Hesiod

This article discusses the ancient Greek poet Hesiod. For the computer application, see Hesiod (name service).

"Hesiodos" redirects here. For the asteroid, see 8550 Hesiodos.

Ancient bronze bust, the so-called Pseudo-Seneca, now conjectured to be an imaginative portrait of Hesiod.

Hesiod (Greek: Ἡσίοδος Hēsíodos; English pronunciation: /ˈhiːsiəd/ or /ˈhɛsiəd/) was a Greek oral poet generally thought by scholars to have been active between 750 and 650 BC. Since at least Herodotus's time (Histories, 2.53), Hesiod and Homer have generally been considered the earliest Greek poets whose work has survived, and they are often paired. Scholars disagree about who lived first, and the fourth-century BC sophist Alcidamas' Mouseion even brought them together in an imagined poetic agon, the Contest of Homer and Hesiod. Aristarchus first argued for Homer's priority, a claim that was generally accepted by later antiquity.

Hesiod's writings serve as a major source on Greek mythology, farming techniques, early economic thought (he is sometimes identified as the first economist), archaic Greek astronomy and ancient time-keeping.

Life

J. A. Symonds writes that "Hesiod is also the immediate parent of gnomic verse, and the ancestor of those deep thinkers who speculated in the Attic Age upon the mysteries of human life."

A handful of scholars have doubted whether Hesiod alone conceived and wrote the poems attributed to him. For example, Symonds writes that "the first ten verses of the Works and Days are spurious—borrowed probably from some Orphic hymn to Zeus and recognised as not the work of Hesiod by critics as ancient as Pausanias."

As with Homer, legendary traditions have accumulated around Hesiod. Unlike Homer's case, however, some possible autobiographical details have survived: a few details of Hesiod's life come from three references in Works and Days; some further inferences derive from his Theogony. His father came from Cyme in Aeolis, which lay between Ionia and the Troad in Northwestern Anatolia, but crossed the sea to settle at a hamlet near Thespiae in Boeotia named Ascra, "a cursed place, cruel in winter, hard in summer, never pleasant" (Works, l. 640). Hesiod's patrimony there, a small piece of ground at the foot of Mount Helicon, occasioned lawsuits with his brother Perses.

Some scholars have seen Perses as a literary creation, a foil for the moralizing that Hesiod directed to him in Works and Days, but in the introduction to his translation of Hesiod's works, Hugh G. Evelyn-White provides several arguments against this theory. Gregory Nagy, on the other hand, sees both Persēs ("the destroyer": πέρθω / perthō) and Hēsiodos ("he who emits the voice:" ἵημι / hiēmi + αὐδή / audē) as fictitious names for poetical personae.

The Muses traditionally lived on Helicon, and, according to the account in Theogony (ll. 22-35), gave Hesiod the gift of poetic inspiration one day while he tended sheep (compare the legend of Cædmon). Hesiod later mentions a poetry contest at Chalcis in Euboea where the sons of one Amphidamas awarded him a tripod (Works and Days ll.654-662). Plutarch first cited this passage as an interpolation into Hesiod's original work, based on his identification of Amphidamas with the hero of the Lelantine War between Chalcis and Eretria, which occurred around 705 BC. Plutarch assumed this date much too late for a contemporary of Homer, but most Homeric academics would now accept it. The account of this contest, followed by an allusion to the Trojan War, inspired the later tales of a competition between Hesiod and Homer.

Two different—yet early—traditions record the site of Hesiod's grave. One, as early as Thucydides, reported in Plutarch, the Suda and John Tzetzes, states that the Delphic oracle warned Hesiod that he would die in Nemea, and so he fled to Locris, where he was killed at the local temple to Nemean Zeus, and buried there. This tradition follows a familiar ironic convention: the oracle that predicts accurately after all.

The other tradition, first mentioned in an epigram of Chersios of Orchomenus written in the 7th century BC (within a century or so of Hesiod's death) claims that Hesiod lies buried at Orchomenus, a town in Boeotia. According to Aristotle's Constitution of Orchomenus, when the Thespians ravaged Ascra, the villagers sought refuge at Orchomenus, where, following the advice of an oracle, they collected the ashes of Hesiod and placed them in a place of honour in their agora, beside the tomb of Minyas, their eponymous founder, and in the end came to regard Hesiod too as their "hearth-founder" (οἰκιστής / oikistēs).

Later writers attempted to harmonize these two accounts.

The legends that accumulated about Hesiod are recorded in several sources: the story "The poetic contest (Ἀγών / Agōn) of Homer and Hesiod;" a vita of Hesiod by the Byzantine grammarian John Tzetzes; the entry for Hesiod in the Suda; two passages and some scattered remarks in Pausanias (IX, 31.3–6 and 38.3–4); a passage in Plutarch Moralia (162b).

Works

Of the many works attributed to Hesiod, three survive complete and many more in fragmentary state. Our witnesses include papyri, one dating from as early as the 3rd century BC, and manuscripts written from the tenth century forward. Demetrius Chalcondyles issued the first printed edition (editio princeps) of Works and Days, possibly at Milan, probably in 1493. In 1495 Aldus Manutius published the complete works at Venice.

Hesiod's works, especially Works and Days, are from the view of the small independent farmer, while Homer's view is from nobility or the rich. Even with these differences, they share some beliefs regarding work ethic, justice, and consideration of material items.

Some (e.g. A. D. Momigliano) have detected a proto-historical perspective in Hesiod. This is rejected by Paul Cartledge as Hesiod advocates a not-forgetting without any attempt at verification.

Works and Days

Main article: Works and Days

Hesiod wrote a poem of some 800 verses, the Works and Days, which revolves around two general truths: labour is the universal lot of Man, but he who is willing to work will get by. Scholars have interpreted this work against a background of agrarian crisis in mainland Greece, which inspired a wave of documented colonisations in search of new land. This poem is one of the earliest known musings on economic thought.

This work lays out the five Ages of Man, as well as containing advice and wisdom, prescribing a life of honest labour and attacking idleness and unjust judges (like those who decided in favour of Perses) as well as the practice of usury. It describes immortals who roam the earth watching over justice and injustice. The poem regards labor as the source of all good, in that both gods and men hate the idle, who resemble drones in a hive.

Theogony

Main article: Theogony

Hesiod and the Muse, by Gustave Moreau

The Theogony,a poem which uses the same epic verse-form as the Works and Days, is also attributed to Hesiod. Despite the different subject matter, most scholars, with some notable exceptions (like Evelyn-White), believe that the two works were written by the same man. As M.L. West writes, "Both bear the marks of a distinct personality: a surly, conservative countryman, given to reflection, no lover of women or life, who felt the gods' presence heavy about him."

The Theogony concerns the origins of the world (cosmogony) and of the gods (theogony), beginning with Chaos, Gaia, and Eros, and shows a special interest in genealogy. Embedded in Greek myth, there remain fragments of quite variant tales, hinting at the rich variety of myth that once existed, city by city; but Hesiod's retelling of the old stories became, according to the fifth-century historian Herodotus, the accepted version that linked all Hellenes.

The creation myth in Hesiod has long been held to have Eastern influences, such as the Hittite Song of Kumarbi and the Babylonian Enuma Elis. This cultural crossover would have occurred in the eighth and ninth century Greek trading colonies such as Al Mina in North Syria. (For more discussion, read Robin Lane Fox's Travelling Heroes and Walcot's Hesiod and the Near East.)

Other writings

A short poem traditionally no longer attributed to Hesiod is The Shield of Heracles (Ἀσπὶς Ἡρακλέους / Aspis Hērakleous). This survives complete; the other works discussed in this section survive only in quotations or papyrus copies which are often damaged.

Classical authors also attributed to Hesiod a lengthy genealogical poem known as Catalogue of Women or Ehoiai (because sections began with the Greek words ē hoiē, "Or like the one who ..."). It was a mythological catalogue of the mortal women who had mated with gods, and of the offspring and descendants of these unions.

Several additional hexameter poems were ascribed to Hesiod:

• Aegimius, a heroic epic concerning the Dorian Aegimius (variously attributed to Hesiod or Cercops of Miletus).
• Astronomia, an astronomical poem to which Callimachus (Ep. 27) apparently compared Aratus' Phaenomena.
• Precepts of Chiron, a didactic work that presented the teaching of Chiron as delivered to the young Achilles.
• Idaean Dactyls, a work concerning mythological smelters, the Idaean Dactyls.
• Wedding of Ceyx, a poem concerning Heracles' attendance at the wedding of a certain Ceyx—noted for its riddles.
• Great Works, a poem similar to the Works and Days, but presumably longer
• Great Eoiae, a poem similar to the Catalogue of Women, but presumably longer.
• Melampodia, a genealogical poem that treats of the families of, and myths associated with, the great seers of mythology.
• Ornithomantia, a work on bird omens that followed the Works and Days.

Scholars generally classify all these as later examples of the poetic tradition to which Hesiod belonged, not as the work of Hesiod himself. The Shield, in particular, appears to be an expansion of one of the genealogical poems, taking its cue from Homer's description of the Shield of Achilles.

"Portrait" Bust

The Roman bronze bust of the late first century BC found at Herculaneum, the so-called Pseudo-Seneca, was first reidentified by Gisela Richter as a fictitious portrait meant for Hesiod, though it had been recognized that the bust was not in fact Seneca since 1813, when an inscribed herma portrait with quite different features was discovered. Most scholars now follow her identification.

References

• Allen, T. W. and Arthur A. Rambaut, 'The Date of Hesiod', The Journal of Hellenic Studies, 35 (1915), 85–99
• Buckham, Philip Wentworth, Theatre of the Greeks, 1827.
• Hugh G. Evelyn-White, Hesiod, the Homeric Hymns and Homerica, p. xliii–xlvii.
• Lamberton, Robert, Hesiod, New Haven: Yale University Press, 1988. ISBN 0300040687
• Murray, Gilbert, A History of Ancient Greek Literature, New York: D. Appleton and Company, 1897. Cf. pp. 53 and onward for Hesiod.
• Peabody, Berkley, The Winged Word: A Study in the Technique of Ancient Greek Oral Composition as Seen Principally Through Hesiod's Works and Days, State University of New York Press, 1975. ISBN 0873950593
• Pucci, Pietro, Hesiod and the Language of Poetry, Baltimore and London: Johns Hopkins University Press, 1977. ISBN 0801817870
• Rohde, Erwin, Psyche, 1925.
• Symonds, John Addington, Studies of the Greek Poets, 1873.
• Taylor, Thomas, A Dissertation on the Eleusinian and Bacchic Mysteries, 1791.

Further reading

• Athanassakis, A.N. (1992). "Cattle and Honour in Homer and Hesiod". Ramus 21 (2): 156–186. 
• Athanassakis, A.N. (1992). "Introduction to 'Essays on Hesiod I'". Ramus 21 (1): 1–10. 
• Athanassakis, A.N. (1992). "Introduction to 'Essays on Hesiod II'". Ramus 21 (2): 117–118. 
• Burn, Andrew Robert (1937). The World of Hesiod: A Study of the Greek Middle Ages, c. 900–700 BC. New York: Dutton. 
• Clay, Diskin (1992). "The World of Hesiod". Ramus 21 (2): 131–155. 
• Debiasi, Andrea (2008) (in Italian). Esiodo e l'occidente. Roma: L'Erma di Bretschneider. ISBN 8882654877. 
• DuBois, Page (1992). "Eros and the Woman". Ramus 21 (1): 97–116. 
• Gagarin, Michael (1992). "The Poetry of Justice: Hesiod and the Origins of Greek Law". Ramus 21 (1): 61–78. 
• Janko, Richard (2007). Homer, Hesiod and the Hymns : diachronic development in epic diction. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press. ISBN 9780521035651. 
• Kirby, John T. (1992). "Rhetoric and Poetics in Hesiod". Ramus 21 (1): 34–60. 
• Lucas, Frank Laurence (1934). "Two Poets of the Pesantry". Studies French and English. London: Cassell & Co. pp. 23–75. http://ia600401.us.archive.org//load_djvu_applet.php?file=1/items/StudiesFrenchAndEnglish/StudiesFrenchAndEnglish.djvu. 
• Martin, Richard P. (1992). "Hesiod's metanastic poetics". Ramus 21 (1): 11–33. 
• Nagler, Michael N. (1992). "Discourse and Conflict in Hesiod: Eris and the Erides". Ramus 21 (1): 79–96. 
• Nagy, Gregory (1992). "Authorisation and Authorship in the Hesiodic Theogony". Ramus 21 (2): 119–130. 
• Thalmann, William G. (1984). Conventions of form and thought in early Greek epic poetry. Baltimore: Johns Hopkins University Press. ISBN 0801831954. 
• Walcot, P. (1966). Hesiod and the Near East. Cardiff: Wales University Press. 
• West, M.L. (1985). The Hesiodic catalogue of women : its nature, structure, and origins. Oxford: Clarendon. ISBN 0198140347. 

Selected translations

• George Chapman, The Works of Hesiod, London, 1618, dedicated to Sir Francis Bacon.
• Cooke, Hesiod, Works and Days, Translated from the Greek, London, 1728
• Sinclair, Thomas Alan (translator), Hesiodou Erga kai hemerai, London, Macmillan and co., 1932.
• West, Martin Litchfield (translator), Hesiod Works & Days, Oxford University Press, 1978, ISBN 0-19-814005-3. Edited with Prolegomena and Commentary.
• Athanassakis, Apostolos N., Theogony; Works and days; Shield / Hesiod; introduction, translation, and notes, Baltimore: Johns Hopkins University Press, 1983. ISBN 0801829984
• Frazer, R.M. (Richard McIlwaine), The Poems of Hesiod, Norman: University of Oklahoma Press, 1983. ISBN 0806118377
• Tandy, David W., and Neale, Walter C. [translators], Works and Days: a translation and commentary for the social sciences, Berkeley: University of California Press, 1996. ISBN 0520203836
• Schlegel, Catherine M., and Henry Weinfield, translators, Theogony and Works and Days, Ann Arbor, Michigan, 2006
• Most, Glenn, translator, Hesiod, 2 vols., Loeb Classical Library, Cambridge, Massachusetts, 2006-07.

External links

• Works by Hesiod at Project Gutenberg
• Hesiod, Works and Days Book 1 Works and Days Book 2 Works and Days Book 3 Translated from the Greek by Mr. Cooke (London, 1728). A youthful exercise in Augustan heroic couplets by Thomas Cooke (1703–1756), employing the Roman names for all the gods.

• Web texts taken from Hesiod, the Homeric Hymns and Homerica, edited and translated by Hugh G. Evelyn-White, published as Loeb Classical Library #57, 1914, ISBN 0-674-99063-3:
  • Scanned text at the Internet Archive, in PDF and DjVu format
  • Perseus Classics Collection: Greek and Roman Materials: Text: Hesiod (Greek texts and English translations for Works and Days, Theogony, and Shield of Heracles with additional notes and cross links.)
  • Versions of the electronic edition of Evelyn-White's English translation edited by Douglas B. Killings, June 1995:
    • Project Gutenberg plain text.
    • Berkeley Digital Library SunSITE: The Online Medieval and Classical Library: Hesiod
    • Sacred Texts: Classics: The Works of Hesiod (Theogony and Works and Days only)
    • Hesiod and the Arcadian theme in the paintings Shepherds of Arcadia - Et in Arcadia Ego