Odyssey 4.285 · Book 4, lines 285–289
A hand over Anticlus's mouth
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ἔνθʼ ἄλλοι μὲν πάντες ἀκὴν ἔσαν υἷες Ἀχαιῶν, Ἄντικλος δὲ σέ γʼ οἶος ἀμείψασθαι ἐπέεσσιν ἤθελεν. ἀλλʼ Ὀδυσεὺς ἐπὶ μάστακα χερσὶ πίεζεν νωλεμέως κρατερῇσι, σάωσε δὲ πάντας Ἀχαιούς· τόφρα δʼ ἔχʼ, ὄφρα σε νόσφιν ἀπήγαγε Παλλὰς Ἀθήνη.
There all the other sons of the Achaeans were silent, but Anticlus alone wished to answer you with words. But Odysseus pressed his mouth with his hands, unceasing and strong, and saved all the Achaeans; and he held on until Pallas Athena led you away.
Word by word
The setting
Odysseus has already held Menelaus and Diomedes back. Now one man, Anticlus, is about to give them all away by answering Helen aloud.
A note on this passage
The danger narrows to one man. Everyone else keeps still, but Anticlus starts to answer, and Odysseus claps a hand over his mouth and holds it there, gripping hard and without let-up, until Athena finally draws Helen away. The whole company in the horse is saved by one man's grip on another's jaw.
Homer states it as rescue and no more, but a darker version was known in antiquity — that Odysseus smothered Anticlus to death. The poem here keeps only the saving act, yet the violence is already in the verb: 'pressed, unceasing and strong.' It is the cost hidden inside the famous self-control — the leader who holds the line by force may also be the man who kills to keep it.
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