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[390] λαοῖσιν, his servants or retainers: a use, however, for which there is no parallel in H. The idea seems to be that if the hide was soaked in fat and then stretched, the natural moisture left the pores, and allowed the grease to enter in. A similar rude process of curing is still practised in India, doubtless from primitive times; the hides are pegged out or stretched, and grease is rubbed into them. Indeed oil is still used in place of tanning to produce certain classes of leather in modern Europe. μεθύουσαν, drunk for drenched; an almost grotesquely violent metaphor, to which there is no parallel in Greek; “μεθύειν τῶι μεγέθει τῶν πεπραγμένων”, which Eust. quotes from Demosthenes, is of course quite different. To be drunk is the primitive and only sense of “μεθύειν”, coming from days older than the Greek language: it never meant to drip or be soaked.

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

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