Odyssey 6.107 · Book 6, lines 107–109
A head above them all
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πασάων δʼ ὑπὲρ ἥ γε κάρη ἔχει ἠδὲ μέτωπα, ῥεῖά τʼ ἀριγνώτη πέλεται, καλαὶ δέ τε πᾶσαι· ὣς ἥ γʼ ἀμφιπόλοισι μετέπρεπε παρθένος ἀδμής.
and above them all she holds her head and brow, and is easily known, though all are lovely; so the unwed maiden stood out among her handmaids.
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The setting
The Artemis simile closes and folds back onto Nausicaa: as the goddess towers over her nymphs, so the princess stands out among her maids.
A note on this passage
The simile lands. Artemis stands a head taller than all her nymphs, instantly picked out though every one of them is beautiful; and just so, Homer says, Nausicaa shone out among her handmaids. The comparison returns cleanly to its subject, the point being visibility — the one you cannot fail to see.
The last word carries the weight: ἀδμής, ‘unbroken, untamed, unwed.’ It is a word used of animals not yet put to the yoke, turned here to a girl not yet given in marriage. Set as the final beat of the whole simile, just before Odysseus wakes, it quietly names what the scene is really about — a marriageable girl at the threshold of her life.
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