Amelia Bensch-Schaus, University of Pennsylvania
Peleus is a prominent figure in Apollonius’ epic, and this paper argues that his characterization both signals the importance of the Iliad as a model for the Argonautica and alludes to Achilles’ tragic fate in the Iliad. Carspecken and Händel were among the first to note the importance of Peleus, and Dräger observes that he is the fourth most referenced Argonaut, with Heracles and Orpheus appearing only a few more times. Peleus’ prominence has prompted political explanations, in Griffiths’ view that he is a model for Ptolemy I, and literary ones, in Sistakou’s assessment of him as embodying the generational divide between the Argonauts and the Homer warriors. Both scholars emphasize that Peleus conveys the prestige associated with his son, but also separates himself from specific instances of Achilles’ problematic behavior in the Iliad.
This paper explains Peleus’ prominence instead through an unobserved link between Peleus’ key interventions in the plot and re-launches of the Argo. On three occasions, Peleus directs the course of the Argonauts’ voyage after unexpected crises: after the death of their helmsmen, when escaping the Colchians following Apsyrtus’ murder, and after the omen on Libya. Several critics have noted that the epic treats the journey of the Argo as an instantiation of the poem’s narrative, which shows the importance of the Odyssey and its voyage as the primary model for the Argonautica (Knight; Nelis; Clare). Allusions to the Iliad have generally been treated as isolated purple patches (e.g. Ransom), but the prominence of Peleus and his close relationship with re-launches of the Argo indicate a continued and programmatic importance of the Iliad for Apollonius’ epic.
After this brief survey of the circumstances surrounding Peleus’ association with narrative re-launches, the paper turns to Peleus’ first speech at Arg. 2.878-884, which has not received sufficient attention for its role in defining his character. As he motivates his fellow Argonauts to overcome the most serious obstacle to their voyage they have yet encountered in the loss of their helmsman, Peleus urges them to put an end to their grief. The circumstance and language of this speech pointedly allude to the fact that Achilles only follows this advice in Iliad 24, after he has ensured his own imminent death and consequent abandonment of an elderly Peleus. The advice of Apollonius’ Peleus works on the Argonauts, but that same advice reminds the reader that it will fail to work on Achilles in time to prevent dire consequences. Peleus cannot, as Griffiths and Sistakou argue, be easily separated from the mistakes and tragic fate of his son, and instead he imports the suffering of the Iliad to an Odyssean story about an ultimately successful voyage. Through Peleus, Achilles and the suffering he endures and anticipates in the Iliad inform the journey of the Argonauts. Peleus as the father of the greatest Homeric hero thus becomes a figure for the Argonautica to focalize its relationship with the Iliad, as well as the Odyssey, as one of the progenitors of heroic epic.