Page:Dictionary of Greek and Roman Biography and Mythology (1870) - Volume 2.djvu/521

Rh verse ; and besides a reference to the manner of epic recitation, as different from that of lyrical poetry, could only be imparted to the word pa^Cfj^os at a time when lyrical composition and recitation ori- ginated, that is, not before Archilochus. Previous to that time the meaning of rhapsodist must have been different. In fine, we do not see why pa.Tr- T61U cpSds should not have been used in the signifi- cation of planning and making lays, as pdrrreiv KaKOL is to plan or make mischief. But whatever may be the right derivation of the word, and whatever may have been the nature and condition of the rhapsodists, so much is evident that no sup- port can be derived from this point for Wolfs position. We pass on, therefore, to the last ques- tion, — the collection of the Homeric poems ascribed to Peisistratus.

Solon made the first step towards that which Peisistratus accomplished. Of him Diogenes La- ertius (i. 57) says, rd 'Ojxipov e| VTvoSoKr]s eypal/€ ^a^pcyh^Xcrdai, i. e., according to Wolf's inter- pretation, Solon did not allow the rhapsodists to recite arbitrarily, as they had been wont to do, such songs successively as were not connected with one another, but he ordered that they should rehearse those parts which were according to the thread of the story suggested to them. Peisistra- tus did not stop here. The unanimous voice of an- tiquity ascribed to him the merit of having collected the disjointed and confused poems of Homer, and of having first committed them to writing. (Cic. de Or. iii. 34 ; Pans. vii. 26 ; Joseph, c. Ap. i. 2 ; Aelian, V.H. xiii. 14 ; Liban. Faneg. in Julian. i. p. 170, Reisk. &c.)

In what light Wolf viewed this tradition has been already mentioned. He held it to have been the first step that was taken in order to connect the loose and incoherent songs into continued and uninterrupted stories, and to preserve the union which he had thus imparted to these poems by first committing them to writing. Pausanias mentions associates {eToxpoi) of Peisistratus, who assisted him in his undertaking. These associates Wolf thought to have been the ^laa-Kevaarai mentioned sometimes in the Scholia ; but in this he was evidently mistaken. AiaaK^vacnai are, in the phraseology of the Scholia, interpolators, and not arrangers. (Heinrich, de Diask. Homericis ; Lehrs, Aris- tarcM slud. Horn. p. 349.) Another weak point in Wolf's reasoning is, that he says that Peisis- tratus was the first who committed the Homeric poems to writing ; this is expressly stated by none of the ancient writers. On the contrary, it is not unlikely that before Peisistratus, persons began in various parts of Greece, and particularly in Asia Minor, which was far in advance of the mother-country, to write down parts of the Iliad and Odyssey, although we are not disposed to extend this hypothesis so far as Nitzscli, who thinks that there existed in the days of Peisistratus numbers of copies, so that Peisistratus only com- pared and reyised them, in order to obtain a correct copy for the use of the Athenian festivals. Whom Peisistratus employed in his undertaking Wolf could only conjecture. The poet Onomacritus lived at that time at Athens, and was engaged in similar pursuits respecting the old poet Musaeus. Besides him. Wolf thought of a certain Orpheus of Croton ; but nothing certain was known on this point, till Professor Ritschl discovered, in a MS. of Plautus at Rome, an old Latin scholion translated from the Greek of Tzetzes (published in Cramer's Anec- dota). This scholion gives the name of four poets who assisted Peisistratus, viz. Onomacritus, Zopy- rus, Orpheus, and a fourth, whose name is cor- rupted, Concylus. (Ritschl, de Alex. Bill. u. d. iSammlu?ig d. Horn. Gedichte durch Peisistr. 1838 ; Id. CoroUar. Disput. de Bibl. Alex, deque Peisistr. Curis Horn. 1840). These persons may have in- terpolated some passages, as it suited the pride of the Athenians or the political purposes of their patron Peisistratus. In fact, Onomacritus is parti- cularly charged with having interpolated Od. xi. 604 {Schol. Harlei. ed. Person, ad loc). The Athe- nians were generally believed to have had no part in the Trojan war ; therefore //. ii. 547, 552 — 554, were marked by the Alexandrine critics as spurious, and for similar reasons Od. vii. 80, 81, and Od. iii. 308. But how unimportant are these alterations in comparison with the long interpolations which must be attributed to the rhapsodists previous to Peisistratus ! It must be confessed that these four men accomplished their task, on the whole, with great accuracy. However inclined we may be to attribute this accuracy less to their critical investiga- tions and conscientiousness, than to the impossi- bility of making great changes on account of the general knowledge of what was genuine, through the number of existing copies ; and although we may, on the whole, be induced, after Wolf's ex- aggerations, to think little of the merits of Peisis- tratus, still we must allow that the praise be- stowed on Peisistratus by the ancient writers is too great and too general to allow us to admit of Nitzsch's opinion, that he only compared and ex- amined various MSS. If, then, it does not follow, as Wolf thought, that the Homeric poems never formed a whole before Peisistratus, it is at the same time undeniable that to Peisistratus we owe the first written text of the whole of the poems, which, without his care, would most likely now exist only in a few disjointed fragments. Some traditions at- tributed to Hipparchus, the son and successor of Peisistratus, regulations for the recital of the Ho- meric poems of a kind similar to those which had been already made by Solon. (Plat. Hipp. p. 228. G.) He is said to have obliged the rhapsodists e^ viToKifi^ius icpe^rjs to, 'Ofj-i^pov Si'ievai. The meaning of the words e| vrrov^eu)s, and their difference from e| vko€otjs, which was the manner of recitation, ordained by Solon, has given rise to a long controversy between Bockh and Hermann (corap Nitzsch, Melet. ii. p. 132); to enter into which would be foreign to the purpose of thia article.

Having taken this general survey of the most important arguments for and against Wolfs hypo*