Page:The Odyssey (Butler).djvu/364

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326
APPENDIX.

used to sleep [translating ἄγχι παρ᾽ ὀρσοθύρην (xxiii. 333) not "near the ὀρσοθύρα" but "near towards the ορσοθύρα"].

At the top of this tower there was a trap door g′ (ὀρσοθύρα) through which it was possible to get out on to the roof of the tower and raise an alarm, but which afforded neither ingress nor egress—or, as I have said, the ὀρσοθύρα may have been a window.

C was the outer court or αὐλή, approached by C′ the main entrance, or πρῶται θύραι, a covered gateway with a room over it. This covered gateway was the αἰθούση ἐρίδουπος or reverberating portico which we meet with in other Odyssean houses, and with which we are so familiar in Italian and Sicilian houses at the present day. It was surrounded by C″, covered sheds, or barns, in which carts, farm implements, and probably some farm produce would be stored. It contained,

h, the prodomus, or vestibule in front of the inner court, into which the visitor would pass through

i, the πρόθυρον, or inner gateway (the word πρόθυρον, however, is used also for the outer gateway), and

k, the tholus, or vaulted room, about the exact position of which we all know is that it is described in xxii. 459, 460, as close up against the wall of the outer court. I suspect, but cannot prove it, that this was the room which Ulysses built round his bed (xxiii. 181—204).

D was the τυκτὸν δάπεδον, or level ground, in front of Ulysses' house, on which the suitors amused themselves playing at quoits, or aiming spears at a mark (iv. 625—627).