A Dictionary of Greek and Roman biography and mythology. By various writers. Ed. by William Smith. Illustrated by numerous engravings on wood.

HOM ERUS. IHOMERUS. 50i
The whole of'antiquity unanimously vieu ed the Greeks. Wood, lead, brass, stone, are not proper
Iliad and the Odyssey as the productions of a cer- materials for writing down poems consisting of
tain individual, called Homer. No doubt of this fact twenty four books. Even hides, which were used
ever entered the mind of any of the ancients; and by the Ionians, seem too clumsy for this purpose,
even a large number of other poems were attributed and, besides, we do not know whlen they were first
to thesameauthor. This opinion continued unshaken in use. (Herod. v. 58.) It was not before the
down to the year 1795, when F. A. Wolf wrote sixth century B. c. that papyrus became easily
his famous Prolegomena, in which he endeavoured accessible to the Greeks, through the king Amato show that the Iliad and Odyssey were not two sis, who first opened Egypt to Greek traders.
complete poems, but small, separate, independent The laws of Lycurgus were not committed to
epic songs, celebrating single. exploits of the heroes, writing; those of Zaleucus, in Locri Epizephyrii,
and that these lays were for tlte first time written in the 29th 01. (B. C. 664), are particularly,. redown and united, as the Iliad and Odyssey, by corded as the first laws that were written down.
Peisistratus, the tyrant of Athens. This opinion, (Scymn. Perieg. 313; Strab. vi. p. 259.) The laws
startling and paradoxical as it seemed, was not en- of Solon, seventy years later. were written on wood
tirely new. Casaubon had already doubted the and eovUcrpo~bln60. Wolf allows that all these concommon opinion regarding Homer, and the great siderations do not prove that no use at all was
Bentley had said expressly "1 that Homer wrote a made of the art of writing as early as the seventh
sequel of songs and rhapsodies. These loose songs and eighth centuries B. c., which would be parwere not collected together in the form of an ticularly improbable in the case of the lyric poets,
epic poem till about 500 years after." (Letter such as Archilochus, Alcman, Pisander, and Arion,
by Phileleuthlerus Lipsiensis, ~ 7.) Some French but that before the time of the seven sages, that is,
writers, Perrault and Hedelin, and the Italian the time when prose writing first originated, the art
Vico, had made similar conjectures, but all these was not so common that we can suppose it to have
were forgotten and overborne by the common been -employed for such extensive works as the
and general opinion, and the more easily, as these poems of Homer. Wolf (Prol. p. 77) alleges the
bold conjectures had been thrown out almost at testimony of Josephus (c. Apion. i. 2):'O4e ical
hazard, and without sound arguments to support dO'Ais eyYwo-av oi "EAh 4ves QP'v?ypaAyc'owv... Kai
them. When therefore WVolf's Prolegomena ap- Qa-tv ovsE'OTOV (i.e. Homerum) EV ypzpa4a.
peared, the whole literary world was startled by rmv a'oro e7rsosfv KtaaAn7rstv, cAahd 8Lagtv7uovyevothe boldness and novelty of his positions. His /piev V C aCV'yscwv'oepov ovPTrOieav. (Bebook, of course, excited great opposition, but no sides Schol. ap. Villois. Anecd. Gr. ii. p. 182.) But
one has to this day been able to refute the principal Wolf draws still more convincing arguments from
arguments of that great critic, and to re-establish the poems themselves. In II. vii. 175, the Grecian
the old opinion, which he overthrew. His views, heroes decide by lot who is to fight with Hector.
hlowever, have been materially modified by pro- The lots are marked by each respective hero, and
tracted discussions, so that now we can almost all thrown into a helmet, which is shaken till one
venture to say that the question is settled. We lot is jerked out. This is handed round by the
will first state Wolf's principal arguments, and the herald till it reaches Ajax, who recognises the
chief objections of his opponents, and will then en- mark he had made on it as his own. If this mark
deavour to discover the most probable result of all had been any thing like writing, the herald would
these inquiries. have read it at once, and not have handed it round.
In 1770, R. Wood published a book On the ori- In Ii. vi. 168, we have the story of Bellerophon,
ginal Genius of h1om2er, in which he mooted the whom Proetus sends to Lycia,
question whether the Homeric poems had originally r,
been wzritten or not. This idea was caught up by pOprrv 8' OC Guava Avepp,
Wolf, and proved the foundation of all his inquiries. rpaI/s Tv'O TK 6Odopp d rAd.
But the most important assistance which he ob- Ae7ar 8' qvo6ye z v -7reP6Ep y, OP a/7r,
tained was from the discovery and publication of Wolf shows that o'rj~Iaa?hvrpd are a kind of conthe famous Venetian scholia by Villoison (1788). ventional marks, and not letters, and that this story
These valuable s cholia, in giving us some insight into is far from proving the existence of writing.
the studies of the Alexandrine critics, furnished Throughout the whole of Homer every thing is calmaterials and an historical basis for -Wolf's in- culated to be heard, nothing to be read. Not a
quiries. The point from which VWolf started was, single epitaph, nor any other inscription, is menas we have said, the idea that the Homeric poems tioned; the tombs of the heroes are rude mounds
were originally not written. To prove this, he of earth; coins are unknown. In Od. viii. 163, an
entered into a minute and accurate discussion con- overseer of a ship is mentioned, who, instead of
cerning the age of the art of writing. He set aside, having a list of the cargo, must remember it; he is
as groundless fables, the traditions which ascribed poprov 1AvYtzIeL. All this seemed to prove, without
the invention or introduction of this art to Cadmus, the possibility of doubt, that the art of writing was
Cecrops, Orpheus, Linus, or Palamedes. Then, entirely unknown at the time of the Trojan war,
allowing that letters were known in Greece at a and could not have been common at the time when
very early period, he justly. insists upon the great the poems were composed.
difference which exists between the knowledge of'Among the opponents of Wolf, there is none
the letters and their general euse for works of lite- superior to Greg. W. Nitzsch, in zeal, perseverance,
rature.'Writing is first applied to public monu- learning, and acuteness. He wrote a series of
mnents, inscriptions, and religious purposes, centuries monographies (Quaestion. HIomeric. Specimn. i. 1824;
before it is employed for the common purposes of indcagandae per Odyss. Inteopplationis Praeparatio,
social life. This is still more certain to be the case 1828; De Hist. Homeri, fascic." i. 1830; De
when the common ordinary materials for writing Aristotele contra Wolfianos, 1831; Patria'et Aetas
are wanting, as they were among the ancient iiom.) to refute Wolf'and his supporters, and he
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