Solon 1-3

Solon 1-3

Solon 1: I came as a herald from lovely Salamis, setting a song, an adornment of words, in the council's place.

Solon 2: In that case, may I trade my Athenian homeland for a Cycladic one; maybe the speech among men be: "that's an Athenian, one of those Salamis-ceders"

Solon 3: Let's go to fight for Salamis, the lovely isle, and thrust off tough shame.

• These three fragments are thought to come from a single poem (Salamis), where Solon encouraged the Athenians to fight and claim Salamis. A bit like Tyrtaeus 5-7, and also an encouragement to conquer and subdue a neighboring territory; part of polis consolidation and expansion in the archaic period, I guess.
• So Solon 1-3 come from another hortatory elegy encouraging the audience to fight; what's different here is that we have the frame with the specific policy suggestion but not the emotional justification. Presumably the poem contained flashbacks and exhortation with homeric-style bits of fighting inside, more like e.g. Mimnermus 12, Archilochus 17a, Tyrtaeus 5-7. What appeals we do have in Solon 2-3 are pretty Homeric -- exhortations to remember the patris, fear of anonymous tis speech, rejection of shame (aiskhos).
• Solon 1 though is strange and interesting. Solon claims to be a herald and to "set a song, an adornment of words, in the council's place" (κόσμον ἐπέων ᾠδὴν ἀντ᾽ ἀγορῆς θέμενος). Plutarch explains away these features with biographical interpretation: Solon was standing on the herald's stone in the agora.
• Honestly I like this interpretation (kick rocking Plutarch, never stop being Plutarch), but also reminds me of Pindar, who likewise calls himself a herald (N. 4.75, Dith. 2.24) and describes his song as an "adornment of words" (fr. 194, ποικίλον / κόσμον αὐδάεντα λόγων). Feels like genre play here -- he calls his elegy a 'song' and uses language reminiscent of lyric, but also calls himself a herald and does exhortation elegy. A real mixture of herald speech, lyric, and elegy.