Still strange choices. I wonder also if the ancient Greeks were really aware that mice/rats were vectors for spreading epidemics? If they really had any idea of the cause of disease or how it spread?

This is related but in Book 1 where Apollo is slaying all the Achaians with his arrows I took that to mean bringing a deadly plague among them. It is actually translated thus among one of the alternate translations other then Lattimore that I read that book. This actually left me wondering what sort of contagious disease would spread first among mules and hounds before spreading to humans? No doubt I am seeking to attach to much literal truth there.