Studies on Homer and the Homeric Age, Vol. 3 of 3. Gladstone William Ewart
of Olympus, than that of Agamemnon, or any other of his kings, on earth. It includes more of the element of force, and it approximates more nearly to a positive supremacy. Accordingly, whatever indicates freedom in Olympus will tend a fortiori to show, that the idea of freedom in debate was, at least as among the chiefs, familiar here below. Yet even in Olympus the other chief deities could murmur, argue, and object. The power of Jupiter is exhibited at its zenith in the Assembly of the Eighth Iliad, when he violently threatens all that disobey, and challenges the whole pack to try their strength with him. The vehemence with which he spoke produced the same intimidatory effect upon the gods, as did the great speech of Achilles upon the envoys: and the result upon the minds of the hearers in the two cases respectively, is described in lines which, with the exception of a single word, precisely correspond270. Still, immediately after Jupiter has given the peremptory order not to assist either party, Minerva answers, Well, we will not fight – which she never had done – but we will advise; and this Jupiter at once and cheerfully permits271. But there is more than this. Be the cause what it may, the personal will of Jupiter, fulfilled as to Achilles272, is not fulfilled as to Troy. The Assembly of the Fourth Book is opened with a proposal from him, that Troy shall stand273. From this he recedes, and it is decided that the city shall be destroyed; while the only reservation he makes is not at all on behalf of the Trojans, but simply on behalf of his own freedom to destroy any other city he may mislike, however dear it may chance to be to Juno.
The position of Agamemnon, of which Jupiter is in a great degree a reflection, bears a near resemblance to that of a political leader under free European, and, perhaps it may be said, especially under British, institutions. Its essential elements are, that it is worked in part by accommodation, and in part by influence.
Besides its grand political function, the ἀγορὴ is, as we have seen, in part a judicial body. But the great safeguard of publicity attends the conduct of trials, as well as the discussion of political affairs. The partialities of people who manifest their feelings by visible signs is thus prevented, on the one hand, by the cultivation of habitual self-respect, from passing into fury, and on the other hand, from degenerating into baseness.
It is perhaps worthy of notice, as assisting to indicate the substantive and active nature of the popular interest in public affairs, that where parties were formed in the Assemblies, those who thought together sat together. Such appears to be the intimation of the line in the Eighteenth Iliad (502),
λαοὶ δ’ ἀμφοτέροισιν ἐπήπυον, ἀμφὶς ἀρωγοί.
As the ἀμφὶς ἀρωγοὶ expresses their sentiments, ἀμφοτέρωθεν can hardly signify any thing other than that they sat separately on each side of the Assembly. A similar arrangement seems to be conveyed in the Twenty-fourth Odyssey, where we find that the party of the Suitors remained in a mass (τοὶ δ’ ἀθρόοι αὐτόθι μίμνον, v. 464.) I think this circumstance by no means an unimportant one, as illustrative of the capacity, in which the people attended at the Assemblies for either political or judicial purposes.
Judicial functions of the Assembly.
The place of Assemblies is also the place of judicature. But the supremacy of the political function is indicated by this, that the word ἀγορὴ, which means the Assembly for debate, thus gives its own designation to the place where both functions were conducted. At the same time, we have in the word Themis a clear indication that the original province of government was judicial. For that word in Homer signifies the principles of law, though they were not yet reduced to the fixed forms of after-times; but on the other hand Themis was also a goddess, and she had in that capacity the office of summoning and of dissolving Assemblies274. Thus the older function, as often happens, came in time to be the weaker, and had to yield the precedence to its more vigorous competitor.
But in Homer’s time, though they were distinguished, they were not yet divided. On the Shield of Achilles, the work of Themis275 is done in full Assembly: and this probably signifies the custom of the time. But in the Eleventh Iliad, Patroclus passes by the ships of Ulysses276,
ἵνα σφ’ ἀγορή τε θέμις τε
ἤην.
And, in the description of the Cyclopes, the line is yet more clearly drawn; for it is said277,
τοῖσιν δ’ οὔτ’ ἀγοραὶ βουληφόροι, οὔτε θέμιστες.
In that same place, too, the public solemnities of religion were performed: and though in the Greek camp it was doubtless placed at the centre of the line with a view to security, its position most aptly symbolized also its moral centrality, as the very heart of the national life. At the spot where the Assemblies were held were gathered into a focus the religious, as well as the patriotic sentiments of the country.
The fact is, that everywhere in Homer we find the signs of an intense corporate or public life, subsisting and working side by side with that of the individual. And of this corporate life the ἀγορὴ is the proper organ. If a man is to be described as great, he is always great in debate and on the field; if as insignificant and good for nothing, then he is of no account either in battle or in council. The two grand forms of common and public action are taken for the criteria of the individual.
When Homer wished to describe the Cyclopes as living in a state of barbarism, he says, not that they have no kings, or no towns, or no armies, or no country, but that they have no Assemblies, and no administration of justice, which, as we have seen, was the primary function of the Assemblies. And yet all, or nearly all the States had Kings. The lesson to be learned is, that in heroic Greece the King, venerable as was his title, was not the fountainhead of the common life, but only its exponent. The source lay in the community, and the community met in the Agorè. So deeply imbedded is this sentiment in the mind of the Poet, that it seems as if he could not conceive an assemblage of persons having any kind of common function, without their having, so to speak, a common soul too in respect of it.
The common Soul or Τὶς in Homer.
Of this common soul the organ in Homer is the Τὶς or ‘Somebody;’ by no means one of the least remarkable, though he has been one of the least regarded, personages of the poems. The Τὶς of Homer is, I apprehend, what in England we now call public opinion. We constantly find occasions, when the Poet wants to tell us what was the prevailing sentiment among the Greeks of the army. He might have done this didactically, and described at length the importance of popular opinion, and its bearings in each case. He has adopted a method more poetical and less obtrusive. He proceeds dramatically, through the medium of a person, and of a formula:
ὧδε δέ τις εἴπεσκεν, ἰδὼν ἐς πλήσιον ἄλλον.
It may, however, not seem worthy of remark, considering the amount of common interest among the Greeks, that he should find an organ for it in his Τίς. But when he brings the Greeks and Trojans together in the Pact, though it is only for the purpose of a momentary action, still he makes an integer pro hâc vice of the two nations, and provides them with a common Τὶς (Il. iii. 319):
ὧδε δέ τις εἴπεσκεν Ἀχαιῶν τε Τρώων τε.
We find another remarkable exemplification in the case of the Suitors in the Odyssey. Dissolute and selfish youths as they are, and competitors with one another for a prize which one only can enjoy, they are nevertheless for the moment banded together in a common interest. They too, therefore, have a collective sentiment, and a ready organ for it in a Τὶς of the Odyssey (Od. ii. 324), who speaks for the body of Suitors:
ὧδε
Il. viii. 28, 9. ix. 430, 1.
Il. viii. 38-40.
Il. i. 5.
Il. iv. 17-19.
Od. ii. 68, 9.
Il. xviii. 497.
Il. xi. 807.
Od. ix. 112-15.