Homer the One of the Iliad

Biography

Homer, the blind poet, is generally regarded as the author of the Iliad and the Odyssey, which are dated to be from the end of the eighth century or early seventh century BCE. Numerous Greek cities claim themselves as Homer's birthplace, but scholars now believe Smyrna and Chios (across the Aegean Sea from mainland Greece) to be the most logical locations. Nothing is known of Homer's life, although ancient Greeks viewed him as a wandering, poverty-stricken minstrel.

Some scholars, however, have questioned whether one person wrote the Iliad and the Odyssey and whether, in turn, each of these might have been created by more than one person. The differences in the language, social customs, and view of the gods from the Iliad to the Odyssey were what the separatists pointed to as proof that the works were not developed by one man. Yet for the Unitarians and Ancient Greeks, who believed one author was responsible for both, the differences are feasible in light of the very differing subjects of the works. Similarly, the language of the two is similar, and the Odyssey is a sequel to the Iliad, with the characters from one to the other remaining constant in personality.

When in the eighteenth century it was espoused that Homer didn't, in fact, write, it was questioned how such long works could have been created. The idea was proposed that that there was a core of shorter ballad-type poems that had been composed and that these had been expanded upon over the years by collective effort or perhaps by one editor. This concept also would account for discrepancies within the works. Attempts to show, however, that the work had been created over an extended period of time proved fruitless. For example, analyzing the linguistic features proved problematic; partially because the language of the poem was one created solely for poetic use and had not ever been spoken. Similarly, analyzing the work from a historical perspective proved ineffective, since while it appeared that different sections were written at different times, the results obtained by those with a historical perspective did not match results obtained by other methods that had been used to date the sections. Archaeological examination proved equally frustrating.

The work of Milman Parry provided new information on the tradition of oral poetry and composition. He studied material comparable to Homer's work that was still surviving in Yugoslavia and suggested that discrepancies and seeming inconsistences in Homer were likely if his composing techniques had followed the centuries-old tradition of oral poetry. For example, while many had commented on Homer's use of repeated phrases, assuming they were used to fill out lines to their required number of stresses, now it was theorized that these were indeed used to fill out lines but that they were designed to help the performer. For example, if there were a few phrases available when describing Achilles, the reciter could choose one extemporaneously to fit his need for a particular line.

Over time, many scholars reverted ...