Book 10
2.17
The poet also uses the name “Samos” for that Thrace which we now call Samothrace. And it is reasonable to suppose that he knows the Ionian Samos, for he also appears to know of the Ionian migration; otherwise he would not have differentiated between the places of the same name when referring to Samothrace, which he designates at one time by the epithet,high on the topmost summit of woody Samos, the Thracian,Hom. Il. 13.12and at another time by connecting it with the islands near it,unto Samos and Imbros and inhospitableOr “smoky”; the meaning of the Greek word is doubtful. Lemnos.Hom. Il. 24.753And again,between Samos and rugged Imbros.Hom. Il. 24.78He therefore knew the Ionian island, although he did not name it; in fact it was not called by the same name in earlier times, but Melampylus, then Anthemis, then Parthenia, from the River Parthenius, the name of which was changed to Imbrasus. Since, then, both Cephallenia and Samothrace were called Samos at the time of the Trojan War (for otherwise Hecabe would not be introduced as saying that heAchilles. was for selling her children whom he might take captive “unto Samos and unto Imbros”), Hom. Il. 24.752. and since the Ionian Samos had not yet been colonized, it plainly got its name from one of the islands which earlier bore the same name. Whence that other fact is also clear, that those writers contradict ancient history who say that colonists came from Samos after the Ionian migration and the arrival of TembrionSee 14. 1. 3. and named Samothrace Samos, since this story was fabricated by the Samians to enhance the glory of their island. Those writers are more plausible who say that the island came upon this name from the fact that lofty places are called “samoi,”See 8. 3. 19.for thence all Ida was plain to see, and plain to see were the city of Priam and the ships of the AchaeansHom. Il. 13.13 But some say that the island was called Samos after the Saïi, the Thracians who inhabited it in earlier times, who also held the adjacent mainland, whether these Saïi were the same people as the Sapaeï or Sinti (the poet calls them Sinties) or a different tribe. The Saïi are mentioned by Archilochus: One of the Saïi robbed me of my shield, which, a blameless weapon, I left behind me beside a bush, against my will.Archil. Fr. 6 (51) (Bergk) Two more lines are preserved: “but I myself escaped the doom of death. Farewell to that shield! I shall get another one as good.”
