I am trying to analyse the structure of this line from Iliad 22.307
τό οἱ ὑπὸ λαπάρην τέτατο μέγα τε στιβαρόν τε
I cannot get it to fit into a dactylic hexameter pattern.
My feeble attempt shows the following:
To ‘oi ‘upo laparen tetato mega te stibaron te
u - u u u u - u u u u u - u u - u
Pathetic. I know
Also, I’m sure there must be some way of rendering this more effectively.
Indeed a metrically strange line! It’s so difficult that I suppose that commentaries would say something to explain this. Let me try my hand without looking up, however.
Homeric formulas contain linguistic fossiles. οἱ origally had a w-sound called digamma and spelt ϝ (in the dialects that still had it when alphabetic writing was used). In the period when the Homeric poems were put into writing the sound was probably already absent in the dialect of the poet, but it could still affect how the line was scanned.
Then there’s another phenomenon that in word boundary, some word-initial consonants can be lengthened, effectively making the preceding syllable long. This apparently happens three times in this line!
On the other hand, the word-final long vowel/diphthong οἱ is shortened here because the next word begins with a vowel. This is called epic correption and it’s actually quite regular when there is hiatus, i.e. a word ending in a vowel/diphthong followed by a word beginning by a vowel - in these cases, the word-final (long) vowel/diphthong was typically shortened. How this was reflected in pronunciation is difficult to say but perhaps the i of the diphthong changed into a word initial y-sound.
For convenience we could rewrite the line like this, and voilà it scans!
τόϝ ϝο yὑπὸλ λαπάρην τέτατομ μέγα τε στιβαρόν τε
Actually, an even older form for οἱ was σϝοἱ unless I’m mistaken, and that could be the form that’s reflected here.
Every omicron that needs to be lengthened here comes on the ictus. This allows a person reading it aloud to hit each of these syllables properly the very first time he ever reads the line. Had they come on the second part of a spondee, a reader would have no choice but to go over the line a couple of times to hit them correctly.
It’s rather strange that a verbal poet would have been so considerate to people reading his poem in written format, isn’t it? And yet Homer generally is. In this line we are 3 for 3 for lengthening only on the ictus. (That is, I doubt the linguistic fossil explanation.)
Looking up “ictus” I find an old post on Textkit which says the ictus has no meaning as regards Greek metre. Looking it up in West’s Introduction to Greek Metre he describes it as a little used but generally harmless term. So I’m not embarrassed to ask how to identify the ictus in this line.
No. Ictus is not sufficient to lengthen a vowel. Word-initial continuant consonants (λ μ ν ρ σ (and originally ϝ)) being lengthened after a word-final vowel is quite regular and frequent, and is actually often reflected in ancient manuscripts, where ortographies like ΤΕΤΑΤΟΜΜΕΓΑ were quite common. Not spelling this out is a modern convention. Likewise, like I said, epic correption is the rule, not the exception.
The only slight abnomality is the beginning of the line τό οἱ. However Richard Bentley over two centuries ago was able to show that the digamma could quite consistently and predictably explain these ”abnormalities”. This has long been universally accepted, so if you wish to challenge this, the burden of proof is on you.
(EDIT: cross-posted this with Steve.)
Thank you Paul for a very thorough reply.
By the way, West’s Introduction to Greek Metre is probably the best place to look for help.
If anybody is confused by ictus, they can just read Goodwin’s definition of it here in Part V of his Grammar, the section on Greek Versification. It literally just means “beat” and has been used that way since Ars Poetica, at least. The hexameter has six beats. West’s (ugly, painful, to the crows!) terminology for this is “princeps” in the hexameter.
If vowel lengthening were a phenomenon only of dropped consonants (digammas, etc.), we should expect to see it on the second part of the foot (the “thesis” in the Latin usage, but “arsis” in the Greek) just as frequently as we see it on the first. That is, we would see it wherever the old consonant was lost. Instead, we see it on the first part of the foot the vast majority of the time, the ictus (“arsis” in Latin usage, but “thesis” in Greek). The beat or place where you tap your foot (θέσις).
Anyway, Paul misunderstands West and the general orthodoxy here. In fact, West describes this lengthening as a type of performance fudge, or “prosodic license” in the hexameter. See West’s discussion on pg. 17-18, and 21-22 of Intro to Greek Metre.
Where I do depart from West is his suggestion that this is a sort of performance-time consonant fudging. In fact that would be a violation of what I’d call the simplest Homeric Law: The vast majority of Homeric lines are easy to scan as you go, without knowing what word comes next. You can generally put your hand or a cue-card over the rest of the line as you read. This is actually the whole reason why this sort of fudge/license is always on the ictus. Off-ictus, you would have to know what was coming next.
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Example: The 20 lines Χ301-320 contain the following variations from “vanilla” meter:
Χ301 οὐδ’ ἀλέη· ἦ γάρ ῥα πάλαι τό γε φίλτερον ἦεν
Missing correption, on the ictus: ἀλέη· ἦ
Χ303 πρόφρονες εἰρύατο· νῦν αὖτέ με μοῖρα κιχάνει.
Lengthening, on the ictus: πρόφρονες εἰρύατο
Χ305 ἀλλὰ μέγα ῥέξας τι καὶ ἐσσομένοισι πυθέσθαι.
Lengthening, on the ictus: μέγα ῥέξας
Χ307 τό οἱ ὑπὸ λαπάρην τέτατο μέγα τε στιβαρόν τε,
Lengthening, on the ictus: (x3) τό οἱ, ὑπὸ λαπάρην, τέτατο μέγα
Χ309 ὅς τ’ εἶσιν πεδίον δὲ διὰ νεφέων ἐρεβεννῶν
Lengthening, on the ictus: διὰ νεφέων
Χ310 ἁρπάξων ἢ ἄρν’ ἀμαλὴν ἤ πτῶκα λαγωόν·
Missing correption, NOT on ictus: ἢ ἄρν’
Χ314 καλὸν δαιδάλεον, κόρυθι δ’ ἐπένευε φαεινῇ
Lengthening, on the ictus: κόρυθι δ’ ἐπένευε
Only 310 is a violation of the Law given above. Every line except for 310 could be read with your hand obscuring the rest of the line as you read. But here, you have to pronounce ἢ without correption. This, of course, really is a fossil consonant. It is a dropped digamma. The word was Ϝάρνα, and I (again disagreeing with West) suspect that it really was pronounced that way by the man who composed most of the Ϝάρνα lines in the poem.
Compare the sort of violation of this rule that we almost immediately get from a post-Homeric poet, the more recent composer of the Astronautilia:
Α2: εὔχομαι ἐκπάγλως καὶ Ἀπόλλωνι ἄνακτι
Here, we have a skipped correption of καί and Ἀπόλλωνι coming off-ictus, forcing someone reading aloud to have to repeat the line after he screws it up on first read. Nothing about this line is impossible to say aloud, once you have read it or heard it once. But for whatever reason we don’t get so many lines like this in Homer (and of course I suspect that the reason is because Homer was composing an incredibly long epic meant to be easily performed aloud while reading).
I was trying to be helpful without unnecessary complications. I do agree that the vast majority of Homeric lines are easy to scan as you go – once you’ve gotten hold of it; that’s just not much of an explanation.
“This is actually the whole reason why this sort of fudge/license is always on the ictus. Off-ictus, you would have to know what was coming next.”
This only makes sense if we imagine that whoever originally performed the poems was primarily acquainted with them through writing. Homer, however, is oral poetry, or at least deeply rooted in oral poetry, so the fact that “fudging” with long syllables occurs mostly in places where it doesn’t confuse the person who is reading them from paper is beside the point.
Agreed, it is a very serious problem with the idea of Homer as a written recording of an oral composition. One of the most serious maybe, next to the impossible length.
τ**ό** οἱ ὑπὸ λαπάρην τέτατο μέγα τε στιβ**α**ρόν τε
is this correct
also, I do not understand the meaning of τετατο, is it like ‘to position horizontally’?
τό οἱ ὑπὸ λαπάρην τέτατο μέγα τε στιβαρόν τε
can u scan the whole line plz, i cant see the ictus.
I increased the font size, and the 6 icti should be visible now.
ok now it is easily understood as a line without anythin irregular.
τέτατο (or ὑπετέτατο) is from τείνω (or ὑποτείνω). I understand it (with the ὑπό) as “extend beneath.”
You can parse any line from Homer using the website hypotactic.com:
https://hypotactic.com/latin/index.html?Use_Id=iliad22
Unfortunately, it doesn’t explain the scansion.