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THE TERMINOLOGY FOR BEAUTY IN THE ILIAD AND THE ODYSSEY
Published online by Cambridge University Press: 01 October 2019
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An ancient Greek proverb declares: ‘beautiful things are difficult’. One obvious difficulty arises from their almost limitless variety: sights, sounds, people, natural phenomena, man-made objects and abstract ideas may all be beautiful, but what do these things have in common? It is not just beauty's breadth of application, then, that makes it difficult, but the way in which its meaning varies depending on context. The beauty of a child may mean something quite different from the beauty of an old and wizened face, let alone the beauty of a supermodel. In common parlance, beautiful may be used as a general term of approbation alongside others like lovely or fine, while in academic discourse, the word beauty has a life of its own: since the emergence of aesthetics as an independent discipline in the mid eighteenth century, beauty has been constantly theorized and responded to in different ways that have laden the term with its own peculiar historical baggage. And although some of these philosophical reflections on beauty may have trickled into the common cultural consciousness, in general they seem a far cry from beauty's most ubiquitous incarnation in modern Western society, in the cosmetics industry; to put it another way, if you go into a beauty salon in search of a Kantian ideal of disinterested contemplation, I suspect you will be disappointed.
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References
1 Pl. Hp. mai. 304e: χαλεπὰ τὰ καλά. I am very grateful to I.J.F. de Jong, J. Elsner, R.L. Hunter, C. Metcalf, M. Paprocki, R.C.T. Parker and CQ’s anonymous readers. Their patience, criticism and encouragement have been invaluable in helping me through these ‘difficult beautiful things’.
2 For some recent approaches to beauty and its modern history, see Zangwill, N., The Metaphysics of Beauty (Ithaca, 2001)Google Scholar; Steiner, W., Venus in Exile: The Rejection of Beauty in Twentieth-Century Art (Chicago, 2002)Google Scholar; Danto, A.C., The Abuse of Beauty: Aesthetics and the Concept of Art (Chicago, 2003)Google Scholar; Prettejohn, E., Beauty and Art (Oxford, 2005)Google Scholar; Nehamas, A., Only a Promise of Happiness: The Place of Beauty in a World of Art (Princeton, 2007)Google Scholar; Scruton, R., Beauty (Oxford, 2009)CrossRefGoogle Scholar; Brouwer, J., Mulder, A. and Spuybroek, L. (edd.), Vital Beauty: Reclaiming Aesthetics in the Tangle of Technology and Nature (Rotterdam, 2012)Google Scholar; Chatterjee, A., The Aesthetic Brain: How We Evolved to Desire Beauty and Enjoy Art (Oxford, 2014)Google Scholar; Hogan, P.C., Beauty and Sublimity: A Cognitive Aesthetics of Literature and the Arts (Cambridge, 2016)CrossRefGoogle Scholar.
3 On the challenges in studying ancient aesthetics, see Porter, J.I., The Origins of Aesthetic Thought in Ancient Greece: Matter, Sensation, and Experience (Cambridge, 2010), 25–56Google Scholar; Destrée, P. and Murray, P. (edd.), ‘Introduction’, in Destrée, P. and Murray, P. (edd.), A Companion to Ancient Aesthetics (Chichester, 2015), 1–13Google Scholar.
4 It is for this reason that beauty is not coterminous with attractiveness (although inextricably linked) and why ‘beautiful’ is different from ‘pretty’, which is purely pleasing; beauty cannot therefore be reduced, in Tolstoy's words, to ‘nothing other than what is pleasing to us’. See Tolstoy, L., What is Art? (London, [1897] 1995), 52Google Scholar. On the relationship between beauty and attractiveness, see Nehamas (n. 2), 24–30.
5 Hom. Il. 3.156–8.
6 Konstan, D., Beauty: The Fortunes of an Ancient Greek Idea (Oxford, 2014)Google Scholar; Konstan, D., ‘Beauty’, in Destrée, P. and Murray, P. (edd.), A Companion to Ancient Aesthetics (Chichester, 2015), 366–80Google Scholar; Konstan, D., ‘Beauty and desire between Greece and Rome’, in Cairns, D. and Fulkerson, L. (edd.), Emotions between Greece and Rome (London, 2015), 45–66Google Scholar.
7 Arnold, M., On Translating Homer (London, 1862), 11Google Scholar. On the importance of sensitivity to semantics when analysing foreign notions of beauty, see Sartwell's, C. Six Names of Beauty (New York, 2004)Google Scholar.
8 Cf. TLG s.v. καλός; LfgrE s.v. καλός.
9 περικαλλής appears fifty-five times in Homer and is applied to a diverse range of physical objects (chariots, houses, armour, people, etc.). In the Odyssey (e.g. Od. 4.130, 8.439), κάλλιμος also appears, which is entirely synonymous with καλός.
10 E.g. Hom. Il. 21.440; Od. 3.69–70. See LfgrE s.v. καλός (3b).
11 Cf. Konstan (n. 6 [2014]), 31–4. Cf. Pl. Hp. mai. 290c–291d; Xen. Mem. 3.8.5–6; Arist. Eth. Eud. 1249a. There seems no substantive difference, moreover, between the Homeric epithets καλλίζωνος (‘beautiful-girdled’) and εὔζωνος (‘well-girdled’); καλλίκομος (‘beautiful-haired’) and ἠύκομος (‘fair-haired’); καλλιπλόκαμος (‘of beautiful locks’) and ἐυπλόκαμος (‘of fair locks’); καλλίρροος (‘beautiful-flowing’) and ἐύρροος (‘fair-flowing’). It is because of this slippage between appearance and quality that καλός is most often translated as ‘fine’; see n. 17 below.
12 See Kosman, A., ‘Beauty and the good: situating the kalon’, CPh 105 (2010), 341–57Google Scholar; Lear, G.R., ‘Response to Kosman’, CPh 105 (2010), 357–62, especially 358Google Scholar. Cf. Eco, U., History of Beauty (New York, 2004), 37Google Scholar.
13 Hom. Il. 2.673–5.
14 Cf. Paris, who is similarly distinguished by his beauty but deficient in heroic excellence; see Hom. Il. 3.39–57, 3.390–4. So, too, Euryalus at Od. 8.158–77.
15 Hom. Il. 3.167–70.
16 On the semantic development of καλός after Homer, see Konstan (n. 6 [2014]), 31–61.
17 For more on καλός, see LfgrE: s.v. καλός; Dover, K.J., Greek Homosexuality (London, 1978), 15–16, 69Google Scholar; Barney, R., ‘Notes on Plato on the kalon and the good’, CPh 105 (2010), 363–77Google Scholar; Irwin, T.H., ‘The sense and reference of the kalon in Aristotle’, CPh 105 (2010), 381–96Google Scholar; Ford, A., ‘Response to Irwin’, CPh 105 (2010), 396–402Google Scholar.
18 Hom. Il. 21.108, 18.518.
19 For other examples of καλός and bigness for people, see Hom. Od. 1.301, 3.199, 6.276, 10.396, 11.309–10, 13.289, 15.418, 16.158.
20 Hom. Il. 10.436. Cf. Od. 9.426.
21 Hom. Il. 6.294. Cf. Il. 18.83–4; Od. 10.227, 14.5–7, 15.107.
22 Hom. Il. 6.295. On the aesthetics of radiance in Greek culture, see Prier, R.A., Thauma Idesthai: The Phenomenology of Sight and Appearance in Archaic Greek (Tallahassee, 1989), 50–6Google Scholar; Parisinou, E., The Light of the Gods: The Role of Light in Archaic and Classical Greek Cult (London, 2000)Google Scholar; Neer, R., The Emergence of the Classical Style in Greek Sculpture (Chicago and London, 2010)CrossRefGoogle Scholar, passim especially 59–68; Konstan (n. 6 [2014]), 42.
23 E.g. αἴγλη, αἰόλος, ἀστερόεις, αὐγή, γανόω, λάμπω, λιπαρός, μαρμαίρω, παμφαίνω, σέλας, σιγαλόεις, etc. Cf. Hom. Il. 6.218–19, 18.130–1; Od. 6.26–7, 15.107–8.
24 Hom. Il. 14.176–7.
25 Hom. Il. 184–5.
26 Hom. Il. 19.379–80.
27 See Hom. Il. 9.187; Od. 1.131, etc. Cf. Bergren, A., ‘Plato's Timaeus and the aesthetics of “animate form”’, in Mohr, R.D. and Sattler, T. (edd.), One Book, the Whole Universe: Plato's Timaeus Today (Las Vegas, 2010), 343–72, at 358–60Google Scholar, where she links aspects of ‘Homeric beauty’ with Plato's demiurgic narrative in the Timaeus.
28 On δαίδαλος, see Morris, S.P., Daidalos and the Origins of Greek Art (Princeton, 1992)Google Scholar.
29 Like δαιδάλεος, ποικίλος applies above all to objects of metalwork, carpentry and embroidery. On the parallel between them, see Frontisi-Ducroux, F., Dédale. Mythologie de l’artisan en Grèce ancienne (Paris, 1975), 52–5Google Scholar; Bergren (n. 27), 360–1. On ποικιλία, see Berardi, E., Lisi, F.L. and Micalella, D. (edd.), Poikilia. Variazioni sul tema (Acireale, 2009)Google Scholar; Grand-Clément, A., ‘Poikilia’, in Destrée, P. and Murray, P. (edd.), A Companion to Ancient Aesthetics (Chichester, 2015), 406–21Google Scholar.
30 Hom. Od. 18.292–3. Cf. Il. 3.327–8, 6.289. ποικίλος is most commonly applied to armour in Homer (τεύχεα ποικίλα, e.g. Il. 3.327, 4.432, 6.504, etc.). It seems no coincidence that the most common adjective applied to armour (τεύχεα and ἔντεα) in Homer is καλός.
31 E.g. Hom. Il. 3.330–1; Od. 1.137, etc.
32 Hom. Od. 4.614–16.
33 See Hom. Il. 5.730–1; Od. 1.137, etc.
34 Hom. Il. 16.180–2; Od. 11.238–9. Cf. Il. 20.223–5; Od. 11.281–2.
35 Hom. Od. 19.34–6; Il. 18.466–7. Cf. Il. 3.396–8, 18.83–4; Od. 17.306–7. On the relation between wonder and beauty for material objects in archaic epic, see Hunzinger, C., ‘Le plaisir esthétique dans l’épopée archaïque: les mots de la famille de θαῦμα’, Bulletin de l’Association Guillaume Budé 1 (1994), 4–30CrossRefGoogle Scholar. Cf. Neer (n. 22), especially 57–69.
36 On the pleasures of mousikē in Homer and elsewhere in Greek literature, see Peponi, A.-E., Frontiers of Pleasure: Models of Aesthetic Response in Archaic and Classical Greek Thought (Oxford, 2012)CrossRefGoogle Scholar.
37 Hom. Il. 1.473–4.
38 Hom. Od. 12.188–92. Cf. Od. 12.52.
39 Hom. Od. 12.39–40, 44, 187.
40 On the power of the Sirens’ song, see Peponi (n. 36), 70–94.
41 Compare Hera's seduction of Zeus, where her beautiful appearance inspires Zeus's ‘desire’ (Hom. Il. 14.294) and therefore effects her deception.
42 Hom. Od. 8.538.
43 Hom. Od. 9.5–11.
44 Hom. Od. 9.12–13. Cf. Peponi (n. 36), 62. Penelope's sorrow in response to Phemius’ song about the return of the Achaeans parallels Odysseus here (Hom. Od. 1.325–44).
45 For the same reason, there is not a dry eye among the Achaeans as they listen to the dirge for Achilles sung by the Muses ‘with their beautiful voice’ (ὀπὶ καλῇ) (Hom. Od. 24.60).
46 Hom. Il. 23.741–3.
47 See Konstan (n. 6 [2014] and [2015]).
48 Hom. Il. 13.428–33; Od. 11.281–2; Il. 20.233–5; Od. 15.251. Cf. Il. 3.390–4, 6.155–61.
49 Hom. Od. 8.457–60, 6.18; Il. 6.156–7. Cf. Hom. Hymn 5.77; Hes. Cat. 120.4.
50 Hom. Od. 18.191.
51 Hom. Od. 18.158–62.
52 Hom. Od. 18.194.
53 Hom. Od. 18.195–6. On female beauty in Greek poetry, see Jax, K., Die weibliche Schönheit in der griechischen Dichtung (Innsbruck, 1933)Google Scholar.
54 Hom. Od. 18.212–13.
55 Hom. Od. 18.281–3.
56 Cf. Konstan (n. 6 [2014]), 61. Penelope's reference to Telemachus’ κάλλος at Hom. Od. 18.218–19 is the only instance in Homer where the noun has no obvious link with desire.
57 For the etymology of χάρις, see Maclachlan, B., The Age of Grace. Charis in Early Greek Poetry (Princeton, 1993), 4CrossRefGoogle Scholar; Beekes, R.S.P., Etymological Dictionary of Greek (Leiden, 2010)Google Scholar, s.v. χαίρω.
58 See Maclachlan (n. 57), especially 3–31, 73–86; Parker, R., ‘Pleasing thighs: reciprocity in Greek religion’, in Gill, C., Postlethwaite, N. and Seaford, R. (edd.), Reciprocity in Ancient Greece (Oxford, 1998), 105–25Google Scholar.
59 See Maclachlan (n. 57), 10–11, 31–40; Nagy, G., Homer the Preclassic (Berkeley, 2010), 267Google Scholar.
60 Hom. Od. 6.229–31.
61 Hom. Od. 6.232–4.
62 Hom. Od. 6.237–45.
63 I take the translation of χάρις as ‘pleasurable beauty’ from Nagy (n. 59), 267. Because of its similar range of social and aesthetic meaning, ‘grace’ is the most common translation of χάρις. Though sometimes useful as an approximation—‘glistening with beauty and grace’, for example—there are some problems with this translation. First, ‘grace’ does not capture the importance of pleasure to χάρις. Second, grace's strong connection with Christian theology is potentially misleading: since χάρις is a fundamental concept in ancient Greek religion, there is a danger in over-assimilating Greek χάρις with Christian grace. Third, in denoting beauty with respect to motion, posture and elegance of proportions, grace is in fact more specific than χάρις in its aesthetic meaning.
64 Hom. Od. 23.156–62.
65 Hom. Od. 8.19–22.
66 Hom. Od. 8.17. Cf. Pasquali, G., Terze Pagine Stravaganti (Florence, 1942), 140Google Scholar.
67 Cf. Hom. Il. 3.172, 18.394; Od. 14.234.
68 See Hom. Od. 2.13, 6.237, 8.17, 17.63–4. On θηέομαι, see Mette, V.H.J., ‘“Schauen” und “Staunen”’, Glotta 39 (1960), 49–71Google Scholar.
69 Hom. Il. 3.392, 14.183; Od. 18.298. Cf. Hom. Hymn 5.174–5.
70 Cf. Hom. Od. 2.12–14 and 17.63–4, where Athena's dispensations of χάρις on Telemachus attract aesthetic admiration untouched by desire.
71 For discussion of beauty's ability to embrace both the erotic and the reverential, see Scruton (n. 2), 53–5; Konstan (n. 6 [2014]), 8–30.
72 See Hom. Il. 14.183; Od. 8.175, 15.320, 18.298.
73 Cf. the brief comparison of χαρίεις and καλός in Latacz, J., Zum Wortfeld «Freude» in der Sprache Homers (Heidelberg, 1966), 99Google Scholar.
74 Hom. Il. 6.90, 6.294. For more examples of the equivalence of καλός and χαρίεις, see Od. 9.5, 9.11; the face and brow of Achilles—the ‘most beautiful’ (κάλλιστος) Greek (Il. 2.673–4)—are both χαρίεις at Il. 16.798, 18.24.
75 The exception is Hom. Il. 7.203: ἀγλαὸν εὖχος. Cf. Hes. Theog. 628.
76 The supposed link with radiance depends on a hypothetical etymological relationship with γελάω; see Chantraine, P., Dictionnaire étymologique de la langue grecque: histoire des mots (Paris, 1968)Google Scholar, s.v. ἀγλαός. For the common interpretation of ἀγλαός and ἀγλαΐη as denoting radiance, see e.g. LfgrE: s.v. ἀγλαός (B); Segal, C., Aglaia: The Poetry of Alcman, Sappho, Pindar, Bacchylides and Corinna (Lanham, 1998), 1–7Google Scholar; Steiner, D.T., Images in Mind: Statues in Archaic and Classical Greek Literature and Thought (Princeton and Oxford, 2001), 214Google Scholar.
77 E.g. Hom. Il. 1.23, 4.97, 11.124, etc.; Od. 4.589, 7.132, 9.201, etc.
78 Cf. Beekes (n. 57), s.v. ἀγλαός; Szemerényi, O., Syncope in Greek and Indo-European and the Nature of Indo-European Accent (Naples, 1964), 155Google Scholar. The inference of radiance to ἀγλαός and ἀγλαΐη in modern scholarship may be owed to the fact that visually delightful things—denoted by ἀγλαός and ἀγλαΐη—are often radiant in Greek literature; but this is different from these words themselves signifying radiance.
79 See Hom. Il. 2.307, 2.506, 19.385, etc.
80 Hom. Od. 10.222–3.
81 Hom. Il. 18.83–4.
82 This also applies to ἄποινα and ἄεθλα; e.g. Hom. Il. 1.23, 23.262; Od. 4.589, 11.357.
83 This connotation is reaffirmed by the two instances when ἀγλαΐη does not refer to an aspect of appearance. At Hom. Od. 17.244–5 the connotation of pride and showiness tip over into the negative sense of ‘excessive pride’ or, in the plural, ‘vanities’. Conversely, at Od. 15.78–9 the association with pride takes a positive meaning: Menelaus tells Telemachus that ‘it is both an honour [κῦδος] and source of pride [ἀγλαΐη] and advantage [ὄνειαρ] to have a meal and then set off over the great boundless earth’. On the interpretative difficulties of these lines, see Heubeck, A. and Hoekstra, A., A Commentary on Homer's Odyssey. Volume II, Books ix–xvi (Oxford, 1989), 235Google Scholar.
84 Hom. Il. 6.506–11, 15.263–8.
85 Hom. Il. 6.509–10 = 15.266–7.
86 Hom. Od. 17.307–10.
87 Given this connotation, the appearance of ἀγλαΐη in connection with Nireus makes perfect sense. He is ‘the son of Aglaïē [Ἀγλαΐης] and Charopos’ (Hom. Il. 2.672). The peculiar nature of Nireus’ beauty is implied by his mother's name which personifies the noun ἀγλαΐη: his characterization as Aglaïē’s son underlines both his beauty—he is the ‘most beautiful’ (κάλλιστος) Achaean after Achilles—and its superficiality—for he is ‘weak’ and a leader of few.
88 Hom. Od. 18.321, 19.81–2.
89 Hom. Od. 18.180–1.
90 Cf. Hes. Theog. 946–7: Ἀγλαΐην … ὁπλοτάτην Χαρίτων.
91 Cf. later authors’ use of ἀγλαΐη to mean ‘festivity’, in the sense of elaborate and spectacular display, e.g. Hes. [Sc.] 272; Pind. Ol. 9.99; Pyth. 1.3.
92 On the relationship between ἄγαλμα, ἀγλαός and ἀγλαΐη, see Day, J.W., Archaic Greek Epigram and Dedication: Representation and Reperformance (Cambridge, 2010), 91–4Google Scholar.
93 See Hom. Il. 4.144; Od. 3.274, 3.438, 4.602, 8.509, 12.347, 18.300, 19.257.
94 Hom. Od. 3.438.
95 Hom. Od. 6.232–5. On the relationship between ἄγαλμα and χάρις, see Lanérès, N., ‘La notion d’agalma dans les inscriptions grecques, des origines à la fin du classicisme, Métis 10 (2012), 135–71, at 160–3Google Scholar. On beautifying the beast in Greek sacrifice, see Van Straten, F.T., Hiera Kala: Images of Animal Sacrifice in Archaic and Classical Greece (Leiden, 1995), 43–6CrossRefGoogle Scholar; cf. Naiden, F., ‘Sacrifice’, in Eidinow, E. and Kindt, J. (edd.), The Oxford Handbook of Ancient Greek Religion (Oxford, 2015), 463–75Google Scholar.
96 Hom. Od. 19.256–7.
97 Hom. Od. 19.226–31.
98 Cf. Alcm. fr. 1.67–9.
99 Hom. Il. 4.141–5.
100 Compare the role of beautiful objects in the customs of Homeric guest-friendship. Menelaus gives Telemachus his ‘most beautiful’ (κάλλιστος) and ‘most valuable’ (τιμηέστατος) treasure—a silver mixing-bowl with gold rims (Hom. Od. 4.614–19); the object's beauty is integral to its material and social value in managing a pleasing relationship of χάρις. Cf. Od. 1.309–13. Cf. N. Himmelmann, ‘The plastic arts in Homeric society’, in Childs, W. (ed.), Reading Greek Art: Essays by Nikolaus Himmelmann (Princeton, 1998), 25–66, at 43–4Google Scholar: ‘a remarkable aspect of the Homeric work of art … [is] its role as a possession’.
101 Hom. Il. 14.175–86.
102 Hom. Il. 14.187; Hom. Hymn 5.79–90, 5.162–6. Cf. Hom. Hymn 27.17.
103 E.g. Hom. Il. 2.214, 10.472; Od. 8.489, 13.77. In Homer, the cognate verb κοσμέω is only used to mean ‘to order, arrange’; cf. Hom. Hymn 5.65, where it used to mean ‘adorn’.
104 Cf. LfgrE: s.v. καλός (B); Mikalson, J.D., New Aspects of Religion in Ancient Athens: Honors, Authorities, Esthetics, and Society (Leiden, 2016), 253–64CrossRefGoogle Scholar, who notes the mutual aesthetic significance of καλός and κόσμος in descriptions of religious ritual.
105 Hom. Od. 8.166, 8.179.
106 So, too, Hera's κόσμος is hardly good or proper in a moral sense (at least as far as Zeus is concerned); it is her weapon of deception. On ‘the problem of female beauty’ in Greek culture, see Blondell, R., Helen of Troy: Beauty, Myth, Devastation (Oxford, 2013), 1–23CrossRefGoogle Scholar.
107 Hom. Od. 8.169–70, 8.174–5.
108 Hom. Od. 8.176–7.
109 Hom. Od. 11.367.
110 Cf. LfgrE: s.v. μορφή.
111 Hom. Od. 5.211–12.
112 Hom. Od. 5.217–20.
113 On the absence of a single word for ‘body’ in Homer, see Redfield, J., ‘Le sentiment homérique du Moi’, Le genre humain 12 (1985), 93–111CrossRefGoogle Scholar; Vernant, J.-P., ‘Mortals and immortals: the body of the divine’, in Zeitlin, F.I. (ed.), Mortals and Immortals: Collected Essays (Princeton, 1991), 27–49, at 29–31Google Scholar.
114 Cf. εὐειδής (Hom. Il. 3.48), ‘of fair appearance’, ‘beautiful’; εὐφυής (Il. 4.147, 21.243), ‘shapely’. εἶδος sometimes appears unqualified in an implicitly positive sense, as when Hector refers to Paris’ ‘gifts of Aphrodite’: ἥ τε κόμη τό τε εἶδος, ‘your hair and your looks’ (Il. 3.54–5). εἶδος is often translated therefore as ‘beauty’, e.g. Blondell (n. 106), 5. We should beware making this leap, however, because εἶδος can be combined with a negative adjective to express ugliness: Dolon ‘was bad in appearance’ (εἶδος … ἔην κακός) (Il. 10.316).
115 Hom. Il. 3.39, 3.44–5, 3.392. Cf. 24.347, 24.376.
116 Hom. Od. 18.248–9.
117 Hom. Od. 18.251–3. Cf. Od. 19.124–6.
118 Comparisons with καλλίων: Hom. Od. 10.396; with κάλλιστος: Il. 2.673, 9.140, 9.282; with κάλλος: Ιl. 9.389, 13.432; with ἀγλαΐη: Od. 19.81–2. Comparisons with εἶδος, δέμας, etc.: Il. 1.114–15, 2.715, etc.
119 Alc. fr. 130B.17. On Greek beauty contests, see Gherchanoc, F., Concours de beauté et beautés du corps en Grèce ancienne: discourse et pratiques (Bordeaux, 2016)Google Scholar.
120 E.g. Hes. Cat. 10.32: κούρας πολυήρ]ατον εἶδος ἐχούσας; e.g. 19.10: Φυλο[νόην θ᾿ ἣ εἶδος ἐρήριστ᾿ ἀθαν]άτηισι. Cf. 13.7, 33.12, 182.14. On female beauty in the Catalogue, see Osborne, R., ‘Ordering women in Hesiod's Catalogue’, in Hunter, R. (ed.), The Hesiodic Catalogue of Women: Constructions and Reconstructions (Cambridge, 2005), 5–24Google Scholar. Cf. Hes. [Sc.] 4–5.
121 Hom. Od. 5.212–13: ἐπεὶ οὔ πως οὐδὲ ἔοικεν | θνητὰς ἀθανάτῃσι δέμας καὶ εἶδος ἐρίζειν.
122 On the similarity and difference between Homeric gods and heroes, see Griffin, J., Homer on Life and Death (Oxford, 1980), especially 144–204Google Scholar.
123 E.g. Hom. Il. 3.158; Od. 2.5.
124 Hom. Od. 6.16, 8.457.
125 Hom. Od. 6.107–9.
126 For this aspect of Nausicaa's portrayal, see Hom. Od. 6.25–35, 6.57–67, 6.158–9, 6.239–46, 6.273–88, 7.311–14.
127 Hom. Od. 17.37, 19.54. Cf. Russo, J., Fernàndez-Galiano, M. and Heubeck, A., A Commentary on Homer's Odyssey, Volume III, Books xvii–xxiv (Oxford, 1992), 21Google Scholar.
128 See Hom. Od. 1.343–4, 19.130–58, 24.194–8.
129 See Hom. Od. 18.187–249, especially 18.212–13.
130 Cf. Hom. Od. 4.121–2.
131 Hom. Il. 24.525–6.
132 Hom. Il. 24.629–34.
133 On the sensitivity to beauty in this passage and its thematic significance, see Griffin, J., Homer (Oxford, 1980), 39Google Scholar.
134 See Destrée and Murray (n. 3), 1–13; Squire, M., ‘Conceptualizing the (visual) “arts”’, in Destrée, P. and Murray, P. (edd.), A Companion to Ancient Aesthetics (Chichester, 2015), 307–26Google Scholar.
135 E.g. Hom. Il. 1.55, 3.121, etc.; Od. 6.101, 7.233, etc.
136 Hom. Od. 18.195–6. Cf. Il. 5.314; Od. 23.240. See Treu, M., Von Homer zur Lyrik (München, 1968), 51–2Google Scholar.
137 Hom. Od. 9.190; cf. 9.256–7.
138 For surprising and lamentable wonders, see Hom. Il. 13.286, 20.344; Od. 10.326. On Greek aesthetics of wonder, see Prier (n. 22); Neer (n. 22); Hunzinger, C., ‘Wonder’, in Destrée, P. and Murray, P. (edd.), A Companion to Ancient Aesthetics (Chichester, 2015), 422–37Google Scholar.
139 Hom. Od. 11.281–2, 11.287–8.
140 Hom. Od. 8.366.
141 Hom. Od. 4.13–14. Cf. Il. 6.156.
142 See especially section on κάλλος above and Konstan (n. 6 [2014] and [2015]).
143 Hom. Od. 18.194. Cf. Il. 3.396–7, 14.170. See Alcm. fr. 3.61–4. Cf. Hes. Theog. 907–11; Sappho, fr. 31; Thgn. 1365; Pind. fr. 123; Pl. Phdr. 251a–252b. On eroticization as a formulaic means of expressing beauty in Alcman and Sappho, see Most, G., ‘Greek lyric poets’, in Luce, T.J. (ed.), Ancient Writers: Greece and Rome (New York, 1982), 75–98, especially 97Google Scholar; Lardinois, A., ‘Keening Sappho: female speech genres in Sappho's poetry’, in Lardinois, A. and McClure, L. (edd.), Making Silence Speak: Women's Voices in Greek Literature and Society (Princeton and Oxford, 2001), 75–92CrossRefGoogle Scholar.
144 Alcm. fr. 1.53–5. Cf. Alcm. 5 (2 col. ii); Hom. Il. 17.51–60.
145 Hom. Il. 10.438.
146 Hom. Il. 10.439.
147 See e.g. Hom. Il. 5.722–31, 8.41–5, 13.23–6.
148 ‘Golden Aphrodite’ appears eleven times.
149 Hom. Od. 4.14; Il. 9.389. Cf. Il. 19.282, 24.699; Od. 17.37, 19.54.
150 See n. 69.
151 Hom. Od. 18.295–6.
152 Hom. Od. 19.232–5. Cf. Od. 8.264–5; Anac. fr. 444.
153 See n. 22.
154 Hom. Hymn 5.174–5; cf. 5.84–90; Hom. Hymn 2.275–80.
155 Hes. Cat. 41.38, 47.3, 123.20, 154a.6.
156 Sappho, fr. 16.18. Cf. Hdt. 1.30.4–5: Tellus had τελευτὴ τοῦ βίου λαμπροτάτη and ἀπέθανε κάλλιστα.
157 Hom. Il. 22.25–33. Cf. Il. 5.4–7, 11.61–6, 13.240–5. See Moulton, C., Similes in the Homeric Poems (Göttingen, 1977), 26–7, 80–1Google Scholar.
158 Hom. Il. 4.75–7. For more divine radiance, see e.g. Hom. Il. 1.199–200, 3.397; Od. 19.34–6; Constantinidou, S., ‘The light imagery of divine manifestation in Homer’, in Christopoulos, M., Karakantza, E.D., Levaniouk, O. (edd.), Light and Darkness in Ancient Greek Myth and Religion (Lanham, 2010), 91–109Google Scholar.
159 Hom. Il. 22.134–6.
160 Hom. Il. 3.392; Od. 6.237.
161 The first in this series, which charts Achilles’ return to the fighting, is at Hom. Il. 18.205–14, where Athena manifests a golden radiant cloud around Achilles’ head.
162 Hom. Il. 22.314–18.
163 Cf. Hom. Hymn 2.275–83; Hom. Hymn 5.173–90. On the relation between the beautiful and the sublime in antiquity, see Porter, J.I., ‘The sublime’, in Destrée, P. and Murray, P. (edd.), A Companion to Ancient Aesthetics (Chichester, 2015), 393–405, at 402Google Scholar; Porter, J.I., The Sublime in Antiquity (Cambridge, 2015)Google Scholar, passim especially 566–9; see 542–7 on sublimity and divinity in Homer.
164 On visual theology in archaic Greece, see Vernant (n. 113); Platt, V., Facing the Gods: Epiphany and Representation in Graeco-Roman Art, Literature and Religion (Cambridge, 2011), especially 31–123Google Scholar; Petridou, G., Divine Epiphany in Greek Literature and Culture (Oxford, 2015), especially 29–105Google Scholar.
165 Cf. Pl. Hp. mai. 304e, where Socrates comes to appreciate the proverb χαλεπὰ τὰ καλά after failing to define clearly the boundaries of καλός. Cf. Burke, E., A Philosophical Enquiry into the Origin of our Ideas of the Sublime and Beautiful (London, 1776), 108Google Scholar: ‘a clear idea is … another name for a little idea’.
166 Cf. Hom. Od. 4.43–8, 4.71–8, where the beauty of Menelaus’ palace is conveyed by an abundance of gold, silver, electrum, ivory and radiance that inspire Telemachus’ aesthetic admiration, wonder, awe and delight.
167 Hom. Il. 18.590–604. Note the description of the maidens as ἀλφεσίβοιαι (18.593), ‘bringing in oxen’, in the sense of ‘who yield their parents many oxen as presents from their suitors’, i.e. ‘much-courted’ (LSJ). Since beauty and skilful handiwork are the two outstanding qualities for which Homeric women are courted, it seems that this adjective joins the list of implicit expressions of beauty. Cf. Il. 9.128–30, 9.388–90, 13.428–33; Od. 11.281–2, 18.187–303. On the visual aesthetics of this scene, see Carruesco, J., ‘Choral performance and geometric patterns in epic poetry and iconographic representations’, in Cazzato, V. and Lardinois, A. (edd.), The Look of Lyric: Greek Song and the Visual (Leiden and Boston, 2016), 69–107, at 71–5Google Scholar.