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Did Homer Really Write the “Iliad” & “Odyssey”? Who Wrote the Trojan Epics?
The Iliad and the Odyssey are two of the most popular and influential poems in Western history. Composed during the Archaic period, they were already famous as renowned works of literature in Classical Greece; even Alexander the Great carried a copy of the Iliad with him. The Greeks glorified Homer, a supposedly blind poet, as the author of these two poems. However, is there actually good evidence that Homer was the composer of the Iliad and the Odyssey? Some scholars believe that a different poet can be identified as the author of these Trojan epics.
Homer as the Composer of the Iliad & Odyssey
Homer and His Guide, by William-Adolphe Bouguereau, 1874. Source: Milwaukee Art Museum, Wisconsin
As far back as we can find in the records, the Iliad and the Odyssey have been attributed to Homer. For example, Herodotus was a Greek historian active in the middle of the 5th century BC. He extensively discussed certain parts of the Iliad, freely connecting the work to Homer without hesitation. It is clear that in Herodotus’ time, the attribution of this poem to Homer was widely accepted. The same can be said regarding the Odyssey, which Herodotus also attributes to Homer.
We can trace this attribution further back. At some point around the middle of the 6th century BC, a custom was established in Athens that involved the recital of Homer’s poems. The poets who recited them were known as the Homeridae, or “Sons of Homer.” Furthermore, the late-6th-century BC Homeric Hymn to Apollo refers to a blind poet from Chios who composed songs that would be supreme over all others; a clear reference to Homer and his two epic poems.
Why Some Scholars Reject Homeric Authorship
Depiction of warfare from the Iliad in Codex F205, c. 500 AD. Source: University of Oxford
With the aforementioned evidence in mind, we can see that the Iliad and the Odyssey were attributed to Homer from an early date. Why, then, do some modern scholars reject Homer’s authorship of these poems? To be clear, most scholars today accept that the Iliad was essentially the work of a single mind. The unity in the poem makes that clear. Whether the Odyssey was composed by the same poet is more controversial. However, that poem also seems to have been composed by a single individual (or, at most, a small guild working closely together). Therefore, it would seem as if the firm tradition from antiquity that they were composed by Homer could well be true.
However, scholars have pointed out some chronological issues with this traditional viewpoint. There is strong evidence that the Iliad and the Odyssey were products of the mid-7th century BC. This is clear from an analysis of the descriptions of the weapons, armor, warfare, customs, geography, and geopolitical features of the world in both poems. This is also evident from when scenes from the poems first appear on artwork on Greek pottery.
Statue of Herodotus at Bodrum, Turkey. Source: Wikimedia Commons
This is an issue because Homer is frequently thought to have lived before the 7th century BC. Herodotus, for example, placed Homer 400 years before his time, in the middle of the 9th century BC. Other ancient references place him not too long after the Trojan War. One notable example is Eratosthenes, who placed Homer just 100 years after the events he allegedly described in his poems.
Homeric scholar Hans van Wees summarized the argument with the following:
“The chief reason why scholars have been prepared to overlook such, surely obvious, objections [to an 8th century BC date for the Trojan epics] is… that these arguments support the earliest possible date, and only the earliest possible date can rescue the ancient belief that the epics had been created by Homer.”
In other words, accepting Homer as the author of these poems depends on their having been composed in the 8th century BC or earlier. Given the clear evidence that the Iliad and the Odyssey were created in the 7th century BC, this contradicts the belief that Homer created them.
Ancient depiction of a musician using the type of lyre allegedly invented by Terpander, c. 470 BC, Agora Museum, Thessaloniki. Source: Egisto Sani via Flickr
Some scholars, such as Hans van Wees himself, suggest that the true author of the Iliad and the Odyssey was a poet called Terpander. He lived in the 7th century BC and is generally accepted as a historical figure. Like Homer, Terpander was renowned in antiquity for his contributions to poetic tradition in ancient Greece. He was also said to have devoted himself primarily to the recital of the Homeric poems, that is, the Iliad and the Odyssey. Some ancient sources also mention that he imitated the musical style of Homer.
We also find evidence for this theory from the aforementioned Homeric Hymn to Apollo. This was the creation of a 6th-century BCE rhapsode, one of the “Sons of Homer.” It appears to have been composed by a certain Cynaethus, yet the poem itself claims that it is the work of the “blind poet” (Homer) mentioned within the text. In other words, the poem claims that it is the work of Homer, despite actually being the work of one of the “Sons of Homer” in the 6th century BC. The same can be said for the other Homeric Hymns, which date primarily from that same century. This demonstrates that poems that were not actually written by Homer were frequently attributed to him.
Regarding Terpander, it is notable that at least one ancient source in the Hellenistic period claimed that he was the composer of this Homeric Hymn to Apollo. Conceivably, this could reflect an otherwise forgotten tradition that he was equated with Homer.
An Alternative Viewpoint
Eratosthenes Teaching in Alexandria, Bernardo Strozzi, c. 1635. Source: Mark Mauno via Flickr
As we have seen, this argument is fundamentally rooted in the chronology of Homer compared to the date of the composition of the Iliad and the Odyssey. The idea is that Homer lived too early to be the real composer of these poems. However, does this argument really stand up to scrutiny? As Hans van Wees himself acknowledged, Theopompos, in the 4th century BC, only a century after Herodotus and a century before Eratosthenes, placed Homer in the 7th century BC. Euphorion, a poet and grammarian who also predates Eratosthenes, likewise placed Homer in the 7th century BC.
Even Herodotus cannot really be used as evidence for placing Homer in the 9th century BC. What Herodotus actually said is that he supposed that Homer lived no more than 400 years before his own time. In other words, this was Herodotus’ attempt at an upper limit for Homer’s lifetime. We do not know how Herodotus arrived at this upper limit. However, if he based this estimate on an unusually long average generation length, then a more realistic average would bring Homer much further forward in time.
Ancient Greek pottery depicting scenes of the Trojan War. Source: Rob Koopman via Flickr
Demetrius of Magnesia in the 1st century BC made Homer a contemporary of Thaletas, a 7th-century BC individual. We should also not ignore the tradition that Homer was a contemporary of the grandfather of Pythagoras’ teacher. Given that Pythagoras was born in 570 BC, this clearly places Homer in the 7th century BC.
It is true that the evidence from the Homeric Hymns shows that poems could be attributed to Homer without having actually been written by him. Yet, the reason why we know this is, in part, precisely because ancient sources directly tell us so, as the evidence regarding Cynaethus and the Homeric Hymn to Apollo shows. In contrast, no ancient source ever attributes the Iliad and the Odyssey to anyone else.
Did Homer Compose the Iliad & Odyssey?
Bust of Homer, Roman copy of a 2nd-century BC original. Source: British Museum
The entire existence of the “Sons of Homer” and the desire to attribute their poems to their old master would be nonsensical if Homer had not been the composer of renowned poems. The idea that a rhapsode composed the Iliad and the Odyssey and simply attributed them to Homer would negate the entire reason why Homer was famous and considered worthy of such attributions in the first place.
Additionally, regarding a suggestion that Cynaethus may have been the true composer, with a certain Onomacritus as his scribe, Hans van Wees wrote:
“…given that our sources seem to know quite a bit about both these figures, it is odd that there is never any mention of their role in publishing “Homer,” which would surely have been their greatest claim to fame.”
Crucially, this exact same logic would equally apply to Terpander. He is frequently mentioned in ancient sources, yet not a single one makes him the composer of the Iliad and the Odyssey. It seems perverse to accept Hans van Wees’ argument against Cynaethus composing these poems but yet accept the idea that Terpander may have been their true composer.
Given the reasonable evidence that Homer was actually a figure of the 7th century BC, the easiest explanation is simply that he really was the composer of the Iliad and the Odyssey, as tradition asserts.
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