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Ὅλβoς, Κόϱoς, Ὕβϱις and Ἄτη From Hesiod to Aeschylus

Published online by Cambridge University Press:  29 July 2016

Richard E. Doyle S.J.
Richard E. Doyle S.J.*
Affiliation:
Fordham University
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Extract

One of the commonplaces of criticism with regard to Greek thought is that there existed a canonical tetralogy, ὄλβος, ϰόος, ὕβις and ἄτη which was inexorably operative in human lives. Thus, Basil Gildersleeve in his comments on Pindar's thought wrote:

The next point suggested by the first Olympian is the representative position of Pindar as the expounder of Greek ethics. Is Pindar speaking for himself or for his people? Many of his thoughts are not his own. They are fragments of the popular Hellenic catechism, and they became remarkable in Pindar partly by the mode of presentation, partly by the evident heartiness with which he accepts the national creed. So in v. 56, and P. 2, 28, we find a genealogy which was as popular with the Greeks as Sin and Death in the Christian system. Oλβος — Kόος — Ὕβις — Ἄτη. The prosperity that produces pride and fulness of bread culminates in overweening insolence and outrage and brings on itself mischief sent from heaven.

Type
Miscellany
Information
Traditio , Volume 26 , 1970 , pp. 293 - 303
Copyright
Copyright © Fordham University Press 

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References

1 Gildersleeve, Basil, Pindar: The Olympian and Pythian Odes (New York 1885) xxxi.Google Scholar

2 Burton, R. W. B., Pindar's Pythian Odes (Oxford 1962) 116.Google Scholar

3 Owen, E. T., The Harmony of Aeschylus (Toronto 1952) 72.Google Scholar

4 The text used is Rzach, A., Hesiodi Carmina 3 (Leipzig 1958).Google Scholar

5 Of the twenty-six occurrences of ἄτβ in Homer, the plural is used three times, viz., Iliad 9.115, 10.391, and 19.270.Google Scholar

6 Paley, F. A., The Epics of Hesiod (London 1861) ad loc. mistakenly understands ἀάτβσιν to refer to ‘the misfortunes enumerated inf. v. 239 sqq.’ Google Scholar

7 The text used is Diehl, E., Anthologia Lyrica Graeca 3 (Leipzig 1949) 1.1.Google Scholar

8 This is the understanding of Bowra, C. M., Early Greek Elegists (Cambridge [Mass.] 1938) 93–95 and 97–98. It is also that of Linforth, I., Solon the Athenian (Berkeley 1919) 108 and especially 165 where he translates ‘blind folly.’ Solmsen, F. seems to contradict himself on this point. On 111 of his Hesiod and Aeschylus (Ithaca 1949) he seems to understand ἄτβ in this sense, but on 107 he takes it to mean ‘disaster bred of infatuation.’ Google Scholar

9 The text used is Bowra, C. M., Pindari Carmina 2 (Oxford 1951).Google Scholar

10 Pindar is quite late for the first appearance of a dictum from ‘the popular Hellenic catechism’ or a supposed ‘age-old Ate doctrine.’ Google Scholar

11 Burton, , op. cit. 116.Google Scholar

12 Cf. Iliad 3.100, 6.356, 24.28, Odyssey 4.261, 23.223.Google Scholar

13 A third Aeschylean passage, Suppliants 524–530, should be noted for the sake of completeness. But it does not really fall within the present investigation for several reasons. First, κόος is not mentioned. Secondly, at the verbal level, the adjective ὄλβιος, rather than the noun, ὄλβος, is employed. Finally and most important, there is in this passage such a clear distinction between Zeus, who is ὄλβιος, and men who possess ὕβις and ἄτβ, that perhaps not even the champions of the supposed tetralogy would see its presence in this passage.Google Scholar

14 The text used is Broadhead, E., The Persae of Aeschylus (Cambridge 1960).Google Scholar

15 This is the interpretation of Rose, H. J., A Commentary on the Surviving Plays of Aeschylus, 2 vols. (Amsterdam 1957) and Smyth, H. W., Aeschylus, 2 vols. (Cambridge [Mass.] 1946) ad loc. Google Scholar

16 This is the interpretation of Dindorf, G., Aeschyli Tragoediae Superstites, 3 vols. (Oxford 1832–1851) ad loc. Google Scholar

17 Op. cit. 205.Google Scholar

18 Incidentally, Solon's use of ἄτβ as distinguished from the effects of εὐνομία, is quite similar to Darius' use of ἄτβ as distinguished from the effects of ϕόνβσις in the present passage.Google Scholar

19 The text used is Fraenkel, E., Aeschylus: Agamemnon, 3 vols. (Oxford 1950).Google Scholar

20 Op. cit, II, 352. In addition to the references given by Fraenkel, , cf. also Edwards, W. M., ‘Agamemnon 767ff.,’ CR 56 (1942) 41.Google Scholar

21 Wilamowitz-Moellendorff, U., Aischylos Interpretationen (Berlin 1914) 197–198.Google Scholar

22 Loc. cit. Google Scholar

23 Op. cit., II, 353.Google Scholar

24 Ibid. Google Scholar

25 Fraenkel, , op. cit, II, 353–354, remarks: 'With regard to the dative μελάθοισιν, many editors have taken it as locative, e.g. Nägelsbach and Wecklein (so too Connington, who, however, understands μελ. μελάθ. ἄτας to mean ‘in the halls of black Ate’; which seems to me quite impossible). It is much more natural to take μελάθ. as a genuine dative (so e.g. Schutz, Bothe, Headlam), ‘as an Ate for the house,’ similar e.g. to 733 ἄμαχον ἄλγος οἰϰέταις. To prove that μέλαθα can stand not only in the concrete sense of the building but also of the house and its inhabitants (with reference to their destiny) in the same way as οῑϰος etc. it is sufficient to compare Ag. 1575, Cho. 1065.Google Scholar

26 I hope to develop this point in a subsequent article. Meanwhile the reader is referred to: Persae 1007, 1037; Septem 315; Supplices 470; Agamemnon 361, 643, 730, 735, 819, 1124, 1230, 1433, 1523, 1566; Choepheroe 339, 383, 403, 404, 467, 825, 830, 836; Eumenides 376, 982; Prometheus 1072, 1078.Google Scholar

27 Cf. the same passages.Google Scholar

28 If Fraenkel's explanation for the passage is accepted, then ἄτβ would also be used in connection with ϳότον in 767. Furthermore, the suggestion of Knox, B., ‘The Lion in the House (Agamemnon 717–36),’ CPh 47 (1952) 18 is also probably correct. In keeping with all the verbal echoes of the second antistrophe contained in the present passage, Knox would maintain that ἄμαχον in 769 recalls ἄμαχον ἄλγος of 733, in which case ἄλγος would be still another concept of evil to which ἄτβ in 771 refers.Google Scholar

29 Ibid. Google Scholar

30 Nor is the presence of ἀϰόεστον in 756 enough to justify such an interpretation.Google Scholar

31 The text used is Diehl, E., Anthologia Lyrica Graeca 3 (Leipzig 1950) 1.2.Google Scholar

32 Thus, Burton, R. W. B., op. cit, is simply wrong when he writes (116–117): ‘The process is familiar in Greek literature and may be paralleled exactly for Pindar by his treatment of the story of Tantalus in Olympian 1.55f.’ Google Scholar

33 Smyth, , op. cit., translates ‘Destruction,’ and Fletcher, F., Notes to the Agamemnon of Aeschylus (Oxford 1949), has ‘Doom.’ Campbell's, A. Y. case (‘The Fall of Paris: Aeschylus, Agamemnon 374–398,’ AAL 28 [1948] 64–82) is built on three false premises: (1) that ἄϕετος, which is in all manuscripts, should be emended; (2) that πειθώ can mean ‘temptation’ (cf LSJ); (3) that the reading at Persians 107–114, which is actually quite disputed, is unquestionably his emended version.Google Scholar

34 Op. cit, II, 201.Google Scholar

35 There is another reason for interpreting ἄτβ as ‘infatuation’ in 386. It is the general erotic context of the Paris-Helen myth which is spoken of in this ode and which was common to the five Homeric passages in which ἄτβ means ‘infatuation.’ Cf. note 12 supra. Google Scholar The present passage adds irony to the reference to Thyestes' adultery in 1192.Google Scholar For the application of 386 to Agamemnon, cf. Goheen, R. F., ‘Aspects of Dramatic Symbolism,’ AJPh 76 (1955) 126–132.Google Scholar