What It Is
The leaves are the image with which Glaucus answers, in Book VI, the question of Diomedes about his lineage: the generation of men is like that of the leaves, which the wind knocks to the ground and the green forest brings forth again when spring arrives. Apollo returns the image, in a different tone, in Book XXI, when he refuses a quarrel between gods over mortals, whom he calls like leaves, now burning in full vigor, now withering without life.
Where It Appears
In Book VI, Diomedes and Glaucus advance against each other between the two lines. Diomedes has never seen his adversary in battle and is amazed that he waited for his spear. He asks who he is, and sets a condition:
εἰ δέ τις ἀθανάτων γε κατʼ οὐρανοῦ εἰλήλουθας, / οὐκ ἂν ἔγωγε θεοῖσιν ἐπουρανίοισι μαχοίμην.(6.128-129), and if you are one of the immortals, come down from heaven, I would not fight against the gods of heaven.
Glaucus answers with the image:
οἵη περ φύλλων γενεὴ τοίη δὲ καὶ ἀνδρῶν. / φύλλα τὰ μέν τʼ ἄνεμος χαμάδις χέει, ἄλλα δέ θʼ ὕλη / τηλεθόωσα φύει, ἔαρος δʼ ἐπιγίγνεται ὥρη· / ὣς ἀνδρῶν γενεὴ ἣ μὲν φύει ἣ δʼ ἀπολήγει.(6.146-149), such as the generation of leaves, such is that of men. Some leaves the wind pours to the ground, others the flourishing forest brings forth when the season of spring arrives; so is the generation of men: one springs up, another ends.
And he does not fall silent after it. He recites the whole genealogy, from Sisyphus to Bellerophon, with the woman who desired him in secret and lied to her husband, the tablet of deadly signs, the Chimera, the Solymi and the Amazons, up to the order his father gave him when he sent him to Troy:
πέμπε δέ μʼ ἐς Τροίην, καί μοι μάλα πόλλʼ ἐπέτελλεν / αἰὲν ἀριστεύειν καὶ ὑπείροχον ἔμμεναι ἄλλων, / μηδὲ γένος πατέρων αἰσχυνέμεν(6.207-209), and he sent me to Troy and charged me greatly: always to be the best, and to excel the others, and not to shame the lineage of my fathers
Diomedes rejoices, plants his spear in the earth, and discovers that their grandfathers were guest-friends. The two exchange armor, and the narrator comments on the deal:
ἔνθʼ αὖτε Γλαύκῳ Κρονίδης φρένας ἐξέλετο Ζεύς, / ὃς πρὸς Τυδεΐδην Διομήδεα τεύχεʼ ἄμειβε / χρύσεα χαλκείων, ἑκατόμβοιʼ ἐννεαβοίων.(6.234-236), then Zeus, son of Cronus, took the wits from Glaucus, who exchanged with Diomedes, son of Tydeus, armor of gold for armor of bronze, the worth of a hundred oxen for that of nine.
The image echoes in Book XII, this time without leaves. Glaucus and Sarpedon, descendants of the same Bellerophon in Book VI, speak of Lycia's honor before the wall of the Achaeans:
ὦ πέπον εἰ μὲν γὰρ πόλεμον περὶ τόνδε φυγόντε / αἰεὶ δὴ μέλλοιμεν ἀγήρω τʼ ἀθανάτω τε / ἔσσεσθʼ, οὔτέ κεν αὐτὸς ἐνὶ πρώτοισι μαχοίμην / οὔτέ κε σὲ στέλλοιμι μάχην ἐς κυδιάνειραν· / νῦν δʼ ἔμπης γὰρ κῆρες ἐφεστᾶσιν θανάτοιο / μυρίαι, ἃς οὐκ ἔστι φυγεῖν βροτὸν οὐδʼ ὑπαλύξαι, / ἴομεν ἠέ τῳ εὖχος ὀρέξομεν ἠέ τις ἡμῖν.(12.322-328), my friend, if by fleeing this war we were always going to be ageless and immortal, I would not fight among the foremost, nor would I send you into the battle that gives glory to men; but now, in any case, the Keres of death stand over us, countless, which no mortal can flee or escape. Let us go, and either we will give glory to someone, or someone to us.
In Book XX, the lineage returns as a matter for a god. Aeneas recites his genealogy from Dardanus before fighting Achilles, and Poseidon, who saves him, explains why:
μόριμον δέ οἵ ἐστʼ ἀλέασθαι, / ὄφρα μὴ ἄσπερμος γενεὴ καὶ ἄφαντος ὄληται(20.302-303), but it is fated for him to escape, so that the line of Dardanus does not perish without seed and without trace.
In Book XXI, Achilles applies the more general law to a suppliant, Lycaon, without using the image:
ἀλλὰ φίλος θάνε καὶ σύ· τί ἦ ὀλοφύρεαι οὕτως; / κάτθανε καὶ Πάτροκλος, ὅ περ σέο πολλὸν ἀμείνων.(21.106-107), But, friend, die you too; why do you lament so? Patroclus died too, and he was far better than you.
And when Poseidon challenges Apollo to fight, it is Apollo who uses the image of the leaves:
δειλῶν, οἳ φύλλοισιν ἐοικότες ἄλλοτε μέν τε / ζαφλεγέες τελέθουσιν ἀρούρης καρπὸν ἔδοντες, / ἄλλοτε δὲ φθινύθουσιν ἀκήριοι.(21.464-466), wretched mortals, who, like leaves, now blaze in full vigor, eating the fruit of the earth, now wither lifeless.
Soon after, the same Apollo enters Troy out of concern for the wall, takes Agenor out of the fight and assumes his form, so that Achilles pursues him across the wheat field to the Scamander while the other Trojans run to the city.
What It Means
The image says that generations pass without sparing any, and each speaker applies it in his own way. Glaucus says it to someone who wants to know where he comes from, and the two readings coexist: resignation before an order that renews the generations without sparing anyone, or the courtesy of one who opens his speech with the weight of the question before giving the names of his parents. Apollo says it from above, and without courtesy: creatures that bloom and wither are not worth a quarrel with an uncle. The text gives yet another reason, the shame of confronting the brother of his father.
The two uses share an irony, because whoever says the image contradicts it in the next gesture. Glaucus, who reduces generations to leaves, recites the whole genealogy and ends with the rule of always being the best and not shaming his ancestors. Apollo, who reduces mortals to leaves, runs to protect the wall, Agenor and the city, and deceives Achilles. The contempt spoken and the care enacted do not coincide, and the book does not choose between them.
The poem, moreover, treats lineage as a serious matter. Poseidon saves Aeneas so that the line of Dardanus does not perish without seed and without trace, and in Book VI Hector himself prays that his son will be better than his father and will reign in Ilion, in the same book in which he says he knows that Ilion will be destroyed.
The leaves are the image that mortals use to say what they know of themselves, and that the gods use to say what they think of them, and in both cases the poem places action beside the phrase. The phrase says that generation passes; the action shows Glaucus speaking of Bellerophon and Sisyphus, Aeneas of Dardanus, Apollo of a wall. The image does not dispense with lineage, it only places it on the scale of the forest, and that is where its force comes from: a leaf does not know which tree it fell from, and these men do.
Relationships
- Standard themes: Death, Honor and reputation, Fate and free will.
- Characters: Diomedes, Apollo, Achilles, Hector.
- Neighboring symbols: Zeus's Scales, the other image with which the poem weighs the lives of mortals, and Hector's Body, in which the general rule of death takes on the name of one man.