For another example of epic/elegiac interaction, see the famous “men as leaves” topos, found in Iliad 6.145–50 (but also 2.467–468, 2.800–801, 21.462–467, Od. 7.105–106, Od. 9.47–50), and in Mimnermus fr. 2.1–5 W, and Simonides frr. 19–20 W; see Griffith 1975; Sider 1996: 273–275; Burgess 2001: 117–126; Kelly 2015: 22–24; Rawles 2018: 106–129. Once more, whatever judgment we make as to priority, the elegiac refraction cannot rely on the narrative context to smooth out its interpretation.
9 9 For readings of Alcaeus’ poem, see e.g., Page 1955: 303–306; Rösler 1980: 256–264; Petropoulos 1994 passim; MacLachlan 1997: 142–143; Hunter 2014: 123–126.
10 10 The pattern is ‒ × ‒ ˘ ˘ ‒ ‒ ˘ ˘ ‒ ‒ ˘ ˘ ‒ ˘ ‒ (“dactylic” portions underlined).
11 11 The poem may have continued; nonetheless, aside from Sirius forming a ring with ἄστρον (1: Budelmann 2018b: on lines 5–6, 113), ἄσδει also reverses the opening verb τέγγει “drench.”
12 12 See Budelmann 2018b: 111.
13 13 See esp. Petropoulos 1994. The image is found also in the Hesiodic Shield of Heracles, a mid-sixth-century epic tale (393–400) roughly contemporaneous with Alcaeus, but the points of arguably direct contact with Hesiod are fewer.
14 14 This remains true even if Alcaeus is, as many scholars think, drawing directly on Hesiod. For another example of his use of epic themes, see fr. 140.3–5 and Il. 3.336–7 (= 11.41–42 = 16.137–138 = 15.480–481), though it is unclear to which particular scene from the Iliad, if any, Alcaeus is referring us: see Page 1955: 209–223; Rösler 198: 153–154; Kelly 2015: 27–28. For more general studies of his poem, see recently Spelman 2015; Budelmann 2018b: 106–110.
15 15 This is a much-studied part of the field: the basic material is collected by Oehler (1926), but see also Meyerhoff 1984; Edmunds 2009.
16 16 Hesiod does not have to maintain this involved stance or perspective, since the Theogony, after its opening proem hymn to the Muses (1–103) where he details his encounter with them, is very much a distanced narrative of the “glorious deeds of gods (and heroes).”
17 17 Tyrtaeus cites him here as the dispreferred object of song and memorialization, like several other figures (3–4, 6–8), next to the “good man” who proves himself in war (10ff.).
18 18 This technique is the so-called “Alexandrian footnote,” where the poet explicitly references previous versions of the tale s/he is about to retell: see Edmunds 2006.
19 19 On this poem, see recently Rawles 2006, the essays in Greene and Skinner 2009; Budelmann 2018b: 146–152.
20 20 See Faulkner 2008: 45–47, 270–271; Richardson 2010: 247–248.
21 21 On this poem, see especially the essays in Boedeker and Sider 2001; Kowerski 2005; Rawles 2018: 77–106.
22 22 For text and commentary, see Swift 2019: ad loc. Archilochus was particularly interested in Heracles myths: see frr. 286–288, 304 W with Swift 2014: 441 n. 28. For recent discussions, see Swift 2012, 2014; Bowie 2016a; Lulli 2016: 197–199.
23 23 On this poem generally, see Currie 2015. On the Cypria and Telephus, see Cingano 2004: 71–73.
24 24 See Swift 2019 ad loc.
25 25 For discussions, see Lloyd-Jones 1968; Bremer, Rösler 1980: 204–221; Bremer, van Erp Taalman Kip, and Slings 1987: 95–127; Liberman 1999: ii 99 (with much further bibliography); Pallantza 2005: 47–56; Bowie 2010b: 69; Boedeker 2012: 72–73.
26 26 Note, however, that the epic formula is never used in epic after κατά, only ἐπί, ἐνί, and εἰς: Alcaeus makes the epic phrase his own. See below, n. 43, for Sappho’s engagement with this same phrase.
27 27 See Finglass 2015c.
28 28 For readings of this poem, see Pfeijffer 2000; Hutchinson 2001: 160–168; Pallantza 2005: 45–57; Bowie 2010b: 67–69; Blondell 2010: 377–387 (~ 2013: 111–116); Swift 2015: 105–106.
29 29 On the basis that the double light in the second half of each of the first five metra (also known as “feet”) can be replaced by a single heavy syllable: i.e., ‒ ˘ ˘ can be rendered as ‒ ‒ . Thus the minimum syllable count for the dactylic hexameter is twelve, and the maximum seventeen.
30 30 See, e.g., fr. 1.24 (κωὐκ ἐθέλοισα “even unwilling”), which deploys the epic form ἐθελ- rather than Lesbian θελ-, though with Lesbian vocalism -οισα for epic-Ionic -ουσα.
31 31 See, e.g., Whitmarsh 2018: 139–145.
32 32 A generally “subversive” effect of myth is not foreign to epic poetry, either, when characters use myths to justify or illustrate something in their immediate circumstance, but end up implying something else entirely. Consider Agamemnon’s evocation of Heracles’ birth story as an illustration of the fact that even Zeus, like Agamemnon himself, could be misled by Ate (Il. 19.90–136). On the surface, it is a powerful exculpation, until we remember that the myth places considerable emphasis on the servitude of a physically greater man (Heracles) to a more powerful but physically inferior man (Eurystheus)—a circumstance not far from Agamemnon’s own situation with regard to Achilles.
33 33 See Boedeker 2012: 69–72; Caprioli 2012; Spelman 2018. Both Race 1989–1990: 23 and Budelmann 2018b: 89–90 make the point that neither Thetis nor Achilles are clearly or unambivalently positive figures in this context, which allows for much the same type of subtle self-questioning we saw in Sappho fr. 16.
34 34 See Fowler 1987: 37; also Meyerhoff 1984: 46–53; West 2002: 208–209 (= 2011–13: 394–395); Liberman 1999: i ad loc., 38; contra Burgess 2001: 115; Kelly 2015: 25–27.
35 35 See Caprioli 2012; Whitmarsh 2018: 146–148.
36 36 See the discussions of Barron 1969; Goldhill 1991: 116–119; Bowie 2010b: 74–78; Boedeker 2012: 75–81; Wilkinson 2013: 50–87; Budelmann 2018b: 172–181.
37 37 -ιδης patronymics in epic show both the older –αο form in the genitive case, as well as the later Ionic –εω.
38 38 Not his invariable practice in this poem: by calling Cyanippus the “most handsome” man to come to Troy, Ibcyus sets himself against the Homeric judgment that it was Nireus who bore this crown (Il. 2.673–675).
39 39 cf. CEG I 344.2 (Phocis, 600–550?).
40 40 Erotic themes are of course found in epos; given the typological nature of the “seduction scene,” one of whose most extensive examples occurs in the Homeric Hymn to Aphrodite, one might well consider these themes sewn into the very fabric of the epic world: see Forsyth 1979. However, Ibycus’ final point of comparison as one of physical beauty displaces the epic primacy of martial achievement for its male addressee.
41 41 Note too the mention of Cassandra and Paris (10–12), both renowned for their physical attractiveness, the latter frequently feminized in the Homeric epic tradition because of it.
42 42 For readings of this poem, see Rissman 1983: 119–141; Meyerhoff 1984: 118–139; Schrenk 1994; Bowie 2010b: 71–74; Kelly 2015: 28–29; Spelman 2017; Kelly 2021.
43 43 For a complete list, cf. Page 1955: 66–70; Ferrari 1986. Sappho doesn’t only or simply copy epic phrases, but recreates them: e.g., ἐπ’ ἄλμυρον / πόντον (7–8) combines two epic formulae (ἁλμυρὸν ὕδωρ and ἐπ’ οἴνοπα πόντον), altering both the position of the epithet, and the usual (line-ending) position of the formular noun; see above, n. 26, for Alcaeus’ engagement with this epic formula. Like him, Sappho is recreating the epic world in lyric form.
44 44 See, e.g., Schrenk 1994; for a survey, Kelly 2021.
45 45 See esp. Il. 22.470–472, but also 1.366–369, 2.691, 6.394–397, 413–428, etc., with Spelman 2016; contra West 2002: 213 = 2011–13: i 400.
46 46 Cf., e.g., Pallantza 2005: 79–88. Scodel 2021: 198 and n. 21 suggests that Sappho knew stories