Epic Cycle

The Epic Cycle ( ) was a collection of Ancient Greek epic poems, composed in dactylic hexameter and related to the story of the Trojan War, including the Cypria, the Aethiopis, the so-called Little Iliad, the Iliupersis, the Nostoi, and the Telegony. Scholars sometimes include the two Homeric epics, the Iliad and the Odyssey, among the poems of the Epic Cycle, but the term is more often used to specify the non-Homeric poems as distinct from the Homeric ones. Unlike the Iliad and the Odyssey, the cyclic epics survive only in fragments and summaries from Late Antiquity and the Byzantine period. The Epic Cycle was the distillation, in literary form, of an oral tradition that had developed during the Greek Dark Age, which was based in part on localised hero cults. The traditional material from which the literary epics were drawn combines Bronze Age Mycenaean culture with the perspective and experience of Iron Age Greece. In modern scholarship, the study of the historical and literary relationship between the Homeric epics and the rest of the cycle is called Neoanalysis.…

The Epic Cycle ( ) was a collection of Ancient Greek epic poems, composed in dactylic hexameter and related to the story of the Trojan War, including the Cypria, the Aethiopis, the so-called Little Iliad, the Iliupersis, the Nostoi, and the Telegony. Scholars sometimes include the two Homeric epics, the Iliad and the Odyssey, among the poems of the Epic Cycle, but the term is more often used to specify the non-Homeric poems as distinct from the Homeric ones. Unlike the Iliad and the Odyssey, the cyclic epics survive only in fragments and summaries from Late Antiquity and the Byzantine period. The Epic Cycle was the distillation, in literary form, of an oral tradition that had developed during the Greek Dark Age, which was based in part on localised hero cults. The traditional material from which the literary epics were drawn combines Bronze Age Mycenaean culture with the perspective and experience of Iron Age Greece. In modern scholarship, the study of the historical and literary relationship between the Homeric epics and the rest of the cycle is called Neoanalysis. A longer Epic Cycle, as described by the 9th-century CE scholar and clergyman Photius in codex 239 of his Bibliotheca, also included the Titanomachy (8th century BCE) and the Theban Cycle (between 750 and 500 BCE), which in turn comprised the Oedipodea, the Thebaid, the Epigoni, and the Alcmeonis; however, it is certain that none of the cyclic epics (other than Homer's) survived to Photius' day, and it is likely that Photius was not referring to a canonical collection. Modern scholars do not normally include the Theban Cycle when referring to the Epic Cycle.

Contents

Compilation

The non-Homeric epics are usually regarded as later than the Iliad and Odyssey. There is no reliable evidence for this, however, and some Neoanalyst scholars operate on the premise that the Homeric epics were later than the Cyclic epics and drew on them extensively. Other Neoanalysts make the milder claim that the Homeric epics draw on legendary material which later crystallized into the Epic Cycle. The nature of the relationship between the Cyclic epics and Homer is also bound up in this question. As told by Proclus, the plots of the six non-Homeric epics look very much as though they are designed to integrate with Homer, with no overlaps with one another. For example, a surviving quotation shows that the Little Iliad narrated how Neoptolemus took Andromache prisoner after the fall of Troy; however, in Proclus, the Little Iliad stops before the sack of Troy begins. Some scholars have argued that the Cypria as originally planned dealt with more of the Trojan War than Proclus' summary suggests; conversely, others argue that it was designed to lead up to the Iliad, and that Proclus' account reflects the Cypria as originally designed. It is probable that at least some editing or "stitching" was done to edit epics together. For the last line of the Iliad, ὣς οἵ γ᾽ ἀμφίεπον τάφον Ἕκτορος ἱπποδάμοιο. In this way they performed the funeral of Hector, tamer of horses. an alternative reading is preserved which is designed to lead directly into the Aethiopis: ὣς οἵ γ' ἀμφίεπον τάφον Ἕκτορος· ἦλθε δ' Ἀμαζών, Ἄρηος θυγάτηρ μεγαλήτορος ἀνδροφόνοιο. In this way they performed the funeral of Hector; then the Amazon Penthesileia came, daughter of great-hearted man-slaughtering Ares. ... There are contradictions between epics in the Cycle. For example, the Greek warrior who killed Hector's son Astyanax in the fall of Troy is Neoptolemus according to the Little Iliad; according to the Iliou persis, it is Odysseus. How and when the eight epics of the Cycle came to be combined into a single collection and referred to as a "cycle" is a matter of ongoing debate. In the late 19th century, David Binning Monro argued that the scholastic use of the word κυκλικός did not refer to the Cycle as such, but meant "conventional", and that the Cycle was compiled in the Hellenistic period (perhaps as late as the 1st century BCE). More recent scholars have preferred to push the date slightly earlier, but accept the general thrust of the argument.

Editions

Online editions (English translation): Hesiod; H.G. Evelyn-White, transl., 1914; The Medieval and Classical Library, , public domain. Hesiod; H.G. Evelyn-White, transl. 1914, Hesiod, the Homeric Hymns, and Homerica via Project Gutenberg. Proklos; Gregory Nagy, transl., Summary of the Epic Cycle, omitting the Telegony, STOA. Print editions (Greek): Bernabé, A. 1987, Poetarum epicorum Graecorum testimonia et fragmenta pt. 1, Leipzig, Davies, M. 1988, Epicorum Graecorum fragmenta, Göttingen, Print editions (Greek with English translation): Hesiod; Evelyn-White, H.G., transl., 1914, Hesiod: The Homeric Hymns and Homerica, Loeb Classical Library, West, M.L. 2003, Greek Epic Fragments, Cambridge, MA,

References

Bibliography

Burgess, J.S. 2001, The Tradition of the Trojan War in Homer and the Epic Cycle (Baltimore). (pbk) Davies, M. 1989, The Greek Epic Cycle (Bristol). (pbk) Kullmann, W. 1960, Die Quellen der Ilias (troischer Sagenkreis) (Wiesbaden). (1998 reprint) Michalopoulos, Dimitris, Homer's Odyssey beyond the myths, Piraeus: Institute of Hellenic Maritime History, 2016. . Monro, D.B. 1883, "On the Fragment of Proclus' Abstract of the Epic Cycle Contained in the Codex Venetus of the Iliad", Journal of Hellenic Studies 4: 305–334. Monro, D.B. 1901, Homer's Odyssey, books XIII-XXIV (Oxford), pp. 340–84. (Out of print) Severyns, A. 1928, Le cycle épique dans l'école d'Aristarque (Liège, Paris). (Out of print) Severyns, A. 1938, 1938, 1953, 1963, Recherches sur la "Chrestomathie" de Proclos, 4 vols. (Bibliothèque de la faculté de philosophie et lettres de l'université de Liège fascc. 78, 79, 132, 170; Paris). (Vols. 1 and 2 are on Photius, 3 and 4 on other MSS.) Severyns, A. 1962, Texte et apparat, histoire critique d'une tradition imprimée (Brussels).

Text derived from https://en.wikipedia.org/w/index.php?oldid=1374668811 under CC BY-SA 4.0; modifications have been made.