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The Kingship of Agamemnon
Published online by Cambridge University Press: 11 February 2009
Extract
What was Agamemnon's political position in Greece? Was he only king of Mycenae and territory adjoining it, or had he in addition a suzerainty over the rest of the Peloponnesus? Was he sovereign in the whole of the Peloponnesus? Did he exercise any supremacy over, and especially can he be described as king or emperor of, Mycenaean Greece and its islands? In regard to the expedition against Troy, did he command it by virtue of a dominion over the whole of Greece, or was he selected for the position for some special reason, as his relationship to Helen or his pre-eminence in power over the other Achaean princes?
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- Copyright © The Classical Association 1917
References
page 146 note 1 And the line occurs in a lay that to Meyer is one of the oldest.
page 147 note 1 The inference in Homer and History, 224, rom the remains of made roads, I leave for examination elsewhere.
page 147 note 2 It has been condemned. The connection with what goes before is clumsy, and the infinitive άνάσσειν hard to construe after ϕορ⋯ναι. But I pass the point.
page 148 note 1 I can find none. On the other hand, there seems to be much, in later tradition at least, that is to the contrary effect.
page 148 note 2 They may have significance in another way. MrHall, , O.C.G. 233Google Scholar, thinks the legend may point to a non-Achaean origin for the Kadmeians. If so, the less chance of Achaean dominion over them.
page 149 note 1 See, e.g. Ameis-Hentze α.ι., παντι wie πολλῇσιν, ein die wirklichen Verhältnisse übertreibender Ausdruck.—It is interesting to notice that in another Homeric passage, ί 22 sqq., which is a geographical crux—to Leukas-Ithaka disputants—πᾆς (in πανμπεγᾀτη) and ν⋯σοι πολλαί recur and have to be translated with the same reservation.
page 150 note 1 According to Philostratus, Heroicus VIII., Idomeneus was ready to assist if the Cretans were made σνμμΈτοχοι τ⋯ς άρχ⋯ς τῷ 'ΑγαμΈμνονι. This is quoted by Fuchs, , De varietate fabb. Troic. 72Google Scholar, who also notes there was a threat to put Palamedes in Agamemnon's place if Iphigeneia were not sacrificed.
Page 150 note 2 But there are limitations even here, as Achilles' promise to Kalchas in A 86 sqq. shows.
page 151 note 1 The critics, to be sure, regard the passage as late, mainly because of the mention of Cyprus and the Gorgon's head! But, as Andrew Langhas remarked, the reconstruction of the old Iliad without it has the effect of sending Agamemnon out at the head of his troops ‘in his shirt.’
page 152 note 1 On this point reference may be made to Seymour, op. cit. 19 sqq.; Keil, in Gercke, and Norden, , op. cit. III. 340Google Scholar; Hall, , O.C.G. 223Google Scholar sq.; Allen, in C.R. XXV. 235Google Scholar; Lang, Andrew, Homer and his Age, IGoogle Scholar sqq., and elsewhere; Leaf's, Troy, 22Google Scholar; and Belzner, , Hom. Probl. I. 2 sqq., and 102 sqqGoogle Scholar.
page 152 note 2 ἆρθμιοι, π 427, indicates one such agreement, by which, however, we need understand no more than that the peoples concerned had agreed for a time to abstain from the plundering of each other's territory that was evidently a normal, standing practice.