Sketches of Imposture, Deception, and Credulity

by R. A. Davenport

It has been maintained that neither the Iliad nor the Odyssey is the work of a single mind, but a collection of the songs of the wandering rhapsodists, as they were called, and, for the first time, completely arranged at Athens under the inspection of Pisistratus, or his son. Pisistratus is mentioned by Ælian as the compiler of the Iliad and the Odyssey. This theory reduces Homer to a name merely; or, at best, as only one bard more celebrated than the rest, or, perhaps, as nothing more than a successful reciter. This idea respecting the authenticity of the above poems, was again started, about the close of the seventeenth century, by Perrault and others, but was received with derision by the learned world.

More recently, it has been again advocated, with great learning, by Heyne; and, with wonderful acuteness, by Professor Wolf, of Berlin.

It appears from the best accounts, that these poems, said to be the production of Homer, were first brought into Greece by Lycurgus; who had heard them in the course of his travels among the Chians, by means of the recitation of their rhapsodists; nor were they then in that perfect form in which they were afterwards presented by Pisistratus, to whom the credit of the arrangement appears to have been generally given by Cicero and others.

The arguments used by Wolf and Heyne are, firstly, the improbability that in such a dark age as that in which Homer is reputed to have lived, and of which so few traces are left, one man should have been capable of composing works of such extent, consistency, and poetical elevation, as the Iliad or Odyssey.

Secondly, that poems of such a length should have been composed, and preserved entire, without being committed to writing. Now there is not the least trace, even in tradition, of any complete copy of Homer’s works, till the existence of the Athenian edition, or at least of that of Lycurgus. No notice is taken in the poems of any epistolary correspondence, though in the Odyssey many opportunities occur where such might have been introduced.

Thirdly, the Greek alphabet was not received at Athens till the ninety-fourth Olympiad, that is, about four hundred and three years before Christ, whereas the works of Homer were dated from the nine hundred and seventh year before Christ. The writing materials also must have been scanty and inadequate to the preservation of a poem of fifteen thousand lines; stone and metal being the only materials on which, in early times, characters were imprinted.

Fourthly, in these ancient poems, no reference is ever made to written treaties; treaties being then only verbal, and ratified by superstitious rites.

Fifthly, the rhapsodists flourished in the earliest times, answering to the Celtic bards in our history; and all who followed this profession recited from memory; by the exercise of which faculty they derived honour and emolument. Without the modern aids to composition, how, it was asked, could any poet keep the plan, or previous part of his design, in his recollection? or, if that were possible, could he have ever expected to procure an audience, to whom such a work should be submitted?

It is more than probable, that the original poems, or series of poetical sketches, were exposed to perpetual variation, from passing through the heads of the rhapsodists; many of whom were, doubtless, also poets, and who, in the warmth of recitation, would make changes unconsciously, or, perhaps, purposely introduce them, to produce greater effect on their hearers. From Ælian we learn that anciently the books of the Iliad or Odyssey were never recited in the order in which they now stand.