IV

The morality of the Homeric age is such as we may expect to find among a people which has only partially emerged from barbarism.  Crimes of violence are very common, and a familiar figure in the society of this period is that of the fugitive, who “has slain a man,” and is flying from the vengeance of his family.  Patroclus, when a mere boy, kills his youthful playmate in a quarrel over a game of knucklebones—­an incident which may be seen illustrated in one of the statues in the British Museum.  One of the typical scenes of Hellenic life depicted on the shield of Achilles is a trial for homicide; and such cases were of so frequent occurrence that they afford materials for a simile in the last book of the Iliad.

Where life is held so cheap, opinion is not likely to be very strict in matters of property.  And we find accordingly a general acquiescence in “the good old rule, the ancient plan, that they may take who have the power, and they may keep who can.”  Cattle-lifting is as common as it formerly was on the Scottish border.  The bold buccaneer is a character as familiar as in the good old days when Drake and Raleigh singed the Spanish king’s beard, with this important difference, that the buccaneer of ancient Greece plundered Greek and barbarian with fine impartiality.  A common question addressed to persons newly arrived from the sea is, “Are you a merchant, a traveller, or a pirate?” And this curious query implies no reproach, and calls for no resentment.  Still more startling are the terms in which Autolycus, the maternal grandfather of Odysseus, is spoken of.  This worthy, we are informed, “surpassed all mankind in thieving and lying”; and the information is given in a manner which shows that the poet intended it as a grave compliment.  In another passage the same hero is celebrated as an accomplished burglar.  So low was the standard of Homeric ethics in this respect; and even in the historical age of Greece, want of honesty and want of truthfulness were too often conspicuous failings in some of her most famous men.

Even more shocking to the moral sense is the wild ferocity which sometimes breaks out in the language and conduct of both men and women.  The horrible practice of mutilating the dead after a battle is viewed with indifference, and even with complacency, by the bravest warriors.  Even Patroclus, the most amiable of the heroes in the Iliad, proposes to inflict this dastardly outrage on the body of the fallen Sarpedon.  Achilles drags the body of Hector behind his chariot from the battlefield, and keeps it in his tent for many days, that he may repeat this hideous form of vengeance in honour of his slaughtered friend.  When the dying Hector begs him to restore his body to the Trojans for burial he replies with savage taunts, and wishes that he could find it in his heart to carve the flesh of Hector and eat it raw!  And Hecuba, the venerable Queen of Troy, expresses herself in similar terms when Priam is preparing to set forth on his mission to the tent of Achilles.