Odyssey and Argonautica

One of the most certain results of Homeric scholarship, in many scholars’ view, is that some of Odysseus’ adventures owe something to a pre-existing narrative about Jason and the Argonauts. Opinions differ as to the extent and nature of the debt, and the matter merits a new discussion. We shall find that it opens up exhilarating views of several topics: the development of Greek geographical knowledge, the early form of the Argo legend, the stages by which the Odyssey evolved, and the eclectic borrowing by different poets of motifs from the Epic of Gilgamesh. The Odyssean adventures that come into question are contained in the sequence that extends from the Laestrygonians (10.77–132) to Thrinacia (12.260–419). I shall not discuss them in the order in which they appear in the narrative, but begin where the presence of Argonautic motifs is clearest.