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A SEW THEORY OF ACHILLES' SHIELD. 



A DISTINGUISHED classical authority has remarked 

 that the description of Achilles' shield occupies an 

 anomalous position in Homer's 'Iliad.' On the one 

 hand, it is easy to show that the poem for the 

 description may be looked on as a complete poem is 

 out of place in the ' Iliad ; ' on the other, it is no less 

 easy to show that Homer has carefully led up to the 

 description of the shield by a series of introductory 

 events. 



I propose to examine, briefly, the evidence on each 

 of these points, and then to exhibit a theory respecting 

 the shield which may appear bizarre enough on a first 

 view, but which seems to me to be supported by satis- 

 factory evidence. 



An argument commonly urged against the genuine- 

 ness of the * Shield of Achilles ' is founded on the 

 length and laboured character of the description. Even 

 Grote, whose theory is that Homer's original poem was 

 not an Iliad, but an Achilleis, has admitted the force 

 of this argument. He finds clear evidence that from 

 Book II. to Book XX. Homer has been husbanding his 

 resources for the more effective description of the final 

 conflict. He therefore concedes the possibility that the 

 ' Shield of Achilles ' may be an interpolation perhaps 

 the work of another hand. 



It appears to me, however, that the mere length of 

 the description is no argument against the genuineness 



