Stories in Disguise: On Odysseus' Ithacan Lies and Their Relevance ...

straining to kill me, for they were all too angered, but the king
held them off from me, and honored the anger of Zeus Protector
of Strangers, who beyond others is outraged at evil dealings.
There for seven years I stayed and gathered together
much substance from the men of Egypt, for all gave to me;
but when in the turning of time the eighth year had befallen me,
then there came a Phoenician man, well skilled in beguilements,
a gnawer at other's goods, and many were the hurts he inflicted
on men, and by his wits talked me over, so I went with him
to Phoenicia, where lay this man's house and possessions.
There for the fulfillment of a year I stayed with him,
but when the months and when the days had come to completion,
with the circling back of the year again, and the seasons came on,
then he took me on his seafaring ship to Libya,
with lying advices, that with him we could win a cargo, but in fact
so he could sell me there and take the immense price for me.
There is clearly a discrepancy between the veteran's boasting about his war merits and his
dishonourable behaviour in the fight against the Egyptians. This record of a battle echoes the
Kikonian episode in the Odyssey IX.39–66. But the differences are revealing: Odysseus is forced
to give up his combat with the Kikonians, but he manages to retreat with his men in good order
and he is never tempted to throw away his weapons and beg for mercy. Another significant detail
in the Cretan's narrative is how he is treated by other men. We can see how he acts a poor figure
against the bullying Phoenician. And he cannot help being the victim of the unscrupulous sailors
who are supposed to take him home from the Thesprotians:
[H]e sent me off, for a ship of Thesprotian
men happened then to be sailing for Doulichion, rich in wheatfields;
so he urged them to convey me there to the king Akastos,
in a proper way, but their hearts were taken with a bad counsel
concerning me, so I still should have the pain of affliction.
So when the seafaring ship had gone far out from the mainlaid,
they presently devised the day of slavery for me.
They took off me the mantle and tunic I wore as clothing,
and then they put another vile rag on me, and a tunic,
tattered, the one you yourself see with your eyes.
In sum, the details show that this person has often been treated with contempt by others and that
he has constantly been outsmarted by other, more cunning men. This should of course also be
seen in contrast to Odysseus, who is always treated with respect and always is the master of
cunning. On the whole, these details add to the sense of parodic heroic poetry.
This parodic technique constantly uses the idea of devaluating, decreasing, lowering the
parodied persons or actions and thus contrasting them with the standard which is Odysseus and
the ethos of heroic aristocratic poetry. From what the first Cretan narrator unconsciously tells he
is clearly not treated as Idomeneus' equal: he is asked to fight under him not together with him.
He is obviously on a lower social level than Idomeneus and not ranked among the aristocrats. The
second Cretan narrator himself admits his lower birth, being an illegitimate child. This contrast
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