A Sampling of Comments on Pindar

Pindar’s Isthmian 8, praising an athletic victory—in the pankration—at the festival of the Isthmia in 478 BCE, also praises the military victories of European Greeks who fought aga ... Continue reading

The victory ode is a song that is chorally performed. Choral performance is a combination of singing and dancing by a group that is ordinarily called a khoros, which means ‘group o ... Continue reading

As already noted in the overall comment at I.8.1–70, Pindar’s wording in Isthmian 8 highlights the reciprocity between the Aeginetan victor and the Theban poet—a reciprocity that i ... Continue reading

The gesture of offering to the victorious athlete the blossoming of the Kharites ‘Graces’, who are the divine personifications of kharis ‘gratification; pleasurable beauty, grace’, ... Continue reading

The stephanos ‘garland’ of mursinē ‘myrtle’ that adorns the hair of the victorious athlete Kleandros is described as habros ‘luxuriant’. The pleasurable material security of victor ... Continue reading

In this context, the name Aiakidai can refer either to the heroes called by that name or to the elites of Aegina who claimed the Aiakidai as their ancestors. See also the comment a ... Continue reading

The songmaking of Pindar pictures Homeric poetry at N.7.21 as a kind of logos ‘wording’ that is relative, not absolute, so that the pathā ‘experiencing’ of experiences by Odysseus ... Continue reading

τιμὰ δὲ γίνεται | ὧν θεὸς ἁβρὸν αὔξει λόγον τεθνακότωνHonor [tīmē] becomes the possession of those who get wording [logos] told about them, when they are dead, that is made great ... Continue reading

ᾤχετο δὲ πρὸς θεὸν | κτέατ᾽ ἄγων Τροΐαθεν ἀκροθινίων· | ἵνα κρεῶν νιν ὕπερ μάχας | ἔλασεν ἀντιτυχόντ᾽ ἀνήρ μαχαίρᾳ. | βάρυνθεν δὲ περισσὰ Δελφοὶ ξεναγέται And he [= Pyrrhos/Neoptlo ... Continue reading

... ἐχρῆν δέ | τιν᾽ ἔνδον ἄλσει παλαιτάτῳ | Αἰακιδᾶν κρεόντων τὸ λοιπὸν ἔμμεναι | θεοῦ παρ᾽ εὐτειχέα δόμον, ἡροΐαις δὲ πομπαῖς | θεμισκόπον οἰκεῖν ἐόντα πολυθύτοις ... but it had t ... Continue reading

ξεῖνός εἰμι· σκοτεινὸν ἀπέχων ψόγον, | ὕδατος ὥτε ῥοὰς φίλον ἐς ἄνδρ’ ἄγων | κλέος ἐτήτυμον αἰνέσωI am a guest [xenos]. Keeping away dark blame [psogos] and bringing genuine [etēt ... Continue reading

The Aeginetan patrons of Pindar were a closed and specially privileged group within their own aristocratic communities, tracing themselves back to the lineage of heroes known as th ... Continue reading

Here at N.7.74 the word ponos refers to the ‘ordeal’ of the poet whose competitive production of a victory ode is a formal compensation for the ‘ordeal’ of the athlete in competing ... Continue reading

ἔα με· νικῶντί γε χάριν, εἴ τι πέραν ἀερθείς | ἀνέκραγον, οὐ τραχύς εἰμι καταθέμεν. Your indulgence, please! If I—to reciprocate the victor—shouted something out loud [anakrazein] ... Continue reading