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[558] This line seems hopeless as it stands. The meaning of Ἰλ́ηϊον we cannot guess at; it is the adj. of an unknown name “Ἰλεύς”. It is commonly taken to be from “Ἶλος” or “Ἴλιος”, and explained to mean ‘near the tomb of Ilos’ (Schol. B, cf. 10.415) or ‘the plain of Ilios.’ But even if the form admitted this, no “πεδίον” other than the “Τρωϊκόν” (10.11, etc.) or “Σκαμάνδριον” (2.465), the plain between the city and the ships, appears elsewhere in the poems. Nothing is gained by adopting Krates' reading “Ἰδήϊον”: the correct form of the adj. is “Ἰδαῖος”, and there is no plain near Troy which can be called ‘the plain of Ida,’ for Ida is twenty miles away across entirely hilly country. There must therefore be something wrong with the text. Bothe's “ἐυλήϊον” is a step in the right direction, as substituting a general epithet for a proper name. But by far the most ingenious and convincing emendation is that of van L. and M. da Costa, “φεύγω πρὸς πεδίον λεῖον, ὄφρ᾽ ἄγκε᾽ ἵκωμαι”. They suppose that “ἄγκἐ” (“ΑΝΚΕ”) was mistaken for “ἄν κε”, and the second particle dropped as redundant, the defective metre being filled out by turning “λεῖον” into “Ἰλήϊον” (“ΙΛΕΙΟΝ”). For “λεῖον πεδίον” = level plain see 23.359; it is opposed to the ascent to Troy on which Agenor finds himself. He proposes to turn aside to the plain of the Scamander SW. of the city, and follow it up till he reaches the ‘glades’ (the natural aim of the fugitive, cf. 22.190, Od. 4.337) and ‘foot-hills of Ida’ — a perfectly intelligible plan. The τε after “Ἴδης” in 559 thus gains a meaning which in the existing text it entirely lacks.

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

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