and the lines they rejected. Other notes explain the poet's art, defend the order of the story and supply myth, genealogy and geography, and some come from Porphyry's Homeric questions. The collection is arranged by the twenty-four books of the poem, one part to each, and ranges from rare words and forms to the handling of a scene: why the poem opens on wrath, the report that the night-raid of Book X was composed apart, the Achaean wall as the poet's invention, the Trojans' numbers reckoned from their watchfires, and why the poem ends with Hector's funeral.
Scholia on the Iliad and Odyssey Scholia on the Iliad: summary and contents (PDF)
Scholia on the Iliad and Odyssey Scholia on the Iliad: summary and contents (Markdown)
Contents
-
Αʹ Book I
Why Homer opens on wrath, so ill-omened a word, and why he begins from the last year of the war are the first questions in these notes on Book I of the Iliad. Nestor's speech prompts an excursus on the Lapiths and Centaurs, with Porphyry's list of sixty Lapiths, and Zenodotus's variant is recorded where Zeus goes up to sleep beside Hera. A subscription names the sources: Aristonicus's critical signs, Didymus, Herodian and Nicanor.
-
Βʹ Book II
Trachis, the Titaresius flowing over the Peneus like oil, and Prothoos's Magnesians head these scholia on Book II, in a run of notes on the Catalogue of Ships. The portent at Aulis brings Chaeris's accent for the sparrow and Zenodotus's reading for the chicks' cry, and the Trojan Catalogue brings notes on the Carian who went to war in gold like a girl, on Sarpedon, and on the eddying Xanthus.
-
Γʹ Book III
A clamour like cranes for the Trojans, set against the Achaeans' silent advance, is the first contrast these scholia on Book III draw between the two armies. Antenor's memory of hosting Menelaus and Odysseus as envoys, and of saving them from murder, brings the story of a leopard skin hung at his door so that his house was spared at the sack. Agamemnon's demand for Helen after Paris vanishes, met by Trojan silence, is where the comment stops.
-
Δʹ Book IV
That the aegis is Zeus's weapon, not Athena's as later poets made it, is argued in damaged notes on Book IV that also touch on Nestor's orders to his charioteers. The commentary proper follows the gods in council with Zeus, the treacherous wounding of Menelaus and the Trojans arming again, with a long note on the form edyn, and takes the unwounded man whom Athena leads through the fighting as a spectator the poet invents for the battle.
-
Εʹ Book V
Why the first great feats go to Diomedes and not to Ajax, the second hero of the Catalogue, is debated in the opening scholia on Book V. When the wounded Aphrodite falls into Dione's lap, the poet is found borrowing old tales of gods who suffered at men's hands, among them Ares bound by Otus and Ephialtes, and the line in which Ares, healed, sits exulting beside Zeus is one that Zenodotus and Aristarchus reject.
-
Ϛʹ Book VI
In Book VI, Hecuba's meeting with Hector, as she goes in to Laodice, draws notes on her trust in her son's courage and on two ways of accenting de k' autos. A papyrus note observes that hands are raised to the gods of the sky but the earth is struck to call those below. Hector's reproach of Paris, and the bowl of freedom he promises the gods once the Achaeans are driven from Troy, conclude the notes.
-
Ζʹ Book VII
Hector's challenge to single combat opens the scholia on Book VII of the Iliad, in a broken papyrus that lists genitives like martyros with examples from Pindar, Simonides and the Phineus of Aeschylus and of Sophocles. The drawing of lots in the helmet, shaken by Nestor, and the army's petition that the lot fall to Ajax, Diomedes or Agamemnon follow, and Zenodotus removes the line on the night's sleep.
-
Ηʹ Book VIII
Book VIII went by the name the Battle Cut Short, the scholia explain, since the poet curtails the story in sympathy with the Achaeans. Zenodotus is faulted for moving the daybreak so that Zeus's assembly of the gods falls late, and Nicanor explains the ground between the Achaean wall, the ditch and the ships. From the Trojan watchfires, fifty men at each, the notes reckon the Trojan citizens at some fifty thousand, since the allies sleep.
-
Θʹ Book IX
Book IX is headed the Entreaties because Agamemnon, on Nestor's advice, sends Phoenix, Odysseus and Ajax to entreat Achilles. Achilles' reply claims twelve cities taken by sea and eleven on land, prompting questions on why he left Sestos and Abydos alone and on how his words expose Agamemnon's ingratitude. Diomedes' call for Agamemnon himself to fight in the front rank at dawn brings the commentary to a close.
-
Ιʹ Book X
The rousing of the Achaean chiefs by night gives Book X its title; a report preserved in the scholia holds that Homer composed the book apart and that Peisistratus set it into the Iliad. Diomedes and Odysseus go out as scouts, and on the heron Athena sends them Aristotle's work on animals is cited. The Greeks, who call on a god as their guide before they act, are set against Dolon, who does not; a bath, a meal and wine poured to Athena round off the book.
-
ΙΑʹ Book XI
Nestor's tale of the raid on the Epeians of Elis survives in broken notes before a defence of the order of Book XI: Agamemnon's feats and the wounding of the best men come before the rout of the Achaeans. The rare word for the lower belly draws rival definitions from Dionysius Thrax, the physician Phylotimus, Aristarchus and Parmeniscus. Patroclus treats Eurypylus with a crushed root, which some identify as birthwort, and a note remarks that the poet knows no physician's regimen.
-
ΙΒʹ Book XII
The Achaean wall was the poet's own invention, built to make room for a battle at the wall itself: so the scholia on Book XII argue at the outset, while Patroclus still tends Eurypylus; Hellanicus is cited on how Patroclus came to join the expedition. The eagle on the left with a snake in its talons divides the readers over punctuation, and the Trojans pour through the gate behind Hector as the Danaans flee to the ships.
-
ΙΓʹ Book XIII
Only Zeus's turning away from Troy lets Poseidon enter the battle against an otherwise unstoppable Hector, the scholia on Book XIII explain. Othryoneus, who asks for Cassandra without bride-price, is read as a mercenary and a barbarian, and her title as fairest of Priam's daughters is reconciled with Laodice's, against the critics who gave the Iliad and the Odyssey to different poets. The cry of both armies rises to the upper air, which the notes take variously as the sky, the sun or the mountain-tops.
-
ΙΔʹ Book XIV
A papyrus set of notes on Zeus's list of loves, closed by a title that credits grammatical questions on this book to Apollodorus of Athens, precedes the main scholia on Book XIV. These defend the reading in which Nestor, though drinking, hears the shout of battle. Hera's offer of a footstool to Sleep raises Herodian's treatment of the form epischoies, and accent and punctuation occupy the notes on Ajax son of Oileus, swiftest in pursuit, with which the book finishes.
-
ΙΕʹ Book XV
The broken phrasing of the Trojans' flight back across the stakes and the ditch pictures a hard crossing, according to the opening scholia on Book XV. Hephaestus made the aegis for Zeus, not for Athena as later poets claim, and Aristarchus and Alexion disagree over how to read Apollo's shaking of it in the Achaeans' faces. Ajax spears the men Hector urges against the ships, and his words, that the light of war is in our hands, are read two ways according to the spelling of meilichiēi.
-
ΙϚʹ Book XVI
Homer's formulas for moving from one scene to the next are listed as Book XVI turns from the fight round the ship of Protesilaus to Patroclus weeping before Achilles. Patroclus drives the Trojans from the ships like wind clearing cloud from a mountain, lines judged apt in this place but out of place in Book VIII. Hector's words over the dead Patroclus are judged a coward's, and the immortal horses are traced to Poseidon's wedding gift to Peleus.
-
ΙΖʹ Book XVII
The middle door of a house, dividing the men's rooms from the women's, is the subject of one of the broken papyrus notes on Book XVII. In the fight over Patroclus's body, Menelaus's appeal to the Argive leaders is set against Hector's rebuke of his allies, to the Greeks' credit. As the mass of the Achaeans flees and drops its armour, the poet is shown sparing their shame, while the two Ajaxes hold firm over the body.
-
ΙΗʹ Book XVIII
The poet varies the scene by taking us back to Achilles' tent while the battle rages like fire, a note on the first line of Book XVIII observes. Achilles' lament draws notes on his promise to Menoetius and on his vow not to bury his friend before he brings Hector's head and arms. Thetis leaps from Olympus like a hawk with the armour Hephaestus has made, and the subscription adds that Aristonicus's signs came with a short commentary.
-
ΙΘʹ Book XIX
How readily Homer's heroes weep is remarked when Thetis, bringing the new armour at dawn, finds Achilles lying over Patroclus's body in Book XIX. Odysseus, as peacemaker, has Agamemnon swear before the army that he never touched Briseis, and urges a royal feast. The horse Xanthus foretells Achilles' death by Apollo in Paris's shape, and because the Erinyes stop his voice, a note argues, the line in which Hera gave him speech should go.
-
Κʹ Book XX
Homer addresses only five heroes in the second person, Achilles among them, and Apollo among the gods, observes the first note on Book XX. Demetrius of Scepsis is cited on the rise in the plain, and Themis calls the gods to assembly. Aeneas's lineage brings notes on Erichthonius's mares running over the corn and on Ganymede, taken by the gods to pour Zeus's wine, not for love, and Achilles' horses, trampling the dead, are compared whole to whole with oxen treading barley.
-
ΚΑʹ Book XXI
Stesichorus and Phrynichus's Phoenician Women are quoted on words for evening in a damaged papyrus on Book XXI, which also discusses the ford of the Xanthus. Achilles' flight from the river, likened to a black hunting eagle, prompts a dispute over that phrase: Aristotle reads 'black-boned', Aristarchus reads otherwise, and the scholiast prefers the article. As the Trojans crowd into the city, Antimachus and Rhianus are cited for the reading that the gates, not the city, were filled.
-
ΚΒʹ Book XXII
Fled into the city like fawns, the Trojans cool their sweat on the battlements in the first lines of Book XXII, where Hector dies; a note insists that the fawns belong to the flight, not to the sweat. In the chase round the walls Megaclides calls the duel a fiction, and Diocles explains the fourth arrival at the springs. Andromache's vow to burn Hector's clothes, since his body is not to be laid out in them, completes the commentary.
-
ΚΓʹ Book XXIII
Achilles leads the Myrmidons' mourning for Patroclus as Book XXIII begins; a papyrus note cites Tryphon, and a later one traces ptolin to the Cypriots of Salamis. At the chariot race Idomeneus watches from a height and quarrels with Ajax son of Oileus, and Chamaeleon is cited on the horse with a moon-shaped mark. Achilles gives Agamemnon the javelin prize uncontested, for Talthybius to carry to the king's tent.
-
ΚΔʹ Book XXIV
The games break up as Book XXIV begins, and its scholia gather the senses of agōn, among them the Boeotian use for a market-place. At Priam's libation a note recalls that he would die at this altar of Zeus Herkeios when the city fell, and the eagle sent to him is read as an omen. Menecrates' explanation of why the poem stops at Hector's funeral is recorded, with a variant line that brings on an Amazon.