Human and Animal in Ancient Greece: Empathy and Encounter in Classical Literature 9781350986749, 9781786731197

Table of contents :
Cover
Author Biography
Title
Copyright
Contents
Acknowledgements
Abbreviations
Introduction: ΕΜΠΑΘΕΙΑ is a Greek Word
Part I: Reading Ancient Greek Literature through Phenomenology
Part II: Encounters with Animals in Greek Literature
Part III: The Spectrum of Human-Animal Relationships in Greek Antiquity
Part IV: Case Studies
Conclusion
Notes
Bibliography
Index

Citation preview

Tua Korhonen is Docent of Greek Literature at the University of Helsinki and a member of the editorial board for Trace: The Finnish Journal for Human-Animal Studies. Erika Ruonakoski is University Researcher in Philosophy at the University of Jyva¨skyla¨, and has written extensively on phenomenology and empathy with animals.

‘Tua Korhonen and Erika Ruonakoski open valuable new perspectives on the place of animals in ancient Greek literature by considering the thinking of Husserl and Merleau-Ponty on embodiment and cognition. They combine phenomenological insights with theories of empathy and sympathy, and critical reading theory from Wolfgang Iser and narratology, to form a practical and conceptual ground for examining Greek philosophical thought (from Presocratics to Plato, Aristotle, and Plutarch) and providing impressive close readings of many literary texts from Aesop to Hesiod and Homer, and the epigrammaticist Anyte.’ Louise Westling, Professor Emerita of English and Environmental Studies, University of Oregon ‘This thought-provoking book is about Greek experiences of animals, as they are reflected in Homeric epics, Attic drama and epigrams. By introducing a phenomenological approach with stress on embodiment and empathy, Tua Korhonen and Erika Ruonakoski establish a sound theoretical framework for their study. The authors have a keen eye for the diversity of human interactions with animals, and they include a wide range of examples, such as the behaviour of Odysseus’ faithful dog, Argos, how Aristophanes’ birds use their bodies and what it is like to be a centaur. In this interdisciplinary and original contribution to the reading of ancient Greek literature, the two authors do an excellent job of making past experiences of animals come alive and speak to moderns.’ Ingvild Sælid Gilhus, Professor, Study of Religion, University of Bergen

HUMAN AND ANIMAL IN ANCIENT GREECE Empathy and Encounter in Classical Literature

TUA KORHONEN

AND

ERIKA RUONAKOSKI

For our parents and siblings, with whom we have learnt to appreciate non-human animals

Published in 2017 by I.B.Tauris & Co. Ltd London • New York www.ibtauris.com Copyright q 2017 Tua Korhonen and Erika Ruonakoski The right of Tua Korhonen and Erika Ruonakoski to be identified as the authors of this work has been asserted by the authors in accordance with the Copyright, Designs and Patents Act 1988. All rights reserved. Except for brief quotations in a review, this book, or any part thereof, may not be reproduced, stored in or introduced into a retrieval system, or transmitted, in any form or by any means, electronic, mechanical, photocopying, recording or otherwise, without the prior written permission of the publisher. Every attempt has been made to gain permission for the use of the images in this book. Any omissions will be rectified in future editions. References to websites were correct at the time of writing. Library of Classical Studies 15 ISBN: 978 1 78453 761 6 eISBN: 978 1 78672 119 8 ePDF: 978 1 78673 119 7 A full CIP record for this book is available from the British Library A full CIP record is available from the Library of Congress Library of Congress Catalog Card Number: available Typeset in Garamond Three by OKS Prepress Services, Chennai, India Printed and bound by CPI Group (UK) Ltd, Croydon, CR0 4YY

CONTENTS

Acknowledgements Abbreviations Introduction Ἐmpa´u1ia is a Greek Word

vi viii 1

1. Reading Ancient Greek Literature through Phenomenology 2. Encounters with Animals in Greek Literature 3. The Spectrum of Human-Animal Relationships in Greek Antiquity 4. Case Studies

73 106

Conclusion

187

Notes Bibliography Index

192 239 256

8 42

ACKNOWLEDGEMENTS

This work has been a happy encounter of two humanist traditions: classical studies and philosophy. It has brought us into contact with numerous researchers in our own respective fields as well as in each other’s fields and the multidisciplinary field of human-animal studies. Many have offered their help. We are indebted especially to Professor Sara Heina¨maa and Professor Mika Kajava, who made our road smoother in many ways, to Docent Maijastina Kahlos, who read parts of the manuscript and commented on them, and to Professor Erica Fudge, Professor Ingvild Sælid Gilhus and Docent Raija Mattila. On a more general level, we wish to acknowledge the welcoming atmosphere we have experienced when presenting our research at a number of scholarly meetings, particularly in those of YKES (the Finnish Society for Human-Animal Studies), the Alterity Seminar, and the Research Seminar in Phenomenology at the Helsinki Collegium for Advanced Studies. We were also encouraged by the enthusiasm of the students in the history of animals course arranged by Tua Korhonen and Raija Mattila at the University of Helsinki. The Kone Foundation and the Alfred Kordelin Foundation have provided the basic funding without which this book would never have seen the light of day. In addition, we have received supplementary funding from the SHC Research Community, the Department of World Cultures at the University of Helsinki, the Department of

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Social Sciences and Philosophy at the University of Jyva¨skyla¨ and the AMNE (Ancient Mediterranean and the Near East) Research Community. Finally, our families and their non-human members have been a source of emotional support and inspiration to our work. Thank you all!

ABBREVIATIONS

Abbreviations for ancient authors and their works as well as for classical journals comply with the standard practices of the discipline, preferring the OCD (¼ Oxford Classical Dictionary) and the LSJ (¼ Liddell – Scott – Jones, see below) system, not the shorter forms of L’ Anne´e Philologique, if possible. For the OCD abbreviations, see http://classics.oxfordre.com/staticfiles/images/ORECLA/OCD. ABBREVIATIONS.pdf. However, here is a list of most common abbreviations: Ar. ¼ Aristophanes; Arist. ¼ Aristotle; Pl. ¼ Plato; Plut. ¼ Plutarch Il. ¼ Homer’s Iliad; Od. ¼ Homer’s Odyssey Aristotle’s works EN ¼ Ethica Nicomachea, The Nicomachean Ethics HA ¼ Historia Animalium, The Study of Animals PA ¼ De Partibus Animalium, The Parts of Animals Poet. ¼ The Poetics Rhet. ¼ The Rhetoric Plutarch’s works: Mor. ¼ Moralia (A collection of Plutarch’s ethical treatises); sometimes the name of the treatise is mentioned.

ABBREVIATIONS

ix

Other: AP ¼ Anthologia Palatina (The Palatine Anthology, The Greek Anthology) DL ¼ Diogenes Laertius, Lives and Opinions of Eminent Philosophers NA ¼ Aelian, De Natura Animalium (On the Characteristics of Animals) Classical Journals: AJPh ¼ American Journal of Philology CP ¼ The Classical Philology CJ ¼ The Classical Journal CQ ¼ The Classical Quarterly JHS ¼ The Journal of Hellenic Studies RPh ¼ Revue de philologie, de litte´rature et d’histoire anciennes TAPA ¼ Transactions of the American Philological Association Some modern works and editions: ANRW ¼ Aufstieg und Niedergang der ro¨mischen Welt Geogh. ¼ Geoghegan, D., Anyte: The Epigrams, see Bibliography LCL ¼ The Loeb Classical Library LSJ ¼ A Greek-English Lexicon by Liddell, Scott, and Jones, see Bibliography: Liddell, Henry George Perry ¼ Perry, B.E., Aesopica, see Bibliography

INTRODUCTION

ΕΜΠΑΘΕΙΑ IS A GREEK WORD

This interdisciplinary book is targeted at many kinds of audiences: most obviously it is intended for classical scholars and historians, but philosophers, literary scholars, and all readers interested in the question of empathy and the human-animal relationship will also find topics of interest. Responding to the growing sensitivity to animal issues within classical studies, this book contributes to the history of animals in ancient Greek culture by rereading the Greek classics. More specifically, we will examine selected literary depictions of non-human animals combining philological and historical analysis with a philosophy of embodiment: the phenomenology of the body. From the viewpoint of our interdisciplinary approach, we will elucidate both the human-animal relationship in ancient Greece and the possibilities of empathy with animals being opened up to readers by ancient Greek literature. While we focus for the most part on the literature before the Hellenistic age, the purpose is not to conduct an exhaustive survey of the human-animal relationship in that period. Instead, we will make in-depth analyses of animal similes in Homer’s Iliad, addresses to animals in Sophocles’ Philoctetes, human birds and bird humans in Aristophanes’ Birds, and Anyte’s animal epigrams. These examples are chosen because they reveal a wide variety of relationships to animal embodiment and to sympathy for animals. At the same time, they offer the diverse possibilities of empathising with animal characters.

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In the past 20 years, the interaction between humans and animals has become a valid research topic within the humanities and social sciences, and a new interdisciplinary field, human-animal studies, has emerged. A growing number of researchers have also become interested in the topic within Greek and Roman studies and, since the 1990s, numerous articles and books dealing with humananimal issues in the ancient world have been published.1 Our research focuses on the interaction and encounters with animals in antiquity. Research into the human-animal relationship is often inspired by philosophical discussions. The tradition of animal ethics mainly evolved within analytical philosophy, starting from Peter Singer’s utilitarian work Animal Liberation (1975), but within current human-animal studies, continental philosophers such as Jacques Derrida and Gilles Deleuze play an important role in theory building. Also Donna Haraway’s concepts of becoming-with-animals, nature-culture and companion species, with which she aims to undo the dichotomous view of humans and animals, are widely discussed within human-animal studies. Yet, as has already been pointed out, the philosophical background of this study is in phenomenology, which, in our view, is the most fruitful approach for discussing animal embodiment and empathy with animals. Describing these issues, we will pay particular attention to the different modes of empathy, such as empathy in the presence of the other and reader’s empathy. In this context we will differentiate between empathy with animals in everyday life and empathy with animal figures in literature. We will also ask whether there may be some differences in how the Greeks experienced these figures in comparison to the experience of readers in our own time. While the Greek roots of the word ‘empathy’ are easy to recognise, the English word is, in fact, an attempt to translate a German word, Einfu¨hlung. Apparently the translation was first introduced by Edward Titchner in 1910. The concept of Einfu¨hlung had emerged a few decades earlier in the German theory of aesthetics, more precisely in the work of Robert Vischer (1873). Literally, the word means in-feeling. In-feeling is a part of Vischer’s theory of projection: in perception, one’s

INTRODUCTION

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‘mental-sensory ego’ is projected inside the perceived object, for instance, a building or a painting.2 Vischer’s theory of projection has since then been questioned, and the concept of empathy is now predominantly used in reference to interpersonal relationships, or, more precisely, to the understanding of the other’s experiences. Among its many definitions one can find ‘putting oneself in the other’s position’, ‘mirroring the other’, ‘tuning in with the other’, ‘inner imitation’, ‘simulation’, and ‘seeing things through the other’s eyes’. For the purposes of this book, we will suggest that empathy is a partial immersion into the other’s situation and perspective.3 How well does the Greek word ἐmpάu1ia, the origin of Titchner’s ‘empathy’, then reflect the current understanding of empathy? The word ἐmpάu1ia occurs fairly late: its first occurrences can be found in the treatises of Ptolemy and Galen, in the third century CE . In these works ἐmpάu1ia refers to physical affection. The adjective ἐmpauή6 can already be discerned, however, in the Aristotelian corpus. There it has the meaning ‘to be in a state of some emotion’, as is implied by its constituents, the preposition ἐn (in) and the noun pάuo6 (affection, emotion, pain). In general, ἐmpauή6 refers to strong emotions,4 but not to immersing oneself into the other’s emotions in particular. Evidently, the meaning of the Greek word ἐmpάu1ia differs profoundly from what is understood by empathy in our own days. In reference to ancient Greek literature, the question of empathy takes two forms. Firstly, do Greek writers show us things from the perspective of the non-human animal, or do they at least provide the reader with such descriptions of the animal’s behaviour that it is easy to empathise with the animal? In other words, the first question is about the relationship to the animal’s experience and the two ways into it, one through the perspective of the imagined animal and the other through the perspective of a narrator or character who describes the animal. Secondly, what do these depictions of animals tell us about the Greeks themselves, and about their relationship to animals? The first impression of a classicist may be that Greek literature does not offer an abundance of scenarios that would invite

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the reader to empathise with animals. Yet our case studies will show that these invitations do exist, even if in some cases they are less evident than in others. Another important concept in our research is sympathy, which is often confused with empathy. Like empathy, sympathy has many definitions in current philosophical and psychological discussions. We will use this concept to refer to a feeling for the other, or compassion. The root of the word sympathy lies in the Greek word, sympάu1ia, which means ‘fellow-feeling’ but it can be translated as ‘sympathy’ because it is a rather loose term.5 It is, in fact, easy to find expressions of sympathy in ancient Greek literature. There are sympathetic references to pets, for instance, in both ancient literature proper (poems, drama, epics, satires) and in the primary material (funerary inscriptions, iconography). However, even the references to pets do not usually describe the relationship between humans and non-humans at length. One exception is the relationship between Arrian (c. 86 – 160) – a Roman who wrote in Greek – and his hound Horme¯ in the fifth chapter of his Cynegeticus. Although Horme¯ was a hunting dog and not merely a companion animal, many modern dog owners will notice familiar features in Horme¯’s behaviour, such as jumping and barking in welcome. However, while Arrian describes Horme¯’s disposition and her affection to her master and her master’s circle of acquaintances, Arrian’s own emotions and affections (which are apparently tender) are not explicitly stated and need to be inferred. Arrian’s description on the human-animal relationship thus seems to be somewhat one-sided – Arrian does not elaborately describe his own feelings towards his dog as a modern dog owner might. There are many possible reasons for this, such as the literary genre (hunting with dogs) and the idea that it was not proper to love one’s pets too much.6 In any case, the passage seems solely to describe an animal’s love for humans – Horme¯’s wilanurvpίa is specially mentioned – which was a familiar theme in Greek literature about animals, especially during the Roman imperial period. Sympathetic stories of companion animals focus on the pet’s affection for its owner just like stories about dolphins rescuing human beings (e.g. Arion and the dolphin) focus on the

INTRODUCTION

5

dolphins’ positive attitude towards humans.7 However, although wilόzῳo6 (‘lover of animals’) – the corresponding adjective for the noun wilanurvpίa – was extremely rare and mainly used to characterise the gods, compound adjectives such as ‘lover of dogs’ and ‘lover of horses’ occur.8 Arrian was such a lover of dogs that he appears to have been interested in his dog’s point of view. He describes Horme¯’s behaviour at length and their lives together, thereby inviting modern readers to empathise with her. As for descriptions of the animal’s point of view, one of the most evident examples in our material is the dolphin epigram by the female poet Anyte, which was written in the first-person singular and is usually dated to the beginning of the Hellenistic age. Sometimes the animal’s perspective seems to be a mere literary device, similar to the speaking animals of fables. However, animal fables may also give glimpses of the animal’s perspective. Another example of a clearly sympathetic account with an animal’s point of view comes from Roman literature. Ovid’s Metamorphoses (composed in the first century CE ) contains a famous passage where the reactions of a sacrificial ox are described not by an ox as a first-person voice, but by the narrator, Pythagoras. Pythagoras describes how the ox hears the priest’s prayers, although it does not understand their meaning, and watches the sprinkling of the barley meal over him. The reader is invited to dwell on the horrifying details of the ox’s predicament. This description is part of Ovid’s long account of the speech uttered by Pythagoras (15.75– 478). The speech is a fictionalisation, but it does contain Pythagorean or Neo-Pythagorean ideas. It is one of the rare evocative advocacies for (sacrificial) animals in Roman literature. While it may be highly questionable to claim that Ovid was against sacrificing animals, he clearly attempted to describe the situation from the animal’s point of view. Passages in which a literary character shows downright pity for a suffering animal character are, for the most part, fairly rare. Should we speak about ancient culture as fundamentally indifferent to animals and animal issues, the basic attitude being anthropocentrism? After all, despite the great number of references to animals as such – factual or symbolical – in some genres, animals often appear

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to have a fixed function in texts, serving, for example, as a metaphor for human behaviour. Furthermore, although in Sophocles’ Philoctetes the eponymous hero addresses birds, his prey, as partially immersed in their situation and perspective and in Aristophanes’ Birds there are glances of the life of birds pestered by humans, it can be asked up to which point the other’s point of view can be accessed. Indeed, can anthropocentrism ever be completely avoided? And if anthropocentrism is unavoidable in our perception of actual birds, is it even less unavoidable while watching a play where male actors are playing birds and mockingly presenting the birds’ point of view? Undoubtedly, caution should be exercised when it comes to using literary texts – especially fragments of texts – as sources of information for collective perceptions of and attitudes to animals. This certainly applies to ancient Greek representations and Greek views of animals. Not only is it problematic to speak about common attitudes to animals in ancient Greece, but we as readers have diverse experiences of animals and attitudes towards them, all of which have an effect on the reading experience. Therefore, describing Greek attitudes to animals on the basis of literary passages is anything but straightforward. To shed light on these issues, we discuss the potential meanings of animal characters to authors and to their contemporaries. This involves not only contextualisation but also activation of the historical meaning in the present situation. It emerges that the past can be a source of innovation, opening up alternative ways of living the human-animal relationship. The book is divided into four sections. Part I discusses the concepts of embodiment and empathy, illustrating the phenomenological approach with the help of Anyte’s goat epigram. Part II, which focuses on Greek literary theory, examines concepts that appear to have been created to explicate similar issues as the concept of empathy: mimesis, tragic pity and the vividness of the artwork. In addition, rhetorical strategies, such as addressing animals, are examined, and these, in turn, illuminate the Greeks’ relationships with animals. Part III offers an overview of human-animal

INTRODUCTION

7

relationships in the ancient world. In Part IV, the last section of the book, the earlier discussions are put into practice as the chosen texts are analysed in chronological order (except that Philoctetes is discussed before The Birds). While the book is the result of our mutual efforts, discussions and reciprocal comments, most chapters have only one principal writer and reflect the distinctive style, discipline and emphasis of that writer. The introductory and concluding chapters, however, have been written by both writers in collaboration. Ruonakoski is responsible for Part I, and Korhonen for Parts II and III. As for Part IV, Korhonen is the author of the case studies on Homer, Sophocles and Aristophanes. The case study on Anyte’s animal epigrams is written by Ruonakoski, with philological support from Korhonen.

PART I READING ANCIENT GREEK LITERATURE THROUGH PHENOMENOLOGY

This section of the book discusses the meaning and implications of phenomenology of the body for studying animal figures in ancient Greek literature. The analysis begins with the following questions: In which ways can ancient literary texts elucidate the human-animal relationship of their time? What is the role of the modern reader in the process of interpretation? It is suggested that although historical and philological analyses help us understand the context and intricacies of Graeco-Roman literary texts, a phenomenological discussion of embodiment, empathy and communication in and through those texts further elucidates their dynamics.1 Literature turns out to be a powerful vehicle for empathy: a literary text opens up not just one but several points of view on its world and reveals alien consciousnesses to us as if from the inside.

Relating to the Animal Other in Different Times: What Can Be Said? When read today ancient Graeco-Roman literature appears ancient and new at the same time: it bears traces of ancient times and yet lives in the present as if it were written yesterday. In it encounters with non-human animals are described in such recognisable ways that one

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may be tempted to adopt the view that, despite some differences, many aspects of the human-animal relationship remain the same throughout millennia. Yet it can be asked with good reason whether the reading experience reveals anything about the experience of the author or about the audience of the time and their culture. Numerous aspects certainly make it difficult for us to approach the alien experience that is supposedly behind ancient Greek literature. First of all, no foreign experience as such can be accessed directly. One cannot, strictly speaking, experience the experience of others, even though we do see traces of the experience of others in their behaviour.2 Likewise, we do not access any foreign experience as such through the reading experience. Instead, we enter a literary apparatus that guides but does not totally control our way of experiencing. Readers always bring their history to the reading experience. For this reason, a piece of literature becomes alive anew and assumes different meanings each time it is read.3 This is true for the reading experiences of all fictive texts, of course, but there are also specific barriers between the modern reader and ancient Greek authors. Differences in text editions make up only one of the many problems pertaining to textual criticism, and many of the allusions concerning political and cultural currents of the writer’s time may remain unknown even to the enlightened reader. Furthermore, our way of receiving text is somewhat different: for us quiet reading is the norm, whereas in ancient Greece the reception of literary texts appears to have been, to a large extent, auditive.4 This may make it difficult for us to appreciate, for example, the phonic and rhythmic elements of Greek poetry. We may also be led to attribute the inherent intimacy of quiet reading too easily to the reception of the texts by the authors’ contemporaries.5 Nevertheless, the experience of contact and communication remains present in the act of reading. Wolfgang Iser distinguishes two ways in which a literary text allows us to relate to a sociohistorical context. First, it allows us to see that which is present in our everyday life but to which we do not pay attention, and second, it helps us grasp realities that were never our own. According to him, this happens through a recodification or a kind of transformation that takes place in the text.

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In the case of an ancient text, the norms of the writer’s age have, according to Iser, faded into past history, and the reader is no longer entangled in the system from which they arose. The reader can in fact reconstruct the historical situation that provided the framework for the text by means of recodification.6 Whether or not relating to the historical framework of the text can happen this schematically is open to question. Particularly if we think about poetry, so many gaps are left in poetic descriptions that it would be rather demanding to reconstruct a historical situation on their basis. However, there is some truth in Iser’s claim: the different historical situation does become somehow graspable in the act of reading. This is not merely due to the so-called historical facts mediated by the text. The text provides a point of view on a situation, one different from our own, as well as a way of reacting and seeing the world that differs from ours at least in some ways. We get to occupy that point of view and willingly become absorbed in that alien world instead of keeping a critical distance to it, as might be the case when we read a set of arguments. It is as if we experienced the other’s experience or thought his or her thoughts, even though we do remain aware of our life and situation as the primary ones for us. It can still be asked, however, what exactly in the reading experience reveals temporal distance to us. As is evident when reading Anyte’s epigram about a goat and children (AP 6.312), an ancient text may include numerous references to a reality foreign to us: Ἡnίa dή toi paῖd16 ἐnί, trάg1, woinikό1nta uέnt16 kaὶ lasίῳ wimὰ p1rὶ stόmati, ἵppia paid1ύoysi u1oῦ p1rὶ naὸn ἄ1ula, ὄwr᾽ aὐtoὺ6 worέh6 ἤpia t1rpomέnoy6. (AP 6.312 ¼ Geogh. 13) Putting red reins on you, goat, with a noseband round your shaggy mouth, the children train you in horse contests around the god’s temple so long as you bear them gently to their delight.7

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A layperson reading this epigram may have only a vague idea about what, for instance, the ‘god’s temple’ might be like, and about whether the poem is indicative of cruelty to animals, humorous, or both. A classical scholar might be able to contextualise the poem, pointing out the position of Anyte as an Arcadian epigrammatist and female poet of the third century BCE and her merits as the possible inventor of two subgenres of the epigram (the pastoral epigram and the animal epigram), or suggesting that the epigram may describe a scene portrayed in a votive painting or relief.8 These pieces of information emphasise our historical and cultural distance to the text, however, and most certainly do not eliminate its fundamental indeterminacy. On the other hand, ancient Greek texts often make us face the taboos of our own time, presenting different sets of rules for decency, attitudes to children and gender, social hierarchies, ways of relating to animals, to death, and so on. There is a constant interplay of intimacy and recognition on the one hand, and an astonishing foreignness on the other. Not only do these texts communicate to us certain kinds of relationships to non-human animals, they put us in the position where we can, in a way, relive those relationships. However, when we do this, we never completely lose ourselves in the text or appropriate an alien way of experiencing. A distance remains within the intimacy of the reading experience. If we scrutinise the possibly universal, transhistorical features of the relationship between humans and non-human animals, the question of embodiment appears as central. There is a particular relationship between different kinds of animal bodies and ourselves, for we relate to the movements of non-human animals through the norm of human embodiment, allowing ourselves to be drawn into those movements while maintaining an experience of distance and difference. Of course, not even all human bodies are exactly the same. There are female bodies, male bodies, intersex bodies, bodies of different skin colour, different sizes and different styles of moving, children’s bodies, handicapped bodies, energetic bodies and sick bodies, to mention just a few variations. Yet there is also a very general,

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common point of departure for humans that includes, among other things, the following: typically human and as such norm-creating sensual, social and linguistic abilities and a body that is lived as both resembling other animal bodies and yet different from them. For this reason, figures of non-human animals are not understood in a totally arbitrary way, should they appear as one of the characters or as metaphors in the text – there are features in the human-animal relationship that acquire their transhistoricity from the embodied condition of humans and non-human animals. Animal metaphors offer the sensuous and bodily characteristics of that particular animal to the reader to empathise with, and for that reason are never merely symbolic. In fact, the power of the metaphor comes, to a great degree, through exactly that sensuous-empathetic possibility. Nevertheless, a literary animal figure does not represent an animal in the sense of giving us a copy of the animal. Instead, it makes present the network of meanings related to that particular animal.9 Depending on the reader, different embodied meanings pertaining to the animal’s sensuous characteristics become activated in the reading experience. Certainly, some of the meanings may be lost along the way, when we deal with an ancient epic, play or poem. It becomes the task of the scholar to retrieve some of those lost meanings, such as the status value of horses or the importance of goats in the religious life of ancient Greece. The bodily relationship to a goat is, as long as the word refers to a certain kind of animal,10 at the same time universal and individually and historically differentiated. This animal is different from humans in that most of us have hands while it has cloven hooves and it is covered with fur while we have hair only here and there. In addition, the goat’s way of moving differs from ours, as it is much more agile than we are. Yet some of us may resemble the goat more than most of us in their way of moving, or by the structure of their bearded faces, and some of us may feel akin to the goat even though others do not. Our human bodies enable certain kinds of relationships to goats, and yet these relationships are also lived in an individually differentiated historical situation and are coloured by this situation.11

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Therefore, it would be absurd to claim that a particular Greek woman who lived in the third century BCE would have encountered goats in exactly the same way as, say, a particular man in our time: their common features, such as being two-legged and having the capacities of speech and imagination, and as such being able to have certain kinds of relationships with these animals, carry with them sediments that have to do with their bodily, social, cultural and psychological differences. In other words, to understand the poem in a context wider than our own limited sociohistorical viewpoint, it is necessary to chart numerous historical variables, and, along with them, questions pertaining to literary expression in Anyte’s time. From the phenomenological perspective, however, ancient literature cannot and should not be read merely as a collection of philological dilemmas but as a vehicle for communication through the ages, a contact point between long-deceased authors and ourselves. For this reason it is useful to examine the questions of embodiment and empathy in more detail.

Situated Bodies In order to gain a clear conception of the role of embodiment in literature, it is necessary to compare the reading experience to everyday experience. To this end, the situation described in Anyte’s goat poem is discussed first from the premise that it takes place in everyday life. A problem arises, however, as soon as one tries to imagine the situation as real: from which viewpoint does the situation at hand appear to us? In everyday encounters one viewpoint is the most fundamental: one’s own. As long as our bodies exist as living bodies, and as long as we are in full possession of our mental capacities, they will constitute for us the primary, fundamental viewpoint or perspective on the world. In literature, however, the viewpoint can easily wander from one character to another. In this case we can choose between the viewpoints of the narrator, the goat or even the children. For the sake of convenience, we shall assume the viewpoint of the narrator, and along with it, the body of a human being. This done, we can forget

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for a moment that the situation we are discussing comes from an epigram, allowing ourselves to extend our description beyond what is given in the epigram, if needed. At this point the goal is not to interpret the poem but to describe embodiment with the help of the situation given in the poem. What is it, then, to be an embodied being? Through my body, I have a spatial location in the world, a point from which I perceive what I perceive. Edmund Husserl also calls one’s own body, the living body, the zero-point of orientation to the world.12 Thanks to this zero-point, inanimate things as well as other bodies appear to me as located in the world and in relation to myself: on my left, on my right, behind me, above me, and so on.13 For instance, I perceive the goat and the children right in front of me, and the earth below my feet appears as the ground to which I have a distinct relationship: this ground does not move but rather things upon it appear to move, and I myself normally have my feet on the ground and head up rather than vice versa.14 I do not perceive things from a disembodied perspective, and it is impossible for me to imagine a perceptible world without imagining it from a perspective, and, by implication, a spatial location. My senses are bodily senses, and I cannot imagine a world that would not be seen, heard, touched or tasted, that is, one given to me through my senses and therefore through my body, because even my imagination operates through what is first given to me sensually. My immediate surroundings are given to me through my senses: I feel the warmth of the sun on my skin, I see the temple in its brilliant colours, I smell the sacrificial animals and their droppings, I hear the children’s voices as well as the sounds the goat makes, and I experience the position of my own body in relation to the rest of the world. I am here, now, and while the surrounding world envelops me, I am also the perceiver of this world.15 Indeed, my body is oriented towards the world; it is intentional. For Husserl and Maurice Merleau-Ponty, movement is the originary form of embodied intentionality, and it implies an ability to function in the world: the intentionality of the body appears to me in the mode of ‘I can’ (ich kann).16 I can walk towards the temple or away

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from it, I can grab a hold of the reins the children are adjusting on the goat, I can form words with my mouth and address others by them. I am not merely a witness to the scene but an agent who is able to reach out and become an active participant in the events. As can be seen, descriptions of bodily existence require resorting to the first person. Even if one’s way of apprehending the world has cultural sediments in it and therefore traces from others, the first-person perspective is called for when we deal with embodied experience or discuss the question of consciousness. According to the basic phenomenological insight, viewing the body and the mind as two separate substances is an error, and consciousness can be accounted for only in its intertwining with the body. As Merleau-Ponty puts it, ‘I am my body’.17 According to him, consciousness is being towards things through the body.18 Hence he links consciousness with general directedness towards the world or ‘operative intentionality’.19 The body does have object-like characteristics, yet it is never merely an object. My body is situated in the world as all perceived things are, but it is also a centre of experience and action. I perceive with my eyes, my nose, my mouth, my ears, my hands, and so on, and therefore my relationship to my body is particular and immediate. On the other hand, I cannot perceive my own body completely. I cannot obtain a full view of my back or of my side without an aid, such as multiple mirrors or a camera, nor can I see my brains or lungs without technical equipment. Even though I can direct my attention to my body at will, to reflect, for instance, upon my sensations or the position of my body, and even though some part of the body may call for my attention through sensations of pain, pleasure, numbness and so on, most of the time my body remains at the margins of my perception. I, as a witness of the scene in which a group of children harness a goat as a pretence, am not pure matter or pure spirit, but a bodysubject, matter endowed with intentionality, and with an ability to sense and also to direct its acts of reflection towards itself. My relationship to the sensuous world is not that of pure activity towards a passive object. It is true that I can actively direct my

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attention towards objects, but, on the other hand, things in the world invite my attention, motivate my actions and have their effect on me. Merleau-Ponty calls the two-sidedness of perception ‘reversibility’: if I hold red reins in my hand, not only do I see and touch them, but I am touched by the reins, through my senses. I experience their red colour as warm, and their roughness or smoothness as pleasant or unpleasant in my body. My body resonates according to what is given to me through my senses; I am this living material that is affected by everything that is present to it. When I see other bodies, however, the bodies of the children and that of the goat, for instance, I am faced with something more than the general sensuousness of objects. These other bodies move spontaneously rather than mechanically, and I immediately recognise that they, too, are directed towards some things in the world, that they, too, are living and experiencing. Indeed, they appear as zeropoints of orientation to the world, as perspectives on the world. If I touch these bodies, I can feel that they are sensitive to my touch. Similarly, when our eyes meet, I perceive the other as someone who perceives me as perceiving her or him. In short, I experience a mutual recognition of subjectivity, a reciprocity of perception. According to the so-called theory theory of mind, people have ‘a theory of mind’ which allows them to attribute mental states to other people.20 The phenomenological analysis reveals, however, that we need no theory or deduction to experience other people – in this case the children in front of me – as alive and experiencing. The children are not identical to me and their movements are not identical to mine, for their bodies are smaller than mine and have their own childish way of moving,21 yet I can see that their movements are not random movements caused by mechanical forces but movements with motivation and direction: they are directed towards the goat. I can see the children act in a specific situation: they are playing with a goat in the vicinity of a temple. Through my own body, I relate to the children’s enthusiastic and joyous movements. If I focus on one of the children, I can follow his or her movements, when he or she puts the reins on the goat, and in the case of a threatening movement on behalf of the goat, I can feel my body become tense and draw back,

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as if I myself were in the child’s situation. In other words, I can feel at least in part the other’s bodily orientation in my own body: my body understands the other body.22 This is empathy at its most basic level. The goat’s body is even more different from my own body than a child’s body is. The goat has horns and four legs, it is covered with fur, and its way of moving is more different from my own than the children’s way is. Nevertheless, the goat’s movements appear to me also as directed and motivated, and I can ‘participate’ in its movement from afar, as if following a melody that calls for a certain kind of continuation.23 When I empathise with its movements, it is as if I could transgress the limits of human embodiment.24 This does not mean that I would lose myself or my particular way of being a body. On the contrary, my own human body remains as the norm of embodiment and as the background of my empathetic sensations. The goat’s movements appear as ‘agile’ or ‘strange’ only against the background of my own embodiment and the human way of moving. While empathising with the other I am aware of my human body as the primordial body: it is mine, I am not the goat even if I can participate in its movements in the as-if mode. In this way my bodily experience is layered: my focus may be on the goat and through the goat’s movements I am, in a way, liberated from my typical way of experiencing movement, and yet I have a continuous awareness of my own body and its position and movements (in a word, proprioception) as the background and basis of all my perceptions and empathetic acts. In the last instance the other’s experience always remains alien to me. I never experience his experiences from his point of view – I can only empathise with him. This is true of my relationship with another human being, for I can never truly know what it is like to be him: I never experience his consciousness directly. Yet, both of us being humans, I act on the basis of a conviction that we perceive the same environment in a way that is basically the same for both of us, especially if we share the same cultural background. For us both there are certain kinds of colours, natural and cultural objects and so on. In point of fact, he may have different kinds of visual perceptions than I have due to his poor eyesight or his different way of perceiving

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colours, but these are either seen as deviations from the culturally shared norm or are not noticed at all.25 As for non-human animals, it is easy to accept that they sense in a different way, because their behaviours and reactions are less in synchrony with ours than those of our fellow human beings. At a given moment, a non-human animal may appear to sense things that we cannot sense and to ignore some things that we perceive clearly. Even if I initially suppose that the goat perceives the world as I do, its reactions and its overall behaviour soon reveal to me that this is not the case.26 But can I not imagine how the non-human other perceives things? Without any doubt I can imagine the world seen ‘in another way’, if that ‘other way’ refers to vision that lacks some of the characteristics of my vision but is the same as mine in most respects. For instance, I can imagine perception in which the world appears as black-andwhite. However, imagining the world as seen with eyes that are positioned in a different way than my own, that is, picturing what it looks like when the field of vision is wider than my own (as it is in the goat’s case), is very difficult if not impossible, as is picturing a world with colours or sounds I am physically unable to see or hear. Certainly I can try to deduce how the goat’s visual sensations might differ from mine, and how, for instance, its agility and ability to climb from the ground to a roof of a building or a steep cliff give it access to quickly changing views. The presence of a goat appears as a presence of a radically different kind of experience, which I can only approximate in my own experiences, be they empathetic sensations or imaginary reconstructions. Just like in my interaction with the children, the reciprocity of perception is present also in my encounter with the goat: I experience it as another living body, which is able to recognise my ability to perceive him. This is not the case with all animal species, for in some cases either the size of the animal or its lack of sense organs and inability to react to my presence may get in the way. In some cases, like in the case of a tick, I experience the animal as directed towards certain things in the world, such as blood, but I have no experience of this animal as perceiving me as its perceiver.27 In the

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case of insects – cicadas and grasshoppers, for instance – it is again difficult to establish a connection even if they do appear to react to my presence. But even though reciprocity may be present only in an obscure manner, I do experience the cicada and the grasshopper as living bodies that are oriented towards their environing world and present a perspective on it. The perceptual basis described is present also in the reading experience. When reading Anyte’s epigrams or the Homeric epics, the words ‘goat’, ‘horse’ or ‘grasshopper’ are enough to evoke relationships to different kinds of living bodies. At the same time the imaginary space of literature allows, of course, more indeterminacy as well as transcending the limits of everyday human experience. This transcendence does not, however, make unimaginable non-human perceptions present to us. For this reason the cases in which an animal’s experience is described ‘from the inside’, the descriptions tend to bear traces of human embodiment and senses.28

Empathy in Context Until now some aspects of empathy have been discussed briefly, but for a more thorough understanding it is necessary to examine its theoretical origins and ramifications. The concept of empathy is rooted in the history of aesthetics and moral philosophy, but the discovery of the so-called mirror neurons29 in the 1990s gave neuroscience the status of torchbearer in empathy studies. Empathy is often described as putting oneself in the position of the other, or feeling as if one was experiencing what the other experiences. But there is no consensus on how the phenomenon in question should be defined and understood in detail, nor is there just one theory of empathy.30 Even within phenomenology, there is more than one view of empathy. Husserl, for one, does not appear to have a single coherent description of empathy, but rather many different articulations of it scattered throughout the massive corpus of his collected works, Husserliana.31 It has been suggested, however, that he fairly consistently argues that empathy is present only when the other is present in the flesh. In his recent discussion on the

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phenomenology of empathy, Dan Zahavi accepts Husserl’s view, arguing that it would be dubious to speak about empathising with absent individuals or groups, not to mention fictional characters. According to him, these experiences should be considered, at the very least, as deriving from the more original form of empathy.32 Husserl’s basic point of departure – the idea that the phenomenon of empathy answers to the question of how other consciousnesses can be present to us – remains central for most phenomenologists. His student Edith Stein defined empathy as the act of experiencing foreign consciousness, and more recently, Zahavi has defined it as ‘the experience of the embodied mind of the other’.33 In the phenomenon of empathy three significant axes converge: (a) the constitution of others as living and experiencing, (b) understanding the other’s experiences, and (c) empathetic sensations and emotions. The first dimension of empathy is always present when we encounter living bodies, human and non-human. This experience implies the possibility of taking part in the other’s situation and to sense empathetic sensations pertaining to that situation. I may experience an unpleasant feeling in my body when I see somebody else vomit or get punched in the stomach, for instance. These are cases of bodily understanding mentioned earlier. There is no need for deduction or reasoning, for the other’s situation is immediately and bodily experienced as unpleasant, as if some of this unpleasantness rubbed off on me or as if the other’s intentions inhabited my body, as Merleau-Ponty puts it.34 Empathy as participation in the other’s intentions involves orientation towards the goals of the other, as can be seen in MerleauPonty’s example in which a child witnesses an adult ‘bite’ the child’s finger: ‘He perceives his intentions in his body, perceives my body with his own, and thereby perceives my intentions in his body.’35 When we go back to the situation described in Anyte’s poem, in which the children are harnessing the goat, it can be seen that my understanding of the situation is precisely of this kind: it is as if I felt the intentions of a keyed up child in my own body, and felt my own body become tense. It is possible to say that my body resonates

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with the child’s situation even if I am totally aware that my situation is not the same as the child’s. Nevertheless, recognition of spontaneous, oriented movement of a human or (non-human) animal body as living does not appear to be always accompanied by empathic sensations. The important thing is, however, that we do not make deductions, either, but there is always the possibility of pairing up with each of these bodies, immersing oneself into their points of view and resonating their situations and bodily expressions. On the other hand, it is possible for us to have empathetic sensations even when no living bodies are present. This is the case when an inanimate object is moving or is moved in a way which makes it appear to us as situated, for instance, when a chair is aggressively broken into pieces, or when a robot hand reaches for a coffee cup.36 This makes it comprehensible why in art inanimate objects can easily acquire characteristics of the living.37 We understand empathy as relating to the other’s embodied situation in its different aspects: first and foremost to the spatiotemporal and kinaesthetic aspects of the situation but also to the personal history and characteristics of the other. The idea of immersion into the other’s situation and perspective does not presuppose active imagining of the other’s situation or imagining what the world looks like from the other’s perspective. It is possible to temporarily transfer into the mode of imagining, but as such empathy involves an invitation by the other’s living and situated body – or by diverse literary techniques – to a partial shift of focus to another point of view, an alien one. All in all, empathy is not feeling exactly like the other feels even though it may involve feeling similar feelings to those the other is experiencing. However, it is possible to have sensations in one’s own body that have to do with the other’s situation even if they apparently have no counterpart in the empathised other. I may, for instance, feel a tension in my body even if the child in the presence of the goat is not tense and I am aware of that. Some empathy theorists argue that for this reason we should not understand this experience as empathetic but as sympathetic or unrelated to the other’s experience: we do not feel what the other feels but instead we fear for the other.38

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It is sometimes pointed out that empathy does not presuppose a sympathetic and thereby positive attitude towards the other. It would seem likely that sympathy, on the other hand, presupposes empathy, that is, ‘seeing’ things as if from the other’s point of view. Yet, again, opinions on how sympathy should be defined are divided. In his influential book on sympathy (1923) phenomenologist Max Scheler insisted that sympathy means taking part in the other’s feelings, yet in such a way that a reflective distance to the other’s experience is maintained: sympathy presupposes both recognition of the other’s feelings and reflection.39 In many psychological accounts, however, sympathy is described in an almost opposite manner: the subject that experiences sympathy towards the other fails to tune in, to really grasp the other’s point of view, to listen to them, and instead projects his or her own experiences onto the other.40 In this study sympathy is understood primarily as compassion and concern for the other’s wellbeing. It has a moral significance and implies a positive attitude towards the other, as Scheler suggested. While the common idea that empathy needs not imply one may be correct, it must be acknowledged that empathy can facilitate the development of such an attitude. For instance, when I observe the goat and the children, I may empathise with the goat, immersing myself in his perspective, tuning into his moods, possibly even having empathetic sensations pertaining to his restless movements. In this empathetic process, the situation starts to appear as mildly irritating, and the behaviour of the children as thoughtless or even as infuriating. I may, indeed, be prompted to side with the goat, to feel sympathy for him and even interfere in the situation.41 One of the goals of this study is, indeed, to indicate expressions of sympathy or disdain for specific animals in Greek literature and to analyse the ways in which these expressions relate to Greek attitudes towards animals. As for empathy, it should be clear by now that the way empathy is understood here presupposes that nobody can have non-pathological relationships to other humans or animals without empathising with them to some degree: when others appear to us as living, experiencing and oriented bodies, we are already empathising with them. Therefore, it would be absurd to ask whether the Greeks

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empathised at all with non-human animals. As long as the Greeks were living and experiencing, as long as their bodies were sensuous human bodies in the same sense as ours are, they must have empathised with animals: they must have recognised the bodies of non-human animals as centres of subjectivity and they must have been able to experience empathic sensations pertaining to the movements of animals. True enough, some current studies suggest that there are individual differences in how easy it is for a person to empathise with another. Some of these differences are defined in terms of physiological differences, such as those pertaining to autism.42 Also childhood experiences appear to influence one’s ability to empathise. From this premise, one would need to be treated in an empathetic manner to understand others empathetically.43 For this reason there might be cultural differences as regards whether empathising with the other is encouraged or not. In theory, then, it would be possible that less empathy was experienced and shown towards animals in archaic and classical Greece than in our own time. Nevertheless, the examined Greek texts from Homer to Anyte imply such sensitivity towards animal existence that an argument of the suggested kind is difficult to defend. Instead, specific empathyinviting passages will be identified in them, and these will serve to point out cracks in the hypothesis of the supposedly allencompassing anthropocentrism of Greek culture. In such passages the animal’s point of view can be evoked in many ways. For instance, the events may be described from the animal’s point of view, using the animal itself as the narrator, as is the case in Anyte’s dolphin poem (AP 7.215). When the animal is addressed by the narrator or a character, like in Anyte’s epigram about the goat and children (AP 6.312) or in Sophocles’ Philoctetes, the reader or listener is invited to step both into the position of the animal and the human spectator (character or narrator), who attributes certain kinds of feelings and preferences to it. Even in the case of animal similes the description can point towards the animal’s experiences or evoke its movements in a way that invites empathy. Surely it is not self-evident

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that the contemporaries of Homer, Sophocles, Aristophanes and Anyte would have experienced this invitation in precisely the same way as we do, for even our own contemporaries can read a specific text in varying ways. It is likely, however, that many of the intersubjective possibilities provided by the structure of a text for readers remain the same throughout the years.

Reader’s Empathy and the Idea of Viewpoint As it was suggested earlier, some phenomenologists wish to reserve the word ‘empathy’ for the empathy experienced in the bodily presence of others. Such empathy may indeed be a necessary condition for the existence of other modes of relating to alien perspectives. Many of the experiences that literature, cinema, and other forms of art evoke in us, however, resemble the empathy of faceto-face situations so much that it would seem artificial to place them in an altogether different category. Neither should one underplay the fact that the very notion of empathy has its roots in aesthetics.44 Furthermore, even face-to-face encounters have narrative elements: one’s empathetic understanding of the other develops through what he or somebody else tells us but is not perceivable as such in the situation at hand. According to literary theorist Suzanne Keen, this is already a case of narrative empathy. In Keen’s definition, narrative empathy is ‘the sharing of feeling and perspective-taking induced by reading, viewing, hearing, or imagining narratives of another’s situation and condition’.45 In other words, narrative empathy is not limited to the reading experience but is also a part of our everyday interaction with others. In her Empathy and the Novel Keen does, in fact, use the expression reader’s empathy in order to distinguish the empathy pertaining to the experience of reading from narrative empathy in general.46 Keen also points out that empathy and character identification should not be equated, even if these two are linked. She argues that empathy is characterised by the experience ‘I feel what you feel’. In her view, however, character identification may invite empathy, and, on the other hand, empathising with a fictional character may

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precede identification.47 According to her, specific aspects of characterisation, such as naming, may influence readers’ ability to identify with a character. This, in turn, enhances the possibility of experiencing empathy.48 Eventually, Keen suggests that her evidence backs up the assumption that ‘character identification lies at the heart of readers’ empathy’, even though she does not elaborate on the differences and convergences between identification and empathy but rather merges the two in an unspecified manner. Keith Oatley, on the other hand, suggests that character identification is a kind of empathy, that is, empathy in which we become the one with the object of identification, we become him or her.49 This becoming can surely be only partial, but the experience of sameness may, indeed, be crucial to the problem of identification. It may be particularly easy to empathise with others when they or their situation is in significant ways similar to oneself of one’s situation. There are many examples in Keen’s studies of real readers that back up this idea: the interviewed readers explain that their own life experience helps them identify with certain characters or their situations. At the same time, Keen points out that it is possible for readers to identify with characters who are different from them, such as animals, and that the elements of identity, situation and feeling that trigger empathy can be quite minimal.50 While the distinctions made by literary scholars between identification and empathy often remain indecisive, it is sufficient for the purposes of this study to define identification as a case of a particularly intense empathy, one nuanced by a degree of experienced similarity. Instead of emotions, which play a major role in studies such as Keen’s, however, the present study takes embodiment as a whole as its basic point of departure and along with it the idea of the viewpoint. One of the most significant aspects of reader’s empathy is the bodily disconnection between the reader and those whose viewpoint or perspective she adopts. Whether I read a text silently by myself or aloud to myself, I come into contact with an alien world in which I am not present as an embodied agent, even though the text does presuppose the reader as an agent that activates the text in their act of

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reading. Even if the characters can typically perceive each other and have actions with consequences within each particular literary universe, I as the reader cannot change the literary universe of a text that proceeds in a linear manner. Conversely, literary others are not spatially present to me, nor can they physically act upon my world. There is no possibility for reciprocity, which is so essential to face-toface encounters. Nor can I freely choose my viewpoint to the literary other as I can to the others I meet in reality: my gaze is, if not totally controlled, at least guided by the author.51 In short, for all practical purposes the literary world and my reality are separate, and my relationships with the literary characters have different kinds of limits than my relationships with real living beings. There is also an outstanding freedom to the literary experience: literature allows us to dwell on the other’s perspective in a way that is impossible in our everyday, face-to-face encounters. In our everyday life a magnitude of disruptive elements gets in the way of empathetic observation: expectations of reciprocity in communication, ethical demands, boredom, the socially acceptable timespans of observing the other, the other’s attempts to hide his true thoughts and feelings, the other’s difficulties in expressing themselves by means of speech, fear that the other’s presence will become too overbearing, and so on. The very fact that the other and I are both physically here right now, in the presence of one another, makes us ethically involved and simultaneously vulnerable to the actions of the other. In case I witnessed interaction of a goat and children and the goat acted aggressively towards the children or the children hurt the goat, I should help the victim or victims, instead of breathing in the dramatic atmosphere of the event. Should some of the children utter something to me, this something may appear to me as a call for help, as a description of the situation or as sheer mockery; but whichever the case may be I am still in the sphere of action and ethical responsibility. However, as we saw, reading calls for a more detached attitude. In Iser’s words, the reader can ‘step out of his own world and enter another, where he can experience extremes of pleasure and pain without being involved in any consequences whatsoever’.52

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When I read Anyte’s poem, only I am present in the flesh. The body of the writer is absent, and even the bodies of the characters only exist through words. Unlike in an actual encounter, there are no demands for reciprocity or for any kind of action at all, and I can truly succumb to these words and savour their meaning and sound. A strange world with several perspectives and different kinds of objects is opened up to me. It is a world in which there is an ‘I’ that is not really myself and a ‘you’ that appears to be a goat with a ‘shaggy mouth’ but that also has myself as a reference point. That world includes children, equipment (reins, noseband) and places (‘around the god’s temple’). These are the things that I ‘see’, or that I am shown by the writer.53 According to Iser’s phenomenological description, there are four basic perspectives: that of the narrator, that of the characters, that of the plot and that marked out for the reader. Each perspective opens up a view to both the world of the literary work and to the other perspectives. This happens when the events are described first from the viewpoint of one character and then from that of another, and the limits of each viewpoint are thereby revealed. On the other hand, the different perspectives interact and interweave, and it is impossible to separate them distinctly from one another. As Iser puts it, ‘there is a moving viewpoint that travels along inside that which it has to apprehend’.54 That is, the viewpoint – which Iser calls ‘the wandering viewpoint’– travels within the literary text. Nevertheless, at a particular moment the reader is more involved with one perspective than another, and this constitutes for him the theme, which ‘stands before the other segments of the horizon in which he has previously been situated’.55 The horizon is, in a way, the background the reader accumulates in the reading process in order to comprehend the future events of the story. Within classical studies the approach of narratology and its conception of perspective are more familiar than those of phenomenology.56 In narratology the terms ‘point of view’ and ‘perspective’ have lately given way to the concept of focalisation, which is considered more precise and unambiguous than the earlier concepts. Focalisation answers the question of which character’s point

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of view orients the narrative, in short, the question of who sees. This is different from asking who the narrator is or who is speaking.57 For a narratologist like Burkhardt Niederhoff, a character implies a perspective only when we learn something about their way of seeing the world.58 The term ‘focaliser’ is used in narratology to refer to what Iser calls ‘the theme’, namely the perspective that the reader is adopting at a given moment. At this point, despite different terminology, the phenomenological and narratological views resemble each other. These descriptions elucidate the specificity of the literary universe and the ways in which we can have contact to the other viewpoint in the reading experience. Nevertheless, the idea of the theme or focaliser may be too rigid to describe properly the contact to the other. Adopting it would imply that the children in the goat poem may not necessarily present perspectives. It can still be argued that all characters present some kinds of perspectives on the world described in the text. What varies is the extent to which the world is revealed from a particular perspective. True enough, sometimes a character is little more than a name, but within that particular literary universe that name implies a body and at least a potential perspective to that universe. The presence of this body and perspective can be more or less robust in the text, however. What distinguishes the view of the present study from Iser’s is that here the literary work is not considered only in terms of temporally changing perspectives (‘now one perspective dominates, now another’) but also in terms of spatiality and embodiment: the epigram about the goat and children, for instance, presents a spatial situation with numerous possibilities for empathy. Indeed, it is as if the goat epigram appeared to me, the reader, as an unfolding of several, partly overlapping viewpoints: most clearly the narrator’s, the goat’s and the children’s. The power of the poem comes partly from this tension between different perspectives. In terms of embodiment, however, the significance of the poem is not restricted to the perspectives opened up by the text: there are the words giving a more general flavour to the poem, words such as ‘god’ and ‘horse’. These words are not ‘only words’, they also challenge us as embodied beings. This challenge has two faces: on the one hand the god or horse

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in question need not be an active character within the poem for us to relate to it as bodies. If we are in command of the language, ‘god’ brings us into contact with something immortal, ‘horse’ to a creature with four legs, an elongated muzzle, a mane and hooves, and we apprehend these beings as different from ourselves, relating their embodied or disembodied existence to our own. Similarly, the words ‘reins’, ‘temple’ and ‘noseband’ have an embodied meaning to us, so that we relate to the ‘temple’ as a sacred place to visit, and ‘reins’ and ‘noseband’ as equipment that have set us within a certain embodied relationship to non-human animals. Furthermore, the phonic material of these words has an effect on us, and here we come to see the specificity of each language and the ultimate untranslatability59 of Anyte’s poem. When the poem is translated into English, it no longer has the same ring, and even the basic visual elements of the words and letters give different kinds of visual impressions.60 In this sense it is not insignificant whether we read the word ἵppo6 or ‘horse’ as a reference to a certain kind of animal, for these words touch us in a different way, and they take place in two registers, that is, in two ways of articulating things.61 Despite this fundamental difference, translations are not, of course, totally impossible. They exist, but only as approximations, not as replicas. Translations involve a rebirth of meaning in the expressions of a foreign language, and an approximation of the style and sensual quality of the original.62 Now we can see more clearly the role of embodiment in reading Anyte’s poem. Each word of the poem resonates in the reader’s body, and each word has a certain kind of ring to which we are responsive. On the other hand, the poem provides us with several viewpoints, and we are to relate our human bodies to different kinds of characters in the text, so that we can experience the clash between our own embodiment and the alien embodiment inaccessible to us as such. Indeed, even if the other’s body is, in reality, absent in the reading experience, the words are able to produce a sensual presence that is peculiarly intimate. Anyte wrote the goat poem in the form of speech directed to ‘you’. The second-person singular, one of the standard devices in ancient

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funerary epigrams, gives the poem a tone of intimacy and creates ambivalence between the speaking ‘I’ and ‘you’.63 Nevertheless, even when literature does not use this particular device or the device of apostrophe, in the modern form of which the reader is addressed directly as ‘you’, the reading experience retains a similar ambivalence: the reader is ‘spoken to’, and at the same time she occupies the position of the speaking subject. The next chapter explores this problem in more detail.

The Other’s Voice Inside Me: Intimacy and Strangeness of Reading In the context of Graeco-Roman epigrams, the question of who is talking or whose voice is heard is a central one. This has to do with the fact that many of the early inscriptions were directly addressed to the potential passer-by or to a god.64 However, it is possible to approach the questions of intersubjectivity and intimacy in the reading experience at a more general level.65 It appears that the reader is spoken to through the text, which the author has put together – and in this sense the reader is spoken to by the author. But as it was demonstrated earlier, this speech is given to the reader as disembodied, as mere words. It is the act of reading that gives life to these words. There is a foreignness to the text, in that the reader does not choose the words nor are they the expression of the reader’s embodied situation. In this sense the reading experience resembles the situation in which somebody speaks to you face to face. On the other hand, reading is not passive but active, it requires an effort on the part of the reader, and it is partly through this effort that the words and worlds of the text become ‘mine’. How does the other’s ‘I’ become mine in this communication, if it does at all? Firstly, it is important to see that one’s own ‘I’ cannot be totally annihilated in the act of reading. According to Simone de Beauvoir, the reader goes back and forth between the literary world – the world of the author – and his own world, without ever leaving the latter completely. Beauvoir claims that, when ‘in the other world’,

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the reader forgets himself and abdicates his ‘I’ in favour of the one who is speaking.66 To put it in more Husserlian terms, the reader retains a prereflective, non-thematic awareness of her bodily existence and whereabouts.67 Prereflective awareness means awareness that comes prior to reflection: I do not think about the fact that my body is in this particular chair in this particular room, but I am nonetheless aware of it – I am aware of it pre-reflectively. It is possible to thematise my body position, to make it the theme of my consciousness, but when I am immersed in the text, this is not likely to happen: the literary world is the theme of my consciousness. Nevertheless, when I occasionally become less immersed in the text, I can move to a reflective stage in which I may compare my own experiences with those of a character’s, for instance, or evaluate the author’s style. After that there is another period of immersion, until I start to reflect again, and so on. An analysis of the so-called inner speech may explain why the back-and-forth movement described by Beauvoir is so typical of reading, and it may also elucidate the alleged confluence of another ego and oneself within the reading experience. Regardless of the problematic nature of the idea that ‘inner speech’ equals thinking,68 we undoubtedly possess an ability to form expressive – even if often fragmentary – sentences within us before speaking them out loud or writing them down. Reading, on the other hand, leaves space for somebody else’s speech and allows us to adopt the other’s speech as if it were our own inner speech. But even if this speech takes place within us and shares the intimacy of inner speech, it remains other. Despite our activity in reading, what is read comes to us from elsewhere – these words are somebody else’s. We let ourselves be led by the other’s words, allowing the perspective given to us by the text to become ours. The voice of the other, which we ourselves activate and, in a sense, adopt as ours, describes events, feelings and characters.69 We allow this voice, this somebody, to lead us through different points of view, so that while we ‘see’ what the other shows us and ‘hear’ the other’s words addressing us, we also gain access to the characters’ way of

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experiencing and to a world that has many that are similar to those of our own perceptual world. It is now possible to crystallise the particular access to the other’s world that literature provides. First, as an analogue of the ‘inner voice’, a literary text is experienced as both ‘spoken’ through our own efforts, and as spoken to us by the other. Second, the lived world described by the author is in many ways analogical with our own lived world: the literary world is not identical to our own but it does consist of similar features – it is, in its own way, a ‘world’. Third, the absence of the speaker’s, that is, the author’s body, facilitates the immersion of oneself in the text and its alien world. And finally, the ethical and practical imperative of face-to-face situations is absent, which further facilitates this immersion. In this sense, it is indeed plausible that when we read a literary text, someone is speaking to us, and that at the same time we enter the world of that someone. Anyte is speaking to us and we enter her world.70 Until now only silent reading has been discussed. Reading the text aloud, however, puts the reader in a slightly different situation in comparison to the case of silent reading. The phonic and rhythmic elements of the text stand out, and reading acquires an element of performance, as one hears one’s voice speaking the written words aloud. As was suggested earlier, some of the intimacy of reading is lost and the relationship between the reader and the possible listeners comes to the fore: the dyad of the textual other and the reader is replaced by a triad in which the possible listeners are the third party. The listener, on the other hand, experiences the text as mediated by another living body, who makes the text his own and audible. This is true irrespective of whether a text is read aloud or recited by heart. In Greek Antiquity, these two modes were not, in fact, clearly separated, as reading aloud to others required that one had already practiced reading the text in question and memorised parts of it, so that the actual text could be used mainly as a support for memory.71 From the point of view of the one who reads or recites the text, these two cases are different, however. When one reads aloud a text that is inscribed in stone or written on papyrus or paper or in an electronic document, the text is present as an object and even as a

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kind of interlocutor. When one recites a text by heart, the text is not present as an object before it is recited, the words pouring out without further effort, one verse inviting another. In both cases, however, there is room for interpretation and improvisation. As can be seen, the reception of literary texts is not phenomenologically as simple as one might first presume but involves a mixture of activity and passivity, a communication in which the text invites the reader and at the same time comes alive through the reader’s act of reading. Literary texts72 provide us with alien perspectives on the world and at the same time make it possible for us to be absorbed in the foreign experience in a way impossible for us in everyday life. In the context of ancient Greek texts this means that the reader has access to an ancient world, one which seems to the reader to be alive but which, in fact, is enlivened by one’s own act of reading. In the next chapter we will see what this enlivening means in terms of the readers’ and writers’ relationship to fictive animal bodies, or more precisely, what kind of role this enlivening plays in the phenomena of anthropomorphism and hybridism and whether anthropocentrism can be avoided in the depictions of animals.

Anthropocentrism, Anthropomorphism and Hybridism: From Problems of Science to Literary Experiments Sometimes the Greek attitudes to non-human others have been defined in fairly simple terms, particularly in terms of anthropocentrism and anthropomorphism. It is less clear, however, what is meant by these concepts in each case, and whether the alterity of the Greeks can be captured through them. On the surface anthropocentrism is a fairly unequivocal concept, referring to, as the word implies, a human-centred worldview and system of values. Upon closer examination, however, a plurality appears. In his article ‘The Greek Anthropocentric View of Man’ (1981), Robert Renehan argues that the standard definitions of man and animal in ancient Greece encapsulate a ‘severely anthropocentric’ attitude, because they sharply differentiate humans from non-human animals, first and foremost through logos, which was absent in

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non-human animals but present in humans.73 In his opinion, the Greeks differ from all other peoples in their persistent pursuit to find the attributes that differentiate humans from non-humans.74 To put it briefly, Renehan understands anthropocentrism in terms of differentiation: one’s own kind, the human kind, is sharply differentiated from others, that is, from non-human animals. This conception of anthropocentrism differs clearly from that of Lynn White’s (1967), for instance. White sees anthropocentrism as a disrespectful attitude towards non-human nature and as such as less typical of pagan animism than of Christianity.75 Since White, however, new distinctions have been made, especially in the area of environmental ethics. Bryan G. Norton (1984) makes a distinction between strong anthropocentrism and weak anthropocentrism. This distinction boils down the difference between taking any satisfiable human desires as the determining value (strong anthropocentrism) and taking carefully considered human desires as the determining value (weak anthropocentrism).76 Frederick Ferre´’s (1994) perspectival anthropocentrism is yet another way to understand humancentredness: we relate to the world as humans, seeing it from a human perspective, even if we attempt to take other kinds of perspectives and interests into account as well.77 The inevitable humanness of perceptions and interpretations has already been discussed – one’s own body is the necessary point of departure and of reference for all of one’s perceptions. Even the languages we speak refer to human embodiment, so that the English verb ‘to grasp’ means both ‘taking hold of something with your hands’ and ‘understanding’, just as the Greek verb ὑpolambάn1in means both ‘take up by getting under’, ‘to take up by the hand’ and ‘to understand’. In English, the concrete act of visual perception gains also a more abstract meaning: ‘to see’ can also mean ‘to understand’. As it is well known, the Greek expression oἶda (‘I know’) similarly refers to visual perception, for its root verb is 1ἴdomai (‘to see’). Every human being is a descendant of other human beings, and notwithstanding the rare cases of hermits and abandoned feral children, we live within human communities with values that are

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primarily human. In these communities we learn the ‘proper’ ways of being a body, of gesturing and of relating to other bodies. Of course, we can rebel against the predominant ways and values of our society and culture, or reveal contradictions between these two, but even when we do this, we speak within the human community, addressing our words (of human language) to other humans. This is not to deny, however, that our value systems can be affected by the needs and preferences of non-human animals, that our perceptions can be enriched by living together with them, nor that many of them actually share with us preferences such as safety and freedom of movement. As we can see, anthropocentrism has many faces. It can be seen as an attitude that allows for the exploitation of non-human nature, as a consciously adopted ethical view, or as a tendency to emphasise human specificity. According to some, it characterises specific historical periods: ancient Greece, the Christian era, the twenty-first century. It is permeated by a belief in human superiority – or not. Mary Midgley argues that the very idea of anthropocentrism becomes absurd when it is taken to mean the absolute claim of humans as the centre of the universe. While such positions have existed in the course of history, Midgley may be right in that such an idea would seem rather ridiculous in our time. She argues that the word ‘anthropocentrism’ is commonly used in the meaning of ‘human chauvinism’ or narrowness of sympathy, in a parallel way to gender chauvinism.78 In a similar vein, Tim Hayward has suggested that using the term ‘anthropocentrism’ is misguided if one simply wants to point out some problems in the human relationship to non-human beings. In his view, the concepts ‘speciesism’ and ‘human chauvinism’ would be more appropriate.79 Sometimes these two words are understood as synonyms, but for Hayward, ‘speciesism’ stands for arbitrary discrimination based on species, while ‘human chauvinism’ means the unquestioned belief in human superiority and failure to recognise the glorified human characteristics in non-humans.80 Perspectival anthropocentrism does not necessarily imply an epistemic flaw, whereas human chauvinism – understood in

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Hayward’s way – most certainly does and should be avoided in scholarly practices. Nevertheless, human chauvinism does not necessarily permeate whole cultures, be they ancient cultures or contemporary scientific cultures. Nor does the search for specifically human attributes necessarily imply human chauvinism, even though these two things are connected. The problem arises when a sincere effort to describe reality is abandoned in favour of a rigid idea of human specificity.81 At this point it is important to acknowledge that overcoming the problems of anthropocentrism does not need to consist of abandoning the human point of view. Instead, it means challenging oneself to learn about other points of views, to empathise with those points of view, to imagine how things appear from those points of view, and to use this experience to think critically about one’s beliefs about the world, ourselves and about non-human animals. Scholarly studies and artistic innovations have significant roles in the accomplishment of this task. This brings us to the concept of anthropomorphism, which is usually defined as the attribution of human characteristics, behaviours and motivations to non-human beings. Such attribution might take place when one describes the experiences of a dolphin in a poem or writes about a bird’s perception of the surrounding world in a play. Usually anthropomorphism is not considered to be a flaw in a work of fiction, whereas in science the word is used normatively, with the intent to reveal false presuppositions and deductions. In reference to the Greeks, however, this term is often used in a descriptive manner, merely to indicate that human-like qualities are attributed to deities and natural entities.82 The given definition of anthropomorphism as an attribution of human characteristics, behaviours and motivations to non-human beings is hardly unproblematic, however, when the word is used in the normative sense. This is because some human characteristics, behaviours and motivations may indeed belong to non-human beings as well. Nevertheless, a wanton attribution of human motivations or abilities to non-human animals is problematic when adopted in scientific practices. Even so, contemporary ethologists such as Frans

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de Waal and Jonathan Balcombe suggest that it is more important to keep an open mind about the abilities of non-human animals than it is to cling to an exaggerated fear of anthropomorphism, which, in point of fact, may amount to anthropodenial, the a priori rejection of shared characteristics between humans and non-human animals.83 In reality, many examples which are given as model cases of anthropomorphism, such as the case of Clever Hans, a horse that allegedly knew multiplication tables, or that of Roger the telepathic dog, are so fantastic that they smack more of bad reasoning than of anthropomorphism.84 The Greek anthropomorphism pertaining to deities and spirits of nature is quite different from the epistemic flaw of arbitrary attribution of human behaviours and characteristics to non-human animals. After all, the personification of higher powers and natural entities such as springs and rivers involves the attribution of life and intentionality to inanimate entities. Unlike those entities, nonhuman animals exist as living bodies that already have their own orientation towards their surrounding world, that is, a bodily intentionality. On the basis of Greek sources, philosophical texts as well as works of fiction, it is evident that the Greeks recognised this intentionality. Despite this, different levels of anthropomorphism can be distinguished in literary works. Aesop’s fables are perhaps the most extreme example of anthropomorphism because they describe animals as reasoning, feeling, acting and even talking like humans. This choice does not make the writer(s) of the Aesopic fables guilty of faulty presuppositions about animals, of course, for their aim is not to describe animals accurately but to say something about human life. On the other hand, there are works of fiction which describe animal life in a more realistic manner. For instance, one of Anyte’s epigrams (Poll. Onom. 5.48) describes a dog’s activities and death as if from the outside, in the second person, without the tell-tale signs of anthropomorphism.85 In another epigram (AP 7.215), however, Anyte boldly embarks upon the task of describing a dolphin’s perceptions ‘from the inside’, in the first person. As we will see in the more detailed discussion of the poem in the Case Studies section, this

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choice contains many anthropomorphising elements, including how the story is told in a human language and from a perspective imagined by a human. The different levels of anthropomorphism distinguishable within ancient Greek fiction do not really say much, however, about the general attitude of the Greeks or even about the attitude of writers towards animals. In fiction it seems natural to experiment with the limits of experience, to build imaginary worlds in which the human experience blends with intuitions and fantasies of non-human ones. The experience of reading a text involving animal figures also implies a mixture of the human and the non-human, as was suggested earlier. To put it another way, a certain degree of cross-species hybridism is always involved in the writing and reading experiences of such texts, even when the writer describes the perceptual world as faithfully as possible. It could even be argued that Greek mythology and literature express a particular interest in experimenting with the limits of embodiment, human and non-human, giving the experience of empathy with non-human animals a visual form in composite animals and metamorphosis stories. Certainly the centaurs, harpies and satyrs, who all have partly human, partly non-human bodies, are not a faithful description of the bodily experience of encountering the animal other. Even if we may have localised empathetic sensations in our limbs when we see a goat move in a certain way, we hardly have a distinct experience of having a human upper body and a goat’s lower body, not even in the as-if mode. Rather than argue for a one-to-one relationship between empathy with non-human animals and descriptions of metamorphoses and hybridism, it might be more realistic to suggest that empathy may motivate the imaginative experimentation of metamorphosis stories and stories about hybrid animals. Empathy alone cannot explain the genesis of creatures that are combinations of several non-human animals, such as the hippocamp, the griffin and the chimera. In the case of the Greeks, Near Eastern art certainly had an important influence. General human curiosity, which is also directed towards the limits of

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embodiment, may give an impulse to these figures as well. This does not, of course, exclude the possibility of misrecognitions of certain figures such as man and horse as a source for fantasy animals like the centaur. In any case imagining hybrids creates a new kind of possibility for empathy. It becomes possible to live one’s human body in a relationship to a body that one has never encountered. For that matter, the existing animals of which we have no firsthand experience but know only through images and stories are in a similar position. We can empathise only with their images or with how they appear to us through our imagination or through the words in which they are given to us. Finally, composite animals and metamorphosis stories may also result from relating to different others in a similar way. One’s relationship to a certain kind of woman and a certain kind of bird may contain some features, which could, through an imaginative process, result in the figure of the harpy. This connection is rather speculative, however, and other avenues remain open for explanation. Yet it can be argued that the affective value given to non-human characteristics has human embodiment and the human norms of being a body as its background. Therefore the negative value of turning into a pig, for instance, has the snoutlessness of the flat human face as its reference point: for a human being it is degrading to put one’s face in food or dirt. The things that are degrading in terms of embodiment have their ‘natural’ analogies in the acts, manners and inclinations – such as debauchery or indolence – considered to be degrading in a given society. In this way the metamorphosed human beings and hybrid animals appear as crystallisations of the bodily aspect of vices and virtues.86 In the phenomenological analysis, as we have seen, the human embodiment shows itself as the fundamental point of orientation to the world, and anthropocentrism, anthropomorphism and hybridism can all be understood in their connection to that fundamental point. Literature, on the other hand, is revealed as one of the fields of experimentation in which the limits of human embodiment and perception are challenged, and in which the accusation of anthropomorphism becomes absurd.

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Summary In this section of the book, a wide array of concepts has been introduced while embodiment and empathy have been explored from various angles. To further clarify this diversity, these concepts will now be presented in a more schematic manner. The definitions given below are necessarily a simplification and do not reflect the whole field of empathy studies but rather our own ideas of how these concepts are best understood. Yet many of the definitions owe to those of earlier phenomenologists as well as those of Keen’s.

empathy narrative empathy

reader’s empathy identification

sympathy

Einfu¨hlung, feeling-in-the-other, partial immersion in the other’s situation and perspective empathy induced by narratives of the other’s situation, be they read, viewed, heard, or imagined empathy induced by reading empathy strengthened by experienced or fantasised similarity between the other and oneself or their situation and one’s own feeling for the other, compassion

In empathy one immerses oneself in the other’s situation, but that immersion is always only partial and can vary in degree. In a way, this immersion happens without effort, but it can acquire new depth through reflective moments and active seeking of information regarding the other’s experience. There are significant differences between empathy experienced in face-to-face situations and reader’s empathy. While face-to-face situations are ethically challenging and often involve distancing oneself from the other, reading is a safe way to immerse oneself in the other’s world. Paradoxically, the absence of the other’s living body may facilitate seeing the world through his or her eyes. What is more, a piece of literature opens up many perspectives to its world, not just one. For this reason the question of reader’s empathy proves to be a complicated one.

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Some critics claim that, because phenomenology is supposedly ahistorical, it is problematic to apply a phenomenological approach to the study of cultural phenomena. Yet the interest in embodiment and sense experience does not exclude historical explanations, because the lived body always exists in a historical and social situation. The following two sections deal with the historical context against which the texts of Part IV, Case Studies, should be read. The next section (Part II) elucidates Greek rhetorical strategies, while the evidence of the human-animal relationship in ancient Greece is examined in Part III.

PART II ENCOUNTERS WITH ANIMALS IN GREEK LITERATURE

‘The subject of literary studies is ultimately the human mind – the mind that is the creator, subject, and auditor of literary works.’ – Gottschall & Wilson (eds), The Literary Animal, p. 3. ‘Well, by now some smart aleck in the audience may be saying, ‘What’s going on? What does the beetle mean?’ – Aristophanes, Peace, 44– 6.1 Animals function in many roles in ancient Greek literature, but basically they seem to figure as metaphors, objects of comparison both in factual literature as well as in ‘fiction’. Besides zoological works, factual literature dealing with animals included, for instance, horse and hound manuals and anecdotes of curious and exotic animals in natural histories. Furthermore, animals were the objects of constant comparison in Greek discourses on ethics and philosophy of mind as Urs Dierauer (1977) and Richard Sorabji (1993) have shown.2 Human mental faculties were compared with those of other animals, and human virtues were paralleled with the ‘natural’ virtues of animals. In Greek poetry, animals functioned as symbols, which had allegoric, metaphorical and narratological roles. As Jeremy B. Lefkowitz sums up, animals appeared ‘in figurative and indirect

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speech acts’ such as similes, portents, metaphors, riddles, allegories and proverbs and in such literary genres as fable, old Attic comedy and mock animal epics (like the Battle of Frogs and Mice).3 Bucolic poetry, mimiambs and epigrams are other obvious genres in which animals have a significant role. However, animals seem to have minor roles in Greek poetry compared to the visual arts. There are not many Greek poems where the main subject or protagonist is a non-human, sentient being, who is, moreover, described as a vivid presence and as an unique individual. In all, when animals occur in Greek poetry, they seemingly serve to clarify the description of humans and their doings. Animals in portents, metaphors and riddles are mere symbols of something in the human world – and they often are quite stereotyped symbols for that matter. But if animals have a merely subsidiary role in Greek poetry, is this a sign of a lack of immersion in animals’ situations (empathy) and compassion for animals (sympathy)? Are modern poets, then, more interested in reflecting on and problematising our relationship with non-human animals than the Greeks were, and was the Graeco-Roman culture therefore essentially more deeply anthropocentric than ours? Or did the Greek poets just have different means of describing empathetical relations with animals? And what about poetics – was poetry thought to speak ‘essentially about people’ in Greek philosophy of art?4 As is well-known, ancient literary criticism – such as discussion of mimesis – took much from the discourse on the visual arts. It seems that ancient art critics noticed animals as subjects of art much more often than literary critics did. How, then, did they discuss animals as subjects of art? These questions will be handled here by concentrating first on animals as a subject matter of Greek literature and then on the problem of how the ancient critics, poets and audience might have related to animal characters. This Part will conclude by presenting some obvious literary techniques of immersion into animals’ situations and some devices to enhance animals’ roles: animals as the tenor of comparison, personification and prosopopoeia, and the direct address and apostrophe to animals.

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Animals as a Subject Matter in Art and Literature When reading Greek literature, we are dealing with well-defined genres, each of which has its own complicated artistic dialect and genre conventions. The impact of genre on characters is obvious – Heracles in tragedy is a different character from Heracles in comedy. Greek audiences were fairly conscious of the differences between the genres and used to the flexibility of characters. Aristotle notes this in the Poetics by his designation of characters in serious literature (tragedy and epics) as spoydaı˜oi (‘earnest, serious, prominent, good, excellent’) and those in comedy and iambic poetry as waῦloi (‘low in rank, common, mean, simple, bad’). Genre and character defined, for their parts, the audience’s reactions: spoudaios might be an object of pity in tragedy and phaulos an object of ridicule in comedy. The different genres took different positions towards non-human animals, too. Animals could have significant functions in comedies, as in Aristophanes’ Birds, but not in tragedies. No memorable, lengthy scene of a suffering, dying animal exists in major Greek poetry. Were animals then thought to be too unpoetic (‘non-spoudaioi’) to be the main subject matter of higher literary genres, or, instead, should the relative ‘animal-lessness’ of Greek poetry, or at least the lack of serious animal protagonists, be explained not by the Greek conception of animals but by the development of the Greek literary tradition? The factors may be intertwined but a thorough answer is out of the scope of this book. In the following subchapters, the discussion of animal protagonists will start with a Late Antique epic poem on hunting (the Cynegetica), where animals are in the main roles, and continue with Philostratus’ discussion of the genre, where animals appear as protagonists, namely the Aesopic fables. After that, animals in the visual arts and in art criticism will be examined, before the scarce references to animals in Greek poetics are discussed. Animals – Worthy of Human Consideration? The Cynegetica, the over 2,000-line epic attributed to Oppian of Cilicia, begins with the goddess Artemis exhorting the poet not to sing the battles of men or love tales between humans but those of animals:

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Sing of the battles of wild beasts and hunting men; / sing of the breeds of hounds and the varied tribes of horses; / the quick-witted counsels, the deeds of skilful tracking; / tell me the hates of wild beasts, sing their friendships / and their bridal chambers of tearless love upon the hills, / and the births which among wild beasts need no midwifery. (Cyneg. 1.35 – 40) (Trans. A.W. Mair).5 The goddess announces that this is a ‘rugged path’, which has not been trodden by anybody ‘with songs’ before (Cyneg. 20 – 1). What is meant by this is that the subject matter had not been treated before in the heroic epic, a revived genre in Late Antiquity.6 This highly valued genre has here taken an unusual subject, partly changing the focus from the deeds of human hunters to the deeds of the animal ‘heroes’. Although this is not an exact description of the content of the Cynegetica, which owes its tone to hunting manuals among other models, the epic includes passages where animals are eulogised (sable antelope, 2.445 – 48) and, in hunting situations, empathised with, even possibly sympathised with, too (bear, 4.406 – 11). Furthermore, the Cynegetica had several similes where animals are the objects of the comparison: a lion is compared to a warrior in battle (4.189– 95), and not vice versa as in the Iliad. When analysing similes, Homeric scholars largely use the terms Ivor Armstrong Richards created for analysing metaphors: the ‘tenor’ (the point of comparison, e.g., Achilleus’ situation or some aspect of it) and the ‘vehicle’ (the lion’s situation).7 The Cynegetica thus contains similes in which the tenor is the animal’s situation, which is compared with the human’s situation. That is to say, the animal world is primary and the human world is secondary.8 Animals are of course main characters in many fables. This genre had a special place in Graeco-Roman literature in general, as anecdotes enlivening the narrative, and later on, after been collected into anthologies, fables were used as suitable reading for children. Philostratus (c. 170– 250 CE ) notes in his Life of Apollonius of Tyana that animal fables may form children’s conceptions of animals:

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[. . .] [S]omeone who tells an untrue tale while adding instruction, as Aesop does, makes plain that he uses falsehood for the benefit of the listener. It is also a charming trait to make unintelligent (ἄloga) animals nicer and deserving serious attention from humans. By growing familiar with these stories from childhood, and being raised on them, we form ideas about each of the animals, that some are kingly, some humble, some clever, and some innocent. (5.14.3) (Trans. Christopher P. Jones, slightly modified).9 The speaker here is the object of this biography, Apollonius of Tyana (c. 50– 100) – a wandering Pythagorean-minded sophist and magician – who discusses the value of mythology with Menippus, the namesake of a famous satirist. Menippus despises Aesop’s fables as stories of ‘frogs and donkeys’ and fit only for ‘old women and children’ (5.14.1), whereas Apollonius defends them, stating that Aesop used ‘the most humble incidents (smikrὰ prάgmata) to teach the greatest truths’ (5.14.2). According to Apollonius, animal stories, which are ‘false’ tales (c1yd1ı˜6) – that is, fiction – not only make us believe that some animals are ‘kingly’, others ‘kind’, but they also describe animals as nicer (ἡdύ6) than they are in everyday life and as ‘deserving serious attention from humans’ (spoydῆ6 ἄjia toı˜6 ἀnurώpoi6, 5.14.3).10 Apollonius himself recounts a charming tale of the origin of fables, told by his mother. Aesop was a shepherd praying to Hermes for wisdom; Hermes, however, gave the most valued branches of wisdom (such as philosophy and oratory) to those who had offered expensive gifts, such as gold. When Aesop was revealed to be without any kind of wisdom,11 Hermes remembered that the Horae (the goddesses of seasons) had told him a story (mythos) about a cow when he was a little boy. The mythos was about ‘the cow which had a conversation with a human about herself and about the earth’ (di1lέxuh tῷ ἀnurώpῳ ἡ boῦ6 ὑpὲr ἑaytῆ6 t1 kaὶ tῆ6 gῆ6, 5.15.2). This story moved Hermes to love cows, especially Apollo’s cattle, which he later stole. Remembering this, Hermes realised that he could at least give the gift of storytelling (mythologia) to Aesop if nothing else (5.15.2).12

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The many-layered mise-en-abyse device combines feminine elements with fables.13 Tales of animals seems to be – as Menippus says – intended for children and old women, but they are also stories that females (Apollonius’ mother, the Horae, the cow) tell. The speaking cow in the Horae’s story inspires baby Hermes to love cattle, but what the cow said is left open; it only states that the cow is telling of herself and the earth – important subjects for this pastoral god. If Apollonius is here defending animal fables, he is nevertheless of the opinion that actual animals (which are referred to as aloga) are a humble subject, basically insignificant, smikrὰ prάgmata. Animals had to be made interesting, worthy of serious consideration, by the help of storytelling. Storytelling was given to Aesop, not the loftier arts, such as philosophy or oratory, as if only stories, ‘false’ tales, were fit for depicting animals – or the best way to do so. Aesopian fables as a genre were generally considered to represent the ‘low’ style because the diction – that is, style of writing – was simple.14 Although Philostratus’ passage does not suggest that it was considered low also because its main characters, animals, were thought to be ‘low’, the writer of the Cynegetica clearly states that he is creating a new subject, different from heroic epic, the genre which was at the top of the hierarchy of literary genres. Writing epic poetry with animals as protagonists was a novelty. While representing foremost Late Antique attitudes, these writers also reflect very ancient beliefs about animals – our capacity to communicate with other animals and understand their way of being, which was a necessity for primordial man’s survival. The importance of animals for prehistoric people is suggested by the fact that animals were probably the first motifs of visual art.15 Greek Art Criticism on Animals Graeco-Roman art includes an abundance of carefully represented animals as well as images of the interaction between humans and animals. Pictures of animals – like vase paintings, votive scenes and tomb monuments – were part of the everyday visual landscape and affected people’s imaginations.16 Besides decorative functions,

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pictures of animals had apotropaic and symbolic functions, and they were frequently used in sacrificial imagery.17 Although animals were usually depicted as examples of their species, they could also be portrayed as individuals who inhabited a kind of alternative world beside the human world – as in the vase of the ‘pig-painter’, which depicts the encounter of two swineherds, which match at the bottom of the vase by a counterpart image of a pig and a piglet meeting snout to snout.18 Although the animal motif was popular, it was, however, not often referred to except among other motifs in Greek discussion of the visual arts. In the Republic, Plato gives a ‘list’ of the objects of art: plants, animals, people, earth, heaven, the gods and ‘all things in heaven and in Hades under the earth’ (Resp. 10.596c). In Plato’s Critias, the eponymous speaker starts his account of Atlantis by drawing an analogy between painting and verbal presentations. According to Critias, it is much easier to please the audience by depicting mountains, forests and ‘all that exists and move’ (tὰ p1rὶ aὐtὸn ὄnta kaὶ ἰόnta) than the human body because in the first case an approximation is enough. Instead, when depicting the human body, our everyday experience of it can point out flawed details (Criti. 107c– d). The passage acknowledges the central concept of Greek art, likeness, and that the function of the art is to please the audience, which happens if there are no ‘flawed details’, that is, when the artist manages to render the object acceptable to the audience. How to depict an animal’s character or soul, which would even acknowledge its individuality, was never discussed by ancient writers. Famous individual animals were nevertheless sometimes immortalised, such as the dog of Pericles’ father, Xanthippus, depicted in the Painted Stoa of Athens, and Alexander’s Bucephalus, commemorated in statues, coins and paintings.19 Some mythological animals (such as Laelaps the dog) may have had identifiable features. In Xenophon’s Memorabilia, Socrates argues against the sculptor Parrhasius’ claim that an artist cannot depict a person’s soul because soul cannot be seen. But, in Socrates’ view, soul can be depicted through facial expressions, pose and posture (3.10.3– 5).20 The Athenian sculptor Myron was praised as almost capturing the souls of

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men and of animals in bronze.21 Myron’s proverbially famous statue of a cow, which was erected first at Athens and later in Rome, inspired many ecphrastic epigrams; the earliest known to us is from the third century BCE . One of the important aesthetic qualities expressed in these epigrams was the liveliness of this statue: it was described as looking as if it were breathing, as if ‘alive’ (ἔmpnoo6).22 In all, the ecphrastic tradition gives us guidelines as to how animal motifs were received.23 Philostratus the Elder (in the third century CE ) describes a painting depicting the bull with which the Cretan queen Pasiphae¨ fell in love.24 The description of the bull suggests that ancient spectators quite freely made suppositions not only about the emotional state of the depicted humans but also of the animals: The bull is depicted with proud mien, the leader of the herd, with splendid horns, white, already experienced in love, its dewlap low and its neck massive, and it gazes fondly at the cow; but the cow in the herd, ranging free and all white but for a black head, disdains the bull. For its purpose suggests a leap, as of a girl who avoids the importunity of a lover. (Imag. 1.16.4) (Trans. by Arthur Fairbanks).25 The bull gazes thus ‘fondly at the cow’, but the cow disdains it. It is noteworthy that also here, as in the Oppianic Cynegetica mentioned above, the animal is the tenor, the object of the comparison, and the human situation is the vehicle: the cow’s movement expressing avoidance is compared with a girl’s movement avoiding her lover.26 The impact of animal images on the viewer was sometimes reflected over into literature. In Herodas’ fourth mime ‘Women Dedicating and Sacrificing to Asclepius’ (from the third century BCE ), a women and (probably) her maid are sacrificing a cock to the healing god. While the priest is preparing the ritual, the women admire the paintings and other artwork of the temple, including the statue of a child that is either choking or embracing a goose (4.32) and another statue of a man leading an ox (4.66). The maid says that the sculptures looked so real that she could have screamed when she saw the ox, because of the way it glanced her, out of the corner of its

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eye (4.70– 1). This woman’s deep absorption into the artwork expresses how common people – especially uneducated women – were supposed to relate to the art. The woman feels not only that the ox is almost alive but that he is looking just at her. That visual arts may arouse both delight and fear by their images (eikones) is stressed in general by Gorgias in his Encomium of Helen (17).27 However, Gorgias declares that speech is even more powerful, because in speech it is possible to attain the most divine achievements (u1iόtata ἔrga) with the smallest and least apparent body, namely with words (8). Gorgias refers to the affective power of speech – how speech can delight and encourage the audience, but also distress and cause fear (14). Speech can also prevent fear and relieve agony, generate joy and pity (ἔl1o6) (8). As a rhetorician, Gorgias is naturally on the side of speech. In Plato’s Statesman, ‘the Eleatic stranger’ expounds the view that living beings (zo¯a) are best captured not by pictures but by words (277c).28 This implies that the soul of a living, ‘ensouled’, being is best depicted by words. No Animal Poetics? In contrast to the discourse on art, Greek poetics seldom seem to mention animals at all as the subject matter of poetry. Instead, it is sometimes explicitly stated that the main subject matter of literature is humans and their relationship with other humans. Both Plato and Aristotle speak of poetry as dealing with ‘humans in action’ (prάttont16, Resp. 10.603c, Arist. Poet. 3.1448a). One obvious reason for this strict anthropocentrism is that the context and reference of Plato’s and Aristotle’s statements is dramatic poetry, the most important genre of public high art in their time. On the other hand, this focus was not limited to dramatic poetry, as the Homeric epics begin with the definition of their anthropocentric subject matter: the anger of Achilleus, the homecoming of Odysseus. However, as religion was an important framework for Greek poetry, the relationship between humans and the gods was a significant subject. This means that poetry in general was not limited merely to the human level, to the world of man. Furthermore, Greek poetics shared the notion of artistic transgression of human limits. The

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invoked Muses were the initiators of Homeric and Hesiod’s epics and also the givers of their subject matter.29 Besides, although humans and gods were the creators and the recipients of literary works, the sensual aspects of art (sounds, modes, forms, colours) were supposed to have some impact on other sentient beings, too. The myths of Orpheus and Apollo soothing animals with their songs bear witness to the belief that songs and the sounds of words, if not their meaning, were thought to have an impact on animals.30 Some animals, like dolphins, were called ‘music-loving’, but nearly all animals were considered in popular thought to be receptive to music.31 Greek poetry was, to a great extent, an auditory art, because words had their nuanced musical qualities and poems were mostly read or recitated aloud.32 Also the mood of the poem was thought to be communicated not only by the poet’s words but also by the performer’s body. Aristotle mentions that suitable gestures and tones would heighten the effect of the words (Rhet. 2.8.1386a32 – 3). In all, poetry was not centred on the human level only – gods and animals participated in it to a certain extent. Furthermore, if Greek poetics seem to be anthropocentric, Archaic poetry was not necessarily so.33 Animals were woven into the lyric poetry as part of the general scheme of things, as in the beginning of the Homeric Hymn to Aphrodite, which states that love is a power which sweeps gods, humans and other animals alike. Man’s continuity with the physical world, as well as some kind of kinship with other animals, seems to be supposed not only by many Presocratic natural philosophers but also by Archaic poets.34 Sappho’s Hesperus brings home not only a human child to its mother but also a lamb to a ewe (fr. 104a), and Alcman’s description of the tranquility of nature includes sleeping animals as well as inanimate things, such as mountains and glens (fr. 39). Bacchylides’ eulogy to an eagle, which occurs within a victory ode for a chariot race (5.16 –31), as well as the dithyrambic poem known as Arion’s Song from the fourth century BCE , an eulogy for dolphins, contains lively descriptions of these animals.35 Birds surely were one of the basic animal subjects of early Greek lyric.36 Besides that, the human-centred speeches of tragedies

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are imbued with animal metaphors and many choral songs include descriptions of animals and animal life.37 Still, is it a universal phenomenon that literature in general focuses to a greater extent than the visual arts on human relationships and ‘human mind’, as the first epigraph of this Part II states? If animals are thought to be largely uncommunicative, as if dumb, will their role in literature, which operates with words, be the same as that of natural objects: will they function mainly as a framework, as a surrounding – and sometimes as projections and symbols – of the human mind? Moreover, if animals were thought to be alogoi, to be without reason (aloga zo¯a), as the Stoics, for instance, mostly opined, they were then viewed as having no deeper psychological states or at least their inner world was assumed not only to be an enigma for humans but perhaps also beyond real interest. Philostratus implies in the passage on fables cited above that it is stories which may make animals interesting for humans. Animal imagery can often be seen as a mere comparative background for the human world. Animals are ‘vehicles’ of comparisons, not ‘tenor’. However, making comparisons is also seeing resemblances. While Aristotle presents convincing and persuasive ‘examples’ ( paradeigmata) in the second book of his Rhetoric, he underlines that they can be invented only if one notices some kind of similarity (tὸ ὅmoion) between the tenor and the vehicle of comparison (Rhet. 2.20.1394a2 – 5). He first divides exempla into two: those taken from past events and those that are invented (tὸ aὐtὸn poi1ῖn), and thus ‘fictional’. Invented examples are futher subdivided into comparisons or similes (parabolaί) and fables (lόgoi) (Rhet. 2.20.1393b28 – 30). After Aristotle has stated that fables are especially suitable when the audience consists of common people, he tells two animal fables.38 The first fable, The Horse and the Stag (Perry 269a), is applied to the historical case of the Sicilian people under the tyranny of Phalaris. But literally it conveys how horses were domesticated, how the horse ‘found himself the slave of man’. But Aristotle is not interested in the animal aspect of this fable. The epimythia or promythia of fables, the moral of the story at the beginning or the end, certainly lead to fables being read

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anthropocentrically and as moral lessons. But although the didactic dimension obviously dominated ancient aesthetic discussion, there were other acknowledged functions of art as well. Classical Ciceronian docere, movere and delectare – teach, touch and delight – were recognised functions of Greek poetry. Archaic poetry was performed at different kinds of celebrations, where one of its functions was pleasurable entertainment. If depictions of beautifully rendered animals in, for instance, vase paintings induced pleasure, why should animals in poetry not also do so? We may suppose that animals, like birds, were described in poetry for pleasure (delectare). But were animals also described in poetry in order to touch, to affect (movere) – as objects intended to arouse the audience’s compassion? This question will be discussed in more detail in the next chapter. As a conclusion for this chapter, it is still appropriate to raise the question of the absence or scarcity of animals in Greek poetry. One might suppose that Hesiod’s Theogony, a lofty early epic on the birth of the gods, lacks references to animals. But there are sheep pasturing at the very beginning. Hesiod relates that he was herding his sheep under the holy mountain of Helicon when the Muses breathed into him a divine voice to praise things (Theog. 22– 34). Later, different kinds of livestock are said to be under protection of the goddess Hecate (444– 7), Prometheus sacrifices a huge bull (536– 41) and Zeus’ eagle eats Prometheus’ liver (523 –6). The Theogony also contains a simile of bees (594– 9) and a lively description of Cerberus’ behaviour as the guard dog of Hades (769 – 74); the monster Typhoeus is told to make sounds like bulls, lions or dogs (832– 4). Although mainly invisible, animals are represented in many different ways in this epic. These include animals: (1) as mere commodities or property, or as a seemingly inert material framework for the human world (Hesiod’s sheep); (2) as part of the general scheme of things, with sometimes an emphasis on the similarity of the situation of human and non-human living beings (the bee simile); (3) as creatures living their own lives as independent agents, whether closely related to humans or not (the dog Cerberus). What is missing from the Theogony is a representation of animals (4) as beings who are encountered, and sometimes even addressed by characters or by the

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first-person-speaker of a personal poem – as in Anyte’s animal epigrams. If animals are shown merely as commodities, as in case (1), the depiction does little to invite the reader’s empathy (on reader’s empathy, see Part I). In all the other cases (2), (3) and (4), the poet describes the animal’s situation, thereby providing the audience with the possibility of empathising with its experience. The next chapter deals with the devices ancient authors used to invite the reader’s empathy – how animal depictions possibly touched (movere), and were meant to touch, the ancient audience.

How to Relate to Animals in Literature A stylised male figure is holding a naturalistically depicted calf. The Calf-bearer, the Moschophorus, from the Athenian Acropolis (c. 560 BCE ), is one of the most famous examples of the ‘Good Shepherd’ statue motif. The kouros may represent the dedicator, who paid for the statue, or Apollo, although in this case the statue was dedicated to Athena.39 The expression of the calf is submissive – for a modern onlooker perhaps even sadly reflective – while the face of the god/ man has the typical Archaic smile, an expression of a general devout attitude. In all, the animal is represented in a more lifelike style than the formalised human/god. The reason for this discrepancy could be – if we think that this was a cultic statue – that the calf is a victim, which needed to be depicted in as life-like a fashion as possible (it had to be alive in order to be killed). As a victim, it had to express submissiveness and passivity. Furthermore, in Archaic art, idealised men and gods were represented if not as masters of their emotions, at least with minimal emotional variability.40 Creatures which were thought to have less self-control – such as animals – were more freely depicted as expressing strong emotions, including suffering.41 The artist must surely have empathised with the calf in order to able to depict it in this way. But did the ancient viewer sympathise with (feel compassion for) the life-like sacrificial calf (as we, modern viewers, may do)? Pity (ἔl1o6, oἶkto6) was one of the desirable emotions a serious literary artwork was expected to arouse in the audience

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according to ancient poetics. Characters in epic and in tragedy are also often shown to feel pity for other characters or appeal for pity (as when Priam appeals to Achilleus in the last Book of the Iliad).42 But was it ‘proper’ to feel compassion only for humans – and not for suffering animals? In the following subchapters it will be discussed how the poets were supposed to identify with their characters, how the audience was thought to engage in fiction, and how the aesthetic emotion of pity was supposed to differ from the pity felt in everyday life. Before dealing with these questions, it is worth saying a few words about the most debated concept of the ancient Greek aesthetic theory, namely, mimesis.43 Mimesis of Animals and Mimetic Animals The word mimesis and its derivatives were used in various ways before Aristotle, who determined the concept of the mimetic arts in the first three chapters of his Poetics. In Aristotle’s view, one function of poetry (and philosophy) was to express something general, in contrast to the sensuous world (and history) which consists of particulars (Poet. 9.1451b5– 8). For Aristotle, the plots of good tragedies serve as ‘cognitive tools’ for understanding the world, as Mark Payne has put it.44 Furthermore, Aristotle combines this with a strong pleasure which is gained from the experience of an artwork: this gratification is partly related to the mimetic accuracy of the art and partly results from learning to understand something (4.1448b10– 2, 15– 9). Aristotle thus acknowledges the value of artistic mimesis for pleasurable aesthetics, combined with an ethical dimension. Mimesis can make even revolting and painful sights delightful. In the Poetics, he mentions animals which he characterises as very insignificant (uhrίa ἀtimόtata) – he means probably very small animals, such as insects. But atimos refers also to unworthiness and ignobility, to something which lacks time¯, ‘honour’. These kinds of animals, however, can be viewed with delight if their depictions are appropriate (Poet. 4.1448b5).45 In his Topics, Aristotle mentions in passing that the opposite of a beautiful house is an ugly, insipid (moxuhrό6) house but the opposite of a beautiful living being

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(zῷon) is an ignominious (aἰsxrό6) living being (Top. 106a20 – 22).46 This implies that all living beings contain an ethical element. But we may question the relevance of the concept of mimesis for depictions of animals in literature, as animals in general have only a minor role as context or framework for the human world – as a means of comparison for human characters or as symbols of, for instance, wealth. Apparently it was considered more important to immerse the audience in the human situation, so that mimetic accuracy concerned only human characters and their situations, and animals were depicted only as archetypes of their species – such as dogs as the embodiment of fidelity – or types of representation.47 It had been argued that animal sympathetic literature – as well as ecocritical literature – is a product of modern sensitivity.48 This is not necessarily due to the more ethological knowledge of animals we have nowadays. Randy Malamud notes that modern poets writing on animals often do not have much factual knowledge of animals. What makes their poems ecocritical is that they somehow acknowledge this ignorance.49 They problematise the human-animal relationship and do not take it at face value. For an ecocritical poet, an animal is an enigma, an Other in an intriguing way. Philosopher Rae Langton speaks about the epistemological humility which is needed when we describe non-human animals – they are Others whose behaviour may seem to be familiar to us but often is not.50 Malamud notes that poets writing about animals generally want to know what it is to be that animal.51 That is, poets try to identify with an animal. Novelist Katherine Mansfield memorably asserted in a letter to her friend that when she writes about a duck, she is ‘a duck’, she becomes a duck floating in a pond.52 A special kind of sensitivity to animals may be a modern thing. But the poet’s identification with her object of description is not. Aristotle advises poets to visualise characters and their actions in their mind’s eye (prὸ ὀmmάtvn, Poet. 17.1455a24). Furthermore, he presents, in a way, the idea of immersion in another’s situation as a natural quality. At least, Aristotle sees the ability to represent or copy as a basic skill for living beings by saying that the ability to mimeisthai (‘represent’, ‘imitate’) is most developed in humans – we

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are the most mimetic of all (mimhtikώtaton, Poet. 4.1448b5). This implies that at least some other sentient beings are mimetic (mimhtikό6) as well, which means that they learn by representing or imitating others. Ancient natural historians note the obvious mimetic skills of apes and monkeys, as well as birds mimicking human speech – and the other way round. The scops dance was named after the scops owl because it was supposed to have been used to enchant that owl. There were other dances in which humans copied animals’ movements.53 Some Greek seasonal customs included dressing as animals, at least in the Swallow Song, if not in its Hellenistic variation, Crow Song.54 Besides imitating movements, simulating animal sounds was a popular entertainment in Greek theatres. In the Republic, Plato mentions the imitation of the sounds of horses, bulls, dogs, sheep and birds (3.396b, 397a), and, in the Laws, the target of his criticisms is especially the musical imitation of animal voices (2.669c– e). Plutarch mentions in his Table-Talks the proverbial story of the comic actor Parmenon, who could excellently reproduce the squeals of pig.55 Moreover, that a human being is mime¯tikos means that not only children but also adults may in everyday life (and not only in artistic renderings) represent others, even non-human others. Demosthenes gives one example of an everyday animal representation in his speech against a certain Conon. By crowing like a cock (kokkύz1in) and also by flip-flopping his elbows against his side like a cock flipflopping his wings, Conon abused a man, who had won the cock-fight (Demosthenes 54.8– 9).56 So, mimicking animals was supposedly one of the means to liven up performative arts as well as everyday life in Antiquity. Creating an animal character in poetic work, we may suppose, demands both mimetic skills and willingness to participate in the animal’s situation. If the poet identifies with animal characters in the course of creating a poetic work, she will obviously use all the poetic devices at her disposal to make the animal character as lively as possible, which is essential for the audience’s participation in the animal’s situation. J. M. Coetzee’s novel Elizabeth Costello (2003) has contributed to the modern discourse on how to write about animals. The

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eponymous character, a novelist, opines that identification with animals is a natural quality of humans. Poets who imagine being in the position of an animal are using their normal human quality, but in a more refined way, in order to create poetry. In her view, good animal poems ask us to ‘inhabit’ that animal body, that is, to imagine our way into the peculiar way that the animal in question moves.57 An impressive example of a moving animal rendered in words occurs at the beginning of Bacchylides’ victory ode (composed in the sixth century BCE ). The poet depicts an eagle in a way that seems to invite us readers to empathise with an animal flying high: bauὺn / d᾿ aἰuέra joyuaῖsi tάmnvn / ὑcoῦ pt1rύg1ssi tax1ίai6 / aἰ1tὸ6 1ὐryάnakto6 ἄgg1lo6 / Zhnὸ6 ἐriswarάgoy / uars 1ῖ krat1rᾷ pίsyno6 / ἰsxύϊ, ptάssonti d᾿ ὄrnix16 / ligύwuoggoi wόbῳ· / oὔ nin korywaὶ m1gάla6 ἴsxoysi gaίa6, / oὐd᾿ ἁlὸ6 ἀkamάta6 / dyspaίpala kύmata· nvmᾷ / d᾿ ἐn ἀtrύtῳ xά1i / l1ptόtrixa sὺn z1wύroy pnoiaῖsin / ἔu1iran ἀrίgnvto6 / [m1t᾿] ἀnurώpoi6 ἰd1ῖn (Bacchylides, Victory Odes 5.6– 31) Cleaving the deep heavens with tawny swift wings on high / the eagle, messenger of wide-ruling loud-thundering Zeus, / is confident, trusting in his mighty strength, and clear-voiced birds / cower in fear: the peaks of the great earth do not bar his way, / nor the rugged waves of the untiring sea: in the limitless void he / plies his fine-feathered plumage before the blasts of the west wind, / a conspicuous sight for men. (Trans. David A. Campbell, slightly modified).58 This is not an eagle poem as such but a simile, in which the poet compares the eagle’s spacious territory (ἄtrytος xάος) with his own countless possibilities for praising. Thus the eagle’s flight stands first and foremost as a symbol for poetry composition and the self-reliance of a poet. The simile takes only 25 lines of this 200-line long poem. Therefore it is easily eclipsed. Nevertheless we get an impressive

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description how a mighty eagle is confident in its strength (pı´synος uars1ı˜n) and takes advantage of wind. An Encounter with Argos and Dead Shepherd Dogs One of the most famous and memorable encounters of human and animal in Greek literature is obviously Odysseus’ meeting his very old hound Argos, who is the first one to recognise him (Od. 17.290 – 327). Both the narrator and Odysseus’ servant, the swineherd Eumaeus, give us a vivid description of the past excellence of this hound in hunting work, a short CV of a dog (17.295–6, 314– 17). His glorious days are contrasted with his current sorry state as a neglected creature, lying in dung, full of vermin (17.297– 301, 318– 21). However, old Argos reacts with his whole body, by wagging his tail and dropping his ears (oὐrῇ mέn ῥ’ ὅ g’ ἔshn1 kaὶ oὔata kάbbal1n ἄmwv, 302) when, at last (after twenty years of waiting), he meets his master. Then Odysseus wipes away a tear, talks with Eumaeus about Argos’ past excellence, and both men step inside the palace – and Argos dies, alone (17.304– 5, 326– 7, 304– 5). The poet seems to have been immersed in Argos’ situation: it is described in an evocative way. The account of the dog’s behaviour is short but accurate and Argos can be felt, as if a bodily presence. Although Odysseus wipes a tear, and most of us may feel sympathy with Argos, we must question what the focus of this passage was – perhaps not Argos’ sorry state but the information that Odysseus’ house is in confusion (his servants do not take care of his dog, 320– 2)? Does Argos thus serve mainly as a symbol of Odysseus’ former lucky life, with its excellent possessions, which are now neglected and which he is in danger of loosing forever?59 Sophocles’ Ajax includes a description of a deadly human-animal encounter. Ajax slaughters a vast number of animals (they are war booty) because in his madness he believes them to be his human enemies.60 Tecmessa recounts how her master and spouse brought his ‘prisoners’ inside the tent in the camp at Troy: bulls, sheep and shepherd dogs (kύn16 botῆr16) were tied together (296 –7). However, these animals are not only slaughtered but tortured, as a messenger shortly relates:

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He cut the throats of some; others he hung head down / and chopped them through the spine; he tortured others in their bonds, / assaulting animals as he might men. (Ajax 298– 300, trans. Oliver Taplin).61 Adjectives and adverbs are missing, as well as description of animals’ panic. Sophocles’ invitation to empathise with these animals is quite restrained because he does not describe their emotions or movements, when they are alive. These violent images do not invite a feeling of compassion for these animals – not even for the shepherd dogs. These animals are only carcasses, they serve merely as symbols of waste, and their torture illustrates Ajax’s insanity.62 An important feature for depicting animals is thus to portray them as alive – as sentient beings. Sympathy with Fictional Characters There are many descriptions of the strong impact of the performance of poetry on the audience in Greek literature from Homer onwards. For instance, Odysseus bursts into tears while listening to a rhapsode singing of the Trojan war in the court of Alcinous (Od. 8.521 – 34). Plato’s attitude to the audience’s involvement with the poetic work was suspicious. In the Republic, Socrates states that even the very best men enjoy hearing recitations of Homer or seeing actors playing heroes abandon themselves (the verb endido¯mi) to the action of the scene. Plato uses the verb sympathein for feeling the same emotions as the characters which the actors are playing: we ‘follow’ the characters on the stage with ‘sympathy and eagerness’ (aὐtoὺ6 ἑpόm1ua sympάsxont16 kaὶ spoydάzont16, Resp. 10.605c – d). Plato concludes that the poets who are most powerfully able to make the audience feel what they want them to feel are considered to be the best poets. The manipulative spirit of an artist is the issue here: poets and performers are like rhetoricians in their ability to regulate their audience’s reactions – and arouse pity. But, for Plato, feeling pity for tragic characters is not desirable because it makes free men prone to be too ‘soft’ and emotive in their everyday life (Resp. 10.606b – d).

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Isocrates, Plato’s contemporary, presents another point in his famous speech, the Panegyricus. He despises those who cry over the misfortunes of fictional characters ‘fabricated by poets’ but are without any feeling of pity (the verb ἐl11ῖn) when hearing the actual calamities which happened in the Peloponnesian war (168 – 9). Isocrates is not saying that compassion for fictional characters makes us indifferent to the sufferings of actual peoples, only that it is much easier to sympathise with fictional characters. It was Aristotle’s task to defend pity (along with fear) as a crucial and necessary emotion for the experience of tragedies both seen on the stage and read as texts. For Aristotle, the dramatic artist deliberately arouses pity, because it is how he can form the moral identity of his audience.63 The basic difference between the aesthetic emotion of pity and the pity felt at everyday life was thought to be that the first also evokes pleasure – an aesthetic pleasure in the accuracy of the mimesis.64 Plutarch considers the difference in one of his discussions in the Table-Talks under the long title, ‘Why we take pleasure in hearing actors represent anger and pain but not in seeing people actually experience these emotions?’ (Mor. 673c– 74c). In Plutarch’s view, the reason artistic depictions of pain can be pleasurable is that they ‘bear the stamp of mind and reason’ (noῦ kaὶ lόgoy m1tέxon). He clarifies this with a thought experiment: if someone were to place in front of a child a loaf of bread or a little figure of a dog or cow made of dough, the child would choose the latter, the edible animal figure.65 The reason for this is that the child can perceive both skill and meaning (tὸ t1xnikὸn kaὶ logikὸn ἐnorᾷ katam1migmέnon) in the animal form (Mor. 673e). In the same dialogue, Plutarch gives animals’ voices as an example in favour of the argument that we receive more pleasure from the performances of the actors than from mere sounds: so a hen that cackles ceaselessly or a cawing crow may be unpleasant and even intolerable to hear, but the imitator of noisy hens and crows delights us. In Plutarch’s opinion, the poet gives a surplus, which appeals to the mind because it has the same nature as the mind: it is the artist’s cunning (panoyrgίa) and authority (or credibility, piuanόth6)

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which makes the passage art (and pleasurable for that matter) (Mor. 674b). Animal representations – such as the edible dough cow or an actor imitating a crow – epitomise human cunning. This is something which Katherine Mansfield in a way asserts, too, in the above-mentioned letter, by confirming that she reinvents the duck after having identified with it: ‘[t]here follows the moment when you are more duck, more apple, more Natasha than any of these objects could ever possibly be, and so you create them anew.’ Aesthetic Sympathy with Animals Aristotle discusses pity (eleos) more thoroughly in the second Book of the Rhetoric than in the Poetics by defining what pity is and for whom we feel pity. Furthermore, as Dana LaCourse Munteanu clarifies, Aristotle presents two kinds of eleos: one we feel in everyday life and one caused by artistic renderings.66 In both cases the basic precondition for pity is that the one who pities might some day be in a situation similar to the one who is pitied. Furthermore, the object – the persons – whom we pity are those for whom we care – expressed in the Rhetoric, for instance, by the phrase ‘some who are of ours’ (tῶn aὑtoῦ tina, 2.8.1385b15). For Aristotle, pity felt in everyday life is direct involvement in our loved ones’ suffering, but pity as an aesthetic emotion is more detached: the involvement is mediated by imagination – the ‘manipulations’ of which are the task of the dramatist. Tragic performance depicts human characters, who seem to be very remote to the ordinary men in the audience. Tragic characters are spoudaioi, prominent in some way. The dramatist needs to make these prominent characters seem ‘of ours’ for us to identify with them. Although Aristotle does not give advice about this in the Poetics, in the Rhetoric he stresses the non-verbal devices the orator uses to intensify the force of the text. According to Aristotle, [T]hose who heighten the effect of their words with suitable gestures, tones, dress, and dramatic action generally are especially successful in exciting pity: they thus put the disasters before our eyes (prὸ ὀmmάtvn poioῦnt16), and

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make them seem close to us, just coming or just past (Rhet. 2.8.1386a32 – 35).67 The passage thus emphasises the orator’s skill at stirring the audience’s imagination and imaginative involvement. Putting ourselves in another’s position causes us to identify with them because we use our experience and imagination in this identification process. Yet, if we apply Aristotle’s ideas of aesthetic pity for humans to that for animals, the first prerequisite for pity (or sympathy, compassion) felt for animals in artistic renderings is that we feel that the animals are ‘some which are of ours’. And this, for its part, depends of course on attitudes to animals and the concept of humananimal relationships. Moreover, Aristotle’s further prerequisite for pity felt for characters rendered in artworks is that the person who pities might some day herself be in a situation similar to that of the one who is pitied. This condition for pity seems at first impossible to realise: as humans, we can never be in a non-human animal’s situation. But, as was shown in Part I, we can not only see analogies between us and animals but also empathise with them – and the poet may invite the reader to partially immerse herself in the animal’s situation, as Bacchylides partially does in his eagle poem. But in some rare cases in Greek literature characters show direct sympathy for animals or appeal for pity for them (some examples are presented in the next chapter). In some stories of animals – such as in the story of Androcles and the lion – humans can show pity and rescue an animal in distress, but the invariable consequence is that, later on, the animal will rescue or help the human in turn.68 An epigram attributed to the fifth century BCE philosopher Xenophanes relays a story about Pythagoras and a dog. When meeting somebody beating a dog, Pythagoras pitied (ἐpoikt1ίr1in) the animal and told the beater to stop because he had heard in the dog’s piteous barking his friend’s voice.69 Because we have no context, it is unclear whether the philosopher Xenophanes was poking fun at the idea of a human soul migrated into a dog’s body or whether he only wanted to characterise Pythagoras’ personality – or whether he was pondering the consequences that metempsychosis (transmigration of the soul)

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might have upon treatment of animals.70 In the well-known anecdote, Bion of Borysthenes, an Athenian philosopher (325– 250 BCE ), seeing boys throwing stones at frogs remarked that boys’ play was play only for them – for the frogs it meant death (Plutarch, Mor. 965b). The anecdote may express a genuine pity for the ill-treated animals or merely applying a saying ‘It is play to you but death to me’.71 But the philosopher Bion is at least described as seeing the situation from the animals’ point of view. The next chapter will present some literary or rhetorical devices which are intended to elicit an animal’s point of view or attempt to orient the audience towards animals. It begins with the question already treated, namely how to portray animals as alive and vivid. It is suggested that to render animals vivid is to invite readers to empathise with them.

How to Invite Readers to Empathise with Animals In the following, liveliness as a criterion for visual arts is shortly discussed before literary devices which guide readers to develop a particularly empathetic relation to animals are dealt with. Representations of animals as mere commodities or as the framework of the human world at least acknowledge their basic existence (at a minimum, animals are not totally removed), but describing animals as lively, personifying them ( prosopopoeia) and addressing them – whether directly or as absent – is acknowledging their presence more strongly. Lifelikeness or Liveliness as an Aesthetic Ideal Hesiod describes how Pandora’s diadem, made by Hephaestus, contained pictures of animals, which were like living beings (zvoῖsin ἐoikόta), and even made sounds (Theog. 584). It is wellknown that lifelikeness was a central criterion or an ideal for the depiction of animals in visual art. A lexical connection may have existed between animal or living being (zῷon) and visual art (zvgrawίa).72 This suggests that the basic object of visual art was understood to be depicting something living.73 Zo¯graphia could also

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point to the endeavour to make the images of the living objects as lifelike as possible, as full of life.74 If so, the aim of representative art was rather to create a presence of the living object than to make an image with a likeness to the object. Cultic sculptures, at least, were thought to be between animate and inanimate, alive to some extent.75 The famous contest between the fifth century BCE painters Zeuxis and Parrhasius led even birds to be deceived by the lifelikeness of the painted grapes.76 Living beings were obviously thought to be more beautiful than dead ones.77 The ‘liveliness’ of animals was probably also one of the criteria in ancient poetics, although the critics did not deal with animals. They praised Homeric similes especially for ἐnarg1ίa, which is usually understood to mean liveliness.78 The adjective enarge¯s refers to something visible and clear, or palpable, as gods may be in their bodily shapes (cf. Od. 3.420, of Athena). Aristotle uses the same adjective of good tragedy. Due to its musical and visual ‘parts’, tragedy gives the most vivid (enarge¯s) pleasure, although tragedy is enarge¯s both when seen on the stage and when only read (Poet. 26.1462a30). As mentioned earlier, Aristotle urges poets to visualise characters and their actions in their mind’s eye, ‘before their eyes’, pro ommato¯n (Poet. 17.1455a24). In the Rhetoric, the phrase pro ommato¯n refers to clarity, which is gained by using words expressing action (energeia). The appearance of action means that things are depicted as alive (empsycha). Aristotle praises Homer for being able to describe everything as moving and alive (kinoύm1na kaὶ zῶnta) as well as for his use of metaphors which make inanimate things seem animate by speaking of them as animate (tὰ ἄcyxa ἔmcyxa poi1ı˜n) (Rhet. 3.11.1411b24–1412a10). Lifelikeness usually implies some kind of movement, as a total lack of movement suggests death. In Plato’s Timaeus, Socrates compares the theoretical discussion of the state and the desire to see that state in practice to the situation of a man who, while looking at beautiful animals in paintings or live animals at rest, wants to see them in motion or ‘exercising in competition (katὰ tὴn ἀgvnίan) some aspect of what he imagined to be their physical nature’ (Tim. 19b– c).79 A living being is thus something which exerts its potential

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for movement or change and experiences some kind of struggle (ago¯nia also means ‘agony’). The writer of the third century CE treatise On the Sublime (which was once attributed mistakenly to Longinus) mentions, among other things, two devices for making an oration a vivid actuality (ἐnagώnion prᾶgma) and thus engaging the audience. The word for ‘vivid’ here, ἐnagώnio6, which contains the word ago¯nia, is how Pseudo-Longinus characterised the Iliad in general.80 Moreover, an artist (and a poet) may make clear mistakes about an animal’s way of moving and anatomy without the image being diminished artistically – or mistakes can be made on purpose in order to achieve the goal, namely, to render the animal as lifelike as possible.81 Aristotle notes that if an artist depicts a horse with both legs thrown forward, this is not a grave fault, only an incidental mistake (Poet. 25.1460b14– 16). Poets also tell ‘lies’, as the proverbial dictum, already present in the Homeric epics, says.82 But poets tell ‘lies’ or write fictional characters and invented incidents in order to capture the poetic truth. In poetry, animals can be shown speaking and acting in a humanised way. Animals can also be ‘made to speak’ by using a rhetorical device called prosopopoeia. Prosopopoeia and Animals as Tenor Prosopopoeia means literally ‘making a mask’; essentially it is a speech made in character, usually in human character. This character speech occurs inside another speech or a larger text.83 Animal prosopopoeia means that animals are as if given a chance to voice their situation and readers are given an opportunity to see the situation from the (imagined) animal’s perspective. The clearest examples of animal prosopopoeia are to be found in factual prose writers.84 Plutarch gives a voice to a sacrificial animal in his essay On the Eating of Flesh. He precedes it by suggesting that the cries of animals which are going to be slaughtered are pleadings for justice and mercy. After that, the animal speaks: ‘I do not ask to be spared if killing is indispensable, only when killing is an expression of transgression (hybris). Kill me to eat, but do not take my life in order to eat sumptuously’ (Mor. 994e). The Stoic philosopher Epictetus,

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Plutarch’s contemporary, let a caged bird lament its captivity: ‘I am born to fly where I will to fly, to live in the air, to sing when I like to sing; you take from me all these and then ask: what is wrong?’ (Discourses 4.1.28, ‘On Freedom’).85 However, whereas Plutarch’s aim was certainly to evoke pity for animals, Epictetus used the caged bird as a symbol for the human situation. But Epictetus also invites readers to take the imaginary birds’ point of view (what it is to be a caged bird). Of course, animal prosopopoeia does not presuppose that the animal’s point of view is described in all sincerity. Aristophanes’ The Knights contains two prosopopoeiae inside the chorus song: first horses complain about their food, then crabs complain about being horses’ food (602 – 3, 609 – 10). In these cases animals are comically humanised into unfamiliarity. In Part IV, it is suggested that some chorus songs in Aristophanes’ The Birds can be viewed as more sincere prosopopoeiae. Animal fables are not examples of animal prosopopoeia as such – because there is usually no other perspective than that of talking animals. The fragment of lyric fable by the iambographic poet Archilochus (from the seventh century BCE ) functions, however, like a prosopopoeia. As far as we know, the fable in which a vixen is speaking is only a part of Archilochus’ poem. The fable tells of an eagle which has devoured a vixen’s cubs. This induces the vixen to turn to Zeus for help by arguing that justice among animals is Zeus’ concern: ‘O Zeus, father Zeus, yours is the power in the heavens [. . .]’ (fr. 177 West).86 Another example of an ambiguous animal prosopopoeia is the fragment of Sophocles’ tragedy Tyro of Cropped Hair where humiliated Tyro, whose hair was forcibly cut by her stepmother, compares her situation to that of a filly. Tyro says that she is grieving for her hair like a filly (pώloy dίkhn) which sees her cropped mane when she is drinking from the stream.87 However, the last three lines of the fragment (beginning with w1ῦ ‘alas!’) may not be spoken by the horse (and therefore not be animal prosopopoeia) but by some other character pitying Tyro or Tyro herself. In any case, Tyro is comparing her situation to that of an animal, which obviously invites the audience also to immerse themselves in the animal’s situation imagined by Tyro. In the Odyssey,

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Penelope compares her anguish with that of a nightingale, or, in fact, with Pandareus’ daughter, who shared Procne’s fate: she was transformed into a nightingale to wail incessantly for her son. The extended comparison illustrates a bird sitting ‘amid the thick foliage of the trees’ and pouring forth trilling notes (Od. 19.516–22). This is a case of simile (not animal prosopopoeia) put inside a character’s speech which is rare in the Homeric epics (on animal similes, cf. Part IV). One device used to invite the reader to empathise with animals is comparison, in which animals are the tenor – to use Richard’s terminology, mentioned earlier. Some specimens occur in Homeric similes, which are presented in Part IV, but none of them are strictly cases where the vehicle is human.88 One example of the latter occurs in Hesiod’s Works and Days, in the passage on midwinter, which portrays how animals with different kinds of hides and hair survive in the cold. The end of the description is an evocative passage, where horned and hornless wild animals (perhaps wild cattle and goats) are seeking for shelter from snowstorms in the rocky environment: Then the horned and hornless denizens of the wood, / with teeth chattering mournfully (lygrὸn myliόvnt16), flee through the copses / and glades, and all, as they seek shelter, have this one care in their spirit (ἐnὶ wr1sί), / to gain thick coverts or some hollow rock. / Then, like (ἶsoi) the threelegged mortal / whose back is broken and whose head looks down upon the ground, / like him (ἴk1lo6), they wander to escape the white snow. (Trans. Hugh G. Evelyn-White, slightly modified) (Op. 529– 35). Animals are roaming like (ἶso6) ‘the three-legged mortal’, their heads turned down. By comparing leaning animals to an elderly person with a stick, Hesiod makes the effect of winter’s storm more tangible, more visually accessible. Furthermore, Hesiod describes the embodiment and emotions of the animals, such as the way their teeth chatter (or gnash) in mournful way, pitifully (lygrόn). In this way, the author makes it possible for the readers to empathise, even perhaps to sympathise, with these animals.89

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Saying ‘You’ to Animals as a Relational Technique One clear example of animals as the target of compassion is Zeus’ pity for Achilleus’ immortal horses Xanthus and Balius in the Iliad (17.426–60). Zeus pitied (ἐlέhs1, 441) the horses weeping over the dead Patroclus in the heat of the battle.90 The god rescues them from the battlefield by encouraging them to move so that they can rescue their driver, Automedon.91 That the horses are divine is the crucial point here. Zeus regrets that he allowed these immortal horses to become a possession of mere mortals and therefore end up taking part in the war. Zeus’ speech is sympathetic: after addressing ‘his heart’ (thumos, 17.442), he speaks to the divine horses, which he calls ‘poor wretches’ (ἆ d1ilώ, 443), and uses the second-person pronoun ‘you’.92 Addressing animal characters is, however, rare, for the simple reason that animals are seldom proper characters in Greek poetry but dwell in the background. Examples are found in personal lyrics, in which the first-person speaker addresses an animal. One example is the dithyrambic poem Arion’s Song (also known as A Hymn to Poseidon and the Dolphins), briefly mentioned earlier, in which the first-person speaker, ‘Arion’, first formally addresses Poseidon, around whom dolphins are dancing, and then the dolphins, which saved his life: ‘You conveyed me to the Peloponnese [. . .]’.93 The empathetic nature of the address is deepened due to the vivid characterisation of dolphins with phrases such as ‘snub-nosed rippling-necked, fleetfooted hounds’ (7– 8). Other examples of the first-person speaker addressing animals occur in animal epigrams, especially epitaphs. An epigrammatist addressing an animal as ‘you’, speaking of it in a second-person narrative, creates an immediate relational impression. The poetic ‘I’ in Anyte’s poems takes the point of view of her addressee by positing herself in the animal’s situation. The secondperson narrative opens up the second-person perspective by forcing the reader also to ponder what this ‘you’ is, who is addressed. A more detailed analysis of this device is given in Part IV (Anyte). The second-person perspective is usually more relational than the third-person perspective. That is, when the poetic ‘I’ in animal epitaphs only describes the death of an animal, that is, uses a third person narrative, the relationship is not so evident. However, in the

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Homeric animal similes, the third-person narrative is used in a way that invites the reader’s empathy. In a short simile the poet may describe, for instance, the dangerous situation of a snake (an animal with which we do not usually sympathise) and its fight for its life, seeing the situation from the snake’s point of view (Il. 22.93–5). Although the poet does not address the snake, we, as readers, can partially immerse ourselves in the snake’s situation. The narrative is ‘objective’, but the focus and change of viewpoint guide our reading. Animal similes in the Iliad will be analysed in a more detailed way in Part IV. In Theocritus’ first Idyll, the dying shepherd Daphnis is saying farewell to his world, and addressing its wolves, foxes and bears: (ὦ lύkoi, ὦ uῶ16, ὦ ἀn’ ὤr1a wvlάd16 ἄrktoi, / xaίr1u’) (1.115– 18). Addresses continue with farewells to the spring Arethusa and the Thymbris vale. This form of direct, basically solemn, address is called apostrophe. Literally, the Greek term ‘apostrophe’ means that the speaker turns away (apostrephein) from his ordinary audience and address another audience, part of his former audience or an extraordinary, non-human audience, such as places, rivers and other natural phenomena, animals and gods.94 The grammatical case of the address is vocative. According to the everyday Greek usage, only when a human being (or a god) is addressed, may the vocative be preceded by the interjection ὦ (‘o’). But the interjection may also mark the emotional intensity and exceptionality of the passage in question.95 Although apostrophes were widely in use not only in the epics but also in lyric poetry, oratory, and especially in drama, the ancient critics did not give any extensive treatment of the device.96 Aristotle neither uses the term apostrophe¯ nor treats the figure, but he gives as an example of inappropriate style the tragic poet Cleophon, whose character addresses a fig tree as ‘mighty’ (pόtnia sykῆ, Rhet. 3.7.1408a15– 6). In this case, though the fig tree is not addressed with ὦ, the lofty attribute is improper, at least in Aristotle’s view. Addressing gods and natural phenomena often involves calling them to be there, to be present – to help or to bear witness. In the Iliad, when Zeus accuses Hera of interfering with the Trojan war, she begins her defence by addressing the River Styx, Heaven, the

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Chthonic gods, the head of Zeus and their marriage bed (Il. 15.36 – 40). However, Hera in fact makes an adjuration, and by calling these mighty powers she adds strength to her words and to her sincerity. 97 Pseudo-Longinus calls adjuration ‘apostrophe’, although he admits that he is using the term in a slightly idiosyncratic way. He praises Demosthenes because ‘by employing the figure adjuration, which I call apostrophe, Demosthenes has deified his ancestors’ (On the Sublime 16.2).98 Not all apostrophes make their object divine, but speaking directly to the object surely gives it more emphasis than just mentioning it. In Homer’s epics, apostrophe of non-human objects often occurs in a ritual context: the apostrophes are appeals, promises and invocations.99 Thus apostrophising is a relational and emphasising device: it shows the object to be meaningful and sometimes elevates it. The fictional character is calling some non-human other (whether god, place, or body part) ‘you’ in an elevated mode. In Attic drama, to address non-human entities – whether they are gods, places, or parts of the body – is to transgress normal dialogue, additionally so because there is no response to these addresses. But animals are very seldom apostrophised in extant tragedies. Such cases are dealt with in Part IV, especially those in Sophocles’ Philoctetes.

Summary This part began by questioning the seemingly subsidiary role of animals in Greek literature and in the Greek discussion on literature. There is no explicit ‘animal poetics’, and there are very few comments on animals as the subject of literature. As the second epigraph (from Aristophanes’ Peace) of this Part II asks, the main question of ancient animal poetics seems to be: What does the animal mean? What does it stand for? Although it is possible to apply Greek discussions on pity for human characters to animal characters, the problem is that there are no proper animal characters except the strongly humanised animals which appear in fables. However, humanised animals were possibly understood to make animals more worthy of serious attention from humans.

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Readers of Greek poetry thus seem to meet animals almost unexpectedly, only here and there. These ‘visitations’ of animals among the human-imbued verses may sometimes, however, give an impression of a poet’s engagement with the situation of animals and even of sympathy for them. Naturally, animals were depicted by using stock characters (stereotyped animals), but one device by which a poet could invite the reader to empathise with animals was to depict animals as vivid and in action. Some rhetorical devices guide readers to take a particularly relational attitude to the animals in question, such as using an animal as a tenor in a comparison and using prosopopoeia (speech in character) – if only the humanisation did not lose the ‘animal character’ of the animals, rendering them unfamiliar. Addressing animals, whether directly or in their absence, is at least acknowledging their existence. From the rhetorical and linguistic point of view, addressing animals as ‘you’ is a technique for creating an imaginary reciprocal relationship with (fictional) animals.

PART III THE SPECTRUM OF HUMANANIMAL RELATIONSHIPS IN GREEK ANTIQUITY

[. . .T]hough we are their masters, we serve them like slaves, and we are compelled to obey their silent commands. (Sophocles, The Shepherds, fr. 505)1 The concept of ‘animal’ is a class which covers multiple species, and of this multiplicity only a fraction – mammals, birds, fish and some vertebra – are easily perceivable to us humans. We are prone to arrange these perceivable, and for us meaningful (useful, harmful, delightful, fearsome, awesome, etc.), animal species in various categories, often in terms which point to our relations with them, from ‘pets’ and ‘livestock’, to ‘game’, ‘pests’, ‘wild predators’ and ‘monsters’.2 These categories may be intermingled, and which species belongs to which may vary from culture to culture and between historical periods. Animals were undoubtedly a more visible part of everyday life in ancient Greece than they are in modern urban societies. Not only family farmers, shepherds and hunters had firsthand experience of many species, but people living in city-states had various opportunities for everyday observation of the life cycles and ways of living of animals, through working and co-habiting with them. Furthermore, ancient societies were totally dependent both on

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animal’s bodies (meat, milk, leather, wool, drugs, magical potions, etc.) and on their work (food production, energy, war, transportation) and therefore dominion was obviously the basic relational attitude to animals – animals were simply thought to be for human use. The aim of this chapter is, however, to open up the complexity of the human-animal relationship, as reflected in Greek literature. The selection of passages which show more or less empathetic human-animal relationships in Greek Antiquity handled here is obviously not exhaustive. The practical focus of the first chapter concerns the various interactions and relationships with animals in Greek life depicted in Greek literature (thus, no epigraphical or archaeological material is included), concentrating on bodily contact and cooperation: taming and caring, working with animals, affective and reverent encounters. The short second chapter (‘Transformations and Animal Body’) focus on the level of imagination and attitudes: Greek ideas of the animal body, which includes the peculiar familiarity in metamorphosis and hybrids and some attempts to imagine what it would be like to be a hybrid or non-human animal, for instance a centaur or a kingfisher.

Experiencing the Other: Observation, Encounter and Companionship Encounters with animals in everyday Greek life involved, among other things, cohabiting with ‘city-animals’ like small rodents and birds, and sacrificing domestic animals. Some animals were coworkers and assistants for humans, such as herding dogs, guarding and guiding livestock, and hunting dogs, trackers and catchers of the quarry. Harnessing a horse or confrontational interactions, like hunting and fighting back larger animals, require anticipation of the other’s movement and intentions. A successful chase is not possible if there is no knowledge of the game’s way of living and anticipation of its situation. The successful taming of an animal or the training of a young animal to its work both require understanding of animal behaviour and adjustment to the idiosyncratic behaviour and

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character of an individual animal. A ploughman, as well as a rider or a charioteer, had to adjust to some extent to animals’ movements. The Greek ritual of blood sacrifice, which required careful attention to ritual norm, meant interaction between the sacrificial executors and the animal victim, for instance in the ritual procession to the altar and the conduct beside it. Interaction can be based on daily encounters or be more occasional. A person who has daily contact with animals necessarily has a different attitude to animals than a person who has no contact or who encounters animals at a distance. This chapter begins with meetings at a distance – looking at animals – and ends with affectionate and reverent relationships and encounters with animals Why Look at Animals? Our modern, urban relationship with animals may have a stronger emphasis on looking, which is often combined with affectionate interest and admiration, in wild-life trekking trips as well as in the urban environment. This is reflected in literature as the so-called ‘excursion mode’ in which a naturalist records his observations for the reader.3 There seem to be fairly few descriptions of the pleasurable observation of animals in Greek literature. However, in the Odyssey, Penelope discloses a dream in which she takes delight (ἰaίn1suai) in watching her domestic geese (Od. 19. 603–612). Although the dream is premonitory, the passage suggests the pleasure of watching familiar animals. Birds and some other animals were, of course, watched quite intensively in divinatory practice; the later term for this was oinoskopein (‘watching birds’), but divination basically included inspecting the movements of many other divinatory animals as well as unusual natural phenomenon. Some anecdotes mention philosophers observing animals: Diogenes the Cynic watched a mouse, and Cleanthes, the second head of the Stoic school, watched ants.4 More often encounters with animals were not from distance, like modern bird watching, but involved concrete contact with the animals. Plutarch tells the story of how the young, wealthy Alcibiades was first noticed in the Athenian assembly. As he

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happened to be passing by, his quail, which he was carrying under his cloak, was frightened by the men’s noise and flew away, and the whole assembly try to catch it. As a consequence, Alcibiades made valuable acquaintances and stuck in people’s minds (The Life of Alcibiades 10.1). Most probably Alcibiades’ quail was an expensive ‘philipping’ bird, which he was carrying around in order that the bird’s body should be in constant movement.5 The anecdote of a young aristocrat bringing a bird to the city hall and others trying to help him to catch it gives a glimpse of a world where corporeal contact with animals was a part of everyday life – even that of politicians and intellectuals. Animals were not encountered from a distance, by looking, but close up, often by touching. Some exotic animals, such as peacocks, were exhibited for pay, and there were other small-scale menageries and, especially in Rome, military parades with exotic animals. Animals might have occasionally been used on the stages of Greek theatre festivals (for instance, a donkey at the beginning of Aristophanes’ Frogs), and they certainly appeared in performances in which trained animals played tricks. Isocrates mentions yearly shows where lions and bears twirled around, wrestling and imitating (mimeisthai) human skills (Antidosis, 15.213). Although animals had their fixed roles in these artificial, and basically abusive, situations, the audience obtained information about animal behaviour, which could evoke sympathy, sentimental or otherwise, with the animals. Plutarch describes the competence of a theatre dog, an animal pantomime ‘actor’ able to mimic dying and recovering, which moved the audience, among them the old emperor Vespasian (Mor. 973e – f).6 Another occasion for intensive attention to animals was animal combat – in the Greek context this generally meant cock-fights but also, in Sparta, boar-fights. In Athens, cock-fights were funded by the polis and fighting cocks were associated with the goddesses Athena and Aphrodite.7 These fighting animals functioned as symbols of masculinity and possible inspirations for courage. They were trained and most probably taken good care of, although the actual fighting was, of course, abusive treatment of animals. Successful fighting animals, like cocks and feline predators, were given names, which

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could be depicted in vase paintings and mosaics commemorating certain fights. Naming animals certainly acknowledges the animal’s particularity, although it is not a guarantee of a personal relationship with the named animal.8 Besides watching animals fight and perhaps die in smaller-scale animal fights, the Greeks shared the public experience of seeing animals die at altars. Ritual slaughter of animals, which provided a shared meal for humans and gods, was a public event. The animals’ struggle for their life, which was the interest for animal fights, was an unwanted reaction at the public slaughter at the altar. Some features of the sacrificial ritual of thysia were probably meant to alleviate and disguise animals’ fear and anguish. Women’s ululations (ὀlolύz1in) probably marked the moment of the zoocide in the Greek ritual of blood sacrifice,9 but it may also have covered up the animals’ cries. Walter Burkert’s and Rene´ Girard’s ideas on the psychological reasons for the minutiae of Greek blood sacrifice have lately met with much criticism.10 Both scholars contributed to the idea that there existed some kind of felt kinship or affinity with the animal victim, which was expressed in the complicated ritual.11 The theory of the willing victim, which Burkert originally proposed, has been criticised as well. It includes the idea that the sacrificial animal had to ‘nod’ as a token of its acceptance of its killing. It has been suggested, as an alternative, that the animal’s ‘nodding’ (or shaking) was only a sign of its vitality – that the victim was a healthy specimen and its meat edible. The blood sacrifice can then simply be seen as a guarantee of the freshness of the meat, because everybody who attended could see that the animal had been killed recently.12 However, the animal’s assent was an important notion, alleviating guilt at least for some people in the audience watching the animal being killed, such as Pythagorean-inspired thinkers. Without doubt, Plutarch speaks of the victim’s nodding as a sign of assent in the Table-Talks (cf. Mor. 729e – f). The ritual reminded all in attendence that the sacrificial meat had a moment ago been a living body. Seeing the animal’s reactions might have made at least some people ponder the justification for killing such domestic animals, which had worked all their life for people.

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In Babrius’ fable (from the second century CE ) The Old Ox and the Young Steer (Perry 300), the different lives of working and sacrificial animals are clearly demonstrated. A young steer, which is turned loose in the fields, pities the hard life of the plough-drawing ox. When the festival time comes, however, the young steer is dragged along by a rope to the altar, whereas the work ox is unyoked and let out to pasture. The adjective attributed to the sacrificial animal, also mentioned in this fable, is ἄw1to6 (‘let loose’, ‘ranging at will without custodian’), which referred to the fact that sacrificial animals were free from work.13 Thus, sacrificial animals had a pleasant but short life before their ritual slaughtering, whereas work animals lived a longer but harder life. Whether the most valuable animals, like oxen, were automatically killed when unproductive, or not, is discussed in the next subchapter. Sympathising with Domestic Animals The story of the hard-working mule, which helped with the building of the Parthenon, is familiar from many sources. According to Aristotle, the mule was released from work on account of its age, and a decree was passed which forbade sellers of corn to drive it away from their display-trays (HA 6.577b– 578a). Adaeus (or Addaeus) of Macedonia, a largely unknown epigrammatist, probably from the third century BCE or much later, wrote an epigram, where one Alcon did not kill his old working ox, because he respected (aἴd1suai) it, due to the work it had done for him. The epigram ends with the ox grazing on the luxuriant lawn and being pleased that it is free from the plough (AP 6.228). Thus the basic idea is that a working animal deserves a ‘retirement’. Much later on, Plutarch speaks of the care of old animals (ge¯rokomia) as an actual practice: at least he himself, a wealthy landowner, had let his old dogs, horses and perhaps oxen roam free. Plutarch wants to stress that animals (and slaves) are not things but living beings (Life of Marcus Cato, 5).14 The idea that working animals should not be eaten comes up also in the didactic poet Aratus’ account of human history (the third century BCE ), which was parallel to Hesiod’s account of degenerative races from the race of gold onwards. According to Aratus, the people of the ‘race of

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bronze’ were the first to ‘eat the flesh of ploughing-ox’ (Phaen. 131–5). Thus, eating work animals was seen as a sign of a degenerative age. Later on, Ovid’s Pythagoras pictures the sacrifice from a working ox’s point of view (cf. ‘Introduction’ of this book). However, the prohibition against eating working animals and even the picturing of the situation from the working animal’s point of view has its parallel in the Near East. Kurt Smolak has noted how in the Avestan literature, the sacred literature of Zoroastrianism, a religion which dates to around the ninth to sixth centuries BCE , there is a commentary on an appeal made by a working cow (thus, an animal prosopopoeia). The cow protests that it is sacrificed despite its service to its patrons.15 Even if the ‘retirement’ of work animals may only have been cultivated by the wealthy few, domestic animals were at least thought to belong to a certain extent within the range of human care and the household. Greek has quite a few words to denote taming or domesticating animals. The connotations refer to making a wild animal tame (he¯meros, praos), or more manageable (kheiroe¯the¯s . kheir ‘hand’) or ‘refined’ (tithasos) or to subduing them and training them away from their natural habits (verb damazein). The tameness of animals could also be expressed either by the adjective philanthro¯pos (‘human loving’) or syne¯the¯s (‘accustomed to humans, friend’) or by the substantive philophrosyne¯ (‘kindliness, friendliness’) – all point to the animal’s stance towards humans. Plato and Aristotle play with the idea of domestic animals as tame and mild and the act of taming as a way of making animals favourable to humans,16 while also both call human beings tame (he¯meros), referring to socialised humans who embody social virtues.17 Thus domestication did not mean only that animals were made more mild and more tame so that it was easier for humans to dominate, subordinate and manage them, but tameness was a positive quality, which had made both humans and domesticated animals somehow different from wild animals (the¯r or the¯rion). Domestic animals were he¯mera zo¯a, although the phrase enoikidia zo¯a – belonging to the household (oikos ‘home, house’) – was more in favour with later writers. Sometimes the term used of a domestic animal was syntrophos ‘eating the same food’.18 In a way, domestic

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animals were thus thought to be part of the oikos, like domestic servants and slaves. Animal husbandry was indirectly discussed in the Aesopic animal fables. In The Wolves and the Sheepdogs, the wolves, which have ‘freedom’ (eleutheria), persuade the sheepdogs to leave their sheltered life and join them as ‘brothers’. In the wolves’ view, dogs slave for men who flog them and put collars on their necks. Dogs guard men’s sheep, but get no mutton, only bones (Perry 342).19 Instead of a form of employment, or sheer enslavement, domestication and husbandry was sometimes depicted as a kind of deal or agreement between human and domestic animals in fables.20 Our knowledge of the practicalities of tending livestock and animal husbandry in Antiquity is derived mainly from Roman agriculturalist writers, although their innovations are acknowledged to be based largely on Greek and Carthaginian agronomists.21 The most common domestic animals in the Greek world were goats, sheep, pigs, chickens and donkeys. Smaller livestock, like sheep, goats and pigs, were collectively called me¯la, while cattle were called boes. Sometimes thremma, ‘creature’, was also used of livestock, as well as kte¯mata, which has connotations of property and was used for livestock in general. There were small family farmers with meagre livestock, such as the one in Hesiod’s Works and Days, but the early ideal was to own large cattle, which is reflected in the cattle raids of the Iliad (11.656– 803, especially 678–81).22 References to tending livestock occur especially frequently in the Odyssey, with allusions to personal care and close contact with animals. There are different kinds of relatedness to animals, represented by Odysseus’ swineherd Eumaeus, the Cyclops Polyphemus and the marine god Proteus (though the latter two are characters in the narratives told by Odysseus and Menelaus respectively). Eumaeus is said to tend, with his three servants and guard dogs, hundreds of pigs, of which the males stay outside at night, roaming freely, whereas the sows with their piglets are put inside pigsties. Eumaeus has built solid pigsties on his own initiative, and he stays awake and keeps a cold night’s watch over the boars, which sleep in the caves (Od. 14. 5– 169, 14.524– 33).23 The Cyclops

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Polyphemus takes diligent care of his herd of goats and sheep, which manage well on their own. In the evening he milks the ewes and nanny-goats inside the cave, where they spend their night with their young; the male of the flock for their part spend the night just outside the cave (9.298, 237– 49, 340– 2, 428).24 Polyphemus sleeps with his goats and sheep on the bed made of twisted willow twigs inside the cave (9.298, 427), whereas Eumaeus sleeps in his hut except when he stays awake guarding the boars. The god Proteus has, for his part, a wild-animal herd, a flock of fatted seals which lives on the island of Pharos. Proteus, who lives under the sea, comes every evening to count his seals and lay himself to sleep among them (4.423, 4.384– 570). Proteus, Polyphemus and Eumaeus thus represent three different levels of care for animals. Proteus’ flock of wild animals is used to his presence so that they allow the god to come near them, but need minimal care. Eumaeus’ pigs are domesticated so far that they need man-made shelters (the hair of sows and piglets is too thin for them to spend the night outside). Polyphemus’ milk-giving ewes and nanny-goats demand a daily milking and are therefore more work than animals which are kept basically for wool (like sheep) and for meat (like pigs and seals). These examples are from a literary work, the Odyssey, but Aristotle also refers to the shepherds’ custom of sleeping with their herd on cold nights in the Study of Animals. He mentions that goats are more prone to seek human company than sheep – that goats ‘come towards people’ (prosέrxontai prὸ6 toὺ6 ἀnurώpoy6, HA 8.610b31– 33). Aristotle deals with the care of other domestic animals, too, like pigs, dogs, cattle, horses, donkeys, elephants and horses, treating the care of horses most extensively. He discusses, for instance, cures for pigs’ diseases and states that the best foods for fattening pigs are chickpeas and figs. The only notion of pigs’ own preferences are in this connection: Aristotle warns against giving a one-sided diet and states that pigs enjoy changes (xaίr1in m1tabάlloysa), like all animals (HA 7.603b29– 30). When speaking of horses, Aristotle shows understanding of animals’ need for variation and stimulation. He mentions that horses like baths, as well as liking meadows and

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marshes as their pastures (HA 7.605a9– 13). Aristotle also discusses the effect of castration on animals’ characters and describes how, for example, young bulls are castrated as a practical necessity (HA 8.631b19– 632a32, bull: 632a15– 20). Daily care and concern for the wellbeing of domestic and companion animals is not necessarily emotionally binding. But a dependent living being needs constant care, and the caretaker is tied down by it. This is implied in the fragment of Sophocles’ lost play named The Shepherds, which is the epigraph of this section (Part III). A shepherd says to his colleague: toύtoi6 gὰr ὄnt16 d1spόtai doyl1ύom1n, / kaὶ tῶnd’ ἀnάgkh kaὶ sivpώntvn klύ1in.25 When masters have to attend to their slaves, the normal hierarchy is not in effect – and here the ‘masters’ must listen to ‘slaves’ who do not speak, who are silent. While animals do not talk and do not understand linguistic symbols, working with animals often includes talking to them – addressing them. Addressing Working Animals In Greek literature, characters addressing animals is an obvious technique for demonstrating the encounter with animals, and it usually reveals the emotional stance of the addresser. There are quite a few examples of addresses to animals in which the speech may or may not represent the situation in everyday life. We may suppose that in actual life working and companion animals were addressed by humans mostly in the same kind of manner in Antiquity as they are nowadays: humans call, invite and order animals, using sharper words in orders and softer words in more affectionate situations.26 In literature, addressing animals may be used to characterise the human who is doing the addressing more than the animal addressee. But, in all, addressing animals can give vividness to the situation. There are several addresses to horses in the Iliad, some of them quite long, mostly urging horses to keep on running.27 Their function for the narrative is often to give a snapshot of the situation and also to reveal the tactics of the heroes and what they are going to do. Still, they mimic quite plausibly the way horsemen might speak to their horses. Hector urges his four steeds on, addressing them first

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by their names and then reminding them of the good care they have had, saying that now is the time to pay it back. Hector also tells his horses that the Trojans are after the shield of Nestor and the armour of Diomedes (8.184– 97).28 In the two-horse chariot race arranged at Patroclus’ funeral, Nestor’s son Antilochus gives a long address to his father’s horses, as does Menelaus to his mares.29 The narrator mentions briefly that the horses shudder at Menelaus’ reproach to run faster (23.446– 7). In the same vein, Achilleus addresses Xanthus and Balius, exhorting them to bring him back from the battle but also rebuking them for leaving Patroclus on the ground. Quite extraordinarily, Xanthus is able to answer and make a defence as well as to prophesy Achilleus’ death (19.400– 21).30 In the Odyssey, Polyphemus’ long address to his head ram at the critical moment in events starts with a term pέpon, which in addresses means ‘dear’. Polyphemus supposes that the ram is lagging behind because it feels sorry for its master who has been blinded by Odysseus, or, literally, ‘because you are grieving for (pouέ1i6) your master’s eye’ (9.453). Polyphemus wishes that the ram could understand and talk (ὁmowronέoi6 potiwvnή1i6), so that it could convey him to where Odysseus is hiding. The irony is that Odysseus is hiding just under this ram’s belly. Another address to livestock in preHellenistic Greek literature is the first chorus song (41–62) in Euripides’ Cyclops, which is sung by the satyrs as companions of Silenus, who is held captive by Polyphemus. A universal phenomenon, according to H. Carrington Bolton, is to create new words for giving orders to different species of domestic animals. In this passage the possibly realistic interjection is cύtta ‘pst! pst!’ (49).31 The satyrs-shepherds drive Polyphemus’ sheep and goats back to the cave, referring first to the animals’ good breed and addressing them in endearing words with gentle reproaches. They appeal to the mother instincts of the nanny goats (‘your young ones are crying for you’, ‘they miss you’) in order to make them move more quickly. In everyday life, this kind of wording is not unusual and, of course, does not necessarily mean that the cowherds and the shepherds in fact believe that the herd literally understands their words. Satyrs speaking to their goats give the same kind of narrative snapshot of

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the situation as Homeric heroes speaking to their horses. However, for comic effect, satyrs – half men and half animals – are shown as having an unusually close connection with their herd. Theocritus’ shepherds and goatherders likewise speak to their herds in a humorous and friendly manner. For instance, at the very beginning of the fifth Idyll, a young shepherd, Lacon, orders his lambs (ἀmnίd16) to hop out of the spring, but he also asks them whether they have seen the thief who stole his pipe (5.3–4).32 This is reminiscent of Polyphemus’ address to his ram and his wish that the ram would reveal the hiding Odysseus (a thief of his sheep). Again, these are devices to express the intimate relationship the animal keeper may have with his domestic animals. But they may reflect popular belief that animals could function as seers or exposers of truth. In all, speaking to sheep and goats became a topos in pastoral literature. The most intimate and idealised form occurs in the novel Daphnis and Chloe from the third century CE . What is common to all these cases – and this is of course only a brief overview of the subject33 – is that these addresses to animals in poetic works reveal a relational view of animals. However, although in all cases humans speak to animals, there is seldom a description of how animals react.34 One counterexample is Menelaus’ horses, which are said to ‘obey’ his commands (Il. 23.446– 7). Animals here are like silent actors, the dumb characters (koῦwa prόsvpa) of Attic drama: they may be addressed, but how they respond is not revealed in the text. The focus in the addresses is on the human, as if the function and meaning of these passages is to characterise the addressers and their situation, their relationship to their non-human servants and companions. However, the addresses also turn the audience’s focus on the animal, for a while at least. Fellowship with Hounds and Hunted Animals The first extant treatise on the training of working animals is Xenophon’s Cynegeticus (On Hunting with Hounds).35 Xenophon handles quite extensively the training commands used for hunting hares, including changing tone of voice and using encouraging words in quite an elevated style: Ἰὼ kύn16, ἰώ, kalῶ6, sowῶ6 g1 ὦ

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kύn16 (‘Up dogs, up, beautifully and wisely, oh dogs’, 6.17– 20).36 He portrays vividly the different characters of dogs and guides the trainer to feed hounds with his own hand in order that the dogs will love (stέrg1in) him (7.12). There are passages in which Xenophon speculates on the motives of dogs that suddenly stop their hunting activity. They halt due to their ‘dislike of the wild animals’ they are hunting or because they ‘prefer the company of humans’. Dogs can also ‘make wild guesses and change their minds while tracking traces’ (Cyneg. 9). Thus, although hunters utter orders, hounds may also have an agency of their own, of which the trainer needs to take notice. Arrian’s advice for the care and training of dogs show more sensitivity to the emotional needs of dogs. In his Cynegeticus (from the third century CE ), Arrian even stresses the importance of the bodily contact, advising that the puppy should sleep beside its owner (Arr. Cyneg. 8 – 13). Both Xenophon and Arrian advise that rubbing and massaging is good for dogs, but Arrian does not fail to mention the point of view of his dog, Horme¯, who shows clearly that she enjoys the treatment (Arr. Cyneg. 10.4). Xenophon does, however, acknowledge the importance of bonding with a working animal in his manual for training cavalry horses, On Horse Breeding, which begins with an appeal to his long experience with horses. As a method for teaching a foal to like people, to become philanthro¯pos, he recommends making sure that it enjoys all kinds of comforts while in human company: it should not be troubled with hunger, thirst or mosquitoes (2.3). Xenophon knows that horses should not be approached or led from the front (6.3 – 4), and he gives advice on how to handle horses of different characters (9.1 – 12). Without implying human superiority, Xenophon notes that while the gods gave speech (logos) for teaching other humans, horses cannot be taught by speaking, but by rewards (ἀntixarίz1suai) and punishments (8.13); he continues that a horse will willingly take his bit if something pleasurable happens afterwards (6.10 – 11).37 In all, Xenophon’s presentation of how to train hounds, but especially cavalry horses, notes the complexities of human-animal interaction and the teamwork across the species in hunting and at war.

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The team of hunters and hounds together has prey animals as its antagonists. Xenophon calls prey strong ‘adversaries’ (ἀntίpala), which fight both for their lives ( psychai) and for their dwellings. According to Xenophon, hunting is an educative pastime, and it makes hunters wiser because, besides the hard work, hunters have to think and concentrate on their sly prey (Cyneg. 13.14).38 In all, the image of the hunted animal was a cunning or mighty antagonist, or both.39 But fables may sometimes offer the imagined hunted animal’s point of view, in which human beings are seen as ruthless enemies to other animals. In Roman poet Phaedrus’ fable The Stag in the Ox-Stall (2.8, Perry 492), the moral of the story is that the master is more careful with his property than his servants are. However, its protagonist is a stag, which escapes human hunters by hiding in the ox-stall. The oxen promise not to betray the stag’s presence, but his long antlers reveals him to the humans.40 Obviously hunting manuals do not take pity on these shrewd adversaries. Xenophon allows his young dogs to tear a hare apart in their first hunting of hares, and he describes tortuous foot traps for deer and boar with cool practicality (Cyneg. 7.9, 9.11 –9, 10.3). However, Xenophon also gives visually captivating descriptions of how at sunrise hinds with their fawns come to the glade (where hunters are waiting) and how hinds then guide their fawns to their daily sleeping-place, suckle them and look around to ensure that they are safe (Cyneg. 9.3). Fawns function as decoys for the hunting of hinds. When the hind hears the cry of its fawn, it comes fatally closer. Xenophon sees the situation from the hind’s (imaginary) perspective by suggesting that after seeing the hunter holding the fawn, the hind wants to get the fawn away from him (9.8). But there are no descriptive words for the fawn’s or the hind’s distress, only a strategy for hunting. Arrian, however, expresses compassion for the game, especially for hares. He relates how he has snatched a hare away alive, protecting her from the dogs, and how he has then let her run away (Cyneg. 16.5). In Arrian’s opinion, the chase is pleasant sport, except for seeing the hare caught, which is aniaros, ‘upsetting’ (Cyneg. 16.6). This strong adjective, ἀniarό6 (‘upsetting, distressing, grievous’),

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may refer to the sorry sight of the hare’s body after a pack of dogs has disembowelled it. Animal Lovers It is difficult to find expressions of explicit emotional attachment to animals before Anyte’s animal epitaphs. Pet-keeping was of course a widely practised custom in Greece even before the Hellenistic period. During the fifth century BCE , it became a kind of fashion to depict children with obvious pet animals and women with birds in vase paintings.41 Although pet-keeping and the companionship of personal animals are historically and culturally universal phenomena, modern western attitudes to pets do not necessary transpose to ancient pet-keeping.42 There is for instance no single term for pets in Greek. The word syntrophos, which was used of domestic animals, occurs in later writers such as Plutarch and Lucian to describe pets as well.43 Plutarch relates how the death of a little pet dog (kynίdion sύntrowon) functions as an omen for the victory of a famous Roman general. The dog belonged to his daughter, and the incident shows not only about her deep affection for her pet but also her close relationship with her father – or so Plutarch tells the story in his Life of Aemilius Paulus (10.7– 8). Syntrophos refers to the fact that pets are fed and cared (trephein) and that they sort of eat ‘together’ (syn) with their owners. In the Iliad, the phrase ‘table dogs’, trap1zῆ16 kύn16, refers to dogs which are fed from their master’s table. King Priam fears that it is his ‘table dogs’ which would eat his corpse, when he is killed (Il. 22.69). Patroclus’ companion dogs are called table dogs, too, and they are then killed and burnt along with two horses and nine prisoners of war in the hero’s funeral pyre (Il. 23.173; see also Od. 17.309– 10).44 However, in the Odyssey, Telemachus’ companion dogs, which followed him even to public assemblies, are not called ‘table dogs’ (Od. 2.11; 17.62; 20.145). They seem more like personal animals, which function as status symbols and identity markers as well as providing company.45 Mocking remarks on pampering pet-keeping already occur in the fourth century BCE from the philosopher Theophrastus and in two comedy fragments by his slightly older contemporary, play-writer

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Eubulus.46 In Eubulus’ The Graces, an anonymous character wonders why people with means bring up sparrows, mischievous apes and geese instead of children. The matter-of-fact comic point here is that bringing up animals is useless compared with children who can later take care of their old parents. For the Greeks, the idea that pets could be surrogates for human company as such might have seemed absurd. At least there is no joking with stereotypes of lonely people with their pets or recluses who hate mankind but love animals. Theophrastus ridicules overindulgent pet-keeping several times in his satirical study of human moral types (Characters 5.9; 21.6, 21.9). A jackdaw and a Maltese lap-dog, whose expensive race is mentioned on its tomb, are the pets of a man with ‘petty ambition’ (Mikrophilotimos). The man has made a tiny shield and bought a little ladder, which is surely a more complicated item than the one described in The Wasps, where Aristophanes compares Philocleon’s attempts to escape his home to a jackdaw hopping from rung to rung, from short sticks driven into the wall (The Wasps 129– 30). A bird with a ‘shield’ is reminiscent of the armed birds of The Birds (produced at least 60 years earlier than the Characters). Some Attic vase paintings depict birds wearing helmets, shields and spears.47 In any case, a shielded bird is a comic sight and pets are often kept for amusement without thought for the comforts (or dignity) of animals. Theophrastus’ ‘petty’ man’s affection for his jackdaw is not obvious, but surely he enjoys watching the bird representing a little soldier. If this reflects an actual practice, at least the ladder has provided stimulation for an indoor bird. The entertainment value of pet animals is indicated in the word ἄuyrma, which means ‘plaything, toy, delight, joy’ (diminutive athurmation) and which may in some cases be translated as pet.48 The Latin word delicia was used both of human pets (beautiful slave children) and animal pets.49 Thinking of animals as living toys may encourage their cruel treatment. A modern reader of the Homeric Hymn to Hermes (from the sixth century BCE ) may find that the incident of the baby Hermes and the tortoise expresses children’s sometimes thoughtless cruelty to animals (lines 25 – 38). It is the story of how Hermes became the inventor of the chelys, the

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tortoise-lyre, how he ‘made the tortoise a singer’ (25). Hermes encounters a tortoise outside his birth-cave and interprets it as a lucky omen. After greeting it with hymnal and affectionate wording, admiring its shell and inviting it to live with him, the divine child carries the tortoise to his cave, kills it and fabricates a chelys.50 For the Greeks, the story might exemplify only the cunning of Hermes. However, in most other retellings of the story the tortoise is not alive – Hermes finds only its shell.51 There are also tales of the friendship, and even erotic relationships, between humans and animals, told especially by such later writers as Aelian and Athenaeus.52 Aelian gives significance to the fact that he knows more tales about animals falling in love with humans than the other way round and notes that animals especially love youngsters blessed by extreme beauty (NA 8.10). Aelian retells traditional stories, which Aristotle also used. Sometimes he mentions explicitly his source. For instance, Aelian reports that the story of the close friendship ( philia) between an eagle and a boy is from the third century BCE historian Phrynichus. Aelian carefully stresses that the boy did not rear the young bird as ‘a plaything for sport’ (athurma es paidia) but as a younger brother. Later, when the boy fell sick, the eagle kept to the boy’s side and refused to eat if the boy did not eat (NA 6.29). Respect for Animals Besides stories such as Arion and the dolphin and Androcles and the lion, there were more historically specific stories of, for instance, dogs rescuing or doing other services to their masters or the public community. Some animals evidently got public honours as a reward for exceptional achievements or behaviour. Pericles’ father, Xanthippus, was evacuated from Athens by boat just before the battle of Salamis in 480 BCE . His dog swam after him but died later of exhaustion. Xanthippus held a memorial and erected a statue of the dog in the Painted Stoa of Athens (Plut. Them. 10.9– 10).53 These stories express gratitude to animals for their favoured qualities: industriousness, diligence, faithfulness and the animals’ love of their masters. These same qualities, besides beauty and charisma, also

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largely define an animal’s position in the general hierarchy of human respect. That is, many Greeks surely liked dogs but hated wolves or admired horses but despised donkeys.54 Some animals were considered sacred to gods, although the concept of sacred animals is many layered in the Greek context, with local variations. Sacrificial animals might obtain special care before sacrifice and were sacred to special gods: for instance, sacrifical pigs were sacred to Demeter, although this does not necessarily mean that all pigs were sacrificed to Demeter. Or animals might be sacred because they were a god’s attributive animal, as the scops owl was to Athena. These animals had some association with the gods as they somehow illuminated aspects of the god – animals were gods’ epithets and emblems or familiars and envoys. In the iconography, gods were pictured with their epithet animals; Athena was pictured with an owl, but in very rare cases Athena was pictured as an owl.55 Sacred wild animals could be fed and cared for in sanctuaries, for instance the divinatory doves in Delphi, sacred to Apollo. Greek divinatory animals were typically wild animals, especially large predatory birds, which could be fed but otherwise were not cared for. Some animals were thought to have healing powers, for instance the snakes fed in Epidaurus, dedicated to Asclepius. Snakes, which were treated as an anomalous kind of animal in so many cultures due to their taxonomic difficulty (a legless land animal, which lays eggs) were probably not treated as taboo-animals in Greece. However, laws regulating sanctuaries often instructed that animals (other than sacrificial or sacred animals) were not allowed to step inside the temple area.56 The Greeks often compared their sacred animals to those revered (tίmasuai, s1mnύ1in, sέb1suai) in Egypt. While Egyptian animal cults were mostly viewed as utterly strange and even ridiculous by the Greeks, some Greeks, like the geographer Strabo (c. 63 BCE – 25 CE ) made a distinction in Egyptian practise between revering animals as gods – such as the Apis bull in Memphis – and revering cows and bulls around the area of Delta as sacred to a god (17.1.22). Strabo’s contemporary, historian Diodorus of Sicily, interprets the Egyptian gods as having formerly being humans but

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then having escaped into animal forms.57 Plutarch also asserts in his On Isis and Osiris that the Greeks, unlike the Egyptians, speak properly of animals as only sacred to the gods, but not as gods. However, in Plutarch’s opinion, the utility of animals is a reason that the Greeks, too, respect some animals – cranes, for instance, because cranes kill venomous snakes. Furthermore, some animals are viewed as having a kind of dim similarity (1ἰkώn ti6 ἀmayrά) with some gods (Mor. 381a). Plutarch cites Euripides’ lost Alexander, where the dog, sacred to Hecate, is said to be the goddess’ ἄgalma, that is, an honoured and glorified image of the goddess. In all, Plutarch is of the opinion that a living being is a better symbol for a god than a lifeless statue, because living beings possess power of perception and have emotions and character (Mor. 382a). Besides demonstrating loyalty to a man or being sacred to a god, animals could be respected or admired due to their special superhuman senses or faculties, which manifested themselves as a particular kind of sensitivity. There are stories, for instance, of animals’ ability to see what humans do not see. In the Odyssey, dogs recognise Athena’s presence, invisible to humans, and do not bark but run whining away (Od. 16.159– 163). The same kinds of superhuman perception are acknowledged, for instance, in stories of great floods, when animals are reported to sense the danger before humans and often guide humans to safety.58 Not only do many mythical foundations of cities include animals who act as guides on the journey and ‘decide’ where the city should be founded (a cow guided Cadmus for the founding of Thebes), but there were stories about actual journeys when animals helped travellers by guiding them to safety.59 The idea that deserted babies were proficiently taken care of by animals is already familiar in the Graeco-Roman mythology from the story that when the infant Zeus was in danger, he was nursed by the goat Amalthea. It had its romantic elaboration in the third century CE novel Daphnis and Chloe, in which both children are foundlings and have been suckled by a goat and a sheep (1.3.2; 1.5.2). Although there is no emphasis on children reared by animals learning some animal ‘wisdom’ as such, these ‘wolf children’ are not seen as ‘feral’ in the sense that they are unable to learn human skills later. In a way,

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animal foster-parents were seen as evidence of the child’s exceptionality as well as of animals’ love for humankind. But, as Kenneth Rothwell has argued, during the fifth century BCE it was not natural animals (any more?) but human-animal hybrids, such as the centaur Cheiron, which were seen as teachers of mankind, as cultural heroes.60 The visual depictions of the Sphinx and Oedipus are positioned as a teacher and her pupil, whereas in the parodic equivalent Aesop and a fox converse at a more equal level.61 In conclusion, the evidence of this chapter shows that Greek literature contains many kinds of interest in animals beyond mere dominance and use. This appears not so much in sheer observation but in traces of contact with animals: working and addressing, training and revering. However, descriptions of human-animal relationships seem usually to be one-sided, which is confirmed by Aelian’s comment that he knows more tales about animals falling in love with humans than the other way round. But typically these kinds of stories were treated as anecdotes or as short references within factual writing. Stories of admiration, love and respect for animals did not form a traditional theme in the serious literary genres of Greek poetry.

Transformations and Animal Body Although Greek mythology is rich in stories of metamorphoses, extant Greek literature contains only few metamorphic characters (men metamorphosed into animals). We have Tereus the hoopoe in Aristophanes’ Birds, Plutarch’s Gryllus the pig in his philosophical dialogue Animals Are Rational – also known as Gryllus (Mor. 985d – 992e), and Lucian’s cock in his satire The Dream, or the Cock, which, in fact, is about metempsychosis, not metamorphosis. Additionally, the satire Lucius, or the Donkey from the second century CE , attributed to Lucian, describes metamorphosis from the point of view of Lucius, the first-person speaker, who becomes a donkey through the agency of a young Thessalian witch. It possibly used the same Greek source as Apuleius’ famous Golden Ass.62 The most influential Roman work on the subject is nevertheless Ovid’s Metamorphoses, which is not ‘fiction’

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but Ovid’s retelling and poetic adaptations of Graeco-Roman mythology on metamorphosis. It is noteworthy that Ovid concentrates sometimes on the actual process of becoming a nonhuman body (animal, tree, stone), as well as on the metamorph’s reactions to the process, which are mostly terror and fear.63 All the above mentioned Greek works are more or less comical or satirical – including Plutarch’s Gryllus, which, however, advocates on behalf of animal rationality.64 But metamorphosis was a topic of serious genres, too. Naturally, becoming an animal was treated in comedy as comical and in tragedy as a tragic incident. Furthermore, there seems to be another important difference. As far as we know, Sophocles’ lost tragedy Tereus mainly depicted Tereus’ life as a king, his crimes and tragic flaws – that is, his life before he became a hoopoe.65 Serious Greek literary genres thus handled the beforemetamorphosis-situation (what leads to the metamorphosis), and comical-satirical genres handled the after-situation.66 The question is: was there a kind of cultural block to imagining in a serious, not merely comical, way what it was to be an animal? Were imaginative leaps like Kafka’s Die Verwandlung and Thomas Nagel’s philosophical essay What Is it Like to Be a Bat? (1974) impossible for the Greeks?67 Moreover, animals are as a matter of fact often eclipsed in modern interpretations of transformation myths – or they have only instrumental value. According to Paul M.C. Forbes Irving, the Greek metamorphosis myths often mirror serious transgression in a person’s life. They are mythical reflections on the crossing of the boundary between significant and rigid social categories, such as that of the oikos and the outside wilderness, or the world of the living and the world of the dead, or the categories of gods and men, or of genders or gender roles.68 Human transformation into an animal is ultimately an extraordinary punishment – not death because mere death would be a too conventional conclusion of this kind of transgression.69 The myth of Tereus, Philomela and Procne, which is one of the many stories of transformations into birds, relates serious crimes against the oikos. King Tereus rapes his wife Procne’s sister, Philomela; as revenge, Procne kills their son and serves him as a meal to Tereus; Apollo rescues Procne from Tereus’ vengeance, changing her into a

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nightingale, and punishes Tereus and changes him into a hoopoe. In Forbes Irving’s view, metamorphosis was thus seen by the Greeks as a punishment for serious transgression, which means an acknowledgement of a failure to be human, to fulfil human norms. But, one may say, this happens also in animal insults: when Achilleus insults Hector saying ‘you dog’, he means that Hector is in human form but does not fulfil human standards at that moment (Il. 22.345). Furthermore, there are mythical characters who commit similar kinds of transgressive crimes as Tereus but get only ‘normal’ punishments, not metamorphosis.70 In all, this kind of reading pinpoints the polarised dualities in which the transformation into animal form is seen to be a change to something totally alien. Instead, Richard Buxton has suggested that we may talk about human-animal transformation as Greek experience rather than mere metaphor, although allegorical interpretations were common among the Greeks.71 In his view, a certain kind of flexibility of all living beings was a basic experience behind the Greek metamorphosis myths. He summarises the specificity of the early Greek metamorphic tradition as follows: ‘it expressed in narrative form the existence of remarkable continuities between human life and the natural environment.’72 That is, to a certain extent, one may say that the Greeks ‘believed’ in metamorphosis, and hybrids for that matter – as incidents that had happened in the mythical past, or even as a possibility which might also happen to them (as modern man may ‘believe’ in extra-terrestrial aliens). In this chapter, metamorphosis and hybrids are analysed from this ‘experiential’ basis, and metempsychosis is also briefly treated. The analysis is combined with the question of what attitude the Greeks had to the animal body – was it thought to be, if not repulsive, nevertheless inferior to a human body – as the sort of negative Other? What Is it Like to Be a Centaur? One thought or imaginative experiment about what it is like to be an animal occurs in Xenophon’s Cyropaedia, a fictionalised account of the education of Cyrus the Great (4.3.15 – 21). While discussing riding, one of Cyrus’ companions, named Chrysantas, confesses that

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he envied centaurs (ἱppokέntayroi) for their hunting abilities until he truly learned to ride. Now he thinks that as a rider with a horse he is more than a centaur, with certain assets. To be a centaur, Chrysantas imagines, is to be ‘born together and be tied’ (symp1wykὼ6 d1dήsomai) to a horse, body and soul, and therefore to be less than to be the union which a horse and a rider form. The latter can be taken to ‘pieces’ (as a horse and a man) and ‘put together again’, and it has four eyes compared to a centaur’s two. The man part of the centaur cannot sleep in a bed nor dress in human clothes. Chrysantas does not think, however, that only the man’s part of a centaur is sensitive. He imagines how awkward the horse part would feel: ‘as a horse, he could not use the wonderful inventions of man and, as a man, he could not enjoy the proper pleasures of a horse’. Even horse food would not be enjoyable because the man part would despise it.73 Chrysantas thus in a lively fashion imagines what practical and psychological consequences would follow if one were a centaur. Although speaking about centaurs can be a frivolous discussion, in this case a way to amuse the young monarch, Cyrus, Greek myths of metamorphoses and hybrids were not just stories for recreation, nor even a mere literary subgenre,74 but they were part of the system which we call Greek religion. As is well known, there was a strong sceptical tradition, which claimed the falsity of myths in general from the Presocratics onwards. Palaephatus, the late fourth century BCE writer of miraculous incidents, one of the first paradoxographers, has an apt rational explanation for centaurs: riding was such a remarkable skill that the first to master it were called centaurs (On Incredible Things, 1). In any case, stories of metamorphoses were interpreted as having an allegorical meaning very early on in Antiquity. In the dialogue named Halcyon, or on Metamorphoses, which is included in Lucian’s corpus but was probably written much earlier, at the earliest in the fourth century BCE ,75 Socrates and Chaerophon are walking by the sea at Phalerum when they hear the cry of a halcyon (a kingfisher), which inspires Chaerophon to tell the myth of Halcyon. She was a queen who wailed over her handsome lost husband Ceyx so much

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that she acquired wings ‘by some divine dispensation’ in order to search for her husband, whom she then found dead (Halc. 1). To Chaerophon’s question how one is to believe the stories of ‘birds turning (gίn1suai) to women or women to birds’ (Halc. 2), Socrates answers that the world at large is mutable and for a god it is as easy to change a woman to a bird as to change the weather; the gods make changes as children fashion clay or wax (Halc. 4). Socrates gives as an example of natural metamorphosis how a footless and wingless creature becomes a colourful bee, which can make honey and, furthermore, how Nature fashions from speechless and soulless eggs creatures of the earth, air and sea (Halc. 7). The reason for metamorphosis is seen in this dialogue as purely practical: the queen Halcyon needed wings in order to search for her husband, and so the god provided them to her. For the discussants, the deeper meaning of the stories of metamorphosis is allegorical: the stories mirror nature’s marvellous transformations from caterpillar to butterfly. At the end of the dialogue, Socrates nevertheless addresses the bird (kingfisher) and reverently promises to tell its story in the future and especially the honour which it obtained from the gods: that the gods grant fine weather (the halcyon days) during the halcyon’s nesting time. The Socrates of the dialogue keeps the allegorical interpretation of metamorphosis and the ancient story of a bird revered by the gods neatly apart. One more detail of this dialogue demands attention: Chaerophon’s basic question about metamorphosis gives the impression that metamorphoses from human to animal and from animal to human are equally frequent in the Greek imagination (Halc. 2). But that is not the case, as has been noticed by many modern critics – at least as regards the texts and myths preserved for us. Basically, only animals which were formerly humans, may retransform to humans.76 One exception is those foundation myths in which the autochthonies, the aboriginals, are animals. The Myrmidons, the clan to which Achilleus belongs, were once ants. Zeus supplied Achilleus’ father Peleus with an army of ants transformed into warriors. This is reminiscent of the similes, especially in the second book of the Iliad,

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in which the troops are compared to a mass of animals – the troops swarmed like bees, ants and so on. However, there is one Aesopic fable, in which a weasel falls in love with a beautiful young man. She prays to Aphrodite to change her into a maiden, and the goddess fulfils the wish. This fable is thus an example of the stock stories – retold, for instance, by Aelian – in which animals fall in love with beautiful humans. But the fable also relates what happens after metamorphoses: the young man marries the weasel-maiden, but when she sees a mouse running over the floor in their house, her original nature is exposed (Perry 50, see also Babrius 32).77 Mark Payne has noted that the fable is also a version of the universal story motif, the ‘animal bride’. Payne even interpreted Semonides’ long misogynist poem (from the sixth century BCE ) as a version of this motif. Semonides compares ten women to ten different animals, building both negative female images (pig-woman, horsewoman etc.) and one positive, ideal woman (a bee woman).78 Animal bride stories entail what happens if an animal is transformed into human. The result is a creature who looks human but ‘inside’ is still, for instance, a weasel. An alien which takes human form is a popular motif in modern horror movies. But humans who are transformed into animals, like Tereus, are similarly not what they seem. Tereus looks like a hoopoe, but ‘inside’ he is still the king of Thrace. When Socrates and Chaerophon (in Halcyon, or in Metamorphoses) are discussing the mutability of the world, they see a kingfisher and the myth of Halcyon comes to their minds. Was this an ordinary experience? When they saw a hoopoe, which is a conspicuous bird, did the Greeks think of the fate of Tereus?79 That is, did they see the mythical human, Tereus, in an animal form? Or, a man reincarnated as a hoopoe? Both metamorphosis and metempsychosis contain the idea that ‘what is inside becomes the outside’: how one behaves in this life determines the form of one’s next life (metempsychosis) or the rest of one’s life (metamorphosis). There prevails a causality and a continuum between this life and the next, between the human character and that of the animal. The idea is also dominant in ancient accounts of physiognomy, in which outer appearance quite simply

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determined personality and temperament. The Physiognomics (c. first century CE ), once attributed to Aristotle, consists of two parts, which are written by two authors with different premises. Both writers, however, agree on the basic principle of physiognomy, which reads the physiological qualities of both human and non-human animals as signs (se¯meia) of their psychological qualities. For instance, the softness of men’s hair is a sign of timidity, because many timid animals (like hare, deer and sheep) have soft hair, whereas brave animals like lions and boars have stiff hair (806b7 – 10).80 Metempsychosis was discussed for instance by Plato, by the comedy-writer Menander and by Lucian. Although in all cases, the ‘belief’ in metempsychosis is of course highly debatable, these passages may reveal something of the general Greek outlook regarding the animal body. Plato’s accounts of metempsychosis clearly assert that humans obtain that kind of life in their next incarnation which they deserve.81 In most cases Plato depicts spending the next life as an animal as a derogatory punishment. This is most explicit in the Timaeus, where Plato’s hierarchical view puts human males at the top and all other living beings, including women, are seen as degenerate reincarnations of human males. In the Phaedrus, the phrasing suggests that the human soul ‘arrives’ into the life of an animal (1ἰ6 uhrίoy bίon ἀnurvpίnh cyxὴ ἀwikn1ῖtai, 249b) – the animal (the¯rion) is thus not specified. However, those human souls which once were human may pass from the animal body back to the human body if they have spent a decent life as animals. Conversely, in the Phaedo and the Republic, the lives of certain animals are not seen as merely damaging. In the Phaedo, unrestrained people (the gluttonous, the violent and drunkards) will slip into the species of donkeys ‘and other animals’ in their next lives – the verb ἐndύ1suai (‘slip in, dress’) used here suggests that bodies are kinds of suits or residences for souls;82 tyrants and robbers for their part become predators like wolves, hawks and kites, whereas social ( politikos) and gentle/tame (he¯meros) people become social and tame beings, like bees, wasps, ants and humans (Phd. 82a). Thus, although the discussants in the Phaedo see some animals in a strictly negative light, the best option for the next life for humans equates humans with

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some social insects. Moreover, in the Republic, heroes like Ajax and Agamemnon choose animal lives (as a lion and an eagle respectively), as do the singers Thamyras and Orpheus (a nightingale and a swan). The reason is their disappointment in the conditions of human life in general or in the specific injustices they have met (Resp. 10.620a). The same idea occurs in Menander’s comedy, The Girl Possessed by a God or The Demoniac Girl (fr. 223 Kock), where the speaker asserts that if the god were to give him a new life, he would not choose the life of a man, because good men do not get what they deserve as good horses, dogs and fighting cocks do (apparently, good care and praise). The protagonist of Lucian’s satire, The Dream, or the Cock, also expresses doubts about human life. Pythagoras, in the body of a cock, recounts his several reincarnations to his master Micyllus. As well as having been both men and women, he has been, for instance, a horse, a jackdaw, a frog and several times a cock. Micyllus wants to know what their way of being (diatribe¯) was like. Pythagoras the cock answers that any animal’s life has less fuss (apragmo¯n) than human life, because the aims and wants of animals are centred on the body so that there exist, for instance, no jackdaw sophists (26– 7). It was easy to joke with the ideas of metempsychosis in both philosophical and comical works. But these latter cases slightly echo Greek pessimism (‘better not to be born at all’, ‘man is the most miserable of all creatures’), cultural criticism (on alleged moral degeneration) and the consideration of animals as paragons of virtues. From this standpoint, animals would have been insane to aspire to become people. But this does not, of course, mean that the Greeks did not have strong negative and stereotyped attitudes to some animal species – as well as engaging in callous practices and the mistreatment of animals.83 Negative Animal Image Much of the Greek philosophical discussion of animals seems to reflect human exceptionalism – that is, the criteria for distinguishing humans from other animals, which are crystallised in the phrase ‘only the humans . . .’.84 This points to a polarised way of thinking. The basic separation was often thought to occur both on a psychological

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and a physiological level.85 Xenophon’s Socrates states that it is not only that if we had the body of an ox, we could not fulfil our lot as humans, but also that although some animals (such as monkeys) have hands, their hands are ‘little worth’ without human reason (Memorabilia 1.4.14). Although the differentiation between humans and non-human animals was generally fixed on human rationality (mostly through the work of Plato and Aristotle and their successors), both the psychological and physical otherness of animals was challenged by the concept of gradation (synecheia), in which all living beings including humans were seen on the same scale. The ideas of the continuum of living beings goes back to the Presocratics, but they were explicated by Aristotle. As the editors of Mensch und Tier in der Antike (2008) note, in Antiquity – and especially for the ancient Greeks, one may add – the concept of human being was not comprehensible or intelligible without referring to non-human animals, whether using the dichotomist model or a gradual differentiation model.86 That is, animals functioned often as the Other for the Greek thinkers, against which to reflect their humanity, sometimes using a more polarised way of thinking, sometimes not. But did the Greeks despise the animal body in general or feel strong contempt for the concept ‘animal’? ‘Animal’ might stand for restrictive passive qualities and for a lack of potentiality, and therefore it could have been associated in the Greek mind with such highly negative qualities as uncontrollability (akolasia) and immodesty (anaidia). Both Plato and Aristotle speak about brutality using the term the¯rio¯de¯s, the meaning of which varies (in the same ways as the¯rion) from the more neutral ‘animal-like’ to the pejorative ‘predatory’. Herodotus, writing a century earlier than Aristotle, used the same adjective (uhriώdh6) neutrally to describe places which were rich in animals (2.65; 4.181). In the Republic, Plato’s Socrates describes the life of the tyrannical man, ruled by his unruly desires, in which case the rational and mild (he¯meros) part of the soul are replaced by the predatory (the¯rio¯de¯s) and cruel (agrios) part. Such a man may copulate with his mother, with a god or an animal, eat any kind of food or kill his own relatives (Resp. 9.571c– d; 10.619b– c). The passage creates an evil image of a wild creature (the¯rion plus agrios) – a

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being which is unrestrained, without any kind of social skills or any dietary preferences. In the Nicomachean Ethics, Aristotle uses the same adjective in the sense of predatory cruelty. According to Aristotle, some people are innately corruptible and disposed to unnatural pleasures; this innate decadence is caused either by sickness, madness or predatory (the¯rio¯de¯s) character. Aristotle gives as examples of the last category of people those who customarily eat their babies and a woman who rips foetuses from other women’s wombs to devour them (EN 7.5.1148b16– 32, see also EN 7.5.1149a5– 20). This strongly negative image of ‘animality’ thus presents animals as aggressive and utterly uncontrollable predators. However, both Plato (Leg. 7.766a) and Aristotle (Pol. 1.1.1253a34– 7) state that without education and other restraints it is man who is the cruellest living being. Aristotle articulates that man’s ‘weapons’ are his intelligence and virtue; if these are used wrongly, man is the most unholy and savage (agrios) animal and also the most prone to sexual indulgence and gluttony. Therefore, the crucial difference is not between human and other animals but between wild creatures – which are also aggressive – and tame, whether they are humans or non-human animals. If anything, the term the¯rio¯de¯s in Plato and Aristotle’s passages handled above gives a negative picture of humans, not of animals; it describes a predatory human who is inherently alien to humankind. But the term the¯rio¯de¯s is also connected to fifth century ideas regarding mankind’s progress from the primitive state.87 Plato’s contemporary Isocrates speaks (in his defence of eloquence) about how humans have ‘escaped from the primitive life’ (toῦ uhrivdῶ6 zῆn ἀphllάghm1n) due to our ability to speak and especially to persuade each other (Nicocles 3.5). Just before this passage, Isocrates however states that human beings do not excel in all things: many other animals (alla zo¯a) have skills which are superior to those of human skills. In a way, the fifth century BCE belief in progress thus included an idea of ‘metamorphosis’: man’s transformation from an animal-like existence to a powerful cultural creature. It was thought to have happened partly through divine privilege and partly through human

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achievement. The interpretation of metamorphosis from human to animal as debasement became then dominant, although for instance Attic drama played with the idea of progress and the juxtaposition of physis with nomos along with ‘animality’ (cf. Part IV). A Stoic Thought Experiment and Animal Beauty The third leader of the Stoic school, Chrysippus, uses the story of Circe transforming Odysseus’ men into animals to show the importance of prudence or wisdom ( phrone¯sis) for humans. In Chrysippus’ version, Circe has two magic potions of transformation.88 One potion will make a man ‘foolish’ (aphro¯n), without ‘sense’ ( phre¯n), but maintaining his bodily form; the other potion will not remove the drinker’s mind, but will change him into a donkey with prudence ( phrone¯sis).89 Chrysippus supposes that his fellow Stoics would (and should) choose the first potion. That is, a Stoic would prefer to be a human being without phre¯n, without his sense (that is: to be aphrosyne¯), than to be a donkey with a prudent mind. This fragment is presented by Plutarch in his essay Against the Stoics on Common Conceptions (Mor. 1064a– b). For Plutarch, it is contradictory that the Stoics would choose the fate of a foolish human being because for the Stoics phrone¯sis and eudaimonia were identical. Furthermore, Plutarch understands the experiment also to be a choice between a beautiful and an ugly body: the Stoics prefer the human body to the ‘ugly’ (dysmorphos) body of a donkey – which is contradictory in Plutarch’s view, because for the Stoics beauty belongs to the adiaphora, to the class of unimportant things, which are not good or bad as such, but simply irrelevant. While presenting this passage, Plutarch clearly gives the impression that he himself thinks, too, that the body of a donkey is dysmorphos. In his Gryllus, however, the pig Gryllus definitely refuses to change back to human form. The starting point of the dialogue is the question of whether men, whom Circe has metamorphosed into donkeys, pigs and predators, will be willing to become humans again. Gryllus is thus a Greek man, whom Circe has transformed into a pig. He has easily adjusted to the life of a pig and found it better than human life. He has his simple pleasure and

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natural virtues; Gryllus prefers, for instance, resting in mud to fine robes (Mor. 989f). Obviously his life in the care of Circe is quite unusual for a normal pig, but here hovers again Greek cultural pessimism and criticism, the idea of the civilised man as most miserable of all creatures.90 But still, was the human body an ideal for Plutarch also, so that all the other bodies of living beings were viewed as failing this norm and therefore considered deformities (dysphormos)? As shown in Part I, the human body is the universal norm for us humans – this is inevitable for us as embodied beings. Therefore, for instance, the long ears of donkeys seem ridiculously long compared with our ears, and primates, such as apes and monkeys, with their ‘human-like’ features are often seen as ‘ugly’ – that is, failing the human norm. Aristotle’s discussion of animal bodies as nano¯de¯s (‘dwarfish’) in the Parts of Animals also sees animal bodies as misshapen, although, as Catherine Osborne has shown, the expression nano¯de¯s was connected to his ideas about the unique upright posture of humans. In Aristotle’s view, the horizontal position of quadrupeds was a consequence of the large size of the upper part of their trunk (PA 686b3 – 29).91 However, and as evidence of the different points of view he takes in his different works, Aristotle could also speak about the functional beauty of all living beings in his Physics.92 Another aspect of attitudes to animal bodies is the divine power of Greek gods to transform themselves into any form, including into animals. In the Iliad, Athena and Apollo are said to take on only the likeness of vultures (ὄrnisin ἐoikόt16 aἰgypioῖsi, Il. 7.59), which suggests that the gods only appear to humans as birds, and actual metamorphosis does not happen. Nevertheless, the divine pair is said to be ‘perching’ on an oak sacred to Zeus and ‘taking pleasure in the sight of men’ (Il. 7.57– 60).93 As scavenger birds, these two gods may have been associated with the gods’ indifference to human suffering, despite their deep involvement in the war – moreover, for vultures, an oak beside a battle-field is a good observation post on which to await a meal.94 That the gods can take the form of ‘negative’ animals (although vultures were also auspicious birds) suggests that an animal body was

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not considered a deformity as such. In Lucian’s satire in the collection Dialogues of Sea-Gods (15.2), the West and South Winds discuss what Zeus looked like when he transformed himself into a bull to woo Europa. Zeus looked splendid (kallistos): spotless white skin, with nice crumpled horns, and gentle (he¯mera) eyes. He gambolled on the shore bellowing most nicely (he¯diston). Despite the satirical tone, the passage express the idea that the Greek gods stay beautiful – and keep their dignity – in their metamorphoses, so that an animal body is not a disgrace for them.

Summary How did the Greek experience of animals differ from ours? The focus of Part III was on descriptions of interactions between human and non-human animals: there were many instances in which humans talked to domesticated and sometimes even wild animals, but few descriptions of eye contact with animals (a common topos in vase paintings). Even though the literary Greeks did not say much about the close observation of animals, training manuals, such as Xenophon’s On Horse Breeding, show a high level of familiarity with animal psychology. There were many terms for taming or domesticating animals, their semantics ranging from breaking in animals to making animals friendlier to humans, as well as ‘refined’. Closeness with domestic animals is presented in the Odyssey by three different kinds of caretaking: with pigs, goats and sheep, as well as with wild animals, in this case, seals. Yet there is no elaborate depiction of the caretaking of pet animals. Thus, there is a kind of erasure of loving and respectful descriptions of animals qua animals in Greek literature. Naturally, some animals were respected as sacred to certain gods. Allegorical explanations, which often eclipse the animal itself in the retellings of transformation stories, were popular among Greek intellectuals. Yet, the Greeks also pondered what it is like to be another animal than man. Some animals might signify evil and arouse dislike or distaste, but the negative term ‘predatory’ (the¯rio¯de¯s), used by Plato and Aristotle, could also refer to human. If metamorphosis into an

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animal or natural force were thought to be the gods’ privilege and pleasure, for a Greek man becoming an animal would have been more or less a disgrace – or becoming a woman or non-Greek for that matter. Still, those who were disappointed with humankind might perhaps choose or play with the idea of the life of some noble or civilised animal. However, the psychology or skills of at least some species – for instance, birds or bees – was seen as something basically akin to humans, which meant that analogies could be seen between the behaviour and acts of these species, such as humans and birds as builders of housing. Furthermore, the physical and psychological similarities seen between human and other animals made it easier to create animal metaphors and animal similes.

PART IV CASE STUDIES

Animal Similes in the Iliad The cattle are in panic: it is midnight, and a lion is attacking in the darkness. All except one manage to escape. This description is not the synopsis of a natural documentary film, but a Homeric simile, occurring in Book 11 of the Iliad, which is devoted to Agamemnon’s excellence in fighting: [. . .] [M]any were still fleeing in panic over the mid-plain, like cattle / stampeded by a lion that has come on them in the dead of the night; / the rest have scattered, and one alone faces sheer death, and / first the lion seizes the neck in its powerful jaws and breaks it, / and then greedily gulps down its blood and all its entrails. / So lord Agamemnon, son of Atreus, pursued the Trojans, / all the time killing the hindmost; and they fell in panic. (Il. 11.172– 8).1 The function of this simile is to serve the characterisation of Agamemnon and his action on the one hand, but also to fulfil some specific narrative functions, which similes in general have, on the other.2 Modern readers may see here a battle for existence, the survival of the fittest, and the description of the way the lion kills may appear to be a moral condemnation of Agamemnon’s conduct (it is ‘bestial’, that is, brutal and crude). However, this restricted picture

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also focuses for a brief moment on that nameless one to whom only ‘sheer death’ (aἰpὺ6 ὄl1uro6) appears, as if underlining the uniqueness of death for each living being. From the point of view of the flock, sacrificing one individual means that all the others will survive (for a while at least); from the point of view of that individual animal, it is its own death, which makes that individual specific, on the focus. Like Iliadic warriors, this unspecified animal is part of the group, and becomes visible only by its death, although even then its individual features are not alluded to. There are, however, other similes, in which the animal victim receives more characterisation, and, as it were, evolves into a character in the simile, sometimes gaining a position which also displays its point of view. Because Agamemnon kills the hindmost warrior (11.178), may we conclude that the lion is also doing the same – catching the last, that is, the weakest cow (or heifer), due to its sickness or age? Moreover, after the simile, the main narrative continues: ‘many men fell from their chariots, head-first or on to their backs’ (11.179). May we imagine the clamour among the cattle of the simile as they too fall headfirst and are trampled upon? How far and long does the image of the simile last? Homeric animal similes are a literary technique for comparing human actions to the animal world. The focus is on what happens to humans, and the animal world is the setting to which it is compared. Greek vase paintings, too, have their visible similes, where, for instance, the same vase contains two hunting scenes: one in which men and dogs are hunting wild animals and another in which wild predators are hunting their animal prey.3 But on round vases which scene is compared with which? Which one is the primary scene? The aim of this section is to focus on the point of view of animals in the animal similes of the Iliad and how similes invite readers to empathise with animals. Special Functions of Animal Simile According to John Heath, ‘one of the most notable features of the Homeric epics is the frequent comparison of humans to animals’.4 This claim seems fairly open to disagreement from sheer quantitative

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measurements,5 but it is also understandable why it is made. As has often been noted, the number of animal similes in the two Homeric epics is not even: in the Iliad, well over half of the similes have animals as their subjects, whereas the proportion in the Odyssey is less than a third.6 Animal similes are the most pervasive group in the Iliad and can roughly be divided into those in which the context is hunting and herding and those in which wild animals are among themselves. Furthermore, there are similes in which the subject matter is the weather, oceans and other natural phenomena, including scenery, and those which handle distinctively humans and human culture (crafts and family matters, e.g., a mother and her little daughter 16.7– 10).7 However, perhaps more than any other kind of similes, animal similes would seem to ‘radiate to their surroundings’ to use Irene De Jong’s phrase.8 The prevalence of animal similes becomes more evident in strings of similes, which can feature different animals (Book 22) or the same animal, a lion (in Books 5 and 17), in the rapidly successive animal similes, the latter case (Book 17) even creating the sense that it is the same, individual lion. Moreover, there are some stock animal similes, such as ‘marauding animal’ similes, whose repetitiveness may make them seem more pervasive. In the Iliad, animals are pictured as part of the nets of relationships between humans, as Helmut Rahn has emphasised, but also as ‘actors in their own right’, as Steven Lonsdale puts it;9 that is, animals are not seen only from the point of view of their relationship with humans but as living their own life apart from humans. Of course, their existence and activities have to reflect or be comparable in some of their parts or aspects with human life in order that they can function as similes in the first place. This is also the case for natural phenomena and plants – comparing young warriors to strong trees is one of the stock similes. However, although the Iliad contains, despite its basic ‘realism’, the personification of the river Scamandrus/ Xanthus (Book 21), it is convenient to differentiate animal similes from the (other) natural world similes because Homeric animals differ from, say, a tree or thunder, due to their having uymό6 (‘mind’) as humans also do.10

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Animals in the animal similes of the Iliad include predators and other wild animals (lions, boars, deer, panthers, jackals, fish, birds, snakes, hares, wasps, locusts, worms, bees, flies, cicadas, dolphins and an unidentified predator or wild animal, uήr) and domestic animals (sheep, goats, cattle, horses, mules and donkeys). The most prevalent animal similes are hunting similes, which include 1) humans hunting predators or timid prey and 2) predator animals hunting wild animals, or cattle and flocks owned by humans (‘marauding’ animal similes).11 Animals occur, of course, not only in the similes but also in the main narrative of the epics – in the Iliad horses are found mostly in the battle scenes, dogs are mentioned in passing as part of everyday Trojan life, and sacrificial and divinatory animals (birds, snakes) occur in omens.12 Because its main thematic context is the war, the Iliad does not contain elaborate descriptions of domestic animals at agricultural work – except in the description of Achilleus’ shield (18.483–608, especially 573–89). In rare cases, working animals do the same activity in a simile as elsewhere in the narrative. The simile in which the two Ajaxes carry Patroclus’ body like mules carry a log (17.742–45) would seem to prefigure the scene where trees are cut and logs are put on the back of mules for Patroclus’ funeral pyre (23.110–26).13 Susan Saı¨d notes that there is a kind of inverse proportion in the Homeric epics when comparing the animals in the similes with the animals in the narrative. For instance, horses are pervasive in the Iliadic narrative, but there are only a few horse similes; in the Odyssey sheep, oxen and pigs are numerous in the narrative, but they are missing from the similes.14 However, which animals the poets generally choose for their similes (or for their metaphors) depend of course on the point of the comparison being made and on how animals are typically viewed in their culture.15 Animal similes are not dispersed evenly in the Iliad. In all, similes – all kinds of similes – occur ‘during descriptions of general battle movement, and when a hero enters or leaves a battle, or has a success or a disaster’, as Mark H. Edwards notes.16 More than fivesixths of the animal similes in the Iliad occur in battle narratives.17 The largest number of animal similes, 16, occurs in Book 17, which

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depicts the battle over Patroclus’ body.18 The first animal simile occurs in Book 2 (troops of soldiers are compared to bees, 2.86 – 90), but Book 1 contains a rare instance of a genuine animal metaphor in the Iliad: Achilleus attacks Agamemnon for his lack of courage, calling him a drunkard ‘with the eyes of dog and the heart of a deer’ (1.225). Book 23, also, is nearly devoid of animal similes, but it contains many references to horses in the horse race (23.259– 650) as part of the funerary games in honour of Patroclus and even an empathetic description of the death of a dove as the target of an archery contest (23.853– 81).19 The scarcity of animal similes in some books has been explained by the markedly non-violent and, therefore, ‘civilised’ subject matter of these books or by the lack of action in them.20 The number of animal similes in the Iliad is around 120. As well as extended, ‘proper’ animal similes, this number also includes a) simple or short similes and b) those where animals have a merely subsidiary role. However, a) the simple animal simile in the form ‘like X’ without any qualifications is rare in the Iliad.21 Usually there is some kind of qualification. ‘Achilleus sprang like a lion’ (24.572) characterises Achilleus’ swiftness, but the simple simile may remind the audience of other, more elaborate lion similes where the lion is characterised in more detail. Animals may have b) a merely subsidiary role in the simile, like flies in the milk-pots (16.641 –44), or the cattle over which the shepherd throws his javelin (23.845–6), or fish in a simile in which a man pulls a fish out of the sea (16.405– 10).22 The animal’s activity may have a subsidiary role in a simile, too. For instance, animal similes which reflect the leadership of generals usually focus on the behaviour or movement of a group of animals – the troop obey its commander like a herd of animals, especially sheep, obey their leader.23 Thus, the behaviour of herd animals is secondary in the simile, where generals are said to master their men with the same kind of facility as goatherders separate their flocks (2.474–76). The interest is in the activity of the goatherder, not in the goats, which are here like mere things to be separated. Furthermore, the point of attention in stock similes – for instance, marauding lion similes – can vary. The linguistic subject of the

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simile may be the lion, but the point of comparison (that is, tenor) is the whole situation or one of its aspects. For instance, the sleepless night watch in the Achaean camp after all the day has been spent fighting is enhanced by the stock simile of a marauding lion, although in this case it is an unnamed predator (uήr): it causes a sleepless night to dogs and men, who try to defend the cattle (10.183–87).24 The objects of comparison are the situation in the Achaean camp and the situation in the cowshed depicted in the simile. Critics in Antiquity were already puzzled over how warriors could be compared both to heroic and to non-heroic animals, as Ajax is when compared to a lion and then to a donkey in successive similes (11.546– 57, 11.558 –65). A donkey might seem to be a humble animal, unsuitable for a heroic epic. Porphyry, a Neoplatonist, explained the matching of these two similes by their suitability for two totally different aspects of the same situation: ‘Ajax kills like a lion and withdraws from the enemy like a donkey.’25 Modern narratologists see these two similes as working together inasmuch as neither of them alone is capable of expressing the complete situation.26 There is, however, a difference in how the animals are pictured in these similes: the lion is the obvious agent and the main actor of the simile; the donkey is seen more from the point of view of the boys who are beating it in order to drive it away from the cornfield. However, the donkey is also an actor in its own right: it manages to eat its stomach full before it has to leave the cornfield. Its stubbornness reflects the way Ajax retreats: he manages to get ‘his stomach full’ of killing before leaving the battle scene. Some animal similes refer only to the animal’s movement, but often in a way in which the animal’s agency is somehow acknowledged. Achilleus swoops away like a black eagle, ‘both the strongest and the swiftest of winged creatures’ (21.251 – 3). Automedon, for his part, makes his chariot pulled by Achilleus’ immortal horses swoop through the Trojan troop with ease, like a vulture through geese (17.460– 1). The chariot of two horses thus forms a moving unity, which is compared to a flying vulture. Animal similes may also refer to a simple detail: Automedon’s feet and hands are blood-stained in the same way a lion is blood-stained after eating

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a bull (17.541– 42). These references to the way an animal moves or eats relate to its whole body, to the body of a living being which has autonomous agency. Hence animal similes present animals as embodied beings, although description of their embodiment is often scanty. The references to the body both appeal to and make demands on the reader’s imagination. Naturally, the richer the image the reader has of a swooping eagle in her mind, the stronger is her picture of Achilleus’ movement. Sometimes the picture is ambiguous due to its very sketchiness. The dead Harpalion is stretched out on the ground like a worm (skώlhj, 13.654– 5) – but what kind of worm? The picture is probably based on everyday observation: a dying worm is contorted, but when dead it is stretched out.27 On the whole, the worm suggests associations with a body that is worn out, feeble, unprotected. The reader relates to the worm’s vulnerable body now stretched out on the ground. Herman Fra¨nkel has pointed out that extended similes are kinds of independent poetic images which often bring the reader to ‘another world’.28 Extended similes thus create a possible imaginative or simulated universe beside the main war narrative – a presence, as Edgbert J. Bakker calls it.29 But animal activities in the Iliadic animal similes are limited. There are wounded and parenting animals, but not, for instance, copulating animals, sick or old animals, animals giving birth, mammals breastfeeding their offspring nor herbivore animals in a time of drought. The following division of the Iliadic animal similes is based on animals in their living environment and in contact with humans (categories sometimes overlap): A. OUTSIDE THE HUMAN DOMAIN (often in the mountainous wilderness): (1) Animals (mammals, birds, fish) living in their natural environment by themselves: 1 a. parenting animals, animals defending their nests; 1 b. herd behaviour; 1 c. predators fighting against each other; 1 d. predators and their prey;

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1 e. other cases.30 (2) Humans hunting wild animals (boars, hares, hinds, predators): 2 a. focus on dogs and the predator; 2 b. focus on dogs and the prey. B. IN BETWEEN THE HUMAN AND NON-HUMAN DOMAIN: (3) Predators (lions, leopards, jackals) hunting domestic animals in pastures and in cow/sheep sheds. (4) Humans and non-domestic animals in the natural environment.31 C. IN THE HUMAN DOMAIN: (5) Domestic animals: 5 a. herd behaviour; 5 b. at work; 5 c. as sacrificial animals. Animals which live outside the human domain (A) or between the wilderness and the human domain (B) are the most prevalent in the Iliadic similes. The ‘in between’ is the place outside the human dominated world but not completely outside the human domain – such as pastures, farmyards, or roads and paths through the wilderness. ‘In between’ is thus the place where wild animals and humans may encounter one another, but they can meet in each other’s domain as well: the wild animals may venture into the human world in order to hunt domestic animals (cattle, sheep) from farmyards, or humans may venture into the wilds because of their travels or in order to hunt wild animals, both predators and herbivores (but not birds).32 Overall, similes create places where humans and non-human animals literally or figuratively meet. They serve as a fictive place where it is possible to compare similarities but also acknowledge differences. Sympathetic Attitudes As said, both predator’s and prey’s viewpoints can be present in an animal simile.33 In all, the story of the Iliad has been praised for its impartiality. The shift of focus transfers from one party to another,

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concentrating not only on the points of view of the Trojans and the Achaeans, but also on different factions inside one camp (viz. Achilleus vs. Agamemnon), and on both humans and the gods. Homeric focalisation not only places someone or something in the limelight but also gives him, her or it a chance to voice their case.34 Of course, the shift of focus or viewpoint does not automatically mean that the reader/audience feels sympathy with the side which is in focus. But if the character is described at least with some kind of embodiment, the reader is invited to empathise with that character. In one of the battle scenes the Trojans are fighting, but they are not winning until Hector joins the battle; the simile pictures a complicated hunting scene (countrymen with their dogs failing to catch the prey are compared to the successful hunter, a lion), which functions as a reference to the Trojans and Hector as the less and the more successful warriors (15.271 – 80). Although the emphasis is on hunters, human and animal alike, the focus shifts briefly also to the prey – which is described only loosely: it is either a stag or a (wild) goat. Through this briefly elaborated shift of focus, we have a glimpse of the prey’s escape under the rock or in the shadow of a wood. From the point of view of the hunters, the prey is getting away, but the point of view is shifted to the hunted creature, which is said to make, temporarily or not, an escape.35 There is often a marked positive attitude to an individual animal or animals, although, of course, these are matters of interpretation. Take, for example, one of the two wasp similes, 16.259 –66: aὐtίka dὲ swήk1ssin ἐoikόt16 ἐj1xέonto 1ἰnodίoi6, oὓ6 paῖd16 ἐridmaίnvsin ἔuont16 aἰ1ὶ k1rtomέont16 ὁdῷ ἔpi oἰkί’ ἔxonta6 nhpίaxoi· jynὸn dὲ kakὸn polέ1ssi tiu1ῖsi. toὺ6 d’ 1ἴ p1r parά tί6 t1 kiὼn ἄnurvpo6 ὁdίth6 kinήsῃ ἀέkvn, oἳ d’ ἄlkimon ἦtor ἔxont16 prόssv pᾶ6 pέt1tai kaὶ ἀmύn1i oἷsi tέk1ssi. tῶn tόt1 Myrmidόn16 kradίhn kaὶ uymὸn ἔxont16

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They came pouring out like wasps at a road’s side, / whom boys love to provoke, forever in their childish folly / tormenting them in their nests beside the way; / and so they make a common nuisance for many people, / and if some traveller passing that way unwittingly /stirs them up, they fly out with courage in their hearts, / one and all, and do battle on their young one’s behalf. / With hearts and spirits like theirs the Myrmidons then / poured out from the ships. The simile begins as a stock insect simile, noting the similarity between a swarm of insects and that of a troop of soldiers (cf. bees: 2.86 – 90, flies: 2.469 – 71). As it continues, it describes the revenging mood of the Myrmidons whom Patroclus is leading into the battle – revenging because the Trojans have set their ships on fire. The picture of wasps explains all this, but it is at the same time sympathetic to these insects guarding their offspring.36 Besides, wasps are pictured here as basically harmless to humans. The reason for their future dangerousness to passersby is explained: some insensitive boys like to provoke, irritate (ἐridmaίn1in) or even torment (k1rtom1ῖsuai) them. Another aspect of wasps, namely the defence of their offspring, is developed more – and in more humanising terms – in the other wasp simile (12.166 – 70). However, in another simile concerning insects, namely the locusts (21.12– 16),37 the sympathetic attitude intended by the poet is not so obvious. Before the simile begins, there is a five-line description of the Trojans falling ‘with a great noise’ into the Xanthus river, where they are whirled about the eddies: ἔnn1on ἔnua kaὶ ἔnua ἑlissόm1noi p1rὶ dίna6. ὡ6 d’ ὅu’ ὑpὸ ῥipῆ6 pyrὸ6 ἀkrίd16 ἠ1rέuontai w1ygέm1nai potamόnd1, tὸ dὲ wlέg1i ἀkάmaton pῦr ὄrm1non ἐjaίwnh6, taὶ dὲ ptώssoysi kau’ ὕdvr· ὣ6 ὑp’ Ἀxillῆo6 Jάnuoy bauydinή1nto6 15 plῆto ῥόo6 k1lάdvn ἐpimὶj ἵppvn t1 kaὶ ἀndrῶn.

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[. . .] [T]hey swam this way and that, whirled about by the eddies. / As when locusts rise fluttering and flee towards a river, / driven by a blast of untiring fire that has suddenly leapt up / in a blaze, and then huddle together in the water, / so at Achilleus’ onslaught the stream of deep-swirling Xanthus / was filled with a confused clamour of horses and men. Thus, in this simile, Achilleus is like a fire which drives locusts into the river, as he is driving the Trojan soldiers and their horses into the river Xanthus, where many of them drown. According to the ancient scholiast’s note, there was a practice in Cyprus of driving out locusts from the crop by fire.38 Nomadic swarms of a certain genus of locusts can do great damage to crops. However, when the Trojans are compared to the locusts, the fate of the Trojans may cast a sympathetic light on the locusts, the cropharming pest, also whirling helplessly in the river. In any case, the focus is on the locusts, which first flee and then huddle together in the river. The auditory image – the whirling river Xanthus, the Trojan soldiers and their horses – may seem to be in contrast with the noiseless, silent drowning of the locusts. However, both the tiny bodies of the insects and the large bodies of men and even horses are defenceless against the force of that mighty, divine river. But is this seeing the locusts in an anthropomorphic, humanising light? Humanising Animals in Animal Similes Some critics read animals in Homeric animal similes as heavily humanised. Heath, for instance, speaks about the anthropomorphic vocabulary of animal similes, calling such animals ‘zoological doubles’.39 Lonsdale alludes to animals in the animal similes as ‘hybrids’ (animals with human traits) in his study of hunting and herding similes in the Iliad. He lists the humanised emotive states which are attributed to hunting and prey animals among the general phraseology of the lion similes.40 Furthermore, although Heath’s brief survey of anthropomorphic vocabulary – that is, the same words (e.g. tέkna ‘children’) used both of humans and non-human

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animals – is creditable, it obviously seems to explain the notable independent agency of animals.41 The animals seem to be actors in their own right because they are humanised by the poet of the Iliad. Yet questions arise as to whether the poet humanised animals in the first place and, if so, whether he did it for the sake of his poetics. Ancient and later critics, such as Eustathius in the twelfth century, noticed the many functions pertaining to the narrative which the similes in general have: as decorations, as a means of amplifying of the narrative, and as means of heightening the emotional intensity of the passage in question. Modern critics have also explored similes as functional parts of the narrative.42 But the consequence of this line of thought is that similes as a poetic technique to enhance the main narrative are seen to create an artificial similarity between humans and non-humans. If animal similes exist only for the sake of the main narrative, they are of course more prone to be manipulated for the rhetorical purposes of the main narrative, which focuses on humans. So, the poetic technique which bridges the simile and the main narrative causes the vocabulary of the main narrative to affect the vocabulary of the simile and may, therefore, affect the possible humanising of animals in similes. However, calling hind’s fawns ‘children’ (tέkna, 11.113), for instance, may be seen as mere extended usage in a specific situation (if not for metrical reasons). For instance, even modern hunters and owners of pets are prone to de-emphasise the boundaries between humans and non-humans. The Greeks could use the same expressions for both humans and animals in certain contexts without attributing any other remarkably specific human qualities to animals. Furthermore, the Iliadic ‘humanising’ vocabulary may be an indicator of archaic or archaising language use, where the human-animal divide was indeterminate. Besides, as was argued in Part I, some degree of humanisation cannot be avoided due to the fact that animals’ experience is depicted by human words. Lonsdale notices the apt way the elaborate mountain lion simile is connected to the narrative in the scene of the teichomachia, where Sarpedon is trying to mount the Achaean wall. Sarpedon is compared to a lion, which attempts the nearly impossible task of

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attacking a strongly built shepherd hut in order to get at the sheep (12.299 – 308): bῆ ῥ’ ἴm1n ὥ6 t1 lέvn ὀr1sίtrowo6, ὅ6 t’ ἐpid1yὴ6 dhrὸn ἔῃ kr1iῶn, kέl1tai dέ ἑ uymὸ6 ἀgήnvr 300 mήlvn p1irήsonta kaὶ ἐ6 pykinὸn dόmon ἐlu1ῖn· 1ἴ p1r gάr x’ 1ὕrῃsi par’ aὐtόwi bώtora6 ἄndra6 sὺn kysὶ kaὶ doύr1ssi wylάssonta6 p1rὶ mῆla, oὔ ῥά t’ ἀp1ίrhto6 mέmon1 staumoῖo dί1suai, ἀll’ ὅ g’ ἄr’ ἢ ἥrpaj1 m1tάlm1no6, ἠὲ kaὶ aὐtὸ6 305 ἔblht’ ἐn prώtoisi uoῆ6 ἀpὸ x1irὸ6 ἄkonti. ὥ6 ῥa tόt’ ἀntίu1on Sarphdόna uymὸ6 ἀnῆk1 t1ῖxo6 ἐpaΐjai diά t1 ῥήjasuai ἐpάlj1i6. Sarpedon set out like a mountain-nurtured lion that has been / a long time without meat, and its noble spirit drives it on to / attack a strongly built farmyard and go after the sheep there; / and even if it finds herdsmen in that very place, / keeping watch over their flocks with dogs and spears, / it refuses to be driven from the sheepfold before attacking it, / and either pounces on a sheep and drags it away, or is itself / struck down in its onslaught by a spear from a quick hand. / So now godlike Sarpedon’s spirit impelled him to / make a rush at the wall and break through its battlements. According to Lonsdale, this lion simile serves to describe ‘the fate of the courageous warrior (Sarpedon) risking attack’ and explores the ‘motives and intentions of the lion’ by giving it ‘anthropomorphic motivation’, which gives us ‘a lion with a manly spirit, a reasoning mind, and indomitable courage [. . .] a hybrid lion’.43 However, it seems that Lonsdale attaches too many human and not enough leonine qualities to this lion. As mentioned earlier, Homeric animals are attributed uymό6 – one of the words used to denote mind – which exercises control over their actions.44 It is even possible to speak of the thumos of a wasp (see above, 16.266) or a fly, the daring of a fly, which persistently comes back to bite despite being

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continuously brushed away (17.656– 64).45 Thumos in a living being may thus be something which forces individuals to exceed themselves in a supreme dangerous situation – like the lion in this simile and Sarpedon in the main narrative. Furthermore, it is clear that the lion’s basic motivation is just a physical need, hunger (12.299–300). Lonsdale acknowledges this by claiming that ‘for the warrior, the desire for glory is as much a motivating appetite as animal flesh is for the lion’46 – but why equate these qualitatively very different desires? The lion in the simile has been ‘a long time without meat’ (krέa, 12.300), and his need for nourishment is natural.47 Extremely hungry human beings would act in accordance with their hunger too and eat even human flesh, whereas lions always seek animal flesh when they are hungry because they are carnivorous. A couple of lines later, Sarpedon incites Glaucus to battle by alluding to their position: both belong to the best families in Lycia, having ‘the best seats and cuts of meat’ (krέa, 12.311). Thus in this passage (12.300– 11) the word krέa48 is used both of the raw meat eaten by a lion and the cooked meat eaten by humans.49 Both Sarpedon and the lion have thumos, both are meat eaters and both are in a very dangerous situation, to which they react in the same manner: not retreating but proceeding. Their situation and their danger are comparable, but man’s appetite for glory expresses the need to be respected and the need for self-esteem, while the lion’s appetite for meat is based on a physiological need, extreme hunger, which incites the lion to do its utmost to survive. For Lonsdale, Homeric lion similes have a specific function: they incite the warrior to act like a predator in a dangerous situation: ‘to exhort a warrior to attack like the beast’, as he puts it.50 This is not, of course, always the case, but the main criticism against this kind of interpretation and language (‘Achilleus’ metaphorical debasement in the animal world’51) is that it is doubtful whether the poet of the Iliad was that blind to the differences between the actions and activities of human warriors and of lions. To be a good warrior in the Homeric sense one did not need to act like a ‘beast’ – or become a beast in a degenerate way. What was needed was to act like an ideal warrior whose actions were reminiscent of some actions or aspects of

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some animals in certain situations. Using the same terms for both man and animal – both have thumos, both eat krea – makes the comparison more plausible. But the poet is not underlining here that lions are raw meat eaters, ὠmowάgoi (as in 5.782, 7.256, 15.592).52 The similarity between the human warrior Sarpedon and the predatory lion may seem artificial and contrived because it emphasises the similarities rather than the differences between them. But that is what similes do: they point to the similarities, the likenesses. Sarpedon in his situation is in certain respects like a certain lion in a certain situation. Furthermore, the poet gives us the situation from the point of view of the lion. As was shown in Part I, the basis of this shift of view is our ability to transgress, up to a point, the limits of human embodiment through empathy with animals. Empathy enables us to go beyond the most obvious dissimilarities between animal others and ourselves, and it is one of the preconditions of compassion for these others, too. We have one animal simile which seems to take notice of the fact that seeing similarities between humans and non-humans is an everyday experience – not only for the poetic mind, but for every human being. While looking down with Helen on the troops of the Achaeans from the walls of Troy, Priam likens Odysseus to a ram (3.193– 8). The simile is typical (that is, a stock simile) comparing the relationship between the ruler and the ruled with the leader animal and the herd.53 However, in this case Priam gradually enlarges the simile: ‘but he [Odysseus] is prowling along the ranks of men like a ram (ktίlo6); / I would liken (ἐίsk1in) him to a thickfleeced ram (ἀrn1iό6) / that roams in and out of a huge flock of white sheep.’ When Priam says that he would liken Odysseus to a certain kind of ram, he implies that it would be possible to liken Odysseus to many other things or other kinds of rams.54 Priam’s simile occurs inside his speech and is not part of the narrative proper. This makes the simile an example of the fact that people use similes in their everyday speech. However, as Carroll Moulton has noticed, there are not very many similes in Homeric speeches, and they are, in general, short. Only Achilleus utters extended and unique, rather than stock, similes. Moulton sees this as

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a deliberate characterisation of the main hero.55 It is a token of Achilleus’ associative way of thinking. Humanising animals usually also means attaching human emotions to them. The emotional state of animals may be described in animal similes – sometimes by one word only. In Book 2, the troops of warriors on each side are compared to different kinds of herds of animals, also to flights of geese, cranes and swans, in an auditory simile (2.459 – 66), where the birds settle with a clamour and the meadows resound with their calls. The flocks of birds are said to be exulting in their wings (ἀgallόm1na pt1rύg1ssi, 2.462). As was showed in Part I, it is not a projection in the first place that lets us speak about animals’ emotions, such as birds here showing or feeling elation at their wings or at their ability to fly. It is more than natural to us to see wild animals as rejoicing, because we are accustomed to read the body language not only of our own species but also of other species. We may never be absolutely sure whether geese are ‘really’ rejoicing (that is, rejoicing as we rejoice), but they appear to us to rejoice. The poet of the Iliad, in any case, gives us this picture. However, in one specific animal simile, the intentionality of an animal is described in a way that may appear dubious from the viewpoint of current zoological knowledge. The simile describes Achilleus’ grief after he finds out that Patroclus has been killed (18.316– 23): toῖsi dὲ Phl1ΐdh6 ἁdinoῦ ἐjῆrx1 gόoio x1ῖra6 ἐp’ ἀndrowόnoy6 uέm1no6 stήu1ssin ἑtaίroy pyknὰ mάla st1nάxvn ὥ6 t1 lὶ6 ἠϋgέn1io6, ᾧ ῥά u’ ὑpὸ skύmnoy6 ἐlawhbόlo6 ἁrpάsῃ ἀnὴr ὕlh6 ἐk pykinῆ6· ὃ dέ t’ ἄxnytai ὕst1ro6 ἐluώn, 320 pollὰ dέ t’ ἄgk1’ ἐpῆlu1 m1t’ ἀnέro6 ἴxni’ ἐr1ynῶn, 1ἴ pou1n ἐj1ύroi· mάla gὰr drimὺ6 xόlo6 aἱr1ῖ· ὣ6 ὃ barὺ st1nάxvn m1t1wώn11 Myrmidόn1ssin· Among them the son of Peleus began the unbroken lament, / laying his man-slaying hands on his companion’s chest, /

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groaning loud and long like some thickly bearded lion / whose cubs a hunter of deer has secretly stolen away / in a dense wood; it returns too late and is struck by grief, / and ranges up and down the glens, tracking the man’s trail, / hoping to find him, because bitter anger has gripped it – / so Achilleus, groaning heavily, addressed the Myrmidons: [. . .] The simile is, in fact, comparing only Achilleus’ groaning with the groaning of a lioness, whose pair of cubs is stolen by a human hunter. But the lioness is automatically paired with Achilleus as well as the lion cubs with Patroclus56 and the hunter with Hector.57 Besides Achilleus’ grief, we get a description of an animal gripped by the loss of her offspring. The simile convincingly describes a mammal – a she-lion despite its beard58 – in grief, but the idea of a lion tracking the human hunter deliberately may raise questions of un-leonine behaviour. The ‘story’ of the simile, however, anticipates Achilleus’ angry address in which he vows to take revenge on Hector for Patroclus’ death (18.334– 5). Modern readers may wonder whether the human-like feelings and volitions attributed to the lion have their source in the comparison between Achilleus and the lion, or whether the poet, in fact, thinks (together with his archaic audience) that this kind of behaviour is possible for lions. In conclusion, animal similes need to be studied very carefully before it is claimed that they include humanising aspects. What Does the Animal Mean? Michael Clarke notes that although animal similes as a literary device in modern European tradition are usually seen as pretty simple and easily accountable devices, not as ‘expressions of deep ideas’, this is not the case with Homeric animal similes. The reason for this, according to Clarke, is that Homer’s animal similes evoked the heroic age for the audience. They portrayed and made explicit the ethical and psychological problems of heroism.59 This is especially plausible because animal similes often occur in the battle narratives. But what about animals themselves – do they merely have instrumental value in the simile? Naturally a simile is a

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comparison in which two objects have something in common; one of them is the tenor, the primary object (Achilleus’ situation), while the other (the lion’s situation) is the ‘vehicle’, the secondary object, in the sense that it basically clarifies the situation of the primary object. The vehicle, an instrument, through its attributes clarifies and gives nuances to the tenor. But there are, in fact, some similes where animals or their activities or movements are the objects of comparison, the tenor. In one instance an animal is compared to an inanimate thing: Zeus sends an eagle as an omen, and the eagle’s long wings are compared to a broad, solid door (24.315– 8).60 This simile resembles a metaphor in its scarcity of details. The same is true when animals are compared to other animals: the running of Admetus’ horses is compared to the flight of birds (2.763– 4), and Hector’s horses are compared to hawks (13.819).61 In some similes, the gods are compared to an animal or animals. A weeping Athena flees to Zeus on account of Hera’s beating like a pigeon flying from a hawk’s pursuit into the hollow of a rock (21.493– 5). This is slightly different from other much-debated comparisons, where gods are as if transformed into birds.62 Furthermore, Apollo is compared to an unspecified predatory animal (uήr). Apollo encourages Hector to join him in battle, and the god and the mortal are likened to two roaring, wild predators, which cause cows and flocks of sheep to panic (15.323–5). There is only one case where a human activity functions as a vehicle to an animal’s activity.63 The example is in Book 5, where Hera is majestically travelling back to Olympus and her divine horses are described as running and leaping in the air in great stretches – comparable to a man’s vision, which reaches great distances (5.767– 72). The man in question may be a shepherd in the mountain looking far away beyond the horizon.64 Thus we have here both Hera’s horses galloping in the sky and a lonely man watching the horizon. His activity is a mere ‘vehicle’ for horses’ activity, but the vehicle part of the simile is also an independent and impressive vignette. The reader is, as it were, in two places: riding with Hera in the sky and watching the horizon with the shepherd. But this kind of double-perspective may occur as well in those similes where animals are ‘mere’ vehicles.

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Thus, many animal similes create such strong and impressive metanarratives and side-stories that the merely instrumental quality of animals in any simile may be questioned. Furthermore, the ‘meanderings’ of similes – the Homeric love of details – make the comparison logically quite incomprehensible in terms of all the details of the simile. An animal simile may begin with a clear comparison between its tenor and vehicle but then dip further into the vehicle’s world – into the animal’s world; therefore the vehicle loses its original instrumental function as the clarifier of the tenor. The poetic function of animals in animal similes cannot thus be viewed only as clarifying the situation of the tenor. As the ‘story’ of an extended, meandering simile moves along, freeing the simile from strict correspondence with the main narrative, the secondary object (animal) becomes the subject of the simile in more than one sense: the animal is not only the linguistic subject but the subject matter of the story of the simile. However, many short animal similes seem at first glance to be genuinely instrumental from the point of view of animals. Take, for instance, three animal similes, which all may or may not refer to the preparations for a sacrificial ritual (13.571–2, 17.520– 22, 20.403– 5).65 The numerous sacrificial scenes in the main narrative of the Iliad do not always mention the species of the sacrificial animal,66 let alone pay any attention to the victim’s reactions.67 In these three animal similes, the ox (boῦ6 or taῦro6) and its action function as a comparison with fallen or dying warriors.68 The first simile describes a reluctant ox, which is thrashing or writhing as it is forcibly taken and led away from its mountain pasture. The Trojan warrior Adamas is dying from his painful wound in the stomach and writhing in the same way as this ox is thrashing (13.571– 2). Thus, Adamas’ agitated writhing in extreme pain is likened to the writhing of a reluctant, but still basically unharmed, ox because the resilient ox’s writhing is so graphic. So the animal’s movement seems to be only the instrument for describing the warrior’s writhing. However, the reader may have also the ox’s situation in mind and not only wonder, for instance, about the reason for the transportation – was it simply transhumance, the change of

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grazing ground, or for sacrifice or just for work69 – but also have a clear picture of a mountainous environment, men, snares, and the struggling of a strong ox. The Achaean warrior Aretus for his part falls down as an ox falls when it is struck behind its horns: it starts forward and collapses. The ox is struck dead, but it is the animal’s forward motion, or its speed, which here is the focus (17.520– 22). This ox is a farm animal, grazing in the fields (ἄgraylo6). In the third ox simile, Hippodamas is bellowing while dying from Achilleus’ spear like an ox which is dragged around the shrine of Poseidon (20.401– 6): Ἱppodάmanta d’ ἔp1ita kau’ ἵppvn ἀΐjanta prόsu1n ἕu1n w1ύgonta m1tάwr1non oὔtas1 doyrί. aὐtὰr ὃ uymὸn ἄϊsu1 kaὶ ἤryg1n, ὡ6 ὅt1 taῦro6 ἤryg1n ἑlkόm1no6 Ἑlikώnion ἀmwὶ ἄnakta koύrvn ἑlkόntvn, gάnytai dέ t1 toῖ6 ἐnosίxuvn 405 ὣ6 ἄra tόn g’ ἐrygόnta lίp’ ὀstέa uymὸ6 ἀgήnvr· Next, when Hippodamas had leapt quickly down from his chariot / and was fleeing before him, Achilleus pierced him in the back / with his spear; he gasped out his life bellowing like a bull / when it is dragged by young men around the shrine of the / Heliconian, while the earthshaker delights in them. / Just so Hippodamas bellowed as his noble life left his bones.’ The situations of the tenor and the vehicle are here quite different: Hippodamas is dying and bellowing, but the bellowing ox to be sacrificed is still alive, not yet dying, although it is already being dragged around the shrine. In all, the primary object of comparison is not these warriors, their mood or characters (or their point of view), but their situation or certain actions in their situations. These three ‘instrumental’ similes seem at first to give us animals as mere functions, simply because the tenor is the motion or activity of the warrior (writhing, falling down, bellowing), but as the main narrative does not represent the mere falling and writhing of the warriors, but presents the warriors in their specific situations, we also

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envisage the oxen in their own situations. With the subtlety of an epigrammatist, the poet of the Iliad gives us in a few lines not only the motion of an animal but the ‘whole’ animal with its specific reactions, although the vehicle of comparison may be only its movement or bellowing. There need not be a full comparison between every human actor in the passage of the main narrative and the animals in the similes. To illustrate this, we can take the passage in which Hector finally decides to fight with Achilleus in Book 22. He is then likened to an eagle which ‘stoops down to the plain through murky clouds’ in order to seize its prey, ‘a tender lamb or a cowering hare’ (22.308–10). Achilleus is surely not meant to be linked with the timid prey. The simile praises Hector’s qualities as a warrior, but at the same time with a short description it goes deeply inside the world of the wild animal living its own life, an eagle searching for food. The simile describes the resolution of the flight of an eagle, which echoes Hector’s resolution.70 The possible elaboration of the simile (murky clouds and herbivore animals) gives a surplus, a glimpse into the life of a predatory bird. The actual animals in the Iliad – the animals which appear in the main narrative as part of the plot or in omens and embedded narratives – include domestic animals (horses, dogs, cattle), wild animals and divine or semi-divine animals, not only the immortal Xanthus and Balius, but other nameless divine horses as well. However, regardless of their status, these animals are seen from the point of view of humans (or of the gods), which means that their existence and agency as part of the narrative are for the sake of humans (or the gods). Their status is always relative to humans/gods, never absolute. That is, animals in the main narrative have a merely instrumental value relative to their utility to humans (or the gods). Besides their value as a commodity, some domestic animals have status value. In all, the actual animals are mainly seen as dependent on humans, controlled by them, not as independent living beings.71 This becomes more evident if we think about the exceptional role of horses in the Iliad: they not only enjoy high status, but are objects of emotional concern (cf. 5.202), which is rare for animals in the Iliad.72 The sufferings of Nestor’s horses (8.80 – 6) and the death of

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Pedasus, Achilleus’ mortal horse (16.467– 69), are described briefly but with pathos: the focus is for a moment on these horses. However, if we compare this standing with the famous stallion simile, which occurs twice (6.506– 12, 15.263– 68), the active, independent presence of the stallion in its own right serves as a striking contrast to the actual horses in the Iliad, which are reliant on human presence. Of course, the horse in the stallion simile, or its activity, can be seen as instrumental, too: a ‘vehicle’ to describe the actions of the brothers, Paris and Hector.73 If we connect the stallion with Paris or Hector, the horse can be seen to characterise the hero’s quality or emotional state – the delight and confidence in his success or strength. Nevertheless, if we take the simile on its own, not as a stand-in for something, we have a description of the joie de vivre, the zest for life of this horse, an active agent, which has its own meaningful world, in which the poet invites us to join.74 To sum up, regarding animals as mere instruments for depicting the tenor is misleading in the Iliadic animal similes. Although an animal simile may concentrate on one aspect only of an animal, it usually gives us the situation and embodiment of the animal in a few succinct words. Furthermore, animals in animal similes are in general depicted as more genuinely having a value of their own than actual animals, animals in the narrative proper. Many Homeric animal similes are short animal poems, where animals are described as agents of their own lives, in their own environment, sometimes far off from the dominion of humans. Not only Bacchylides but surely also other later poets using similes or depicting animals were influenced by Homeric animal similes.

The Presence of Animals in Sophocles’ Philoctetes The Attic tragedies leaned greatly on the epic tradition but exploited the Homeric device, simile, only to a very limited extent. Instead of similes, tragic poets used metaphors; animal metaphors especially mirrored human emotions in times of crisis. Feline predators, dogs or creatures with canine features, birds of prey and snakes were used to emphasise the aggressive side of the characters, whereas birds, for

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instance, typified the victimised status of characters.75 Young characters were compared to young animals: Helena’s daughter Hermione was compared to a foal and a heifer and Achilleus’ son Neoptolemus to a puppy in Euripides’ Andromache (621, 711, 1169 – 70). Chiara Thumiger has argued that the spirited animal imaginary in the Attic tragedies is not just a means to characterise the strong personalities – that animal metaphors do not serve only as ‘an ancillary to human experience’. In her view, animal imagery represents the ‘otherness within’ humans, the instinctive and strongly affective part of human characters.76 But, as if in counterbalance to the rich animal imagery, actual animals are almost entirely missing in the habitats of tragic characters. No kind of relationship with animals plays a seminal or acknowledged role in their lives.77 In all, tragedy depicts a human world, a life distant from non-human animal life and a life devoid of animals. Sophocles’ Philoctetes is an exception to this rule. Although there are no animal characters proper in Philoctetes either, Philoctetes addresses animals and refers to the fauna in Lemnos, the island on which he is marooned. The former chieftain of Malis is depicted living in a cave, sleeping on a bed of leaves, using a wooden cup and dirty rags. Philoctetes has divine weapons for his means of sustenance and survival, but he is crippled (xvlό6) due to his incurable malady – the reason why he was deserted on Lemnos in the first place (486, 1032). Besides the basic physical needs – how to survive as a disabled person on a rugged island – there is the question of how to stay sane. The play presents the questions of what it means to exist and what may happen to a person without the company of other human beings.78 Patricia E. Easterling sees Philoctetes’ exiled life as symbolising ‘alienation, loneliness and animal-like life’.79 However, if Philoctetes lives an ‘animal-like’ life among animals, he is not compared clearly to any animals at all – there is only a short lion simile, a Homeric reminiscence, at the end (1436). Instead, Philoctetes apostrophises animals, for instance when he has been tricked into giving away his divine bow: ὦ ptanaὶ uῆrai xaropῶn t’ / ἔunh uhrῶn (‘O winged prey and tribes of bright-eyed animals’, 1146 –7).

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These solemn vocatives are not direct addresses to animals present but a ceremonial apostrophe. Apostrophising is a common device in tragedies, but the number of apostrophes in Philoctetes (Sophocles’ longest extant tragedy, 1471 verses) is substantial, and most of them are uttered by Philoctetes himself.80 Moreover – as was mentioned in Part II – addressing animals as they might be addressed in everyday practice occurs not infrequently in Greek literature, but apostrophising animals in extant tragedies or in any serious literary genre before Oppianic epics is extremely rare. Philoctetes’ apostrophes to animals are usually explained as creating the sense of the uncommon setting for an Attic tragedy, the wilderness with its animals,81 but also as a reference to Philoctetes’ ‘regression to the savagery’.82 What is suggested here is that the apostrophes mark the process by which Philoctetes recognises his ‘animality’. Thumiger’s ‘the otherness within’, which may mark tragic characters and manifest in animal metaphors, is not ‘outsourced’ as apostrophes to animals in Philoctetes, but the apostrophes function as tokens of relational attitude to animals. In the following, these animal apostrophes and the other animal references in the play are analysed, and it is suggested that Philoctetes’ solemn use of ‘you’ to the animals has the poetic function of expressing his empathy – his imaginative participation in the animals’ situation and perspective. Animals are his cohabitants on an island devoid of people. His involvement is gradual, developing from one animal apostrophe to another (936 – 39, 1087 – 94, 1146 – 58), and it is aided by the poet’s concentration on Philoctetes’ embodiment, his sick body. Lemnos and the Apostrophe to Cybele The dramatis personae of Philoctetes is exceptionally scarce, and there are no female roles. Odysseus and the just fallen Achilleus’ son, Neoptolemus, have been sent from Troy to Lemnos to retrieve Philoctetes and his divine bow, without which, according to an oracle, Troy cannot be taken. This gift from Heracles is a lethal weapon: like a ballistic missile it always hits its mark. The other characters of the play are the fake merchant, in the short episode as

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part of Odysseus’ plot,83 and Heracles, making his epiphany as deus ex machina at the end of the play. The male chorus consists of Neoptolemus’ sailor-soldiers, who represent the attitudes of the everyman vacillating between Odysseus’ opportunism and young Neoptolemus’ (possible) idealism. Pierre Vidal-Naquet famously suggested that Philoctetes is the story of Neoptolemus’ coming-of-age and that the tragedy symbolically refers to ancient initiatory rites. Before entering the life of male citizen in the polis, boys like Neoptolemus had first to spend their time in the wilderness.84 But there is also a strong equation between the wilderness and the power of the female divinities, an equation of wilderness and femininity.85 Lemnos had an ominous aura in Greek mythology as a one-time women’s kingdom because the Lemnian women, all except one, murdered their husbands in revenge for their infidelity.86 The first lyric passage of male chorus is an apostrophe to the mighty ( potnia) mother, that is, the Phrygian mother goddess Cybele. It also refers to her animals, lions: ἰὼ mάkaira tayroktόnvn / l1όntvn ἔw1dr1 (‘Hear it, blessed queen, / who is sitting on bull-slaughtering lions’, 400 – 1).87 In the Homeric Hymn to Mother of the Gods (14.4 – 5) she is described as rejoicing in wolves’ and lions’ cries.88 Besides, Cybele is here referred to as a ‘goddess of the rocky mountains’ (ὀrέst1ro6) and ‘all nourishing’ (pάmboto6), which may refer to the richness of animals on Lemnos. Mountains were the places for gods’ sanctuaries ‘to be visited only to be left again’, as Richard Buxton puts it in his analysis of the spiritual significance of Greek landscapes.89 Lemnos is depicted in this apostrophe and elsewhere in the play as an uncultivated place. Nurturing even pastoral economy (keeping herds) is not possible for the crippled Philoctetes, who, without tame goats, lives a life of hunter-gathering. Thus the female goddess with the bull-slaughtering lions emphasises that Lemnos is a place outside domestication – bulls are killed by lions, not slaughtered and sacrificed by humans. Later on, the chorus especially laments Philoctetes’ deprivation of ‘life’s gift’, wheat and wine – that is, the products of agriculture (707 – 17).

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Other feminine and wild powers present are the Lemnian nymphs (1454). Philoctetes’ wound was caused by a divine snake, which crept from under the altar on the island named Chryse in dedication to an eponymous nymph, who is referred as ‘cruel’ (194).90 The term used of the serpent is sometimes echidna (267, 632), which is also the name of a mythical hybrid, half nymph and half snake, which lives in a cave and eats raw meat.91 Philoctetes’ malady, nόso6 (a feminine substantive), which is sometimes personified (758–9, 807–8), is also called wild (ἄgrio6, 173, 265).92 Philoctetes was produced in 409 BCE when Sophocles was very old.93 It is possible that it was just Sophocles’ innovation to make Lemnos, a fairly large island (now around 477 km2), deserted with only occasional visitors.94 Philoctetes mentions that nobody comes near the island of his own free will, or, at least, no sensible man, because it is no use: there are no harbours and no inhabitants to whom to sell commodities (300 – 4). Sophocles’ Philoctetes can be seen as participating in the fifth century BCE discussion on ‘nature’ vs. ‘culture’ ( phusis – nomos) and on the progress of mankind from the primitive state, which mankind has ‘escaped’ (cf. Part III). The interest in the state of ‘primitive’ societies was reflected in many comedies, too, which depicted characters in search of a better place to live ending up among primitive people.95 Sophocles’ Philoctetes depicts, however, a place without humans – out of human dominion. ‘In Company of Dappled or Hairy Animals’ Loneliness and the primitive setting of Philoctetes’ dwelling-place are described from the point of view of all main characters plus the chorus, with different emphases. Odysseus saw Philoctetes’ abode nine years prior to the events of the play, when he was one of his deserters. According to Odysseus, the cave was a quite sufficient place to live (16 –21).96 Neoptolemus, a privileged prince, is shocked when he witnesses the piteous simplicity of Philoctetes’ home. When Neoptolemus shows the cave to the chorus (while Philoctetes is still absent), he describes the cripple’s means of sustenance – hunting – repeating the information he just obtained from Odysseus (16–44):

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taύthn gὰr ἔx1in biotῆ6 aὐtὸn lόgo6 ἐstὶ wύsin, uhroboloῦnta pthnoῖ6 ἰoῖ6 smyg1rὸn smyg1rῶ6, oὐdέ tin’ aὐtῷ paiῶna kakῶn ἐpinvmᾶn.

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For I know of a report / that this is his means of sustenance / shooting animals / with his winged arrows, painfully in his pain, / and none, they say, / brings him remedy to heal his afflictions.97 The phrase ‘none brings him remedy’ refers unambiguously to humans and Philoctetes’ humanless existence.98 However, animals, especially snakes, were used as healers in temples dedicated to healing gods. They licked wounds ‘clean’, which was thought to have a healing effect – possible especially in this kind of case when the cause of sickness was a snake.99 But with his holy weapon, which hits every time it shoots, Philoctetes is a formidable dweller on the island. There are later allusions to the fact that Lemnian animals have learnt to avoid Philoctetes (1093, see also 1149). Philoctetes has had only a successful hunter’s deathly contact with animals. The chorus is especially concerned that Philoctetes has none ‘among mortals (brotos) to care for him and no companion he can look on’ (mhdὲ sύntrowon ὄmma ἔxvn, 171).100 The primary meaning of syntrophos here is obviously human companion. However, the word was also used of domestic and companion animal, as was mentioned in Part III. For a hunter like Philoctetes, the obvious animal companion would have been a hound, with which to share his quarry. Philoctetes’ lameness is naturally a hindrance in hunting. He later describes to Neoptolemus how he creeps to collect the prey he has shot, namely wild rock pigeons (pέl1ia, 287–91).101 Philoctetes is thus missing the essential company for Greek hunting parties, hunting-dogs, which would have retrieved his shots and carried them to him, besides being company for him. The chorus stresses Philoctetes’ deprivation of any human contact by stating that the hero is among wild animals, his ailment, hunger

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and the nymph Echo (180– 90). Although Philoctetes is of high class, he is ‘the has-not in life’ (ἄmmoro6 ἐn bίῳ); he is ‘alone, isolated from others’ (moῦno6 ἀp’ ἄllvn) and ‘in company of dappled or hairy animals’ (stiktῶn ἢ lasίvn / m1tὰ uhrῶn, 184 – 5). Dappled animals may refer to dappled fallow-deer or lynx and ‘hairy animals’, for instance, to wild goats.102 Thus, the wild animals (uήr) referred to here are probably not large carnivorous predators but timid game like swift deer and agile wild goats. Philoctetes himself laments his humanless situation and primitive setting, too.103 But he additionally shows a certain kind of Robinson Crusoic pride in how he has survived. He managed to make fire by rubbing two stones against another, and he admits that his dwelling place provides everything except a cure for his curse-like sickness (299). Luckily, he has some herbs (44, 649– 50, 698), which can ease the pain or perhaps prevent the inflammation from spreading. Philoctetes has thus some knowledge of pharmacopeia and knows where these wild plants grow. But Philoctetes suffers not only from his cruel malady but also from cruel memories. It is impossible for him to forgive the desertion of his former companions, friends and subordinates.104 Philoctetes speaks about the impiousness and shamefulness of the desertion (257 – 67), which deepens the loneliness of his existence. He has not been handled as a man of his stature and condition deserves.105 In Philoctetes’ opinion, his abandoners even laughed at him while deserting him (258). Later on, when Philoctetes acknowledges that Neoptolemus was part of the deceptive plot and when Neoptolemus declines to help him (895 – 926), Philoctetes experiences his desertion again. He feels that he is dead, a shadow of smoke, a mere reflection or ghost (1ἴdvlon, 946 – 48), ‘nothing’ (oὐdέn 1ἰm’ ὁ dύsmoro6, 951).106 Philoctetes also recalls his desertion when Odysseus enters and they meet after nine years. He accuses Odysseus of casting him on this shore without friends, in isolation, without society (apolis), a corpse among the living (ἐn zῶsin n1krό6, 1018). The latter phrase may be nothing more than strong antithesis, but what are the living beings in the desolate island other than his prey? Philoctetes with his paralysing disease is

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like a corpse in an island brimming with life – swift birds, wild goats and deft deer. However, the very reason for the desertion, as Odysseus tells Neoptolemus, was the impossibility of making sacrifices (libations and blood offerings) due to Philoctetes’ wild (agrios) and ill-omened cries (dyswhmίa, 10).107 Philoctetes’ sickness thus destroyed communication with the gods. The smell of Philoctetes’ cursed wound makes him miasmatic.108 Although Philoctetes is not compared to animals in this tragedy, his sickness is seen as a living creature. Philoctetes’ ailment is a deep ulcer in his foot, which cannot be cured by usual methods (7, cf. also 692– 700). The chorus calls it ‘a cruel/wild malady’ (agria nosos), from whose attacks Philoctetes has to defend himself. From time to time the inflammation will even turn Philoctetes into a state of a delirium, a suffering body (730– 820). Thus the bite of a snake, a predator, made Philoctetes, a male warrior, vulnerable as a preyed on animal. The animal imagery for the malady is pervasive: it comes when it wills and goes when its appetite is satisfied. Its movement is described as crawling (prosέrp1i, / prosέrx1tai tόd᾽ ἐggύ6, 788– 9) and once Philoctetes is described as if seeing it (814 –5). Thus the malady is like a lurking, and then attacking, wild predator and Philoctetes is like prey, which may sense – ‘foresee’ – a danger, the presence of a predator. When the nosos hits, Philoctetes senses it as though it is going through him and even eating him alive (745, brukomai). In the grip of the nosos, as the chorus describes, Philoctetes has to crawl like a child (701 –3), which gives the impression of a four-footed animal. Thus, the malady is like a serpent eating its victim alive, relentless in its attacks, against which Philoctetes is helpless like a little animal (say, a rodent), but also attentive like prey to its vicinity. A predator – the hunter Philoctetes – becomes the prey of his nosos, moving thus from the one trophic level to another. But for other humans, Philoctetes seems like a ruthless killer. At the beginning of the play, Odysseus warns Neoptolemus that the cripple will kill them (75 – 6).109 Philoctetes can never be persuaded by arguments based on victory at Troy, nor he can be won by force (100– 5). Odysseus’ warning makes Philoctetes seem like an

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aggressive (or frightened and therefore hostile) predator: he is outside human communication and will kill immediately because of his hatred. Notwithstanding the pity which the chorus show after hearing Philoctetes’ sad situation described by Neoptolemus, the cry of the upcoming Philoctetes scares them: they liken it to the voice of a creature which crawls on the ground (herpein, 207), which gives the impression of a snake or a lurking, prowling animal. Philoctetes, in his bitterness, loneliness and sickness, has thus become like a predator, ready to attack humans, a snake, ready to bite. Philoctetes himself apologises for his wild appearance (ape¯grio¯menos, 226), when he encounters Neoptolemus and the chorus. Later, Neoptolemus inspires confidence in Philoctetes more with his deeds than with his words, by staying with him during the horrible seizure of the malady (869– 76). Convincing Philoctetes is like communicating with animals: it is deeds, gestures and tone of words which matter. Animal Apostrophes in Tragedies According to Anthony Pelzer Wagener, the most common inanimate things to be apostrophised in the extant Attic tragedies are places: countries and cities, rivers, islands, caves etc.110 Other non-human objects addressed are artefacts, man-made things, which have great symbolic meaning, like the divine weapons in Philoctetes (1128– 35). Characters may apostrophise parts of their body, as Philoctetes does his hands and his ailing foot (786, 1004, 1188), and there are also abstract things like sleep and life, which are both also addressed in Philoctetes (827– 32, 1348). But animals are addressed only in three tragedies: in Philoctetes and in Euripides’ Ion and Helen.111 Ion, which was produced a couple of years before Philoctetes, contains quite a long and lively address to three birds in lyric metre, which comprises features of an elevated apostrophe but mimics at the same time an actual address to birds. It functions as a description of Ion’s daily task of shooing and even shooting birds with his bow, because the birds take sacrificial meat and stain statues and the altars of Apollo’s temple with their droppings (154 – 80). The address was noted already in Antiquity as an effective scene for an actor to play – Ion rushing his bow and

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turning his face to the sky (Pseudo-Demetrius On Style, 195). Although Ion’s address to the birds is ‘realistic’, the wording has also reverent tones. The first bird is an eagle, ‘the herald of Zeus’, and the second is a swan, whose ‘partner in song’ is ‘Phoebus’ lyre’, whereas the third bird, which might build a nest on the eaves of Apollo’s temple, is unknown to Ion. When it at first will not fly away, Ion asks: ‘Don’t you obey me?’ (174). Ion orders the three birds to fly away, to Delos, to the river of Alpheius, and to the grove on the Isthmus – that is, back to places, which have religious significance. Ion mentions that he is reluctant to kill them with his bow since they may bring messages from the gods. But there are also sacred doves, which dwell ‘unafraid’ in Apollo’s temple. A messenger reports how one of them dies after drinking a poisoned libation intended for Ion. The death of this auspicious dove is depicted carefully: ‘choking for breath it met its end / relaxing its reddish feet and claws’ (1207 – 8).112 Ion also contains a reference to scavenger birds. Ion’s mother, Creusa, fears that birds had snatched her abandoned baby (Ion) as their meal (902 – 4).113 Apostrophes to birds occur also in Euripides’ Helen, which is dated between Ion and Philoctetes. The chorus of Helen’s maidens first lyrically apostrophises a nightingale by inviting it to lament with them Helen’s sad fate (1107– 15). Later the chorus addresses some migratory birds, probably cranes, asking them to bear the message of Menelaus’ victory in Troy (1487– 94). Unique to the extant tragedy corpus, Philoctetes contains not only apostrophes to birds but also to wild mammals (936– 40, 1146– 58). Philoctetes’ addresses to animals are not everyday addresses as in Ion nor the highly elevated lyrical addresses used in Helen. Becoming One of the Prey Animals: Three Apostrophes When Philoctetes realises that Neoptolemus, the son of the hero, has also deceived him, his world collapses. Neoptolemus refuses to return the bow and is silent, not responding, which is underlined by Philoctetes’ use of the third-person pronoun for Neoptolemus, despite his presence: ‘But he does not even speak to me any longer, but looks away [. . .]’ (934– 5). Neoptolemus, the first Greek whom

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Philoctetes had met after nearly ten years of loneliness, declines to give him a response, so Philoctetes turns away from his human companions and turns instead towards his surroundings – harbours, promontories and animals – by addressing them with short, solemn vocatives: ὦ limέn16, ὦ problῆt16, ὦ jynoysίai uhrῶn ὀr1ίvn, ὦ katarrῶg16 pέtrai, ὑmῖn tάd’, oὐ gὰr ἄllon oἶd’ ὅtῳ lέgv, ἀnaklaίomai paroῦsi toῖ6 1ἰvuόsin, oἷ’ ἔrg’ ὁ paῖ6 m’ ἔdras1n oὑj Ἀxillέv6.

940

O you inlets and you headlands, you animals / of the hillsides who have shared my life, and you rough cliffs, / to you – for I know no other I can speak to – / to you my accustomed companions, I bewail the treacherous treatment / I have received from the son of Achilleus. The phrase ‘who have shared my life’ (synousia), which Philoctetes uses of the animals of the mountains, echoes the meta-preposition in the chorus’ song mentioned earlier. The chorus pitied Philoctetes because he is devoid of human contact: only the wild animals are with him (stiktῶn ἢ lasίvn / m1tὰ uhrῶn, 184– 5). However, while meta denotes a being-with-relationship, synousia refers to the more reciprocal concepts of companionship and company – usually, of course, between human beings.114 Another phrase, pάront16 oἱ 1ἰvuόt16, ‘the accustomed companions’, alludes to an even more permanent being-with.115 Philoctetes declares that he is addressing his lament (ἀnaklaίomai) to them because he does not know any other to whom to speak. Lonely people, as well as animal caretakers, may speak to animals (cf. examples in Part III) – except the caretakers often address animals in order to demand something of them. Philoctetes is not giving animals orders but expressing his lament. This apostrophe obviously mixes the terms of human companionship (synousia) with those of the living among animals and natural surroundings in order to stress the humanless situation of the hero.

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But Philoctetes has also been dependent on his surroundings and its other living beings for survival: animals for meat and skin, plants for making a medicine to reduce his pain (and for food, obviously), and natural formations like caves for shelter.116 Apart from mere sustenance, the apostrophe suggests that the natural environment with its animals had been his companion, too. By apostrophising, Philoctetes turns towards his sustaining environment. But Philoctetes continues appealing to the silent Neoptolemus and wailing (‘What do you say? You are silent’, tı´ wῇ6; sivpᾷ6. 951). When he does not get any answers, he addresses his cave and mentions also his prey, but he does not apostrophise them at this time (952– 60). The first apostrophe to animals (937– 940) refers only to wild animals living in the hills. Here, besides the ‘beast that roams the hills’, birds are also mentioned (955). The first apostrophe to animals looked to the common past – animals and the natural environment as companions – but these lines tell what lies in their common future. Philoctetes is confronting one of the most horrible fates a Greek could imagine: he will be eaten by animals: ἀll’ aὐanoῦmai tῷd’ ἐn aὐlίῳ mόno6, oὐ pthnὸn ὄrnin, oὐdὲ uῆr’ ὀr1ibάthn tόjoi6 ἐnaίrvn toisίd’, ἀll’ aὐtὸ6 tάla6 uanὼn parέjv daῖt’ ἀw’ ὧn ἐw1rbόmhn, kaί m’ oὓ6 ἐuήrvn prόsu1 uhrάsoysi nῦn· wόnon wόnoy dὲ ῥύsion t1ίsv tάla6 prὸ6 toῦ dokoῦnto6 oὐdὲn 1ἰdέnai kakόn.

955

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Yes, in that chamber I will wither away alone, / bringing down with that bow / no winged bird, no beast that roams the hills. / Rather I myself shall die in misery, and supply a feast / for those who fed me, becoming the prey of those on whom I preyed. / Ah, in requital for blood my own blood will flow, all the doing of that who seemed all unknowing of evil!117 Withered Philoctetes will crawl to his cave, starve to death (aὐanoῦmai ‘wither, parch up’, 954) and be food for his former prey.

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He will provide a meal (daı˜th) for those off whom he used to live; those he used to hunt (uhrᾶn) will now hunt him (958). When Philoctetes recalls his desertion on Lemnos, he used a wording suggestive of the desertion of unwanted babies: he was exposed in wilderness (268– 9, protiuέnai).118 But, in fact, only now, when he has lost his identity as an always-winning hunter, with his divine weapons, can his situation be compared to the stock motif of babies abandoned in caves, whose fate is to die of hunger or to be killed by predators. In Euripides’ Ion, the chorus describes how Creusa was forced by fear to leave her new-born baby, fathered by Apollo, in the cave, exposing it to the birds and ‘wild beasts’ (uhrsὶn ἐkt1u1ί6, 951).119 However, to be deserted on an inhabitable island was also a punishment for adults, and it was connected with the idea of being eaten by birds. Aegisthus, Clytemnestra’s lover, abandoned a rhapsode on a deserted island ‘to be exposed to the birds to eat’ (Od. 3.270– 71).120 Unwanted babies were thus deserted in the wilderness and unwanted adults were marooned on islands in order to evade the pollution of actual murder. Both were exposed for animals to eat. To be eaten by animals meant the utmost isolation from the communion of humans. Thumiger sees this stock motif – the fear of being eaten by animals – as one of the factors which creates a ‘neutral’ ‘middle ground’ between humans and animals in the tragedies. That animals are feeding on humans ‘reaffirms certain closeness’ and exposes ‘the reduction of human to animal’.121 However, what is overturned here is the hierarchy of superior human hunter and the animals that are his prey to a frail human prey who is without the protection of other human beings. With his supreme weapons Philoctetes has been overpowering, superior in comparison with his prey. His antagonists have not had any chance of surviving against his divine technology. He has not fought with a mighty antagonist but, like some marauding predators in the Iliadic similes, he has attacked the helpless ones. Hunting has not been a noble game but mere butchering with the bow, which always finds its target. But what animals will eat him? Of his prey, Philoctetes specifies only rock doves (289). They are not carnivorous, nor are the prey animals the chorus possibly mentioned (wild goats and dappled

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fallow deer, 184– 85). The ‘animals that roam the hills’ (ὀr1ibάth6) mentioned here could also be, for instance, mountain jackals, although jackals are difficult to think of as edible game. During nine years of sojourn, a healthy man with a supreme weapon would probably have managed to kill any larger predators which happened to live on the island or to swim to it.122 But Philoctetes is a cripple. ‘Animals that roam the hills’ could also be, for instance, rodents or other small mammals, which occasionally eat cadavers – or wild boars. Besides vultures, such common birds as crows and seagulls eat carcasses. In contrast to the birds in Ion, animals in Philoctetes remain largely unidentifiable – like some animals in the Homeric similes. The reason for not specifying animals may thus be the Homeric tradition, or it may point to Philoctetes’ ignorance.123 On the other hand, hunters often use cautious, euphemistic language of their prey. Mentioning the worst kind of future is Philoctetes’ method of appealing to the silent Neoptolemus, like saying, ‘Look what is going to happen to me!’ Neoptolemus begins to hesitate but is interrupted by Odysseus. After Neoptolemus has walked out carrying the divine weapons, Philoctetes is left with the ineffective chorus. He is deserted another time. Once again Philoctetes turns to his environment: in the long lyric passage he apostrophises his cave and birds (1087– 94): ὦ plhrέstaton aὔlion lύpa6 tᾶ6 ἀp’ ἐmoῦ tάlan, tίpt’ aὖ moi tὸ kat’ ἦmar ἔstai; toῦ pot1 t1ύjomai sitonόmoy mέl1o6 pόu1n ἐlpίdo6; ἴu’ aἱ prόsu’ ἄnv ptvkάd16 ὀjytόnoy diὰ pn1ύmato6 ἅlvsin oὐkέt’ ἴsxv.

1090

O shelter polluted by my pain, / what shall be my daily portion? / What hope of obtaining food shall come to me, / and from where, unhappy man? / Come, you timorous creatures in the sky / that once feared me, through the piercing breeze! / No longer have I the power to catch you! /124

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The cave is a place of extremes: hot in summer, icy in winter – there is no comfortable middle. It will be the tomb of Philoctetes, but it is a polluted grave, permeated by his sickness: the memories of the seizures of pain and the smell of the putrefied rags and the herb he has used for his cure. To his cave Philoctetes invites birds to come. The addressees of this second apostrophe to animals are ‘timorous creatures in the sky’. In the Iliad, Athena and Hera are described as going with steps ‘like those of timorous rock doves’ (5.778– 9).125 Philoctetes notices that birds have learnt to shun him.126 They have a harsh life in the windy island, flying ‘through the piercing breeze’ (ὀjytόnoy diὰ pn1ύmato6). Philoctetes finds himself in a situation similar to that of Lemnian birds. Now, when he himself is in the place of his prey, he begins to be able to take their point of view.127 Next, Philoctetes lovingly addresses his lost weapons, with which he has an affectionate relationship (1128– 35). He imagines that the bow would pity him, if it were able to have feelings. After discussing with the unhelpful chorus, it is again time to turn to the animal kingdom: ὦ ptanaὶ uῆrai xaropῶn t’ ἔunh uhrῶn, oὓ6 ὅd’ ἔx1i xῶro6 oὐr1sibώta6, wygᾷ mhkέt’ ἀp’ aὐlίvn ἐlᾶt’· oὐ gὰr ἔxv x1roῖn tὰn prόsu1n b1lέvn ἀlkάn, ὢ dύstano6 ἐgὼ tanῦn. ἀll’ ἀnέdhn ὅd1 xῶro6 ἐrύkomai, oὐkέti wobhtὸ6 ὑmῖn, ἕrp1t1, nῦn alὸn ἀntίwonon korέsai stόma prὸ6 xάrin ἐmᾶ6 sarkὸ6 aἰόla6·

1150

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O winged prey and tribes of bright-eyed / animals whom the / mountain pastures of this place contain, / no longer shall you rush in flight from your lairs,128 / for my hands no longer hold / the arrows that were once my protection! / Unhappy am I now!

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/ But come as you please here / and you need no longer fear me – / now it is easy to sate your mouths in revenge upon my quivering flesh. The third, lyric apostrophe to animals includes both birds and wild land animals. Here is the same motif as before, but there is no Neoptolemus present to persuade with defiant language. Despite the epic flavour – ethnos ‘tribe’, used in Homer of various groups of animals, and xaropό6, ‘bright-eyed’, for the epithet of wild predators, like lions129 – the wording is harsher, the imagination more concrete, as if Philoctetes is already in the mouths of his former prey, surrendering to death. If the former image was that Philoctetes would be eaten after his death, which is itself a horrible destiny, he will in this imagined future be still half alive, ‘quivering flesh’ (sάrj aἰόlo6), when the animals take ‘revenge’ on him, kill him because he killed their fellow creatures.130 He is in the position of a sick animal, with no possibility of succeeding: weakened by starvation, he is not able to run away or defend himself. Pietro Pucci interprets this apostrophe as a gesture for Philoctetes to turn away from the human society by preferring the wild animal community.131 But, obviously Philoctetes does not prefer animal companionship as such – he is not the people-shunning but animal-loving misanthrope – a character, which is in fact absent from Greek literature.132 While speaking of the association with animals in Philoctetes in general, Peter Meineck claims that ‘the prey is here conceived as a worthy antagonist and became the object of anthropomorphisation’ and ‘the beasts are serving a symbolic role as both the antithesis of human culture and the representatives of what we could become – hunters of human flesh.’133 However, for ancient hunters, the prey was most often ‘a worthy antagonist’, even timid game like deer. Capturing an animal in its natural habitat, before fire arms, was not easy, and the hunter had, in a way, to put himself in the position of the prey in order to anticipate its movements. Philoctetes has been on a hunting trip for almost ten years. Animals have not only served ‘a symbolic role’: they have been vital for his survival. Philoctetes is speaking to them, or, speaking as if to them, using the formal

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elevated address so common in epic and drama but also as hunter speaking with euphemistic words to his prey. Philoctetes returns immediately to his role as predator when Neoptolemus decides to restore the bow to its rightful owner. In the final scene, Heracles exhorts them to ‘guard each other like two companion (sύnnomo6) lions’ (1436).134 Synnomos means in general ‘companion’, but etymologically it derives from things or people that have common customs or laws (nόmo6) or common pasture (nomό6) – both refer to the idea of sharing something (nέm1in ‘share’). Usually the attribute in this passage is understood to refer to sharing a ‘pasture’ – i.e., hunting together. Carl Wolff refers to the three Iliadic similes of the pair of lions (Il. 5.554– 60, 10.297– 8, 13.198– 202), which for him denote the fierceness of lions as hunters, while in Seth L. Schein’s view they suggest also a ‘savage, anti-social quality’.135 However, lions are carnivorous and ‘savage’ killers when they hunt, but a pair of lions is as ‘anti-social’ in relation to their pact as soldiers killing their enemies are anti-social. Philoctetes and Neoptolemus will go together to Troy and win the war with the divine bow, the Trojans being their prey. The second meaning, ‘sharing the same law’, which is very rare, at least hovers in the background so that lions here are understood to kill in accordance with the natural law or the gods’ law (announced by Heracles) – which may be understood to be different than human law. Furthermore, the pair of lions calls to mind the pair of lions in the chorus’ apostrophe to Cybele (391– 402). At the end, in his last lines, Philoctetes also addresses his dwelling-place lovingly, praising its streams and springs, shore and caves (1453–7). The last address is also a prayer for euploia, for a fortunate sea voyage. Vidal-Naquet has suggested that here the wild island has been given a new significance: the scene is transformed and made almost pastoral, representing the re-entry of Philoctetes into the civilised world.136 But how civilised is a war-field? Furthermore, hunting was compared to war and regarded as practice for war, but war was also seen as hunting and as encountering one’s own violent side. But Lemnos was not merely a war-field of animals, which kill each other. Philoctetes is triumphant for many reasons: a god,

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Heracles, is again on his side, he is fulfilling the god’s will, and he has been promised fame but also a very personal victory – the conquering of his cruellest enemy, his malady. To sum up, Philoctetes’ relationship with the animals in Lemnos is at first glance purely instrumental: he kills them for his food (and, for instance, for clothes). Philoctetes does not have any special positive emotional ties with the Lemnian animals, his timid prey. His malady confines his hunting so that he is not able to clear Lemnos of predators. Without his superior weapon, Philoctetes would not have survived, but even the terrible, divine weapon, the gift of a god, a symbol of human culture, would have been useless if the island had been totally deserted of all other living beings. The crippled Philoctetes is like a lurking predator, waiting for his prey to come nearer. He is living the life of a human among the other animals of Lemnos, experiencing the animals’ presence without always being able to see them, observing animals while the animals observe him. After his final disappointment with human beings (Neoptolemus goes away, albeit temporarily, with the divine bow), he understands the interdependency of animal life. Sophocles depicts his hero becoming one of the preyed on animals, which does not necessary mean a descent into ‘brutality’ or a lapsed mental state but an admission of one’s animality and animal status – not accepting it, but recognising that ‘the very act of eating is a way of preparing to become food’, as H. Peter Steeves puts it while discussing the beliefs of the Kwakiutl Indians of the North-West Coast of North America, whose meat-eating is based on ideas of interconnectedness.137 Philoctetes is ready to pay his debt to the timid prey, the inhabitants of Lemnos, with his own body. But, in the end, Philoctetes is restored back to his former trophic level, as a predator, to fulfil the god’s will.

The Birds’ Point of View in Aristophanes’ Birds That animals have a more prominent role in comedies than in tragedies is already indicated in their titles. As well as Aristophanes’ The Birds, The Frogs, The Wasps138 and the lost play The Storks, there are several other animal-named old comedies, such as Critias’

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The Wild Animals (Qhrίa).139 Two other fifth-century comedy writers, Magnes and Crates, wrote a comedy also named The Birds, and there is a comedy titled The Nightingales. Birds as possible favourite ‘candidates’ for animal choruses in old Attic comedy may point to the special status of birds in Greek fauna as well as the suitability of birds, as bipeds, for the stage.140 Animal choruses and the rich presence of animals in comedies – as well as hybrid satyrs in satyr-plays – have traditionally been explained as deriving from fertility rituals with their animal masquerades.141 Besides animal choruses, Aristophanes often refers to Aesopic fables and Greek sayings containing animals; he uses animal names as insults and endearments and, perhaps, had actual animals on stage, too.142 The Birds, The Frogs and, to a much lesser extent, The Wasps (dog’s bark, aὗ, aὗ, 903) include comical and realistic imitations of animal communication.143 The human body – or the living body in general – is obviously not treated in a similar way in comedy and in tragedy. Corporeality, bodily functions and the basic needs and desires of the body – hunger, lust and the need to defecate – are openly announced in old comedy. Jean-Claude Carrie`re speaks about the acceptance of natural and elementary life,144 Giulia Sissa about ‘noisy and unseemly exhibitions of corporeal exuberance’.145 Sexual innuendos and ribaldry, as well as constant talk about food and eating plus preparing the sacrificial meal, were common topics and activities in the old comedies.146 The main action at the plot level in Aristophanes’ The Birds is the making of the wall of Nephelococcygia (‘Cloud Cuckoo Land’, actually a polis) and Peisetaerus’ rise to power – over birds and to a certain extent over men and even gods (185– 6, 1225– 8, 1514– 24). Characters in The Birds include birds, gods (also a winged god, Iris), human beings and humans metamorphosed into birds in various stages. Birds are depicted as using their body like humans, and humans like birds, so that birds are humanised and humans are ‘avianised’ for comic effect. Characters also amuse themselves by finding physiognomic and behavioural resemblances between particular birds and well-known Athenians. One of the themes of

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The Birds is, therefore, embodiment itself and, moreover, the comically transgressed embodiment of human beings and birds. What is suggested here is that The Birds also includes passages of empathy, the involvement with a bird’s position, as one feature or method of playing with the blurred boundaries between humans and birds. A reading, named here as ‘post-colonialist’, serves as an introductory to The Birds; then the special affinity, and therefore also ambiguity, felt by the Greeks towards birds is analysed along with their attitudes to flying and the question of how birds use their bodies in The Birds. After that the birds’ point of view is presented, and the chapter will end with the theme of carnivorous birds.147 A Post-Colonialist Reading of The Birds Aristophanes’ fantasies attract allegorical readings. Because The Birds was first produced in 414 BCE , in the middle of the new flare up of the Peloponnesian war, Nephelococcygia has been seen as a symbol of Athenian wishful thinking concerning the Sicilian expedition and Peisetaerus’ tyranny over birds, for its part, as a warning of an antidemocratic coup.148 The Birds is often lumped together with such fifth-century comedies as Pherecrates’ The Wild Ones (Ἄgrioi) and Phrynichus’ The Recluse (Μonόtropo6),149 as depicting utopias or heterotopias searched for among primitive people: the polis is discarded for the sake of ‘nature’. Like Philoctetes, The Birds is seen as attending to the fifth-century discourse on ‘nature’ and ‘culture’, phusis and nomos, and to the progress of civilization. Recently, Mark Payne and Babette Pu¨tz have paid more attention to the human-bird configuration. Payne sees the play as the staging of an encounter between humans and birds, whereas Pu¨tz interprets The Birds as basically playing at blurring the boundaries between animal and human.150 The starting point for the post-colonialist reading of The Birds is Payne’s idea that the play demonstrates how the ‘multiple forms of avian sociality’ (the ‘tribes’ of birds mentioned in 231, 1088) are reduced to ‘a single form of human society’.151 In Payne’s interpretation, Nephelococcygia thus replaces the former natural social formations of birds. The human protagonists are not only

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foreigners and emigrants in the realm of birds but also colonialists. According to the post-colonialist reading, The Birds thus tells a story about the influence of these new settlers (Peisetaerus and Euelpides and, before them, Tereus) on the natives (birds) and about how the new settlers change the community of birds by living with them. At the opening of the play Peisetaerus and Euelpides are heading to the ‘primitive’. They have discarded Athens and are faltering across a mountainous wilderness, guided by birds (a crow and a jackdaw),152 and they are looking for Tereus in order to ask his guidance about a better place to live. The former king of Thracia has been metamorphosed into a hoopoe as a punishment for his evil deeds. Because Tereus has been a man and now is a bird, he has the knowledge of both species (46– 8, 119). He gives a good impression of the place he is now living, that is, in the frontier of the abode of birds. Tereus the hoopoe thus functions as a conciliator between the two Athenians and the birds. However, the first meeting with these ‘primitives’ is a dangerous confrontation. The chorus of birds forms an appropriately comic army, and the two Athenians express genuine human fears of the scavenger birds, saying that birds are able not only to tear them apart but also to pluck out their eyes (342–3, 355, 360–1, 365, 443). The birds are also ‘primitives’ in that the bird army consists only of wild birds (mainly fairly harmless birds, such as francolin). In all, domesticated, ‘civilised’ birds, such as cocks, occur only in allusions (71, 483, 707). But the bird army does also consist of proper predator or carrion birds and the two humans are helpless prey for them. Menacingly spreading their wings, the bird army states that humans cannot hide anywhere, not in the mountains, the air nor the sea (349–51). Birds are thus like guerillas with knowledge of their territory. The life of the birds in their own element, the air, is pictured as idyllic (159–61 and 1088–101). Their community also has rules. Believing that Tereus has betrayed them by bringing their arch enemies, humans, into their community, the chorus accuses him of damaging their archaic order (u1smoὶ ἀrxaῖοi) and the oaths that bind all birds (ὅrkoi ὀrnίuvn) (331–2). By telling flattering tales about the old sovereignty of birds (they are older than the Olympian gods, and therefore the first kings) and

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of their actual power (workmen jump up when a cock crows in the morning, 481– 92), Peisetaerus persuades the birds to his side.153 His other strategy is to point out the ill treatment which birds have endured from humans (522– 38). It is viewed as even more humiliating in contrast to their status as former kings of the world. Peisetaerus stresses that they were once held to be ‘great and holy’, but now they are ‘treated like slaves and fools’ (522– 3). So, although Peisetaerus has a hidden agenda, he also functions as a radical folklorist or agitator, explaining to the natives who they are and empowering them. After warming up the birds, Peisetaerus brings in his transgressive idea of building a citadel in the air, which would be a blockade preventing the sacrificial smoke from going up from earth to the upper heaven and the gods. Peisetaerus assures the birds that this would restore their former power, and, finally, the birds hail him as their ‘saviour’ (svtήr, 545), and the building of Nephelococcygia can begin. Tereus, the pioneer, has mixed in his lifestyle the colonialist and native styles: he has introduced the custom of keeping servants by having his human slave or servant (doulos, diakonos) metamorphosed into a bird (70 – 3). Tereus has also taught birds to talk human language (199– 200). He himself has learned the language of the natives, which becomes clear, when he calls forth the different tribes of birds to hear Peisetaerus’ great plan (227– 62). Tereus uses bird language (‘Epopopoi, popopopoi, popoi’, 227) and Greek, which sounds like bird song: deuro, deuro, deuro, deuro (‘here’, 259). Peisetaerus, for his part, does not need to learn bird language, but he sometimes seems to imitate the repetitive and alliterate language of birds (1199). In all, there are several demonstrations of bird language in the play (for instance, 769– 84).154 According to post-colonialist theory, the coloniser wants and needs the colonised to be similar to him but not the same, and because the change is reciprocal, the encounter creates ‘hybrid cultures’ through mutual ‘mimicry’.155 Peisetaerus indeed changes the original society of the birds to look more like human society and makes the birds live in a nominal polis. He humanises the animal society of birds by introducing a reduced polity – defensive walls

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with guardians (1158– 62, 1174). The birds mimic the human working methods and technology while building the walls. Peisetaerus does not change the birds to be similar to himself nor does he become a true metamorph (he does not go native). He has a rather condescending attitude to these aboriginals when he acknowledges that as ‘new gods’ they luckily need very simple worshipping compared with the Olympians: there is no need to build temples or purchase expensive sacrifices and gifts (612– 26). According to the ‘bird history’ reported by Peisetaerus, birds were the first residents of the whole world (467 –75, cf. 699–703). Now these aboriginals have to adjust themselves to the narrowing of their regime, when Peisetaerus orders the open and free heaven to be limited to a place surrounded by a brick wall – the open polos (pόlo6 ‘heaven’) becomes a polis (180– 4). Birds loose their sovereignty in their own element, air,156 and their polis is reduced to a mere fortification (t1ı˜xo6, pόlisma, 553, 1565). Their polis attracts rogues, as new settlements always do, such as the Athenian sycophant. He arrives in order to acquire wings, which would gain him opportunities to practice vices in Athens (1410– 69). Moreover, the thousands of Athenians going to move to the bird state would certainly alter the aboriginals’ life even more. There is also ‘mimicry’ on the part of Peisetaerus’ former fellowcitizens, who have heard of the new polis. Edward Said describes in his Orientalism, how the exoticism of the Orient swept over Europe in the end of the nineteenth century, taking on quite absurd manifestations.157 The same happens in Athens, too, in The Birds: the former city of Peisetaerus is swept by ornithomania (verb ὀrniuoman1ῖn ‘be bird-mad’ 1284, 1290, 1344). The Athenians want to mimic (ἐkmim1ῖsuai, 1285) birds in many ways. They act like birds by ‘flying right away in the morning to the pasture (nomό6) of agora and to the bookstalls for decrees’ – a pun on the words no´mos– nomo´s referring to the enthusiasm for lawsuits. The peak of ornithomania is that many Athenians have obtained bird names, and for love of birds (ὀrniuowilίa) many sing songs, which have bird as their subject – or have ‘wings or at least one feather’ (1300–303). Three incomers from Athens to Nephelococcygia actually sing such songs.158

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The post-colonialist theoreticians see aboriginals’ bodies as a tool and an object of discipline.159 The body of a colonialist, also, had to adjust to a new kind of surroundings (such as climate). In The Birds, the bodies of the birds, the natives, are on display through the constant verbal reminders of the strange outward appearance of several birds as well as of the metamorphosed main characters. Birds use their bodies comprehensively as they build the wall, and their bodies are noted to be used in utmost way as edible meat. Peisetaerus and Euelpides for their part have to adjust themselves to their new feathered, winged bodies, with beaks, although this is not elaborated (there is, for instance, no marvelling at how different it is to eat and drink with a beak). But how, then, are bird bodies, the ‘birdness’ of birds and metamorphosed humans represented in The Birds? In the following it will be argued that it may not be just feathers, wings and beaks, but two-footedness, ‘speech’ and a type of erect position which are the distinctive marks of ‘birdness’ in the Greek mind. For What Use is Flying Worth Birds are not mammals but lay eggs and may have wings, beaks, tails and feathers. But many birds, such as crows, jackdaws and cranes, walk human-like (not only hopping), and their standing positions, especially that of cranes, are reminiscent of humans. Birds had a special place in everyday animal categories in ancient Greece because divinatory birds functioned as messengers between humans and gods. There existed even a certain kind of taxonomic ‘kinship’ between birds and humans. The playful definition of man as a featherless biped goes back to Plato’s Statesman, where the phrase does not occur as such, but can be deduced from the passage.160 The ‘definition’ is repeated in an anecdote of Diogenes the Cynic, who plucked a chicken and said it was Plato’s man, a featherless biped (DL 6.40). Although feathers and wings may be analogous denotations for birds, the ‘definition’ is not ‘man is a wingless biped’ because feathers are in fact a more distinctive feature than wings – there are other winged creatures besides birds.161 The great metaphorical significance of feathers was that they were used to wing arrows – feathers were what

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made arrows ‘fly’. Plato utilises the image of the maturing soul growing feathers and flying in the Phaedrus (246a– 56e).162 Aristotle, for his part, carefully differentiates kinds of winged creatures, or ‘fliers’ (hoi pte¯noi), by noting that some have membranous wings; some, such as bats, dermatoid wings; some, such as beetles, sheathed wings; and some feathered wings, which, as he notes, have a special name, ptero¯ta – which Plato does not use in his ‘definition’.163 Besides two-footedness, Aristotle points to the kind of erect position (ὀρθός) of birds,164 as well as other affinities, such as the ability of certain birds to utter articulate sounds, and the many instances of ingenuity and cleverness which birds show in their lives, like swallows with their excellent skill in nest-building.165 In all, these discussions suggest a certain kind of felt affinity between birds and human beings, the common features being twofootedness – which refers to the upright position – and ‘speech’, one of the distinguishing human characteristics. Negative features were naturally associated with birds, too. Reincarnation as a bird is expressed as an option in the final myth of Plato’s Timaeus (91d – e), but it is not portrayed as a positive possibility: those men who had proved to be frivolous and foolish were to be birds in their next life. Also in The Birds, there are several references to birds as feeble-minded – or to persons who are as flighty as birds (167 – 170, 1372). In all, the verb petesthai (‘to fly’), when applied to humans, meant to be ‘all in the air, a-flutter’.166 Therefore, the bird chorus even expresses its fear that people will not believe birds to be gods because they fly (571 – 2) – as if flying were not a dignified activity fitting for gods. Furthermore, the advantage birds have over men, the ability to fly, is described in The Birds as having utility for petty human interests. When Peisetaerus and Euelpides are acquiring their wings behind the scenes, the chorus addresses the audience and explains the usefulness of wings for satisfying one’s basic needs (like need to defecate) while watching a play (785– 800).167 Another petty use of wings occurs when Peisetaerus receives Athenian visitors who want to acquire wings only for their small-minded ends. Birds’ amazing ability to fly is thus trivialised for comic effect.

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At the beginning of the play, when Peisetaerus and Euelpides enter the community of birds, they did not mean to become birds as such but simply to be members of the society of birds (syn-genesthai, 113).168 But later it occurs to Peisetaerus to ask how they, who cannot fly, could manage to live with birds (syn-einai). He is afraid of a kind of downtrodden status as wingless members of the birds’ society. Tereus promises to give them a magic root, which will give them wings (650– 5). Eventually Peisetaerus and Euelpides get not only wings but feathers (801– 8). However, these new dimensions and possibilities to broaden their personae are not put to use – there are no happy experiments with new wings and no display of flying on the stage.169 Peisetaerus nevertheless sends Euelpides to ‘go off to the air’ (bάdiz1 prὸ6 tὸn ἁέra, 837) in order to superintend the building of the wall in the air, which would be impossible without the ability to fly. In fact, it becomes not altogether clear whether wings have given Peisetaerus the ability to fly at all – or at least he does not activate it.170 It is as if the capacity to fly quickly from one place to another is a quality of servants.171 Thus, humans in The Birds do not glorify birds’ ability to fly but see it mainly from a petty, utilitarian point of view. Flying is a useful skill for servants, and it speeds up the building of the wall. When Peisetaerus asks by whom the wall was built, the messenger proudly reports: ‘Birds – birds only; they had neither Egyptian brick maker, nor stonemason, nor carpenter; the birds did it all themselves’ (aὐtόx1ir16) (1131– 5). The substantive autocheir means in general a do-it-yourselfer (even a person who commits suicide) but literally a person who does something ‘with her own hands’ (cheir). Birds can use their wings – and beaks and feet – instead of human hands. This is naturally an everyday observation: birds build nests using their beaks, feet, wings – even their whole body can be used, as swallows do, to shape the round form of their nest. Besides this, parrots, for instance, use their feet like hands when eating. The huge number of bird builders underlines the hugeness of the wall. Birds co-operated in flocks: thirty thousand cranes carried founding stones in their stomachs;172 the stones were chiseled by water-rails using their beaks; bricks were made by storks; water fowl

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carried the water needed; and the herons carried the mortar in the hods, having first spaded the mortar with their feet (using their feet as spades) – the messenger bird says that the last technique is one of the very clever inventions the birds have come up with (1144–6). To this Peisetaerus answers: ‘Ah! to what use cannot feet be put?’ (1147). The comment plays with the nonspecialist character of human hands: the handy hands of humans can be compared with the ‘handy’ feet of many birds. Then the messenger says yet more about three groups of birds: the ducks, who carried the bricks; the swallows, who ‘came flying to the work, their beaks full of mortar and their trowels on their backs, just the way little children are carried’ (1149– 5);173 and the pelicans, ‘for they squared up the gates with their beaks in such a fashion that one would have thought they were using axes’ (1155– 56).174 As well as being hard-working and cooperative, birds appear also to be resourceful, in contrast to their own opinion of themselves (637, cf. 455– 6). The report of the messenger creates, of course, a comic image by picturing, for instance, birds with flipper feet using their feet as spades.175 Birds are reported here to use their bodies like humans, but on the stage, the actors who played the roles of birds (the chorus and messenger birds) and metamorphosed humans surely occasionally mimicked bird-like movements. Also, in the speeches Aristophanes utilises bird and flying metaphors to the extreme, and double entendres. One of the scenes with ample double-meaning references to birds, all of which are sexual innuendos, is Peisetaerus and Euelpides’ encounter with Procne (667–74). All that is said about Procne the nightingale in this scene could be said about a promiscuous woman. However, it is preceded by Procne’s wailing for her son (that is, the sound of a flute behind the scene to Tereus’ singing, 209–22). The lyric passage is also a eulogy for the nightingale’s own voice. Birds’ Point of View Flying is, as said, here associated mainly with servility by Peisetaerus and the other humans of the play. However, the birds themselves connect the ability to fly with seeing more, and therefore having more extensive knowledge (1470–2). Birds describe themselves as all

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seeing – like the gods, which is connected with their high position (1058). Tereus also is sought out by Peisetaerus and Euelpides because as a bird he has reached and seen far more countries than humans ever could, so that he knows where to search for a new home (46– 8, 116–9). Peisetaerus attached the saying ‘a little bird knows’ to birds’ fancied ability to spot treasures (599– 601). Several bird eulogies are delivered by birds themselves, some of them genuinely lyrical, like the encomium to the nightingale, swains and wild nature (676– 84, 737– 51, 770– 83). The swains are said to eulogise Apollo and charm with their song both ‘many-hued tribes of animals’ (poikίla wῦla tὰ uhrῶn, 777) and the Olympians (777 – 81). Although the point of view of birds is less on display in The Birds than the point of view of women in Aristophanes’ women comedies (due to the simple reason that birds are not, after all, the main characters in The Birds), the comedy manages to show that if one were a bird, one’s worldview would be bird-centred. The ‘ornithocentrism’ is manifest most clearly in the organic bird cosmogony, where the world is said to have been born from a cosmic egg, and birds are said to be the offspring of Eros and Chaos (the first parabasis, 691– 703).176 Later on, the bird choir declares laws to protect birds from bird-sellers, such as a certain Philocrates (1077– 87): ἢn ἀpokt1ίnῃ ti6 ὑmῶn Filokrάth tὸn Stroύuion, lήc1tai tάlanton, ἢn dὲ zῶntά , g’ . ἀgάgῃ, tέttara, ὅti syn1ίrvn toὺ6 spίnoy6 pvl1ῖ kau’ ἑptὰ toὐboloῦ, 1ἶta wysῶn tὰ6 kίxla6 d1ίknysi kaὶ lymaίn1tai, 1080 toῖ6 t1 kocίxoisin 1ἰ6 tὰ6 ῥῖna6 ἐgx1ῖ tὰ pt1rά, tὰ6 p1rist1rά6 u’ ὁmoίv6 jyllabὼn 1ἵrja6 ἔx1i, kἀpanagkάz1i pal1ύ1in d1d1mέna6 ἐn diktύῳ. taῦta boylόm1su’ ἀn1ip1ῖn· k1ἴ ti6 ὄrniua6 trέw1i 1ἱrgmέnoy6 ὑmῶn ἐn aὐlῇ, wrάzom1n m1uiέnai. 1085 ἢn dὲ mὴ p1ίuhsu1, syllhwuέnt16 ὑpὸ tῶn ὀrnέvn aὖui6 ὑm1ῖ6 aὖ par’ ἡmῖn d1d1mέnoi pal1ύs1t1. If any of you kills Philocrates the Sparrovian, / he will receive a talent, and if he brings him in alive, four talents; / because he

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strings together finches and sells them at seven for an obol, / then also abuses thrushes by blowing air into them and putting them / on display, and fills blackbirds’ nostrils with their own feathers, / and likewise captures pigeons, keeps them imprisoned, and forces / them to act as decoys, confined in a net. / That’s the proclamation we want to make. / And if any of you keeps birds / caged up in your courtyard, we order you to release them; / and if you don’t obey, you’ll be arrested by the birds / and you in your turn will be imprisoned to act as decoys on our estates. (Trans. Alan H. Sommerstein, slightly modified).177 Aristophanes reports here actual fowling and bird handling methods. Birds were kept in cramped cages, there were various torturous decoy methods, and also small singing birds like finches were eaten.178 The description empathises with birds, but whether Aristophanes felt sympathy with birds and meant to criticise their abusive treatment is questionable. Stephen Halliwell points out that Greek comedy enabled the Athenian audience to laugh about the blurring of distinctions between free and slave, leaders and masses, that ‘laughter was a response for seeing the structures of the society distorted in bizarre, even dreamlike, ways.’179 Depicting birds as making laws which protect them from human exploitation, is blurring the human-animal distinction. Yet The Birds does not portray birds actually taking the power (like the women in Aristophanes’ women comedies) and forcing men to act as maltreated decoys as this ‘law’ states. Comedy is not the genre to take ethical responsibility for maltreatment, but to laugh at it. But, still, what this passage is suggesting is that if we were birds, we would see fowling from this point of view. The language describing the tortures which birds encounter at the hands of fowlers and bird-sellers, is earlier enlisted by Peisetaerus when he explains to the birds their slave-like status – that they are esploited in human society. It includes three kinds of humiliation and abuse: to be hunted with ‘noose, springs, limed twigs, snares, light nets, heavy nets, traps’; to be sold at the market; and to be prepared as

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food (522– 38). The last category includes the description of how birds are prepared as a meal: grating cheese, mixing it with oil and silphium and making a dressing (529– 38). It is noteworthy that the bodies of the birds, which are prepared for a meal in this passage, are described as like carcasses (k1n1br1ίa, 538), a word which refers to rotting bodies and the bodies of animals which have died naturally, and whose meat is not, for this reason, necessarily edible for humans. This means that kenebreia have to be prepared carefully by applying sauce and seasoning, in order that the possible rot should not be tasted.180 Peisetaerus is thus speaking about cooking birds to birds in a way that makes clear his distaste for the idea of birds as food. However, as a tyrannos, Peisetaerus prepares a meal of bird meat (1579– 90). Life far from humans is pictured in a striking contrast with the life birds lead as men’s slaves.181 The eulogy of bird life sung by the chorus after Nephelococcygia is at last founded describes their life among meadows in summer and caves of mountains in winter, playing with the mountain nymphs (1088– 1101). The simple but abundant life of birds in the wild is completely the opposite of Philoctetes’ meagre life in Sophocles’ tragedy. Birds seem to live like gods. When Euelpides compares Tereus and Procne’s life to that of the newly wed (nymwίvn bίo6, 161),182 the phrase also refers to the life of birds in general. The diet of the bird couple is described as consisting of sesame, myrtle-berries, poppies and bergamot (159–60), which is reminiscent of the diet of the gods.183 Although the chorus of birds expresses its hatred towards humans – that man is birds’ archenemy (370) – in their first encounter, the birds later admit that humans are, after all, quite harmless. From the birds’ point of view, men are a mere wingless tribe of poor, weak mortals: skio1idέa wῦl’ ἀm1nhnά, / ἀptῆn16 ἐwhmέrioi, talaoὶ brotoί (686–7). Besides the bird’s eye view – the human world seen from above – the chorus also interprets the human world from the nonhuman point of view: in their last parabasis, they depict Athens as an exotic place, and take one Cleonymus to be a tree, because he is big and mainly unmoving (in contrast to the birds, at least) (1473–7).184 The roles of humans and birds are thus displaced: it is not humans who are

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watching birds in divination or in order to capture them, but birds which observe the human world as if for the first time, after Peisetaerus has humanised them. The post-colonialist reading gives voice to the ‘subaltern’, the aboriginals and natives.185 The birds are able to voice their position through some chorus songs, which function like prosopopoeiae, speeches in bird character. Aristophanes invites the audiencce to empathise with the birds, to imagine the birds’ realm and think about how they might see the human world. Thus, humanising birds for comic effect also gives voice to the birds. As mentioned before, Pu¨tz reads The Birds as playing with the blurring of boundaries between humans and birds. She competently analyses renderings of the outward appearance and costume of the characters, their language and behaviour and the ways of thought of both birds and humans. In Pu¨tz’ view, Peisetaerus’ humanity is even emphasised after his metamorphosis. Aristophanes is not only obscuring the boundaries between humans and birds, but also reinforcing them.186 However, one reason for birds to be shown as humanised in The Birds is simply the comicality of animals behaving like humans. The other reason is that humanising birds is an essential part of the plot: Tereus and Peisetaerus humanise birds in order more easily to control them. Moreover, although the blurring of the boundary between humans and birds is surely one of the central themes, it is performed to such extent, so extravagantly, that it is difficult to see where the boundary is actually situated. Pu¨tz sees the introductory scene as already indirectly defining the boundary of human and animal, because Peisetaerus and Euelpides are probably carrying actual, living birds on the stage.187 However, while the opening scene would accentuate the perceptible difference between birds and humans, especially the difference in size, which is underlined even if the guiding birds were mere props on the stage,188 it does not necessarily stress the boundaries between humans and birds. Meeting first the human-size metamorphs (Tereus and his servant) and then the human-size bird army (naturally human-size because they are actors) reinforces the experience of stepping into the birds’ own world: to a realm where

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birds exist for themselves, not for the sake of humans. Thanks to their human size, the birds are simply more conspicuous and are taken more seriously as antagonists by humans. Jackdaws are Carnivorous Birds Peisetaerus’ guide to the realm of birds is a jackdaw and there are jackdaw guardians in Nephelococcygia (1174, see also 571 – 2).189 There are many stories of jackdaws in the Aesopic fables.190 In several of them, a jackdaw aspires to be other than he is – for instance, an eagle (Perry 2) or a pigeon. In the latter case, he paints his plumage white in order to share the copious food of the pigeons in the farmyard (Perry 129). When Zeus is willing to elect the most beautiful bird as the king of birds, the jackdaw puts on other birds’ feathers and is nearly accepted as a king until other birds recognised their own feathers and pluck them from the jackdaw’s skin (Perry 101). In a way Peisetaerus also puts on other birds’ feathers to become the ruler of the birds. He becomes winged and feathered, and he also denies his humanity when he is entering the realm of birds. Peisetaerus and Euelpides tell Tereus’ servant that they are not humans (ἄnurvpoi) and invent mock bird identities. This first encounter between the human and bird world is full of questions and misgivings about each others’ identity and attempts to determine and assure one’s own identity.191 After his metamorphosis (801ff), Peisetaerus is a human-bird or merely a human with some bird-like features. His metamorphosis is like a trick, a ‘costume’ to disguise him in order to get along in the bird community. The gods regard him as human: Prometheus counts him among human beings (1545); Heracles and Poseidon speak about him as a human or man (ἄnurvpo6 1575, ἀnήr 1581). But Peisetaerus identifies himself several times as ‘one among the birds’. This is an understandable thing to say among birds to create and strengthen we-spirit, but he also utters it twice while speaking with the outsiders, non-birds.192 In Euelpides’ view, Peisetaerus’ plumage and beak look like those of a blackbird (805), but as a buffoon Euelpides is constantly off the

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mark. Peisetaerus’ costume may have looked like a jackdaw – his guiding bird and a possible allusion to the jackdaw in the fable which aspired to be the king of the birds. Neither blackbirds nor jackdaws are clearly herbivorous. Blackbirds eat insects, whereas jackdaws, like other birds of the crow family, eat small invertebrates and carrions. In the general imagination, the ‘real’ carnivorous birds are large birds of prey, such as eagles, vultures and hawks. Scavenger birds (vultures and ravens) especially were part of Greek literary horror topos of man being eaten by animals. But small and sympathetic birds like jackdaws may also eat carcasses. If Peisetaerus is meant to be identified with the jackdaw, it is not so surprising that he is preparing a meal of bird meat at the end of the play.193 In conclusion, Aristophanes humanises birds for comic effect but also opens up the possibility of peeping into the bird’s realm, or Aristophanes’ fantasy of it. Some chorus songs function as prosopopoeia, giving voice to the birds and their bird-centred world. Aristophanes offers us the possibility of playfully imagining what it would be like to be a bird. Even if the purpose of the play is not to discuss the characteristics of actual birds, it brings these characteristics to the fore and makes explicit the presence of birds in human life: the lives of humans and birds are not, in fact, separate. Thanks to this coexistence, our observations of bird abilities and behaviours are ample.

Anyte’s Animal Epigrams The final case study deals with the poetry of Anyte, whose goat epigram served as an example in the theoretical section of the book (Part I). As Anyte is relatively unknown in comparison to the other authors discussed in the Case Studies section, a short introduction to her life, poetic style, literary influences and the role of animal epigrams in her oeuvre is provided at the beginning of the case study. After that a more detailed and philosophically driven study of her animal epigrams is presented, including an analysis of the intertwining positions of ‘you’ and ‘I’ in the dolphin epigram, loss and mortality in the marauder epigram, the human-animal bond in

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her horse and dog epigrams, the singing insects as metaphors for artistic expression in the cicada and the grasshopper epigram, and finally, her two goat epigrams as possible ecphrases. Anyte as an Epigrammatist Information about Anyte’s life is scant. Her surving poetry is dated from around 300 BCE , which would make her one of the earliest Hellenistic epigrammatists. Anyte is presented as Anyte of Tegea by Pollux (5.48) as well as by Stephanus of Byzantium. The hypothesis that she comes from Tegea may be based on the fact that she mentions this region in one of her epigrams.194 Whether or not Anyte also wrote lyric poetry in addition to her epigrams, as it has sometimes been claimed, is uncertain, for only the epigrams have been preserved.195 In the Greek Anthology there are 24 epigrams attributed to her, and in addition one can be found in Pollux’s Onomasticon (5.48). Of these 25 epigrams, 21 are currently considered authentic. All are of a high artistic quality and appear to have survived in their entirety. In fact, more entire poems from Anyte have survived to the present day than from any other ancient Greek female poet. This suggests that her poems were collected into a book already in her own time. On the basis of numerous sources, it appears that Anyte was well appreciated as a poet in both her own time and later Antiquity.196 It has been argued that Antipater of Thessalonica’s praise of the ‘female Homer’ (AP 9.263) refers to Anyte, not Sappho, and that a statue was erected in her honour.197 Meleager, the editor of the Garland, mentions her ‘lilies’ first in his ‘garland’ of poets (AP 4.1). Anyte’s fame has not quite persisted till our days, however. The fact that only epigrams have survived of her poetry, may have contributed to the waning of her renown, as authors of other forms of poetry have received more attention in classical scholarship. It is also true that in the context of the Greek Anthology, her poetry, not unlike that of many other epigrammatists, is scattered here and there, which until recently made it difficult to form a consistent picture of it. The reception by later commentators was not always favourable, either. In his Hellenistiche Dichtung in der Zeit des Kallimachos (1924), the

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famous German philologist Ulrich von Wilamowitz-Moellendorff dismisses Anyte’s work as unoriginal, unfeminine and self-repeating, describing it also as ‘nice’ but ‘without a distinctive style’.198 It is only from the late 1980s on, along with the increasing interest in gender issues in classical studies, that Anyte’s poetry has been rediscovered. In a number of anthologies, she is introduced along with other women poets: Sappho, Erinna, Moero and Nossis.199 Even if we agreed with the old saying that there is no accounting for taste, the accusation of unoriginality is hard to justify, when Anyte’s poetry is studied more closely. As D. Geoghegan shows in a thorough commentary (1979) to Anyte’s epigrams, her writing is quite inventive despite the fact that she worked within the confined form of traditional inscription.200 Anyte’s poetic language is an artificial dialect of Doric and Epic/Ionic, with occasional Atticisms.201 The most distinctive feature of her style is her complex and sophisticated use of Homeric allusion: Geoghegan points out that almost every line of her work contains a reminiscence of Homer.202 Allusions to Homer can appear in sentence structure, line structure, syntax and neologisms that were formed by analogy with Homeric expressions. Geoghegan also suggests that she purposefully revived rare and obscure readings in Homer, giving her own suggestions on the authenticity of controversial Homeric passages in her poetry.203 Anyte’s literary tools also included alliteration and onomatopoeia, which she used as references to the topic of the poem, such as s for splashes in the dolphin epigram.204 The invention of both the pastoral epigram and the animal epigram is attributed to Anyte, and later epigrammatists appear to have imitated her poetry.205 Anyte’s animal epigrams differ from those of her followers in one important sense: written in the form of epitaphs, most of them are tragic rather than comic, whereas some of the later writers of animal epigrams even make fun of the animal’s death. A good example of such a mocking poem is Meleager’s hare epigram, in which a pet leveret dies of over-eating.206 Two of Anyte’s animal epigrams do have a lighter tone, thanks to their subject matter, namely the epigram about a goat and children (AP 6.312) introduced in Part I, and the epigram about a goat and a nymph (AP 9.745), which will be discussed later. These humorous

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poems appear to belong to ecphrastic epigrams – a genre of which Anyte is considered to be one of the early proponents.207 Some interpreters have detected humour and even irony in some of her funeral epigrams for animals as well, such as the marauder epigram. The solemn style of these poems does not speak for this hypothesis, however.208 Anyte does borrow Homeric expressions that in the original context often serve to describe valiant human beings rather than animals, but such questioning of the human– animal distinction and hierarchy needs not be ironic. The meaning of the Homeric allusions depends entirely on the context. In some cases they may be meant as appreciative, but in others they may have a humorous tone. Kathryn Gutzwiller suggests that Anyte’s position as a female poet made it possible for her to address topics that might have been difficult for a male poet to deal with.209 This difficulty may partly account for the change in tone in some later animal epigrams. It may have been easier for a woman poet to deal with the grief pertaining to the loss of a companion animal, or, to deal with loss in general through the animal theme. In comparison, male epigrammatists may have found it more acceptable to distance themselves from an emotional attachment to animals and to deal with them and the very subgenre of the animal epigram with humour. In point of fact, we will see that Anyte’s way of dealing with the topic of animals is more intimate than that of the male authors discussed so far. This is not to imply that women’s relationship to animals should be inherently different from that of men or that they would somehow feel more deeply about animals – this is hardly the case – but simply that different registers of expression tend to be available for men and women in a given era due to their different positions in society. It is likewise important to recognise that the nature of epigrams as personal poetry makes their tone different from that of the main forms of Greek literature. This difference may, in part, account for the sensitivity of Anyte’s animal depictions. The Question of Perspective in the Dolphin Epigram Anyte’s epigram on the unfortunate fate of a water animal is among her most powerful. She does not mention the species of the being in

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question, but so many details in the poem connote dolphins that it is quite reasonable to refer to this poem as ‘the dolphin epigram’: the creature swims joyfully, ‘snorts round’ the ship, and faces death when it has been stranded. Oὐkέti dὴ plvtoῖsin ἀgallόm1no6 p1lάg1ssin aὐxέn’ ἀnarrίcv byssόu1n ὀrnύm1no6, oὐdὲ p1rὶ skalmoı˜si n1ὼ6 p1rikallέa x1ίlh poiwύssv tἀmᾷ t1rpόm1no6 protomᾷ· ἀllά m1 porwyrέa pόntoy notὶ6 ὦs’ ἐpὶ xέrson, k1ῖmai dὲ ῥadinὰn tάnd1 par’ ἠiόna (AP 7.215 ¼ Geogh. 12) No longer shall I toss up my neck, lifting it from the depths rejoicing in the swinging seas, nor shall I snort round the ship’s brinks lovely with their rowlocks being pleased in my image on the figurehead; the purple swell of the sea cast me upon the shore, and I lie on this narrow shore.210 The epigram describes the movements of the dolphin and the element of water in a vivid manner, bearing some resemblance to the address to ‘glorious ships’ in Euripides’ Electra, in which the chorus recites: ‘the dolphin that loves the sound of the pipe /gamboled in company / with the dark-blue prows’ (435– 6).211 Arguably the movements are not depicted in the content of the words only but also in the phonetic form of the poem. According to Geoghegan the alliteration of s in the first four lines of this poem may be an onomatopoeic imitation of a dolphin leaping and snorting through the water.212 Among Anyte’s animal epigrams, the dolphin epigram is the only one written in the first-person singular, so that the role of the speaker is given to the animal itself. Gutzwiller claims, however, that despite appearances, the speaker is a human projecting into the persona of the dolphin.213 While this interpretation is worthy of consideration, a phenomenological analysis of self-other

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relations in the poem will show us that the picture is more complicated. Certainly the human perspective is present in the poem in numerous ways, the most obvious one being that we as humans are invited to adopt the dolphin’s perspective. An ambivalent situation arises when we are at the same time ‘inside’ the dolphin’s experience and spoken to by the dolphin. Earlier it was argued that all literary works have this double character of becoming alive within us, through our own activity of reading or of intent listening, and remaining nonetheless other to us, as somebody else’s speech.214 In the case of the epigram written in the first person, this is even more evident. The events are, indeed, shown from the dolphin’s perspective. The act of reading makes the dolphin’s movements and bodily positions present to us as experiential possibilities: ‘I toss up my neck, lifting it from the depths’, ‘I snort round the ship’s brinks’, ‘the purple swell of the sea cast me upon the shore’, ‘I lay on this narrow shore’. First we participate in a free and joyful movement, and then we face the agony of being trapped. Not only movements and body positions are revealed to us in this manner, but so is the environment of the sea in its benign and cruel aspects as well as the existence of humans. Humans are present in the poem through only through a cultural artifact, the ship. As readers we approach them from a peculiar angle: the dolphin sees the ship from the level of the sea surface and below, and pays attention to the side and rowlocks of the ship. In this respect Anyte allows us to transcend the typical human perspective to the world, even if one may argue that the dolphin’s perspective is still a humanised perspective. That a humanisation happens is, in a way, inevitable. First of all, neither Anyte nor any other human being has direct access to a dolphin’s way of sensing and experiencing, so she necessarily can only describe the perspective of the dolphin as she, a human being, imagines it. Secondly, the dolphin tells its story in a human language, Greek, hence giving it a form that is pregnant with human concepts and a human way of being in the world. A critical reader may also have some doubts about whether a dolphin would appreciate the figurehead of a ship as its own image, or the beauty of the rowlocks.

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Furthermore, the description the dolphin gives of itself is in part as if it saw itself from the outside, as if it described itself in the third person, from the human perspective, as a joyful creature that moves effortlessly in the water and has been immortalised in the figurehead of the ship. Therefore, the dolphin’s perspective is difficult to separate from the human perspective. As it was pointed out earlier, the human point of view is always present, owing to the fact that we as readers always remain aware of our own perspective as the more fundamental one for us. What is more, the first-person perspective not uncommon to funerary epigrams also puts us in the position of ‘you’ without addressing us directly: the poem is speech that is directed to us as readers, we are, perhaps ambivalently, the implied ‘you’ of the poem. While this kind of reduplication of perspective is typical to literary experience in general, yet Anyte’s intimate tone makes this aspect of literary intersubjectivity even more prominent. The first-person perspective is dominant, however, in this poem, and that perspective is that of the dolphin. The perspective of the humans in the ship is evoked only vaguely. The question may still arise, whether Anyte is, in fact, trying to describe animal experience or whether she is merely using the figure of the dolphin as a metaphor. As it was demonstrated earlier, literary animal figures are never merely metaphoric, for they always imply some kind of relationship to the animal in question. At the same time these figures have different characteristics that resonate with the reader in a number of ways that are not limited to their relationship with actual animals. At one level the poem describes the situation of an imaginary dolphin, allowing us to participate in its point of view and in a different way of being a body. Using her prior knowledge of dolphins, her knowledge of literature and her imagination, Anyte has described in these few lines the life and bitter end of an individual dolphin. The animal could even be a mythological animal like the hippocamp, and the reader would still have the same possibilities of relating to the imaginary animal’s way of moving and experiencing in the poem, had the writer described them with the same vividness.

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Reading Anyte’s poem, the reader transcends the norm of human embodiment and approaches non-human embodiment, in this case dolphin embodiment and the dolphin’s effortless movement in the deep waters. But the effortless movement of the dolphin resonates with our other experiences, perhaps those experiences of enjoyment and freedom present to us in different kinds of situations. As the poem describes the loss of that movement and the approaching death ‘on this narrow shore’,215 it evidently resonates with the human experience of mortality as losing all of one’s living possibilities, the end of all earthly pleasures and experiences. The reader experiences the poem as a meaningful whole, in which different layers of meaning come alive in an ambiguous manner. In the dolphin epigram, the similarities and dissimilarities between human and non-human embodiment have an important role. Still, the most important theme of the epigram is mortality, a theme that will be further elaborated on in the chapter on the marauder epigram. The Marauder Epigram as a Reflection of Loss: No Longer, as Before In addition to stating the fact of death, funeral epigrams often describe the activities of the protagonist, thereby making the loss experienced by the loved ones more tangible. Nevertheless, it is typical for epigrammatists of all eras to overlook the existential truth – or truth from a secular perspective – that one cannot know one’s own death, and to describe both the life and death from the point of view of the deceased person, as if the soul of the deceased was speaking. Anyte’s animal epigrams, on the other hand, were written as speech to the deceased or as descriptions of events seen from the outside. In the single case of using the first-person perspective, in the dolphin epigram, the epigram ends before the narrator dies.216 While the dolphin poem presents a reflection on mortality from the point of view of a dying animal (with the reservations suggested above), the focus of the marauder epigram is on losing a loved one.217 This epigram describes a violent death. Someone is killed, but who and by whom, is anything but clear:

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Oὐkέti m’ ὡ6 tὸ pάro6 pykinaῖ6 pt1rύg1ssin ἐrέssvn ὄrs1i6 ἐj 1ὐnῆ6 ὄrurio6 ἐgrόm1no6· ἦ gάr s’ ὑpnώonta sίni6 laurhdὸn ἐp1luὼn ἔkt1in1n laimῷ ῥίmwa kau1ὶ6 ὄnyxa. (AP 7.202 ¼ Geogh. 11) No longer, as before, plying with whirring wings, will you awaken me from bed at daybreak – for as you slept, a marauder approaching secretly killed you, one claw easily piercing your throat.218 The animal killed is one with wings, but there appears to be no unambiguous way of defining its species or kind. In point of fact, most efforts to interpret the epigram focus on this problem. Some interpreters have suggested the animal is a bird and, probably due to the creature’s association with morning, a rooster. Others, like Geoghegan, argue that the animal is indeed a cicada. Diane Rayor’s translation, which is quoted above, has Geoghegan’s analysis as its starting point. Relying on the rooster hypothesis, Gutzwiller comes up with a very different end result, in which, unlike in Rayor’s translation, the participle form of ἐgrόm1no6 is taken into account and the winged being is said to both awaken the speaker and to wake up: No longer as before will you rouse me from bed, flapping your thick wings as you awake in the morning. A marauder, coming stealthily upon you as you slept, swiftly placed his claw on your throat and killed you.219 Support can be found for both the cicada hypothesis and the bird hypothesis. Firstly, the epigram had the title ‘to the same, cicada’, in AP 7.202, referring to the previous epigram, AP 7.201, which is about a cicada. On the basis that the animal awakens the speaker with the sound of its wings, which would not be the typical behaviour of a rooster, it has been argued that the later decision to ignore the reference to the cicada was a mistake.220

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Those who prefer the bird hypothesis like to emphasise that the expression pt1rύg1ssin ἐrέssvn – meaning ‘rowing with wings’ or ‘flapping wings’ – normally refers to birds.221 Sappho, on the other hand, used the expression pύkna ptέra (1.11) to describe the fast-beating wings of sparrows.222 Perhaps the strongest evidence in favour of the bird hypothesis is that speaking about the throat of an insect seems somewhat far-fetched. This does not solve the problem, however. Another question to be considered is the way the killing happens. Geoghegan suggests that the meaning of ῥίmwa – rendered as ‘easily’ by Rayor and ‘swiftly’ by Gutzwiller – is in this case ‘heedlessly’ or ‘without caution’, and therefore the killing act is, in fact, involuntary.223 This is a very speculative suggestion, and is not really backed up by the fact that the killer is called sίni6, ‘a marauder’, that is, somebody who acts with intent, and that the whole scene revolves around the horror of killing an innocent sleeping being. As far as the killer is concerned, commentators are particularly interested in the singular accusative ὄnyxa, asking how the killer can pierce the victim’s throat with ‘one claw’ if it is a non-human animal. In Geoghegan’s view, the scene tells about a boy who tries to catch a cicada and accidently kills it, while Gutzwiller sees it as a story about a bird, the death of which is compared to the possible nighttime dangers faced by the narrator, a human being. Gutzwiller finds it possible that the killer is a fox, a weasel, or, indeed, a human being.224 Numerous other arguments for different solutions to identify the killer and the victim could be presented,225 but even so, we are left without a clear answer to the questions of who did it and who it was done to. A definite closure seems to escape all attempts of interpretation. For this reason the victim will from now on be referred to merely as ‘the winged being’.226 Luckily solving the question of who is not mandatory for the reader to enjoy and even comprehend the epigram. In point of fact, the emphasis is not on who it was but on what happened. The first words are indicative of the general tone of the epigram: ‘No longer, as

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before’. Indeed, this beginning resembles the beginning of the dolphin poem, which also begins with the expression ‘no longer’ (oὐkέti): ‘No longer [. . .] rejoicing in the swinging seas’. Like in the dolphin epigram, the speaker starts with the description of events that will no longer be repeated. The winged being will no longer wake her up in the morning, as it has done before. The difference, of course, is that the dolphin epigram appears as a general discussion of mortality, while the marauder epigram deals with loss, possibly the loss of a loved one. After all, in the dolphin epigram the narrator is the one who is dying, while in the marauder epigram the narrator is the one who is left behind. Certainly the approaching death is present as one’s own possibility in the marauder epigram as well, due to the already mentioned parallel between the description of the animal’s last moments and the dangers experienced by humans from unwanted nighttime visitors. In fact, the line ‘placed his claw on your throat and killed you’ can easily be associated with the idea of a knife on a human’s throat. The image of stabbing invites one not only to observe the described sight from the outside but also to shift empathetically to the position of the victim, who has something sharp and threatening on its throat. Even so, also the marauder’s activities are described in such detail that it is possible to empathise, up to a point, with that perspective as well: ‘a marauder, coming stealthily upon you as you slept, swiftly / placed his claw on your throat and killed you’. From this perspective, the scene appears as one of suspense – unless, of course, we adopt Geoghegan’s view that the whole killing happens by mistake. Yet the poem appears to be, more than anything, a description of loss, the speaker being the one who experiences this loss. It is through absence that the meaning of the loved one’s death manifests itself: the narrator experiences the morning as quiet, empty or somehow skewed, now that the winged being no longer lives. This experience of loss can be elucidated with the help of a Husserlian analysis of inner time-consciousness and its basic structure of impression– retention –protention.227 When one has an impression of something, for instance of a melody, this impression includes both a kind of remembrance of the past (retention) and a

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kind of anticipation of the future (protention). Yet those are only kinds of remembrances and anticipations. This is because retention does not imply thinking back or remembering actively. Neither does protention refer to thinking about the future. When the protentions of how an event or a verse continues fail to achieve their fulfilment, the melodic flow of the experience comes to a standstill. This halt may be accompanied by experiences of shock, amusement or lack. Our protentions are not fulfilled, and if nothing else grasps our attention, we focus on the lack. In the case of the events described in the marauder epigram, the dawn is not accompanied by the sounds made by the winged being, and this amounts to a lack, emptiness or loss. Even if the speaker knows that the winged being is dead she is not yet free from an earlier, habitual way of experiencing the dawn, the one which involves the presence of the winged being. Certain kinds of situations may inspire us to communicate our perceptions to somebody, and if we know that someone to be dead, the very orientation towards communication clashes with the thought of ‘I can’t do that any more, I can’t talk to that person any more.’ Before reflection, in the prereflective consciousness, it still seems possible to be in contact with the deceased, but in retrospect this possibility has to be denied. Therefore the idea expressed by Anyte and many other epigrammatists, of ‘no longer, as before’, expresses the core of that retrospective thought: I can no longer see the loved one, hear them, smell them, feel them, speak to them – it is impossible in principle even if my protentions promise the opposite. I do not actually expect to have here-and-now perceptions of the deceased being, but I cannot help but protending them to emerge in my experience. As Martin Heidegger and Beauvoir have pointed out, it may be easy to think of death as a universal event that everybody will have to face, yet far more difficult to acknowledge it as a genuine possibility for oneself or for one’s loved ones.228 It may well be argued that the marauder epigram, and Anyte’s animal epitaphs in general, are more realistic than her other epigrams, for in her animal epigrams the specificity and inevitability of death not just for anybody but for a

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specific being or for oneself becomes explicit. In most of her human epigrams Anyte discusses death only in the abstract.229 Non-human animals may be easier motives when it comes to describing the actual event of death, whereas descriptions of humans’ deaths appear to require more caution and tact. Even so, the similarity of the fates of all living beings allows the reader to confront their relationship with loss and mortality also on a more general level.230 The marauder epigram further shows, very clearly, the abruptness of death – of any death, in the sense that one first exists among other living beings and then does not. On the other hand, the poem also shows the facticity of dying. Death does not happen in the abstract but for some reason: disease, accident, or even killing.231 A violent scene like that of the marauder epigram is difficult to face in reality but a literary depiction of the scene makes it easier to deal with the event empathetically, as the actual body is absent. In the poem, the winged being is described in its last moments, after which its living body becomes a mere corpse. The narrator addresses the winged being after its death, either as a memory or in the afterlife. Certainly we need not decide what Anyte thought of life after death. From the point of view of existence of those who are left behind, it is obvious that one’s orientation towards communication with the loved one does not end at the moment of the loved one’s death, as we saw earlier. The loved one’s death brings about a sudden break with the past: the world as one has known it disintegrates, and everything has to be restructured. After all, the presence of the winged being is not intertwined only with how the speaker experiences the dawn, but with a whole network of experiences.232 Recovering from that turmoil or restructuring of one’s world, on the other hand, involves negotiation between the different levels of consciousness – reflective and prereflective – until they are no longer in evident dyssynchrony. This said, it must be acknowledged that the poem may also discuss loss on a more general level: not as losing a loved one but as losing love – in which case the winged being could be Eros233 – or as losing the ability to compose poetry, if we follow the lead of the cicada hypothesis and interpret the insect’s death in a similar way as in the

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case of the grasshopper and cicada epigram (AP 7.190), which will be discussed in the next subchapter. Whichever the case, loss presents itself in similar ways. Life as we know it comes to a standstill and loses meaning. At its core the epigram appears to be about just this: the disintegration of meaning in the face of loss, and the violence involved in the experience of loss. The Horse Epigram, the Dog Epigram, and the Grasshopper and Cicada Epigram Just like Anyte’s dolphin epigram (AP 7.215) and the marauder epigram (AP 7.202), her epigrams on a horse (AP 7.208), a dog (Poll. Onom. 5.48), and a grasshopper and a cicada (AP 7.190) were also written in the form of funeral epigrams. Of these the horse epigram most resembles actual inscriptions. As Gordon L. Fain puts it, it purports to be one: it positions the reader at the foot of a grave, as if the reader were a visitor in the graveyard, reading the inscription on a tombstone.234 Even the name of the person who has had the tomb built is mentioned (Damis). It was not rare that horses and dogs were commemorated in Hellenistic epitaphs, but it is more likely that even this epigram merely mimics actual inscriptions.235 Mnᾶma tόd1 wuimέnoy m1n1daΐoy 1ἵsato Dᾶmi6 ἵppoy, ἐp1ὶ stέrnon toῦd1 dawoinὸ6 Ἄrh6 tύc1, mέlan dέ oἱ aἷma talayrίnoy diὰ xrvtό6 zέss᾽, ἐpὶ d᾽ ἀrgalέan bῶlon ἔd1ys1 wόnῳ. (AP 7.208 ¼ Geogh. 9) This tomb Damis built for his steadfast war-horse pierced through the breast by gory Ares. The black blood bubbled through his stubborn hide drenching the ploughed earth with blood.236 The horse itself is described sparingly. In practice, we learn only the colour of its chest, the thickness of its hide, the steadfastness of its character and that it did not flinch in the face of death. Indeed, it is a fellow warrior. Damis the master is presented as being grateful for the

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horse’s loyalty in how he erects a memorial for the horse, and, apparently, orders an epitaph for its gravestone. The first line underlines the relationship between Damis and his horse, demonstrating that the bond persists even when the horse has died. Horses were highly valued in Greek culture, and a particularly praiseworthy horse could add to its owner’s prestige.237 Anyte’s way of approaching the animal is in accord with the glamour associated with horses in general, but this epigram is not rigidly ceremonious. Like most of the epigrams attributed to Anyte, it is but tinged with an acute sense of drama. The epigram places us in the middle of a trampled battleground to witness the brutal end of a valiant animal, inviting us to empathise with it. Like the marauder epigram, the horse epigram also describes a violent death. The horse epigram dwells longer on the event of death, however, and is certainly bloodier. However, in both poems death comes when a fatal wound is inflicted on the animal’s skin, which marks a borderline between the exterior world and the animal: the last defence is broken down. In the gushing blood the secret physiological life of the body rushes to the fore, prefiguring the transformation of the living body into a corpse. The epigram is written in the third person singular, which makes it a bit less intimate than some other animal epigrams by Anyte. It is as if we were witnessing a horrifying spectacle from a distance. Gutzwiller likens the cool and solemn style of this poem to that of the earliest Greek inscriptions.238 On the other hand, the poem describes the horse’s death in gory detail reminiscent of the Iliad, and, on the level of individual words, numerous Homeric allusions can be found. In Book 16 of the Iliad, there is a passage that particularly resembles Anyte’s horse epigram. In this passage (16.468– 9), which was briefly alluded to in the first case study, Sarpedon strikes Achilles’ mortal horse Pedasus on the right shoulder, with a fatal effect: ‘It screamed as it gasped its life away, / and fell bellowing in the dust, and the life flew from it.’239 This description has a similar dramatic tone as Anyte’s horse poem. Furthermore, the image of a bloody battleground is common in the Iliad. Soon after the passage dealing

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with Pedasus, the poet of the Iliad describes the fate of the warrior Sarpedon: ‘So Sarpedon lay sprawled in front of his horses and chariot, / roaring, and scrabbing at the blood-soaked dust.’ (16.485– 6).240 Sarpedon is pierced through the chest, and when Patroclus withdraws his spear, Sarpedon’s innards come out with the spearhead (16.502– 5). Here is yet another similarity to Anyte’s poem in which the horse is pierced through the breast. There are other resemblances between Anyte’s description of Damis’ horse and how warriors are described in the Iliad. For instance, Anyte uses the word m1n1dάϊo6 (‘steadfast’, ‘unflinching’ or ‘standing against the enemy’) as an attribute of the horse, but in the Iliad (12.247 and 13.228) the same word describes a quality according to which warriorship is evaluated.241 The horse is also said to have a ‘tough hide’ (talaύrino6), an epithet used for Ares in the Iliad, ‘enduring a bull’s-hide shield’.242 The main focus of the epigram is on the event of death itself, and one can almost see the blood streaming out of the horse’s chest in slow motion. Blood is also mentioned in the second and third lines of the poem. First Ares himself is described as gory (dawoinό6), subsequently we are shown how the black blood bursts through the hide of the horse. Finally, the blood of the dying horse drenches the earth. The poem speaks about camaraderie in extreme circumstances, but the horse hardly functions as a metaphor for camaraderie. More clearly than some other animal epigrams of Anyte’s, this one appears to describe the relationship between a human being and a non-human animal. Such a relationship is discussed in a considerably softer tone in the dog epitaph: Ὤl1o dή pot1 kaὶ sὺ polύrrizon parὰ uάmnon, Lόkri, wilowuόggvn ὠkytάth skylάkvn· toῖon ἐlawrίzonti t1ῷ ἐgkάtu1to kώlῳ ἰὸn ἀm1ίlikton poikilόd1iro6 ἔxi6. (Poll. Onom. 5.48 ¼ Geogh. 10) You, too, once perished by a thickly-rooted bush, Locris, swiftest of puppies who love to bark.

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Such pitiless poison was thrust into your nimble limb By a viper with iridescent neck.243 Allegedly, the word ‘Locris’ may refer to the dog’s name but also to the type of hound, the Locrian hound, which Xenophon mentions in Cynegeticus (10.1), recommending it for boar hunting.244 In the archaic epic, the word skύlaj usually refers to a young dog or puppy even though it has a later usage as an equivalent of ‘dog’.245 If the dog is interpreted to be a puppy, it immediately appears more playful and uncertain in its movements, and the snake’s attack seems even harsher to the reader than it would be otherwise. In any case, the dog is a female dog and probably a hunting dog, not only because it may be a Locrian hound, but also, as Geoghegan points out, because the locus of the poem, a bush (uάmno6), would be an appropriate environment for a hunting dog seeking its quarry.246 The characteristics of the dog aside, the sensuous aspects of the poem open up interesting avenues. According to Snyder, the numerous sharp consonants of the poem may imitate the barking of dogs.247 Gutzwiller, on the other hand, argues that the events are described as if through the eyes of the dog itself and that the last line about the snake with an iridescent (poikilόd1iro6) neck gives us the last thing the dog sees.248 From the point of view of these interpretations, the poem both imitates the sound of the dog and traces the movement of its gaze in the roots of the bush to the snake – the ‘root’ was not a root after all but a snake.249 In this way, it puts us inside the dog’s skin while maintaining also the tender gaze of the speaker, who addresses the deceased dog in the second person singular and picks out some of its characteristics. It is the ‘swiftest’ of ‘noiseloving’ (wilόwuoggo6) dogs, and its limbs move lightly, they ‘are nimble’ (ἐlawrίz1in).250 Anyte appears to emphasise the speed and agility of the dog’s movements as she first refers to it both as ὠkύ6 (swift) and as ἐlawrό6 (nimble). This is certainly a sharp contrast to the motionless corpse of the dog, the unspoken presence of which overshadows the epigram from the first line on.251 The shifting perspectives between ‘you’ and ‘I’ resemble the ones in the marauder epigram. In both epigrams, the cause of death and

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the killer are revealed in the last two lines. According to Ellen Greene, the beginning of the dog epigram, ὤl1o dή pot1 kaὶ sύ, which she translates as ‘you perished, even you, once’, shows that the speaker is not mourning merely the loss of this particular animal but reflecting on the nature of mortality in general: the dog has faced the fate of all living beings.252 Like in the marauder epigram, the description of losing a singular animal is also a contemplation of mortality on a universal level. Even if the Greeks used the word brotό6, ‘mortal’, only about humans, Anyte does not appear to distinguish between the mortality of humans and animals in this poem.253 Greene suggests that the words kaὶ sύ (‘even you’ or ‘you, too’) particularly emphasise the universality of mortality,254 and they may indicate that Anyte acknowledged this aspect of her poem.255 Gutzwiller points out that at the beginning of this poem the narrator addresses the deceased animal in the same way as Andromache addresses Hector’s dead body in the Iliad: ὤl1o, ‘you perished’.256 This expression may have been a conventional feature in women’s laments at funerals.257 According to Greene, however, Anyte’s approach is less emotional than that of women’s laments in general, and devoid of the bitterness that permeates Andromache’s lament. Both the victim and the killer are described as having praiseworthy qualities, hence in a dispassionate tone that is reminiscent of the tradition of the masculine funeral oration rather than women’s laments. In addition, the expression kaὶ sύ, which indicates the general reflection of mortality, was a kind of formulaic element in that tradition.258 Greene concludes that the dog poem effectively challenges the boundaries of the categories ‘feminine’ and ‘masculine’ as well as those of the categories ‘public’ and ‘private’.259 In addition to this, of course, the transgressiveness of Anyte’s poetry manifests itself also in how she describes animals with the same expressions that were used for war heroes in the Iliad. For their Homeric allusions as well as for their detailed descriptions of dying animals, the marauder epigram, horse epigram and dog epigram are all stylistically quite similar. All are at the same time dramatic and dispassionate. Anyte’s epigram about the

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grasshopper and cicada is, however, less dramatic and less detailed than the animal epigrams we have discussed so far. In fact, the authorship of the epigram has been subject to dispute. In the Greek Anthology the poem is attributed to Leonidas, but recent commentators agree that Anyte is the author.260 This is likely, because the epigram bears a resemblance to Anyte’s other epigrams, namely the pastoral epigrams and the ones commemorating humans: Ἀkrίdi tᾷ kat᾽ ἄroyran ἀhdόni, kaὶ dryokoίtᾳ tέttigi jynὸn tύmbon ἔt1yj1 Myrώ, paruέnion stάjasa kόra dάkry, dissὰ gὰr aὐtᾶ6 paίgni᾽ ὁ dysp1iuὴ6 ᾤx1t᾽ ἔxvn Ἀίda6. (AP 7.190 ¼ Geogh. 20) For her grasshopper, the nightingale of the fields, and her cicada, dweller in the oak, Myro made a common tomb, A girl shedding a maiden’s tear. For Hades, hard to dissuade, took away both her playthings.261 This epigram follows the model of the funerary inscription in the sense that it incorporates a direct reference to a tomb. Even if the poem is basically serious, Anyte may be playing with the implausibility of the idea that there would indeed be a gravestone with inscriptions at the grave of two insects. As a matter of fact, this epigram does not focus so much on the dead insects as on the girl Myro, who is mourning for them. In this sense, the epigram is in line with those epigrams by Anyte that commemorate humans, as four out of six of them describe the fate of young girls. The insects are sketched with a couple of strokes. The grasshopper (ἀkrί6) is characterised as ‘the songstress of the fields’ or ‘the nightingale of the fields’ (kat᾽ ἄroyran ἀhdώn) and the cicada (tέttij) as ‘the dweller in the oak’ (dryokoίth6). Gutzwiller points out that Anyte’s way of describing these animals evokes Homer’s line mentioning cicadas ‘perched on a tree in the wood’ (kau᾽ ὕlhn d1ndrέῳ ἐw1zόm1noi) (Il. 3.152) and that of Hesiod’s describing a cicada ‘sitting in a tree’ (d1ndrέῳ ἐw1zόm1no6) (Op. 583).262

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Grasshoppers and cicadas were highly valued for their song in Greek Antiquity, and there is some evidence that they were, in fact, kept as pets, probably in some kind of small cages.263 If this is the case, their position as pets must have been of a particular kind. Anyte describes them as the girl’s ‘playthings’. Gutzwiller suggests that Myro’s loss is predominantly the loss of the music made by the grasshopper and the cicada.264 There are many theories about Myro herself. The name could refer to another Hellenistic woman poet, Moero. If this is the case, the link to the world of poetry and music is even stronger than implied merely by the figures of singing insects. According to Gutzwiller, this might also indicate a function of the poem as Anyte’s self-portrait.265 Gutzwiller argues that the grasshopper and the cicada represent the sources of poetic inspiration, whereas the harsh realities of death encountered by the young girl would ‘parallel the limitations of art’.266 This seems like a fairly plausible interpretation. Later epigrammatists specifically took it upon themselves to write about cicadas, which may imply that they used the figures of the grasshopper and the cicada in a symbolic manner, as references to their artistic work. This, in turn, might suggest that they may have interpreted the meaning of the insects in Anyte’s epigram also as a reference to poetry. Another possible interpretation is that a loved one’s death has made the narrator feel that her source of inspiration has dried up and she is no longer capable of writing poetry. From this point of view, the references to childlike existence, such as ‘a girl’ (kόra), ‘maidenly’ (paruέnio6) and ‘playthings’ (paίgnia), as well as the contrast between childhood and the pitiless character of Hades, ‘hard to persuade’ (dysp1iuή6), could point towards helplessness and a loss of innocence in the face of bereavement. This interpretation would then indicate a link to the marauder epigram, in which another winged being is lost to death. The Goat Epigrams It is perhaps appropriate to end the case studies section with an analysis of the goat theme introduced at the beginning of the book, more precisely with a look at Anyte’s two goat epigrams, the one

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about a goat and children (AP 6.312) and the other about a goat and a nymph (AP 9.745). Both epigrams have been interpreted as ecphrastic. According to Geoghegan, the epigram on the goat and the children is most likely a description of a scene portrayed in a votive painting or relief. Such scenes have definitely been the subject of paintings and sculptures. Some gods and goddesses (the child Dionysus, Aphrodite and Ceres in Rome) are portrayed as riding on a goat, and Eros is portrayed as riding a goat chariot.267 Marilyn B. Skinner has argued that Anyte had a particular introspective approach to ecphrases of paintings and sculptures: ‘Far from offering a detached, strictly empirical report of visual experience, her ecphrases infer, from observed phenomena, the internal disposition of the object portrayed.’268 Skinner interprets especially Anyte’s poem about the statue of Aphrodite269 as an effort to create audience empathy with the visualised object. In her view the technique used by Anyte blurs the boundaries ‘between textual perceiver and thing perceived, and consequently between that perceiver and the reader’.270 Certainly also many of Anyte’s animal epigrams have the same tendency. As we saw in the beginning, the epigram about the goat and the children allows us, despite its brevity, to inhabit numerous perspectives. Typically of epigrams, its length is restricted to two elegiac couplets: Ἡnίa dή toi paῖd16 ἐnί, trάg1, woinikό1nta uέnt16 kaὶ lasίῳ wimὰ p1rὶ stόmati, ἵppia paid1ύoysi u1oῦ p1rὶ naὸn ἄ1ula, ὄwr᾽ aὐtoὺ6 worέh6 ἤpia t1rpomέnoy6. (AP 6.312 ¼ Geogh. 13) Putting red reins on you, goat, with a noseband round your shaggy mouth, the children train you in horse contests around the god’s temple so long as you bear them gently to their delight.271 In the first line the speaker addresses the goat directly, giving a very tactual feel for the goat’s experience of being harnessed. Within the

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world of the poem, the perspectives of the goat and the speaker appear to be the primary ones. The object of the gaze, namely the goat, is also given as a point of view, as if from the inside. Is it then of any importance for the reader that the poem may describe a relief or a painting? If one is aware of this possibility, the epigram certainly evokes not only a scene with a goat and children, but also a work of art. The poem is anything but a mere description of that work of art, however, for it guides the spectator’s eye in a particular way. In terms of embodiment, everything that was there in the first place, when we approached the poem without paying attention to its ecphrastic nature, is still there, such as the different perspectives and the sensuous characteristics of the poem. If anything, as an ecphrasis the epigram would gain a new layer that adds to its playfulness and appeals to the intellect. It evokes both the world of living, experiencing beings, and the pictorial world, which gives the viewer also a relationship to future and past events and movements despite its seeming stasis in the here and now. Geoghegan points out that Anyte has inserted a few puns in the poem. Firstly, as a rule children (paῖd16) are taught, but in this case it is they who teach or train (paid1ύv) the goat. Secondly, the expression referring to horse contests (ἵppia [. . .] ἄ1ula) together with the word referring to a god (u1ό6) may be combined in order to evoke ἵppio6 (of horses) as the epithet of a god. The god in question could be Poseidon as the lord of horses but also Athena or Hera. Thirdly, the verb wor1ῖn is, of course, used sometimes by Homer in regard to horses pulling the chariots of heroes (cf. Il. 2.770), so when Anyte uses this expression about a goat pulling the small carriage of children, her reference to Homer may be understood as humorous.272 The numerous allusions of the poem are transgressive in the sense described earlier, that is, they demean the sublime and elevate the lowly. These subtleties are not easily accessible to non-connoisseurs of Greek literature, but the mischievous spirit of the poem is clear even in most translations. While the children imitate, and, perhaps, make fun of the adults’ world, the goat may turn the tables again to the disadvantage of the humans.273 Thereby the allusion to the

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subversive power of children’s playing is followed by an allusion to the subversive power of a non-human world. Anyte’s other goat epigram, the one about a goat and a nymph, is also light in tone and believed to be ecphrastic. According to the lemmatist, it describes a bronze sculpture.274 Qά1o tὸn Bromίoy k1raὸn trάgon, ὡ6 ἀg1rώxv6 ὄmma katὰ lasiᾶn gaῦron ἔx1i g1nύvn kydiόvn ὅti oῦ uάm᾽ ἐn oὔr1sin ἀmwὶ parῇda bόstryxon 1ἰ6 ῥodέan Naῒ6 ἔd1kto xέra. (AP 9.745 ¼ Geogh. 14)275 Look at Bromius’ horned goat, how haughtily he casts his arrogant eye down over his shaggy face, Proud because often in the mountains Nais took the tuft along his cheek into her rosy hand.276 The silliness of the uppity goat is certainly depicted in a vivid way in this epigram, but how should we interpret the idea that the nymph Nais takes ‘the tuft along his cheek’ in her hand? In Greek mythology, Nais277 is one of the fresh water nymphs, the Naiads, who were considered to be of a jealous and revengeful nature. Nais is connected to the stock character of bucolic poetry, the shepherd Daphnis, whose infidelity she is said to have retaliated to by blinding him. Later, when Daphnis falls into a river by accident, other nymphs let him drown. From this perspective, Nais’ caress is anything but harmless. A link to the nymphs can also be found in the myth of Dionysus, to whom Anyte refers with the name Bromius (bromios, ‘boisterous’, ‘noisy’). According to one myth, Zeus turned his son Dionysus into a goat to hide him from the jealous Hera, and nymphs raised him in that form until he was a young man.278 The poem may also allude to the goat-legged and horned god Pan, who was, according to some legends, the son of Dionysus. The role of goats in Dionysus’ festivities is also well known: the chorus of satyrs were dressed in outfits reminiscent of goats, and a goat was sacrificed in Dionysus’ honour.279

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Though it is possible to read the poem as merely a mildly amusing ecphrasis inspired by a sculpture or a painting, it is typical of Anyte to play with opposites and to introduce darker tones among the brighter ones, as we can see already in the first goat poem (AP 6.312), at the end of which there is a suggestion that the goat might put a sudden end to the children’s game. Anyte could also use ‘Nais’ (Naΐ6) as a figurative way of saying ‘water’, as Geoghegan suggests. Subsequently, the poem would describe how the goat’s beard gets wet when he drinks from a mountain stream. According to Geoghegan the goat would be proud, because ‘he, in drinking, got his beard into the water so that it became wet, and he thinks that this is due to the fact that a Nymph found him so beautiful that she wanted to drag him into the spring’.280 This interpretation is in harmony with Anyte’s affinity for a play between the serious and the humorous. The play between the opposites is repeated on the level of vocabulary when she describes the lowly goat with lofty words: ἀg1rώxv6 (‘lordly’, ‘haughtily’), gaῦro6 (‘disdainful’, ‘exulting’) and kydiά1in (‘be proud’).281 This transgressive practice amplifies the somewhat twisted undercurrent of the poem. Like so many of Anyte’s epigrams, this one also presents numerous viewpoints. In the beginning we see the goat as if from the outside, and witness how he ‘casts his arrogant eye down over his shaggy face’.282 Then the perspective shifts, and we are suddenly in the past, possibly in the memories of the goat. Now we get an explanation of why he is proud: ‘because often in the mountains Nais took the tuft along his cheek into her rosy hand’. Hence the goat is given to us in a dual manner, as from the outside, when his appearance and demeanour are described, and also through a recollection of past events. In the first case the goat can be empathised with as another living being which one may encounter and which manifests subjectivity, whereas in the second case we are, perhaps, within the stream of his consciousness. The epigrammatist, however, adheres to the third person when she refers to the goat. As the focus shifts to the past, that is, to the remembered events, the goat’s point of view is adopted more clearly than in the beginning.

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This shift is interesting because often in everyday life we experience similar shifts when people relate their experiences, or when we come to understand an animal’s behaviour against the backdrop of its past. In those cases empathy gains a new profundity through a narrative. In the goat and nymph epigram, there is, in a way, a narrative within a narrative. The poem also appeals to the visual, tactual and proprioceptive senses. One of the first things Anyte brings to our awareness is the fact that the goat is horned, k1raό6. The sharpness of the horns is contrasted with the softness of the Naiad’s touch, ‘rosy’ (ῥόd1o6) like a caress. The Naiad is described with only a few words, yet the associations pertaining to her are rich: a womanly body combined with a certain unpredictability and a watery habitat. Here Anyte also seems to contrast the masculinity and self-righteousness of the bearded he-goat with the femininity and deceptiveness of the Naiad. The references to the water, the goat’s shagginess and horns, and the caress-like contact that takes place between the Naiad and the goat, all appeal to the sense of touch, even though they certainly also have a visual meaning. As for the Naiad’s ‘rosy’ touch, olfactory connotations are evoked along with tactual and visual ones. Certainly the sense of vision is also very clearly present in the poem, as the whole description begins with an invitation to look (ua1ῖsuai) at the goat. But not only is the goat seen, he is also a beholder, when he ‘casts his arrogant eye down over his shaggy face’. Interestingly, the reader’s gaze is first directed at the goat, but then it is located alongside or inside the goat’s gaze, which proceeds from its own face to the past time in the mountains. The last shift in the back-and-forth movement of gazing happens when the Naiad, at least in the goat’s imagination, looks at his face appreciatively. The poem also opens up a possibility to empathise with the goat’s proprioceptive awareness, that is, with his awareness of his body position, among other things, when his haughty manner is described in the first two lines. This brings us to the more general question of Anyte’s animal descriptions. Anyte certainly does not describe animals merely as representatives of their species, yet her descriptions appear realistic

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and tap into the feelings the audience has for non-human animals. Anyte’s approach to animals is sympathetic even in the one case in which she appears to laugh gently at the animal, namely in the epigram about the goat and the nymph. The animals are given to us both from the outside as well as from the inside. In other words, their behaviour is observed, but we get to see the world as if through their eyes. Even when Anyte discusses more abstract questions such as mortality, the joy of life or artistic creation, she dwells on the specific embodiment of an animal, enriching her description through this particular variation of being a sensuous, experiencing body. Without being sentimental, Anyte also describes the bond between non-human animals and ourselves: we enjoy the playful behaviour of a dog or a dolphin, we appreciate the camaraderie of a horse, we are absorbed in the inner world of a goat, we understand the sounds of birds, grasshoppers and cicadas as the song of fellow musicians; we are so habituated to the presence of our animal companions that when these animals die, we face an emptiness. Through Anyte’s animal epigrams, the common fates of humans and non-human animals come to the fore. Both are vulnerable and mortal, both are connected to other living beings. Anyte’s animals do not appear as altogether foreign and unapproachable; instead, the realm of human experience is expanded through their communicative and inviting otherness.

Summary The four case studies examined in this section represent different literary genres: the Homeric epic, the Attic drama and the epigram. This bears on the ways animals are described and on the devices with which they are depicted. At first glance, the ‘objective’ and ‘realistic’ point of view and the narrative manner of the Homeric epics seem to adhere to formulaic and repetitive depictions of animals in similes, which can therefore be classified for instance as ‘marauding animals similes’. However, the analysis of the Iliadic animal similes shows that animals are often described briefly within their surroundings (habitats, haunts and lairs), and as experiencing, sentient beings.

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Rapid shifts of focus inside the simile offer us different points of views, and the poet’s genius is manifested in his ability, by few but apt words, to evoke the embodiment of animals. In addition to choral songs, the Attic drama consists of speeches in which animals appear mainly in expressive metaphors, as comparisons to humans. Animals have almost no relevant part in the plot and characters rarely mention any actual animals. Against this concentration on mere human relationships with humans, the tragedy analysed here, Sophocles’ Philoctetes, is exceptional for the protagonist’s three solemn addresses to wild animals living in Lemnos (along with a few scattered references to animals). Apostrophe is the usual device of Attic tragedies, but apostrophes to animals in extant tragedies are extremely rare. Apostrophising animal quarries is, however, a successful poetic device to depict not only Philoctetes’ reliance on his surroundings but also his empathising process: in the course of the play Philoctetes is forced to put himself in the position of his prey, especially that of birds, and the hunter has to imagine what it is to be like a helpless victim. Both Philoctetes and Aristophanes’ Birds can be viewed as participating in the debate over nature vs. culture ( phusis vs. nomos), which was a lively one during the Classical period. The protagonists of both dramas are living in primitive settings. While the transgressing of the boundaries between the human and the animal is the basic device of the Aristophanean comedy, The Birds also offers the birds’ point of view meditated by the characters and by the chorus of birds. Like Philoctetes, The Birds show what it is to be hunted – often by torturous means – by humans. The embodiment of birds is reflected in the comic narrative about the building of the wall of the Nephelococcygia (birds acting like humans). The embodiment is also present in the descriptions of metamorphic bodies. These make humans look like birds, but they do not necessarily depict them realising the full potential of bird bodies by showing the humans, for example, attempting experiments with flying. The birds’ point of view depicted in The Birds – as well as the many animal similes in the Iliad and all Philoctetes’ apostrophes – linked with the rivalry of dominance between humans and other

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animals in which animals are often on the losing side. In comparison to this, Anyte’s epigrams, which were written on the threshold of the Hellenistic period and represent the genre of personal poetry, appear to dwell less on the juxtaposition of humans and animals. Fluidly moving between addressing animals as ‘you’, describing them in the third person, and, in one case even assimilating the animal’s point of view with the speaker’s, Anyte makes the bodily existence and vulnerability of animals tangible. These features of Anyte’s epigrams make them easily accessible to the modern reader. Yet they also point backwards, towards the Homeric vocabulary and imagery of animals and embodiment.

CONCLUSION

This book was driven by three questions: (a) How did Greek poets depict animals? (b) What kinds of relationships to non-human animals is it possible to discern from Greek literature? (c) What kinds of empathetic relationships to the non-human other do these depictions open up to the reader? Part I sketched a phenomenological approach to studying ancient Greek literature and its animal figures. We described how literature enables communication across millennia and a particular intimacy in a relationship to the other, one that lacks the reciprocity of everyday encounters but facilitates adopting the other’s perspective. It was suggested that empathy can also encompass the relationship to the other opened up by literature, and that empathy can be defined as a partial immersion in the other’s situation and perspective. In addition, it was shown that in some cases literature also enables the reader to, as if, adopt a non-human animal’s point of view, even if this point of view is always mediated by a human one and is never genuinely non-human. The implications of this intertwining were elucidated through analyses of anthropocentrism, anthropomorphism and hybridism. In our analysis it emerged that although the very medium of literature, the human language, necessarily adds a human layer to descriptions of non-human animals, different texts involve different levels of anthropomorphism. In literature, it turns out, anthropomorphism is not the flaw it is considered to be in science.

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Part II began with a reflection on the seeming lack of animal poetry in the Greek corpus available to modern readers (especially when compared to the abundance of animals in Greek visual arts) as well as on the subsidiary role of animals in Greek poetry. Animals appear to function namely as ‘mere’ symbols and a comparison matrix for human characters and their situations. However, although Greek poems seldom seem to express an interest in animals qua animals – and in animals as fascinating and alluring in their alterity – at least addressing animals (such as when the Cyclops Polyphemus addresses his ram in the Odyssey) can function as a device to pay attention to that individual animal and the human– animal relationship. Furthermore, we saw how the discussion on mimetic arts, whether on poetry or on pictorial art, emphasises the likeness as well as the liveliness of the animals depicted. In his Rhetoric (3.11), Aristotle praises Homer’s talent for lively description and equates it with expressing action. Life-likeness of depicted animals comes to pass thus when animals are described as active, in situation accessible to an audience, such as hunting and parenting. Some writers, like Philostratus in his Life of Apollonius of Tyana, imply that most people need the aid of an artistic rendering in order to adopt an animal’s perspective. Despite the rich discussion on feeling the same emotions as fictional (human) characters and feeling pity over character’s suffering in Greek poetics, there are few conspicuous scenes of humans pitying the lot of suffering animals or an explicitly expressed sympathy for suffering animals in Greek poetry. This lack has often been interpreted as evidence of bias against non-human others and of the anthropocentric worldview of the Greeks. We questioned this presupposition, however, in Part I and also in Part III, which dealt with the relationship between humans and animals in Greek Literature on the everyday and imaginary levels as well as with Greek attitudes to similarities between humans and nonhuman animals. The analysis of the attitudes of the Greeks towards animals revealed that the concept of anthropocentrism as such does not do justice to the nuances and dynamics of those attitudes. At the first glance, statements about human exceptionalism and on behalf of a strong human– animal distinction seem to encapsulate

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the fundamental Greek attitude to animals. However, no strong demonisation of animals exists, despite how Plato and Aristotle speak about predatory (the¯rio¯de¯s) vices as the worst kind of degeneration. The distinction between predatory/wild and tame/civilised is not between humans and other animals. Instead, it is between some humans (and some animals) who are tame and some humans (and some animals) that are wild and predatory. The phrase, ‘humans and other animals’ (ta alla zo¯a) implies a physical and psychological continuity, which is conspicuous not only in the rich variety of Greek metamorphic myths but also in the rich animal imagery of Greek poetry. However, just because animals were omnipresent and the ancient economy was highly dependent on animal labour and animals’ bodies as material for commodities, few descriptions can be found on the human– animal relationship that go beyond dominion and concentrating on the instrumental value of animals – also when speaking of pets or personal animals. Animals were for humans to use as slaves were for free citizens. Against this basic dominance, Greek poetry did offer for its audience a possibility to dwell on their empathy with non-human others. Along with addressing animals, other devices to immerse the audience more deeply into the animal’s situation and perspective were in use in Greek poetry, including prosopopoeia (speech in character) and comparisons in which animals were the objects of comparison (tenor). Part IV, the Case Studies section, examined the Greek devices for describing animals and human– animal relationships and ways of inviting the reader’s empathy in three different genres: the Homeric epics (animal similes in the Iliad), the Attic drama (Sophocles’ Philoctetes and Aristophanes’ Birds) and epigrams (Anyte’s animal epigrams). A basic device in the Iliad to make animals appear as lifelike and lively is to focus on their movements and other bodily expressions, which the poet evokes with a few select words. However, animals in animal similes seems to be depicted as more genuinely having a value of their own than actual animals, animals in the narrative proper. Therefore, many Iliadic animal similes are like short animal poems. The Attic tragedy, which seldom uses animals in other ways than as efficient metaphors, has at least one example of a more

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direct approach to animals, namely Sophocles’ existential tragedy, Philoctetes. Animal apostrophes, that is, the solemn addressing of animals, do not merely describe the atmosphere of a desolated island (an unusual scene in the Attic drama) but they also show the development of the human – animal relationship from mere instrumental use to a limited participation in the others’ situation. In Sophocles’ play Philoctetes becomes one of the prey animals, which does not necessarily imply a descent into ‘brutality’ or a weakened mental state but a recognition of one’s animality – our basic animal status. In Aristophanes’ Birds, the human characters are immigrants in the birds’ realm and society. Thanks to this coexistence, observations of bird abilities and behaviours are ample in this play. Besides this, the fate of birds as the prey of humans (fowling carried out with torturous methods) is presented both by the protagonist (Peisetaerus) and the chorus of birds. There are also other non-anthropocentric – in a way ‘ornithocentric’ – descriptions of birds’ situation spoken mainly by the bird chorus. Humanising birds, even in comical ways, also makes it possible to give voice to the birds’ point of view, to be immersed in the situation and perspective of birds. Although the embodiment of birds is reflected in many ways, birds’ ability to fly is not presented to the extent one would expect. It is suggested that the reason for this (besides the restrictions of the stage: though Greek theatre had some stage technique, flying is not easy to re-enact) is that, for the Greeks, birds were not only creatures with wings, feathers and beaks but also ones with two feet who stood upright, making them like humans. In Anyte’s poetry, the joyful movements of a hunting dog in its hunting grounds and a dolphin in its watery habitat are contrasted with the abruptness of death. In this way, non-human existence is described as parallel to human existence, equally vulnerable to violence and twists of fate. And here the circle closes, as also in the Iliad the fundamental vulnerability and expressivity of animal bodies is the background for the ample use of animal similes. From Homer to Sophocles, Aristophanes and Anyte, the expressive bodies of nonhuman animals are the object of wonder, laughter and sympathy. Descriptions of animal characteristics do more than make our own

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strengths and weaknesses explicit or aid us in dealing with existential questions such as mortality in more detail than might otherwise be possible: these descriptions also make us face the imagined or real borderlines between ourselves and animals, or between ourselves and some other ‘others’. In Greek literature, not unlike in the literature of our own time, animals are simultaneously real and metaphoric. They help us deal with questions of human existence while still appearing as themselves, speaking to us in their alterity.

NOTES

Introduction

Ἐmpáu1ia is a Greek Word

1. See the extensive bibliographies in Gordon Lindsay Campbell (ed.), The Oxford Handbook of Animals in Classical Thought and Life (Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 2014). A good introduction to the methodologies of Human-Animal Studies in combination with the Classics is in Cristiana Franco, Shameless. The Canine and the Feminine in Ancient Greece (Berkeley, California: University of California Press, 2014), pp. 161 – 84. 2. Harry F. Mallgrave and Eleftherios Ikonomou, ‘Introduction’, in Robert Vischer, Conrad Fiedler, Heinrich Wo¨lfflin, Adolf Go¨ller, Hildebrand Adolf and August Schmarsow, Empathy, Form, and Space: Problems in German Aesthetics, 1873– 1893, trans. Harry F. Mallgrave and Eleftherios Ikonomou, The Getty Center Publication Programs, Texts and Documents (Santa Monica, CA: Getty Center for the History of Art and the Humanities, 1994), pp. 22 – 3, 71n64. 3. This idea will be discussed in detail in Part I of the book. For the significance of situation in the interpretation of animal behaviour, see Erika Ruonakoski, ‘Phenomenology and the Study of Animal Behavior’, in Christian Lotz and Corinne Painter (eds), Phenomenology and the Non-Human Animal (Dordrecht: Springer, 2007), pp. 75– 84. 4. LSJ s.v. Aristotle On Dreams 2.15. For example, Plutarch uses ἐmpauή6 to refer to a mad dog’s serious and strong affects (Mor. 963c). 5. LSJ s.v. The adjective occurs for the first time in the Attic comedy fragment but both Plato and Aristotle used the verb (see Part II of this book). 6. See Part II. 7. See Part II and Tua Korhonen, ‘On Human-animal Sexual Relationships in Aelian’s Natura Animalium’, Arctos 46 (2012), p. 71. 8. LSJ s.v. and Tua Korhonen ‘Antiikin misantrooppi’, La¨hde 5 (2008), p. 142 [in Finnish, on ancient misanthropy].

NOTES

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Reading Ancient Greek Literature through Phenomenology

1. In this context the most important sources are Edmund Husserl, Cartesian Meditations, trans. Dorion Cairns (Dordrecht: Kluwer, 1999); Cartesianische Meditationen und Pariser Vortra¨ge, Husserliana Band I (Haag: Martinus Nijhoff, 1950); Edmund Husserl, Ideen zu einer reinen Pha¨nomenologie und pha¨nomenologischen Philosophie, Zweites Buch: Pha¨nomenologischen Untersuchungen zur Konstitution, Husserliana Band IV (Haag: Martinus Nijhoff, 1952); Maurice Merleau-Ponty, Phenomenology of Perception, trans. Donald A. Landes (Abingdon: Routledge, 2012); Phe´nome´nologie de la perception [1945] (Paris: Gallimard, 1998); Wolfgang Iser, The Act of Reading: A Theory of Aesthetic Response (Baltimore: John Hopkins University Press, 1980); Der Akt des Lesens: Theorie a¨sthetischer Wirkung (Mu¨nchen, Wilhelm Fink, 1976); Simone de Beauvoir’s essays on literature; Edith Stein, On the Problem of Empathy [1964], The Collected Works of Edith Stein, Volume Three, trans. Waltraut Stein (Washington, DC: ICS Publications, 1989); Zur Problem der Einfu¨hlung (Halle: Buchdru¨ckerei des Waisenhauses, 1917); Erika Ruonakoski, Ela¨imen tuttuus ja vieraus: Fenomenologisen empatiateorian uudelleentulkinta ja sen sovellus vieraslajisia ela¨imia¨ koskevaan kokemukseen (Helsinki: Tutkijaliitto, 2011). 2. For a discussion of the subject’s relationship to the other’s experience or the other as experiencing, see e.g. Merleau-Ponty, Phenomenology; MerleauPonty, Phe´nome´nologie; Husserl, Cartesian Meditations; Husserl, Cartesianische Meditationen. 3. See e.g. Wolfgang Iser, Prospecting: From Reader Response to Literary Anthropology (Baltimore, MD: John Hopkins University Press, 1989), pp. 5, 9. 4. It has been argued that texts were typically read aloud in the classical period and even before it, and that, in point of fact, one had to read them aloud to make sense of them, due to scriptio continua used until late Antiquity. See e.g. Jesper Svenbro, Phrasikleia: Anthtropologie de la lecture en Gre`ce ancienne (Paris: E´ditions la de´couverte, 1988), p. 54. According to Svenbro, a Greek literary text is not complete before the reader lends his voice to the writer, due to the use of scriptio continua, i.e., due to writing without word dividers, such as punctuation or spaces between words. Ibid.; cf. e.g. Alexander Gavrilov, ‘Techniques of Reading in Classical Antiquity’, CQ, New Series, 47:1 (1997), pp. 56 – 73. 5. For a modern reader, reading a text with blank spaces between the words is considerably easier than reading a text without spaces. Why, then, did the Greeks, continue to use scriptio continua for well over a thousand years? According to Gregory Nagy, the use of scriptio continua promoted ‘the phonological realism of continuity in speaking or singing or reciting in ways that people really spoke and sang and recited’. In other words, it would have prevented the reader from stopping at a wrong place and from ‘ruining the rhythmic and melodic contour of the phrasing’. Gregory Nagy, ‘Performance and Text in Ancient Greece’, in George Boys-Stones, Barbara Graziosi, and

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6. 7.

8.

9.

10.

NOTES TO PAGES 9 –12 Phiroze Vasunia, The Oxford Handbook of Hellenic Studies (Oxford: Oxford University Press, 2009), pp. 417– 31. It is not unanimously agreed upon, however, that reading aloud was the norm in Graeco-Roman Antiquity. For instance, Myles Burnyeat questions this idea by referring to passages such as Plotinus’ Enneads 1.4.10, in which Plotinus discusses reading as an example of activities without self-reflective awareness: Plotinus’ argument that one can read without being really aware of the act of reading itself would make no sense if he were referring to reading aloud. Myles Fredric Burnyeat, ‘Postscript on Silent Reading’, CQ, New Series, 47:1 (1997), p. 76. Similarly, Alexander Gavrilov reinterprets several texts that include references to reading and argues that silent reading must have been commonplace in ancient Greece. He also claims that silent reading and reading aloud are intertwined in the sense that when we read silently there is still a ‘voice’ within us. He calls this phenomenon ‘subvocalisation’, pointing out that the only way to read fluently aloud is by first reading the next words silently. While Gavrilov’s concept of subvocalization implies a somewhat contradictory idea of ‘inaudible reading aloud’, it can be agreed, along with Nagy, that the basic phenomenon Gavrilov is referring to is familiar to readers of our time, at least. See Gavrilov, ‘Techniques of Reading’, p. 60. Another argument for the intertwining of silent reading and reading aloud would be that one perceives bigger chunks of text at a time, thereby knowing beforehand what one will read aloud next. Iser, The Act of Reading, 74. Translation Diane Rayor, in Diane Rayor (ed.), Sappho’s Lyre: Archaic Lyric and Women Poets of Ancient Greece (Berkeley: University of California Press, 1991), p. 127. For a discussion of the goat epigram as ecphrastic, see D. Geoghegan, Anyte: The Epigrams: A Critical Edition with Commentary (Roma: Edizioni dell’Ateneo & Bizarri, 1979), p. 131. For a critique of art as representation, see Martin Heidegger, ‘The Origin of the Work of Art’, Basic Writings: From Being and Time (1927) to the Task of Thinking (1964) (San Francisco, CA: HarperSanFrancisco, 1993). One of Heidegger’s examples is van Gogh’s painting A Pair of Shoes (1885). According to him, it is clear that the painting does not represent a pair of shoes – the painting does not ‘draw a likeness from something actual’ to transpose it into a product of artistic production. Instead it gives the viewer the universal essence of the shoe as a tool or equipment (Zeug), it allows us to understand what the shoe-tool is in truth. Ibid., pp. 161– 2. The painting does this by making present a network of meanings and practices, by showing the ‘toolness’ or ‘equipmental being’ of the shoe by evoking the fields on which it has walked, the heavy toil of the peasant woman who has used it: ‘In the shoes vibrates the silent call of the earth, its quiet gift of the ripening corn and its unexplained self-refusal in the fallow desolation of the wintry field.’ Ibid., p. 159. Naturally, the typical goat may itself be different in different times and cultures due to evolutional changes and breeding preferences.

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11. Simone de Beauvoir exemplifies this kind of understanding of historically lived subjectivity and meanings in The Second Sex. Simone de Beauvoir, The Second Sex, trans. Constance Borde and Sheila Malovany-Chevallier (New York: Alfred A. Knopf, 2010); Simone de Beauvoir, Le deuxie`me sexe I: Les faits et les mythes [1949] (Paris: Gallimard, 2008); Le deuxie`me sexe II: L’expe´rience ve´cue [1949] (Paris: Gallimard, 2008). A similar approach is applied in this study. See also Erika Ruonakoski, ‘Literature as a Means of Communication: A Beauvoirian Interpretation of an Ancient Greek Poem’, Sapere Aude, Vol. 3, No. 6 (2012), pp. 250– 70, available at http://periodicos.pucminas.br/index. php/SapereAude/article/view/4785/4998 (accessed 8 May 2015); Erika Ruonakoski, ‘Interdisciplinarity in The Second Sex: Between Phenomenology and Psychoanalysis’, in Tove Pettersen and Annlaug Bjørsnøs (eds), Simone de Beauvoir – A Humanist Thinker (Leiden: Brill/Rodopi, 2015), pp. 41– 56. 12. See Husserl, Cartesian Meditations; Husserl, Cartesianische Meditationen; Husserl, Ideen II. 13. Ibid., pp. 158 – 9. 14. See Edmund Husserl, ‘Grundlegende Untersuchungen zum pha¨nomenologischen Ursprung der Ra¨umlickeit der Natur (1934)’, in Marvin Farber (ed.), Philosophical Essays in Memory of Edmund Husserl (Cambridge, MA: Harvard University Press, 1940), pp. 307–25. 15. See e.g. Merleau-Ponty, Phenomenology, pp. xx– xxxv, 252, 263; Merleau-Ponty, Phe´nome´nologie, pp. i –xvi, 280, 291. 16. Husserl, Ideen II, pp. 11 – 12, 152, 216, 254 – 69; Merleau-Ponty, Phenomenology, pp. 108, 139; Merleau-Ponty Phe´nome´nologie, pp. 123, 160. 17. Merleau-Ponty, Phenomenology, pp. 140, 151; Phe´nome´nologie, pp. 161, 175. 18. Merleau-Ponty, Phenomenology, p. 140; Phe´nome´nologie, p. 161. 19. In point of fact, Husserl makes a distinction between the intentionality of the act and operative intentionality ( fungierende Intentionalita¨t). Intentionality of the act means theoretical, axiological and practical positings of things as such and such, while operative intentionality can be considered to be more fundamental and means the general directedness of all our actions towards the world. See also Merleau-Ponty Phenomenology, pp. xxxi – xxxii; Merleau-Ponty, Phe´nome´nologie, pp. xii – xiii. 20. For a defence of the theory theory of mind, see K. Vogeley, P. Bussfeld, A. Newen, S. Herrman, F. Happe´, P. Falkat, W. Mater, N. J. Shah, G. R. Fink and K. Zilles, ‘Mind Reading: Neural Mechanisms of Theory of Mind and SelfPerspective’, NeuroImage, Vol. 14 (2001), pp. 170– 81. For a phenomenological critique of this theory, see e.g. Dan Zahavi, ‘The Embodied SelfAwareness in the Infant: A Challenge to the Theory-Theory of Mind’, in Dan Zahavi, Thor Gru¨nbaum and Josef Parnas (eds), The Structure and Development of Self-Consciousness (Amsterdam: John Benjamins Publishing, 2004), pp. 35– 6; and Shaun Gallagher and Dan Zahavi, The Phenomenological Mind: An Introduction to Philosophy of Mind and Cognitive Science (London: Routledge, 2008), pp. 171 – 2. For another critique of this theory and a defence of the

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21. 22. 23.

24.

25.

26.

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so-called simulation theory, see Vittorio Gallese and Alvin Goldman, ‘Mirror Neurons and the Simulation Theory of Mind-Reading’, Trends in Cognitive Science, Vol. 2, No. 12, December (1998), pp. 493– 541. According to the simulation theory, understanding the other is based on simulating their mental states without a theory of these states. The phenomenological approach differs from both the theory theory of mind and the simulation theory. See Stein, Zur Problem der Einfu¨hlung, p. 66. See Merleau-Ponty, Phenomenology, p. 225; Merleau-Ponty, Phe´nome´nologie, p. 215. This description is based on Merleau-Ponty’s views on animal behaviour. He famously approves of Jakob von Uexku¨ll’s (1864 – 1944) idea of explaining animal behaviour with musical metaphors, and particularly of the idea that each organism is ‘a melody which sings itself’. Maurice Merleau-Ponty, La structure du comportement [1942] (Paris: Quadrige / PUF, 1990), p. 173; Maurice Merleau-Ponty, The Structure of Behavior, trans. Alden L. Fisher (Pittsburgh: Duquesne University Press, 1998), p. 159. For Uexku¨ll’s musical metaphors as well as for Merleau-Ponty’s theme of the animal melody, see Brett Buchanan, Onto-Ethologies: The Animal Environments of Uexku¨ll, Heidegger, Merleau-Ponty, and Deleuze (Ithaca, NY: SUNY Press, 2008), pp. 26 – 8, 115– 49. For the latter, see also Ruonakoski, Ela¨imen tuttuus ja vieraus, pp. 75, 104– 5. MerleauPonty describes an animal’s relationship to its situation: ‘[The situation] calls for the animal’s movements – just as the first notes of the melody call for a certain mode of resolution’. Merleau-Ponty, Phenomenology, p. 81, trans. Donald A. Landes; Merleau-Ponty, Phe´nome´nologie, p. 93. It is noteworthy that Husserl also describes inner time-consciousness through the example of melody in his Die Bernauer Manuskripte u¨ber das Zeitbewusstsein (1917/18), Husserliana, Band XXXIII (Dordrecht: Kluwer, 2001). For a recent update on the melodic presence of the other, see Joona Taipale, ‘Empathy and the Melodic Unity of the Other’, Hum. Stud. 38 (2015), pp. 463– 79. Merleau-Ponty argues that the movements of non-human animals are, in some part, beyond bodily understanding. Merleau-Ponty, Phenomenology, p. 81; Merleau-Ponty, Phe´nome´nologie, p. 93. For a counterargument, see Ruonakoski, Ela¨imen tuttuus ja vieraus, pp. 108, 141– 70. On normativity, see Joona Taipale, Incarnate Subjectivity: The Constitutive Significance of Embodiment in Husserlian Phenomenology, Philosophical Studies from the University of Helsinki (Helsinki: Department of Philosophy and Department of Social and Moral Philosophy, 2009). For a discussion on the relevance of one’s conceptual framework on perceiving differences in colour, see Paul Kay and Willett Kempton, ‘What Is the Saphir–Whorf Hypothesis?’, American Anthropologist, New Series, Vol. 86 (March 1984), pp. 65–79. Uexku¨ll’s concept of Umwelt is often translated as ‘the environing world’. By this concept Uexku¨ll referred to the perceptual and experiential world of animals, pointing out that each species has its particular way of perceiving its surroundings, so much so that one can talk about different environing worlds of different species. What is more, there are individual differences in the

NOTES

27. 28. 29.

30.

31.

32.

33. 34.

TO PAGES

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perceptual relationship to the world. However, it is of utmost importance to realise that the Umwelten of different animals are not separate but rather it is the same world seen from different angles and in very different ways. See e.g. Jacob von Uexku¨ll, ‘A New Concept of the Umwelt: A Link between Science and Humanities’, trans. Go¨sta Brunow, Semiotica 134, 1/4 (Walter de Gruyter, 2001), pp. 111– 23. Many phenomenologists were influenced by Uexku¨ll’s ethological studies even though they did not necessarily adopt his views as such. Ruonakoski, Ela¨imen tuttuus ja vieraus, pp. 164–5. See the chapter ‘Anthropocentrism, Anthropomorphism and Hybridism’. Giuseppe di Pellegrino, Luciano Fadiga, Leonardo Fogassi, Vittorio Gallese and Giacomo Rizzolatti, ‘Understanding Motor Events: A Neurophysiological Study’, Experimental Brain Research, Vol. 91 (1992), pp. 176 – 80. The theory theory of mind and the simulation theory are the best-known theories of empathy. Some suggest that these theories could be combined, e.g. Christian Keysers and Valeria Gazzola, ‘Integrating Simulation and Theory of Mind: From Self to Social Cognition’, Trends in Cognitive Science, Vol. 11, No. 5 (2007), pp. 194 – 6. Contemporary phenomenologists such as Dan Zahavi and Shaun Gallagher have also done research on the topic of empathy, and Vittorio Gallese has even attempted to combine phenomenology and simulation theory. See Vittorio Gallese, ‘The Roots of Empathy: The Shared Manifold Hypothesis and the Neural Basis of Intersubjectivity’, Psychopatology 36 (2003), pp. 171 – 80. Some scholars have asked whether the concept itself should be discarded, see Max Scheler, Wesen und Formen der Sympathie: Der ‘Pha¨nomenologie der Sympathiegefu¨hle’ [1913] (Bonn: Verlag Friedrich Cohen, 1926); Noe¨l Carroll, ‘On Some Affective Relations Between Characters and Audiences in Popular Fiction’, in Amy Coplan and Peter Goldie (eds), Empathy: Philosophical and Psychological Perspectives (New York: Oxford University Press, 2012), pp. 162 – 83. On the difficulties of agreeing on what empathy is all about, see e.g. Dan Zahavi, Self and Other: Exploring Subjectivity, Empathy, and Shame (Oxford: Oxford University Press, 2014), p. 101. Zahavi points out that ‘there might not even be one single analysis of Husserl’s theory of empathy, since over the years Husserl pursued different directions’. Zahavi, Self and Other, p. 124. Zahavi, Self and Other, pp. 151– 2. See Edmund Husserl, The Crisis of European Sciences and Transcendental Phenomenology, trans. David Carr (Evanston: Northwestern University Press, 1970); Edmund Husserl, Die Krisis der europa¨ischen Wissenschaften und die tranzendentale Pha¨nomenologie: Eine Einleitung in die pha¨nomenologische Philosophie (Den Haag: Martinus Nijhoff, 1954). Stein, Zur Problem der Einfu¨hlung, p. 10; Zahavi, Self and Other, p. 151. Merleau-Ponty Phenomenology, p. 225; Phe´nome´nologie, p. 215.

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NOTES TO PAGES 20 –22

35. Merleau-Ponty Phenomenology, p. 368; Phe´nome´nologie, p. 404: ‘Il perc
oit ses intentions dans son corps, mon corps avec le sien, et par la` mes intentions dans son corps.’ See also Ruonakoski, Ela¨imen tuttuus ja vieraus, p. 106. 36. Ruonakoski, Ela¨imen tuttuus ja vieraus, p. 133. 37. From the perspective of psychology, however, the question of empathy looks different. Psychologists often describe empathy as a skill, which some people are more in possession of than others. It is believed that this skill can be improved, and its use is seen as recommendable in our interaction with others. David Howe uses the term tuning in to refer to empathetic listening, while some others use the term attunement in reference to parent – child relationships. David Howe, Empathy: What it is and Why it Matters (Hampshire: Palgrave Macmillan, 2013); Stein Bra˚ten and Colwyn Trevarthen, ‘Prologue: From Infant Intersubjectivity and Participant Movements to Simulation and Conversation in Cultural Common Sense’, in Stein Bra˚ten (ed.), On Being Moved: From Mirror Neurons to Empathy, Advances in Consciousness Research 68 (Amsterdam: John Benjamins Publishing Company, 2007), pp. 21– 34; Daniel N. Stern, ‘Applying Developmental and Neuroscience Findings on Other-Centred Participation to the Process of Change in Psychotherapy’, in Bra˚ten (ed.), On Being Moved, pp. 35 – 47. In point of fact, empathic listening is part and parcel of a therapeutic session, the idea being that the patient can elaborate and express his or her feelings more freely, when the therapist tunes into the patient’s experiences rather than imposes his or her own views and advice on the patient. The idea of tuning in or attunement is not without philosophical value, for it points to two important things in interpersonal communication. Firstly, it shows that there is a voluntary aspect to empathy. Secondly, the very concept of ‘tuning in’ refers to the fact that the other’s experience cannot be appropriated as such, only approximated by putting one’s own preoccupations aside and letting the other open up and recognise them in their becoming, that is, in the continuously changing, indeterminate aspect of their existence. E.g. Jojaneke A. Bastiaansen, Marc Thioux and Christian Keysers, ‘Evidence for Mirror Systems in Emotions’, Philosophical Transactions of the Royal Society 364 (2009), 2399; Howe, Empathy. 38. This is sometimes called emotional concern, a sub-genre of emotional empathy. See Adam Smith, ‘Cognitive Empathy and Emotional Empathy in Human Behavior and Evolution’, The Psychological Record, Vol. 56, Issue 1, Article 1 (2006), p. 3. Available at http://opensiuc.lib.siu.edu/tpr/vol56/iss1/1 (accessed 10 August 2015). 39. Scheler, Wesen und Formen, pp. 4, 10. 40. Howe, Empathy, pp. 11– 13. 41. The typical counter-example is the cold-blooded calculation of a person who ‘empathises’ with his opponent, trying to figure out his next moves. It is possible that this kind of ‘empathiser’ wilfully distances herself from emotional involvement.

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42. Ibid., pp. 74 – 85. 43. Ibid., pp. 34, 88 – 100. 44. A collection of early texts pertaining to empathy can be found in Vischer, Empathy, Form, and Space. See also Theodor Lipps, A¨sthetik – Psychologie des Scho¨nen und der Kunst, Erster Teil: Grundlegung der A¨sthetik (Hamburg: Verlag von Leopold Voss, 1903); Theodor Lipps, A¨sthetik – Psychologie des Scho¨nen und der Kunst, Zweiter Teil: Grundlegung der A¨sthetik (Hamburg: Verlag von Leopold Voss, 1906); Theodor Lipps, ‘Das Wissen von fremden Ichen’, in Theodor Lipps (ed.) Psychologishe Untersuchungen, 1. Band (Leipzig: Verlag von Wilhelm Engelmann, 1907), pp. 694– 722. 45. Suzanne Keen, ‘Narrative Empathy’, Paragraph 1, in Peter Hu¨hn et al. (eds), The Living Handbook of Narratology (Hamburg: Hamburg University). Available at http://www.lhn.uni-hamburg.de/article/narrative-empathy (accessed 10 August 2015). 46. Suzanne Keen, Empathy and the Novel (Oxford: Oxford University Press, 2007), pp. 65 – 96. 47. Keen, ‘Narrative Empathy’. See also Keen, Empathy and the Novel, p. 70. 48. Keen, Empathy and the Novel, p. 93. 49. Keith Oatley, ‘Meetings of Minds: Dialogue, Sympathy, and Identification, in Reading Fiction’, Poetics 26 (1999), p. 466. 50. Ibid., p. 68. For a categorization of different kinds of identifications, see Hans Robert Jauss, Aesthetic Experience and Literary Hermeneutics (Minneapolis: University of Minnesota Press, 1984). 51. ‘[T]he formulated text [. . .] represents a pattern, a structured indicator to guide the imagination of the reader’, argues Iser. Wolfgang Iser, The Act of Reading: A Theory of Aesthetic Response (Baltimore: John Hopkins University Press, 1980), p. 9. 52. Iser, Prospecting, p. 29. 53. Drama is different in the sense that it is by nature at the crossroads of everyday reality and the fictional world, as the actors are present to the audience in the flesh. Drama is, in fact, ‘dangerous’ in the sense that it is possible for the actor to challenge members of the audience by demanding that they participate in the action in one way or another, or when a comic makes an insulting comment about a member of the audience, as could happen in a performance of the Old Comedy. As for one’s own ethical involvement, surely one is not responsible for what happens to the characters on stage, but should a performer be in danger, this would have ethical and practical consequences to the one watching him. Likewise, one’s reaction to a performance influences the performer, even if it did not influence the character. 54. Iser, The Act of Reading, p. 109. 55. Ibid., pp. 96 – 7. 56. Narratological ideas have been adapted to classical studies often in hybrid forms, just as our approach is a hybrid form between the traditional methods

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57.

58.

59. 60.

61.

62.

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of classical studies and phenomenology. See Jonas Grethlein and Antonios Rengakos (eds), Narratology and Interpretation: The Content of Narrative Form in Ancient Literature (Berlin: Walter Gruyer, 2009). The narrator can also be the one who sees, especially when the narrator refers to himself as ‘I’, that is, in the case of the internal narrator who is also a character in the story, in contrast to the external narrator, who simply tells the story, as if he or she saw everything and knew the inner world of the characters. Burkhard Niederhoff, ‘Perspective – Point of View’, Paragraph 34, in Peter Hu¨hn et al. (eds), The Living Handbook of Narratology (Hamburg: Hamburg University Press). Available at http://www.lhn.uni-hamburg.de/article/perspective-–-pointview (accessed 10 August 2015). On the ultimate untranslatability of linguistic expressions see Merleau-Ponty, Phenomenology, p. 193; Merleau-Ponty, Phe´nome´nologie, p. 218. Similar ideas can be found in Gaston Bachelard’s and Maurice Merleau-Ponty’s works. Bachelard argues poems bring about resonances (re´sonances) in us, and the resonances turn into reverberations (re´tinences) when we speak the language of the poem as our own. See Gaston Bachelard, La poe´tique de l’espace (Paris: PUF, 1957). On the other hand, Merleau-Ponty’s description of reversibility, already explained earlier, hinges on the idea that touching implies being touched – and after all it is commonplace to claim that works of art ‘touch’ us, even if the exact nature of this touching is difficult to explain by common sense arguments. Merleau-Ponty argues that the words or ‘speech’ (la parole) of the literary work ‘couple’ with my own – in his view the relationship between these speeches resembles the relationship between my body and the other’s body. Maurice Merleau-Ponty, La prose du monde (Paris: Gallimard, 2004), p. 21. How this comparison can be substantiated, however, remains unclear. Merleau-Ponty puts this idea more poetically in the following, often cited passage: ‘The predominance of vowels in one language, of consonants in another, or systems of construction and syntax would not represent so many arbitrary conventions for expressing the same thought, but rather several ways for the human body to celebrate the world and to finally live it.’ MerleauPonty, Phenomenology, p. 193; Merleau-Ponty, Phe´nome´nologie, p. 218. There are, of course, several views on how best to convey the meaning of the original into the target language. The main dividing line between these views is the one between literal and sense-oriented translation. Some theorists think it is best to leave traces (structures, for instance) of the original language in the translation so that the alterity of the foreign text forces its way into the translation, while others agree that the meaning and spirit of the original are best conveyed, with certain restrictions, when the translation is faithful to the idioms and structures of the target language. The former ideal of translation is called ‘foreignising translation’, the latter ‘domesticated translation’. One of the major proponents of foreignising translation was a hermeneut and a romantic philosopher, Friedrich Schleiermacher (1768– 1834), who hoped

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that foreignising translations of Greek poetry into German could be an education project of a people. See e.g. Susan Bernofsky, ‘Schleiermacher’s Translation Theory and Varieties of Foreignization: August Wilhelm Schlegel vs. Johann Heinrich Boss’, The Translator, Vol. 3, No. 2 (1997), pp. 175 – 92; Richard E. Palmer, Hermeneutics: Interpretation Theory in Schleiermacher, Dilthey, Heidegger, and Gadamer (Evanston: Northwestern University Press, 1969). For a critique of the domesticated translation as ‘imperialist’, see Lawrence Venuti, The Translator’s Invisibility: A History of Translation (London: Routledge, 2004). Without explicitly taking a stand on this debate, it can be said that good translations can certainly be delivered using different approaches. Yet the extreme cases of both foreignising and domesticated translation fail to convey much of the meaning of the original text. To be sure, translating ancient Greek poetry poses even more challenges than has been mentioned so far. Among the problems Thomas F. Higham and Cecil M. Bowra brought out already in 1938, are the following: (1) choice of style, when translating writers from different periods: to archaise or not, and if we do, how do we do this; (2) differences in the use of compound words; and (3) the problem of form: whether the Greek metres should be imitated in the target language when the outcome may be unfaithful to the content and still unsatisfactory in artistic terms. Thomas F. Higham and Cecil M. Bowra, ‘Greek Poetry in Translation’, in Thomas F. Higham and Cecil M. Bowra (eds), Oxford Book of Greek Verse (Oxford: Clarendon Press, 1938), pp. xxxiii– cviii. 63. The use of second-person singular in Greek literature will be discussed in more detail in Part II. 64. See especially Michael A. Tueller, Look Who’s Talking: Innovations in Voice and Identity in Hellenistic Epigram (Leuven: Peeters, 2008). 65. According to Simone de Beauvoir, the reading experience as such implies that ‘someone is speaking to me’ (quelqu’un me parle). That someone is the author, who through his individual style imposes his presence upon the reader. Simone de Beauvoir, ‘What Can Literature Do?’, trans. Marybeth Timmermann, ‘The Useless Mouths’ and Other Literary Writings (Urbana: University of Illinois Press, 2011), p. 200; Simone de Beauvoir, ‘Que peut la litte´rature? Intervention’, in Yves Buin (ed.), Que peut la litte´rature? (Paris: L’inde´dit 10/18, Union Ge´nerale d’E´ditions, 1965), p. 79. In another lecture, ‘My Experience as a Writer’, given in 1966, Beauvoir is less explicit about whom the reader identifies with – in fact, she says it could also be the protagonist. Simone de Beauvoir, ‘My Experience as a Writer’, trans. J. Debbie Mann, ‘The Useless Mouths’ and Other Literary Writings (Urbana: University of Illinois Press, 2011), pp. 282 – 301; ‘Mon expe´rience d’e´crivain’, Les ´ecrits de Simone de Beauvoir (Paris: Gallimard, 1979), pp. 439 – 57. She also argues: ‘[I]n order for the reading to be gripping, I must identify with someone: the author. I must enter into his world and his world must become mine.’ Beauvoir, ‘What Can Literature Do?’, p. 201; Beauvoir, ‘Que peut la litte´rature?’, p. 82. As Beauvoir puts it, a work of fiction allows one to leave one’s world and enter the other’s, to ‘abdicate’ one’s own ‘I’ in

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67.

68.

69.

70.

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favour of the other’s. She also formulates her idea by saying that consciousnesses can communicate with each other through literature. Beauvoir, ‘My Experience’, pp. 295 – 7; Beauvoir, ‘Mon expe´rience’, pp. 455 – 7; Beauvoir, ‘What Can Literature Do?’, p. 201; Beauvoir, ‘Que peut la litte´rature’, p. 82. Beauvoir; ‘My Experience’, pp. 295–7; Beauvoir, ‘Mon expe´rience’, pp. 455–7; Beauvoir, ‘What Can Literature Do?’, p 201; Beauvoir, ‘Que peut la litte´rature?’, p. 82. Husserl’s discusses prereflective awareness in the context of timeconsciousness (e.g. Edmund Husserl, Pha¨nomenologische Psychologie, Vorlesungen Sommersemester 1925, Husserliana IX (Den Haag: Martinus Nijhoff, 1968), pp. 390 – 430. At this point it is necessary to take a stand on Maurice Merleau-Ponty’s famous discussion on thought and expression. According to him, speech is not ‘the fixation’ or ‘clothing’ of thought. Words do not ‘represent’ ideas, nor do they create representations of ideas in the listeners, for words and what they express go hand in hand. Hence, thought is inseparable from its expression, even though we may be led to think otherwise: already expressed, recalled thoughts give us the illusion of inner life of thought. Yet Merleau-Ponty argues that these ready-made words can evoke in us only secondary, unoriginal thoughts. Merleau-Ponty has a point in criticising the view that thoughts would be separate from their expression. It is less certain that the words one forms silently prior to speaking or writing would necessarily belong to the sphere of mere repetition. Merleau-Ponty, Phenomenology, pp. 188– 9; Merleau-Ponty, Phe´nome´nologie, pp. 212– 14. The term ‘voice’ does not refer here to the unique literary style of the author, nor to a character’s particular way of expressing things. Instead, the word is used in a less technical sense: to refer to the communicative device, which each of us uses in the act of speaking and hears the other use, when this other speaks to her or him. ‘Speaking’, on the other hand, means here merely addressing the other through words. The basic sense of this addressing can be found in everyday conversations, but it can also be seen in a more metaphorical way, as turning towards the other with an invitation to communion. Another way to understand this matter would be the Heideggerian – Lacanian – Derridean view that language speaks us, not vice versa. This idea is plausible in the sense that when we speak or write, we necessarily carry on the culturally loaded meanings and differentiations of language and express ourselves through its structures. Linguistic communication, let alone literature, cannot be stripped of its subjective source, however: the lived experience of contact is not an illusion. Even if ancient Greek and Roman texts are interesting because they tell us about their background cultures, these cultures can become of interest only because we situate other living and experiencing bodies as reference points in those cultures and see those cultures as part of their lived world.

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71. For a discussion on reading aloud, see e.g. Svenbro, Phrasikleia; Nagy, ‘Performance and Text’; Gavrilov, ‘Techiques of Reading’. 72. It can surely be argued that being ‘spoken to’ and ‘entering the other’s world’ can be a part of the reading experience of scholarly texts as well. Do we not feel that Aristotle speaks to us when we read his text, and that we, in a sense, enter his world? Fiction, however, appears to discuss existence rather than scientific facts, and operates in the register of ambiguity or indeterminacy rather than in that of unequivocalness and arguments. In point of fact, a similar view can be found in Aristotle’s poetics, even though he does not refer to artistic texts as literary but as mimetic. What is more, most scholarly texts do not concentrate on describing lived experiences in their sensual and emotional dimensions or recreating them in the reader, nor do they offer perspective changes quite in the same way as works of fiction do. For such an argument, see Beauvoir, ‘My Experience’, pp. 284 – 9; Beauvoir, ‘Mon expe´rience’, pp. 441 – 7. See also Simone de Beauvoir, ‘Literature and Metaphysics’, Philosophical Writings, trans. Veronique Zauzeff and Frederick M. Morrison (Urbana: University of Illinois Press, 2004), p. 270; ‘Litte´rature et me´taphysique’ [1946], L’existentialisme et la sagesse des nations (Paris: Nagel, 1948), p. 105. Something resembling a perspective change is accomplished, however, when a scholar explains another scholar’s views at length and then turns to criticism. Despite all this, it must be admitted that the distinction between fiction and other texts may very well have been and may still be unstable and that it takes special writing techniques for scholars to distance themselves from the intimacy inherent in literary communication. 73. Robert Renehan, ‘The Greek Anthropocentric View of Man’, Harvard Studies of Classical Philology 85 (1981), p. 246. 74. Ibid., p. 247. 75. In his famous article ‘The Historical Roots of Our Ecologic Crisis’ (1967) Lynn White argues that by ‘destroying pagan animism, Christianity made it possible to exploit nature in a mood of indifference to the feelings of natural objects’. Lynn White, Jr., ‘The Historical Roots of Our Ecologic Crisis’, Science, New Series, Vol. 155, No. 3767, March 10 (1967), p. 1205. 76. Bryan G. Norton, ‘Environmental Ethics and Weak Anthropocentrism’, Environmental Ethics, Vol. 6, Summer (1984), pp. 134– 5. 77. Frederick Ferre´, ‘Personalistic Organism: Paradox or Paradigm?’, in Robin Attfield and Andrew Belsey (eds), Philosophy and the Natural Environment (Cambridge: Cambridge University Press 1994), p. 72. See also Mary Midgley, ‘The End of Anthropocentrism’, in Robin Attfield and Andrew Belsey (eds), Philosophy and the Natural Environment (Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 1994), pp. 103–12; Tim Hayward, ‘Anthropocentrism: A Misunderstood Problem’, Environmental Values 6 (1997), pp. 49–63. 78. Midgley, ‘The End of Anthropocentrism’, p. 111.

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79. Hayward, ‘Anthropocentrism’, pp. 51 – 2. 80. Ibid., pp. 52 – 3. 81. A more recent input to the discussion on anthropocentrism comes from Rosi Braidotti. Braidotti considers her own thinking decidedly post-anthropocentric and also posthumanist, while most forms of animal ethics would be equally post-anthropocentric in that they contest anthropocentric presuppositions, but still humanist in that they embrace many humanist presuppositions. Braidotti’s criticism of such humanist notions that glorify human specificity seems apt. Within the limits of this work, however, it is not possible to discuss the intricacies of her Deleuzian posthumanism or to compare the decentred posthumanist subjectivity with the phenomenological description of subjectivity. See Rosi Braidotti, The Posthuman (Cambridge: Polity, 2013). 82. For instance, Walter Burkert uses the terms ‘anthropomorphic’ and ‘anthropomorphism’ in a descriptive manner. Walter Burkert, Greek Religion: Archaic and Classical (Oxford: Blackwell, 1987), pp. 182–9. 83. About anthropodenial, see e.g. Frans de Waal, Ape and the Sushi Master: Cultural Reflections by a Primatologist (New York: Basic Books, 2001), p. 69. Jonathan Balcombe, for his part, stresses the importance of studying animal pleasure. Jonathan Balcombe, Pleasurable Kingdom: Animals and the Nature of Feeling Good (Basingstoke: Macmillan, 2006). 84. In the beginning of the twentieth century, a horse called Clever Hans was supposed to know how to make quite complicated calculations. When asked a mathematical question, it tapped with its hoof on the ground as many times as was the answer to the question. It turned out, however, that instead of calculating it reacted to the subtle changes in the posture of the human’s body, stopping its tapping when the human changed his position. See e.g. Douglas Keith Candland, Feral Children and Clever Animals: Reflections on Human Nature (New York: Oxford University Press, 1993), pp. 111–33. In tests made in the 1910s, a dog called Roger appeared to recognise playing cards as well as to know how to read and write. Again, the non-human animal was reacting to the gestural cues of humans. Ibid., pp. 167–74. 85. Of course the very choice to speak to a dog, as if it could understand complicated sentences, might qualify as a sign of anthropomorphism. However, the epigram is written as speech directed to a deceased animal and is not as such more fantastic than epigrams that address deceased humans. Both are speech directed at an unreachable object of longing. 86. About Pan as a composite of human and goat, and as representing human debauchery, see Louise Calder, Cruelty and Sentimentality: Greek Attitudes to Animals, 600– 300 BC, BAR International Series 2225, Studies in Classical Archeology V (Oxford: Archaeopress, 2011), p. 33.

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Encounters with Animals in Greek Literature

1. Translated by Jeffrey Henderson, slightly modified, in Jeffrey Henderson, Aristophanes: Clouds, Wasps, Peace, LCL 488 (Cambridge, MA: Harvard University Press, 1998), p. 432. 2. Urs Dierauer, Tier und Mensch im Denken der Antike. Studien zur Tierpsychologie, Anthropologie und Ethik, Studien zur antiken Philosophie 6 (Amsterdam: Gru¨ner, 1977); Richard Sorabji, Animal Minds and Human Morals. The Origins of the Western Debate (Ithaca, NY: Cornell University Press, 1993). 3. Jeremy B. Lefkowitz, ‘Aesop and Animal Fable’, in Campbell (ed.), The Oxford Handbook of Animals, p. 4. On Animal and Bird epics, see Martin L. West, Homeric Hymns, Homeric Apocrypha, Lives of Homer, LCL 496 (Cambridge, MA: Harvard University Press, 2003), pp. 229– 37. 4. See Randy Malamud, Poetic Animals and Animal Souls (New York: Palgrave MacMillan, 2003), p. 34. 5. Translation in A. W. Mair, Oppian, Colluthus, Tryphiodorus, LCL 219 (Cambridge, MA: Harvard University Press, 1928), p. 7. 6. The Cynegetica is influenced by Oppian’s Halieutica. On the writer of the Cynegetica, see Adam N. Bartley, Stories from the Mountains, Stories from the Sea. The Digressions and Similes of Oppian’s Halieutica and the Cynegetica (Go¨ttingen: Vandenhoeck & Ruprecht, 2003), pp. 4 – 5. 7. Ivor Armstrong Richards, The Philosophy of Rhetoric (New York: Oxford University Press, 1936), pp. 96 – 7. 8. There are more of these kinds of similes (animal as tenor) in the Halieutica than in the Cynegetica. See Bartley, Stories from the Mountains, p. 211. 9. Translation in Christopher P. Jones, Philostratus, Life of Apollonius of Tyana. Vol. 2. Books 5–8, LCL 17 (Cambridge, MA: Harvard University Press, 1928), p. 27. 10. The phrase has been translated as ‘deserving respect from humans’ by Christopher P. Jones (see above note 9) and as ‘making them interesting to mankind’ by Frederic Cornwallis Conybeare in Frederick Cornwallis Conybeare, Philostratus: The Life of Apollonius of Tyana. The Epistles of Apollonius and the Treatise of Eusebius, Vol. 1, LCL 16 (Cambridge, MA: Harvard University Press, 1948), p. 495. 11. Aesop offered only flowers and berries, because he cared more about the wellbeing of his sheep and did not want to spend on gifts to the gods. 12. The Greeks used the term mythoi of the fables, along with ainoi and logoi. 13. Mise-en-abyse means that a story is told by someone who was told the story by somebody else. Here Apollonius tells a story that his mother told him about Aesop – a story Hermes had been told by the Horae about a cow talking about herself and the earth. Cf. Plut. Mor. 154b (Dinner of Seven Wise Men) where Aesop defends a present female sage, Eumetis/Cleobulina, a composer of riddles. 14. See Leslie Kurke’s account on this passage and the hierarchy of genres, in Kurke, Aesopic Conversations (Princeton: Princeton University Press, 2011), pp. 1 – 2, 86.

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15. In Neolithic cave pictures, the few human figures are often mere stick figures compared to the animals, which even have individual features. See, for instance, Carleton Dallery, ‘Into the Truth with Animals’, in Peter H. Steeves (ed.), Animal Others: On Ethics, Ontology, and Animal Life (Albany, NY: State University of New York Press, 1999), pp. 251– 2 on how cave-paintings reflect reciprocity and not mere object-assessing observation. 16. Gisela M. A. Richter, Animals in Greek Sculpture (Oxford: Oxford University Press, 1930), p. ix. 17. Alastair Harden, ‘Animals in Classical Art’, in Campbell (ed.), The Oxford Handbook of Animals, pp. 29 –37. On the subject, see Harden’s suggested reading and bibliography, pp. 57 – 60. 18. Fitzwilliam Museum, Cambridge, GR.9.1917 (470 –460 BCE ). 19. Xanthippus’ dog: Plut. Them. 10, Ael. NA 12.35; Bucephalus: Plut. Alex. 61.2– 3. See Calder, Cruelty and Sentimentality, p. 87. 20. See Michael Squire, ‘Making Myron’s Cow Moo? Ecphrastic Epigram and the Poetics of Simulation’, AJPh 131:4 (2010), pp. 606– 7. 21. In Petronius’ Satyricon, 88. See Jerome J. Pollitt, The Ancient View Of Greek Art. Criticism, History, And Terminology (New Haven, CT: Yale University Press, 1974), p. 199. This is the only reference to animals in Pollitt’s passages under the titles ‘eˆthos kai pathos’ and ‘animum et sensus pingere’ (pp. 194– 200). 22. On Myron’s Cow, see Squire, ‘Making Myron’s Cow Moo?’, pp. 589, 594, 599 (Poseidippus’ poem). Some of the epigrams disagreed with the view that Myron had captured the spirit of the animal. See ibid., p. 608. 23. The Archaic bronze lion on the Acropolis of Athens collected several stories around it. See Lillian B. Lawler, ‘Lion among Ladies (Theocritus II, 66 – 68)’, TAPA 78 (1947), p. 88. 24. Philostratus, the writer of the Life of Apollonius of Tyana was a senior kinsman to the Elder Philostratus (or Philostratus the Lemnian) and the Younger Philostratus (Philostratus the Athenian) – who both wrote parts of the work called Eikones (‘Imagines’). 25. Translation in Arthur Fairbanks, Elder Philostratus: Imagines, Younger Philostratus: Imagines, Callistratus: Descriptions, LCL 256 (London: William Heinemann, 1960), p. 67. 26. Philostratus may also be describing a non-existent artwork. Lucian’s Zeuxis or Antiochus (4) includes a description of Zeuxis’ painting of a family of centaurs. 27. Pollitt, The Ancient View Of Greek Art, p. 51. See also Philost. Imag. 1.28.2 on the immersion in the artwork. 28. The Eleatic stranger makes here, in fact, a distinction between those who can follow argument and those who cannot. 29. On divine inspiration, see Stephen Halliwell, Between Ecstasy and Truth (Oxford: Oxford University Press, 2011), pp. 13 – 18, 55 – 67, 171–2. 30. Apollo charming animals with his music, see Eur. Alc. 578– 85. 31. On dolphins, Eur. El. 432. On musicality of cattle, Plato Pol. 268a – b. According to Aelian, the proverbial unmusicality of donkeys was based on the

NOTES

32. 33.

34.

35.

36. 37. 38. 39.

40. 41.

42.

43.

44. 45.

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belief that they (alone among animals) were tone-deaf (NA 10.28). See also the fable about a donkey admiring cicada’s song (Perry 184). For instance, Plato applied poetry to hearing, ἀkoή (cf. Plato Resp. 10.603b). See also Part I. For animal imagery in early Greek poetry, with examples, see Rene` Nu¨nlist, Poetologische Bildersprache in der fru¨hgriechischen Dichtung (Stuttgart: Teubner, 1998), pp. 39 – 67; Henry Gossen, ‘Die Tiere bei den griechischen Lyriken’, Sudhoffs Archiv 30:6 (April 1938), pp. 321– 51. On the Presocratics and animals, see Dierauer, Tier und Mensch, p. 2 –4; Sorabji, Animal Minds, pp. 8 –9; Stephen T. Newmyer, ‘Being the One and Becoming the Other’, in Campbell (ed.), The Oxford Handbook of Animals, pp. 509 –12. Sappho’s poem has, however, textual problems. On Arion’s Song, see William D. Furley and Jan Maarten Bremer, Greek Hymns. Selected Cult Songs from the Archaic to the Hellenistic Period. Vol. 2: Greek Texts and Commentary, Studien und Texte zu Antike und Christentum 10 (Tu¨bingen: Mohr Siebeck, 2001), pp. 377 – 81. Nan Dunbar, Aristophanes: Birds. Edited with Introduction and Commentary (Oxford: Clarendon Press, 1995), p. 644. E.g., Eur. Hipp. 73 – 8, Ba. 864– 76, Alc. 575– 85. Aristotle attributed the first fable to Stesichorus (Perry 269a) and the second to Aesop (The Fox and the Hedgehog, Perry 427). On the Moschophorus, see Richard Neer, ‘Sacrificing Stones: On Some Sculpture, Mostly Athenian’, in Christopher A. Faraone and F. S. Naiden (eds), Greek and Roman Animal Sacrifice. Ancient Victims, Modern Observers (Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 2012), pp. 104– 6. Pollitt, The Ancient View Of Greek Art, p. 6. See for instance, Anne Carson, ‘Putting Her in Her Place: Women, Dirt, and Desire’, in David M. Halperin et al. (eds), Before Sexuality (Princeton, NJ: Princeton University Press, 1990), pp. 142– 3. On pity and appeals for pity in tragedies, see Dana LaCourse Munteanu, Tragic Pathos: Pity and Fear in Greek Philosophy and Tragedy (Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 2012), Part II, especially pp. 141–50. The concept had gone through a kind of revaluation or redetermination during the past decennia of classical scholarship. See Stephen Halliwell, The Aesthetics of Mimesis: Ancient Texts and Modern Problems (Princeton, NJ: Princeton University Press, 2002), pp. 7, 151– 76, especially pp. 151 – 6, 171. Mark Payne, Theocritus and the Invention of Fiction (Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 2007), pp. 6 – 7. In the Parts of Animals, Aristotle stresses that the study of animals had to consider every kind of animal, including the ignoble (ἄtimo6) (PA 644a5 – 10). Here atimos is, however, pared with the concept of attractiveness (kecharismenos) so that atimos refers to the unpleasantness of certain animals. They cause disgust (dyschereia), and they are disgustful to look at, like human viscera (PA 645a25).

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46. On Aristotle’s conception of beauty, see Terence H. Irwin, ‘The Sense and Reference of kalon in Aristotle’, CP 105:4 (2010), pp. 381– 96. 47. On the impression of spontaneity in animal figures, which in reality is an example of the generic type in Geometric art, Nikolaus Himmelman, Reading Greek Art (Princeton, NJ: Princeton University Press, 1998), pp. 77 – 8. 48. On ecocriticism, see, for instance, Louise Hutchings Westling (ed.), The Cambridge Companion to Literature and the Environment, Cambridge Companion to Literature (New York: Cambridge University Press, 2014), pp. 1– 7. 49. Malamud, Poetic Animals, p. 35. 50. Richard Holton and Ray Langton, ‘Empathy and Animal Ethics’, in Dale Johnson (ed.), Singer and his Critics (Oxford: Basil Blackwell, 1998), p. 225. 51. Malamud, Poetic Animals, p. 7. 52. Katherine Mansfield’s letter to Dorothy Brett on 11 October 1917, in Vincent O’Sullivan and Margaret Scott (eds), The Collected Letters of Katherine Mansfield. Volume 1: 1903– 1917 (London: Oxford University Press, 1984). 53. Aelian NH 15.28, Athenaeus Deipn. 391a. John Pollard, Birds in Greek Thought and Life (London: Thames & Hudson, 1977), pp. 179– 80. 54. Athenaeus Deipn. 8.359e – 360d. On animal masquerades, Giannis M. Sifakis, Parabasis and Animal Choruses (London: Athlone, 1971), pp. 81 –3; Eva Stehle, Performance and Gender in Ancient Greece: Nondramatic Poetry in its Setting (Princeton, NJ: Princeton University Press, 1997), pp. 39 – 41. Ancient pantomime dances – a genre developed during the Hellenistic period – included mimicking animals’ movements. See Ismene Lada-Richards, Silent Eloquence: Lucian and Pantomime Dancing (London: Duckworth, 2007), pp. 28, 35, 182n32. 55. The Table-Talks 5.1 (Mor. 674c). Parmenon was probably a historical person, whose act won such fame that a fable was even composed about it (Perry 527), see Sven-Tage Teodorsson, A Commentary on Plutarch’s Table Talks. Vol. II, Books 4– 6 (Go¨teborg: Acta universitatis Gothoburgensis, 1996), p. 153. 56. See Halliwell, Greek Laughter: A Study of Cultural Psychology from Homer to early Christianity (Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 2008), p. 34. 57. James Maxwell Coetzee, Elizabeth Costello: Eight Lessons (London: Vintage Books 2004), pp. 76 –80, 95– 8 (on Ted Hughes’ poem Jaguar). 58. The text and translation are from David A. Campbell, Bacchylides, Corinna and Others, Greek Lyric IV, LCL 461 (Cambridge, MA: Harvard University Press, 1992), pp. 138–41. See also Nu¨nlist, Poetologische Bildersprache, p. 58. 59. Gilbert T. Rose notes how Argos’ excellence suggests his master’s qualities, see ‘Odysseus’ Barking Heart’, TAPA 109 (1979), pp. 222– 3. See also Simon Goldhill, The Poet’s Voice. Essays on Poetics and Greek Literature (Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 1991), pp. 12 –13 and Peter Gainsford, ‘Formal Analysis of Recognition Scenes in the Odyssey’, JHS 123 (2003), p. 57.

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60. See Chiara Thumiger, ‘ἀnάgkh6 z1ύgmat’ ἐmp1ptώk1n: Greek Tragedy between Human and Animal’, in Leeds International Classical Studies 7:3 (2008), pp. 1–23. On the animal slaughter in Ajax, see Chiara Thumiger, ‘Animals in Tragedy’, in Campbell (ed.), The Oxford Handbook of Animals, p. 94. 61. Sophocles. Four Tragedies: Oedipus the King, Aias, Philoctetes, Oedipus at Colonus. A new verse translation by Oliver Taplin (Oxford: Oxford University Press, 2015), p. 98. 62. Aristotle mentions carcasses among the atimoi issues which (visual) art can change into objects of pleasure (Poet. 5.1448b5). 63. Aristotle for his part speaks about the ‘sympathy’ between aesthetic emotions and everyday emotions. The eighth book of the Politics is Aristotle’s main discussion, along with the Poetics on the effect of art, especially the effect of instrumental music on the audience. See Halliwell, Between Ecstacy and Truth, pp. 240– 2; The Aesthetics of Mimesis, p. 161. Aristotle shared the view that music can imitate the ethical qualities of the characters much better than painting (Pol. 8.5.1340a20 – 1 and 1340a38– 9). Aristotle compares emotions which we feel when listening to these acoustic mime¯seis of characters to the emotions which are evoked in everyday life. He asserts that when one is experiencing creations crafted by mimetic arts one’s evoked emotions are in ‘sympathy’ with emotions experienced in everyday life (ἔti dὲ ἀkroώm1noi tῶn mimήs1vn gίgnontai pάnt16 sympau1ῖ6, Pol. 8.5.1340a13). 64. Munteanu, Tragic Pathos, pp. 117– 31, especially p. 120. 65. Plutarch also gives another example: if the choice were between a lump of silver and a little silver animal or a silver cup, the child would choose the animal or the cup (Mor. 673e). 66. Cf. Munteanu, Tragic Pathos, pp. 70 –103, especially p. 91. 67. Trans. by W. Rhys Roberts, in Aristotle, Rhetoric (Blacksburg, Virginia: Virginia Tech, 2001), p. 56. In the Greek text, there is no verb ‘excite’, only the comparative: ‘to be more pitiful’ (ἐλεεινότερος). In a textually dubious passage of the Poetics, Aristotle also recommends visualisation to tragic poets when creating tragedy: the poet (and not only the performer) should see the events of tragedy as if he were ‘there’, present (ho¯sper par’ autois) and should even imitate the relevant gestures which fit to the emotions under depiction (Poet. 17.1455a23– 4 and 29 – 32). See also Munteanu, Tragic Pathos, pp. 80 – 9, especially pp. 85 and 87. 68. For animals rescuing humans, see Stephen T. Newmyer, Animals in Greek and Roman Thought: A Sourcebook (London: Routledge, 2011), pp. 48–53; and Olivar Hellmann, ‘Antike Berichte u¨ber “Symbiose”,’ in Annetta Alexandridis, Markus Wild and Lorenz Winkler-Horacˇek (eds), Mensch und Tier in der Antike: Grenzziehung und Grenzu¨berschreitung (Wiesbaden: Reichert, 2008), pp. 187–8, 192–3). See also the Aesopic fable The Peasant and the Eagle Set Free (Perry 296). 69. DL 8.36 (also in AP 7.120). 70. Catherine Osborne, Dumb Beasts & Dead Philosophers: Humanity & the Humane in Ancient Philosophy & Literature (Oxford: Clarendon Press, 2007), pp. 47 – 8.

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71. See Arist. Eud. Eth. 7.10.1243a20. 72. As David Gallop puts it, ‘Greek used the same noun (zo¯ion) for “picture” and for “animal”, and the Greek word for pictorial art (zo¯graphia) embodied a connection between those arts and the living subjects they depicted’. Gallop, ‘Aristotle: Aesthetics and Philosophy of Mind’, in David Furley (ed.), From Aristotle to Augustine (London: Routledge, 1997), p. 81. 73. The word zῷon for a non-human animal was, however, generalised only after Aristotle. See Renehan, ‘The Greek Anthropocentric View of Man’, pp. 242–3. 74. On the lifelikeness of Myron’s Cow in Hellenistic epigrams, see Squire, ‘Making Myron’s Cow Moo?’, pp. 600– 1. 75. Many sculptures of the gods needed constant care: they were dressed up, decorated with garlands, and also moved from their sanctuary, for instance to the banks of a river in order to be washed. See, for instance, Nigel Spivey, Understanding Greek Sculpture. Ancient Meanings, Modern Readings (London: Thames and Hudson, 1996), pp. 48 – 9. 76. Plinius the Elder says only that birds flew towards the spot where the picture was exhibited, not that they actually tried to eat the painted grapes (HN 35.65). 77. As a decisive proof of the beauty (kalos) of wild animals, Xenophon’s Cyrus states that the animals which he hunted in the dangerous wilderness, were even when dead more beautiful than those animals alive which were kept and hunted in the hunting parks (Cyr. 1.11). Cf. also Aris. Mete. 4.389b31 – 3: dead human bodies are human only in name. 78. Rene´ Nu¨nlist suggests the translation ‘graphic quality’, see Nu¨nlist, The Ancient Critic at Work: Terms and Concepts of Literary Criticism in Greek Scholia (Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 2009), pp. 291, 194– 7. Enargeia was also a quality for ecphrasis in Greek rhetoric, see Squire, ‘Making Myron’s Cow Moo?’, p. 592n15. 79. Trans. Robin Waterfield, in Plato, Timaeus and Critias, trans. Robin Waterfield. With an Introduction and Notes by Andrew Gregory (Oxford: Oxford University Press, 2008), p. 5. 80. Pseudo-Longinus 9.13; 25; 26.1. See Donald A. Russell, ‘Longinus’: On the Sublime. Edited with Introduction and Commentary (Oxford: Clarendon Press, 1982). The word ἐnagώnio6, when it refers to the style, means ‘energetic’ or ‘vivid’. Its opposite is dihghmatikό6, see LSJ s.v. According to PseudoLonginus, the Iliad is ‘vivid’ whereas the Odyssey is a ‘narrative’ poem (9.13). 81. According to Mark Payne, Aristotle was in fact the first to advocate ‘poetics of fiction’ instead of the ‘poetics of truth’. Payne, Theocritus and the Invention of Fiction, p. 6. 82. Stephen Halliwell has listed all the important loci of this theme, Halliwell, The Aesthetics of Mimesis, p. 20n48 and n49. 83. On prosopopoeia, see Gavin Alexander, ‘Prosopopoeia: the Speaking Figure’, in Sylvia Adamson, Gavin Alexander and Katrin Ettenhuber (eds), Renaissance Figures of Speech (Cambridge: Cambridge University Press),

NOTES

84.

85.

86.

87.

88.

89.

90. 91.

92.

93. 94. 95. 96.

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66 –70

211

pp. 97 – 112, especially pp. 107 – 8 on the differences between apostrophe and prosopopoeia. Pythagoras’ long speech in Ovid’s Metamorphoses (15.464 – 8, 470 – 4), mentioned in the introduction of this book, contains an appeal for pity for a sacrificial ox. Ovid created a character and gave a voice, not to that ox but to Pythagoras. Greek literature contains many curious speaking entities, like a curl of hair in Callimachus’ Lock of Berenice, which laments about its separation from the queen Berenice’s hair. Trans. by Deborah Steiner in her article ‘Framing the Fox: Callimachus’ Second “Iamb” and its Predecessors’, JHS 130 (2010), p. 99. Archilochus used an Aesopic fable (Perry 1), where the fox does not appeal to Zeus. See also Mark Payne, The Animal Part. Human and Other Animals in the Poetic Imagination (Chicago: University of Chicago Press, 2010), p. 31. The fragment is preserved by Aelian (NA 11.18), who gives the passage as an example of how mares are proud of their hair and feel shame if it is clipped, referring to Aristotle (cf. HA 6.572b7 – 10: to diminish mare’s rut). On Sophocles’ Tyro, see Hugh Lloyd-Jones, Sophocles: Fragments, LCL 483 (Cambridge, MA: Harvard University Press, 1996), pp. 312–21. Xenophon compares a boar’s movement to the way a brave man rushes ahead in battle (Cyr. 1.4.11). Other cases, already mentioned, are Philostratus the Elder (Imag. 1.16), several cases in Oppianus’ Halieutica and some cases in the Cynegetica. However, what comes next is a list of advice for humans on how to dress and shelter from winter’s coldness, obviously utilising the furs and hides of these animals (Op. 535– 56). See also Op. 512– 14: animals putting their tails between their legs to shelter their furless bellies. The same line is used in the passage where the object of Zeus’ pity is Achilleus mourning the death of Patroclus (Il. 19.340). Automedon lashes the horses with a whip and speaks ‘with soft words and many times with threats’ (17.431), but only Zeus, by breathing courage into them, is able to make them move. The poet/narrator also may address characters. See Scott Richardson, The Homeric Narrator (Nashville: Vanderbilt University Press, 1990), pp. 167– 81; addressing a character, pp. 170– 4; address to the audience, pp. 174– 82; the Muses, pp. 178– 82. The fragment is quoted by Aelian (NA 12.25). See Furley and Bremer, Greek Hymns, pp. 377– 8. The term comes from the Greek verb apostrephein, which literally means ‘to turn back, turn away, to avert’. LSJ s.v. Eduard Bornemann and Ernst Risch, Griechische Grammatik (Frankfurt am Main: Diesterweg, 1978), p. 176. On apostrophe, see Sylvie Franchet d’E`spe`rey, ‘Rhe´torique et poe´tique chez Quintilien: a` propos de l’apostrophe’, Rhetorica 24:2 (2006), pp. 164– 5; and

212

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TO PAGES

70 –77

Tua Korhonen, ‘Apostrophe and Subjectivity in Johan Paulinus Lillienstedt’s Magnus Principatus Finlandia (1678)’, in Pernille Harsting and Jon Viklund (eds), Rhetoric and Literature in Finland and Sweden, 1600– 1900, Nordic Studies in the History of Rhetoric, vol. 2 (Copenhagen: Nordisk Netvaerk for Retorikkens Historie, 2008), pp. 3 – 6. 97. However, adjuration (like ‘by Jove’, ‘by the dog’) differs linguistically from direct address, the case is not vocative, but accusative. 98. Trans. by Donald A. Russell. Demosthenes appeals to Athenians by swearing by the soldiers of Marathon. The reference is to the oration On the Crown (208). 99. An oath: Il. 3.275; appeals: Od. 5.445 – 450 and Od. 17.240 – 6.

Part III

The Spectrum of Human-Animal Relationships in Greek Antiquity

1. Translated by Alan H. Sommerstein. See Alan H. Sommerstein and Thomas H. Talboy, Sophocles. Selected Fragmentary Plays. Vol. 2 (Oxford: Oxbow, 2012), p. 192. 2. Cf. Edmund Leach, ‘Anthropological Aspects of Language. Animal Categories and Verbal Abuse’, in Pierre Marauda (ed.), Mythology. Selected Readings (London: Penguin, 1972), pp. 54 – 5. 3. Malamud, Poetic Animals, p. 33. He gives as an example William Wordsworth (among other poets). 4. Diogenes is reported to have converted to the Cynic way of life after he once observed a mouse and noticed that it was not afraid of darkness and did not need any luxuries. Cleanthes once observed the ants running around his feet and noticed how they were carrying a dead ant among them. Anecdote of Diogenes of Sinope, DL 6.22 (according to Theophrastus), see also 6.40 and Plut. Mor. 77f; anecdote of Cleanthes, Ael. NA 6.50 and Plut. Mor. 967e – f. 5. Cf. Pl. Leg. 7.789c. On quail-philipping, see Calder, Cruelty and Sentimentality, p. 85. 6. Aesop’s fable The Dancing Apes (Perry 463) relates how an Egyptian ruler taught apes to dance the pyrrhic dance. When nuts were thrown on the stage the monkeys however forgot their task. 7. On Greek animal combats, see Jo-Ann Shelton, ‘Spectacles of Animal Abuse’, in Campbell (ed.), The Oxford Handbook of Animals, pp. 464– 5; Calder, Cruelty and Sentimentality, pp. 85 – 6. 8. We know quite a lot of horse and dog names – even Xenophon recommends 45 dog names in his treatise on training of hounds (Cyneg. 7.5) – but less for any other animals. However, the Linear B tablets from Knossos, which already give names for cattle, bear early evidence that work animals could also be named. Cf. Mika Kajava, ‘pa-ko-qe (KN Ch 5728): A New Ox Name from Knossos’, Arctos 45 (2011), pp. 59 – 70. In Theocritus’ Idylls, which naturally depicts a fictionalised account of shepherds’ and goatherds’ lives, there are goats, calves and a bull, which are called by names by their care-takers.

NOTES

9.

10. 11.

12.

13. 14.

15.

16. 17. 18. 19. 20. 21.

TO PAGES

77 –80

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On animal names, see Kenneth F. Kitchell, Animals in the Ancient World from A to Z (London: Routledge, 2014), pp. 132– 4; Calder, Cruelty and Sentimentality, p. 28; Edouard Delebecque, Le cheval dans l’Iliade suivi d’un lexique du cheval chez Home`re et d’un essai sur le cheval pre´-home´rique (Paris: Librairie C. Klincksieck, 1951), p. 146 (horse names in Homer). Walter Burkert, Homo necans. Interpretationen altgriechischer Opferriten und Mythen, Religionsgeschichtliche Versuche und Vorarbeiten, 32 (Berlin: Walter de Gruyter, 1972), p. 12. See Fritz Graf, ‘One Generation after Burkert and Girard: Where are the Great Theories?’, in Faraone and Naiden, Greek and Roman Animal Sacrifice, pp. 32–51. Burkert’s idea that the ritual alleviates the guilt felt for killing a living being was based on his view that sacrifice is a relic of ancient hunting rituals, which attempted to appease the killed animal and bring back the balance which the killing has destroyed. Burkert, Homo necans, pp. 24 – 5, 29 – 30, 53 – 4. Girard suggested that an animal victim was in fact a substitute for a human victim: it had to be uncastrated, in good health and perhaps somehow handsome, presentable. Rene Girard, Violence and the Sacred, trans. Patrick Gregory (London: Continuum, 2005), pp. 29 – 30, 116, 289. On Greek sacrifice, see Stella Georgoudi, Rene´e Koch Piettre and Francis Schmidt (eds), La cuisine et l’autel. Les sacrifices en questions dans les socie´te´s de la me´diterrane´e ancienne, Bibliothe`que de l’E´cole des hautes e´tudes, Sciences religieuses, 124 (Turnhout: Bepolis, 2005); Robert Parker, On Greek Religion (Ithaca, NY: Cornell University Press, 2011), pp. 124 – 70; and Gunnel Ekroth, ‘Animal Sacrifice in Antiquity’, in Campbell (ed.), The Oxford Handbook of Animals, especially pp. 325 – 6. See Burkert, Homo necans, pp. 23 – 4n20. See also Arist. Rhet. 3.11.1411b28. See Newmyer, Animals in Greek and Roman Thought, p. 115; Calder, Cruelty and Sentimentality, p. 113; Jean Bouffartigue, Plutarque: Oeuvres Morales tome XIV:1, traite` 63. L’intelligence des animaux (Paris: Bude´, 2012), pp. xxxv –vi. Kurt Smolak, ‘Das Opfertie als Ankla¨ger’, in Anette Alexandridis et al. (eds), Mensch und Tier in der Antike, pp. 212– 13. See also Keller, Die antike Tierwelt I, pp. 348– 9. The adjectives he¯meros and tithasos (as cultivated) were also used side by side (Plat. Resp. 589b, Arist. HA 8.630b18). See Pl. Leg. 6.766a, Soph. 222c–d; Arist. Top. 138a. See also Pol. 1.2.1253a36–7. Cf. Hdt. 2.65; Xen. Mem. 2.3.4. See also Perry 269 and 269a. Cf. Perry 411 (Synt. 30), which is a discussion between a wild and a tame donkey. Naama Harel, ‘The Animal Voice Behind the Animal Fable’, Critical Animal Studies 7:2 (2009), pp. 9 – 21. Geoffrey Kron, ‘Animal Husbandry’, in Campbell (ed.), The Oxford Handbook of Animals, p. 110. In Kron’s view, Roman writers express a detailed knowledge even of the behavioural needs of livestock. See Kron, ibid., pp. 115–16; and Timothy Howe, ‘Domestication and Breeding of Livestock: Horses, Mules,

214

22.

23.

24. 25.

26. 27. 28.

29. 30.

31. 32.

33.

34.

NOTES TO PAGES 80 –84 Asses, Cattle, Sheep, Goats, and Swine’, in Campbell (ed.), The Oxford Handbook of Animals, p. 103. On Greek animal husbandry in general, see Sigene Isager and Jens Erik Skydsgaard, Ancient Greek Agriculture: An Introduction (London: Routledge, 1992). On cattle as a symbol of property, see Timothy Howe, ‘Value Economics: Animals, Wealth, and the Market’, in Campbell (ed.), The Oxford Handbook of Animals, pp. 136– 55, as well as Jeremy McInerney, The Cattle of the Sun: Cows and Culture in the World of the Ancient Greeks (Princeton: Princeton University Press, 2010). On cattle raids, see ibid., pp. 97 – 102. The Iliad contains only sporadic allusions to agricultural work, such as the statement that mules are better at ploughing than oxen, 10.352 –3. The number of pigs expresses Odysseus’ wealth, which also comprises 12 herds of cattle and sheep as well as 11 herds of goats (14.99– 104). Odysseus’ goatherd Melantheus says the goatherd’s work is ‘to sweep out the pens and to carry young shoots to the kids’ (Od. 17.223 – 5). When Odysseus fatally wounds Polyphemus, the Cyclops’ livestock is in danger of being left without care, without milking (9.438– 40). The lines are preserved by Plutarch. He quotes them in the Life of Agis (1.2). On the genre of the play (not satyr-drama?), see Sommerstein and Talboy, Sophocles. Selected Fragmentary Plays, pp. 183– 8. See H. Carrington Bolton, ‘The Language Used in Talking to Domestic Animals’, The American Anthropologist 10:3 (1897), pp. 1 – 2. Addresses to horses in the Iliad: 8.184– 97, 16.684, 17.431, 19.400 –3 (Achilleus to Xanthus and Balius), 23.403– 16, 23.443 – 5. Hayden Peliccia, Mind, Body, and Speech in Homer and Pindar (Go¨ttingen: Vandenhoeck & Ruprecht, 1995), pp. 170– 1. On horse care in the Iliad, see Korhonen, ‘. . . and Horses’, pp. 55 – 7. Ibid., pp. 54 – 5. Ibid., p. 59; and Mark H. Edwards, The Iliad: A Commentary. Volume 5: Books 17 – 20 (The Iliad Commentary, general editor Geoffrey S. Kirk) (Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 1991), pp. 282– 5. Carrington Bolton, ‘The Language Used in Talking to Domestic Animals’, p. 66. Kenneth J. Dover notes the colloquial form of command, see Dover, Theocritus: Select Poems (Basingstoke: Macmillan, 1971), p. 129. Animals could be addressed by ‘demostrative force of the article’, like aἱ xίmairai in Theocr. 1.151, see Richard Hunter, Theocritus: A Selection. Idylls 1, 3, 4, 6, 7, 10, 11 and 13 (Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 1999), p. 107. He mentions that it was used only ‘to inferiors or animals’. Animals or fantasy animals were addressed humorously in comedies, for instance the giant dung beetle addressed by Trygaeus in Aristophanes’ Peace (82– 9, 154– 63). Hayden Pellicia discusses ‘mute-addresses’, referring to addresses to children, animals and the dead. Peliccia, Mind, Body, and Speech in Homer and Pindar, pp. 161– 77.

NOTES TO PAGES 84 –88

215

35. There are no manuals for training shepherd dogs in the Greek corpus. Plutarch’s contemporary, Dio of Prusa (Chrysostomus) tells in his Euboean Discourse, or Hunter (7.16– 17) how shepherd dogs are re-educated as hounds because their masters lost their jobs as cattle tenders. 36. Xenophon notices the difference between dogs that are fond of humans ( philanthro¯pos) and those which are self-willed, full of themselves (authade¯s) (Cyneg. 6.25). Greek text of Xenophon’s Cynegeticus and its translation used here is by A. A. Phillips and M. M. Willcock, Xenophon & Arrian: On Hunting (Warminster: Aris & Phillips, 1999), pp. 58 – 9. 37. Xenophon discusses horses only sporadically in his Cavalry Commander (Hipparchicus), see Eq. Mag. 1.3 and 1.16. 38. Xenophon also refers to hunting in his Education of Cyrus, but to the ‘great hunt’, familiar in Egypt and Mesopotamia, which only the upper part of the society attended (Cyr. 1.3.14). 39. In the Odyssey, Odysseus’ reminiscence of the hunting of wild boar in his youth contains a detailed description of the boar’s habitat, outward appearance and its ferocity against the hunting party (19.439– 43). The description thus gives the boar’s perspective, too, although the wounding of young Odysseus is the point of the story. 40. See also Harel, ‘The Animal Voice Behind the Animal Fable’, p. 10. 41. Jenifer Neils and John H. Oakley, Coming of Age in Ancient Greece: Images of Childhood from the Classical Past (New Haven: Yale University Press, 2003), pp. 145–7, 280; Calder, Cruelty and Sentimentality, pp. 81, 92; Francis D. Lazenby, ‘Greek and Roman Household Pets’, CJ 44:4 (1947), pp. 247, 300. 42. On the terms ‘pet’, ‘personal animal’, ‘companion animal’ and ‘status animal’, see Michael MacKinnon, ‘Pets’, in Campbell (ed.), The Oxford Handbook of Animals, pp. 269– 70; Ingvild Sælid Gilhus, Animals, Gods, and Humans. Changing Attitudes to Animals in Greek, Roman and Early Christian Ideas (Oxford: Oxford University Press, 2006), p. 29. See also Calder, Cruelty and Sentimentality, pp. 79 – 97. 43. However, the ‘pet’ (syntrophos) in Lucian’s case is a fly (Ode to the Fly 4.6). Cf. the word syntrophos in Aelian’s NA 6.63 (snake and a boy) and rhetorician Aelius Theon’s (the first century CE ) Progymnasmata 75.6. (lion whelp and a prince). 44. On pet and war horse burials, see McKinnon, ‘Pets’, pp. 274– 5; and Calder, Cruelty and Sentimentality, pp. 81 – 2 (dogs). Aelian mentions an Athenian, who held public funerals for his dogs and fighting cocks (VH 8.4). 45. Lazenby, ‘Pets’, p. 245. 46. Both fragments of Eubulus are preserved by Athenaeus, in Deipnosophistae (12.519a and 12.553b). 47. James Diggle, Theophrastus: Characters (Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 2004), pp. 407– 8. 48. Aelian uses the term when talking about the attribute animals of the gods; for instance, that partridge is the athurma of Artemis (NA 10.35).

216

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TO PAGES

88 – 91

49. On the delicia, see Hanne Nielsen, ‘Delicia in Roman Literature and in the Urban Inscriptions’, Analecta Romana Instituti Danici 19, pp. 79 – 88. The corresponding Greek word is paidika (Eur. Cycl. 584). See also Lazenby, ‘Pets’, p. 249. 50. On hymnal wording, see Athanassios Vergados, The Homeric Hymn to Hermes: Introduction, Text and Commentary (Berlin: De Gruyter, 2013), p. 253. 51. Animals’ deaths and animals’ bodies are thus seen as prerequisites for refined cultural commodities. As Walter Burkert has noted, the death of a singer (Linus and Orpheus) or the death of an animal (a tortoise, a cow – the tympanon is covered with cow-hide; and bone-flutes are made from several animals) is seen as a prerequisite for the birth of music and its power. Burkert, Homo necans, p. 50. 52. On Aelian’s tales of zoophilia, see Steven D. Smith, ‘Monstrous Love? Erotic Reciprocity in Aelian’s De natura animalium’, in Ed Sanders et al. (eds), Eroˆs in Ancient Greece (Oxford: Oxford University Press, 2013), pp. 73 – 89; Tua Korhonen, ‘On Human-Animal Sexual Relationships in Aelian’s Natura Animalium’, Arctos 46 (2012), pp. 65 – 78; Gilhus, Animals, Gods, and Humans, p. 72. 53. Several dogs reveal the murderer of their master; this kind of story was told of the epic poet Hesiod’s dog by Plutarch. See Plut. Mor. 969e, 984d. 54. See Justina Gregory, ‘Donkeys and Equine Hierarchy in Archaic Greek Literature’, CJ 102:3 (2007), pp. 193– 5. On wolves, see Franco, Shameless, pp. 29, 113. 55. Athena is depicted on the fifth century Attic hydria as a giant owl standing on an altar (deposited in the Museum Gustavianum, Uppsala), see Helen Collard ‘Montrer l’invisible. Les dieux et leurs statues dans la ce´ramique grecque’, in Philippe de Borgeaud and Doralice Fabiano (eds), Perception et construction du divin dans l’Antiquite´ (Recherches et rencontres, 31) (Gene`ve: Librairie Droz, 2013), p. 81. On gods linked to specific animals, Gilhus, Animals, Gods, and Humans, pp. 93 – 5; Christine Morris, ‘Animals into Art in the Ancient World’, in Linda Kalof (ed.), A Cultural History of Animals, pp. 190 – 1; Burkert, Homo necans, pp. 23 – 4n20. See also Eran Lupu, Greek Sacred Law: A Collection of New Documents (NGSL) (Leiden: Brill, 2005), pp. 29–30. 56. Lupu, Greek Sacred Law, pp. 15 – 16. 57. K. A. D. Smelik and E. A. Hemelrijk, ‘Who Knows Not What Monsters Demented Egypt Worships? Opinions on Egyptian Animal Worship in Antiquity as Part of the Ancient Conception of Egypt’, ANRW IV (Berlin: Guyter, 1984), pp. 1900– 3, 1968– 89, 1976– 9. 58. Cf. Pausanias 10.6.1– 2 (wolves) and 1.40.1 (cranes). Ovid, by contrast, describes the animal victims of the flood as being as helpless as the humans (Met. 1.253 –347). 59. Plutarch relates in his life of Alexander the Great (27.2– 3) how ravens saved Alexander and his men when they got lost in the desert while travelling to the

NOTES

60. 61. 62. 63. 64.

65. 66.

67. 68. 69. 70.

71. 72. 73.

74.

75.

76.

TO PAGES

91 – 96

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Temple of Ammon. On animal me¯tis, ‘cunning’, see Debra Hawhee, Bodily Arts: Rhetoric and Athletics in Ancient Greece (Austin, TX: University of Texas Press, 2004), pp. 44 – 6, 55 – 7. Kenneth Rothwell, Nature, Culture, and the Origins of Greek Comedy A Study of Animal Choruses (Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 2007), pp. 96 – 9. Kurke, Aesopic Conversations, pp. 224– 9. Stefan Tilg, Apuleius’ Metamorphoses: A Study in Roman Fiction (Oxford: Oxford University Press), pp. 1– 7. Paul M. C. Forbes Irving, Metamorphosis in Greek Myths (Oxford: Clarendon, 1990), pp. 23 –5. Gryllos has been interpreted as a Menippean satire, as a criticism of Epicureanism, disguised as Cynicism, and recently as an advocation of Plutarch’s views of animals as paragons of natural virtue. Giovanni Indelli, Plutarco: Le bestie sono esseri razionali (Napoli: Bibliopolis, 1995), pp. 21–34. On Sophocles’ Tereus, see, for instance, Dunbar, Aristophanes, pp. 139– 40. Io, in Aeschylus’ Prometheus Bound, is a notable exception. But does Io’s frustration – Hera has changed her into a heifer – result more from the fact that she is pursued by Hera and not from her discomfort at being in a heifer’s body? Thomas Nagel, ‘What Is It Like to Be a Bat?’, The Philosophical Review 83:4, pp. 435– 50. Forbes Irving, Metamorphosis in Greek Myths, p. 196. Richard G. A. Buxton, Forms of Astonishment: Greek Myths of Metamorphosis (Oxford: Oxford University Press, 2009), p. 240. For instance, Ixion desires Hera, and Atreus kills his nephews and feeds their bodies to their father, Thyestes (who had had an affair with Atreus’ wife). Buxton, Forms of Astonishment, p. 249. See also Forbes Irving, Metamorphosis in Greek Myths, p. 60. Buxton, Forms of Astonishment, p. 252. Translation of the Cyropaedia by Walter Miller in Walter Miller, Xenophon: Cyropaedia. Volume 1, Books 1 – 4, LCL 51 (Cambridge, MA: Harvard University Press, 1914), pp. 355– 9. On the Hellenistic collections of stories of transformations, see Buxton, Forms of Astonishment, pp. 110– 15; and Forbes Irving, Metamorphosis in Greek Myths, pp. 19 – 20. See M. D. MacLeod’s introduction in M. D. MacLeod, Lucian VIII, LCL 432 (Cambridge, MA: Harvard University Press, 1967), pp. 302 – 5. Lucian handles metamorphosis for instance in the Dialogues of Sea-Gods, where the sea-god Proteus compares his ability to transform himself to the mimicry of an octopus (‘Menelaus and Proteus’ 4.2 – 3), and dolphins explain the reason for their kindness to men: they were once humans (‘Poseidon and Dolphins’ 5.1). Gilhus, Animals, Gods, and Humans, p. 82.

218

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TO PAGES

97 –102

77. The written form of this fable is known to be late because it uses the verb metamorpho¯sein, which first occurs in Strabo (see Buxton, Forms of Astonishment, pp. 22 – 3). 78. Mark Payne, The Animal Part: Human and Other Animals in the Poetic Imagination (Chicago: University of Chicago Press. 2010, pp. 115– 20. 79. Bird metamorphoses are explained as aetiological myths frequently. For instance, because the hoopoe’s crest is unusual, the myth of a king metamorphosed into a hoopoe (the crest was a crown) was created. 80. On this work, see Simon Swain (ed.), Seeing the Face, Seeing the Soul: Polemon’s Physiogonomy from Classical Antiquity to Medieval Islam (Oxford: Oxford University Press, 2007), pp. 75 – 100. See also Gilhus, Animals, Gods, and Humans, pp. 74 –5. 81. Pl. Phd. 81e–82b, Phdr. 249b, Resp. 10.620a–d, and Tim. 90e–92c. See also Buxton, Forms of Astonishment, pp. 241–3; Gilhus, Animals, Gods and Humans, pp. 87–8. 82. Pl. Phd. 81e: 1ἰ6 tὰ tῶn ὄnvn gέnh [. . .] ἐndύ1suai. ‘The species of donkeys’ may refer to domesticated and wild donkeys and to mules. 83. On callousness, Calder, Cruelty and Sentimentality, pp. 107– 8. 84. For the list of ancient conceptions of the distinguishing features of humans, see Richard Sorabji, Animal Minds and Human Morals, pp. 89 –93. 85. Cf. Philippe Descola’s fourfold table of the ‘interiorities’ and ‘physicalities’ between humans and non-humans in four belief systems: in totemism, animism, naturalism and analogism. Descola, Beyond Nature and Culture, trans. Janet Lloyd (Chicago: University of Chicago Press, 2013), pp. 121– 2, see also pp. 233, 239, 304. 86. Alexandridis et al. (eds), Mensch und Tier in der Antike, p. 2. See also Emma Aston, Mixanthroˆpoi: Animal-Human Hybrid Deities in Greek Religion, Kernos. Supple´ment 25 (Lie`ge: Centre International d’e´tude de la Religion Grecque Antique, 2012), pp. 16 – 21, especially p. 17. 87. On fifth century BCE ideas of progress, see, for instance, Rothwell, Animal Choruses, pp. 82– 4. 88. In the Odyssey, Circe performs two magical acts in order to transform men into animals: she gives men a magic potion, and then she completes the transformation by striking them with her wand. Elaine Fantham notes that Homer does not make this a moral tale about the consequences of men’s gluttony – it is only a story of the witch’s craft. Later on, metamorphosis was interpreted as a punishment. Elaine Fantham, Ovid’s Metamorphoses (Oxford: Oxford University Press, 2004), pp. 8–9 (see Palladas, AP 10.50). 89. Chrysippus seems to quote a poem, in which a personified Phroneˆsis asks to be despised because it is now in a donkey’s body ( proso¯pon). William Cro¨nert attributed the quote to Timotheus’ Elpenor (the fifth century BCE ), which is now held to be unconvincing. See J. H. Hordern, The Fragments of Timotheus of Miletus (Oxford: Oxford University Press, 2002), p. 106.

NOTES

TO PAGES

103 –108

219

90. On Gryllus, Plutarch’s other animal treatises (like On Cleverness of Animals) and on the recent, substantial research on them, see Stephen T. Newmyer, ‘Animals in Plutarch’, in Mark Beck (ed.), A Companion to Plutarch (Oxford: Blackwell, 204), pp. 223–34. 91. Osborne, Dumb Beasts, pp. 111– 15. 92. Arist. Physica 1.1.639b19 – 21. Plutarch, for his part, states that any living being is more valuable than any inanimate, soulless thing, even jewellery, Plut. Mor. 382a. 93. Karin Johannesson, The Birds in the Iliad: Identities, Interactions and Functions (Gothenburg: Acta Univeritatis Gothoburgensis, 2012), pp. 83 – 5. 94. Much later on, Saint Augustine explained metamorphosis, which in his view happens by the agency of the Devil, as not an actual transformation to an animal but only an animal appearance. Gilhus, Animals, Gods and Humans, pp. 85 – 6.

Part IV

Case Studies

1. Translated by Anthony Verity. All translations of the Iliad in this book are from his Iliad (2011), sometimes slightly modified. 2. William M. Scott lists the following functions of similes: as decorations, as a means to amplification, as a method of heightening the emotional intensity of the passage in question; similes can also show a thematic contrast or mark a shifting of the scene. William M. Scott, The Artistry of the Homeric Simile (Hanover, NH: Dartmouth College Press, 2009), pp. 42 –93. On the interpretations of Homeric similes by ancient critics, see Rene´ Nu¨nlist, The Ancient Critic at Work, pp. 286–98, especially pp. 289–90. On different modern approaches to similes, such as rhetorical-thematic, and attempts to date them by focusing on performance, see Richard Buxton, ‘Similes and other likenesses’, in R. L. Fowler (ed.), The Cambridge Companion to Homer (Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 2004), p. 140. 3. On visual similes, see Judith M. Barringer, The Hunt in Ancient Greece (Baltimore & London: Johns Hopkins University Press), pp. 4 – 5. 4. John Heath, ‘Animals’, in Margalit Finkelberg (ed.), The Homer Encyclopedia Vol. I (Chichester, MA: Wiley-Blackwell, 2011), p. 57. See also John Heath, The Talking Greeks: Speech, Animals, and the Other in Homer, Aeschylus, and Plato (Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 2005), p. 43. 5. The number of animal similes in the Iliad is around 120, comprising around 800 lines, but compared to the total of 15,693 lines in the Iliad, it is of course a small number. 6. Mark H. Edwards, The Iliad: A Commentary. Volume 5: Books 17 –20 (The Iliad Commentary, general editor Geoffrey S. Kirk) (Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 1991), p. 24; William C. Scott, ‘The Oral Nature of the Homeric Simile’, Mnemosyne, Supplement 28 (1974), pp. 191– 205; D. J. N. Lee, The Similes of the Iliad and the Odyssey Compared (Melbourne: Melbourne

220

7.

8. 9.

10.

11. 12. 13. 14. 15.

16. 17. 18.

19.

NOTES

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University Press, 1964), pp. 3 – 4; Susan Said, ‘Animal Simile in Odyssey 22’, in Franco Montanari, Antonios Rengakos and Christos C. Tsagalis (eds), Homeric Contexts: Neoanalysis and the Interpretation of Oral Poetry (Berlin: De Gruyter, 2012), p. 347; Steven H. Lonsdale, Creatures of Speech: Lion, Herding, and Hunting Similes in the Iliad (Stuttgart: Teubner, 1990), p. 10. The total number of all kinds of similes according to Scott and Lee in the Iliad: 341–50 similes; in the Odyssey: 132– 4 similes. Similes are c. 7.2 per cent of the total verses of the Iliad (Edwards, The Iliad: Commentary 5, p. 24). The division is based on James M. Redfield, Nature and Culture in the Iliad: The Tragedy of Hector (Chicago: University of Chicago Press, 1975), pp. 188 – 9. Irene J. De Jong, Narrators and Focalizers: The Presentation of the Story in the Iliad (Amsterdam: Gru¨ner, 1987), p. 12. Helmut Rahn, ‘Tier und Mensch in der Homerischen Auffassung der Wirklichkeit’, Paideuma 5:6 (1953), p. 288; and Paideuma 5:7/8 (1954), pp. 452, 466– 7. According to Rahn, human beings are not seen as ‘rein menschlich’, but as part of their net of relationships. See also Lonsdale, Creatures of Speech, p. 1. On the question of thumos and psyche of the Homeric animals, see Caroline P. Caswell, A Study of Thumos in Early Greek Epic (Leiden: Brill, 1990); Dierauer, Tier und Mench, p. 9n21; Rahn, ‘Tier und Mensch’, pp. 447–50. See Lee, The Similes, pp. 65 – 73 (foxes pro jackals); and Scott, The Artistry of the Homeric Simile, Appendix. On animals in the general narrative of the Iliad, see Rahn, ‘Tier und Mensch’. Chariot horse race in simile, see 22.161 – 63, and actual horse race in Patroclus’ funeral in Book 23. Saı¨d, ‘Animal Simile in Odyssey 22’, pp. 347– 9. Carroll Moulton has noted that sometimes lion simile can function as a sign in itself: both Patroclus and Hector ‘receive’ a lion simile before their deaths; therefore Achilleus’ lion simile in Book 24 (24.41– 5) can be viewed as a kind of omen for his forthcoming near death, which occurs outside the scope of the Iliad. Carroll Moulton, Similes in the Homeric Poems (Go¨ttingen: Vandenhoeck & Ruprecht, 1977), p. 113n63. Edwards, The Iliad: A Commentary 5, p. 39. Lonsdale, Creatures of Speech, p. 10. Books 15 and 16 contain ten animal similes each, Book 11 has twelve animal similes and Books 13, 21 and 22 contain seven or eight animal similes each. Of course, the division into books is quite artificial and books do not have an equal number of lines. See, for example, Nicholas Richardson, The Iliad: A Commentary. Volume 6: Books 21 – 24 (Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 1993), pp. 20 – 1. The description is empathetic but the practice is cruel and callous: a living dove bound in a pole is the target for an archery contest.

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20. Annie Schnapp-Gourbeillon, Lions, He´ros, Masques: le representations de l’animal chez Home`re (Paris: Maspero, 1981), pp. 66– 7. Books 6, 9 and 24 contain only one animal simile each. 21. Sometimes, it is a (mere) comparison not a simile: a warrior attacks ‘like a predator’ (uhrὶ ἐoikώ6, 3.449, 11.546). 22. Patroclus drags a Trojan warrior from the chariot with his spear like a man drags out a fish of the sea (16.405 –10). See also horse similes: 15.679 – 85 and 22.162– 3. 23. See 2.474– 6 (goatherds – goats). See also sheep similes: 13.492– 3, 8.131. Much more elaborate animal description in sheep similes: 4. 433– 5 and 5.136– 42. 24. The point of comparison is thus a sleepless night caused by a threat. C. Due´ and M. Ebbott, Iliad 10 and the Poetics of Ambush (Washington, DC: Center for Hellenic Studies, 2010), p. 274. 25. Porphyry’s passage, and its translation by Rene Nu¨nlist, The Ancient Critic at Work, pp. 289– 90. 26. Scott, The Artistry of Homeric Simile, p. 186 referring to Stephen A. Nimis, Narrative Semiotics in the Epic Tradition: the Simile (Bloomington: Indiana University Press, 1987). 27. Richard Janko, The Iliad: A Commentary. Volume 4: Books 13 – 16 (Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 1992), pp. 126 – 7. Janko refers to Gisela Strasburger’s Die kleinen Ka¨mpfer der Ilias (Frankfurt: Privately printed, 1954), p. 40. Janko notices the bloodlessness of the worm (the bloodlessness of the dead warrior is mentioned) and that the word skώlhj means also maggot. However, maggots are usually seen alive in a dead body rather than themselves dead. 28. Herman Fra¨nkel, Die homerische Gleichnisse (Go¨ttingen: Gruyter, 1921), p. 89. However, see Moulton, Similes, p. 18. 29. Egbert J. Bakker, ‘Similes, Augment, and the Language of Immediacy’, in Janet Watson (ed.), Speaking Volumes: Orality and Literacy in the Greek and Roman World (Leiden: Brill, 2001), p. 22. 30. Examples: 3.151– 3 (cicadas in the forests), 2.86 – 90 (bees, flowers). 31. Examples: 3.33– 5 (a wanderer and a snake), 16.259– 265 (boys plaguing wasps). 32. Wild animals are rarely eaten in the epics, not even fish and fowl, although references to fishing and fowling are frequent in the similes. Janko, The Iliad: A Commentary 4, pp. 368– 9. 33. See examples also in Lonsdale, Creatures of Speech, pp. 58 –60. 34. On focalisation in the Homeric epics, see Irene J. de Jong, Narrators and Focalizers: The Presentation of the Story in the Iliad (Amsterdam: Gru¨ner, 1987). As Barbara Graziosi puts it: ‘[o]ften the poet of the Iliad describes things from the perspective of an implicit observer [. . .] the same scene is focalized through different characters in close succession’. Barbara Graziosi, ‘Introduction’, in Homer: The Iliad, trans. Anthony Verity (Oxford: Oxford University Press, 2011), p. xviii.

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35. The vantage point of the prey; see, for instance, 11.113 – 9, 21.493– 5, 22.93 – 5, 22.181– 92. 36. Janko, The Iliad: A Commentary. Volume 4, p. 352. 37. On Homeric insects, see Malcolm Davies and Jeyaraney Kathirithamby, Greek Insects (London: Duckworth, 1986), pp. 7 –9. 38. Richardson, The Iliad: A Commentary 6, p. 55. 39. Heath, ‘Animals’, p. 57; Heath, The Talking Greeks, p. 43. See 2.311 (sparrow’s tekna), 11.113 (hind’s tekna). On lion’s cubs: tekos (‘child’, ‘young’, 17.133), skumnos (‘whelp’, 18.319) 40. Lonsdale, Creatures of Speech, pp. 1, 65, 127. However, for instance, Richard Janko points out that ‘Homer often grants [animals] emotions which many wrongly deem exclusive to humans’. Janko, The Iliad: A Commentary 4, p. 352. See also Payne, Animal Part, p. 33n9. 41. Heath, The Talking Greeks, pp. 43 – 51. 42. Edwards, The Iliad: A Commentary 5, pp. 38 – 41. 43. Lonsdale, Creatures of Speech, pp. 64 – 5. 44. Lion: kέl1tai dέ ἑ uymὸ6 ἀgήnvr (12.300) and Sarphdόna uymὸ6 ἀnῆk1 (12.307). Thumos sends up Sarpedon (ἀnίhmi, translated as ‘impel’), and in the case of the lion, thumos even orders (kέlomai) it. 45. Animals with thumos, for instance: 22.142 (hawk), 23.881 (dove). 46. Lonsdale, Creatures of Speech, p. 65. 47. Hungry lions seeking after krea in 11.548 – 55 (this simile is partly repeated in 17.656– 64). 48. Kreio¯n in 12.300 is a variant gen. pl. form of kreo¯n. 49. The word can be used of meat both before and after it is cooked. On the terminology of cooked meat eaters and raw meat eaters in the Iliad, see Heath, Talking Animals, p. 136. 50. Lonsdale, Creatures of Speech, p. 123. 51. Ibid., p. 94. 52. Carnivorous animals do eat meat rather differently from human meat eaters for the simple reason that without equipment the meat must be torn asunder by claws and teeth, and to eat freshly killed animals means being stained with their blood. Bryan Hainsworth praises this simile as ‘the finest lion simile in the Iliad’ and points out the phraseological similarities with Od. 6.130 – 4, where a mountain lion’s motive, the sheer necessity of hunger, is the basis for its action. Hainsworth, The Iliad: A Commentary. 3, p. 351. 53. Cf. Agamemnon is likened to a bull among cattle, 2.480– 2. 54. Anthony Verity’s translation slightly modified here. Priam uses two different words for ram: first ktilos, which can mean especially an uncastrated ram, then arneios, which later was more usual and was used especially in connection with sheep. See LSJ s.v. 55. Moulton, Similes, pp. 100– 1.

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56. Achilleus compares their relationship with that of a mother and a daughter (16.7 – 10), and, later, father and son (23.222– 25). For other protection motifs uttered by Achilleus, see Moulton, Similes, pp. 101– 3. 57. The hunter in the simile is not a lion hunter but a hunter of deer. 58. Ancient scholia defined that lionesses have beards, lions manes. Edwards, The Iliad: A Commentary 5, p. 184. 59. Michael Clarke, ‘Between Lions and Men: Images of Hero in the Iliad’, Greek, Roman and Byzantine Studies 36:2 (1995), p. 137. Furthermore, Heath interprets animal similes in general lines as ‘culture giving way to savage nature’. Heath, Talking Greeks, p. 138. We may question what the notions of ‘culture’ and especially ‘savage nature’ mean in the context of the Iliad? 60. Cf. 17.434– 5: the stillness of Xanthus and Balius is compared to the stillness of a gravestone. 61. See also 20.495 – 7, where the pair of bulls, which thresh barley, are compared to Achilleus’ chariot horses, which trample down dead men and shields. 62. For instance, Hera and Athena step like rock doves (5.778– 9), and Apollo and Athena are compared with vultures (7.59– 62). For the ambiguity of the presentation of gods as birds, see Buxton, ‘Similes and Other Likenesses’, p. 142. 63. For other instances in Greek literature, see Part II. 64. There is often a simile attached to divine travels. Kirk, The Iliad. A Commentary 2, pp. 137 – 8. Herdsmen as solitary observers of scenery: 4.275 – 9 and 8.555 – 61. 65. Does comparison with sacrificial animals cast a certain kind of ‘sacred’ light on these otherwise insignificant warriors? Or did the associations point to humiliation: the dying warriors were helpless under subordination and were butchered like sacrificial animals? 66. Sacrificial scenes, for instance: 1.458– 66; 3.245 – 6 (two young rams). 67. A notable exception is the sacrifice in Patroclus’ funeral, where the slumping of the bulls and the bleating of the goats are mentioned in order to emphasise the abundance of the sacrificial animals, the expense of the sacrifice, not the emotional state of the animals (23.30– 4). 68. In Book 16, a dying warrior is compared to a bull which is killed by a lion (16. 487 – 5). 69. Janko interprets the mountain pasture as referring to the wildness of the animal and raises the question of whether the animal is meant to be sacrificed. Janko, The Iliad: A Commentary 4, p. 116. 70. See Moulton, Similes, pp. 81– 8 and, on other eagle similes, Richardson, The Iliad: A Commentary 6, p. 137. 71. For the opinion that sympathetic descriptions of animals are confined for the most part to similes, see Davies and Kathirithamby, Greek Insects, p. 7. 72. See Korhonen, ‘. . . and Horses’, pp. 56, 58– 60.

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73. The same simile can function as a comparison to such different characters as brothers Paris and Hector, in different situations. The point of comparison is the delight on account of joining the battle, which expresses a heroic ideal. The specific narrative function is to advance the narrative: the warrior’s return to the battle is quickly related by the simile. Janko, The Iliad: A Commentary 4, p. 256. 74. On the atypical language and the literary references of this simile, see Magdalene Stoevesandt, Homers Ilias. Gesamtkommentar Band IV: Sechster Gesang, Faszikel 2: Kommentar (Berlin: Gruyter, 2008), pp. 157– 8 and Kirk, The Iliad: A Commentary 2, pp. 226– 7. 75. Chiara Thumiger, ‘Animals in Tragedy’, in Campbell (ed.), The Oxford Handbook of Animals, p. 89. 76. Chiara Thumiger,‘ἀnάgkh6 z1ύgmat’ ἐmp1ptώk1n, p. 2. In her view, animal imagery may even have a force to create a parallel ‘animal tragedy’ inside the tragedy, which imitates the human experience. Thumiger, ‘Animals in Tragedy’, p. 93. 77. Although there are several chariot entries by royalty in the extant tragedies, it is unclear how these were produced on the stage. Did they include actual horses coming onto the stage? See Oliver Taplin, The Stagecraft of Aeschylus (Oxford: Clarendon Press, 1977), pp. 74 –9. 78. Pietro Pucci compares the hero to Heideggerian authentic man, Pietro Pucci, ‘Introduzione’, in Guido Avezzu`, Pietro Pucci and Giovanni Cerri (eds), Sofocle: Filottete (Milano: Mondadori, 2003), pp. xxii–xxiii. 79. Patricia E. Easterling, ‘Philoctetes and Modern Criticism’, Illinois Classical Studies 3 (1978), p. 27. 80. Cf. Anthony Pelzer Wagener, ‘Stylistic Qualities of the Apostrophe to Nature as a Dramatic Device’, TAPA 62 (1931), pp. 89 – 90. According to Sarah H. Nooter, address, self-address and apostrophes combined are more frequent in Philoctetes than in any other Sophocles’ tragedy, see Seth L. Schein, Sophocles: Philoctetes (Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 2013), p. 36. (Schein’s reference to Nooter’s book: When Heroes Sing: Sophocles and the Shifting Soundscape of Tragedy (Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 2012), p. 134). 81. Also the environment of Prometheus Bound is a wilderness, and the protagonist apostrophes his surroundings (88 – 91). 82. As Charles Segal put it, ‘the bestial life of “savagery”, or agrioteˆs, [is] an important theme in the play’. Sophocles’ Tragic World. Divinity, Nature, Society (Cambridge: Harvard University Press, 1995), pp. 98, 114. See also Schein, Sophocles, pp. 17 – 18; Poulcheria Kyriakou, ‘Philoctetes’, in Andreas Markantonatos (ed.), Brill’s Companion to Sophocles (Leiden: Brill, 2012), p. 150; Penelope Biggs, ‘The Disease Theme in Sophocles’ Ajax, Philoctetes and Trachiniae’, CP 61:4 (Oct. 1966), p. 232 (‘savage qualities’). 83. One of the sailor’s functions as a fake merchant is to make Philoctetes believe in Neoptolemus’ lies (542 – 627).

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84. Pierre Vidal-Naquet, ‘Sophocles’ Philoctetes and the Ephebeia’, in JeanPierre Vernant and Pierre Vidal-Naquet, Myth and Tragedy in Ancient Greece, trans. J. Lloyd (New York: Zone, 1981), pp. 161 – 79. On Neoptolemus’ character and his struggle between ‘nature’ and ‘nurture’, see Hanna M. Roisman, Sophocles: Philoctetes (London: Duckworth, 2005), pp. 89 – 105. 85. Virgilio Masciadri, Eine Insel im Meer: Untersuchungen zu Mythen aus Lemnos (Stuttgart: Steiner, 2008), pp. 287– 9. However, Lemnos is not only ‘nature’ but bears references to ‘culture’, even to divine male craftsmanship. Divine weapons were crafted by the crippled Hephaestus, who also sojourned nine years on Lemnos (after been cast down from Olympus). 86. The expression ‘Lemnian deeds’ was proverbial, meaning ‘terrible deeds’ and referring to the murders by the Lemnian women. Masciadri, Eine Insel im Meer, p. 288. 87. The adjective ἔw1dro6 refers to sitting position so that Cybele is either seated on a chariot drawn by a pair of lions or riding seated on lions’ backs or seated on a throne which is decorated by lions. According to a Byzantine scholar, the name Lῆmno6 was one of the ancient epithets of Cybele and Lemnos was one of her cult sites. Schein, Sophocles, pp. 192 – 3. There were also other mythical islands governed by goddesses, like Circe’s and Calypso’s islands. 88. On Cybele as Greek divinity, see Schein, Sophocles, pp. 192– 3. 89. Richard Buxton, Imaginary Greece: The Context of Mythology (Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 1994), p. 96. 90. The island of Chryse was situated close to the east coast of Lemnos. On the nymph Chryse and her island, Masciardi, Eine Insel im Meer, pp. 50, 53 – 4, 117– 28; Schein, Sophocles, pp. 158, 171. 91. Soph. Phil. pp. 266–7 (echidne¯): the man-slaying serpent; it has made Philoctetes footless (apous, 632). A footless creature thus made Philoctetes ‘footless’, a cripple. For Echidna, see Hes. Theog. 298–300; Schein, Philoctetes, p. 170. 92. Schein, Philoctetes, pp. 258– 9; Biggs, ‘The Disease Theme’, p. 231. 93. Sophocles was already 87 years old when the play was produced at the Great Dionysia in Athens in 409 BCE . It won the first prize. 94. In Aeschylus’ and Euripides’ Philoctetes, both composed before Sophocles’ tragedy, the chorus consists of the Lemnian people. See, for instance, Paul Woodruff, ‘The Philoctetes of Sophocles’, in Kirk Ormand (ed.), A Companion to Sophocles (Malden, MA: Wiley-Blackwell, 2012), pp. 126– 7. 95. In Pherecrates’ The Wild Ones (or ‘Primitives’), which was produced for the Lenaia c. 420 BCE , the primitive people turn out to be cannibals. The same ending occurs in Phrynichus’ Monotropos (‘The Solitary’ or ‘The Recluse’), which earned the third prize at the same Great Dionysia (414 BCE ), where Aristophanes’ Birds won the second prize. In The Birds the protagonists also end up in wilderness. Cf. Ce´cile Corbel-Morana, Le Bestiaire d’Aristophane (Paris: Les Belles Lettres, 2012), p. 204.

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96. The cave is warm in winter and cool in summer, says Odysseus (17 – 19). It is mentioned several times that there are two exits from the cave – as in foxes’ and many other wild animals’ lair. Caves have a symbolic meaning, for instance, as cultic places. See Buxton, Imaginary, pp. 93 – 4, 104– 8. 97. Translations of Philoctetes given here are based on translations by Sir Richard Jebb (1898) and Hugh Lloyd-Jones (1994). Richard Jebb, The Philoctetes of Sophocles. Edited with Introduction and Notes (Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 1898); Hugh Lloyd-Jones, Sophocles II, LCL 21 (Cambridge, MA: Harvard University Press, 1994). 98. The subject of the verb ἐpinvmᾶn is oὐdέ ti6 not oὐdέ ti. 99. There were healing springs on Lemnos, and some accounts of the myth of Philoctetes note that he was left on Lemnos in order to be healed. Masciardi, Eine Insel im Meer, p. 50. 100. The word brotos was used only of humans; syntrophos means literally those who have the same nourishment, eat together. 101. For wild rock pigeons, Johannesson, The Birds in the Iliad, pp. 79 –82. 102. A typical adjective pertaining to goats, lάsio6 (‘shaggy’), LSJ s.v.; stiktό6 of deer, see Soph. El. 568. T. B. L. Webster, Sophocles: Philoctetes (Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 1970), p. 83: ‘probably [. . .] spotted deer and shaggy goats’. 103. Philoctetes had yearned for the sound of Greek language (234–5). 104. One of the most moving passages in this tragedy is Philoctetes’ description of his awakening after he has been deserted in Lemnos (276 – 84). He has slept after his harsh attack of pain, and awakes to notice that his companions have gone away. He is alone: ‘When I looked all around me, I could find nothing present but my pain’ (plήn ἀniᾶsuai parόn) (282 – 3). In the Iliad, Philoctetes is not forgotten by his men, although they have a certain Medon as their chief (Il. 2.721 – 3). 105. The text has adverbs; ἀnosίv6 (‘in unholy wise’, 257) and aἰsxrῶ6 (‘shamefully’, 265). 106. Odysseus treats Philoctetes like a cursed man: he commands Philoctetes not to speak to him (1065) and when Philoctetes implores the silent Neoptolemus, Odysseus commands Neoptolemus not even to look at Philoctetes so that he will not destroy their luck (1068– 9). 107. Cf. Segal, Sophocles’ Tragic World, p. 97. 108. Besides the pain and the wild cries by which Philoctetes tries to alleviate his pain, there is the bad smell (kake¯ osme¯, 890– 1; dysosmia, 876). The septic sore spreads such stench that Philoctetes is foul-smelling (dyso¯de¯s, 1032) and he is disgusting for others (dyschereia, 473, 900). When he has hopes of returning home, he fears that his stench will burden the sailors (889 – 92). According to some versions of the myth of Lemnian women, it was the foul smell of women which drove their husbands away. 109. Later on, Philoctetes admits that he hates Odysseus as much as he hates the snake that bit him (631 –2).

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110. Wagener, ‘Stylistic Qualities of the Apostrophe to Nature as a Dramatic Device’, pp. 81–3, but he mentions only one apostrophe to animals in Philoctetes. 111. There is only one apostrophe to a plant in extant tragedies, namely Ion’s address to a laurel branch, of which his brush is made (Ion 112 – 19). Ibid., p. 81. 112. Translation by K. H. Lee, Euripides: Ion. With an Introduction, Translation and Commentary (Oxford: Aris & Phillips, 2007), p. 287. On sacred birds in Ion, M.-H. Giraud, ‘Les oiseaux dans l’ ‘Ion’ d’ Euripide’, RPh 61 (1987), pp. 83 – 94. 113. Thus, there are in Ion (a) auspicious, sacred doves dwelling in the temple, (b) some other birds, which may stain altars as well as eat and clean sacrificial meat from the altars, and (c) birds as eaters of human flesh. 114. Plato, for example, speaks about Socrates’ way of teaching philosophy by conversation, as synousia. Pl. Tht. 150d, Soph. 217d– e, 232c. 115. The verb par-eimi ‘to be with, to be present’ refers to the presence of the surrounding landscape, the island of Lemnos, where the animals of the hills dwell. 116. That he also ate wild herbs and cooked them is perhaps so obvious that it does not need to be mentioned. The same applies to eggs (for instance, seagulls eggs) and fish. However, on the diet of Homeric heroes, see Janko, The Iliad: A Commentary 4, pp. 368– 9. 117. The seemingly innocent one refers to Neoptolemus. The Greeks did not think that predators were ‘innocent killers’. Line 956: conjecture of preposition (from ὑw’ to ἀw’), see Hugh Lloyd-Jones and Nigel G. Wilson, Sophoclea (Oxford: Clarendon Press, 1990), p. 202: ‘ὑw’ would imply that the birds fed Philoctetes’. 118. Philoctetes uses also the verbs ekballein, erriptein, leipein here (257 – 73). See also Phil. 600 (ekballein), 1017 ( proballein), 1028 (ballein), 1390 (ekballein). On the wording of baby exposure, see Cynthia Patterson, “Not Worth the Rearing”: The Causes of Infant Exposure in Ancient Greece’, TAPA 15 (1985), pp. 104, 112. 119. The chorus (handmaidens of Creusa) mentions both birds and wild animals; Creusa only alludes to birds while describing the actual rape (900, 915) and using then the verb riptein (‘throw’) for abandonment, which is used in the curse errei eis korakas. Hermes in his monologue at the beginning of the tragedy also relates Creusa’s rape by Apollo and the exposure of Ion. 120. See also Eur. Hec. 1285. 121. Thumiger, ‘Animals in Tragedy’, p. 85. See also Thumiger, ‘Greek Tragedy between Human and Animal’, pp. 6 – 7. 122. Sophocles does not use here, or elsewhere in Philoctetes, the Homeric adjective ‘raw flesh eaters’ (o¯mophagoi), which is usually attached to larger predators such as wolves, lions and jackals. 123. The sole exception is wild rock doves, which brings to mind domestic doves, which were surely familiar species for Philoctetes.

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124. The distribution of lines and the visual outlining of this and the next lyric passage is from Schein, Sophocles, pp. 99 and 101. 125. However, the adjective here (ptvkά6) is not the same as that used in the Homeric phrase (trήrvn). On rock doves, see Johannesson, The Birds in the Iliad, pp. 79 – 82. 126. Animals may at first have been trustful, then learnt to shun Philoctetes. However, timorous is a stock adjective for such birds as doves. 127. Without his bow, Philoctetes’ only means to catch birds is to mimic a dead body. Is this address a last trick of the hunter to lure the prey? 128. The passage can also be understood as saying that animals are driven away (elaunein) by Philoctetes from his lodging, his cave. The word aulios usually refers to human housing. However, using words of human culture of animals is usual for Philoctetes. Manuscripts have xῶro6 (‘place’, ‘country’), which was later conjectured as xvlό6 (‘lame’, ‘cripple’) (1153). See Lloyd-Jones and Wilson, Sophoclea, p. 208; and Guido Avezzu` in Guido Avezzu`, Pietro Pucci and Giovanni Cerri (eds), Sofocle: Filottete, Scrittori greci e latini (Milano: Mondadori, 2003), p. 118 (apparatus criticus). Avezzu` and Schein prefer xῶro6. 129. Schein, Sophocles, pp. 298– 9. ‘Bright-eyed’ (xaropό6) of the lion in Od. 11.611. ‘Feeding in the mountains’ (oὐr1sibώth6) occurs only here, but its equivalent, oresitrophos, is a lion’s attribute in the Iliad (12.299). Pucci, ‘Commento’, p. 289. 130. The expression antiphonon (1156) means ‘in revenge of blood’. 131. Pucci, ‘Commento’, p. 287. 132. Lucian’s Timon lives on the fringe of human society, hating humans, but not loving animals (Timon or the Misanthrope). Korhonen, ‘Antiikin misantrooppi’, p. 142. 133. Peter Meineck, Sophocles: Philoctetes (Indianapolis, IN: Hackett Publishing Company, 2014), p. 23. 134. Two lions – the case is dual – gives a Homeric flavour for the simile. 135. This is one of two lion similes in Sophocles’ surviving plays, the other being the positive image of animal parenthood in Ajax (986– 7). See Carl Wolff, ‘A Note on Lions and Sophocles: Philoctetes 1436’, in Glen Warren Bowerstock, Walter Burkert and Michael C. J. Putnam (eds), Arktouros: Hellenic Studies Presented to Bernard M. W. Knox on the Occasion of his 65th Birthday (Berlin: de Gruyter, 1979), pp. 144– 50; Schein, Sophocles, p. 339. 136. Vidal-Naquet, ‘Sophocles’ Philoctetes and the Ephebeia’, p. 175. 137. H. Peter Steeves, ‘They Say Animals Can Smell Fear’, in H. Peter Steeves (ed.), Animal Others: On Ethics, Ontology, and Animal Life (Albany: State University of New York Press, 1999), p. 166. 138. In Aristophanes’ The Frogs, the zoomorphic chorus does not have as eminent a role as the chorus does in The Birds, not to mention The Wasps, where the jurors are only metaphorically, but partly dressed as, wasps. 139. Other comedies with titles which are animal names: Magnes’ The Frogs, The Birds, The Gall-flies (or The Fig-Wasps); Crates’ The Birds; Callias’ The Frogs;

NOTES

140.

141.

142.

143. 144.

145. 146.

147. 148.

149. 150.

151.

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145 –146

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Cantharus’ The Nightingales and The Ants; Eupolis’ The Nanny-goats; and Archippus’ The Fishes (dated c. 401 BCE ). See Sifakis, Parabasis and Animal Choruses, p. 76; Rothwell, Animal Choruses, pp. 197 – 9; and Dunbar, Aristophanes, pp. 104 and 187– 206. See also Aristophanes’ comment in the Knights 521 – 4 on Magnes’ animal choruses. On the popularity and decline of animal choruses during the fifth century, see Rothwell, Animal Choruses, pp. 102 – 5; on diminishing animal imagery in Middle and New Comedy, see Babette Pu¨tz, ‘Good to Laugh with. Animals in Comedy’, in Campbell (ed.), The Oxford Handbook of Animals, p. 61. On animal masquerades, see Sifakis, Parabasis and Animal Choruses, pp. 81 – 3. Rothwell suggests that animal masquerades were also associated with the fifth century BCE Attic elitist symposium culture, see Animal Choruses, especially pp. 34 – 5, 149 – 50. The scholiast speaks about Xanthias sitting on a donkey at the beginning of the Frogs. Nu¨nlist, The Ancient Critic at Work, p. 354. See also P. D. Arnott, ‘Animals in Greek Theatre’, Greece & Rome 6:2 (1959), pp. 177 – 9. See also horses’ neighing in the ‘eulogy’ to horses in Ar. Eq. 602. On imitating animals’ sounds as popular entertainment, see Part II. Jean-Claude Carrie`re, Le carnaval et la politique. Une introduction a` la Come´die grecque, suivie d’un choix de fragments (Paris: Les Belles Lettres, 1983), p. 136. See also Corbel-Morana, Le Bestiaire, p. 17. Giulia Sissa, Sex and Sensuality in the Ancient World. Trans. George Staunton (New Haven: Yale University Press, 2008), p. 130. Animal sacrifices were often prepared in Aristophanes’ extant comedies. Later on, gluttony and the gluttonous person became a stock-type in Middle comedy and Roman comedy. The Greek text used here is the Oxford edition edited by Nigel Wilson (2007). For political and anti-political interpretations, Angus M. Bowie, Aristophanes: Myth, Ritual and Comedy (Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 1993), pp. 171, 177; Dunbar, Aristophanes, pp. 2–5; Corbel-Morana, Le Bestiaire, pp. 171–2. Corbel-Morana, Le Bestiaire, pp. 191– 4. Babette Pu¨tz, ‘Schra¨ge Vo¨gel und flotte Wespen: Grenzu¨berschreitungen zwischen Mensch un Tier bei Aristophanes’, in Alexandrines et al. (eds), Mensch und Tier in der Antike, pp. 219– 42. On the similarities between birds and men in The Birds, see also Corbel-Morana, Le Bestiaire, pp. 172 – 84 and Bowie, Aristophanes, pp. 172– 3. Mark Payne, ‘Aristotle’s birds and Aristophanes’ Birds’, in Sandrine Dubel, Sophie Gotteland and Estelle Oudont (eds), E`clats de litte`rature grecque d’ Home`re a` Pascal Quignard. Me`langes offerts a` Suzanne Said (Paris: Presses universitaires de Paris Ouest, 2012), pp. 123, 125. See also Payne, The Animal Part, p. 97.

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152. Animal-guides were often an important part of settlement myths (Cadmos was guided by a cow to settle Thebes). See Bowie, Aristophanes, pp. 92, 154– 5; Dunbar, Aristophanes, p. 131. On the question of how to distribute the lines at the beginning of the play, see ibid., p. 128. Wilson’s edition (2007), which is used here, has, however, different distribution of lines than Dunbar. 153. The chorus mentions that birds determine the seasons, e.g., the first swallow brings the spring (714– 15). 154. On the language of birds in The Birds, see Pu¨tz, ‘Schra¨ge Vo¨gel’, pp. 233 –4 and Corbel-Morana, Le Bestiaire, p. 180. Poseidon compares language of the barbarous god Triballos, a member of the gods’ envoy, to that of swallows’ twitter (1681). 155. The terms were created by Homi Bhabha. See Cheryl McEwan, Postcolonialism and Development (London: Routledge, 2009), pp. 65 – 71. Peisetaerus is, in fact, an uncommon colonialist because he wins with words not with weapons. 156. However, Prometheus mentions that birds have now colonised (oikizein) the air (1515) pointing to their blockade, the city wall. 157. Edward W. Said, Orientalism (New York: Vintage Books, 1979), pp. 80 – 1. 158. Dunbar, Aristophanes, p. 644. 159. McEwan, Postcolonialism, pp. 65 – 6, 126. 160. After the quadrupeds and bipeds are separated, the biped class is noted to include only men and birds: ‘since the winged ( pte¯nos) herd, and that alone, comes out in the same class with human, we should divide bipeds into those which have feathers ( pterophye¯s) and those which have not’ (Pl. Pol. 266e). Trans. Harold N. Fowler, Plato VIII, LCL 164 (Cambridge, MA: Harvard University Press, 1925). Cf. also Arist. Cat. 2.92a: ‘What is man? A living being, mortal, with feet, biped, wingless. Why?’ 161. However, here Plato also uses in this ‘definition’ the word pte¯nos ‘winged’, which comes from the verb ‘fly’ ( petesthai) and can be translated more accurately as ‘flier’. Pte¯nos was used of all flying animals: birds, bats, gnats, bees and other flying insects. 162. Yearning to have wings is actually a common topos in Greek lyric. Hans Gossen interprets The Birds as a subversion of this topic, see his ‘Die Tiere der Griechischen Lyriken’, p. 215. 163. Arist. HA 1.490a5 – 15. On flying insects, HA 4.531b – 532b. 164. See also Arist. IA 5.706a27 – 30, 710b5– 8. But then, Aristotle also sees twofootedness as an unimportant special characteristic (PA 1.642b9); moreover, he discusses how it is not possible for birds to stand really erect and also notes why humans cannot have wings (IA 710b15– 711a7). 165. HA 4.536b10 – 20, HA 8.612b18– 620b10. 166. Dunbar, Aristophanes, pp. 187, 385. 167. The chorus describes how spectators can fly away if some tragic performance is too boring or they are hungry or want to make love with their mistresses (whose husbands they see among the audience).

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168. Euelpides asks what life with birds is like (ho met’ ornitho¯n bios, 155). 169. ‘Flying’ would have been possible technically in ancient theatre by using a crane. Iris probably arrives ‘flying’. See Dunbar, Aristophanes, p. 612. However, the chorus is clearly said to run around, not fly (306). 170. Peisetaerus refers to his wings twice (1361, 1760– 2). 171. In order to fulfil the errands of his master, Tereus’ servant had been changed into the shape of a trochilos, ‘the running-bird’ – that is, a plover-like bird – as if it is not using its wings but rather running his errands. 172. It was a common belief that cranes swallowed stones as ballast. 173. This passage (1149 – 5) has textual problems. See Dunbar, Aristophanes, pp. 601– 5. 174. Ar. Av. 1155 – 6: p1l1kᾶnt16, oἳ toῖ6 ῥύgx1sin / ἀp1p1lέkhsan tὰ6 pύla6. The pun is on the homonymy between pelican and the verb pelika¯n ‘to axe, chop, hew’ (p1l1kᾶ6 – ἀp1p1lέkhsan). Sommerstein notes that, although the pelican’s beak is large, it is too soft for any kind of wood work. Therefore, many suggest that peleka¯s here means woodpecker. Sommerstein translates peleka¯ntes as nuthatches. Alan H. Sommerstein, Aristophanes: Birds, The Comedies of Aristophanes Vol. 6 (Warminster: Aris & Phillips, 1987), p. 276. 175. On the corporeal background for the comicality of animals’ movement, see Ruonakoski, Ela¨imen tuttuus ja vieraus, pp. 157–62. 176. Aristophanes based the bird cosmogony (the cosmic egg, for instance), mostly on the Orphic cosmogony. Dunbar, Aristophanes, pp. 428, 439. 177. All translations of The Birds here are from Alan H. Sommerstein’s translation (see above note 174). 178. Nan Dunbar suggests that putting feathers in blackbird’s nostrils (1081) refers to actual torturing of slaves (instead of feathers, vinegar). See Dunbar, Aristophanes, p. 585. On decoy methods, ibid., p. 586. 179. Stephen Halliwell, ‘Laughter’, in Martin Revermann (ed.), The Cambridge Companion to Greek Comedy (Cambridge: Cambridge University Press), p. 196. 180. Dunbar, Aristophanes, p. 369 and Corbel-Morana, Le Bestiaire, p. 189n85. Kenebreia brings to mind Plutarch’s claim about the unnaturalness of meat as food, which is proved by the practice of diluting its taste with seasoning and sauces (On the Eating of Flesh, Mor. 995a). 181. Trapping methods are mentioned in an Aesopic fable related by Dio Chrysostomus (Perry 437 and 437a). It deals with the old sovereignty of birds and describes three phases of history, when birds had opportunities to prevent the tricks of future fowlers. 182. Nymphio¯n bios refers to Tereus and Procne as ‘love birds’. Birds were thought to be especially amorous creatures. On erotic themes in The Birds, see William Arrosmith, ‘Aristophanes’ Birds: The Fantasy Politics of Eros’, Arion 1:1 (1973), pp. 119– 67. Nymphio¯n bios may also refer to the change of Tereus’ life, his ever-new life as a bird.

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183. The vegetarian diet of gods (asphodel, mallow), see Johannes Haussleiter, Der Vegetarismus in der Antike (Berlin: Verlag von Alfred To¨pelmann, 1935), pp. 81 – 2. The pastoral elements of this play, see Dora Pozzi, ‘The Pastoral Ideal in the Birds of Aristophanes’, CJ 81 (1985) (December 1985 – January 1986), pp. 119 – 29. 184. On Cleonymus, see Dunbar, Aristophanes, pp. 238– 9 and the interpretation of this passage, p. 690. Dunbar sees the passage as playing with audience’s expectations: Cleonymus was not thin like a tree but fat from gluttony. 185. On ‘subaltern’, see McEwan, Postcolonialism, pp. 15 – 16, 228– 30. 186. Babette Pu¨tz, ‘Schra¨ge Vo¨gel’, p. 237 and Pu¨tz, ‘Good to Laugh with’, p. 66. 187. Pu¨tz, ‘Schra¨ge Vo¨gel’, p. 229. The first bird they meet is Tereus’ servant, a human metamorphosed into a bird; he is not the size of the birds, but humansize – in a way a giant bird. Tereus’ servant frightens Peisetaerus and Euelpides so much that they let their living birds go free (86– 91). All the other birds they then meet are human-size birds. 188. See Dunbar, Aristophanes, p. 130; Pu¨tz, ‘Schra¨ge Vo¨gel’, p. 229. The ancient scholiast speaks of them as stage props, see Nu¨nlist, Ancient Critics, p. 355. 189. The chorus asks how humans are supposed to believe they are gods and not jackdaws (571– 2). 190. Cf. Perry 2, 101, 123, 129, 219. 191. Peisetaerus and Euelpides ask both Tereus’ servant and Tereus what animal (the¯rion) they are (69, 93). At the first encounter with Tereus, Peisetaerus asks him: ‘Are you Tereus? Are you a bird or tao¯s? (102). Tao¯s means a peacock, but the point here is to refer to the rarity of peacock. But when Tereus asks them who they are, Peisetaerus answers with slight wonder: ‘We? We are mortals (brotos)’ (107). They emphasise their humanity as a counter-assurance for Tereus’ affirmation that he is, indeed, a bird (ὄrni6 ἔgvg1, 103). After this declaration Tereus is not referred by his human name any more in this play. 192. Firstly, while describing the ancient law of birds to the young ‘father-slayer’ (1353) and, later, while stating to the ambassador gods that Zeus should give the sceptre back to ‘us birds’ (1600). 193. There is a lot of discussion of this scene among modern critics. Cf. Dunbar, Aristophanes, pp. 432– 3; and Corbel-Morana, Le Bestiaire, pp. 190– 3. 194. See A. S. F. Gow and D. L. Page, The Greek Anthology: Hellenistic Epigrams, Vol. II (Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 1965), pp. 89–90. For references of early sources mentioning Anyte, see Geoghegan, Anyte, pp. 181–2. 195. Gow and Page take it for granted that Anyte wrote also lyric poetry, because she is frequently called m1lopoiό6 in the epigram headings. Gow and Page, The Greek Anthology II, p. 90. In contrast to this, Kathryn Gutzwiller argues that even though these lemmata present Anyte as a lyric poet, this maybe due to a willingness to see all poetry written by women in Sapphic terms rather than to actual evidence of her lyric poems. Kathryn Gutzwiller, Poetic Garlands: Hellenistic Epigrams in Context (Berkeley: University of California Press, 1998), pp. 54n22– 3.

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196. See also Marilyn B. Skinner’s discussion on the significance of women’s poetry in the Hellenistic world. Marilyn B. Skinner, ‘Ladies’ Day at the Art Institute: Theocritus, Herodas, and the Gendered Gaze’, in Andre´ Lardinois and Laura McClure (eds), Making the Silence Speak: Women’s Voices in Greek Literature and Society (Princeton, NJ: Princeton University Press, 2001), pp. 201– 22. Skinner argues that when the evidence contained in the texts of male literary figures is closely studied, ‘it becomes increasingly likely that the works of Erinna, Nossis, and Anyte were not peripheral curiosities but major counters in Hellenistic scholarly and aesthetic exchanges’. Ibid., p. 222. 197. According to Gow and Page, the designation ‘female Homer’ by Antipater more likely refers to Sappho in the next line than to Anyte, but Geoghegan argues the opposite. Gow and Page, The Greek Anthology II, p. 90n1; Geoghegan, Anyte, p. 9. About the bronze sculpture depicting Anyte, see Andrew Stewart’s One Hundred Greek Sculptors, Their Careers and Extant Works, part 2, chapter 5 (Perseus Digital Library). 198. Ulrich von Wilamowitz-Moellendorf, Hellenistische Dichtung in der Zeit des Kallimachos [1924] (Berlin: Weidmann, 1999), pp. 136– 7. An earlier example of a similar belittling attitude can be found in J. A. Giles, ‘Greek Authoresses’, The Edinburgh Review, or Critical Journal, Vol. LV, January – July (1832), pp. 182– 208. Giles questions why Anyte was called ‘the female Homer’, pointing out that her poetry has nothing of ‘the Homeric force’. Ibid., p. 201. Gutzwiller briefly discusses Wilamowitz-Moellendorff’s possible influence on the disregard for Anyte’s poetry in the twentieth century and the attempts of feminist scholars to re-evaluate Anyte’s poetry. Gutzwiller, Poetic Garlands, p. 35n28. For the tendency of interpreters to understand women’s poetry in terms of the private and the sensual rather than of the public and the political, see Holt Parker, ‘Sappho’s Public World’, in Ellen Greene (ed.), Women Poets in Ancient Greece and Rome (Norman: University of Oklahoma Press, 2005), pp. 3 – 24. 199. See Greene (ed.), Women Poets; Gutzwiller, Poetic Garlands; Ian M. Plant, Women Writers of Ancient Greece and Rome: An Anthology (Norman: University of Oklahoma Press, 2004); Rayor, Sappho’s Lyre; Jane MacIntosh Snyder, The Woman and the Lyre: Women Writers in Classical Greece and Rome (Carbondale: Southern Illinois University Press, 1989). 200. Geoghegan, Anyte, p. 9. 201. Ibid., p. 14. 202. Ibid., p. 9; Gutzwiller, Poetic Garlands, p. 56. 203. Geoghegan, Anyte, pp. 9– 11. 204. Ibid., p. 14; Snyder, The Woman and the Lyre, p. 71. 205. Nicias and Mnasacles are mentioned as her imitators. E.g. Gutzwiller, Poetic Garlands, p. 228. On variations of the same theme in epigrams, see Niall Livingstone and Gideon Nisbet, Epigram (Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 2010), pp. 8 – 9; Sonya Lida Tara´n, The Art of Variation in the Hellenistic Epigram (Leiden: Brill, 1979).

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161 –166

206. Meleager (first century BCE ) writes in his hare epigram (AP 7.207): ‘I was a swift-footed long-eared leveret, torn from / my mother’s breast while yet a baby, and sweet / Phanion cherished and reared me in her bosom, / feeding me on flowers of spring. No longer did I / pine for my mother, but I died of surfeiting, fattened / by too many banquets. Close to her couch she / buried me so that ever in her dreams she might see / my grave beside her bed.’ Translated by William Roger Paton, in William Roger Paton, The Greek Anthology IV, Books VII – VIII, LCL 68 (Cambridge, MA: Harvard University Press, 1917), pp. 116 – 17. For the parodical quality of such poems, see Tara´n, The Art of Variation, p. 36. 207. Skinner points out that there are many female poets among the first ones writing ecphrastic epigrams. Nossis, who is considered to be Anyte’s contemporary, was one of them, as was Erinna, who presumably wrote her work about fifty years earlier than Anyte and Nossis. Skinner, ‘Ladies’ Day’, p. 202. 208. See Gutzwiller, Poetic Garlands, pp. 64– 5 for a discussion on irony in this context. Gutzwiller does not regard the epigram ironic. 209. Ibid., p. 62. 210. Tua Korhonen’s translation. 211. Translated by David Kovacs, in David Kovacs, Euripides: Suppliant Women, Electra, Heracles, LCL 9 (Cambridge, MA: Harvard University Press, 1998), p. 198. Another early example of the dolphins in Greek literature is the socalled Arion’s song (c. 400 BCE ). See also Part II in this book. 212. Geoghegan, Anyte, p. 121. As we will see, a similar onomatopoeic description of the sounds made by an animal can be found in the dog epigram. 213. Gutzwiller, Poetic Garlands, p. 64. 214. See Part I, ‘Reader’s Empathy and the Idea of Viewpoint’. 215. According to Geoghegan, the adjective ῥadinό6 (slender, mobile) means in this context ‘long’ and the expression ῥadinὰn tάnd1, in fact, refers to the sandy beach, the waters of which are typically shallow and therefore dangerous for dolphins. Geoghegan, Anyte, p. 128. 216. The souls of the deceased do speak in one epigram attributed to Anyte, namely in the epigram about three virgins (AP 7.492). According to Geoghegan, however, Anyte was hardly the author of this poem. Geoghegan, Anyte, p. 7. About the difficulties to define the author of the epigram, see also Gow and Page, The Greek Anthology II, p. 103. 217. This epigram is not named according to the species of the deceased animal for the reason that its species is almost impossible to determine. Ruonakoski has discussed this poem also in her article ‘Literature as a Means of Communication’. This chapter draws from the research done for the article; yet the focus is different, for this chapter concentrates on Anyte’s art, whereas the article compares the description of loss in Anyte’s epigram to Beauvoir’s discussion of losing a loved-one in A Very Easy Death. Simone de Beauvoir, A Very Easy Death, trans. Patrick O’Brien (London: Penguin Books, 1990); Simone de Beauvoir, Une mort tre`s douce (Paris: Gallimard, 1964).

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218. Translation Diane Rayor, in Rayor (ed.), Sappho’s Lyre, p. 128. 219. Gutzwiller, Poetic Garlands, pp. 64 – 5. 220. Geoghegan, Anyte, pp. 111–12. Nevertheless, a cicada does not actually make a sound with its wings but with the tymbals in its abdominal region. Yet, as Geoghegan notes, the masculine participle points towards the cicada rather than the cricket or the grasshopper, if the insect hypothesis is accepted. Ibid., p. 112. 221. The verb ἐrέssvn can be found in the Odyssey (11.78), and in the same epic the expression pykinὰ pt1rὰ (5.53) refers to thick plumage. Yet Geoghegan argues that Anyte is more likely to be inspired by Hesiod’s description of a cicada (Op. 582– 3) than by Homer’s description of birds, and hence the meaning of pykinaῖ6 would be ‘continuous’ or ‘uninterrupted’. Geoghegan, Anyte, pp. 112– 13. 222. Ibid., p. 116. 223. Ibid., p. 119. 224. Gutzwiller, Poetic Garlands, p. 65. 225. For instance, both cicadas and birds were kept as pets. Should one prefer the idea that the killed animal was a bird, one can find a similar scene in the Odyssey, in Penelope’s discussion of her dream about the death of her geese. Od. 19.603– 612. See also Calder, Cruelty and Sentimentality, p. 92. 226. Geoghegan does present very detailed evidence in comparison to other commentators, but his arguments remain speculative. 227. Husserl, Die Bernauer Manuskripte. 228. Beauvoir describes the death of a family member as something that was acknowledged to happen in some distant future but not in this reality. Beauvoir, A Very Easy Death, pp. 18 – 19. Beauvoir, Une mort tre`s douce, p. 29. In a similar vein, Heidegger argues that one tends to think that will not come just yet, even if one acknowledges in principle that everybody has to die some time. Heidegger, Sein und Zeit, Gesamtausgabe Bd. 2, 1. Abt (Frankfurt am Main: Klostermann, 1976), §51, p. 336. Heidegger describes one’s own death as ‘a possibility of the impossible’. In other words, death means the end of one’s projects and the end of one’s world, and for this reason it has ontological priority to the other’s death. The death of the other is significant as well, however, for it makes one aware of the finitude of life in general as well as of the finitude of one’s own life. Ibid., §52–§53, pp. 340–54. See also Sara Heina¨maa, ‘Being towards Death’, Chapter 5 in Sara Heina¨maa, Robin May Schott, Vigdis Songe-Møller and Sigridur Thorgeirsdottir, Birth, Death, and Femininity: Philosophies of Embodiment (Bloomington: Indiana University Press, 2010), p. 99; Ruonakoski, ‘Literature as a Means’, pp. 262–3. 229. Ibid., p. 264. The most detailed description about the death of a human being can be found in the epitaph to Amyntor (AP 232): ‘This Lydian earth covers Amyntor, Philip’s son, / who often engaged his hands in iron battle: / no painful disease led him to the House of Night, / but he perished covering a comrade with his round shield.’ Rayor (trans. and ed.), Sappho’s Lyre, p. 129. There is some controversy about whether this epigram should be attributed to Anyte or to

236

230. 231. 232. 233. 234.

235. 236. 237. 238. 239.

240.

241.

242. 243. 244. 245.

246. 247. 248. 249. 250.

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171 –175

Antipater. See Geoghegan, Anyte, pp. 177–80. As for Anyte’s funeral epigrams to young maidens, they do not reveal the cause of death but focus on the too early passing of these girls, often referring to their unwed status. See Greene, ‘Playing with Tradition’, in Greene (ed.), Women Poets, p. 149. See Beauvoir, A Very Easy Death, p. 92; Beauvoir, Une mort tre`s douce, p. 164. See Heina¨maa, ‘Being towards Death’, p. 105. See Ruonakoski, ‘Literature as a Means’, pp. 261– 2n26. Gordon L. Fain, Ancient Greek Epigrams: Major Poets in Verse Translation (Berkeley: University of California Press, 2010), p. 44. Snyder suggests that the horse and dog poems could be actual inscriptions. Snyder, The Woman and the Lyre, p. 70. Gutzwiller, Poetic Garlands, p. 54; Greene, ‘Playing with Tradition’, p. 154n8. Translation William Roger Paton (slightly modified), in William Roger Paton, The Greek Anthology IV, p. 119. E.g. Calder, Cruelty and Sentimentality, pp. 44 – 5. Gutzwiller, Poetic Garlands, p. 63. Trans. Anthony Verity in Homer, The Iliad (Oxford: Oxford University Press, 2011), p. 266. Hom. Il. 16.468 – 9: ὃ d᾽ ἔbrax1 uymὸn ἀΐsuvn, / kὰd d᾽ ἔp1s᾽ ἐn konίῃsi makώn, ἀpὸ d᾽ ἔptato uymό6. On the horses of the Iliad, see Korhonen, ‘. . . and Horses’: The Affectionate Bond between Horses and Humans/Gods in Homer’s Iliad’, pp. 52 – 61. Trans. Anthony Verity in Homer, The Iliad (Oxford: Oxford University Press, 2011), p. 267. Hom. Il. 16.485 – 6: ὣ6 ὃ prόsu᾽ ἵppvn kaὶ dίwroy k1ῖto tanysu1ὶ6 / b1bryxὼ6 kόnio6 d1dragmέno6 aἱmatoέssh6. The word m1n1dήio6 can be found only in two instances in the Iliad, 12.247 and 13.228. See Geoghegan, Anyte, p. 98. In the first instance Hector mocks Polydemos for being all but m1n1dήio6, while in the second Idomeneus attributes this quality to Thoas. Ibid., p. 63. Trans. Gutzwiller in Gutzwiller, Poetic Garlands, p. 63. Ibid., p. 63. Gutzwiller argues that in the Homeric connection the word refers to ‘puppy’ and that Anyte’s fondness for Homeric terminology would speak for understanding this word as ‘puppy’. Ibid., p. 63. But as Homer uses this word just once (Od. 9.289), it may be wise to leave the question open: the dog may be, indeed, a puppy among other barking puppies, but just as well it may be a full-grown dog running together with other hunting dogs. Geoghegan, Anyte, p. 107. Snyder, The Woman and the Lyre, p. 71. Gutzwiller, Poetic Garlands, pp. 63 – 4. Geoghegan agrees with this interpretation: ‘No doubt a viper would find the exposed roots of the bush a useful camouflage’ (Geoghegan, Anyte, p. 107.) The word ἐlawrό6 (nimble), on the other hand, can easily be associated with the word ἔlawo6, ‘deer’, hence evoking a light deer-like movement and long

NOTES

251. 252. 253. 254. 255. 256.

257. 258. 259. 260.

261. 262. 263.

264. 265. 266. 267.

268. 269.

TO PAGES

175 –179

237

legs. Most ancient authors saw an etymological connection between these words, one rare exception being Plutarch (cf. Soll. 976d). About the dogs of the classical world, see Adrian Phillips, ‘The Dogs of the Classical World’, in Douglas Brewer, Terence Clark and Adrian Phillips (eds), Dogs in Antiquity: Anubis to Cerberus (Warminster: Aris & Phillips, 2001), pp. 104 – 6; and Katherine Trantalidou, ‘Companions from the Oldest Times: Dogs in Ancient Greek Literature, Iconography and Osteological Testimony’, in Lynn M. Snyder and Elizabeth A. Moore (eds), Dogs and People in Social, Working, Economic or Symbolic Interaction (Oxford: Oxbow, 2006), pp. 96 – 120. See also the discussion on the ideal of liveliness in ancient Greek poetry (Part II). Greene, ‘Playing with Tradition’, pp. 149– 50. See the discussion on this concept in Part III. Ibid., p. 150. Cf. Gow and Page, The Greek Anthology II, p. 96. Il. 24.725; Gutzwiller, Poetic Garlands, p. 63. For a more detailed comparison between Andromache’s lament and Anyte’s dog epigram, see Greene, ‘Playing with Tradition’, p. 149. Gutzwiller, Poetic Garlands, p. 63. Greene, ‘Playing with Tradition’, pp. 149– 50. Ibid., p. 150. Geoghegan, Anyte, p. 171; Gutzwiller, Poetic Garlands, p. 65n52; Snyder, The Woman and the Lyre, p. 72. Also Gow and Page underline that the epigram does not bear any resemblance in style to Leonidas of Tarentum. Gow and Page, The Greek Anthology II, p. 101. Translation Gutzwiller, in Gutzwiller, Poetic Garlands, p. 66. Ibid., pp. 66 – 7. Ian C. Beavis, Insects and Other Invertebrates in Classical Antiquity (Exeter: Exeter University, 1988), pp. 76, 91, 103. There is no general agreement, however, on whether it is possible to keep cicadas in captivity without starving them to death. In addition, the relationship of the Greeks appears to be different from that of the Romans: the Greeks enjoyed their song and associated them with gods, but the Romans did neither of these things. Ibid., pp. 101 – 3. Gutzwiller, Poetic Garlands, pp. 66– 7. Ibid. Ibid., pp. 67, 113. Geoghegan, Anyte, p. 131; Keller, Die antike Tierwelt I, p. 107. About an Attic red-figure vase painting with two boys and a chariot drawn by two goats see Neils and Oakley, Coming of Age in Ancient Greece, pp. 147, 286. Skinner, ‘Ladies’ Day’, p. 209. Anyte writes (AP 9.144 ¼ Geogh. 15): ‘This is the precinct of the Cyprian, since it pleases her / always from land to look upon a shining sea, / So that she may make sailing pleasant for sailors; and the water / round about trembles, gazing at her gleaming image.’ Translation Gutzwiller in Gutzwiller, Poetic Garlands, p. 68.

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270. Ibid., p. 210. 271. Translation Rayor, in Rayor (ed.), Sappho’s Lyre, p. 127. 272. Geoghegan, Anyte, pp. 133– 5. Geoghegan argues that the verb form worέh6 (without iota subscriptum) should be preferred to ἐworῇ used in several editions (e.g. Gow and Page’s) after A. Hecker’s correction in his commentary on the Greek Anthology in 1840s. As Geoghegan points out, ὄwra (plus subjunctive) means ‘as long as’ (or ‘till’), when it is used as a temporal conjunctive. Geoghegan, Anyte, p. 134. 273. This interpretation requires, however, that the poem is read as Geoghegan does, choosing worέh6 instead of ἐworῇ and understanding ὄwr᾽ as ‘as long as’ instead of as ‘so that’. Interpreting these words in the opposite way takes the leading role away from the goat (see Geoghegan, Anyte, p. 134) and actually makes the epigram far less witty. Gutwiller’s interpretation differs from Geoghegan’s, and her translation, reminiscent of Richard Aldington’s, is completely different from Rayor’s, who follows Geoghegan. Gutzwiller translates: ‘The children, placing purple reins upon you, goat, / and a noseband about your shaggy mouth, / Train you in horse racing around the god’s temple, / to make you carry them gently for their pleasure.’ Gutzwiller (ed.), Poetic Garlands, p. 67. Cf. Anyte, The Poems of Anyte of Tegea, trans. Richard Aldington; Poems and Fragments of Sappho, trans. Edward Storer, from The Poet’s Translation Series, Second Set, No. 2 (London: The Egoist, 1919). 274. Geoghegan points out that the title eis to auto refers to a goat poem by Leonidas (AP 9.744). According to him, the mentioning of landscape may suggest a wallpainting. Geoghegan, Anyte, p. 137. Gutzwiller, on the other hand, argues that the painting option is not likely, because the landscape and the Naiad are present only in the goat’s thoughts. Gutzwiller, Poetic Garlands, pp. 67–8. 275. See Geoghegan, Anyte, p. 141 for a defence of oὗ in mss against Richard F. P. Brunck’s conjecture oἱ in his edition (1772– 6). 276. Translation Gutzwiller, in Gutzwiller, Poetic Garlands, p. 67. 277. Naΐ6 is a variant from the word Naiά6 (plural Naiάd16), that is, Naiad. Therefore the word could also be translated as ‘Naiad’. The travel writer Pausanias (second century CE ) refers to a Naiad called Nais as the wife of Silenus (3.52.2), but without connecting her to the legend of Daphnis. 278. E.g. Walter F. Otto, Dionysus: Myth and Cult, trans. Robert Palmer (Bloomington: Indiana University Press, 1965), p. 168; Burkert, Greek Religion, p. 165. 279. Otto, Dionysus, pp. 171– 80. 280. Geoghegan, Anyte, pp. 143– 4. Geoghegan borrows this idea from Friedrich Du¨bner. 281. Geoghegan also points out that she refers to his beard with the word bόstryxo6 (lock of hair, curl), which was not otherwise used of animals and which had tragic connotations, because Euripides and Aeschylos had used the word in important scenes in their tragedies. Ibid., p. 142. 282. Just like in the epigram about the goat in ‘horse contests’, also here Anyte uses the typical adjective pertaining to goats, lάsio6 (‘shaggy’).

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INDEX

Adaeus (or Addaeus, AP 6.228), 78 addressing animals by characters in Greek literature, 1, 6, 23, 43, 53, 64, 69–72, 82–4, 92, 96, 128–9, 135–8, 141, 143, 185–6, 188–90, 211n91, 214n33, 214n34 in everyday life, 82– 3 Aelian, On the Characteristics of Animals (De Natura Animalium, NA), 89, 92, 97, 206n19, 206n31, 208n53, 211n87, 211n93, 212n4, 215n43, 215n48 Varia Historia (VH), 215n44 Aesop, 37, 46– 7, 92, 205n11, 205n13, see also fables Alcman (fr. 104a), 51 alla zo¯a, 101, 189 aloga (zo¯a), 46– 7, 52 ancient literary criticism animals as subject matter of literature, 43– 4, 53 lifelikeness and liveliness, 64– 6 mimesis, 55 –9 pity (eleos), 44, 50, 56, 62– 4 animal choruses in comedies, 145, 228n138, 228n139, 229n140 animal cults and animal worship, 90–1 animal poetics, 42–9, 50–3, 55–66, 71 animal similes, 1, 23, 43, 45, 52, 68, 70, 96, 105, 106–27, 139 – 40, 143,

184 –5, 189– 90, 205n8, 219– 24, 228n135 in the Iliad, 106– 27, 219–24 actual animals vs. animals in similes, 109, 126–7 humanising animals, 116– 22 living environment of animals, 112 – 13 ox similes, 124– 6 sympathetic attitudes, 113– 16 animals children and, 49, 61, 87, 89, 91, 178 – 81, 209n65 negative view or value of, 39, 99– 102, 151 rationality and intelligence of, 46, 93, 100 ‘retirement’ of, 78– 9 superhuman senses of, 84, 91, 154, 217n59 ugliness of, 55 –6, 102– 3, 207n45 women and, 68, 75, 87, 162, see also Anyte, Circe, Cybele see also individual animals anthropocentrism, 5 – 6, 23, 33– 6, 59, 187 –8, 204n81 anthropodenial, 37 anthropomorphism, 33, 36 –8, 164– 5, 187, 204n84– 5 Antipater of Thessalonica (AP 9.263), 160

INDEX ants, 75, 96, 97, 98, 212n4, 229n139 Anyte dog epigram (Poll. Onom. 5.48), 37, 174–6 dolphin epigram (AP 7.215), 5, 37, 162–6 epigram to Aphrodite (AP 9.144), 179, 237n269 epitaph to Amyntor (AP 232), 235n229 goat and children epigram (AP 6.312), 10– 19, 23, 26– 30, 178 – 81 goat and nymph epigram (AP 9.745), 178–9, 181– 4 grasshopper and cicada epigram (AP 7.190), 176– 8 horse epigram (AP 7.208), 172 – 4 life of, 11, 160 marauder epigram (AP 7.202), 166 – 72 position as a woman poet, 160 – 2, 233n198 style, 159– 62, 186 apes and monkeys, 57, 88, 100, 103, 212n6 apostrophising animals, 30, 43, 70, 71, 129, 130, 135– 8, 141 – 3, 185, 190, 211n94, 224n80 Apuleius, Golden Ass, 92 Aratus, Phaenomena (Phaen.), 78 Archilochus (fr. 77 West), 67, 211n86 Argos (the dog), 59 Arion’s Song, 51, 69 Aristophanes (Ar.) Peace, 42, 71, 214n33 Birds, The (Av.), 1, 6, 44, 67, 88, 92, 144–59, 185, 189– 90, 225n95, 228–32 abusive treatment of birds, 154 – 5 birds’ point of view, 153 – 8 definition of man as a featherless biped, 150 Peisetaerus as jackdaw, 158 –9 post-colonialist reading of, 146–50, 157 Frogs, The, 76, 144, 145, 228n138, 229n142 Knights, The (Eq.), 67, 229n143 Wasps, The, 88, 144, 145, 228n138

257

Aristotle (Arist.) Categories (Cat.), 230n160 Eudemian Ethics (Eud. Eth.), 210n71 Meteorologica (Mete.), 210n77 Nicomachean Ethics (Ethica Nicomachea, EN), 101 On Dreams, 192 On the Gait of Animals (De incessu animalium, IA), 151, 230n164 Parts of Animals (De partibus animalium, PA), 103, 207– 8n45, 230 Physics (Physica), 103, 219n92 Poetics (Poet.), 44, 50, 55, 62, 65, 203n72, 209n67 Politics, 79, 101, 209n63, 213n17 Rhetoric (Rhet.), 51– 2, 62 –3, 65, 70, 188, 213n13 Topics (Top.), 55– 6, 79, 213n17 Study of Animals, the (Historia animalium, HA), 78, 81– 2, 211n87, 213n16, 230n163 Arrian Cynegeticus (Cyneg., On Hunting with Hounds), 4 – 5, 85 –6 Athenaeus Deipnosophistae (Deipn.), 89, 208n53–4, 215n46 awareness inner time-consciousness, 169–70 prereflective, 31, 170 reflective, 31, 170 Bacchylides, The Fifth Victory Ode, 51, 58–9, 63, 127 bears, 45, 70, 76 bees, 53, 97 –8, 105, 109 –10, 115, 230n161 beauty in animals, 53, 55, 65, 210n77 Beauvoir, Simone de, 30 –1, 170, 195n11, 201n65, 203n72, 234n217, 235n228 Bion of Borysthenes, 64 Birds, 51, 53, 57 –8, 65, 67– 8, 73– 6, 87–90, 93, 96– 7, 103, 105, 109, 112 –13, 121, 123, 126– 7, 134–6, 138 –42, 144–59, 167– 8, see also cocks, eagles, geese, owls, peacocks

258

HUMAN

AND

ANIMAL

body, see embodiment Bucephalus (the horse), 48 carcasses, 60, 140, 156, 159, 209n62 cattle cows, 46– 7, 49, 61– 2, 79, 90– 1, 107, 113, 123, 205n13, 216n51 bulls, 49, 53, 57, 59, 82, 90, 104, 112, 125, 130, 213n8, 222n52, 223n61, 223n68 heifers, 107, 128, 217n66 oxen, 78, 86, 109, 126, 214n22 centaurs, 38 –9, 74, 92, 94– 5, 206n26 Cerberus, 53 Chrysippus, 102 cicadas, 19, 109, 167–8, 171–2, 176–8 Circe, 102– 3, 218n88 cocks, 49, 57, 76, 92, 99, 147, 148, 167, 215n44 Coetzee, J.M., 57 consciousness, see awareness Cybele, 129– 30, 143, 225n87 Cynegetica, the (Ps.-Oppian), 44– 5, 47, 49 Daphnis and Chloe, 84, 91 death, 64– 5, 69, 87, 93, 106 –7, 110, 126– 7, 136, 142 inevitability of, 166, 176, 184, 235n228 losing a loved one, 87, 169 – 70, 176–8 violence of, 110, 127, 170 – 4 decoy animals, 86, 155 Deleuze, Gilles, 2 Demosthenes, 57, 71 Derrida, Jacques, 2, 202n70 Dio of Prusa, 213n181 Euboean Discourse, or Hunter, 215n35 Diogenes Laertius (DL), Lives and Opinions of Eminent Philosophers, 150, 209n69, 212n4 divination and animal omens, 75, 87, 89, 123, 157 dogs, 4– 5, 37, 48, 53, 56– 7, 59 –61, 74, 78, 80– 1, 85– 91, 99, 107, 109– 11, 113– 14, 118, 126 –7, 132, 145, 172, 174 –6

IN

ANCIENT GREECE

dolphins, 4– 5, 37, 51, 69, 109, 162–6, 169, 184, 206n31, 217n75 domestication, see tameness and domestication donkeys, 46, 76, 80– 1, 90, 92, 98, 102 –3, 109, 111, 207n31, 213n19 eagles, 51, 53, 58– 9, 63, 67, 89, 99, 111 –12, 123, 126, 136, 158–9 ecphrases and ecphrastic epigrams, 49, 160, 162, 179– 82, 210n78, 234n207 elephants, 81 embodiment, 11 –19, 27 –9, 56, 68, 112, 114, 120, 127, 129, 146, 166, 180, 184 empathy definitions, 3, 19– 24, 40 etymology, 2 – 3 movements as a melody, 17, 196n23 narrative empathy, 24, 40 reader’s empathy, 24 –30 40, 54 simulation theory, 195n20 tuning in, 198n37 epic similes, see similes Epictetus, Discourses (‘On Freedom’), 66–7 Epicureanism, 217n64 Erinna, 161, 233n196, 234n207 Eubulus, The Graces, 88 Euripides (Eur.) Alcestis (Alc.), 207n30, n37 Alexander, 91 Andromache, 128 Bacchae (Ba.), 207n37 Cyclops (Cycl.), 83, 216n49 Electra (El.), 163, 206n31 Hecuba, 227n120 Helen, 135 –6 Hippolytus (Hipp.), 207n37 Ion, 135 – 6, 139– 40, 227n113 fables, 5, 37, 43 –7, 52, 67, 71, 78, 80, 86, 97, 145, 158, 159, 207n31, 208n55, 209n68, 211n86, 212n6, 213n19, 231n181

INDEX Dancing Apes, The (Perry 463), 212n6 Horse and the Stag, The (Perry 269a), 52 Old Ox and the Young Steer, The (Perry 300), 78 Owl and the Birds, The (Perry 437 and 437a), 231n181 Stag in the Ox-Stall, The (Perry 492), 86 Wolves and the Sheepdogs, The (Perry 342), 80 Weasel as Bride (Perry 50), 97 fighting and hunting spectacles, see violence fish, 73, 109– 10, 112, 221n32 focalisation, 27– 8, 114, 221n34 foxes, 70, 92, 168, 211n86 geese, 75, 88, 111, 121, 235n225 goats, 10 –30, 68, 80 –1, 83 –4, 91, 104, 109– 10, 114, 130, 133 –4, 139, 178– 84, 212n8, 214n23, 221n23, 226n102 gods compared to animals in similes, 103, 123, 223n62 epithet animals of the gods, 90 grasshoppers, 19, 176– 8 Gorgias, Encomium of Helen, 50 Greek Anthology (AP), 10, 23, 37, 78, 160– 83, 209n69, 218n88, 234n206, 235n229, 237n269, 238n274 Halcyon, or on Metamorphoses (Ps.-Lucian), 95– 7 Haraway, Donna, 2 hares, 84, 86, 98, 109, 113, 126, 161, 234n206 harpies, 38– 9 Hecate, 53, 91 Heidegger, Martin, 170, 194n9, 202n70, 235n228 Herodas, ‘Women Dedicating and Sacrificing to Asclepius’, 49– 50 Herodotus (Hdt.), The Histories, 100, 213n18 Hesiod Theogony, the (Theog.), 53, 64, 225n91

259

Works and Days, the (Op.), 68, 177, 211n89, 235n221 hippocamps, 38, 165 Homer, see also animal similes: in the Iliad Iliad, the (Il.), 23, 70– 1, 84, 87, 94, 103, 106– 27, 143, 173 –4, 176 – 7, 180, 211n90, 212n99, 226n104, 236n239 – 40, 237n256 Odyssey (Od.), 59, 60, 65, 67, 68, 75, 80, 81, 83, 87, 91, 104, 108, 109, 139, 188, 212n99, 214n23, 215n39, 218n88, 222n52, 228n129, 235n225, 236n245 Homeric Hymn to Aphrodite, 51 Homeric Hymn to Hermes, 88– 9 Homeric Hymn to Mother of the Gods, 130 Homeric similes, see animal similes horses, 5, 10, 12, 19, 28 –9, 37, 39, 42, 45, 52, 57, 66 –7, 69, 74, 78, 81– 5, 87, 90, 95, 99, 109 –11, 123, 126– 7, 172–4 human chauvinism, 35– 6 humour, comicality of animals comedy, 145, 147, 152–3, 157, 214n33 epigrams, 161 – 2, 180, 184 pets, 88 hunters and hunting, 45, 73, 84–7, 95, 107–9, 113–14, 116, 122, 130–2, 139–40, 142–4, 155, 175 Husserl, Edmund, 14, 19, 20, 31, 169, 195n19, 196n23, 197n31 hybrids, 38– 9, 74, 92, 94– 5, 116, 118, 131, 145, 148, see also centaurs, harpies, Pan, satyrs Hymn to Poseidon and the Dolphins, see Arion’s Song identification, 24 –5, 40, 56, 58, 63 infant exposure, 136, 139, 227n119 insects, 19, 55, 99, 115– 16, 159, 167 –8, 176 – 8, 171, 230n161, 237n263, see also ants, bees, cicadas, grasshoppers Iser, Wolfgang, 9– 10, 26 –8, 199n51

260

HUMAN

AND

ANIMAL

Isocrates Antidosis, 76 Nicocles, 101 Panegyricus, 61 jackdaws, 88, 99, 147, 150, 158 – 9, 232n189 Keen, Suzanne, 24– 5, 40 lions, 45, 53, 63, 76, 89, 98– 9, 106 –11, 113– 4, 116–20, 122 –3, 128, 130, 142– 3, 206n23, 215n43, 222n39, 222n47 love in animals, 49, 87 –9 Lucian Dialogues of Sea-Gods, 104, 217n75 Dream, or the Cock, The, 97, 99 Ode to the Fly, 87, 215n43 Timon, or the Misanthrope, 228n132 Zeuxis, or Antiochus, 206n26 Lucius, or the Donkey (Ps.-Lucian), 92 Mansfield, Katherine, 56, 62 masculinity, 76, 176, 183 Meleager, 160 (AP 4.1), 161, 234n206 Menander, The Girl Possessed by a God, 99 Merleau-Ponty, Maurice, 14 –16, 20, 196n23–4, 200n60– 1, 202n68 metamorphoses, 38 –9, 74, 92– 9, 103– 4, 145, 147, 150, 157 – 8, 217n66 metaphors, 6, 12, 42– 3, 45, 52, 65, 94, 105, 109– 10, 123, 127 –9, 153, 160, 165, 174, 185 metempsychosis, 63, 92, 94, 97– 9, 151 mice and other small rodents, 74– 5, 97, 134, 140 Moero, 161, 178 motif of animal bride, 97 mules, 78, 109, 214n22 Nossis, 161, 233n196, 234n207 nymphs, 131, 156, 181 –2

IN

ANCIENT GREECE

On Style (Ps.-Demetrius), 136 On the Sublime (Ps.-Longinus), 66, 71, 210n80 Oppian, Halieutica, the, 205n6 Ovid, Metamorphoses (Met.), the, 5, 93, 211n84, 216n58 owls, 57, 90, 216n55 Palaephatus, On Incredible Things, 95 Pan, 181 Parrhasius (the painter), 48, 65 peacocks, 76, 232n191 perception, 14– 20, 26, 183 performing animals, 76 –7, 145, 157, 212n6, 224n77 personal names for animals, 76– 7, 212n8 perspective, see viewpoint pets and companion animals, 4, 73, 87 –8, 117, 132, 166– 72, 174– 8, 189, 215n43 philanthro¯pia (as animals’ love for humans), 79, 85, 215n36, 217n75 Philostratus the Elder (the Lemnian), Imagines, 49, 211n88 Philostratus, The Life of Apollonius of Tyana, 44 –7, 52, 188, 206n24 Physiognomics (Ps.-Aristotle), 98 pigs, boars and sows, 39, 48, 57, 80– 1, 90, 92, 97, 102– 4, 109 Plato (Pl.) Critias (Criti.), 48 Laws (Leges, Leg.), the, 57, 79, 101, 212n5, 213n17 Phaedo (Phd.), 98, 218n81 –2 Phaedrus (Phdr.), 151, 218n81 Republic, the (Respublica, Resp.), 48, 50, 57, 60, 79, 99– 100, 207n32 Sophist (Soph.), 79, 213n17, 227n114 Statesman (Politicus, Pol.) 50, 150, 206n31, 230n160– 1 Theaetetus (Tht.), 227n114 Timaeus (Tim.), 65, 98, 151 Plinius the Elder, Naturalis historia (HN), 210n76 Plutarch (Plut.) Lives Life of Agis, 214n25

INDEX Life of Aemilius Paulus, 87 Life of Alcibiades, 75– 6 Life of Alexander, 216n59 Life of Marcus Cato, 78 Life of Themistocles (Them.), 89 Moralia (Mor.) Against the Stoics on Common Conceptions, 102 Animals Are Rational (Gryllus), 92, 102–3, 217n64 Dinner of Seven Wise Men, 205n13 On Cleverness of Animals, 64, 76, 192n4, 212n4, 216n53 On the Eating of Flesh, 66, 231n180 On Isis and Osiris, 91, 219n92 Progress in Virtue, 212n4 Table-Talks, 57, 61 –2, 77, 208n55, 209n65 point of view, see viewpoint Pollux, Onomasticon, 37, 160, 172, 174 Polyphemus (the Cyclops), 80– 1, 83 –4, 188, 214n24 posthumanism, 204n81 prestige and status, 126, 173 prosopopoeia, see relating to animals in literature protention, 169–70 Pseudo-Oppian, see Cynegetica Pythagoras, 5, 63, 79, 99, 211n84 reading experience intimacy of, 30– 3 silent reading vs. reading aloud in Greek Antiquity, 193n4, 193n5 reincarnation, see metempsychosis relating to animals in Greek literature, 54– 64 animals as tenor, 43, 45, 49, 52, 66, 68, 72, 111, 123 –4, 189, 205n8, 211n88 prosopopoeia (speech in character), 43, 64, 66– 8, 72, 79, 157, 159, 189 see also addressing animals respect for animals, 89 –92 retention, 169 reversibility, 16, 200n60

261

sacred animals, 90 sacrifice, 53, 75, 77– 9, 90, 125, 130, 149, 181, 213n11, 223n67, 229n146 Sappho, 51, 160 – 1, 168, 207n35, 233n197 satyrs, 38, 83 –4, 145, 181 Scheler, Max, 22 scriptio continua, 193n4, 193n5 Semonides (Types of Women), 97 sheep, 53, 57, 59, 80 –1, 83– 4, 91, 98, 104, 109 –10, 113, 118, 120, 123, 214n23, 221n23 rams, 83, 84, 120, 188, 222n54, 223n66 similes, see animal similes Singer, Peter, 2 slaves, 52, 73, 78, 80, 82, 88, 148, 155, 156, 189 snakes and serpents, 70, 90 –1, 109, 127, 131 –2, 134 – 5, 175 Socrates, 48, 60, 65, 95– 7, 100 Sophocles Ajax, 59– 60 Philoctetes, 23, 71, 127–44, 146, 156, 185, 189, 190, 224– 8 apostrophes to animals, 136–44 companionship with animals, 131 – 5 Philoctetes as predator, 134– 5, 143 – 4 wild environment, 129– 31 Shepherds, The (fr. 505), 73, 82 Tereus, 93 Stein, Edith, 20 Stephanus of Byzantium, 160 stereotypes, 43, 72, 88, 99 Stoics, the, 52, 66, 75, 102 sympathy, 4 –5, 22, 40, 43, 45, 59, 60 –4, 68–70, 72, 76, 78, 86, 113– 16, 155, 159, 184, 188, 209n63 taking care of domestic animals, 74– 5, 78, 80– 2, 85, 87, 104 tameness and domestication, 79 –80, 98, 101, 189, 213n19 tenor (of comparison), see relating to animals in literature

262

HUMAN

AND

ANIMAL

Theocritus, Idylls, the, 70, 84, 206n23, 212n8, 214n32 Theophrastus, Characters, the, 87 –8 the¯rio¯de¯s, 100– 1, 104 thumos, 69, 118–20, 222n44 tick, 18 tortoises, 88– 9, 216n51 translation theories, 200n62 transmigration of souls, see metempsychosis upright posture/position, 103, 151, 190 vegetarian diet, 156, 232n183 viewpoint, 5 – 6, 10, 13, 17, 21– 30, 121, 162– 6, 175, 179 –80 animals’ point of view in Greek literature, 64, 66– 7, 69– 70, 79, 85– 6, 92, 107, 114, 120, 124, 141, 144, 146, 153 – 8 violence animal fights, 76 animals as toys, 88, 115 bird-selling, 154–5 castration, 82 decoys and other torturous hunting methods, 86– 7, 155, 190 targets for archery contest, 110, 220n19

IN

ANCIENT GREECE

Vischer, Robert, 2 –3 visual arts ancient criticism on animal depictions, 44, 47– 50, 65 –6 Moschophorus (the Calf-bearer), 54 Myron’s Cow, 48 –9 wild boars, 76, 86, 98, 109, 113, 140, 175, 211n88, 215n39 wings, 57 –8, 96, 121, 123, 147, 149– 52, 166 –8 ‘wolf children’, 34, 91–2 Xenophanes, 63 Xenophon Cavalry Commander (Hipparchicus, Eq. Mag.), 215n37 Education of Cyrus (Cyr.), 94 –5, 210n77, 211n88, 215n38 On Horse Breeding (De equitandi ratione, Eq.), 85 On Hunting with Hounds (Cyneg.), 84 –6, 175, 212n8, 215n36 Memorabilia (Mem.), 48, 100, 213n18 Zahavi, Dan, 20, 197n31 zoopoetics, see animal poetics Zoroastrianism, 79