Hesiod, Homeric Hymns, and Homerica

 Table of Contents

 Preface

 Introduction

 General

 The Boeotian School

 Life of Hesiod

 The Hesiodic Poems

 Date of the Hesiodic Poems

 Literary Value of Homer

 The Ionic School

 The Trojan Cycle

 The Homeric Hymns

 The Epigrams of Homer

 The Burlesque Poems

 The Contest of Homer and Hesiod

 The Works of Hesiod

 Works and Days (832 lines)

 The Divination by Birds (fragments)

 The Astronomy (fragments)

 The Precepts of Chiron (fragments)

 The Great Works (fragments)

 The Idaean Dactyls (fragments)

 The Theogony (1,041 lines)

 The Catalogues of Women and Eoiae (fragments)

 The Shield of Heracles (480 lines)

 The Marriage of Ceyx (fragments)

 The Great Eoiae (fragments)

 The Melampodia (fragments)

 Aegimius (fragments)

 Fragments of Unknown Position

 Doubtful Fragments

 Works Attributed to Homer The Homeric Hymns

 I. To Dionysus (21 lines)

 II. To Demeter (495 lines)

 III. To Apollo (546 lines)

 IV. To Hermes (582 lines)

 V. To Aphrodite (293 lines)

 VI. To Aphrodite (21 lines)

 VII. To Dionysus (59 lines)

 VIII. To Ares (17 lines)

 IX. To Artemis (9 lines)

 X. To Aphrodite (6 lines)

 XI. To Athena (5 lines)

 XII. To Hera (5 lines)

 XIII. To Demeter (3 lines)

 XIV. To the Mother of the Gods (6 lines)

 XV. To Heracles the Lion-Hearted (9 lines)

 XVI. To Asclepius (5 lines)

 XVII. To the Dioscuri (5 lines)

 XVIII. To Hermes (12 lines)

 XIX. To Pan (49 lines)

 XX. To Hephaestus (8 lines)

 XXI. To Apollo (5 lines)

 XXII. To Poseidon (7 lines)

 XXIII. To the Son of Cronos, Most High (4 lines)

 XXIV. To Hestia (5 lines)

 XXV. To the Muses and Apollo (7 lines)

 XXVI. To Dionysus (13 lines)

 XXVII. To Artemis (22 lines)

 XXVIII. To Athena (18 lines)

 XXIX. To Hestia (13 lines)

 XXX. To Earth the Mother of All (19 lines)

 XXXI. To Helios (20 lines)

 XXXII. To Selene (20 lines)

 XXXIII. To the Dioscuri (19 lines)

 Homer's Epigrams

 Fragments of the Epic Cycle

 The War of the Titans (fragments)

 The Story of Oedipus (fragments)

 The Thebaid (fragments)

 The Epigoni (fragments)

 The Cypria (fragments)

 The Aethiopis (fragments)

 The Little Iliad (fragments)

 The Sack of Ilium (fragments)

 The Returns (fragments)

 The Telegony (fragments)

 Non-Cyclic Poems Attributed to Homer

 The Expedition of Amphiaraus (fragments)

 The Taking of Oechalia (fragments)

 The Phocais (fragments)

 The Margites (fragments)

 The Cercopes (fragments)

 The Battle of Frogs and Mice (303 lines)

 Of the Origin of Homer and Hesiod, and of their Contest (aka The Contest of Homer and Hesiod)

The Margites (fragments)

Fragment #1 -

Suidas, s.v.:

Pigres. A Carian of Halicarnassus and brother of Artemisia, wife of Mausolus, who distinguished herself in war . . . 1 He also wrote the "Margites" attributed to Homer and the "Battle of the Frogs and Mice".

Fragment #2 -

Atilius Fortunatianus, p. 286, Keil:

'There came to Colophon an old man and divine singer, a servant of the Muses and of far-shooting Apollo. In his dear hands he held a sweet-toned lyre.'

Fragment #3 -

Plato, Alcib. ii. p. 147 A:

'He knew many things but knew all badly . . . '

Aristotle, Nic. Eth. vi. 7, 1141: 'The gods had taught him neither to dig nor to plough, nor any other skill; he failed in every craft.'

Fragment #4 -

Scholiast on Aeschines in Ctes., sec. 160:

He refers to Margites, a man who, though well grown up, did not know whether it was his father or his mother who gave him birth, and would not lie with his wife, saying that he was afraid she might give a bad account of him to her mother.

Fragment #5 -

Zenobius, v. 68:

'The fox knows many a wile; but the hedge-hog's one trick 2 can beat them all.' 3

1 This Artemisia, who distinguished herself at the battle of Salamis (Herodotus, vii. 99) is here confused with the later Artemisia, the wife of Mausolus, who died 350 B.C.

2 i.e. the fox knows many ways to baffle its foes, while the hedge-hog knows one only which is far more effectual.

3 Attributed to Homer by Zenobius, and by Bergk to the "Margites".