previous next

[6] ταύρους παμμέλανας. A title or epithet of Poseidon in Boeotia was “ταύρεος” ( Hes. Scut.104), which probably refers to this practice. Black victims were generally offered to the powers of the nether world ( Od.11. 33), or to Gaia ( Il.3. 103). In Pindar Ol.13. 69, and Virg. Aen.5. 237, a white bull is the sacrifice made to Poseidon. Here the colour must have been chosen as emblematical of the dark sea, or, as Nitzsch suggests, because of the terrible power of the God which seemed to put him on the same footing as the “χθόνιοι θεοί”. For the relationship between Nestor and Poseidon see Od.11. 235 foll.

κυανοχαίτῃ probably describes the colour that Tennyson calls ‘blue-black hair’ (Last Tournament). It is used as an epithet of “Ἀίδης” h. Hom. Cer. 348; and of “ἵππος” Il.20. 224.

Homer's Odyssey. W. Walter Merry. James Riddell. D. B. Monro. Oxford. Clarendon Press. 1886-1901.

The National Endowment for the Humanities provided support for entering this text.

Creative Commons License
This work is licensed under a Creative Commons Attribution-ShareAlike 3.0 United States License.

An XML version of this text is available for download, with the additional restriction that you offer Perseus any modifications you make. Perseus provides credit for all accepted changes, storing new additions in a versioning system.

hide References (8 total)
  • Commentary references from this page (8):
    • Hesiod, Shield of Heracles, 104
    • Homer, Iliad, 20.224
    • Homer, Iliad, 3.103
    • Homer, Odyssey, 11.235
    • Homer, Odyssey, 11.33
    • Homeric Hymns, Hymn 2 to Demeter, 348
    • Pindar, Olympian, 13
    • Vergil, Aeneid, 5.237
hide Display Preferences
Greek Display:
Arabic Display:
View by Default:
Browse Bar: