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Leukas-Ithaka

Published online by Cambridge University Press:  23 December 2013

Extract

It was in 1900 that Dr. Dörpfeld first proclaimed, to the German Institute at Athens, that Leukas and not Thiaki was the Ithaka of Homer. In 1902 he read to the Archäologische Gesellschaft of Berlin a paper on the subject, which in 1903 was published in Mélanges Perrot. To this paper Wilamowitz gave a scathing and even contemptuous reply in 1903, and Dörpfeld rejoined in his Leukas, 1905, which also contains his original essay. Since then the controversy has raged without intermission, but it has been almost confined to Germany. This country has not so far contributed any comprehensive paper on the subject, and it would not be easy, so many are the matters that the dispute embraces, and so warm and minute has the discussion become, to prepare a statement with less than a considerable volume at one's disposal. I therefore propose to confine myself here to one of the points in the controversy, and I select that which the Leukadists, as they are called for short, regard as supplying the best evidence in their favour, and which is consequently noticed in nearly all papers and treatises on the subject. This includes the incident of the return voyage of Telemachus from Pylos to Ithaka, his escape from the ambush laid for him by the Wooers at the island Homer calls Asteris, and the identification of that island on the modern map.

Type
Research Article
Copyright
Copyright © The Society for the Promotion of Hellenic Studies 1914

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References

1 Draheim had really anticipated him, in a review of Jebb's Homer in W. kl. Ph. 1894, 63 ff.

2 See a short Bibliographical Note at the end of this paper.

3 Small streams S. of the Alpheus (Sikes and Allen on Hym. Ap. 425).

4 The interpretation might be justified if θοός were a standing epitheton ornans of νῆσος. But common as νῆσος is, the combination does not recur.

5 Exact position given by Gruhn, , Kyklopen u. Phäaken, 60Google Scholar, as 37° 54′ N., and 21° E.

6 The Rocks are accepted by Mr.Agar, , Homerica, 266Google Scholar, admitting θοός = ‘sharp,’ ‘pointed.’ But Telemachus' fear, he insists,is not of shipwreck, as Bérard thinks, but of capture by the Wooers.

7 But see von Mareés in N. Jbb. f. d. kl. Alt. xvii. 236.

8 For recent statements see MrAllen, in J.H.S. xxx. 304 ff.Google Scholar and Stürmer, in B. ph. W. 1913, 1660 f.Google Scholar The former refers to Bunbury, Hist. of Anct. Geogy. i. 69 f., and Vollgraff, N. Jbb. f. d. kl. Altert. xix. 627 ff. The suggestion had also been made by Prof.Warr, in C.R. xii. 304Google Scholar, and apparently by Kuruklis, in W. kl. Ph. 1894, 697 ff.Google ScholarMr.Thompson, , in Liverpool Annals iv. 133Google Scholar, seems to approve. Dörpfeld appears to make Dulichium part of the kingdom of Odysseus, which would involve a discrepancy between the two epics. I have seen this view contested, and can find no warrant for it in the Odyssey. Ferrabino, Le Interpolazioni nel Catalogo Omerico (Attid. R. Accad. d. Scienze d. Torino, xlvii.) makes the same assertion.

9 For instance, among the old writers on the Ithaka question, von Lilienstern, Ueber das homerische Ithaka, 1832, and more recently Lang, Gustav, Untersuchungen zur Geographie der Odyssec, 40 f.Google Scholar

10 Manatt, (Aegean Days, 384)Google Scholar gives its width as 18 miles, which is too great—Arkoudi really seems not to be in a strait at all. If it were 5 miles further W., it might be so described.

11 There is room on Daskalio for the ruins of two churches, a reservoir and a tower. Probably, as Mr. Wace tells me, there had been a monastery there or some such religious institution, whence, as in other similar cases, the name, corrupted from Διδασκαλϵῖον.

12 ἀκταὶ ἀμφίδυμοι, in Argonautica, A 939 f., is rendered by Mr. Seaton, ‘(and the isthmus has) double shores.’ Thomopoulos' explanation based on Apoll. Rhodius' words seems untenable (op. cit. 17 f.)

13 See the photographs he gives, and the frontispiece to G. Lang's work.

14 But there does not seem to have been great change between Strabo's days and now.

15 A particularly hard variety, von Marées says! The discrepancies as to such matters are, as Rothe has observed, a remarkable feature of this controversy.

16 This paragraph was written before I had seen Professor Manly's paper. I now add the following extract from it, p. 36, opposite which will be found a photograph of the double harbour. ‘An examination of the coast line under the guidance of Dr. Dörpfeld showed, however, no such harbour. The eastern shore of the island, where the double harbour is said to lie, is practically a straight line from which a rocky strip, a few yards wide and four to six feet high, extends at right angles to the shore to a distance of about seventy-five yards. The surface of this rocky strip shows, as may be seen from the accompanying cut, that the water dashes over it readily, so that the whole shore is entirely unprotected and cannot be said to have any harbour at all.’

17 Paulatos, op. cit. 122, explains the name from the sparkling of the stone—δίκην ἀστέρος μαρμαίρϵι ἐν τῇ κνανῇ θαλάσσῃ.

18 The places mentioned in the Wanderings of Odysseus, commonly included in the ‘Outer Geography’ of the Odyssey, are not here in question, but only the Schauplätze of the epics.

19 Herkenrath, who is not a partisan, finds in the later name Asteria sufficient ground for holding that Asteris is not an invention (B. ph. W. 1910, 1270).

20 Dörpfeld's full confession of faith on the subject of the verity and actuality of all in Homer will be found in his review of Croiset's Légende in W. kl. Ph. 1912, 1081 ff.

21 La Roche (op. cit. 488) recalls the familiar lines of Horace, pictoribus atque poetis quidlibet audendi semper fuit aequa potestas. scimus, et hanc veniam petimusque damusque vicissim.

22 Apparently Tiglia on the chart in Bérard, ii. 419.

23 The vexed question of the site of the capital on Thiaki cannot be discussed here, but my impression is that opinion preponderates in favour of Polis. Among the old papers on the Ithacan question Mr. Gladstone's is still good. Among the moderns, von Marées is against Polis, and Vollgraff's paper, which I have quoted more than once, is in reply to him. See also Bérard, and Mr.Allen, in J.H.S. xxx. 304.Google Scholar But there is no want of literature on the subject. The name Polis looks like a survival, and the depth of water in the bay corresponds to the Homeric πολυβϵνθής. With Polis there is little difficulty in getting a satisfactory conception of the events in Ithaka, the incidents of Telemachus' trip, and the departure of Hermes in ω, according to the narrative of the Odyssey. It may at least be said that there are fewer difficulties with Polis than with any other site.

24 So bad that Goessler (op. cit. 52) seems disposed to adhere to the first interpretation of ἑκὰς νήσων, which he declares to be not only grammatically accurate but also sachlich notwendig.

25 Chosen because apparently Dörpfeld fixes on Engiros, near Skydhi, for the dwelling-place of Evmaeus. Hennings, , however (B. ph. W. 1908, 620)Google Scholar, denies that the swine could get shelter from the North wind (ξ 533) at Evgiros. They could in the site for the steading and Κόρακος πέτρη N. of S. Andrea.

26 He has been subjected to merciless criticism even in his own country, especially by Engel (Der Wohnsitz des Odysseus), who is not an armchair critic but speaks after visiting the islands. Strong as his exposure of Dörpfeld's methods is, it must be admitted there is good foundation for it. Dörpfeld impresses one as establishing a point with satisfaction to himself by giving some evidence for it and then insisting on it strongly as proved to demonstration. ‘I believe …… and I can prove it’ is a sort of final formula with him (Manatt, op. cit. 381, 383, 387).

27 The discussion has become very involved, and many authorities might be quoted pro and con. I note that Vollgraff (l.c. 617 n.) is not convinced. The statement in J.H.S. xxvii. Procgs. xliii. that it had been shewn conclusively that Leukas was an island in 1000 B.C., was extremely premature.

28 Rothe, (Die Odyssee als Dichtung, 335)Google Scholar thinks it strange the outcasts did not go further on, as to the richer and more distant Zanté. They remained just on the other side of the ‘strait’ from the Dorian fiends.

29 Paulatos quotes modern Greek equivalents. But Vollgraff, though he objects to Dörpfeld's inference, does not admit a Witz.