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BEN BRYNMOR FOWLER
Currently living in Ebisu, Tokyo. A lover of city living & city walking, cinema, music, fiction, currently writing a PhD on contemporary theatre in Britain and Germany, and developing an intense relationship with apple gadgets.

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The Aporeticus: Argos, dog of Odysseus

superfluidity:

mills:

At the end of The Odyssey, Odysseus returns home in disguise after two decades of war and wandering; his old swineherd, Eumeaus, taking him for a stranger, walks him across his property and nearby his old dog, occasioning one of the earliest sentimental descriptions of the human-canine bond…

I’ve always loved this passage for exactly the reason Mills points out. It’s also interesting to place it in its context of recognition scenes as Odysseus comes home, noting how it happens for each character, some of whom require a great deal of evidence, while others—such as Argos—don’t. Someone once argued that the sequence of recognition scenes is patterned after a social hierarchy.

The word argos in Greek usually means “shining”, but appears often of dogs in Homer, in the phrases πόδας ἀργοί, “swift-footed”, and κύνες ἀργοί, “swift dogs.” The usual explanation is that swift motion can appear to flicker or shine. This connection is supported by the Sanskrit cognate ṛjrá-, which also means both “shining” and “fast.” There is an epithet of the god Hermes, Argeiphontes, which is usually explained as the slayer of Argus, but Martin West has argued that in fact it refers to his function as a god of thieves, helping them past guard dogs, and that argos here refers to dogs, the slayer of dogs. If so, it’s interesting to consider the etymology of his dog’s name in the Odyssey.

dogs Homer
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  4. birkettsdivagation reblogged this from mills and added:
    There is another translation...this, Im not sure if its
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    Odyssey This is the moment when Odysseus finally achieves his νόστος (nostos), his true homecoming. Before arriving in...
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