Chapter 5 Repeating the Unrepeated: Allusions to Homeric Hapax Legomena in Archaic and Classical Greek Poetry

In: Repetition, Communication, and Meaning in the Ancient World
Author:
Thomas J. Nelson
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Type:
Chapter
Pages:
119–157
DOI:
https://doi.org/10.1163/9789004466661_007

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Abstract

In this paper, I investigate the repetition of Homeric hapax legomena in archaic and classical Greek poetry. Scholars frequently assume that fine-grained engagement with Homeric rarities is a distinctive feature of the Hellenistic period, but I reveal the significant precedent for this phenomenon in earlier poetry. Proceeding through comedy, tragedy and lyric, I explore a range of case studies which demonstrate the extremely sophisticated appropriation of Homeric unica in the pre-Hellenistic world. I argue that this evidence requires us to reconsider the extent of allusion in archaic and classical Greece and to rewrite traditional narratives of literary history.

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Repetition, Communication, and Meaning in the Ancient World

Orality and Literacy in the Ancient World, vol. 13

Series:  Mnemosyne, Supplements, Volume: 442
Cover Repetition, Communication, and Meaning in the Ancient World
E-Book ISBN:
9789004466661
Publisher:
Brill
Print Publication Date:
31 Aug 2021
Front Matter
Introduction
Chapter 1 Repetition or Recurrence? A Traditional Use for ἄνδρεσσι μελήσει in Archaic Greek Poetry
Chapter 2 Enumeration and Embodiment in Homeric Repetition
Chapter 3 Odysseus’ Scar Once More: Repetition, Tradition, and Fiction in the Story of Odysseus’ Hunting in the Mountains of Parnassus
Chapter 4 Repetition, Sortition, and Abbreviations in the Cypro-Minoan Script
Chapter 6 Repetition and the Creation of “Sappho”
Chapter 7 Repetition, Disanalogy, and Reflexivity in Hesiod’s Theogony: About the Fate of the Cyclopes, of the Hundred-Handers, and of the Children of Iapetus
Chapter 8 Reperformance, Writing, and the Boundaries of Literature
Chapter 9 Other-Initiated Repetition and Fictive Orality in the Dialogues of Plato
Chapter 10 Repetition, Improvisation, and Parody: Eumolpus Re-takes Troy in Petronius’s Satyrica 83–90
Chapter 11 Oral Prayer Patterns in Epigraphic Songs to Asklepios
Chapter 12 Harmonization in the Pentateuch and Synoptic Gospels: Repetition and Category-Triggering within Scribal Memory
Chapter 13 “Godlike” Grappling: Professional Wrestling as a Model for the Shifting of Epithet Significance in Oral Poetry
Chapter 14 The Creation of a Storyrealm: The Role of Repetition in Homeric Epic and Alice Oswald’s Memorial
Back Matter

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