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[60] This phrase, to let bygones be bygones, is again used by Achilles in 18.12, 19.65. ‘We will let these matters go their way, i.e. put them away from us. The common explanation is let them have happened before, i.e. treat them as past and done with; but this is not the exact force of the expression. The inf. προτετύχθαι is not = “ὥσπερ προτετυγμένα” but = “ὥστε προτετυγμένα εἶναι”. And it is more natural to take πρό = forth, away; cp. “προ-ίαψε”,’ etc.: Monro. But this is not entirely convincing. ἦν, the common use of the imperf. to express the contrast of a past belief with the reality: ‘I see that it was not possible for me.’

The Iliad, edited, with apparatus criticus, prolegomena, notes, and appendices. Walter Leaf. London. Macmillan. 1900.

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