The Epic Cycle (Greek: Επικός Κύκλος) was a collection of Ancient Greek epic poems that related the story of the Trojan War, which includes the Kypria, the Aithiopis, the Little Iliad, the Iliou persis ("The Sack of Troy"), the Nostoi ("Returns"), and the Telegony. Scholars sometimes include the two Homeric epics, the Iliad and the Odyssey, among the poems of the Epic Cycle, but the term is more often used to specify the non-Homeric poems as distinct from the Homeric ones. Note: This article contains special characters. ... In mathematics, see epic morphism. ... The fall of Troy by Johann Georg Trautmann (1713–1769) From the collections of the granddukes of Baden, Karlsruhe The Trojan War was waged, according to legend, against the city of Troy in Asia Minor, by the armies of the Achaeans (Mycenaean Greeks), after Paris of Troy stole Helen from... The Kypria (Greek: Κύπρια; Latin: Cypria) is a lost epic of ancient Greek literature. ... The Aithiopis (Greek: Αἰθιοπίς; Latin: Aethiopis) is a lost epic of ancient Greek literature. ... The Little Iliad (Greek: Ἰλιὰς μικρά, Ilias mikra; Latin: Ilias parva) is a lost epic of ancient Greek literature. ... The Iliou persis (English: Sack of Ilion; Greek: Ἰλίου πέρσις; also known as Iliupersis, esp. ... The Nostoi (English: Returns; Greek: Νόστοι; also known as Nosti in Latin) is a lost epic of ancient Greek literature. ... The Telegony (Greek: Τηλεγόνεια, Telegoneia; Latin: Telegonia) is a lost epic of ancient Greek literature. ... It has been suggested that Deception of Zeus be merged into this article or section. ... Odysseus and Nausicaä - by Charles Gleyre The Odyssey (Greek: , Odusseia) is one of the two major ancient Greek epic poems attributed to the poet Homer. ...

Aside from the Odyssey and the Iliad, the cyclic epics only survive in fragments, the most important of which is a detailed summary written by someone named Proclus (not same person as the philosopher Proclus Diadochus). The epics were composed in dactylic hexameter verse. Odysseus and Nausicaä - by Charles Gleyre The Odyssey (Greek: , Odusseia) is one of the two major ancient Greek epic poems attributed to the poet Homer. ... It has been suggested that Deception of Zeus be merged into this article or section. ... Proclus Lycaeus (February 8, 412 – April 17, 485), surnamed The Successor or diadochos (Greek Πρόκλος ὁ Διάδοχος Próklos ho Diádokhos), was a Greek Neoplatonist philosopher, one of the last major Greek philosophers (see Damascius). ... Dactyllic hexameter (also known as heroic hexameter) is a form of meter in poetry or a rhythmic scheme. ...

In modern scholarship the study of the historical and literary relationship between the Homeric epics and the rest of the Cycle is called Neoanalysis. Homeric scholarship is the study of Homeric epic, especially the two large surviving epics the Iliad and Odyssey. ...

==Contents==

A longer Epic Cycle, as described by the 9th-century CE scholar and clergyman Photius in his Bibliotheca, also included the Titanomachy and the Theban Cycle, which in turn comprised the Oedipodea, the Thebaid, the Epigoni and the Alcmeonis. However, it is certain that none of the cyclic epics (other than Homer) survived to Photius' day, and it is likely that Proclus and Photius were not referring to a canonical collection. Modern scholars do not normally include the Theban Cycle when referring to the Epic Cycle. The Kypria (Greek: Κύπρια; Latin: Cypria) is a lost epic of ancient Greek literature. ... Stasinus, of Cyprus, according to some ancient authorities the author of the Cypria (in 11 books), one of the poems belonging to the epic cycle. ... The Judgment of Paris, Peter Paul Rubens, ca 1636 (National Gallery, London) For the wine-tasting event known as The Judgment of Paris, see Paris Wine Tasting of 1976 The Judgement of Paris is a story from Greek mythology, in which the legendary roots of the Trojan War can be... It has been suggested that Deception of Zeus be merged into this article or section. ... Homer (Greek: , HómÄ“ros) was a legendary early Greek poet and aoidos (singer) traditionally credited with the composition of the Iliad and the Odyssey. ... For other uses, see Achilles (disambiguation). ... The so-called Mask of Agamemnon. Discovered by Heinrich Schliemann in 1876 at Mycenae. ... Shantae is a game created by Matt Bozon, brother of Mark Bozon, for the Game Boy Color. ... A cup depicting Achilles bandaging Patroklos arm, by the Sosias Painter. ... The Aithiopis (Greek: Αἰθιοπίς; Latin: Aethiopis) is a lost epic of ancient Greek literature. ... Arctinus of Miletus was one of the earliest poets of Greece and contributors to the epic cycle. ... In Greek mythology, Penthesilea (also spelled Penthesilia) was an Amazonian queen, daughter of Ares and Otrera, sister of Hippolyte. ... The Amazons ( Amazones) were an ancient nation of female warriors, or a society dominated by women, at the edges of Scythia in Sarmatia (Herodotus). ... Memnon may refer to three men: Memnon (mythology), in Greek mythology Memnon (Fantasy Literature), in the Forgotten Realms setting Memnon of Heraclea was a Greek historian. ... In Greek mythology, Antilochus (also transliterated as Antílokhos) was the son of Nestor, king of Pylos. ... The Little Iliad (Greek: Ἰλιὰς μικρά, Ilias mikra; Latin: Ilias parva) is a lost epic of ancient Greek literature. ... Lesches (Lescheos in Pausanias x. ... // For other uses, see Trojan Horse (disambiguation). ... The Iliou persis (English: Sack of Ilion; Greek: Ἰλίου πέρσις; also known as Iliupersis, esp. ... Arctinus of Miletus was one of the earliest poets of Greece and contributors to the epic cycle. ... Troy or Ilion, see Troy (disambiguation) and Ilion (disambiguation). ... The Nostoi (English: Returns; Greek: Νόστοι; also known as Nosti in Latin) is a lost epic of ancient Greek literature. ... Eumelus of Corinth or Eumelos of Korinthos was an early Greek poet, probably the author of Corinthiaca, an epic narrating the legends and early history of his home city Corinth. ... The so-called Mask of Agamemnon. Discovered by Heinrich Schliemann in 1876 at Mycenae. ... Menelaus regains Helen, detail of an Attic red-figure crater, ca. ... Odysseus and Nausicaä - by Charles Gleyre The Odyssey (Greek: , Odusseia) is one of the two major ancient Greek epic poems attributed to the poet Homer. ... Homer (Greek: , HómÄ“ros) was a legendary early Greek poet and aoidos (singer) traditionally credited with the composition of the Iliad and the Odyssey. ... Odysseus (Greek Odusseus), pronounced /oʊˈdɪs. ... Penelope represented as a statue in the Vatican, Rome For other uses, see Penelope (disambiguation). ... The Telegony (Greek: Τηλεγόνεια, Telegoneia; Latin: Telegonia) is a lost epic of ancient Greek literature. ... Eugammon of Cyrene was an early Greek poet to whom the epic Telegony was ascribed. ... Thesprotia (Greek: Θεσπρωτία) is one of the prefectures of Greece. ... For other places named Ithaca, see Ithaca (disambiguation). ... In Greek mythology, Telegonus (born afar) was the youngest son of Circe and Odysseus. ... Photius (b. ... The Titanomachy is an epic poem, which is a part of Ancient Greek Mythology. ... The Theban Cycle is a collection of four lost epics of ancient Greek literature which related the mythical history of the Boiotian city of Thebes. ... The Thebaid is an Ancient Greek epic poem of uncertain authorship (see Cyclic poets) sometimes attributed by early writers to Homer. ... Epigoni (in Greek, Epigonoi The Next Generation) was an early Greek epic, a sequel to the Thebaid and therefore grouped in the Theban cycle. ... Alcmeonis (in Greek, Alkmeonis or Alkmaionis) is the title of a lost early Greek epic which is considered to have formed part of the Theban cycle. ...

Evidence for the Epic Cycle

Only the Iliad and the Odyssey survive intact, although fragments of the other epics are quoted in later authors, and a few lines survive in the tattered remains of ancient papyri. It has been suggested that Deception of Zeus be merged into this article or section. ... Odysseus and Nausicaä - by Charles Gleyre The Odyssey (Greek: , Odusseia) is one of the two major ancient Greek epic poems attributed to the poet Homer. ... Blank papyrus. ...

Most of our knowledge of the Cyclic epics comes from a broken summary of them which serves as part of the preface to the famous 10th-century CE Iliad manuscript known as Venetus A. This preface is damaged, missing the Cypria, and has to be supplemented by other sources (the Cypria summary is preserved in several other manuscripts, each of which contains only the Cypria and none of the other epics). The summary is in turn an excerpt from a longer work. Venetus A is the more common name for the 10th century manuscript catalogued in the Biblioteca Marciana in Venice as codex Marcianus Graecus 454. ...

This longer work was entitled Chrestomathy, and written by someone named Proclus. This is known from evidence provided by the later scholar Photius, in his Bibliotheca. Photius provides sufficient information about Proclus' Chrestomathy to demonstrate that the Venetus A excerpt is derived from the same work.^[1] Little is known about Proclus, except that he is certainly not the philosopher Proclus Diadochus. Some have thought that it might be the same person as the lesser-known grammarian Eutychius Proclus, who lived in the 2nd century CE,^[2] but it is quite possible that he is simply an otherwise unknown figure. Chrestomathy (Greek, from the words khrestos, useful, and mathein, to know) is a selection of linguistic writings which can help you to learn a language. ... Photius (b. ... Proclus Lycaeus (February 8, 412 – April 17, 485), surnamed The Successor or diadochos (Greek Πρόκλος ὁ Διάδοχος Próklos ho Diádokhos), was a Greek Neoplatonist philosopher, one of the last major Greek philosophers (see Damascius). ... Eutychius Proclus (Latin; Greek Eutychios Proklos) was a grammarian who flourished in the 2nd century CE. He was born at Sicca in Africa. ...

Reception and influence

The non-Homeric epics are usually regarded as later than the Iliad and Odyssey. There is no reliable evidence for this, however, and some Neoanalyst scholars operate on the premise that the Homeric epics were later than the Cyclic epics and drew on them extensively. Other Neoanalysts make the milder claim that the Homeric epics draw on legendary material which later came to crystallise into the Epic Cycle. This is an ongoing debate. Homeric scholarship is the study of Homeric epic, especially the two large surviving epics the Iliad and Odyssey. ...

In antiquity the Homeric epics were considered to be the greatest works in the Cycle. For Hellenistic scholars the Cyclic poets, the authors to whom the other poems were commonly ascribed, were νεώτεροι (neōteroi "later poets"), and κυκλικός (kyklikos "cyclic") was synonymous with "formulaic": then, and in much modern scholarship, there has been an equation between poetry that is later and poetry that is inferior. The Hellenistic period (4th - 1st c. ... Cyclic Poets are epic poets who followed Homer and wrote poems and songs about the Trojan war. ...

Famously Aristotle in his Poetics criticises the Cypria and Little Iliad for the piecemeal character of their plots: Aristotle (Greek: Aristotélēs) (384 BC – March 7, 322 BC) was a Greek philosopher, a student of Plato and teacher of Alexander the Great. ...

But other poets compose a plot around one person, one time, and one plot with multiple parts; like the composer of the Cypria and the Little Iliad. As a result, only one tragedy is made out of the Iliad and the Odyssey, but many from the Cypria many, and from the Little Iliad more than eight ...^[3]

Aristotle does not extend his criticism to the other epics in the Cycle; the Aethiopis, Iliou persis, and Telegony fare much better under his criteria for epic poetry.

In more recent times it has been argued that the fantastic and magical content of the non-Homeric epics mark them as inferior;^[4] on the other hand, parts of the Iliad and most of the Odyssey could sound just as fantastic if only brief summaries of them survived, with talking horses, a river chasing a man, and one-eyed man-eating monsters. It is certain that the poets of the Iliad and Odyssey knew the stories in the rest of the Cycle and drew upon them extensively, and it is likely that the Aethiopis in particular was of relatively high quality. Overall it is impossible to tell how good the lost epics were; though some parts, especially the end of the Telegony, sound frankly bizarre in summary.

The tales told in the Cycle are recounted by other ancient sources, notably Virgil's Aeneid (book 2) which recounts the sack of Troy from a Trojan perspective; Ovid's Metamorphoses (books 13-14), which describes the Greeks' landing at Troy (from the Cypria) and the judgment of Achilles' arms (Little Iliad); Quintus of Smyrna's Posthomerica, which narrates the events after Achilles' death up until the end of the war; and the death of Agamemnon and the vengeance taken by his son Orestes (the Nostoi) are the subject of later Greek tragedy, especially Aeschylus's Oresteian trilogy. A bust of Virgil, from the entrance to his tomb in Naples, Italy. ... The Aeneid (IPA English pronunciation: ; in Latin Aeneis, pronounced — the title is Greek in form: genitive case Aeneidos): is a Latin epic written by Virgil in the 1st century BC (between 29 and 19 BC) that tells the legendary story of Aeneas, a Trojan who travelled to Italy where he... Engraved frontispiece of George Sandyss 1632 London edition of Publius Ovidius Naso (Sulmona, March 20, 43 BC â€“ Tomis, now Constanta AD 17) Roman poet known to the English-speaking world as Ovid, wrote on topics of love, abandoned women, and mythological transformations. ... // Cover of George Sandyss 1632 edition of Ovids Metamorphosis Englished The Metamorphoses by the Roman poet Ovid is a poem in fifteen books that describes the creation and history of the world in terms according to Greek and Roman points of view. ... Quintus Smyrnaeus, Greek epic poet, probably flourished in the latter part of the 4th century AD. He is sometimes called Quintus Calaber, because the only manuscript of his poem was discovered at Otranto in Calabria by Cardinal Bessarion in 1450. ... The Posthomerica is an epic poem by Quintus of Smyrna, probably written in the latter half of the 4th century AD, and telling the story of the period between the death of Hektor and the fall of Ilium. ... Orestes Ορεστης is a Greek name, literally he who stands on the mountain, or mountain-dweller. Orestes can refer to: In Greek mythology, the son of Agamemnon. ... In general usage a tragedy is a play, movie or sometimes a real world event with a sad outcome. ... Bust of Aeschylus from the Capitoline Museums, Rome Aeschylus (525 BC—456 BC; Greek: Ασχύλος) was a playwright of Ancient Greece. ... The Oresteia is a trilogy of tragedies about the end of the curse on the House of Atreus, written by Aeschylus. ...

Compilation of the Epic Cycle

How and when the eight epics of the Cycle came to be combined into a single collection and referred to as a "cycle" is a matter of ongoing debate. In the late 19th century, Monro argued that the scholastic use of the word κυκλικός did not refer to the Cycle as such, but meant "conventional", and that the Cycle was compiled in the Hellenistic period (perhaps as late as the 1st century BCE).^[5] More recent scholars have preferred to push the date slightly earlier, but accept the general thrust of the argument. Alternative meaning: Nineteenth Century (periodical) (18th century — 19th century — 20th century — more centuries) As a means of recording the passage of time, the 19th century was that century which lasted from 1801-1900 in the sense of the Gregorian calendar. ... David Binning Monro (November 16, 1836 – August 22, 1905) was an Scottish Homeric scholar. ... The Hellenistic period (4th - 1st c. ... (Redirected from 1st century BCE) (2nd century BC - 1st century BC - 1st century - other centuries) The 1st century BC starts on January 1, 100 BC and ends on December 31, 1 BC. An alternative name for this century is the last century BC. (2nd millennium BC - 1st millennium BC - 1st...

The nature of the relationship between the Cyclic epics and Homer is also bound up in this question. As told by Proclus, the plots of the six non-Homeric epics look very much as though they are designed to fit around Homer, with no overlaps with one another. It is certain that this was not originally the case.

For example, a surviving quotation shows that the Little Iliad narrated how Neoptolemus took Andromache prisoner after the fall of Troy;^[6] however, in Proclus, the Little Iliad stops before the sack of Troy begins. Some scholars have argued that the Cypria as originally planned dealt with more of the Trojan War than Proclus' summary suggests;^[7] conversely, others argue that it was designed to lead up to the Iliad, and that Proclus' account reflects the Cypria as originally designed.^[8] Neoptolemus killing Priam In Greek mythology, Neoptolemus, also Neoptólemos or Pyrrhus, was the son of the warrior Achilles and the princess Deidamea. ... Andromache grieves the loss of Hector In Greek mythology, Andromache was the wife of Hector and daughter of Eetion, sister to Podes. ...

It is certain that at least some editing or "stitching" was done to edit epics together. For the last line of the Iliad,

ὣς οἵ γ᾽ ἀμφίεπον τάφον Ἕκτορος ἱπποδάμοιο.

In this way they performed the funeral of Hector, tamer of horses.

an alternative reading is preserved which is designed to lead directly into the Aethiopis:

ὣς οἵ γ' ἀμφίεπον τάφον Ἕκτορος· ἦλθε δ' Ἀμαζών,
Ἄρηος θυγάτηρ μεγαλήτορος ἀνδροφόνοιο.

In this way they performed the funeral of Hector; then the Amazon [Penthesileia] came,
daughter of great-hearted man-slaughtering Ares. ...

There are contradictions between epics in the Cycle. For example, the Greek warrior who killed Hector's son Astyanax in the fall of Troy is Neoptolemus according to the Little Iliad; according to the Iliou persis, it is Odysseus. In Greek mythology, Astyanax (Greek Ἀστυάναξ, prince of the city) was the son of Hector and Andromache. ... Neoptolemus killing Priam In Greek mythology, Neoptolemus, also Neoptólemos or Pyrrhus, was the son of the warrior Achilles and the princess Deidamea. ... Odysseus (Greek Odusseus), pronounced /oʊˈdɪs. ...

Bibliography

Editions

• Online editions (English translation):
  • Online Medieval and Classical Library text (translated by H.G. Evelyn-White, 1914; public domain)
  • Project Gutenberg text (translated by H.G. Evelyn-White, 1914)
  • Proklos' summary of the Epic Cycle, omitting the Telegony (translated by Gregory Nagy)
• Print editions (Greek):
  • Bernabé, A. 1987, Poetarum epicorum Graecorum testimonia et fragmenta pt. 1 (Leipzig). ISBN 3-322-00352-3
  • Davies, M. 1988, Epicorum Graecorum fragmenta (Göttingen). ISBN 3-525-25747-3
• Print editions (Greek with English translation):
  • West, M.L. 2003, Greek Epic Fragments (Cambridge, MA). ISBN 0-674-99605-4

Further reading

• Burgess, J.S. 2001, The Tradition of the Trojan War in Homer and the Epic Cycle (Baltimore). ISBN 0-8018-7890-X (pbk)
• Davies, M. 1989, The Greek Epic Cycle (Bristol). ISBN 1-85399-039-6 (pbk)
• Kullmann, W. 1960, Die Quellen der Ilias (troischer Sagenkreis) (Wiesbaden). ISBN 3-515-00235-9 (1998 reprint)
• Monro, D.B. 1883, "On the Fragment of Proclus' Abstract of the Epic Cycle Contained in the Codex Venetus of the Iliad", Journal of Hellenic Studies 4: 305-334.
• Monro, D.B. 1901, Homer's Odyssey, books XIII-XXIV (Oxford), pp. 340-84. (Out of print)
• Severyns, A. 1928, Le cycle épique dans l'école d'Aristarque (Liège, Paris). (Out of print)
• Severyns, A. 1938, 1938, 1953, 1963, Recherches sur la "Chrestomathie" de Proclos, 4 vols. (Bibliothèque de la faculté de philosophie et lettres de l'université de Liège fascc. 78, 79, 132, 170; Paris). (Vols. 1 and 2 are on Photius, 3 and 4 on other MSS.)
• Severyns, A. 1962, Texte et apparat, histoire critique d'une tradition imprimée (Brussels).

References