Source-groundedThe Iliad
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Item · Individual

Pandarus’s arrow

Published entity metadata

Read-only identity and editorial metadata.

Canonical name
Pandarus’s arrow
Disambiguator
None
Kind
Item
Scope
Individual
Editorial note
The particular arrow shot by Pandarus, diverted by Minerva, and removed from Menelaus.

Aliases

1

winged arrow

Descriptive reference · Direct

Location presence

Phase 6 currently covers 24 processed books.

0

No presence observations in the processed scope.

Claims

2
·Direct

Pandarus selects a fresh winged arrow fraught with death.

See evidence text
“a winged arrow that had not yet been shot, fraught with the pangs of death”
·Direct

Minerva diverts the arrow through Menelaus’s layered armour; it pierces all three layers before grazing skin and drawing blood.

See evidence text
“She turned it from his skin as a mother whisks a fly from off her child when it is sleeping sweetly; she guided it to the part where the golden buckles of the belt that passed over his double cuirass were fastened, so the arrow struck the belt that went tightly round him. It went right through this and through the cuirass of cunning workmanship; it also pierced the belt beneath it, which he wore next his skin to keep out darts or arrows; it was this that served him in the best stead, nevertheless the arrow went through it and grazed the top of the skin, so that blood began flowing from the wound”

Additional evidence

Evidence records not already represented by a claim.

3
·Direct
“When Pandarus had strung his bow he laid it carefully on the ground, and his brave followers held their shields before him lest the Achaeans should set upon him before he had shot Menelaus. Then he opened the lid of his quiver and took out a winged arrow that had not yet been shot”
·Direct
“the arrow struck the belt that went tightly round him”
·Direct
“Machaon passed into the middle of the ring and at once drew the arrow from the belt”

Passage preview

Book 4 · Passage 8

His fool’s heart was persuaded, and he took his bow from its case. This bow was made from the horns of a wild ibex which he had killed as it was bounding from a rock; he had stalked it, and it had fallen as the arrow struck it to the heart. Its horns were sixteen palms long, and a worker in horn had made them into a bow, smoothing them well down, and giving them tips of gold. When Pandarus had strung his bow he laid it carefully on the ground, and his brave followers held their shields before him lest the Achaeans should set upon him before he had shot Menelaus. Then he opened the lid of his quiver and took out a winged arrow that had not yet been shot, fraught with the pangs of death. He laid the arrow on the string and prayed to Lycian Apollo, the famous archer, vowing that when he got home to his strong city of Zelea he would offer a hecatomb of firstling lambs in his honour. He laid the notch of the arrow on the oxhide bowstring, and drew both notch and string to his breast till the arrow-head was near the bow; then when the bow was arched into a half-circle he let fly, and the bow twanged, and the string sang as the arrow flew gladly on over the heads of the throng.