motions such as wheeling about and whirling on high, and making side-thrusts and
jumping forward and leaping on high and running above and rushing forward
and rushing upwards (MBh. 8. 18. 29 f.; cf. 7. 164. 143–7, where twenty-one types of
movement are mentioned).
Cú Chulainn was taught a whole series of special feats by the supreme woman
trainer Scáthach. They are listed in several texts. At Táin (I) 1714–19, where
he is found practising them, they appear as
The ball-feat, the blade-feat, the feat with horizontally-held shield, the javelin-feat,
the rope-feat, the feat with the body, the cat-feat, the hero’s salmon-leap, the cast of a
wand, the leap across the ..., the bending of a valiant hero, the feat of the gae bolga,
the feat of quickness, the wheel-feat, the eight-men feat, the over-breath feat, the
bruising with a sword, the hero’s war-cry, the well-measured blow, the return-stroke,
the mounting on a spear and straightening the body on its point, with the bond of a
valiant warrior.
Eagerness to fightThe heroic warrior of course stands firm against the enemy.^33 But more than
that: the real hero actually delights in fighting.^34 The Vedic samád- and the
Homeric χα ́ ρμη both mean by derivation ‘rejoicing’ but in regular usage
‘battle’. Another Vedic word, rán
̇
a-, has both senses. When Achilles stays away
from the battle in his anger against Agamemnon, he misses it: ποθεσκε
δ, qϋτ ν τε πτο ́ λεμο ́ ν τε (Il. 1. 492). The Aiakidai ‘rejoiced in fighting as at
a feast’ (‘Hes.’ fr. 206). Archilochus, spoiling for a scrap with someone, says
‘I crave the fight with you, as if thirsting to drink’ (fr. 125). The Anglo-Saxon
poet of Exodus (182) uses the same metaphor when he describes the Egyptian
warriors as þurstige þræcwı ̄ges, ‘thirsty for the violence of battle’.
The hero shows his zeal and courage by leading the charge and fighting in
the front line.
qρτ3νθη δC μα ́ χη, στwν δ, qντοι· $ν δ, Lγαμμνων
πρ;το Zρουσ,,#θελεν δC πολ7 προμα ́ χεσθαι >πα ́ ντων.
Battle was ordered, they stood opposed. Then Agamemnon
rushed in first, wanting to fight far in front of them all. (Il. 11. 216 f.)(^33) The epithet yudhi-tis
̇
t
̇
hat-, applied to Bhı ̄ma at MBh. 3. 12. 51, means literally ‘standing
(firm) in battle’, as does the name of the hero Yudhis
̇
t
̇
hira. The same idea is expressed by the
Homeric epithets μενεχα ́ ρμη, μενεπτο ́ λεμο (found later as a personal name) and by the
name of Menelaos, ‘withstanding the war-host’, and indeed by that of his father Atreus, ‘he who
does not flee’.
(^34) Durante (1976), 114.
458 12. Arms and the Man