In Greek epic tales, intellect is plain common sense, there are never tactical tricks or strategic ploys, but instead, the hero succeeds because of great valor, and the brave man never retreats. Homer's greatest poems are about the " heroic age ", about the men who fought at Thebes and Troy a. The powers of the heroes of epic poetry are human-based: the heroes are normal human beings who are cast on a large scale, and although gods are everywhere, they only act to support or in some cases thwart the hero.
The tale has a believed historicity , which is to say the narrator is assumed to be the mouthpiece of the goddesses of poetry, the Muses, with no clear line between history and fantasy.
The tales are told in a mannerly composition : they are often formulaic in structure, with repeated conventions and phrases. Epic poetry is performed , either the bard sings or chants the poem and he is often accompanied by others who act out the scenes. In Greek and Latin epic poetry, the meter is strictly dactylic hexameter; and the normal assumption is that epic poetry is long , taking hours or even days to perform.
The narrator has both objectivity and formality , he is seen by the audience as a pure narrator, who speaks in the third person and the past tense.
The poet is thus the custodian of the past. In Greek society, the poets were itinerant who traveled throughout the region performing at festivals, rites of passage like funerals or weddings, or other ceremonies. The poem has a social function , to please or entertain an audience.
It is both serious and moral in tone but it doesn't preach. Source: Hatto AT, editor. Traditions of Heroic and Epic Poetry.
London: Modern Humanities Research Association. Actively scan device characteristics for identification. Use precise geolocation data. It is an epic, which imitates the conventions of the folk epic, but gives it a written shape. It is absolutely opposite to the folk epic. They were written unlike the folk epics, which came all the way down to us through oral tradition.
The literary epics tend to be more polished, coherent, and compact in structure and style when contrasted with the folk epics. Literary epics are the result of the genius of the poet. That is why; they have great significance from literary point of view. Its subject-matter is of the old heroic and mythical kind; it makes free use of supernatural; it follows the same structural plan and reproduces many traditional details of composition; while, greatly it necessarily differs in style, it often adopts the formulas, fixed epithets, and stereo typed phrases and locutions, which are among the marked feature of the early type.
Just awesome! Thanks for this masterpiece. It helps me a lot to understand the epic ins and outs. It really clear my doubts about epic. Whole world is looking forward to see the epic poetry to be continued in any manner but will it be possible as the epic poetry is fast disappearing from the poetic arena because of the lack of talent.
Very helpful article and answer. Everything is available here. I think it is the best answer among all. Only Roman poets like Virgil and John Milton had 12 rather than 24 books.
But Homer had 24 books NOT You have mentioned that Homer's epics are divided into 12 books. Both Homers illiad and the odyssey are divided into 24 books not Please be authentic with what you share as children looking for information can get influenced by such inauthentic material.
Sir it would be even more helpful if you could kindly add the concepts of primary and secondary epics as well as what's mock epic about. The article was really helpful though. Thank you. I am new reader in epic ,I try to find out this new thing, This element is very necessary ,so i feel happy for this helping.
He is also considered the father of political realism, which is a school of thought within the realm of political science that views the political behavior of individuals and the relations between states to be governed by self-interest and fear. Unlike Herodotus, Thucydides did not view his historical accounts as a source of moral lessons, but rather as a factual reporting of contemporary political and military events. Thucydides viewed life in political terms rather than moral terms, and viewed history in political terms.
Thucydides also tended to omit, or at least downplay, geographic and ethnographic aspects of events from his work, whereas Herodotus recorded all information as part of the narrative. However, unlike his predecessor, Thucydides does not reveal his sources. In particular, the History of the Peloponnesian War echoes the narrative tradition of Homer, and draws heavily from epic poetry and tragedy to construct what is essentially a positivistic account of world events.
Additionally, it brings to the forefront themes of justice and suffering in a similar manner to the philosophical texts of Aristotle and Plato. Skip to main content. Search for:. Classical Greek Poetry and History Learning Objective Explain how epic poetry influenced the development of classical Greek historical texts.
Key Points The formative influence of the Homeric epics in shaping Greek culture was widely recognized, and Homer was described as the teacher of Greece. The Iliad, sometimes referred to as the Song of Ilion or Song of Ilium, is set during the Trojan War and recounts the battles and events surrounding a quarrel between King Agamemnon and the warrior Achilles.
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