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[197] αἶσα. Supposing the etymology which refers “αἶσα” to “ἴσος” to be correct, the usage of the word certainly seems to bear it out, as it generally implies a ‘due portion.’ Cp. “ληίδος αἶσα” Il.18. 327, “ἐλπίδος αἶσα” Od.19. 84, “τίω δέ μιν ἐν καρὸς αἴσῃ” Il.9. 378.See also Il.6. 333“ἐπεί με κατ᾽ αἶσαν ἐνείκεσας οὐδ᾽ ὑπὲρ αἶσαν”=‘in due proportion and not disproportionately.’ Thus αἶσα signifies also vitae portio ( Juv.9. 127) in Il.1. 416“ἐπεί νύ τοι αἶσα μίνυνθά περ, οὔ τι μάλα δήν”. With “αἶσα” may be joined a genit. auctoris, as “Διὸς, δαίμονος αἶσα” Od.11. 61; or a genit. appositionis, as “αἶσα θανάτοιο” Il.24. 428.Sometimes “αἶσα” seems to be used quite impersonally, as in the phrase “ἰῇ αἴσῃ” Il.22. 477; or, again, as a power or person, as in the present passage, and Il.20. 127; a tendency to which usage is seen from its being joined with such words as “παρέστη” Od.9. 52, “ἆσε” 11. 61. See Nägelsbach, Hom. Theolog. 122 foll.

κατά need not be taken in composition with νήσαντο, but as an adverbial addition. Cp. Od.14. 226“τά τ᾽ ἄλλοισίν γε κατὰ ῥιγηλὰ πέλονται”, and 349 “κεφαλῇ δὲ κατὰ ῥάκος ἀμφικαλύψας”. We may perhaps render ‘span off for him with their thread at his birth.’ Eusebius (Praep. Evang. 6. 8) has remarked that the Homeric poems do not countenance fatalism: that no more is meant here than when we say that there are some things we cannot escape. So Alcinous declares, ‘we will do our part by him’ (this by itself excludes the notion of fate, and so does ἅσσα that follows), ‘and then whatever his own efforts cannot avert will befall him.’

“κλῶθες, μεταπλασμός ἐστι τοῦ κλωθοὶ ἀπ̓ εὐθείας τῆς κλωθώ” Schol. H. P. Q. T. The B. notion of three “Μοῖραι” is post-Homeric, appearing first in Hesiod ( Hesiod Theog.218Hesiod Theog., 906). Here the κλῶθες are merely the half-personified agency of “αἶσα”, cp. Il.20. 126“πείσεται ἅσσα οἱ αἶσα”

“γεινομένῳ ἐπένησε λίνῳ”. This is an instance of a personification that stops short of mythology; cp. “ἅρπυιαι” Od.1. 241.The epithet βαρεῖαι, ‘stern,’ is no more than could have been said of “αἶσα”. Buttm. Mythol. 1. 293 and Bekk. adopt the reading in the text with Hesych.

Homer's Odyssey. W. Walter Merry. James Riddell. D. B. Monro. Oxford. Clarendon Press. 1886-1901.

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