Hello everybody, I’ve been translating some excerpts from the book VII of the Odyssey in my Greek class, and I’ve came upon a verse which got me stuck. I’m referring to vv. 216 – 217, when Odysseus says the following:
οὐ γάρ τι στυγερῇ ἐπὶ γαστέρι κύντερον ἄλλο
ἔπλετο, […] (vv. 216 - 217, book VII of the Odyssey)
Supposedly, the translation should be something like: ‘Because nothing is more shameful than a hateful stomach’, yet I fail to understand this comparison.
From what I’ve learned, when comparing something, the second term of comparison should either be in the Genitive case or in the same case as the first term of comparison but preceded by an ἥ. Here, the second term of comparison seems to be in the Dative, followed by ἐπὶ.
So could anyone clarify how the comparison works in this verse?
Many thanks!
(PS: Please excuse my bad English, but this is not my native language.)
κύντερον is more like “shameless”. It means that whatever you do, however you feel, your stomach always reminds you that you should eat and grumbles shamelessly. Dogs are the epitome of shamelessness in Homer. ἐπὶ is a bit strange true, something like “nothing tops the stomach in shamelessness”?
For shameless dogs, compare for example Iliad 1.225 (Achilles insulting Agamemnon):
οἰνοβαρές, κυνὸς ὄμματ’ ἔχων, κραδίην δ’ ἐλάφοιο
You drunk, you have the eyes of dog and the heart of a deer"
A dog may do anything and look you in the eye while doing it.