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On the Fragment of Proclus' Abstract of the Epic Cycle contained in the Codex Venetus of the Iliad

Published online by Cambridge University Press:  23 December 2013

D. B. Monro
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Extract

The document which is the subject of the following paper has the interest of being the only copy of the only direct record of a whole period of Greek literature—the period, namely, of the poets who carried on the traditions of Homeric art in the eighth and seventh centuries B.C. It is a fragment in a double sense: first because it is a mere extract, and secondly because the pages on which it is preserved are themselves in a fragmentary condition. It professes to be derived from a certain χρηστομάθεια γραμματική—a kind of primer or résumé of Greek literature—the work of a grammarian named Proclus; and contains, with other matter, part of his account of the so-called ‘Epic Cycle.”

Regarding Proclus himself nothing is certain, except that he is not Proclus Diadochus, the Platonic philosopher of the fifth century. According to Welcker's probable conjecture, he is to be identified with Eutychius Proclus of Sicca, instructor of the emperor M. Antoninus

Type
Research Article
Information
The Journal of Hellenic Studies , Volume 4 , November 1883 , pp. 305 - 334
Copyright
Copyright © The Society for the Promotion of Hellenic Studies 1883

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References

page 306 note 1 In Mr. Mahaffy's very readable History of Greek Literature this poem is mentioned, but it is stated that ‘the arrangers of the mythical cycle preferred, on the Sack of Troy, a poem of Lesches called the Little Iliad.’ I do not see any ground for this departure from the usual account. If Arctinus' Sack of Ilium did not enter into the Epic Cycle, how did an abstract, of it come to be given by Proclus?

page 310 note 1 It is true that Stesichorus is followed by the artist of the Tabula Iliaca. But the Tabula Iliaca was meant for use in Roman schools: and Stesichorus was the chief authority for the official Roman legend of Æneas.

page 314 note 1

page 314 note 2

page 314 note 3 I quote the words for convenience from Prof.Mahaffy, 's Hist, of Gr. Lit. i. p. 86Google Scholar. The view was originally put forward by Heyne when he edited the fragments of Proclus for the first time, in the Bibliothek der antiken Literatur und Kunst (1786). It is not held by Welcker, and indeed has been generally abandoned. I may add that I agree with Prof. Mahaffy as to the existence of a ‘selection of poems or parts of poems,’ and only differ from him in holding that the term Epic Cycle means that selection, and nothing else.

page 316 note 1 Compare the words quoted in the text with the phrase διὰ τὴν ἀκολουθίαν τῶν ἐν αὐτῷ πραγυάτων in Photius.

page 316 note 2 The natural place for Proclus to notice any changes made in the poems in order to fit them for a place in the Epic Cycle would be the passage in which he explained that they were ‘preserved and valued not for their merit so much as διὰ, τὴν ἀκολουθίαν τῶν ἐν αὐτῷ πραγυάτων.’ It seems very possible that he there discussed the rejection of books or parts of poems, not merely of entire poems. Note that the sequence of events, according to Photius, was in the Epic Cycle (ἐν αὐτῷ), not in the poems which were chosen to form it.

It may be worth while noticing also that the form used by Proclus in introducing the several poems, does not always expressly assert that the whole poem was before him e.g. and so of the Little Iliad and Iliupersis—the books, not the poem, are said to comprise so much matter.

page 325 note 1 This point cannot be sufficiently discussed without going into the general question of the use of κύκλος in Roman and Byzantine times. Meanwhile it may be suggested that the appearance of κύκλος in the list of Homer's works given by Suidas (along with ‘cyclic’ poems, as the Cypria and Little Iliad), and the statement that the ancients attributed the κύκλος to Homer, are perhaps due to confusion between the Epic Cycle and a particular short poem entitled κύκλος.

page 326 note 1 If we adopt the correction of Menage κύκλος ἢ περὶ ποιητῶν, and compare the titles of other dialogues, as also the Platonic titles generally, it seems possible that the word κύκλος is the corruption of a proper name. Otherwise we may acquiesce in the opinion of Rose, that κύκλος here has nothing to do with the dialogue ‘on the poets,’ but is another name for the famous Πέπλος of Aristotle. If so, it was a summary of mythical history, like the κύκλος of Dionysius.

page 327 note 1 The στέφανος of Dionysius, mentioned by Socrates (Hist. Eccl. iii. 23), is generally thought to be the same book. If so, Στέφανος may have been the proper title.

page 328 note 1 It is needless to go into the notices connecting Zenodotus and Aristarchus with the collection of the Homeric poems under Pisistratus. Among these must be counted an epigram of Ausonius in which Zenodotus is referred to as the grammarian qui sacri lacerum collegit corpus Homeri. This lacerum corpus, or fragmentary Homer of Pisistratus, is a ghost that has no business in the daylight of Alexandrine criticism.