Bibliography.—The first complete edition of the Heliand was published by J. A. Schmeller in 1830; the second volume, containing the glossary and grammar, appeared in 1840. The standard edition is that of E. Sievers (1877), in which the texts of the Cotton and Munich MSS. are printed side by side. It is not provided with a glossary, but contains an elaborate and most valuable analysis of the diction, synonymy and syntactical features of the poem. Other useful editions are those of M. Heyne (3rd ed., 1903), O. Behaghel (1882) and P. Piper (1897, containing also the Genesis fragments). The fragments of the Heliand and the Genesis contained in the Vatican MS. were edited in 1894 by K. Zangemeister and W. Braune under the title Bruchstücke der altsächsischen Bibeldichtung. Among the works treating of the authorship, sources and place of origin of the poems, the most important are the following: E. Windisch, Der Heliand und seine Quellen (1868); E. Sievers, Der Heliand und die angelsächsische Genesis (1875); R. Kögel, Deutsche Literaturgeschichte, Bd. i. (1894) and Die altsächsische Genesis (1895); R. Kögel and W. Bruckner, “Althoch- und altniederdeutsche Literatur,” in Paul’s Grundriss der germanischen Philologie, Bd. ii. (2nd ed., 1901), which contains references to many other works; Hermann Collitz, Zum Dialekte des Heliand (1901).
(H. Br.)
[1] The term Volkssänger, commonly used in German discussions of this question, is misleading; the audience for heroic poetry was not “the people” in the modern sense, but the nobles.
HELICON, a mountain range, of Boeotia in ancient Greece, celebrated in classical literature as the favourite haunt of the Muses, is situated between Lake Copaïs and the Gulf of Corinth. On the fertile eastern slopes stood a temple and grove sacred to the Muses, and adorned with beautiful statues, which, taken by Constantine the Great to beautify his new city, were consumed there by a fire in A.D. 404. Hard by were the famous fountains, Aganippe and Hippocrene, the latter fabled to have gushed from the earth at the tread of the winged horse Pegasus, whose favourite browsing place was there. At the neighbouring Ascra dwelt the poet Hesiod, a fact which probably enhanced the poetic fame of the region. Pausanias, who describes Helicon in his ninth book, asserts that it was the most fertile mountain in Greece, and that neither poisonous plant nor serpent was to be found on it, while many of its herbs possessed a miraculous healing virtue. The highest summit, the present Palaeovouni (old hill), rises to the height of about 5000 ft. Modern travellers, aided by ancient remains and inscriptions, and guided by the local descriptions of Pausanias, have succeeded in identifying many of the ancient classical spots, and the French excavators have discovered the temple of the Muses and a theatre.
See also Clarke, Travels in Various Countries (vol. vii., 1818); Dodwell, Classical and Topographical Tour through Greece (1818); W. M. Leake, Travels in Northern Greece (vol. ii., 1835); J. G. Frazer’s edition of Pausanias, v. 150.
HELICON (Fr. hélicon, bombardon circulaire; Ger. Helikon), the circular form of the B♭ contrabass tuba used in military bands, worn round the body, with the enormous bell resting on the left shoulder and towering above the head of the performer. The pitch of the helicon is an octave below that of the euphonium. The idea of winding the long tube of the contrabass tuba and of wearing it round the shoulders was suggested by the ancient Roman buccina and cornu, represented in mosaics and on the sculptured reliefs surrounding Trajan’s Column. The buccina and cornu[1] differed in the diameter of their respective bores, the former having the narrow, almost cylindrical bore and harmonic series of the trumpet and trombone, whereas the cornu, having a bore in the form of a wide cone, was the prototype of the bugle and tubas.