a—
Launch and Distribution of Seats (363–401)
In his account of the launch and mooring of Alcinous's 
, Homer did not present an involved description; rather, he refers to its completion summarily in a few lines (Od. 8.50–55). Apollonius, however, does go into considerable detail, accounting for the various stages of the launch in thirty-one verses (363–93) and concluding with the apportionment of the benches (394–401). Fränkel has argued that this launch is in keeping with Apollonius's love of realism and his predisposition toward technical accuracy, a feature of his poetry consonant with contemporary Hellenistic tastes.[21] Yet a unique archaic phrase cleverly incorporated in the narrative refers the reader to a text that suggests that more is going on here than a lengthy and detailed description of the Argo 's first launch.
Before the launch of the ship, the men strip off their clothes and set them on a flat stone made smooth from the constant battering of the waves (364b–66). The expression describing this stone ( 
, 365a) looks to h. Merc. 128a, the only other recorded instance of this phrase.[22] Although the Homeric
hymn might appear an unlikely model for the launch of the Argo , an examination of the wider context of the archaic phrase reveals some remarkable correspondences.
On the first day of his life and just after he had invented the lyre, Hermes stole the cattle of his brother, Apollo. He led the herd from Pieria to the river Alpheus. After deciding to sacrifice and roast the meat of two of the cows, the devious god set firewood in a trench (h. Merc. 112), slaughtered the two cows (ibid. 116b–19), roasted the meat on spits (121), and then arranged the meat in twelve equal portions on a smooth flat surface ( 
, 126b–29). The launch of the Argo involves a procedure whose similarity is remarkable, especially considering the different nature of the two actions. After setting their clothes 
and securing the ship with ropes, the men dig a trench into which they set logs as rollers; once the ship has been set on the first of these, they reverse the oars in the tholes and use these to shove the vessel forward. The weight of the Argo is such that as it moves forward it causes smoke to billow up from the rollers below. After the ship is in the water, the seats are apportioned. In sum, Apollonius has included in his description of the launch analogues to all the basic components of Hermes' sacrifice: trench, wood (= rollers), spits (= reversed oars), roasting meat (= smoke under the ship), portions of meat (= division of the seats). Such a comparison, as unlikely as it may seem at first, finds support not only in the borrowed phrase and similar progression of events but also in the extensive preoccupation with the theme of sacrifice before and after the launch, which deepens the sacrificial overtones in these lines.
In the description of the division of the benches that follows, Apollonius exploits the suggested equation of Argo and sacrificial victim in his evocative vocabulary. In the first line, Apollonius says of the men that they took care of each of the details: 
(394).[23] The last two words
of this line are used in the Iliad and Odyssey exclusively in banquet contexts: 
occurs only in the phrase 
, and 
(in the Odyssey ; it does not appear in the Iliad ) always has as its object 
or 
(1.374, 2.139, 8.38,[24] 11.186, 13.23).[25] Although 
is used outside the Homeric poems with other objects, even as early as the archaic period (cf. h. Ven. 11; h. Merc. 361, 476), it clearly has special application to banquets in Homer, of which usage Apollonius is cognizant (cf. 1.979, 2.495).[26] Thus to one intimately familiar with Homeric usage, the direct object of the verb 
in the expression 
would be edible. Second, in describing the selection of seats by lot ( 
, 395), Apollonius uses the verb 
, which occurs only once in the Homeric corpus (Od. 14.434) and which also comes from a banquet context.[27] When Odysseus was staying at the hut of Eumæus, his host butchered and roasted his finest pig, which he divided up into seven portions, setting aside a special piece for the nymphs and Hermes, and saving the piece of honor, the back, for Odysseus:
Cutting up all the food he [sc. Eumæus] divided it up into seven
portions;
he set aside one portion for the nymphs and Hermes, son of Maia,
with a prayer, and he shared the other portions with each one.
But he honored Odysseus by giving him the long back
of the white-toothed boar, thus gratifying the heart of his master.
In a similar fashion, the Argonauts reserve a special bench, that in the middle, for Heracles, which he would share with Ancæus (396b–400)—the same two heroes, incidentally, who offer the sacrificial victim to Apollo in the scene that immediately follows.[28] Accordingly, in vocabulary and in the sequence of events, Apollonius prompts the reader to envisage the launch and subsequent apportionment of the benches on the ship as a sacrifice and the Argo as a sacrificial victim that, figuratively speaking, they prepare and divide among themselves. An unstated point of contact between the two passages from which Apollonius borrowed such rare vocabulary items (Hermes' sacrifice in the hymn and the banquet at the hut of Eumæus in the Odyssey ) is potentially significant: it is the god Hermes.
The central story of the Homeric hymn is based upon the age-old expeditionary motif in which the hero goes on a distant trip to bring back some prized object, especially a treasured animal or animals.[29] The two cows that Hermes sacrificed, with which event the launch of the Argo is by implication compared, belonged to Apollo's herd, and to steal these cattle the mischievous god had made an extraordinary journey (extraordinary because he was not even one day old!) from Arcadia to Pieria. The Argonautic expedition entails the same motif: Jason must sail to Colchis to retrieve the golden fleece of the ram that rescued Phrixus from the plot of Ino.[30] The Homeric hymn also involves a conflict between the same antithetical types seen in the poem so far: Hermes represents in this poem a god of skill, and Apollo, his older and physically more powerful brother who tries unsuccessfully to overwhelm the infant god with his power, a god of strength. The
conflict, however, is resolved. Although Apollo was furious with his younger brother because of the theft of his cattle, and although his anger showed no sign of abatement, Hermes sang a song about the origin of the universe and the gods to the accompaniment of his newly invented lyre. The song caused Apollo to give up his anger (h. Merc. 416a–35). As we have seen, other celebrated arguments underlie the present episode: that between Achilles and Agamemnon in the Iliad and that between Achilles and Odysseus in the Odyssey . Moreover, there is a disruptive argument about to break out among the Argonauts that, like the dispute between Hermes and Apollo, will ultimately be settled amicably. In fact, the climax of the hymn to Hermes provides a telling parallel to the conclusion of the Argonautic dispute. After Jason puts an end to the shouting match between Idas and Idmon, Orpheus takes up his lyre and sings about the origin of the universe through 
and about the generations of the gods (496–511). This will have the effect of reestablishing the harmony of the group disrupted by the argument between Idas and Idmon, in which Jason successfully intervened. Just as happens in the Argonautic 
, the tension arising from conflict between Hermes and Apollo is resolved through the power of theogonic music:
Playing a lovely tune on his lyre
the son of Maia gained courage and took his stand to the left of
Phoebus[*] Apollo. Quick to play a clear-sounding melody
he began to sing—and the voice that issued forth was lovely.
He celebrated the immortal gods and the black earth,
how they first came into being and how each acquired his allotment.
Mnemosyne was the first god he honored in his song,
the mother of the Muses, patron goddess of Maia's son.
The son of Zeus then honored the other immortal gods in order
of age,
describing how each of them was born,
telling everything in precise order as he played the lyre cradled
in his arm.
Irresistible desire seized his [sc. Apollo's] soul.
When we recognize the subtext of the launch of the Argo and of the distribution of the seats, one of the central themes of the episode comes more sharply into focus. These actions are a metaphor for a sacrifice. The sacrificial overtones lend a sense that the Argo , as a symbolic "victim," is somehow dedicated or sanctified for its goal at the moment of its launching. The apportionment, with its implied sharing of the victim Argo by the Argonauts, carries suggestions of the unity—and consequent harmony—that such ritual practice by its very nature represents. More specifically, the details of the scene recall one famous sacrifice by, and another in honor of, Hermes, a young god who ultimately brings about the successful completion of his expedition by calming the 
between himself and his more powerful brother through his musical skill.[31] The allusion to this sacrifice and the consequent success of Hermes—with its attendant harmony and unanimity achieved through skill—bodes well for the Argonauts and for their leader. Following the launch, our attention is immediately directed to a genuine sacrifice offered to Apollo by Heracles and Ancæus in the scene that follows.