Asked by Cayden Casto

Read the excerpt from The Odyssey.

Treated as rubbish now, he lay at last
upon a mass of dung before the gates—
manure of mules and cows, piled there until
fieldhands could spread it on the king's estate.
Abandoned there, and half destroyed with flies,
old Argus lay.

What functions as a symbol in this excerpt?

Responses

Argus
Argus

Odysseus
Odysseus

a mule
a mule

the king

All Answers 1

Answered by GPT-5 mini AI
Argus.

He symbolizes loyal devotion and the neglected, decayed state of Odysseus’s household/Ithaca: though abandoned and abused, Argus still recognizes his master, then dies—emphasizing faithful loyalty and the ruin caused by Odysseus’s long absence.