Homer in
Grecian times was "conceived as a blind, old man,
singing or reciting his own compositions" and seven
Grecian cities claimed to be his birthplace. Possibly
one man was responsible for the Iliad which exhibits
remarkable unity. Its composition is considered to be
due to the work of a supreme minstrel. The episodes
which it describes have been dated as extending from
1280 to 1180 B.C., but the work would seem to have
been integrated during the 9th Century B.C.
The Odyssey was completed considerably later than
the Iliad, possibly by a century or more. Sarton
suggests that the author of the Iliad be called Homer
I and the author of the odyssey, Homer II. Each book
contains stories, ideas, and phases. Neither poem was
completed at a definite time although the two have
many common characteristics. Sarton states that "Homer
was not simply the educator of Greece but one of the
educators of mankind."
The medical knowledge apparent in the Iliad and the
Odyssey involved the use of drugs. Farmers had learned
to use dung to increase fertility of their fields.
The Odyssey, trans. Robert Fitzgerald, Garden
City, N.Y., Doubleday, c. 1961.
The Iliad, trans. Richmond Lattimore,
University of Chicago Press, 1962.
