Clarke, Joseph Thacher: Report on the investigations at Assos, 1881 (Boston, 1882)

156 ARCHAEOLOGICAL INSTITUTE.

tary operations or human dwellings; and it does not appear to be
alluded to at all in the Iliad.

In this poor little rivulet Lechevalier recognized the Pa6v§ivr}as
Sxa/iaj'Spos, " deep-eddying Scamander." It is a valid objection to
this, that it would make the whole twenty-first book of the Iliad, if we
attempt to identify exactly the scenes of Homer, utterly meaningless.
The fact is that the 'S,Kap.avSpoi is throughout Homer 6 7roTa/xos,
the great river of the plain, — that stream which, however its lower
course may have changed, must have been for ages sweeping around
the Bali-dagh on its way from Gargaros to the Hellespont. We will
quote here one illustrative passage : —

t£>v Wvta rroKka veaiv awo Km Kkuridav
is mbiov ■npo^iovro 'SicapdvhpioV avrap imb x#<bi»
ixpfpSdKiop Kovd/3ife irobtov avrwv re Kal lirnav.
Zorav S1 iv Xeipavi 2icap.avBpia di/8ep6evrt
pvploi, o<rtxa re (piiXXa Kat avflea yiyverai &PJJ.1

THE PLAIN.

The walk of fourteen kilometres from the Bali-dagh to Sigeion
should be taken once by every student of the Iliad, though he
may find it wearisome, and possibly monotonous. It will be heavy
walking over the ploughed land and through the endless fields of
maize; but he will remember that under the very walls of the city
Homer speaks of 7re8ioto irupo<p6poio, and Athene, striving with Ares,
hurls at him, —

.....\idou . . •

Ktifiepov iv mSico, fickava Tprjxyv re p.iyav re,

tov p avbpes irporepoi 8eirav tpfievai. odpov dpoipr]!^ —

1 " The many tribes poured forth from ships and huts
Into the Scamandrian plain. The earth
Groaned fearfully beneath the feet of men and horses,
And in the blooming Scamandrian mead they stood
Countless as are the leaves and flowers of spring."

Iliad ii. 464.

a "A stone

That lay upon the plain, black, rough, and huge,
Which men of earlier days had set, to be
The cornland's bound."

Iliad xxi. 403.