Asphodel

In Practice

In the Odyssey the spirits of Achilles, Patroclus and the murdered suitors are found on the meadow of asphodel, and Orion drives wild beasts across it (Odyssey 24.11-14; 11.538-540; 11.572-575). The passages checked here describe it as a dwelling, not as a reward or a punishment.

The fullest route there is the one Hermes takes at the start of Odyssey Book 24. He calls up the suitors' spirits with his golden wand and leads them down the damp paths, past the streams of Oceanus, the rock Leucas, the gates of the sun and the land of dreams. They reach the mead of asphodel, where the spirits dwell, the phantoms of men who have done with toils (Odyssey 24.1-14). This is the psychopomp role at work: Hermes escorts the dead and does nothing to them once they arrive.

Odysseus sees the same meadow from the other side in his visit to the dead. Achilles strides away across the field of asphodel, glad to hear that his son was preeminent (Odyssey 11.538-540). Not far from Minos, who gives judgment to the dead from his seat, Odysseus sees Orion driving the beasts he once killed over the field of asphodel (Odyssey 11.568-575). The meadow is part of the wider picture of the Greek underworld, and in Homer it is simply where the dead are.

It is not Elysium. Proteus tells Menelaus that he will not die in Argos but will be sent to the Elysian plain at the ends of the earth, because he is the husband of Helen and so the son-in-law of Zeus (Odyssey 4.561-569). That is an exception granted to one man. The asphodel meadow is the ordinary place, and Achilles' own verdict on the ordinary dead is bleak: he would rather be a hired labourer on earth than lord over all the perished (Odyssey 11.488-491). Modern accounts that set the Asphodel Meadows beside Elysium and Tartarus as three regions describe a later arrangement, which these Homeric passages do not state.

The plant has a separate and much shorter record. Hesiod tells his brother that fools do not know how much more the half is than the whole, nor the great advantage in mallow and asphodel (Works and Days 40-41). The line praises modest living. It does not describe the flower or say what the plant was used for, and the sources checked here do not link it to the dead. Why Homer chose asphodel as the plant of the dead is not explained in any passage checked here.

Where Accounts Differ

• Homer's meadow versus the later three regions
• the meadow of the dead and the plant

• Homer's meadow and the later three-region scheme: the Odyssey passages checked here put the ordinary dead on the asphodel meadow and send Menelaus to the Elysian plain as a personal exception (Odyssey 4.561-569; 24.1-14). The modern habit of listing the Asphodel Meadows, Elysium and Tartarus as three sorted regions describes a later arrangement. No passage checked here states it.
• The meadow and the plant: Homer names the field of asphodel as the place of the dead (Odyssey 24.1-14). Hesiod names asphodel only as a plant in a saying about modest living (Works and Days 40-41). Neither passage connects the two, and the sources checked here do not say why the dead are placed among asphodel. Botanical identification and edibility belong to modern botany and are not covered.
• Verification: Odyssey 11.538-575 and 24.1-20 were read in the Murray translation on Perseus. Hesiod Works and Days 40 was read in the Evelyn-White translation on Perseus, and the page showed lines 11-41 only, so the sentence is cited as 40-41 on the strength of line 40. Pliny the Elder on the plant (Natural History 21) could not be read here and is not cited.

Where This Appears

• Character Hermes
• Character Achilles
• Character Minos
• Character Menelaus
• Character Patroclus
• Term Elysium
• Term The Underworld
• Term Psychopomp
• Term Tartarus
• Mythology Greek Mythology

Referenced By

• Topic The Underworld and Death

Sources