Jan. 31. 1852.] 



NOTES AND QUERIES. 



99 



cuted ; to whom they originally belonged ; and if 

 there are du[)licates of them in existence, where 

 they may be seen. Edw. Auchmuty Glover. 



HOTES ON HOMEE, NO. I. 



Homeric Literature. 



There has been a very great difficulty In the 

 world of literature, which it were almost vain to 

 think of removing. This difficulty is that usually 

 known as " the Homeric question." After the 

 folios and quartos of the grand old scholars of an- 

 tiquity ; after the octavos of Wolf, Heyne, and 

 Knight ; after the able chapters of Grote, and the 

 eloquent volumes of Mure ; after the Alexandrian 

 Chorizontes; and after the incidental reflections 

 on the subject scattered through thousands of 

 volumes, it seems almost hazardous, and indeed 

 useless, to offer any more conjectures on " the 

 bard of ages," and (to use the phrase of the no- 

 velists) "his birth, education, and adventures." 

 On a consideration of the question, however, it 

 will be seen that (strange fact !) the subject is not 

 yet exhausted; I shall "therefore, with your kind 

 assistance, submit a retrospective view of the 

 matter to the readers of " IST. & Q." and after- 

 wards attempt to show what results may be drawn 

 from the united labour of so many minds. I shall 

 then give a resume, first, of the ancient history 

 bearing on Homer, and, continuing the sketch to the 

 late volumes of Mure, draw my own conclusions, 

 which, after much patient consideration, I must 

 say, appear to be neai-er an approximation to the 

 truth, than any theory which has yet been pro- 

 mulgated. 



Let us cast our eyes on antiquity. This very 

 much misunderstood period of the earth's progress 

 offers to us the proofs of an appreciation of Homer 

 to which literary history affords but one parallel. 

 The magnificent flights of thought, which the 

 Hellenes could so well accompany, the tone of 

 colouring at once so subdued and so glorious, 

 gained for the unknown poet a reputation ever- 

 lasting and world and age-wide. But as time fled 

 by, there arose a race of men who wrote poetry as 

 schoolboys do Latin, by judiciously arranging (or 

 vice versa) appropriate lines from the earlier 

 poets, called Cyclic poets, or cento-makers. The 

 men who wrote thus were, probably, persons 

 either engaged in itinerant vocal pursuits, or 

 regular verse makers, who wrote " on a sub- 

 ject," as our own street writers on the present 

 day. Indeed, I may say, that the state of the 

 rhapsodists of Greece resembles much that of our 

 own " itinerant violinists," as an eminent counsel 

 once a[)ostrophized the class which the excellent 

 judge on the bench named, according to general 

 custom, " blin' fiddlers." The probable reason 

 for the introduction of passages into the original 



Homeric compositions was the necessity of a 

 novelty. The Cyclic poems are to Homer what 

 the letters of Poplicola, Anti-Sejanus, Correggio, 

 Moderator, and the rest, were to Junius. How- 

 ever, they prove in a remarkable manner how- 

 great the excitement regarding " the poet," as 

 Aristoteles calls him, ever continued to be in 

 Hellas. 



These gentlemen, whose object was not to dis- 

 grace Homer by their puling compositions, but 

 only to practically observe the maxims subse- 

 quently instilled by lago into Roderigo's mind 

 (viz., to "put money in their purse"), were 

 the precursors of another race of writers. In 

 ancient times, we are informed by Tatian*, there 

 were many writers on Homer, whose works, it is 

 to be lamented, have perished with the nominal 

 exception of a few fragments, — though, perhaps, 

 scholars will once learn to use those as a clue, and 

 find, as Burges did in the case of Thucydidesf , that 

 many valuable passages are lying hid in the pages 

 of the lexicographers, who spared themselves the 

 trouble of writing fresh matter, by merely slightly 

 changing the expressions of their sources, and not 

 " bothering " their lexicographical brains by at- 

 tempting original composition. It is thus, that 

 even the weaknesses of the human mind benefit 

 after ages ! 



The names furnished us by Tatian are these : — 

 Theagenes of llhegium (the earliest writer of 

 whom we are cognizant, contemporary with 

 Cambyses) ; Stesirabrotos of Thasos (contem- 

 porary with Pericles \) ; Antimachos of Claros ; 

 Herodotos, Dionysios of Olynthos, Ephoros of 

 Cyme ; Philochoros of Athens, Metacleides, Cha- 

 maeleon of Heracleia § ; Zenodotos of Ephesus, 

 (b.c. 280); Aristophanes of Byzantium (b. c. 264); 

 Callimachus, whose poetry, by the way, is dryer 

 and more vapid than his prose, if the little we have 

 left of him allows us to form an opinion ; Crates 

 of Malfus (b. c. 157) ; Eratosthenes of Cyrene ; 

 Aristarchos of Samothrace, and Apollodoros of 

 Athens. The minds or pens of these men in Hellas 

 alone, were occupied with this grand subject ; and 

 in Rome, that city of translations and " crib," we 

 find the pens of the scribes were at work, and pro- 

 lific in prolixity. Besides these authors, there are 

 others whose attempts at illustrating the text of 

 the writers of antiquity have been met in a most 



« Fabr. Bihl Grcec. II. 1. iii. 



f Journ. of the Royal Sac. of Literature, vol. ii., New 

 Series, and afterwards in a pamphlet in 1845. 



J Plato, Ion, p. 550. c. ; Xenoph. Mem. iv. 2. § 10. ; 

 Sympos. iii. 5. ; Plutarch, TViewisf. 2. 24. ; Cim. 4. 14. 

 16. ; Per. 8. 10. 13. 26. 36. ; Strabo, x. p. 472. ; Athen. 

 xiii. p. 598. e. 



§ Quoted by Athenaeus (ix. p. 374. a.) under the 

 title of Xlipi Tr\s apxaiai Ka>p,oiiSlas, which, however, is 

 also the name of a work by Eumelus. 



