One of the most frequent Homeric formulas, epea pteroenta (“winged words”), today appears as a problem in semantics: how can one apply this particular adjective, whatever its “exact” meaning may be, to this particular noun other than metaphorically? If the phrase is a metaphor, what is its import, and in what domain does the characteristic semantic transfer actually take place? Finally, to what epoch can the expression be traced back and, if it stems from a tradition preceding the era in which the Homeric poems were composed, how could the transmission of that tradition have come about? I will not address here all of these complex problems, which also involve the overall understanding of Homeric epic—its formation and transmission, along with an enormous bibliography. But it does seem to me that the formulaic phrase itself deserves a fresh analysis, and it is perhaps worthwhile to begin with a history of its interpretations.