Studies on Homer and the Homeric Age, Vol. 1 of 3: I. Prolegomena II. Achæis; or, the Ethnology of the Greek RacesGladstone, W. E. (William Ewart)
History
Studies on Homer and the Homeric Age, Vol. 1 of 3: I. Prolegomena II. Achæis; or, the Ethnology of the Greek Races
Gladstone, W. E. (William Ewart)
Civilization, Homeric; Epic poetry, Greek -- History and criticism; Homer
The case stands only a little less distinctly as to song. There is an
ἀοιδὸς in the palace of Priam, as well as in that of Ulysses; one in
that of Agamemnon, and one in that of Alcinous. The Muses are Olympian
Muses. Olympus geographically was quite as much Hellic as Pelasgian,
and in every other sense, as I believe, far more. We may perhaps most
fairly estimate its national character, by contrasting the Jupiter
of Olympus with the Jupiter of Dodona, and the home of the large and
varied group of Grecian gods with the solitary grandeur which affords a
trace of the old Pelasgian worship. In this view Olympus and the Muses
will be clearly Hellic. Further[586], Thamyris in his boast supposes
the Muses to be contending against him at the public matches. If I have
been correct in tracing such matches to an Hellic source, Thamyris must
have regarded the Muses as Hellic when he made this supposition. Again,
Thamyris himself is a Θρὴξ, that is to say, a highlander: this connects
him with the Helli of the hills, not with the Pelasgians of the more
open country. The place, too, where the punishment is inflicted upon
Thamyris, is in the dominions of Pylus: which, at any rate for a term
equal to three generations before the _Troica_, had been Achæan, that
is, Hellic[587].
Apollo was doubtless an object of Pelasgian worship: the Apollo of
Homer however is not confined to the Pelasgians, but is by many signs,
scattered throughout the poems, placed in close as well as friendly
relations with the whole Greek nation. Among these may be reckoned his
acceptance of the propitiation and prayer offered by Calchas. In truth,
though it is his business, as the organ of Jupiter, to assist the
Trojans, he no where shows any of that hostility to their opponents,
which Neptune and Juno show to them.
_As to poetry and music._
In later times, the traditions of Orpheus, Musæus, and Eumolpus, always
Θρῇκες, supported the tradition which derives Greek song from the
mountain tribes.
Why has Arcadia a muse of her own, but because the Pelasgian poetry is
not the Hellic? and does not the reputed character of that muse oblige
us to assign a Hellic origin to the higher national poetry?
Public-domain text, read in full here on John Shaqi.
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