swift footed like a road-runner.

[Bert]

Iliad 2:764 caused some puzzlement for me. Horses being [size=150]ποδώκεας ὄρνιθας ὣς[/size] ?
First of I thought [size=150]ὄρνιθας [/size]looks like 'birds' but horses are not swift footed like birds are they? So it must be something else.
It turned out to be birds after all. My next thought was that Homer must be reffering to Road-runners or Ostriches.
Another thing I learned from this verse is that [size=150]ὥς[/size] can come at the end of a clause.
(Looking up [size=150]ποδώκεας[/size] in Cunliffe I found out that it can mean plain 'swift'. I just wanted to share my rambling train of thought and part of my learning curve.)

[Timotheus]

I would probaly suggest ostrich. I believe road runners are native to New Mexico and Arizona USA.