HOMER: BIOGRAPHY, FACTS, INFLUENCES, WORKS - BIOGRAPHIES - 2025

Homer (8th century BC?), Was a legendary Greek author, from whose pen it is believed that two of the most important works of the ancient period were produced: the Iliad and the Odyssey. In his work there is no record of the writer's life and the records that account for him were created a posteriori.

Although the veracity of his existence is controversial, that was not an impediment for several authors, since ancient times, to create mythical biographies with different information about his place or date of birth, family and cities in which he lived.

Bust of Homer, by British Museum, via Wikimedia Commons

Another subject of debate among scholars was whether Homer composed his works following an oral structure or whether, on the contrary, from the beginning they were conceived as essentially literary creations.

Important facts about Homer

It is believed that countless myths about his life were created to support Homer's legacy as a writer. The authorship of his poems has raised doubts, even among those who are thought to have been his contemporaries.

Although tradition indicates that Homer is the creator of the Iliad and the Odyssey, some thinkers have concluded that the differences in style are proof that they belong to different authors and times.

Homer, by Rembrandt, via Wikimedia Commons

Among all the biographies that were made about this obscure character, the data assigned to him varied again and again: no less than seven cities were named the birthplace of the author of the greatest Greek works.

According to Michael Schmith, the interesting thing about studying each of the lives that Homer has been given is that fragments emerge from all of them that present different attitudes, both of the historical or mythological figure, and of his work.

Homeric question

All these doubts have historically been dubbed the "Homeric Question." Among the debate is the question about the origin of the name Homer, since it is not known if it was one or more men.

This legendary writer occupied such a privileged place in the Greek imagination that they used to call him in classical texts simply "the author", as an antonomastic figure. In addition to the two greatest epics of Greek antiquity, many other compositions were attributed to Homer.

The debate over its existence flared up in the mid-1700s, which was when it was more firmly supported than Homer's works as nothing more than a compilation of epic songs.

The conception of Homer as an author of the oral tradition gained support at this time, since in the period of time around the Trojan War the Greeks did not master writing techniques on papyrus, material in which long texts of comfortable way.

Homer's bust, photo by Gunnar Bach Pedersen, via Wikimedia Commons

Consequently, it was normal for authors to memorize long verses or songs to recite before an audience. Although in the case of Homeric compositions, memorizing their works would have taken more time than was considered common at that time.

Language

The language used in his works varies, which suggests that they were written in different times and places. However, most are based on Ionian Greek, an element that for some supports the claim that this was their region of origin.

Homer's texts served a purpose of utmost importance to Greek society. They were widely disseminated among its citizens: even those who could not read knew the Homeric passages by heart.

Name and legend

The etymology of the name Homer has been one of the elements by which it has been tried to trace the steps or the existence of the legendary author.

Some say that the origin of the name comes from a Greek word for "blind", which would indicate that the poet had vision problems.

Others claim that Homers, in ancient Greek, referred to hostages, so it was assumed that he or his father could have been prisoners. According to other records, Homer had been a nickname that described the poet and his real name was Melesigenes.

Biography

Birth

The human and the divine are intertwined in each of the lives that have been given to Homer since his figure appeared as a popular author. Dozens of cities have fought over saying that the mythical author was born on their land, but few have a sustainable basis for his claims.

Seven places are the most mentioned, since ancient times, as the cradle of Homer: Smyrna, Chios, Colophon, Cumás, Argos, Ithaca and Athens itself.

Homer, by British Museum, via Wikimedia Commons

Others claim that he was a native of Egypt or Cyprus, but nothing is certain about the greatest poet of the beginning of time. In addition, there is no precision about its birth, since the fan dates from the 11th century BC. C., to the VIII a. C.

While some consider that he lived near the Trojan War, others think that he had to have been born later to the Greek approach to writing, in order to establish his work.

The former tend to be identified with the idea that Homer had followed the oral tradition when making his compositions, or that these are creations of multiple poets. The other party tends to support the idea that authorship is unitary.

Traditional life

There are several stories about Homer's life and conception. The one that is most renowned, and also has the greatest antiquity, is the piece written by Herodotus. In this version it is stated that the poet's real name was Melesigenes and that he was born in Smyrna.

His mother was Criteis, an orphan girl who became pregnant without having married, for which she was forced to leave her hometown of Cumas. Once established in her new home, she agreed to be with a teacher named Femio who recognized the young Melesigenes as her son.

According to the story, Melesigenes was a very intelligent child, and that made him stand out among his peers. By reaching adulthood he had already equaled, or surpassed, his own teacher's skill in the art of teaching. In fact, when Femio died, the school passed into the hands of his stepson.

Then the young man set sail to see the world first-hand in the company of Mind, who was a sailor. After many adventures, Melesigenes fell ill and later lost his vision. From then on he began to call himself Homer, which meant "blind."

Other versions

In other stories about the life of Homer, it is said that he was the son of the river Meles, together with Criteis and from there came his name "Melesigenes", which can be translated as born from - or in - the Meles.

Some versions assure that the poet's mother was not an ordinary woman, but a nymph.

The young Criteis was also said to have been kidnapped and forced to marry the King of Lydia named Meon, with whom she conceived Homer. The boy, it seems, was born on the banks of the Meles River at the time his mother died.

Homer and His Guide, by William-Adolphe Bouguereau, via Wikimedia Commons

In other cases, Homer was presented as the grandson of Odysseus. According to that version, the poet was the son of Telémaco along with Policasta, and it is assured that this is why he told the story of his family, magnifying the achievements of his ancestors.

Those who supported the version of a foreign Homer, thought that he was a poet, or bard, who sang to the military to entertain them.

According to that story, "homero" corresponds to the word prisoner. This version ensures that he or his father would have been prisoners of war at some point.

Death

As for his death, two theories are the most widespread. The first is that he died from a disease related to his loss of vision, and the other claims that he died as a result of shame at not being able to solve a riddle posed to him by some children.

Although hundreds of versions were created on the existence of Homer, no account with verifiability.

Homeric question

Doubts about the real existence of some poet or author named Homer, or even Melesigenes, have been around for a long time. Although the Greeks did not doubt its existence, they could not verify that it had really happened.

It should be noted that in Greek culture it was common to mix fantasy with reality to magnify feats, which makes Homer an even more controversial and difficult character to trace.

Questions

Did Homer really exist? Was it one man? Was he the sole author of the Iliad and the Odyssey? Was it just a compiler of popular stories? At what time were your works carried out? Did the compositions follow the oral tradition or were they written that way?

This is just a portion of the questions that have not been able to find an accurate answer in thousands of years and, probably, can never be fully clarified.

For certain scholars, the only documents that can provide data on Homer are precisely his texts. Thanks to the rigorous study of these pieces, aspects of the language, the time or the number of authors can be glimpsed, but nothing can ever be firmly affirmed in this regard.

Antiquity

From the Hellenic times, the intellectuals debated from different positions, about the work of Homer and the own existence of the Greek author. Then there were already at least seven different biographies in which each writer changed the circumstances of his life.

Aristotle with a Bust of Homer, by Rembrandt, via Wikimedia Commons

Some Greeks argued that given the abysmal differences between the Iliad and the Odyssey, it was shown that each text was written by a different person.

That group received the title of corizontes, but their assertion did not win the approval of the intellectuals of their time.

Modern debates

The Homeric question is still a matter of discussion today, but it was especially so after the publication of a 17th century text by Francois Hédelin, Abbe of Aubinac. He rejected the physical existence of Homer and brought the controversial subject once more to the public arena.

This current proposed that the term "Homer" was an allusion to the anonymous Greek poets who composed their stories in ancient times, but whose names did not individually pass into the memory of the people for whom they sang.

One or many Homers?

At the end of the 18th century, characters such as Giambattista Vico and Friedrich August Wolf defended what was proposed by the Abbe of Aubinac.

No one thought that the Iliad or the Odyssey had been written by a single man, since they found many differences in style within the same text.

Homer, by Internet Archive Book Images, via Wikimedia Commons

Some were inclined to think of Homer as a compiler who was able to gracefully put together a handful of songs from different sources to orchestrate two of the most important works.

But there were also those who thought of Homer as the greatest poet of antiquity, who was able to carry out his extensive work in a masterful way. Among them was Franchesco de Sanctis, one of Wolf's main detractors and his supporters.

The question today

During the last century, the voice of those scholars who argued that the texts attributed to Homer had to have been conceived in an oral tradition gained prestige, especially for the discoveries associated with the ancient Greek civilization.

Milman Parry and Albert Lord were two of the great exponents of the current of oral tradition. They supported their assertions in the text itself, since they considered that the existence or not of the author had passed into the background.

What seemed to prove according to Parry and Lord that Homer's texts were not composed as a piece of original writing was, among other things, the mixture of dialects. So did repetitions that emulated a constant formula and anachronisms in language.

Central debate

In our time, the idea that the texts included the oral tradition is one of the most accepted approaches, since it teaches a solution to many doubts that swirl around Homer and his work.

Despite the discrepancies, some claim that through this theory there may be a consensus between both positions.

The fundamental topic of interest to students of the matter today, focuses especially on Homer's own work, since no other source can provide, until now, accurate data related to the author or his creation.

Homeridae

In Chios there was a group of people who called themselves, or were known, as homeridae, that is, "sons of Homer" in Greek. However, it is not known if they were actual descendants of the mythical poet or if they were a guild that followed his example.

Homer with his disciples, by Pier Francesco Mola - Collezione privata, via Wikimedia Commons

The second option is the most plausible, since there were more similar cases in Greek society during that time. The doctors of that time called themselves aclepidae, in homage to their greatest exponent in medicine Asclepius.

Although no records have been found that prove the existence of Homer, historical data have been found on the homeridae, who served as poets or rhapsodies and whose oldest references can be traced back to the 6th century BC. C.

Work of the heirs

Plato and Isocrates referred in their works to these Homeric heirs. It is believed that at first the interpreters called homeridae were limited to transmitting the work of Homer, but that over time they gave way to new voices with the same Homeric style and tone.

Some of the Homeric Hymns were actually written by the homeridae and it is thought that they too may have influenced the work as it is known today, although it cannot be known to what extent.

Language

The texts attributed to Homer and the Homeridae, both in the Iliad and the Odyssey, as well as the later Homeric Hymns used a form that was called "Homeric language", in other cases Homeric language or language.

It was based on Greek, but consisted of archaic structure and words, even by the 7th century BC. It was influenced by the dialects of Ionia and the Aeolian.

Metrics

The Homeric language was used in epic works, since it was adapted to the metric known as catalectic dactyl hexameter. That shape is known as a hexameter because it consisted of six feet.

Those feet could consist of a dactyl, which is a long syllable followed by two short ones; but they could also be replaced by a spondeo, which is two long syllables with the same duration as a dactyl.

Homer, by Giuseppe Benaglia (inc.), Via Wikimedia Commons

Normally in the fifth foot a dactyl was used and in the sixth a spondeus. The hexameter was used until the 4th century.

Another outstanding aspect of Homeric Greek is the lack of a definite article, which did exist in the classical form of the same language.

Approximately 9,000 words were used in the writing of the Homeric works, of which 1,382 are proper names and 2,307 are ápax, that is, words that only appear once in a text and whose meaning is taken by inference.

Apocryphal works

Despite doubts about their existence, or authorship of the Iliad and Odyssey, these are the only epics attributed to Homer today. However, in the past he was thought to have authored many other works, including:

- Batracomiomachy (The war of the frogs and the mice).

- Homeric Hymns.

- Margites.

- The Homer and Hesiod Contest.

- Ilias parva (The Little Iliad).

- Nostoi (Returns).

- Thebaid.

- Cypria (Cipria, or Ciprios Songs).

- Epigoni.

- The capture of Oechalia.

- Phocais.

Influence

Homer's legacy for Western society is incalculable, especially on a historical level with his stories about Troy, a site of which only a few artifacts and archaeological sites remain.

It also marked the social and pedagogical aspect of Ancient Greece, since in schools it was studied with passages from the Iliad and the Odyssey as the main text. Thus, Homer forged through his words several generations of Greeks who laid the foundations of philosophical thought.

Homer reciting, by Karl Becker, via Wikimedia Commons

Literary influence

Besides that, the homeridae, who claimed to be their descendants, were great poets and rhapsodies of Ancient and Classical Greece.

From them the actors, poets and playwrights would evolve, as well as the singers, since in the case of the rhapsodies they used music in their representations.

As for the language, the legacy of this mythical Greek is equally incalculable, since the formula he used in his compositions was used for more than 15 centuries.

The same happens with his work: Homer cemented what would become the epic narratives, in the case of the Iliad, and of the novel with the Odyssey.

Homer was one of the greatest sources of inspiration for many artists. His figure served to create beautiful works of art, both in sculpture and in painting, since ancient times.

Plays

The

This epic poem is set in the siege of Troy by the Greeks, specifically in the weeks when Achilles, the best of Greek warriors, and Agamemnon, king of Argos and commander of the Greek coalition, had a dispute.

Although the events take place in the last year of the siege of Troy, as was customary in the narrative of the epic, the events of the past were discussed using the memories of the characters.

This work explores the ideal of the hero and its contradictions. Other themes that are addressed in the Iliad are the nostos or return, the kleos or the glory of the hero, the timê, which is honor, menis that corresponds to anger and, of course, destiny.

Deception of the Gods

The problems of Achilles and Agamemnon began because the latter decided that the warrior should return to a maiden that he had received as part of a looting, named Briseida, and ordered that she be taken from Achilles.

Later, Agamemnon thought that he could win the war without the help of Achilles by a dream that Zeus induced him. Consequently, he prepared for battle. Trying to avoid combat, Paris offered to duel Menelaus to resolve the dispute over Helena.

Homer, by Ernst Wallis et al, via Wikimedia Commons

Although Menelaus wounded Paris, it was saved by Aphrodite, the Trojans broke the truce and began an intense combat.

After a duel between Hector and Ajax, the Trojans offer to return the treasure that had been taken together with Helena, but without returning the girl.

No interference

The proposal was rejected, but a truce was granted in order to burn their dead. When the fighting resumed, the gods were not allowed to help either side, so the Trojans took the lead.

It is at that moment, is when Agamemnon realizes that he needs Achilles fighting on his side in order to win and decides to return Briseis to him, along with other gifts on the condition that he join his ranks again; however, he refuses.

The death of Patroclus

The encounters became intense so Patroclus, Achilles' friend, asks him to be able to fight to defend the ships and he hands over his armor and with it the command of the Myrmidons, causing the Trojans to flee when they think that Achilles was returning to battle..

But, finally, Patroclus dies at the hands of Hector. The moment Achilles learns of the death of his partner is when he decides to return to battle and avenge him.

The return

Thetis, who was the mother of Achilles, gets the god Hephaestus to supply the Greeks with new weapons, including a new armor for the warrior.

When they met again, again with the help of the gods on both sides, Achilles cut the Trojans' numbers in half. Hector decided to confront Achilles, who murders him in the fight and then drags him into his carriage.

Later, Príamo, Héctor's father, manages to get to Achilles's tent and begs him to return his son's body. Achilles agrees and grants the Trojans 11 days of truce to carry out the boy's funeral.

The Iliad in art

Not only was the Trojan War a subject of unequaled relevance for the Greeks in artistic matters, but particularly the Iliad was one of the most widespread and influential texts.

In the Middle Ages, after having recovered the original texts, Europeans marveled, although they did not see Homer as a reliable source. In spite of everything, in the arts and academia he managed to permeate the history of the Trojan war once again.

Homer reciting, by Jacques-Louis David, via Wikimedia Commons

In the 20th century, the Iliad was brought to Broadway, and novels such as Christa Wolf's Cassandra (1983) emerged. On that occasion they approached the subject through a feminine point of view.

The 2004 film Troy was a global box office success, grossing nearly $ 500 million, despite receiving totally mixed reviews.

The

In the same way as the Iliad, the Odyssey is composed of 24 songs.

It focuses on all the situations that Odysseus or Ulysses had to go through to reach his destination, which is to return to his home on the island of Ithaca, where Penelope, his wife, waited for him for many years.

The events narrated in the Odyssey begin, as was very common in epic poems, in the middle of the story. As events unfold, the past will be revealed with the memories of the hero, in this case Odysseus.

The influence that this work had on western popular culture is enormous, so much so that the word "odyssey" is collected in the dictionary as a long journey with many adventures or as a succession of events, generally unpleasant.

The forced absence

After the Trojan War, which lasted ten years, Odysseus finds himself imprisoned on the island of the nymph Calypso, who has held him for several years. Athena takes human form and suggests that Telemachus find out where his father is.

In Ithaca, the suitors of Penelope, Odysseus's wife, have been stalking her for some time, trying to become kings by marrying her.

Telemachus manages to expel them to be able to leave in search of the news about his father calmly, and he does so. In Pylos, Nestor suggests that he speak with Menelaus in Sparta.

Homer, by Charles Lebayle, via Wikimedia Commons

In Sparta, Menelaus and Helena receive Telemachus. There she learns that Odysseus is being held by Calypso on an island. At the same time, the suitors find out that Penelope has been left alone and attempt to ambush Telemachus.

Hermes is sent to request Calypso to free Odysseus, who departs in a makeshift boat. Once at sea, Poseidon sends him a storm, but Leucótea helps him to reach land safely.

Way home

Odysseus, on the island of the Phaeacios, meets Princess Nausícaa, daughter of Alcinous. She takes him to her father, who upon hearing her story offers her his daughter's hand and after Odysseus rejects her, offers him help to return to Ithaca.

There Odysseus recounted everything he had lived through: the destruction of Ismaro, in which he lost many companions, the island of the lotus, in which some tried the lotus and lost the will to return to their land.

Then he told them about the island of the Cyclopes, where he blinded Polyphemus, son of Poseidon, so this god held a grudge against him.

Bust of Homer from the Naples Museum, by Cornell University Library, via Wikimedia Commons

From there he had moved to the island of Aeolus, who gave him the bag with all the winds, to favor them in their return, but they escaped and left them stranded in Laestrygones with the giants that devoured men.

After that, they were on the island of Circe, who desired Odysseus' love, which was not reciprocated and told him that before returning to Ithaca he should visit Tiresias in the underworld. That he was able to do while he was in the country of the Cimmerians.

Later, Odysseus managed to save himself from the song of the sirens and reached Trinacria (Sicily), where Homer's men ate Helios's cattle and as punishment his ship was destroyed, leaving Odysseus stranded on the island of Calypso.

Return and revenge

After finishing his tale, the Phaeacians kept their promise and helped Odysseus return to Ithaca.

He disguised himself as a beggar so as not to arouse suspicion of his return and later revealed it to his son Telemachus. Together they plotted revenge against Penelope's suitors.

After having murdered the suitors and Penelope had recognized him, the parents of the murdered boys sought revenge. However, Athena appeared and urged them to give themselves a truce and live in peace.

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