Pindar and the Language of the Senses

This article argues that the thinking accomplished in Pindar’s epinician poetry pertains as much to the domain of the sensory as to the conceptual. The claims that characterize this poetry are experiential as well as propositional, insofar as they draw attention to and aim to inflect the affective and attitudinal processes which occur when epistemic or ethical positions are adopted. My readings locate the poems’ capacity to accomplish interventions into the lives of their listeners or readers in the formal means that they employ to structure and organize thought. Particularly important in this respect are their use of metaphor and narrative, and their presentation of temporal experience. In order to examine these techniques, I look first at a truth claim, a description of aging, and a metapoetic metaphor (fr. 205, Isthmian 7.40–42, and Olympian 6.80–82), before discussing Pindar’s account of witnessing Hagesidamus’ victory at Olympia (Olympian 10.97–105). I then consider the depiction of Achilles’ youthful exploits in Nemean 3.