Homer (Greek Ὅμηρος Hómēros)
Idealized portrayal of Homer dating to the Hellenistic period. Greek (el ελληνική γλώσσα or simply el ελληνικά — "Hellenic" is an Indo-European language, spoken today by 15-22 million people mainly This article focuses on the cultural aspects of the Hellenistic age for the historical aspects see Hellenistic period. British Museum. The British Museum is a Museum of human history and culture in London.
Lived	ca. 8th century BC
Influences	rhapsodic oral poetry
Influenced	Classics (Western canon)

Homer and His Guide, by William-Adolphe Bouguereau (1825–1905). In Classical Greece, in the fifth and fourth centuries BC and perhaps earlier a rhapsode (ῥαψῳδός was a professional Performer of Poetry, especially Oral poetry is a form of Poetry that is transmitted orally and memorized or improvised rather than written down "Classical literature" redirects here For literature in Classical languages outside the Graeco-Roman sphere see Ancient literature. The Western canon is a term used to denote a canon of books and more widely music and art, that has been the most influential in William-Adolphe Bouguereau (November 30 1825 – August 19 1905 was a French academic painter. The scene portrays Homer on Mount Ida, beset by dogs and guided by the goatherd, Glaucus. Two sacred mountains are called Mount Ida in Greek mythology, equally named "Mount of the Goddess (The tale is told in Pseudo-Herodotus).

Homer (ancient Greek: Ὅμηρος, Homēros) is an ancient Greek epic poet, traditionally said to be the author of the epic poems the Iliad and the Odyssey. The Ancient Greek language is the historical stage in the development of the Hellenic language family spanning the Archaic (c The Ancient Greek language is the historical stage in the development of the Hellenic language family spanning the Archaic (c An epic is a lengthy Narrative poem, ordinarily concerning a serious subject containing details of heroic deeds and events significant to a culture or nation A poet is a person who writes Poetry. Etymology From the Ancient greek: ποιέω, poieō: "I make or compose" The Iliad ( Greek: Ἰλιάς (Ancient Ιλιάδα (Modern is together with the Odyssey, one of two ancient The Odyssey ( Greek: Ὀδύσσεια or Odússeia) is one of two major ancient Greek epic poems attributed to Homer. The ancient Greeks generally believed that Homer was a historical individual, but some modern scholars are skeptical: no reliable biographical information has been handed down from classical antiquity. Classical antiquity (also the classical era or classical period) is a broad term for a long period of cultural History centered on the Mediterranean According to Martin West, "Homer" is "not the name of a historical poet, but a fictitious or constructed name. Martin Litchfield West (born 23 September 1937, London, England) is an internationally recognised scholar in Classics, Classical "^[1] The poems are now widely regarded as the culmination of a long tradition of orally composed poetry, but the way in which they reached their final written form, and the role of an individual poet, or poets, in this process is disputed. Oral poetry is a form of Poetry that is transmitted orally and memorized or improvised rather than written down By the reckoning of scholars like Geoffrey Kirk, both poems were created by an individual genius who drew much of his material from various traditional stories. Geoffrey Stephen Kirk ( 3 December 1921 – 10 March 2003) was a British classical scholar Others, like Martin West, hold that the epics were composed by a number of poets. Gregory Nagy maintains that the epics are not the creation of any individual; rather, they slowly evolved towards their final form over a period of centuries and, in this view, are the collective work of generations of poets. Gregory Nagy (pronounced /nadj/ born in Budapest Hungary, is an American professor of Classics at Harvard University, specializing in

The date of Homer was controversial in antiquity and is no less so today. Herodotus said that Homer lived 400 years before his own time, which would place him at about 850 BC;^[2] but other ancient sources gave dates much closer to the Trojan War. Herodotus of Halicarnassus ( Greek: Hēródotos Halikarnāsseús) was a Greek Historian who lived in the 5th century BC ( 484 BC&ndash Events and trends 859 BC — Assurnasirpal II died 859 BC — Shalmaneser attacked Syria and Palestine. In Greek mythology, the Trojan War was waged against the city of Troy by the Achaeans after Paris of Troy stole Helen from her ^[3] For modern scholarship, "the date of Homer" refers to the date of the poems' conception as much as to the lifetime of an individual. The scholarly consensus is that "the Iliad and the Odyssey date from the extreme end of the 9th century BC or from the 8th, the Iliad being anterior to the Odyssey, perhaps by some decades. "^[4],i. e. somewhat earlier than Hesiod^[5], and that the Iliad is the oldest work of western literature. Hesiod ( Greek: Hesiodos) was an early Greek Poet and Rhapsode, who presumably lived around 700 BCE Over the past few decades, some scholars have been arguing for a 7th-century date. Those who believe that the Homeric poems developed gradually over a long period of time, however, generally give a later date for the poems: according to Nagy, they only became fixed texts in the 6th century. ^[6]

Homer's works form the cornerstone of the Western Canon and are universally praised for their genius. The Western canon is a term used to denote a canon of books and more widely music and art, that has been the most influential in Their formative influence in shaping key aspects of Greek culture was recognised by the Greeks themselves, who considered him their instructor. ^[7]

Life and legends

Although "Homer" is a real Greek name, attested in Aeolic-speaking areas,^[8] nothing definite is known of him; yet rich traditions grew up, or were conserved, purporting to give details of his birthplace and background. Many of them were purely fantastical: the writer Lucian makes him out to be a Babylonian called Tigranes, who only assumed the name Homer when taken "hostage" by the Greeks. Lucian of Samosata (Λουκιανός ὁ Σαμοσατεύς Lucianus c Babylonia was an Amorite state in lower Mesopotamia (modern southern Iraq) with Babylon as its capital ^[9] When the Emperor Hadrian asked the Oracle at Delphi who Homer really was, the Pythia proclaimed that he was Ithacan, the son of Epikaste and Telemachus, from the Odyssey. Publius Aelius Hadrianus (January 24 76 &ndash July 10 138 as emperor Imperator Caesar Divi Traiani filius Traianus Hadrianus Augustus, and Divus Hadrianus after An oracle is a person or agency considered to be a source of wise counsel or prophetic opinion an Infallible authority usually spiritual in nature Delphi ( Greek,) ( pronounce and dialectal forms) is an archaeological site and a modern town in Greece on the south-western PYTHIA is a computer simulation program for particle collisions at very high energies (see Event (particle physics) in Particle accelerators Ithaca or Ithaka (in Greek, Ιθάκη, Ithaki) is an island in the Ionian Sea, in Greece, with an area of 118 km² In Greek mythology, Jocasta, also known as Jocaste (Iοκαστη or Epikastê was a daughter of Menoeceus and Queen consort of Thebes This article is about the figure in greek mythology For the Christian saint see Saint Telemachus, and for the South African cricketer, see Roger The Odyssey ( Greek: Ὀδύσσεια or Odússeia) is one of two major ancient Greek epic poems attributed to Homer. ^[10] These stories proliferated and were incorporated into a number^[11] of Lives of Homer compiled from the Alexandrian period onwards. ^[12] The most common version has Homer born in the Ionian region of Asia Minor, at Smyrna, or on the island of Chios, and dying on the Cycladic island of Ios. Geography Physical Ionia was of small extent not exceeding 90 geographical miles in length from north to south with a breadth varying from 40 to 55 miles but to this Anatolia (Anadolu Ανατολία Anatolía) or Asia minor, comprising most of modern Turkey, is the geographic region bounded by the Black This article is on the Ancient Greek city of Smyrna principally in connection with the ruins remaining to this day Chios (Χίος pronounced ˈçio̞s alternative transliterations Khíos and Híos) is the fifth largest of the Greek islands, situated The CYCLADES Packet switching network was an extremely influential French network system in the early 1970s similar to the ARPANET. ^[13][14] A connection with Smyrna seems to be alluded to in a legend that his original name was "Melesigenes" ("born of Meles", a river which flowed by that city), and of the nymph Kretheis. This article is on the Ancient Greek city of Smyrna principally in connection with the ruins remaining to this day Internal evidence from the poems gives some support to this connection: familiarity with the topography of this area of Asia Minor's littoral obtrudes in place-names and details, and similes evocative of local scenery: the meadow birds at the mouth of the Caystros (Iliad. Cayster River (or Küçük Menderes, "Little Maeander" is located south of İzmir, Turkey. The Iliad ( Greek: Ἰλιάς (Ancient Ιλιάδα (Modern is together with the Odyssey, one of two ancient 2:459ff. ), a storm in the Icarian sea (Iliad2. Icarus ( Greek:, Latin: Íkaros, Etruscan: Vicare) is a character in Greek mythology. The Iliad ( Greek: Ἰλιάς (Ancient Ιλιάδα (Modern is together with the Odyssey, one of two ancient 144ff. ), and wind-lore (Iliad2. The Iliad ( Greek: Ἰλιάς (Ancient Ιλιάδα (Modern is together with the Odyssey, one of two ancient 394ff: 4. 422ff: 9. 5)^[15], or that women of either Maeonia or Caria stain ivory with scarlet (Iliad 4. The Iliad ( Greek: Ἰλιάς (Ancient Ιλιάδα (Modern is together with the Odyssey, one of two ancient 142). ^[16]

The association with Chios dates back at least to Semonides of Amorgos who cited a famous line in the Iliad (6. Semonides (or Semontoes) of Amorgos was an ancient Greek Iambic Poet who flourished in the middle of the 7th century BC Amorgos (Αμοργός is the easternmost island of the Greek Cyclades island group and that lying closest to the neighboring Dodecanese island 146) as by "the man of Chios". Some kind of eponymous bardic guild, known as the Homeridae (sons of Homer), or Homeristae ('Homerizers')^[17] appears to have existed there, variously tracing descent from an imaginary ancestor of that name,^[18] or vaunting their special function as rhapsodes or "lay-stitchers" specialising in the recitation of Homeric poetry. Etymology The word is a Loanword from descendant languages of Proto-Celtic *bardos, ultimately from Proto-Indo-European *gwerh2 A guild is an association of craftsmen in a particular trade The earliest guilds were formed as confraternities of workers The Homeridae were a family clan or professional lineage claiming descent from the legendary Greek epic poet Homer. In Classical Greece, in the fifth and fourth centuries BC and perhaps earlier a rhapsode (ῥαψῳδός was a professional Performer of Poetry, especially

The poet's name is homophonous with "homêros", meaning, generally, "hostage" (or "surety"), long understood as "he who accompanies; he who is forced to follow", or, in some dialects, "blind". ^[19] The assonance itself generated many tales relating the person to the functions of a hostage or of a blind man. In regard to the latter, traditions holding that he was blind may have arisen from the meaning of the word both in Ionic, where the verbal form "hómêreuô" has the specialized meaning of "guide the blind",^[20] and in the Aeolian dialect of Cyme, where homêros was cognate with tuphlós, meaning 'blind'. Blindness is the condition of lacking Visual perception due to Physiological or Neurological factors Ionic Greek was a sub-dialect of the Attic-Ionic dialectal group of Ancient Greek (see Greek dialects) Aeolic Greek (also known as Lesbian Greek) is a linguistic term used to describe a set of rather archaic Greek sub- Dialects spoken ^[21] The characterization of Homer as a blind bard goes back to some verses in the Delian Hymn to Apollo, the third of the Homeric Hymns,^[22] verses later cited to support this notion by Thucydides. Etymology The word is a Loanword from descendant languages of Proto-Celtic *bardos, ultimately from Proto-Indo-European *gwerh2 The island of Delos ( Greek: Δήλος Dhilos) isolated in the centre of the roughly circular ring of islands called the Cyclades, near Mykonos The thirty-three anonymous Homeric Hymns celebrating individual gods are a collection of ancient Greek Hymns "Homeric" in the sense that they employ the Thucydides ( C 460 BC &ndash C 395 BC) ( Greek Θουκυδίδης Thoukydídēs) was a Greek ^[23] The Cumean historian Ephorus held the same view, and the idea gained support in antiquity on the strength of a false etymology deriving his name from ho mê horôn (ὁ μὴ ὁρών: "he who does not see"). In the practice of measuring the size of US commercial broadcasting and newspaper audiences cume, short for "cumulative audience" is a measure of the total Ephorus or Ephoros ( Ancient Greek:, c 400 - 330 BC) of Cyme in Aeolia, in Asia Etymology is the study of the History of Words &mdash when they entered a language from what source and how their form and meaning have changed over time Critics have long taken a passage in the Odyssey describing a blind bard, Demodocus, in the court of the Phaeacian king, who recounts stories of Troy to the shipwrecked Odysseus,^[24] as self-referential. In the Odyssey by Homer, Demodocus ( Greek: Δημοδόκος Demodokos) is a poet who often visits the court of Alcinous Scheria ( ancient Greek or) also Scherie or Phaeacia, was a region of land in the eastern Mediterranean in Greek mythology, first mentioned grc-Latn Odysseus or la Ulysses ( Greek grc-Latn Odysseus; Latin: la Ulixes or more commonly Ulysses) oʊˈdɪsiəs ^[25]

Many scholars take the name of the poet to be indicative of a generic function. Gregory Nagy takes it to mean "he who fits (the Song) together". ^[26] "Hómêréô", another related verb, besides signifying "meet", can mean "(sing) in accord/tune". ^[27] Some argue that "Homer" may have meant "he who puts the voice in tune" with dancing. ^[28][29] Marcello Durante links "Homeros" to an epithet of Zeus as "god of the assemblies" and argues that behind the name lies the echo of an archaic word for "reunion", similar to the later Panegyris, denoting a formal assembly of competing minstrels. A panegyris (&pi&alpha&nu&eta&gamma&upsilon&rho&iota&sigmaf ( Greek - gathering) is an Ancient Greek religious assembly ^[30][31]

The Ancient Lives depict Homer as a wandering minstrel, much like Thamyris^[32] or Hesiod, who walked as far as Chalkis to sing at the funeral games of Amphidamas. In Greek mythology, Thamyris ( Greek: Θάμυρις son of Philammon and the nymph Argiope, was a Thracian singer who was so proud Hesiod ( Greek: Hesiodos) was an early Greek Poet and Rhapsode, who presumably lived around 700 BCE Chalcis or Chalkida, Halkida, Halkis or Chalkis ( Greek, Modern Χαλκίδα xal'ciða Ancient/ Katharevousa: -ίς Amphidamas may refer to both historical and mythological figures in Ancient Greece: Mythology Amphidamas is the name of six men in Greek mythology ^[33] We are given the image of a "blind, begging singer who hangs around with little people: shoemakers, fisherman, potters, sailors, elderly men in the gathering places of harbour towns". ^[34] The poems themselves give evidence of singers at the courts of the nobility. Scholars are divided as to which category, if any, the court singer or the wandering minstrel, the historic "Homer" belonged. ^[35]

For more details on this topic, see Ancient accounts of Homer, Life of Homer (Pseudo-Herodotus). The ancient accounts of Homer include many passages in archaic and classical Greek poets and prose authors that mention or allude to Homer, and ten biographies of Homer often The Life of Homer &mdash its unknown author is referred to as Pseudo-Herodotus &mdash is one among several ancient biographies of the Greek epic poet Homer

Works attributed to Homer

The Greeks of the sixth and early fifth centuries understood by "Homer", generally, "the whole body of heroic tradition as embodied in hexameter verse". An epic is a lengthy Narrative poem, ordinarily concerning a serious subject containing details of heroic deeds and events significant to a culture or nation Hexameter is a literary and poetic form consisting of six metrical feet per line as in the Iliad. ^[36] Thus, in addition to the Iliad and the Odyssey, there are "exceptional" epics which organize their respective themes on a "massive scale"^[37], many other works were credited to Homer in antiquity, including the entire Epic Cycle. The Epic Cycle (Επικός Κύκλος was a collection of Ancient Greek Epic poems that related the story of the Trojan War, which includes the The genre included further poems on the Trojan War, such as the Little Iliad, the Nostoi, the Cypria and the Epigoni, as well as the Theban poems about Oedipus and his sons. In Greek mythology, the Trojan War was waged against the city of Troy by the Achaeans after Paris of Troy stole Helen from her The Little Iliad ( Greek:, Ilias mikra; Latin: Ilias parva The Nostoi (Νόστοι also known as Nosti in Latin, Returns in English) is a lost epic of ancient Greek literature. The Cypria ( Ancient Greek: Kypria; Latin form Cypria) is an epic of ancient Greek literature that was quite This is an article about the Greek myth For the epic on the subject see Epigoni (epic. Thebes ( Classic Greek Θῆβαι, Mod Θήβα) is a city in Greece, situated to the north of the Cithaeron range which divides Oedipus (pronounced /ˈɛdəpəs/ in American English or /ˈiːdəpəs/ in British English; Greek: Oidípous meaning "swollen-footed" Other works, such as the corpus of Homeric Hymns, the comic mini-epic Batrachomyomachia ("The Frog-Mouse War"), and the Margites were also attributed to him, but this is now believed to be unlikely. The thirty-three anonymous Homeric Hymns celebrating individual gods are a collection of ancient Greek Hymns "Homeric" in the sense that they employ the The Margites, a comic mock-epic of Ancient Greece,is about an idiot named "Margites" (Greek μάργος "raving mad lustful" who was so dense Two other poems, the Capture of Oechalia and the Phocais were also assigned Homeric authorship, but the question of the identities of the authors of these various texts is even more problematic than that of the authorship of the two major epics. The Capture of Oechalia was an epic of the ancient Greek Epic Cycle variously attributed to both Homer and Creophilus of Samos some sources say Homer gave The Phocais was an ancient Greek epic widely attributed to Homer.

Problems of authorship

The idea that Homer was responsible for just the two outstanding epics, the Iliad and the Odyssey, only won consensus by 350 B. C. E. ^[38]. While many find it unlikely that both epics were composed by the same person, others argue that the stylistic similarities are too consistent to support the theory of multiple authorship. One view which attempts to bridge the differences holds that the Iliad was composed by "Homer" in his maturity, while the Odyssey was a work of his old age. The Batrachomyomachia, Homeric Hymns and cyclic epics are generally agreed to be later than the Iliad and the Odyssey. The thirty-three anonymous Homeric Hymns celebrating individual gods are a collection of ancient Greek Hymns "Homeric" in the sense that they employ the

Most scholars agree that the Iliad and Odyssey underwent a process of standardisation and refinement out of older material beginning in the 8th century BCE. The 8th century BC started the first day of 800 BC and ended the last day of 701 BC. An important role in this standardisation appears to have been played by the Athenian tyrant Hipparchus, who reformed the recitation of Homeric poetry at the Panathenaic festival. Athens (ˈæθənz Αθήνα Athina,) the Capital and largest city of Greece, dominates the Attica periphery as one of the world's In modern usage a tyrant is a single ruler holding absolute power over a State or within an Organization. Hipparchus (Ἵππαρχος (d 514 BCE was a ruler of Athens. The Panathenaea (Παναθήναια "all-Athenian festival" was the most important festival for Athens and one of the grandest in the entire ancient Greek Many classicists hold that this reform must have involved the production of a canonical written text. "Classical literature" redirects here For literature in Classical languages outside the Graeco-Roman sphere see Ancient literature. This article is not about Literary canons of influential works of fiction but about the concept of a canon which defines the world of a particular fictional series

Other scholars still support the idea that Homer was a real person. Since nothing is known about the life of this Homer, the common joke, also recycled in disputes about the authorship of plays ascribed to Shakespeare, has it that the poems "were not written by Homer, but by another man of the same name,"[1][2]. William Shakespeare ( baptised Samuel Butler argued that a young Sicilian woman wrote the Odyssey (but not the Iliad), an idea further pursued by Robert Graves in his novel Homer's Daughter and Andrew Dalby in Rediscovering Homer. Samuel Butler ( December 4, 1835 - June 18, 1902 was an iconoclastic Victorian author who published a variety of works including the Robert Graves (24 July 1895 &ndash 7 December 1985 was an English Poet, Translator and Novelist. Andrew Dalby (born Liverpool, 1947 is an English linguist translator and historian who most often writes about Food history. Rediscovering Homer is a 2006 book by Andrew Dalby. It sets out the problems of origin dating and authorship of the two ancient Greek epics Iliad ^[39]

Independent of the question of single authorship is the near-universal agreement, after the work of Milman Parry,^[40] that the Homeric poems are dependent on an oral tradition, a generations-old technique that was the collective inheritance of many singer-poets (aoidoi). Milman Parry ( 1902 - December 3[[ 935]] was a scholar of Epic poetry and the founder of the discipline of Oral tradition. Oral tradition, oral culture and oral lore is a way for a society to transmit history, literature, law and other Knowledges An analysis of the structure and vocabulary of the Iliad and Odyssey shows that the poems contain many formulaic phrases typical of extempore epic traditions; even entire verses are at times repeated. Parry and his student Albert Lord pointed out that such elaborate oral tradition, foreign to today's literate cultures, is typical of epic poetry in a predominantly oral cultural milieu, the key words being "oral" and "traditional". Albert Bates Lord (1912-1991 was a Professor of Slavic and Comparative Literature at Harvard University who after the untimely death of Milman Parry, carried on An epic is a lengthy Narrative poem, ordinarily concerning a serious subject containing details of heroic deeds and events significant to a culture or nation Parry started with "traditional": the repetitive chunks of language, he said, were inherited by the singer-poet from his predecessors, and were useful to him in composition. Parry called these repetitive chunks "formulas".

Exactly when these poems would have taken on a fixed written form is subject to debate. The traditional solution is the "transcription hypothesis", wherein a non-literate "Homer" dictates his poem to a literate scribe between the 8th and 6th centuries. The Greek alphabet was introduced in the early 8th century, so it is possible that Homer himself was of the first generation of authors who were also literate. The Greek alphabet (Ελληνικό αλφάβητο is a set of twenty-four letters that has been used to write the Greek language since the late 9th or early More radical Homerists like Gregory Nagy contend that a canonical text of the Homeric poems as "scripture" did not exist until the Hellenistic period (3rd to 1st century BCE). This article focuses on the cultural aspects of the Hellenistic age for the historical aspects see Hellenistic period. The 3rd century BC started the first day of 300 BC and ended the last day of 201 BC The 1st century BC started the first day of 100 BC and ended the last day of 1 BC.

For more details on this topic, see Homeric Question. The Homeric Question concerns the doubt and consequent debate over the identity of Homer

Homeric studies

Main article: Homeric scholarship

Reconstitution of the world described by the Odyssey

The study of Homer is one of the oldest topics in scholarship, dating back to antiquity. Homeric scholarship is the study of Homeric epic, especially the two large surviving epics the Iliad and Odyssey. The Odyssey ( Greek: Ὀδύσσεια or Odússeia) is one of two major ancient Greek epic poems attributed to Homer. The aims and achievements of Homeric studies have changed over the course of the millennia. In the last few centuries, they have revolved around the process by which the Homeric poems came into existence and were transmitted down to us—first orally and later in writing.

Some of the main trends in modern Homeric scholarship have been, in the 19th and early 20th centuries, Analysis and Unitarianism (see Homeric Question), schools of thought which emphasized on the one hand the inconsistencies in, and on the other the artistic unity of, Homer; and in the 20th century and later Oral Theory, the study of the mechanisms and effects of oral transmission, and Neoanalysis, which is the study of the relationship between Homer and other early epic material. The Homeric Question concerns the doubt and consequent debate over the identity of Homer

Homeric dialect

Main article: Homeric Greek

The language used by Homer is an archaic version of Ionic Greek, with admixtures from certain other dialects, such as Aeolic Greek. Homeric Greek is the form of Ancient Greek that was used by Homer in the Iliad and Odyssey. Ionic Greek was a sub-dialect of the Attic-Ionic dialectal group of Ancient Greek (see Greek dialects) Aeolic Greek (also known as Lesbian Greek) is a linguistic term used to describe a set of rather archaic Greek sub- Dialects spoken It later served as the basis of Epic Greek, the language of epic poetry, typically in dactylic hexameter. An epic is a lengthy Narrative poem, ordinarily concerning a serious subject containing details of heroic deeds and events significant to a culture or nation Dactylic Hexameter (also known as "heroic hexameter" is a form of meter in poetry or a rhythmic scheme

Homeric style

Aristotle remarks in his Poetics that Homer was unique among the poets of his time, focusing on a single, unified theme or action in the epic cycle. Aristotle (Greek Aristotélēs) (384 BC – 322 BC was a Greek philosopher a student of Plato and teacher of Alexander the Great. Aristotle 's Poetics ( Greek: Ποιητικός, c 335 BCE aims to give an account of what he calls 'poetry' (for him the term includes the ^[41] The cardinal qualities of the style of Homer are well articulated by Matthew Arnold:

[T]he translator of Homer should above all be penetrated by a sense of four qualities of his author:—that he is eminently rapid; that he is eminently plain and direct, both in the evolution of his thought and in the expression of it, that is, both in his syntax and in his words; that he is eminently plain and direct in the substance of his thought, that is, in his matter and ideas; and finally, that he is eminently noble. Matthew Arnold (24 December 1822 &ndash 15 April 1888 was an English Poet, and Cultural critic who worked as an inspector of schools In Linguistics, syntax (from Ancient Greek grc συν- syn-, "together" and grc τάξις táxis, "arrangement" is the ^[42]

The peculiar rapidity of Homer is due in great measure to his use of hexameter verse. Hexameter is a literary and poetic form consisting of six metrical feet per line as in the Iliad. It is characteristic of early literature that the evolution of the thought, or the grammatical form of the sentence, is guided by the structure of the verse; and the correspondence which consequently obtains between the rhythm and the syntax, the thought being given out in lengths, as it were, and these again divided by tolerably uniform pauses, produces a swift flowing movement, such as is rarely found when periods are constructed without direct reference to the metre. The metre or meter is a unit of Length. It is the basic unit of Length in the Metric system and in the International That Homer possesses this rapidity without falling into the corresponding faults, that is, without becoming either fluctuant or monotonous, is perhaps the best proof of his unequalled poetic skill. The plainness and directness, both of thought and of expression, which characterise him were doubtless qualities of his age, but the author of the Iliad (similar to Voltaire, to whom Arnold happily compares him) must have possessed this gift in a surpassing degree. The Iliad ( Greek: Ἰλιάς (Ancient Ιλιάδα (Modern is together with the Odyssey, one of two ancient François-Marie Arouet ( 21 November 1694 30 May 1778) better known by the Pen name Voltaire, was a French The Odyssey is in this respect perceptibly below the level of the Iliad. The Odyssey ( Greek: Ὀδύσσεια or Odússeia) is one of two major ancient Greek epic poems attributed to Homer.

Statue of Homer outside the Bavarian State Library in Munich. Munich (München; Minga is the capital city of Bavaria, Germany.

Rapidity or ease of movement, plainness of expression, and plainness of thought are not distinguishing qualities of the great epic poets, Virgil, Dante^[43], and Milton. Publius Vergilius Maro ( October 15, 70 BCE &ndash September 21, 19 BCE later called Virgilius, and known in English as Virgil or John Milton ( 9 December, 1608 – 8 November, 1674) was an English Poet, Prose Polemicist and On the contrary, they belong rather to the humbler epico-lyrical school for which Homer has been so often claimed. The proof that Homer does not belong to that school, and that his poetry is not in any true sense ballad poetry, is furnished by the higher artistic structure of his poems and, as regards style, by the fourth of the qualities distinguished by Arnold, the quality of nobleness. A ballad is a Poem usually set to Music; thus it often is a story told in a Song. Matthew Arnold (24 December 1822 &ndash 15 April 1888 was an English Poet, and Cultural critic who worked as an inspector of schools It is his noble and powerful style, sustained through every change of idea and subject, that finally separates Homer from all forms of ballad-poetry and popular epic. An epic is a lengthy Narrative poem, ordinarily concerning a serious subject containing details of heroic deeds and events significant to a culture or nation

Like the French epics, such as the "Chanson de Roland", Homeric poetry is indigenous and, by the ease of movement and its resultant simplicity, distinguishable from the works of Dante, Milton and Virgil. The Song of Roland (La Chanson de Roland is the oldest remaining major work of French literature. It is also distinguished from the works of these artists by the comparative absence of underlying motives or sentiment. In Virgil's poetry, a sense of the greatness of Rome and Italy is the leading motive of a passionate rhetoric, partly veiled by the considered delicacy of his language. The Roman Empire was the post-Republican phase of the ancient Roman civilization, characterised by an autocratic form of government and large territorial Italy (Italia officially the Italian Republic, (Repubblica Italiana is located on the Italian Peninsula in Southern Europe, and on the two largest Dante and Milton are still more faithful exponents of the religion and politics of their time. A religion is a set of Tenets and practices often centered upon specific Supernatural and moral claims about Reality, the Cosmos Politics Politics is the process by which groups of people make decisions Even the French epics display sentiments of fear and hatred of the Saracens; but, in Homer's works, the interest is purely dramatic. The Experimental Physics and Industrial Control System ( EPICS) is a software environment used to develop and implement Distributed control systems to operate devices Saracen was a term used by Europeans in the Middle Ages for Fatimids at first then later for all who professed the religion of Islam. There is no strong antipathy of race or religion; the war turns on no political events; the capture of Troy lies outside the range of the Iliad; and even the protagonists are not comparable to the chief national heroes of Greece. Troy ( Greek: grc Τροία Troia, also, Ilion; Latin: Trōia, Īlium, Hittite: Wilusa or So far as can be seen, the chief interest in Homer's works is that of human feeling and emotion, and of drama; indeed, his works are often referred to as "dramas". Drama is the specific mode of Fiction represented in Performance.

History and the Iliad

Main article: Historicity of the Iliad

Greece according to the Iliad. The extent of the historical basis of the Iliad has been debated for some time

The excavations of Heinrich Schliemann at Hisarlik in the late 19th century provided initiatory evidence to scholars that there was a historical fundament for the Trojan War. Heinrich Schliemann (ˈʃliːman ( January 6 1822 in Neubukow Mecklenburg-Schwerin - December 26 1890, Naples) was a German Hisarlik ( Turkish: Hisarlık, "Place of Fortresses" is the modern name for the site of ancient Troy, also known as The 19th century of the Common Era began on January 1, 1801 and ended on December 31, 1900, according to the Gregorian calendar In Greek mythology, the Trojan War was waged against the city of Troy by the Achaeans after Paris of Troy stole Helen from her Research into oral epics in Serbo-Croatian and Turkic languages, pioneered by the aforementioned Parry and Lord, began convincing scholars that long poems could be preserved with consistency by oral cultures until they are written down. The Serbo-Croatian language or Croato-Serbian language (cрпскохрватски језик srpskohrvatski jezik) is a South Slavic Diasystem The Turkic languages constitute a Language family of some thirty languages spoken by Turkic peoples across a vast area from Eastern Europe and the ^[40] The decipherment of Linear B in the 1950s by Michael Ventris (and others) convinced many of a linguistic continuity between 13th century BC Mycenaean writings and the poems attributed to Homer. Linear B is a script that was used for writing Mycenaean, an early form of Greek. The 1950s Decade refers to the years of 1950 to 1959 inclusive Michael George Francis Ventris ( July 12, 1922 &ndash September 6, 1956) was an English architect and classical scholar who along "Lion Gate" redirects here For other uses see Lions' Gate (disambiguation.

It is probable, therefore, that the story of the Trojan War as reflected in the Homeric poems derives from a tradition of epic poetry founded on a war which actually took place. In Greek mythology, the Trojan War was waged against the city of Troy by the Achaeans after Paris of Troy stole Helen from her It is crucial, however, not to underestimate the creative and transforming power of subsequent tradition: for instance, Achilles, the most important character of the Iliad, is strongly associated with southern Thessaly, but his legendary figure is interwoven into a tale of war whose kings were from the Peloponnese. "Achilleus" redirects here For the emperor with this name see Achilleus (emperor. The Iliad ( Greek: Ἰλιάς (Ancient Ιλιάδα (Modern is together with the Odyssey, one of two ancient Thessalia redirects here For the Butterfly Genus, see Thessalia (butterfly. The Peloponnese or Peloponnesus ( Greek: Πελοπόννησος Pelopónnisos; see also List of Greek place names) is a large Peninsula Tribal wanderings were frequent, and far-flung, ranging over much of Greece and the Eastern Mediterranean. ^[44] The epic weaves brilliantly the disiecta membra of these distinct tribal narratives, exchanged among clan bards, into a monumental tale in which Greeks join collectively to do battle on the distant plains of Troy.

Hero cult

The Apotheosis of Homer, by Archelaus of Priene. Marble relief, possibly of the 3rd century BC, now in the British Museum. The 3rd century BC started the first day of 300 BC and ended the last day of 201 BC The British Museum is a Museum of human history and culture in London.

In the Hellenistic period, Homer was the subject of a hero cult in several cities. "Cult Hero" redirects here For the Cure sideproject called Cult Hero see I'm a Cult Hero Hero cults were one of the most A shrine, the Homereion, was built devoted to him in Alexandria by Ptolemy IV Philopator in the late 3rd century BC. Alexandria ( Egyptian Arabic: اسكندريه Eskendereyya; Standard Arabic: ar الإسكندرية Al-Iskandariyya; Ἀλεξάνδρεια Ptolemy IV Philopator ( Greek:, Ptolemaĩos Philopátōr, reigned 221-205 BC son of Ptolemy III and Berenice II of Egypt was The 3rd century BC started the first day of 300 BC and ended the last day of 201 BC This shrine is described in Aelian's 3rd century work Varia Historia. Aelianus Tacticus, Greek military writer of the 2nd century CE resident at Rome is sometimes confused with Claudius Aelianus The 3rd century is the period from 201 to 300 in accordance with the Julian calendar in the Christian / Common Era. He describes how Ptolemy "placed in a circle around the statue [of Homer] all the cities who laid claim to Homer" and mentions a painting of the poet by the artist Galaton, which apparently depicted Homer in the aspect of Oceanus as the source of all poetry. Galaton ( Ancient Greek:) was an Ancient Greek painter whose picture representing Homer vomiting and other poets gathering up what fell from him is Ocean (Ὠκεανός was believed to be the world-ocean in Classical antiquity, which the ancient Romans and Greeks considered to be

A marble relief, found in Italy but thought to have been sculpted in Egypt, depicts the apotheosis of Homer. This article is about the country of Egypt For a topic outline on this subject see List of basic Egypt topics. It shows Ptolemy and his wife or sister Arsinoe III standing beside a seat poet, flanked by figures from the Odyssey and Iliad, with the nine Muses standing above them and a procession of worshippers approaching an altar, believed to represent the Alexandrine Homereion. Arsinoe III ( 246 BC or 245 BC - 204 BC was Queen of Egypt (220 - 204 BC In Greek mythology, the Muses ( Ancient Greek, hai moũsai: perhaps from the Proto-Indo-European root * men- "think" are Apollo, the god of music and poetry, also appears, along with a female figure tentatively identified as Mnemosyne, the mother of the Muses. Mnemosyne (Greek, nɪˈmɒzɪni or /nɪˈmɒsəni/ (sometimes confused with Mneme or compared with Memoria Zeus, the king of the gods, presides over the proceedings. Zeus (zjuːs in Greek: nominative: Zeús /zdeús/ genitive: Diós; Modern Greek /'zefs/ in Greek mythology The relief demonstrates vividly that the Greeks considered Homer not merely a great poet but the divinely-inspired reservoir of all literature. ^[45]

Homereia also stood at Chios, Ephesus and Smyrna, which were among the city-states that claimed to be his birthplace. Chios (Χίος pronounced ˈçio̞s alternative transliterations Khíos and Híos) is the fifth largest of the Greek islands, situated Ephesus ( Hittite Apasa; Ancient Greek; Turkish Efes) was a city of ancient Anatolia. This article is on the Ancient Greek city of Smyrna principally in connection with the ruins remaining to this day Strabo (14. Strabo ( Greek: Στράβων 63/64 BC – ca AD 24 was a Greek historian, geographer and philosopher. 1. 37) records a Homeric temple in Smyrna with an ancient xoanon or cult statue of the poet. A xoanon ( Greek: ξόανον plural ξόανα xoana, from the verb ξέειν xein, to carve or scrape) was an Archaic wooden He also mentions sacrifices carried out to Homer by the inhabitants of Argos, presumably at another Homereion. Argos ( Greek: Ἄργος, Árgos ˈaɾɣos is a city in Greece in the Peloponnese near Nafplio, which was its historic harbor ^[46]

Transmission and Publication

Though evincing many features characteristic of oral poetry, the Iliad and Odyssey were at some point committed to writing. The Greek script, adapted from a Phoenician syllabary around 800 B. A syllabary is a set of written symbols that represent (or approximate Syllables which make up Words A symbol in a syllabary typically represents an optional C. E. , made possible the notation of the complex rhythms and vowel clusters that make up hexametric verse. Homer's poems appear to have been recorded shortly after the alphabet's invention: an inscription from Ischia in the Bay of Naples, circa 740 B. For the comune see Ischia (comune. For the part of the human hip see Ischium Ischia is a Volcanic Island in the Naples ( Napoli, Neapolitan: Nàpule) is a historic City in southern Italy, the Capital of the C. E. , appears to refer to a text of the Iliad; likewise, illustrations seemingly inspired by the Polyphemus episode in the Odyssey are found on Samos, Mykonos and in Italy in the first quarter of the seventh century B. Polyphemus ( English launguage: fvmdkofmsdk transliterated as Polyphemos in Robert Fitzgerald 's translation is a character in Greek Mykonos ( Greek: Μύκονος is a Greek island and a mass tourist destination renowned for its cosmopolitan character and its intense nightlife C. E. . We have little information about the early condition of the Homeric poems, but Alexandrian editors stabilized the text in the second century BC, from which all modern texts descend.

In late antiquity, knowledge of Greek declined in Latin-speaking western Europe and, along with it, knowledge of Homer's poems. Late Antiquity (c 300-600 is a Periodization used by historians to describe the transitional centuries from Classical Antiquity to the Middle Ages, in It was not until the fifteenth century that Homer's work began to be read once more in Italy. The first printed edition appeared in 1488.

See also

Homeric topics

Works ascribed to Homer

Notable Modern Homeric Scholars

References

Selected bibliography

Editions

(texts in Homeric Greek)

• Demetrius Chalcondyles editio princeps, Florence, 1488
• the Aldine editions (1504 and 1517)
• Th. Demetrius Chalcocondyles or Demetrios Chalcocondylis or Chalcocondylas or Chalcondyles (1423 &ndash 1511 born in Athens, was one of the most Aldine Press was the Printing office started by Aldus Manutius in 1494 in Venice, from which were issued the celebrated Aldine editions of the Ridel, Strassbourg, ca. 1572, 1588 and 1592.
• Wolf (Halle, 1794-1795; Leipzig, 1804 1807)
• Spitzner (Gotha, 1832-1836)
• Bekker (Berlin, 1843; Bonn, 1858)
• La Roche (Odyssey, 1867-1868; Iliad, 1873-1876, both at Leipzig)
• Ludwich (Odyssey, Leipzig, 1889-1891; Iliad, 2 vols. , 1901 and 1907)
• W. Leaf (Iliad, London, 1886-1888; 2nd ed. 1900-1902)
• W. Walter Merry and James Riddell (Odyssey i. -xii. , 2nd ed. , Oxford, 1886)
• Monro (Odyssey xiii. -xxiv. with appendices, Oxford, 1901)
• Monro and Allen (Iliad), and Allen (Odyssey, 1908, Oxford).
• D. B. Monro and T. W. Allen 1917-1920, Homeri Opera (5 volumes: Iliad = 3rd edition, Odyssey = 2nd edition), Oxford. ISBN 0-19-814528-4, ISBN 0-19-814529-2, ISBN 0-19-814531-4, ISBN 0-19-814532-2, ISBN 0-19-814534-9
• H. van Thiel 1991, Homeri Odyssea, Hildesheim. ISBN 3-487-09458-4, 1996, Homeri Ilias, Hildesheim. ISBN 3-487-09459-2
• M. L. West 1998-2000, Homeri Ilias (2 volumes), Munich/Leipzig. ISBN 3-598-71431-9, ISBN 3-598-71435-1
• P. von der Mühll 1993, Homeri Odyssea, Munich/Leipzig. ISBN 3-598-71432-7
• Ilias in Wikisource

Interlinear translations

• John Jackson. John Jackson may refer to Politics: John Jackson (Tampa, mayor of Tampa Florida John Jackson (UK politician (1851&ndash1919 Homer: Iliad Books 1-12, & 13-24, ed. by Monro, 3rd Ed. : © Oxford Univ. Press 1902, parsing and English definitions © 2005 Free eBook for Palm Handheld
• John Jackson. John Jackson may refer to Politics: John Jackson (Tampa, mayor of Tampa Florida John Jackson (UK politician (1851&ndash1919 Homer: Odyssey © Oxford Univ. Press 1902, parsing and English definitions © 2006 Free eBook for Palm Handheld

English translations

Main article: English Translations of Homer

This is a partial list of translations into English of Homer's Iliad and Odyssey. This is a list of English translations

• Augustus Taber Murray (1866-1940)
  • Homer: Iliad, 2 vols. , revised by William F. Wyatt, Loeb Classical Library, Harvard University Press (1999).
  • Homer: Odyssey, 2 vols. , revised by George E. Dimock, Loeb Classical Library, Harvard University Press (1995).
• Robert Fitzgerald (1910–1985)
  • The Iliad, Farrar, Straus and Giroux (2004) ISBN 0-374-52905-1
  • The Odyssey, Farrar, Straus and Giroux (1998) ISBN 0-374-52574-9
• Robert Fagles (b. Robert Stuart Fitzgerald ( 12 October 1910 – 16 January 1985) was a poet critic and translator whose renderings of the Greek classics "became Robert Fagles ( September 11, 1933 &ndash March 26, 2008) was an American Professor, poet, and academic 1933)
  • The Iliad, Penguin Classics (1998) ISBN 0-14-027536-3
  • The Odyssey, Penguin Classics (1999) ISBN 0-14-026886-3
• Stanley Lombardo (b. Stanley F Lombardo (born 1943 is an American Professor of Classics at the University of Kansas. 1943)
  • Iliad, Hackett Publishing Company (1997) ISBN 0-87220-352-2
  • Odyssey, Hackett Publishing Company (2000) ISBN 0-87220-484-7
  • Iliad, (Audiobook) Parmenides (2006) ISBN 1-930972-08-3
  • Odyssey, (Audiobook) Parmenides (2006) ISBN 1-930972-06-7
  • The Essential Homer, (Audiobook) Parmenides (2006) ISBN 1-930972-12-1
  • The Essential Iliad, (Audiobook) Parmenides (2006) ISBN 1-930972-10-5
• Samuel Butler (novelist) (1835-1902)
  • The Iliad, Red and Black Publishers (2008) ISBN 978-1-934941-04-1
  • The Odyssey, Red and Black Publishers (2008) ISBN 978-1-934941-05-8

General works on Homer

• Pierre Carlier, Homère, Fayard 1999. Hackett Publishing Company Inc is an academic Publishing house based in Indianapolis, Indiana. Hackett Publishing Company Inc is an academic Publishing house based in Indianapolis, Indiana. Samuel Butler ( December 4, 1835 - June 18, 1902 was an iconoclastic Victorian author who published a variety of works including the ISBN 2-213-60381-2
• Pierre Vidal-Naquet, Le monde d'Homère, Perrin 2000. ISBN 2-262-01181-8
• Jacqueline de Romilly, Homère, Presses Universitaire de France, 5th ed. 2005. ISBN 2-13-054830-X
• J. Latacz 2004, Troy and Homer: Towards a Solution of an Old Mystery, Oxford, ISBN 0-19-926308-6; 5th updated and expanded edition, Leipzig 2005 (in Spanish 2003 ISBN 84-233-3487-2, modern Greek 2005 ISBN 960-16-1557-1)
• Robert Fowler (ed. ), The Cambridge Companion to Homer, CUP, Cambridge 2004. ISBN 0-521-01246-5
• I. Morris and B. B. Powell 1997, A New Companion to Homer, Leiden. ISBN 90-04-09989-1
• B. B. Powell 2007, "Homer," 2nd edition. Oxford. ISBN 978-1-4051-5325-5
• Wace, A.J.B.; F. Alan John Bayard Wace ( July 13, 1879 in Cambridge England – November 9, 1957, in Athens Greece was an English archaeologist and director H. Stubbings (1962). A Companion to Homer. ISBN 0-333-07113-1.  

Influential readings and interpretations

• E. Auerbach 1953, Mimesis, Princeton (orig. publ. in German, 1946, Bern), chapter 1. ISBN 0-691-11336-X
• M. W. Edwards 1987, Homer, Poet of the Iliad, Baltimore. ISBN 0-8018-3329-9
• B. Fenik 1974, Studies in the Odyssey, Wiesbaden ('Hermes' Einzelschriften 30).
• I. J. F. de Jong 1987, Narrators and Focalizers, Amsterdam/Bristol. ISBN 1-85399-658-0
• G. Nagy 1980, "The Best of the Achaeans", Baltimore. ISBN 978-0801860157

Commentaries

• Iliad:
  • P. V. Jones (ed. ) 2003, Homer's Iliad. A Commentary on Three Translations, London. ISBN 1-85399-657-2
  • G. S. Kirk (gen. Geoffrey Stephen Kirk ( 3 December 1921 – 10 March 2003) was a British classical scholar ed. ) 1985-1993, The Iliad: A Commentary (6 volumes), Cambridge. ISBN 0-521-28171-7, ISBN 0-521-28172-5, ISBN 0-521-28173-3, ISBN 0-521-28174-1, ISBN 0-521-31208-6, ISBN 0-521-31209-4
  • J. Latacz (gen. Joachim Latacz (born 4 April 1934, Katowice, Poland, at that time Autonomous District of Upper Silesia is a German classical philologist ed. ) 2002-, Homers Ilias. Gesamtkommentar. Auf der Grundlage der Ausgabe von Ameis-Hentze-Cauer (1868-1913) (2 volumes published so far, of an estimated 15), Munich/Leipzig. ISBN 3-598-74307-6, ISBN 3-598-74304-1
  • N. Postlethwaite (ed. ) 2000, Homer's Iliad: A Commentary on the Translation of Richmond Lattimore, Exeter. ISBN 0-85989-684-6
  • M. W. Willcock (ed. ) 1976, A Companion to the Iliad, Chicago. ISBN 0-226-89855-5
• Odyssey:
  • A. Heubeck (gen. ed. ) 1990-1993, A Commentary on Homer's Odyssey (3 volumes; orig. publ. 1981-1987 in Italian), Oxford. ISBN 0-19-814747-3, ISBN 0-19-872144-7, ISBN 0-19-814953-0
  • P. Jones (ed. ) 1988, Homer's Odyssey: A Commentary based on the English Translation of Richmond Lattimore, Bristol. ISBN 1-85399-038-8
  • I. J. F. de Jong (ed. ) 2001, A Narratological Commentary on the Odyssey, Cambridge. ISBN 0-521-46844-2

Trends in Homeric scholarship

"Classical" analysis

• A. Heubeck 1974, Die homerische Frage, Darmstadt. ISBN 3-534-03864-9
• R. Merkelbach 1969, Untersuchungen zur Odyssee (2nd edition), Munich. ISBN 3-406-03242-7
• D. Page 1955, The Homeric Odyssey, Oxford.
• U. von Wilamowitz-Möllendorff 1916, Die Ilias und Homer, Berlin.
• F. A. Wolf 1795, Prolegomena ad Homerum, Halle. Published in English translation 1988, Princeton. ISBN 0-691-10247-3

Neoanalysis

• M. E. Clark 1986, "Neoanalysis: a bibliographical review," Classical World 79. 6: 379-94.
• J. Griffin 1977, "The epic cycle and the uniqueness of Homer," Journal of Hellenic Studies 97: 39-53.
• J. T. Kakridis 1949, Homeric Researches, London. ISBN 0-8240-7757-1
• W. Kullmann 1960, Die Quellen der Ilias (Troischer Sagenkreis), Wiesbaden. ISBN 3-515-00235-9
• Rainer Friedrich, Formular Economy in Homer. The Poetics of the Breaches (Stuttgart: Franz Steiner Verlag, 2007), Pp. 159 (Hermes Einzelschriften, 100).

Homer and oral tradition

• E. Bakker 1997, Poetry in Speech: Orality and Homeric Discourse, Ithaca NY. ISBN 0-8014-3295-2
• J. M. Foley 1999, Homer's Traditional Art, University Park PA. ISBN 0-271-01870-4
• G. S. Kirk 1976, Homer and the Oral Tradition, Cambridge. ISBN 0-521-21309-6
• A. B. Lord 1960, The Singer of Tales, Cambridge MA. ISBN 0-674-00283-0
• M. Parry 1971, The Making of Homeric Verse, Oxford. ISBN 0-19-520560-X
• B. B. Powell, 1991, Homer and the Origin of the Greek Alphabet, ISBN 0-521-58907-X

Dating the Homeric poems

• R. Janko 1982, Homer, Hesiod and the Hymns, Cambridge. ISBN 0-521-23869-2

External links

• Works by Homer at Project Gutenberg. Project Gutenberg, abbreviated as PG, is a volunteer effort to Digitize, archive and distribute Cultural works
• Collection of Homer-related links
• Greek lessons based on Homer
• Clyde Pharr, Homer and the study of Greek
• Homer
• SORGLL: Homer, Iliad, Bk I, 1-52; read by Stephen Daitz