| Homer | [ L. Homerus, Gr. "O`mhpos, one who puts together; a hostage; a pledge agreed upon between two parties.] The poet to whom is assigned by very ancient tradition the authorship of the Iliad and the Odyssey, and of certain hymns to the gods ("Homeric Hymns"). Other poems also, as the "Batrachomyomachia" ("Battle of the Frogs and Mice"), were with less certainty attributed to him. Of his personality nothing is known. Seven cities -- Smyrna, Rhodes, Colophon, Salamis (in Cyprus), Chios, Argos, and Athens -- contended for the honor of being his birthplace: of these, the best evidence connects him with Smyrna. He was said to have died on the island of Ios. The tradition that he lived on the island of Chios, and in his old age was blind, is supported by the Hymn to the Delian Apollo. Modern destructive criticism has led to the doubt whether such a person as Homer existed at all, the great epics which bear that name being supposed to be, in their existing form, of a composite character, the product of various persons and ages. It is altogether probable, however, that the nucleus of the Iliad, at least, was the work of a single poet of commanding genius. (See Iliad, Odyssey, and the quotation below.) Various dates have been assigned to Homer. According to Herodotus he lived about 850 b. c.; others give a later date, and some a date as early as 1200 b. c. His poems were sung by professional reciters (rhapsodists, who went from city to city. (See Homeridae.) They were given substantially their present form by Pisistratus or his sons Hipparchus and Hippias, who ordered the rhapsodists to recite them at the Panathenaic festival in their order and completeness. The present text of the poems, with their division into books, is based upon the work of the Alexandrine critics.
We may assume it as certain that there existed in Ionia schools or fraternities of epic rhapsodists who composed and recited heroic lays at feasts, and often had friendly contests in these recitations. The origin of these recitations may be sought in northern Greece, from which the fashion migrated in early days to Asia Minor. We may assume that these singers became popular in many parts of Greece, aud that they wandered from court to court, glorifying the heroic ancestors of the various chiefs. One among them, called Homer, was endowed with a genius superior to the rest, and struck out a plot capable of nobler and larger treatment. It is likely that this superiority was not recognized at the time, and that he remained all his life a singer like the rest, a wandering minstrel, possibly poor and blind. The listening public gradually stamped his poem with their approval, they demanded its frequent recitation, and so this Homer began to attain a great posthumous fame. But when this fame led people to inquire into his life and history, it had already passed out of recollection, and men supplied by fables what they had forgotten or neglected. The rhapaodists, however, then turned their attention to expanding and perfecting his poem, which was greatly enlarged and called the Iliad. In doing this they had recourse to the art of writing, which seems to have been in use when Homer framed his poem, but which was certainly employed when the plan was enlarged with episodes. The home of the original Homer seems to have been about Smyrna, and in contact with both Aeolic and Ionic legends. Hia date is quite uncertain: it need not be placed before 800 B. C., and is perhaps later, but not after 700 a. c. Mahaffy, Hist. of Classical Greek Lit., I. 81. [century Dict. 1906.] |
| Homer | n. [ Heb. khōmer. ] A Hebrew measure containing, as a liquid measure, ten baths, equivalent to fifty-five gallons, two quarts, one pint; and, as a dry measure, ten ephahs, equivalent to six bushels, two pecks, four quarts. [ Written also chomer, gomer. ] [ 1913 Webster ] |
