Studies on Homer and the Homeric Age, Vol. 3 of 3

This supposition accords better with the fact of his having had influence sufficient to cause the refusal of the original demand for the restitution of Helen, peacefully made by the Greek embassy; and the endurance of so much evil by his country on his behalf.

It explains the fact of his having had a palace to himself on Pergamus; a distinction which he shared with Hector only[470 - Il. vi. 313, 317, 370.], for the married sons as well as daughters of Priam in general slept in apartments within the palace of their father[471 - Ibid. 242-50.]. And also it accords with his original expedition, which was evidently an affair of great pains and cost; and with his being plainly next in military rank to Hector among the sons of Priam.

Further, it would explain the fact, otherwise very difficult to deal with, that alone among the children of Priam, Paris or Alexander is honoured with the significant title of βασιλεύς. Helenus is called ἄναξ, and Hector ποίμην λαῶν, but neither expression is of the same rank, or has a similar effect. This exclusive application of the term βασιλεὺς is a very strong piece of evidence, if, as I believe to be the case, it is nowhere else applied in the Iliad to a person thus selected, without indicating either the possession, or the hereditary expectancy of a throne.

And indeed, even if we could show that Homer had applied the name βασιλεὺς to two brothers in one family, the result would be the same, as far as the main argument is concerned, for there is no such pronounced mark of equality found among brothers in any of the royal families of Greece.

Again; in considering the law of succession among the Greeks, we have found four cases in the Catalogue, where contingents were placed under the command of two leaders seemingly co-ordinate; they are in every instance brothers, and the four dual commands occur in a total of twenty-nine. Or let us state the case in another form, so as to include the cases of Bœotia and Elis. Among sixteen Trojan contingents, there are but six where the chief authority is plainly in a single hand; out of twenty-nine Greek contingents, there are twenty-three, and, of the remaining six, four are the cases of brothers. This fact is material, as tending to show a looser and less effective military organization in the ranks of the Trojans and their allies, than in those of the Greeks; a circumstance which does not prove, but which harmonizes with, the hypothesis that they were wanting also in a defined order of succession to the seat of political power.

There are other reasons, immediately connected with Hector, for supposing that Homer intended to represent Paris as older than his brother[472 - Il. xxiv. 765.]. Paris had been in manhood for at least twenty years, according to the letter of the poem, which must at least represent a long period of time. But Hector has one child only, a babe in arms, which is in itself a presumption of his being less advanced in life. Again, we must suppose his age probably to be not very different from that of Andromache. But it is quite plain that she was a young mother; since after the slaughter of Eetion, her father, Achilles shortly took a ransom for her mother, who thereupon went back to the house of her own father, Andromache’s maternal grandfather, and subsequently died there[473 - Il. vi. 426-8.]. If then the grandfather of Andromache was alive when Thebe was taken, and Hector’s age was in due proportion to her own, he must in all likelihood have been younger than Paris. Again, it may be noticed that the term ἥβη is nowhere ascribed to Paris, but it is assigned to Hector at his death[474 - Il. xxii. 363.]. Notwithstanding its complimentary use for Ulysses in Od. viii. 135, that word has a certain leaning to early life. But we have a stronger, and indeed I think a conclusive argument in the speech of Andromache after his death[475 - Il. xxiv. 725.];

ἆνερ, ἀπ’ αἰῶνος νέος ὤλεο.

Thus he is distinctly called young. And we may consider it almost certain, under these circumstances, that Paris was the first-born son of Priam[476 - Possibly Horace meant to convey this opinion in the words Quid Paris? ut salvus regnet, vivatque beatus, Cogi posse negat. Epist. I. ii. 10.], but that his right of succession oozed away like water from a man’s hand.

The relations of race between the Trojans and the Greeks have already been examined, in connection with the great Homeric title of ἄναξ ἀνδρῶν[477 - Achæis, sect. ix. p. 492.]; under some difficulties, which resolve themselves into this, that Homer, on almost every subject so luminous a guide, is in all likelihood here, as it were, retained on the side of silence; and that we have no information, except such as he accidentally lets fall. But he was under no such preoccupation with regard to the institutions of Troy; so that, while he had no occasion for the same amount of detail as he has given us with reference to the Greeks, or the same minute accuracy as he has there observed, enough appears to supply a tolerably clear and consistent outline.

We have been accustomed too negligently to treat the Homeric term Troy, as if it designated only or properly a single city. But in Homer it much more commonly means a country, with the city sometimes called Troy for its capital, and containing many other cities beside it. The proper name, however, of the city in the poems is Ἴλιος, not Τροίη. Ilios is used above an hundred and twenty times in the Iliad and Odyssey, and always strictly means the city. The word Τροίη is used nearly ninety times, and in the great majority of cases it means the country. Often it has the epithets εὐρεῖα, ἐρίβωλος, ἐριβώλαξ, which speak for themselves. But more commonly it is without an epithet; and then too it very generally means the country. When the Greeks speak, for example, of the voyage Τροίηνδε, this is the natural sense, rather than to suppose it means a city not on the sea shore, and into which, till the end of the siege, they did not find their way at all[478 - One only of the epithets of the word Ilios seems to point out that it may too mean the district. It is εὔπωλος, used Il. v. 551, and in four other places.].

Priam and his dynasty in Troas.

According to the genealogical tree in the Twentieth Iliad, Dardanus built Dardania among the mountains: his son Erichthonius became wealthy by possessions in the plain; and Tros, the son of Erichthonius, was the real founder of the Trojan state and name[479 - Il. xx. 230.].

Τρῶα δ’ Ἐριχθόνιος τέκετο Τρώεσσιν ἄνακτα.

Thus the name of Troes at that time covered the whole race. But the town of Ilios must, from its name, have been built not earlier than the time of Ilus, the son of Tros. And now the dynasty separates into two lines, as Assaracus, the brother of Ilus, continues to reign in Dardania. Thus the local existence of the Dardanian name is prolonged; for it is plain that the Dardanian throne was associated, at least in dignity, with a rival, and not a subordinate, sovereignty. Still it does not extend beyond the hills. It was over these that Æneas fled from Achilles[480 - Ibid. 189.]. But even the Dardanians did not wholly cease to be known by the appellation of Trojans; for not only does Homer frequently use the dominant name Troes for the entire force opposed to the Greeks, which is naming the whole from the principal part, but he also uses the word Troes to signify all that part of the force, which was under the house of Dardanus in either branch; and he distinguishes this portion from the rest of the force described under the name ἐπίκουροι, at the opening of the Trojan Catalogue:

ἔνθα τότε Τρῶές τε διέκριθεν, ἠδ’ ἐπίκουροι[481 - Il. ii. 815. So likewise Il. vi. 111. xiii. 755. xvii. 14. xviii. 229.].

This line is followed by an account of the whole force opposed to the Greeks, in sixteen divisions. Of these the eleven last bear each their own national name, beginning with the Pelasgians of Larissa, and ending with the Lycians; and they are under leaders, whom the whole course of the poem marks as not being Trojan, but independent. These eleven evidently were the ἐπίκουροι of ver. 815.

The five first contingents are introduced and commanded as follows:

1. Troes under Hector[482 - Ver. 816.]:

Τρωσὶ μὲν ἡγεμόνευε μέγας κορυθαίολος Ἕκτωρ.

2. Dardanians, under Æneas, with two of the (ten) sons of Antenor, Archelochus and Acamas, for his colleagues[483 - Ver. 819.]:

Δαρδανίων αὖτ’ ἦρχεν ἐῢς παῖς Ἀγχίσαο.

3. Trojans of Zelea, at the extreme spur of Ida, under Pandarus[484 - Ver. 824-6.]:

οἳ δὲ Ζέλειαν ἔναιον ὑπαὶ πόδα νείατον Ἴδης

Τρῶες.

4. People of Adresteia and other towns, under Adrestus and Amphius, sons of Merops of Percote[485 - Ver. 828.]:

οἳ δ’ Ἀδρήστειάν τ’ εἶχον, κ. τ. λ.

5. People of Percote and other towns, under Asius:

οἳ δ’ ἄρα Περκώτην, κ. τ. λ.

And then begins the enumeration of the Allies, each under their respective national names.

It seems evident, that these five first-named contingents comprise the whole of the subjects of the race of Dardanus. First come the Trojans of the capital and its district, under Hector. Then, taking precedence on account of dignity, the Dardanian division of Æneas. In the third contingent the Poet returns to the name Troes, which, I think, plainly enough overrides the fourth and fifth, just as in the Greek Catalogue the name Pelasgic Argos[486 - ii. 681.] introduces and comprehends a number of contingents that follow, besides that of Achilles.

There are several reasons, which tend plainly to this conclusion. The sense of διέκριθεν (815) and the reference to the diversity of tongues spoken (804) almost require the division of the force between Troes and allies; it is also the most natural division. The fourth and fifth contingents are not indeed expressly called Troes, but this name, already given to the third, may include them. We must, I think, conclude that it does so, when we find clear proof that they were not independent national divisions: for the troops of Percote were in the fifth, but the sons of Percosian Merops command the fourth, a fact inexplicable if these were the forces of independent States, but natural enough if they were all under the supremacy of Priam and his house.

In the great battle of the Twelfth Iliad, the Trojans are πένταχα κοσμηθέντες (xii. 87). Sarpedon commands the allies with Glaucus and Asteropæus (v. 101), thus accounting for eleven of the sixteen divisions in the Catalogue. Æneas, with two sons of Antenor, commands the Dardanians, thus disposing of a twelfth. Again, Hector, with Polydamas and Cebriones, commands the πλεῖστοι καὶ ἄριστοι, evidently the division standing first in the Catalogue. This makes the number thirteen. The three remaining contingents of the Catalogue are

1. Zelean Troes, under Pandarus, (since slain,) Il. ii. 824-7.

2. Adresteans &c. under Adrestus and Amphius, (828-34,) both slain, Il. v. 612. vi. 63.

3. Percotians &c. under Asius (835-9).

These three remaining divisions of the Catalogue evidently reappear in the second and third of the five Divisions of the Twelfth Book. The Second is under Paris, with Alcathous, son-in-law of Antenor, and Agenor, one of his sons. In the command of the Third, Helenus and Deiphobus, two sons of Priam, are associated with, and even placed before, Asius. The position given in these divisions to the family of Priam appears to prove, that the troops forming them were among his proper subjects.

Again, the territorial juxtaposition of these districts, between Phrygia, which lay behind the mountains of Ida, on the one side, and the sea of Marmora with the Ægæan on the other, perfectly agrees with the description in the Twenty-fourth Iliad[487 - Il. xxiv. 543-5.] of the range of country within which Priam had the preeminence in wealth, and in the vigour and influence of his sons. Strabo quotes this passage as direct evidence that Priam reigned over the country it describes, which is rather more than it actually states; and he says that Troas certainly reached to Adresteia and to Cyzicus.

Again, we have various signs in different passages of a political connection between the towns we have named and the race of Priam. Melanippus, his nephew, was employed before the war at Percote[488 - Il. xv. 548.]. Democoon[489 - Il. iv. 99.], his illegitimate son, tended horses at Abydus; doubtless, says Strabo[490 - P. 585.], the horses of his father.

The partial inclusion of the Dardanians within the name of Troes is further shown by the verse[491 - Il. xiii. 463.],

Αἰνεία, Τρώων βουληφόρε·

and by the appeal of Helenus to Æneas and Hector jointly, as the persons chiefly responsible for the safety of the Troes and Lycians: the name Lycians being taken here, as in some other places[492 - See Il. iv. 197, 207. xv. 485.], to denote most probably a race akin to and locally interspersed with the Trojans.

But the Dardanians have more commonly their proper designation separately given them. It never includes the Troes. And we never find the two appellations, Troes and Dardans, covering the entire force. Whenever the Dardans are named with the Troes, there is also another word, either ἐπίκουροι, or Λύκιοι.

The word Troes, it is right to add, is sometimes confined strictly to the inhabitants of the city: but the occasions are rare, and perhaps always with contextual indications that such is the sense.

Another sign that Priam exercised a direct sovereignty over the territory which yielded the five contingents may perhaps be found in the fact, that we do not find any of his nephews in command of them. They were led by their local officers, while the brothers of Priam constituted a part of the community of Troy, and chiefly influenced the Assembly: and their sons, though apparently more considerable persons than most of those local officers in general, simply appear as acting under Hector without special command. The brothers of Priam are Lampus, Clytius, and Hiketaon. His nephews and other relatives are Dolops the son of Lampus; Melanippus the son of Hiketaon; Polydamas, Hyperenor, and Euphorbus, the sons of Panthous and his wife Phrontis.

Had the senior members of the family held local sovereignties, we should have found their sons in local commands. But we find only two sons of Antenor in command, as either colleagues or lieutenants of Æneas, over the Dardans, whom we have no reason to suppose they had any share in ruling.

Strabo, indeed, contends, that there are nine separate δυναστεῖαι immediately connected with Troy[493 - Strabo xiii. 7. p. 584.], besides the ἐπίκουροι. Of these states one he thinks was Lelegian, and was ruled over by Altes, father of Laothoe, one of Priam’s wives. Another by Munes, husband of Briseis. Another, Thebe, by Eetion, father of Andromache. Others he considers to be represented by Anchises and Pandarus: but this does not well agree with the structure of the Catalogue. He refers also to Lyrnessus and Pedasus; which are nowhere mentioned by Homer as furnishing contingents, but they had apparently been destroyed, as well as taken, by Achilles. He places several of the dynasties in cities thus destroyed: and they all, according to him, lay beyond the limits marked out in the Twenty-fourth Iliad.

This assemblage of facts appears to point to a very great diversity of relations subsisting between Priam, with his capital, and the states, cities, and races, of which we hear as arrayed on his side in the war. There are first the cities of Troas, or Troja proper, furnishing the five, or if we except Dardania four out of the five, first contingents of the Catalogue. Over these Priam was sovereign.

There are next the cities, so far as they can be traced, under the δυναστεῖαι mentioned by Strabo, such as Thebe, and the cities of Altes and Munes. These were probably in the same sort of relation to the sceptre of Priam, as the Greek states in general to that of Agamemnon.

Thirdly, there are the independent nations. Of these eleven named in the Catalogue; others are added as newly arrived in the Tenth Book[494 - Il. x. 428-30.], and further additions were subsequently made, such as the force under Memnon, and the Keteians under Eurypylus[495 - Od. xi. 519-22.]. Nothing perhaps tends so much, as the powerful assistance lent to Priam by numerous and distant allies, to show how justly in substance Horace has described the Trojan war as the conflict between the Eastern and the Western world. The two confederacies, which then came into collision, between them absorbed the whole known world of Homer; and foreshadowed the great conflicts of later epochs.

Political institutions of Troy.