Abstract

This article focuses on the interpretation of Homeric ἴσκε(ν) (Od. 19.203; 22.31) as well as its reception in Apollonius Rhodius (A. R. 1.834 et alibi) and Theocritus (Id. 22.167). I argue that the passage Od. 22.31-33, in which ἴσκεν (Od. 22.31) occurs, was owed to a bard’s imitation of Od. 19.203, who not only took ἴσκε (Od. 19.203) as a verbum dicendi but used ἴσκεν ἕκαστος ἀνήρ at Od. 22.31 as a semantic equivalent of the Homeric formula ὣς ἄρα τις εἴπεσκε(ν). It will further show that Apollonius’ frequent employment of ἴσκω meaning ‘say’ is mainly modelled on Od. 22.31 and ἴσκον at Theocritus Id. 22.167 is understood by the poet as an ‘iterative’. If this interpretation is accepted, it might shed some new light on the relative chronology of Apollonius’ Argonautica and Theocritus’ two Idylls (13; 22).