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[555] The following passage, with another allusion to the “τειχομαχία”, must go with 509 ff. Köchly condemns 55562, but we must carry on the athetesis to 568. 555 = 13.46, where πρώτω is in place, for the words spoken to the Aiantes are the beginning of Poseidon's plan of action; here there is nothing to account for the word. ἀρείους 557 is probably a post-Homeric form; though the neuter in -“ω” recurs several times the masc. -“ους” is found again only in Od. 2.277, Od. 9.48 (a suspicious line, see Menrad Contr. et Syn. p. 81), Od. 24.464. 558 = 12.438, where it is used not of Sarpedon but of Hector. 562 = 15.565. The discrepancy in the application of the identical words in 558 and 12.438 is certainly striking, but too much stress cannot be laid upon it; a reminiscence of the prominent part there played by Sarpedon in attacking the wall might easily suggest a phrase in the immediate context. The contradiction in fact is rather within the twelfth book than between that and this (see Introd. to M). The supernatural darkness in 567-68 is introduced only to be forgotten again, though it could not but change the whole character of the fighting. It is no more than a rhapsodist's cheap device to produce an effect of awe; we find similar attempts in 15.668, 17.368, perhaps by the same hand.

The Iliad, edited, with apparatus criticus, prolegomena, notes, and appendices. Walter Leaf. London. Macmillan. 1900.

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