Dec 27, 2009

The Odyssey | Historical Context

The context in which the Homeric poems were created is clouded by the fact that their creation is a process that spans several centuries. In a very real sense, the poems' historical and cultural background is rather like one of the archaeological sites from which we gather our information about the period, it is deep, it has many levels or layers, and over time things can get pushed up or down from their proper context. Consider, for example, that the cremation burial of Elpenor described in XII.11-15 would have been common practice in Homer's day, but extremely rare in the Bronze Age...