Odyssey 1.169 · Book 1, lines 169–173
But tell me — who are you?
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ἀλλʼ ἄγε μοι τόδε εἰπὲ καὶ ἀτρεκέως κατάλεξον· τίς πόθεν εἰς ἀνδρῶν; πόθι τοι πόλις ἠδὲ τοκῆες; ὁπποίης τʼ ἐπὶ νηὸς ἀφίκεο· πῶς δέ σε ναῦται ἤγαγον εἰς Ἰθάκην; τίνες ἔμμεναι εὐχετόωντο; οὐ μὲν γάρ τί σε πεζὸν ὀίομαι ἐνθάδʼ ἱκέσθαι.
But come, tell me this truly and recount it exactly: who are you among men, and from where? Where is your city and your parents? On what kind of ship did you come? And how did the sailors bring you to Ithaca? Who did they claim to be? For I do not think you came here on foot.
Word by word
The setting
Telemachus turns from grief to the fixed courtesies of hospitality: only after feeding and seating a guest does the host ask who he is. He puts the standard questions — name, people, city, parents, and the ship that brought him.
A note on this passage
This is a type-scene: the guest-questions. In Homer's world you feed and seat a stranger first and interrogate him only after — the order matters, and Telemachus has kept it. Now come the fixed items: name, people, city, parents, and the ship, since no one reaches an island on foot.
The formula is doing quiet character-work. A boy who a moment ago was choking on grief steadies himself into the adult script of hospitality, performing the host's role his absent father should be filling. And there is an irony the audience feels and he cannot: he is grilling a disguised goddess about her ship and crew, and she will answer with a fluent, invented lie.
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