Heroes Can't Read (But We Can)

Or, Why "Painful Signs"

"Painful Signs" is my loose translation of the description of the message Proitos sends along with Bellerophon in book 6 of the Iliad when he sends him to Lykia, with the hopes his father-in-law will murder him. (Proitos' wife was in love with Bellerophon, but he refused her, so she told Proitos that Bellerophon raped her. Because they were guest-friends, however,  Proitos could not have him killed in his country). This all comes in a story told by Glaukos to Diomedes in the middle of the battlefield.

Homer, Iliad 6.168-170

“Then he sent him to Lykia and he gave him painful signs,
He marked many heart-rending things on a folded table,
Which he told him to show to his father-in-law, so he would die.”

πέμπε δέ μιν Λυκίην δέ, πόρεν δ' ὅ γε σήματα λυγρὰ
γράψας ἐν πίνακι πτυκτῷ θυμοφθόρα πολλά,
δεῖξαι δ' ἠνώγειν ᾧ πενθερῷ ὄφρ' ἀπόλοιτο.

This is the only apparent reference to writing in Homeric epic, but most sources believe it is not actually so. Here are ancient scholars' comments:

Schol. T ad Hom. Il. 6.168 ex

Murderous signs: letters.

“It would be strange if people who developed every kind of craft would not know about letters. Some people claim these are like the sacred images of the Egyptians, used to communicate actions.”

     σήματα λυγρά: γράμματα...ἄτοπον γὰρ τοὺς πᾶσαν τέχνην εὑρόντας οὐκ εἰδέναι γράμματα. τινὲς δὲ ὡς παρ' Αἰγυπτίοις ἱερὰ ζῴδια, δι' ὧν δηλοῦται τὰ πράγματα.

Schol. A. ad Hom. Il. 6.169 ex

“written on a folded tablet”: this appears to use letters. But it does not mean this-instead to scrape [graphein] means to ‘smooth’ out. This is really the impression of images through which Proitos’ father-in-law may understand”

γράψας ἐν πίνακι πτυκτῷ: ὅτι ἔμφασίς ἐστι τοῦ τῆς λέξεως γράμμασι χρῆσθαι. οὐ δεῖ δὲ τοῦτο δέξασθαι, ἀλλ' ἔστι γράψαι τὸ ξέσαι· οἷον οὖν ἐγχαράξας εἴδωλα, δι' ὧν ἔδει γνῶναι τὸν πενθερὸν τοῦ Προίτου

Schol. D ad Hom. Il. 6.168

“Signs: symbols and shapes through which he communicates a plan. For there was no use of writing [letters]”

σήματα: σημεῖα καὶ τύπους δι᾿ ὧν δηλοῖ τὴν ἐπιβουλήν. οὐδὲ γὰρ ἦν τῶν γραμμάτων χρῆσις

Schol. D ad Hom. Il. 169

“After he wrote”: after he sketched out signs and symbols. For heroes did not know about writing.”

γράψας: χαράξας σημεῖα τινὰ καὶ συμβόλαια. τοὺς γὰρ ἥρωας μὴ ἑπίστασθαι γράμματα

I like this phrase "painful signs" and its use in the Iliad because it conveys (to me) some sense of the peril of secret messages, of the potential dangers of a fixed communication, of the insidious side of language. There's something telling in the way that the message's bearer does not know its contents and their implications. And, further, there’s something important for the epic in that these ‘words’ don’t have the effect their ‘author’ wants, but nearly the opposite. Once let loose on the world, these signs cause pain (and pleasure) in surprising ways.

So, I am taking this phrase as a bit of a thematic tuning for the beginning of a return to thinking about the Iliad . I think it is probably tenuous to claim that this tablet taken from the Peloponnese to Asia Minor is in away a symbol for epic itself, but I don't think its too much to say that the episode shows a poetic concern with what effects signs have on the world, and how they have different meaning depending on who you are.

Waxed ivory tablet from British Museum. #131952. Neo Assyrian, 8th Century BCE