Page 437 - the-odyssey

for the suitor’s early meal (xvii. 170 and 176) say at ten or
eleven o’ clock. The context of the rest of the book shows
this. Eumaeus and Ulysses, therefore, cannot have started
later than eight or nine, and Eumaeus’s words must be tak-
en as an exaggeration for the purpose of making Ulysses
bestir himself.
{143} I imagine the fountain to have been somewhere
about where the church of the Madonna di Trapani now
stands, and to have been fed with water from what is now
called the Fontana Diffali on Mt. Eryx.
{144} From this and other passages in the ‘Odyssey’ it
appears that we are in an age anterior to the use of coined
money—an age when cauldrons, tripods, swords, cattle,
chattels of all kinds, measures of corn, wine, or oil, etc.
etc., not to say pieces of gold, silver, bronze, or even iron,
wrought more or less, but unstamped, were the nearest ap-
proach to a currency that had as yet been reached.
{145} Gr. is [Greek]
{146} I correct these proofs abroad and am not within
reach of Hesiod, but surely this passage suggests acquain-
tance with the Works and Ways, though it by no means
compels it.
{147} It would seem as though Eurynome and Euryclea
were the same person. See note {156}
{148} It is plain, therefore, that Iris was commonly ac-
cepted as the messenger of the gods, though our authoress
will never permit her to fetch or carry for any one.
{149} i.e. the doorway leading from the inner to the outer
court.

The Odyssey