laurel, the symbol of Apollo's inspiration. In the 5th century B.C. we find that various Greek cities had their own editions ([Greek: hai politikai, kata poleis] or [Greek: ek poleon ekdoseis]) of the poems, for recitation at their festivals. Among these were the editions of Massilia, of Chios and of Argolis. There were also editions bearing the name of the individual editor ([Greek: hai kat' andra])--the best known being that which Aristotle prepared for Alexander. The recension of the poems by Aristarchus (156 B.C.) became the standard one, and is probably that on which the existing text is based. The oldest Homeric MS. extant, Venetus A of the _Iliad_, is of the 10th century; the first printed edition of Homer was that edited by the Byzantine Demetrius Chalcondyles (Florence, 1488). The Homeric question. The ancient Greeks were almost unanimous in believing the _Iliad_ and the _Odyssey_ to be the work of one man, Homer, to whom they also ascribed some extant hymns, and probably much more besides. Aristotle and Aristarchus seem to have put Homer's date about 1044 B.C., Herodotus about 850 B.C. It is not till about 170 B.C. that the grammarians Hellanicus and Xenon put forward the view that Homer was the author of the _Iliad_, but not of the _Odyssey_. Those who followed them in assigning different authors to the two poems were called the Separators (_Chorizontes_). Aristarchus combated "the paradox of Xenon," and it does not seem to have had much acceptance in antiquity. Giovanni Battista Vico, a Neapolitan (1668-1744), seems to have been the first modern to suggest the composite authorship and oral tradition of the Homeric poems; but this was a pure conjecture in support of his theory that the names of ancient lawgivers and poets are often mere symbols. F. A. Wolf, in the _Prolegomena_ to his edition (1795), was the founder of a scientific scepticism. The _Iliad_, he said (for he recognized the comparative unity and consistency of the _Odyssey_), was pieced together from many small unwritten poems by various hands, and was first committed to writing in the time of Peisistratus. This view was in harmony with the tone of German criticism at the time; it was welcomed as a new testimony to the superiority of popular poetry, springing from fresh natural sources, to elaborate works of art; and it at once found enthusiastic adherents. For the course of Homeric controversy since Wolf the reader is referred to the article HOMER. Cyclic poems.