Odyssey: A Daily Odyssey through Homer’s The Odyssey
Aug 2, 2026 · 9 min · 6 segments
The dead answer the call. From darkness, voices rise — and one is painfully familiar. In *The Odyssey*, Book 11 continues as Odysseus performs the rites Circe commanded, digging a trench and…
Landon SolanoHost
But I drew my sharp sword from my thigh, and dug a pit, as it were a cubit in length and breadth, and about it poured a drink-offering to all the dead, first with mead, and thereafter with sweet wine, and for the third time with water.
And I sprinkled white meal thereon, and entreated with many prayers the strengthless heads of the dead, and promised that on my return to Ithaca I would offer in my halls a barren heifer, the best I had, and fill the pyre with treasure, and apart unto Teiresias alone sacrifice a black ram without spot, the fairest of my flock.
But when I had besought the tribes of the dead with vows and prayers, I took the sheep and cut their throats over the trench.
And lo! the spirits of the dead that departed gathered them from out of Erebus brides and youths unwed, and old men of many evil days, and tender maidens with grief yet fresh at heart; and many there were wounded with bronze-shod spears, men slain in fight with their bloody mail about them.
And these many ghosts flocked together from every side about the trench with a wondrous cry.
Then did I speak to my company, and command them to flay the sheep that lay slain by the pitiless sword, and to consume them with fire, and to make prayer to the gods, to mighty Hades and to dread Persephone.
And myself I drew the sharp sword from my thigh and sat there, suffering not the strengthless heads of the dead to draw nigh to the blood, ere I had word of Teiresias.
And first came the soul of Elpenor, my companion, that had not yet been buried beneath the wide-weighed earth.
For we left the corpse behind us in the hall of Circe, unwept and unburied, seeing that another task was instant on us.
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But I drew my sharp sword from my thigh, and dug a pit, as it were a cubit in length and breadth, and about it poured a drink-offering to all the dead, first with mead, and thereafter with sweet wine, and for the third time with water.
And I sprinkled white meal thereon, and entreated with many prayers the strengthless heads of the dead, and promised that on my return to Ithaca I would offer in my halls a barren heifer, the best I had, and fill the pyre with treasure, and apart unto Teiresias alone sacrifice a black ram without spot, the fairest of my flock.
But when I had besought the tribes of the dead with vows and prayers, I took the sheep and cut their throats over the trench.
And lo! the spirits of the dead that departed gathered them from out of Erebus brides and youths unwed, and old men of many evil days, and tender maidens with grief yet fresh at heart; and many there were wounded with bronze-shod spears, men slain in fight with their bloody mail about them.
And these many ghosts flocked together from every side about the trench with a wondrous cry.
Then did I speak to my company, and command them to flay the sheep that lay slain by the pitiless sword, and to consume them with fire, and to make prayer to the gods, to mighty Hades and to dread Persephone.
And myself I drew the sharp sword from my thigh and sat there, suffering not the strengthless heads of the dead to draw nigh to the blood, ere I had word of Teiresias.
And first came the soul of Elpenor, my companion, that had not yet been buried beneath the wide-weighed earth.
For we left the corpse behind us in the hall of Circe, unwept and unburied, seeing that another task was instant on us.
