ἦ μάλα πολλὰ μεταξὺ,
οὔρεά τε σκιόεντα θάλασσά τε ἠχήεσσα,[17]
the mountains and the sea are both alike mentioned as barriers between
people and people, although it may be questioned whether the idea is
more definite than that of distance, to which the epithet σκιόεντα is
more appropriate. In this case the mountains are introduced merely to
give a concrete horizon to the idea of remoteness conveyed by μάλα
πολλά and σκιόεντα.
The sea was commonly regarded by the Greeks as a tie between land
and land, the mountains as a barrier. So they damned the mountains
with faint praise of their timber, their hunting grounds, and, most
unkindest cut, the wider view of the sea from their cliffs. There was
no one to tell the primitive Greeks that from the hated mountains,
by streams and melting snows, came the very meadows in which they
delighted, that the richness of their ideal pasture-lands of Thessaly
was produced, not in spite of, but actually by the mountains round. So
they continued to regard them as heaps of waste, and it was this view
which was primarily responsible for the reticence about the mountains
with which we meet in Greek literature. In all the Odyssey there are
hardly twenty lines descriptive of the mountains. In one of the most
beautiful lines of Homer:--
εἴσατο δ’ ὡς ὅτε ῥινὸν ἐν ἠεροειδέϊ πόντῳ.[18]
_Od._ v. 281.
the picture is of the island, not of its mountains; they are mentioned,
but merely because a low-lying island is not visible in ‘misty’
distance.
The first use of the mountains in simile is to represent big, ugly
people: of the Cyclops,
καὶ γὰρ θαῦμ’ ἐτέτυκτο πελώριον, οὐδὲ ἐῴκει
ἀνδρί γε σιτοφάγῳ, ἀλλὰ ῥίῳ ὑλήεντι
ὑψηλῶν ὀρέων, ὅ τε φαίνεται οἶον ἀπ’ ἄλλων.[19]
_Od._ ix. 190.
and of the queen of the Læstrygones,
τὴν δὲ γυναῖκα
εὗρον ὅσην τ’ ὄρεος κορυφήν, κατὰ δ’ ἔστυγον αὐτήν.[20]
_Od._ x. 112.
For the most part, the mountains are treated with contemptuous
indifference. It is evident that, as a place of outlook over low-lying
scenery or the sea, a height of some sort is necessary, and where such
an outlook is mentioned by Homer he does not grudge it an epithet; but
in such a passage as the following the hill is nothing, the view from
it all-important:--
εἶδον γὰρ σκοπιὴν ἐς παιπαλόεσσαν ἀνελθὼν
νῆσον, τὴν πέρι πόντος ἀπείριτος ἐστεφάνωται·
αὐτὴ δὲ χθαμαλὴ κεῖται· καπνὸν δ’ ἐνὶ μέσσῃ
ἔδρακον ὀφθαλμοῖσι διὰ δρυμὰ πυκνὰ καὶ ὕλην.[21]
_Od._ x. 194.
There is only one passage in Homer in which one mountain is seen from
another. Poseidon is watching the battle before Troy from the highest
crest of wooded Samothrace:--
ἔνθεν γὰρ ἐφαίνετο πᾶσα μὲν Ἴδη,
φαίνετο δὲ Πριάμοιο πόλις καὶ νῆες Ἀχαιῶν.[22]
_Il._ xiii. 13.
If we analyse our own pleasure in the ascent of a mountain, giving due
importance to the view of other peaks from it, we shall realise how
significant it is that this reference is unique in Homer.
Of rock-climbers Homer had a very poor opinion: he would be a very
bold man now who would say of any rock peak in the world:--
οὐδέ κεν ἀμβαίη βροτὸς ἀνὴρ οὐδ’ ἐπιβαίη,
οὐδ’ εἴ οἱ χεῖρές τε ἐείκοσι καὶ πόδες εἶεν·
πέτρη γὰρ λίς ἐστι, περιξεστῇ εἰκυῖα.[23]
_Od._ xii. 77.
Baedeker himself could not more vehemently warn of a novice from a
dangerous face; but there was little chance that the climb in question
would ever become ‘an easy day for a lady,’ as it led past the cave of
Scylla, whose six heads would have required a toll likely to leave an
appreciable gap in the largest party.