Όδυσσεύς (fr. 34)

165

For άλίσκομαι used of a potential lover being ‘caught,’ cf. Aeschin. 1.195;
PL Smp. 184a; Dover 1978. 87-8. For the pursuit and ‘capture’ of a lover gen-
erally, see Dover 1978. 81-96.
14 φράσον γάρ Cf. Antiph. fr. 49.1 (same metrical position; seeming-
ly also a rhetorical question); Cratin. fr. 40; Amphis fr. 36.1; Nicostr. fr. 4.1
(φράζε).
15 δαμάζεται Cf. on fr. 6.2 and on χειρουμένη (16).
16 Perhaps a mock-tragic line; cf. A. Ch. 694 τόξοις πρόσωθεν εύσκόποις
χειρουμένη.
έφθοΐς προσώποις ιχθύων Cf. on fr. 31.2. Bers 1974. 44 treats έφθοϊς
προσώποις ιχθύων as an example of enallage, but this understanding of the
phrase is not necessary; fr. 31.1-2 τμητόν μέγα / γλαύκου πρόσωπον is similar.
χειρουμένη Normally in the middle (contrast Ar. V. 443), the verb is
commonly used of physical assaults and capturing both in the tragedians
(normally of persons; e.g. A. Ch. 694; S. OC 903; Ph. 92; E. El. 1168; IT 359)
and the historians (normally of states or armies; e.g. Hdt. 1.169.2; 4.103.3; Th.
1.122.2; 3.11.3; X. HG 2.4.26; Ages. 1.20), although it need not always have a
violent connotation (e.g. Men. fr. 821). Here it does not refer to a physical
attack, but continues the undercurrent of violence begun with άλίσκεται (13),
δαμάζεται (15), and possibly ώθισμός (7) and πνιγμός (8).
17-18 These two lines involve some sort of word-play, conceivably ob-
scene, but 17 is difficult to make sense of as it stands, even if the precise
corruption cannot be pinpointed. Even if the wording remains uncertain, the
sense may have been along the lines of ‘driving the (best, choicest?) mor-
sels past the gates (of the mouth/body?), even a free-loading nature (which
otherwise would have kept grabbing for more?) is driven to capitulate’; this
would thus be a high-flown description that continues the overtones of martial
violence in the previous couplet.
18 άσύμβολον κλίνειν τ’ αναγκάζει φύσιν For άσύμβολον, see on fr.
10.2. κλίνειν evokes a symposiastic context, but is perhaps used in the martial
sense ‘make (a foe) give way’, as at e. g. Η. II. 5.37.
The various interpretations of the line are all problematic. ‘And makes
it feast Dame Nature as a guest’ (thus Edmonds); in addition to the obscure
referent of ‘it’, άσύμβολον is not a complimentary term and does not mean
‘guest’. Henderson 1991. 5 (cf. §451, where his translation of άσύμβολον has
the same failing as Edmonds’) believes that φύσις refers to the genitals61 (cf.

61 His assertion of the same meaning at Alex. 242.8, where he echoes Edmonds ad
loc., is probably equally mistaken.