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The epic is a broadly defined genre of poetry, which retells in a continuous narrative the life and works of a heroic or mythological person or group of persons. In the West, the Iliad, Odyssey and Nibelungenlied; and in the East, the Mahabharata, Ramayana, and Shahnama are often cited as examples of the epic genre. A genre is any of the traditional divisions of art forms from a single field of activity into various kinds according to criteria particular to that form. ...
Bust of Homer, one of the earliest European poets, in the British Museum Poetry (ancient Greek: ποιεω (poieo) = I create) is an art form in which human language is used for its aesthetic qualities in addition to, or instead of, its notional and semantic content. ...
The Iliad tells the story of the Trojan War and is, along with the Odyssey, one of the two major Greek epic poems traditionally attributed to Homer, a blind Ionian poet. ...
The Odyssey (ΟΔΥΣΣΕΙΑ) is the second of the two great Greek epic poems ascribed to Homer, the first being the Iliad. ...
The Nibelungenlied is an epic poem in Middle High German that takes Burgundian kings as its subject matter. ...
The Mahabharata (Devanagari: महाभारत, phonetically Mahābhārata - see note), sometimes just called Bharata, is the great religious and philosophical epic of India. ...
Lord Ram, Laxman, Sita and Hanuman(crouching) The Ramayana (Sanskrit: vehicle of Rama) is part of the Hindu smriti, written by Valmiki (c. ...
Shahnameh Shahnameh The Shahnama (Book of Kings) also written Shahnameh, written by Ferdowsi around 1000 AD, is the national epic of Iran and one of the definite classics of world literature. ...
Epic versus narrative One factor that distinguishes epics from other forms of narrative poetry is scale: epic poems tend to be too long to be read or performed in a single sitting. A second distinguishing factor is stylistic: epic poems are written in what might be termed high style, avoiding popular metres and verse patterns. For example, an epic written in English would not use the ballad form. The metre (American spelling: meter), symbol: m, is the basic unit of distance (or of length, in the parlance of the physical sciences) in the International System of Units. ...
Verse is a writing that uses meter as its primary organisational mode, as opposed to prose, which uses grammatical and discoursal units like sentences and paragraphs. ...
The English language is a West Germanic language that originates in England. ...
A ballad is a story in song, usually a narrative song or poem. ...
Thirdly, epic poems always deal with persons and events that are considered to be historically real by the poet and their audience. Epics are, essentially, the tale of the tribe. In oral cultures, the learning and performance of epic poems frequently formed an integral part of the education of the poet and, by extension, the audience. This assumed historicity is important for distinguishing epic from other long narrative forms such as allegory. ǎ This article is on the social structure. ...
An allegory (from Greek αλλος, allos, other, and αγορευειν, agoreuein, to speak in public) is a figurative representation conveying a meaning other than and in addition to the literal. ...
The fourth distinguishing factor in the definition of an epic is what is termed the epic hero cycle. The hero in an epic poem tends to follow a predictable cycle of events that is repeated in epics from every sort of culture. Although the cycle may repeat upon itself and vary slightly in order from epic to epic, the general points of the cycle include a charge (e.g. from a god to complete a quest); a test (to test worthiness to complete said quest), various mythical, human, or animal helpers; a main antagonist, often supernatural; a magical/unreal world, unable to be visited by a normal human, that the hero visits (e.g. the underworld or the world of the gods); an escape from the quest/low point (the hero questions the validity of his quest and seeks to escape from his responsibility); a resurrection (either from being dead or from a dead-like state of mind, such as an unwillingness to complete the quest, and may also be a hero who was thought to be dead who was rediscovered); and a restoration (e.g. a king restored to his throne). George Lucas' original Star Wars trilogy, in particular, follows this cycle exactly, and some have cited it as the reason for its mass appeal. The monomyth (often referred to as the Heros Journey) is the cyclical journey undertaken by the standard mythological hero, as described by Joseph Campbell in his book The Hero with a Thousand Faces. ...
Sir Galahad, a hero of Arthurian legend In many myths and folk tales, a hero is a man or woman (the latter often called a heroine), traditionally the protagonist of a story, legend or saga, commonly possessed of abilities or character far greater than that of a typical person, which...
The term God is ordinarily used to designate a singular, universal Supreme Being. ...
The quest is a plot device frequently found in mythology and literature. ...
A monarch is a type of ruler or head of state. ...
This article is about royal thrones, for the order of angels by the same name see Thrones. ...
George Lucas George Walton Lucas, Jr. ...
The DVD cover of the Star Wars trilogy. ...
Early epics The first recorded epic is the Sumerian Gilgamesh. The longest epic (and, in general, work of literature) of all time is the Tibetan Epic of King Gesar, which has been collected as a work composed of roughly 120 volumes, with more than one million verses, totaling over 20 million words, making it 25 times the size of the ancient Greek epic, the Iliad. The Mahabharata, whose 100,000 verses make it four times the size of the Bible and seven times the size of the Iliad and Odyssey combined, is considered the second-largest literary work. The Deluge tablet of the Gilgamesh epic in Akkadian The Epic of Gilgamesh is from Babylonia, dating from long after the time that king Gilgamesh was supposed to have ruled. ...
The Epic of King Gesar is a Tibetan epic poem about King Gesar, who ruled the mythical Kingdom of Ling. ...
The Iliad tells the story of the Trojan War and is, along with the Odyssey, one of the two major Greek epic poems traditionally attributed to Homer, a blind Ionian poet. ...
The Mahabharata (Devanagari: महाभारत, phonetically Mahābhārata - see note), sometimes just called Bharata, is the great religious and philosophical epic of India. ...
The Bible (From Greek (τα) βιβλια, (ta) biblia, (the) books, plural of βιβλιον, biblion, book, originally a diminutive of βιβλος, biblos, which in turn is derived from βυβλος—byblos, meaning papyrus, from the ancient Phoenician city of Byblos which exported this writing material), is a word applied to sacred scriptures. ...
Oral epics or world folk epics The first epics are associated strongly with preliterate societies and oral poetic traditions. In these traditions, poetry is transmitted to the audience and from performer to performer by purely oral means. World folk epics are those epics which are not just literary masterpieces but also an integral part of the weltanschauung of a people. They were originally oral literatures, which were later written down by either single author or several writers. A society is a group of people living or working together. ...
Literature is literally an acquaintance with letters as in the first sense given in the Oxford English Dictionary (from the Latin littera meaning an individual written character (letter)). The term has, however, generally come to identify a collection of texts. ...
Originally, the term masterpiece (or chef doeuvre) referred to a piece of handicraft art produced by a journeyman aspiring to become a master craftsman in the old European guild system. ...
A world view, also spelled as worldview is a term calqued from the German word Weltanschauung (look onto the world). The German word is also in wide use in English, as well as the translated form world outlook. ...
Literature is literally an acquaintance with letters as in the first sense given in the Oxford English Dictionary (from the Latin littera meaning an individual written character (letter)). The term has generally come to identify a collection of texts. ...
Studies of living oral epic traditions in the Balkans by Milman Parry and Albert Lord demonstrated the paratactic model used for composing these poems. What they demonstrated was that oral epics tend to be constructed in short episodes, each of equal status, interest and importance. This facilitates memorisation, as the poet is recalling each episode and using them to recreate the entire epic as they perform it. The Balkans is the historic and geographic name used to describe southeastern Europe (see the Definitions and boundaries section below). ...
Milman Parry was a classical scholar who between 1933 and 1935 was in Yugoslavia studying the oral traditions among the South Slavs. ...
Albert Bates Lord was a Professor of Slavic and Comparative Literature at Harvard who, after the untimely death of Milman Parry, carried on that scholars research into epic literature. ...
Parataxis (contrasted to syntaxis) is a writing or rhetorical style that favors short, simple sentences, often without the use of conjunctions. ...
Parry and Lord also showed that the most likely source for written texts of the epics of Homer was dictation from an oral performance. Bust of Homer in the British Museum For other uses, see Homer (disambiguation). ...
See also list of world folk-epics. World-folk epics are those epics which are not just literary masterpieces but also an integral part of the weltanschauung of a people. ...
Epics in literate societies Literate societies have often copied the epic format, and the earliest known European example is Virgil's Aeneid, which follows both the style and subject matter of Homer. Another obvious example is Tulsidas' Ramacharitamanas, following the style and subject matter of Valmiki's Ramayana. The Aeneid is a Latin epic written by Virgil in the 1st century BC that tells the legendary story of Aeneas, a Trojan who traveled to Italy where he became the ancestor of the Romans. ...
Bust of Homer in the British Museum For other uses, see Homer (disambiguation). ...
Lord Ram, Laxman, Sita and Hanuman(crouching) The Ramayana (Sanskrit: vehicle of Rama) is part of the Hindu smriti, written by Valmiki (c. ...
Epic non-poetry By extension, the word "epic" is used in reference to any fictional work that follows the broad stylistic and thematic conventions of epic poetry, namely high language, historical or pseudo-historical settings, and hero-worship. Examples of non-poetic epics are Beau Geste, The Great Indian Novel and Star Wars. The Three Graces, here in a painting by Sandro Botticelli, were the goddesses of charm, beauty, nature, human creativity and fertility in Greek mythology. ...
Beau Geste is one of the most re-made stories of all time, with three movie versions released in 1926, 1939, and 1966, as well as a television mini-series in 1982 and a 1977 parody, the aptly named The Last Remake of Beau Geste starring Marty Feldman and Michael...
The DVD cover of the Star Wars trilogy. ...
Notable epic poems (21st century BC - 20th century BC - 19th century BC - other centuries) (3rd millennium BC - 2nd millennium BC - 1st millennium BC) Events 2064 - 1986 BC -- Twin Dynasty wars in Egypt circa 2000 BC -- Abraham, a significant patriarchal figure in Judaism, Christianity, and Islam, is born. ...
The Deluge tablet of the Gilgamesh epic in Akkadian The Epic of Gilgamesh is from Babylonia, dating from long after the time that king Gilgamesh was supposed to have ruled. ...
Chaldean mythology is the collective name given to Sumerian, Assyrian and Babylonian mythologies, although Chaldea did not comprehend the whole territory inhabited by those peoples. ...
(20th century BC - 19th century BC - 18th century BC - other centuries) (3rd millennium BC - 2nd millennium BC - 1st millennium BC) Events Hittite empire in Anatolia 1829 - 1818 BC -- Egyptian-Nubian war 1818 BC -- Egyptian Campaign in Palestine 1813 BC -- Amorite Conquest of Northern Mesopotamia 1806 BC -- Traditional date for the...
Lord Ram, Laxman, Sita and Hanuman(crouching) The Ramayana (Sanskrit: vehicle of Rama) is part of the Hindu smriti, written by Valmiki (c. ...
Itihasa (Sanskrit: thus verily happened) refers collectively to the epic Hindu scriptures, detailing the actions of divine incarnations on earth while interspersing them with often large sections of philosophical and ethical discourse. ...
Centuries: 15th century BC - 14th century BC - 13th century BC Decades: 1360s BC 1350s BC 1340s BC 1330s BC 1320s BC - 1310s BC - 1300s BC 1290s BC 1280s BC 1270s BC 1260s BC Events and Trends The Bhagavad Gita is written, according to some Hindu traditions. ...
The Mahabharata (Devanagari: महाभारत, phonetically Mahābhārata - see note), sometimes just called Bharata, is the great religious and philosophical epic of India. ...
Itihasa (Sanskrit: thus verily happened) refers collectively to the epic Hindu scriptures, detailing the actions of divine incarnations on earth while interspersing them with often large sections of philosophical and ethical discourse. ...
(9th century BC - 8th century BC - 7th century BC - other centuries) (800s BC - 790s BC - 780s BC - 770s BC - 760s BC - 750s BC - 740s BC - 730s BC - 720s BC - 710s BC - 700s BC - other decades) (2nd millennium BC - 1st millennium BC - 1st millennium AD) Events Golden age in Armenia Assyria...
The Iliad tells the story of the Trojan War and is, along with the Odyssey, one of the two major Greek epic poems traditionally attributed to Homer, a blind Ionian poet. ...
Bust of Homer in the British Museum For other uses, see Homer (disambiguation). ...
Greek mythology comprises the collected legends of Greek gods and goddesses and ancient heroes and heroines, originally created and spread within an oral-poetic tradition. ...
The Odyssey (ΟΔΥΣΣΕΙΑ) is the second of the two great Greek epic poems ascribed to Homer, the first being the Iliad. ...
Bust of Homer in the British Museum For other uses, see Homer (disambiguation). ...
Greek mythology comprises the collected legends of Greek gods and goddesses and ancient heroes and heroines, originally created and spread within an oral-poetic tradition. ...
(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 millennium AD) Events The Roman...
The Aeneid is a Latin epic written by Virgil in the 1st century BC that tells the legendary story of Aeneas, a Trojan who traveled to Italy where he became the ancestor of the Romans. ...
For other uses see Virgil (disambiguation). ...
(2nd century - 3rd century - 4th century - other centuries) Events The Sassanid dynasty of Persia launches a war to reconquer lost lands in the Roman east. ...
Cilappatikaram (The Ankle Bracelet - initial c pronounced like the first syllable of chat) also spelled as Cilappadhikaram or Silappadhigaram, is one of the five great epics of ancient Tamil Literature. ...
South India is a geographic and linguistic-cultural region of India. ...
A prince (from the Latin princeps) is a male member of royalty or a royal family. ...
(7th century — 8th century — 9th century — other centuries) Events The Iberian peninsula is taken by Arab and Berber Muslims, thus ending the Visigothic rule, and starting almost 8 centuries of Muslim presence there. ...
( 9th century - 10th century - 11th century - other centuries) As a means of recording the passage of time, the 10th century was that century which lasted from 901 to 1000. ...
The first page of Beowulf This article describes Beowulf, the epic poem. ...
The Anglo-Saxons arrived in Britain from southern Scandinavia, the Netherlands and northern Germany, thus the Anglo-Saxon gods were originally the same gods as those in Germanic mythology and in the better-known version Norse mythology. ...
( 9th century - 10th century - 11th century - other centuries) As a means of recording the passage of time, the 10th century was that century which lasted from 901 to 1000. ...
Shahnameh Shahnameh The Shahnama (Book of Kings) also written Shahnameh, written by Ferdowsi around 1000 AD, is the national epic of Iran and one of the definite classics of world literature. ...
The Bhagavata Purana (sometimes rendered as Bhagavatha Purana), also known as the Srimad Bhagavatam, written c. ...
The Sanskrit language (Skt. ...
(10th century - 11th century - 12th century - other centuries) As a means of recording the passage of time, the 11th century was that century which lasted from 1001 to 1100. ...
The Song of Roland (La Chanson de Roland) is an 11th century Old French epic poem about the Battle of Roncevaux Pass (or Roncesvalles) fought by Roland of the Brittany Marches and his fellow paladins. ...
The Song of Roland (La Chanson de Roland) is an 11th century Old French epic poem about the Battle of Roncevaux Pass (or Roncesvalles) fought by Roland of the Brittany Marches and his fellow paladins. ...
The Epic of King Gesar is a Tibetan epic poem about King Gesar, who ruled the mythical Kingdom of Ling. ...
(11th century - 12th century - 13th century - other centuries) As a means of recording the passage of time, the 12th century was that century which lasted from 1101 to 1200. ...
The Knight in the Panthers Skin (Vepkhis Tkaosani in Georgian) is a well-known epic poem written in the 12th century (though the earliest surviving copy dates to the 16th century) by the Georgian poet Shota Rustaveli, who was a Prince, the Treasurer (Mechurchletukhutsesi) of Queen of Georgia Tamar. ...
Shota Rustaveli (by Professor Sergo Kobuladze (1937)) Shota Rustaveli (შოთა რუსთაველი) was a Georgian poet of the 12th century, considered by many to be one of the greatest representatives of the literature of the medieval world. ...
(12th century - 13th century - 14th century - other centuries) As a means of recording the passage of time, the 13th century was that century which lasted from 1201 to 1300. ...
Hervarar saga ok Heidhreks is a fornaldarsaga from the 13th century using material from an older saga. ...
Norse mythology, Viking mythology or Scandinavian mythology refer to the pre-Christian religion, beliefs and legends of the Scandinavian people, including those who settled on Iceland, where the written sources for Norse mythology were assembled. ...
The Ramsund carving depicting the Saga of the Völsungs The Volsunga saga is a late 13th century Icelandic prose rendition of the story of Sigurd and Brynhild, and the destruction of the Burgundians. ...
Norse mythology, Viking mythology or Scandinavian mythology refer to the pre-Christian religion, beliefs and legends of the Scandinavian people, including those who settled on Iceland, where the written sources for Norse mythology were assembled. ...
The Nibelungenlied is an epic poem in Middle High German that takes Burgundian kings as its subject matter. ...
Germanic mythology is a comprehensive term for Norse mythology, Anglo-Saxon mythology and other versions of the mythologies of the Germanic peoples. ...
Layamon, or Laȝamon (using the archaic letter yogh), was a poet of the early 13th century, whose Brut (c. ...
Events Beginning of the Renaissance. ...
Cursor Mundi, meaning runner of the world, is the name of a lengthy (around 30,000 lines) religious history written around 1300 AD. It was extremely popular in its time. ...
Anonymity is the state of not being identifiable within a set, called the anonymity set. When referring to human beings, we say that a person is anonymous when the identity of that person is not known. ...
(13th century - 14th century - 15th century - more centuries) As a means of recording the passage of time, the 14th century was that century which lasted from 1301 to 1400. ...
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Dante shown holding a copy of The Divine Comedy, next to the entrance to Hell, the seven terraces of Mount Purgatory and the city of Florence, in Michelinos fresco. ...
Dante in a fresco series of famous men by Andrea del Castagno, ca. ...
Events March - With the death of Ferdinand II of Aragon, his grandson Charles of Ghent becomes King of Spain as Carlos I. July - Selim I of the Ottoman Empire declares war on the Mameluks and invades Syria. ...
Orlando Furioso is an epic poem written by Ludovico Ariosto in 1516. ...
Ludovico Ariosto (September 8, 1474 – July 6, 1533) was an Italian poet, author of the epic poem Orlando furioso (1516), Orlando Enraged. He was born at Reggio, in Emilia. ...
Events Russia breaks 60 year old truce with Sweden by attacking Finland May 23 - Paul IV becomes Pope. ...
Os Lusíadas (The Lusiads) is considered one of the finest and most important works in Portuguese literature. ...
Luís de Camões Luís Vaz de Camões (sometimes rendered in English as Camoens) (1524 – June 10, 1580) is generally considered Portugals greatest poet. ...
Events February 13 - Henry III of France is crowned at Reims February 14 - Henry III of France marries Louise de Lorraine-Vaudémont August 5 - Henry Sidney is appointed Lord Lieutenant of Ireland. ...
Torquato Tasso (March 11, 1544 - April 25, 1595) was an Italian poet of the 16th century, best known for his poem La Gerusalemme liberata (Jerusalem Delivered; 1575), in which he describes the imaginary combats between Christians and Muslims at the end of the First Crusade, during the siege of Jerusalem. ...
(15th century - 16th century - 17th century - more centuries) As a means of recording the passage of time, the 16th century was that century which lasted from 1501 to 1600. ...
Lord Ram, Laxman, Sita and Hanuman(crouching) The Ramayana (Sanskrit: vehicle of Rama) is part of the Hindu smriti, written by Valmiki (c. ...
Una and the Lion by Briton Rivière The Faerie Queene is a poem by Edmund Spenser, first published in 1590 (the first half) with the more or less complete version being published in 1596. ...
Edmund Spenser Edmund Spenser (c. ...
(16th century - 17th century - 18th century - more centuries) As a means of recording the passage of time, the 17th century was that century which lasted from 1601-1700. ...
Cover to the first edition Paradise Lost (1667) is an epic poem by the 17th century English poet John Milton. ...
John Milton, English poet John Milton (December 9, 1608—November 8, 1674) was an English poet, most famous for his blank verse epic Paradise Lost. ...
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. ...
The Prelude is an autobiographical poem in blank verse by the English poet William Wordsworth. ...
William Wordsworth, English poet William Wordsworth (April 7, 1770 – April 23, 1850) was an English poet who with Samuel Taylor Coleridge launched the Romantic Age in English literature with the 1798 publication of Lyrical Ballads. ...
poonany feels good! ...
Lord Byron, English poet George Gordon Byron, 6th Baron Byron (January 22, 1788 – April 19, 1824), commonly known as Lord Byron, was the most widely read English language poet of his day. ...
Herman Melville (August 1, 1819 – September 28, 1891) was an American novelist, essayist, and poet. ...
Events and Trends Dutch-speaking farmers known as Voortrekkers emigrate northwards from the Cape Colony. ...
The Kalevala is an epic poem compiled by Elias Lönnrot in the 19th century from Finnish folk sources. ...
Elias Lönnrot (April 9, 1802 - March 19, 1884) was a Finland-Swedish philologist and collector of traditional Finnish oral poetry. ...
Finnish mythology survived as oral tradition well into the 18th century. ...
(19th century - 20th century - 21st century - more centuries) Decades: 1900s 1910s 1920s 1930s 1940s 1950s 1960s 1970s 1980s 1990s As a means of recording the passage of time, the 20th century was that century which lasted from 1901–2000 in the sense of the Gregorian calendar (1900–1999 in the...
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Ezra Pound in 1913 The Cantos by Ezra Pound is a long, incomplete poem, written mostly between 1915 and 1962 in sections, although much of the early work was abandoned and the early Cantos as finally published date from 1922 onwards. ...
Ezra Pound in 1913. ...
Odyssey, poem of Greek writer, poet and philosopher Nikos Kazantzakis, the largest of his works. ...
Nikos Kazantzakis Nikos Kazantzakis (February 18, 1883, Heraklion, Crete - October 26, 1957, Freiburg, Germany) was a Greek novelist, poet, playwriter and thinker. ...
David Jones (1895-1974) was both an artist and one of the most important first generation British modernist poets. ...
Charles Olson (27 December 1910 _ 10 January 1970) was an important 2nd generation American modernist poet who was a crucial link between earlier figures like Ezra Pound and William Carlos Williams and such later avant garde groups as the Beats and L=A=N=G=U=A=G=E...
Biography William Carlos Williams (September 17, 1883 - March 4, 1963), often abbreviated with the initials WCW, was an American poet during the Modernist movement. ...
The cover of The Changing Light at Sandover shows the ballroom of James Merrills childhood home in the 1930s The Changing Light At Sandover is a 560-page poem by James Merrill (1926-1995). ...
poet James Merrill, age 30, in a 1957 publicity photograph for The Seraglio James Ingram Merrill (March 3, 1926 - February 6, 1995) was a Pulitzer Prize winning American writer, increasingly regarded as one of the most important 20th century poets in the English language. ...
See also Byzantine Empire - Digenes Akritas (11th/12th Century C.E.) The ancient Sanskrit epics, the Ramayana and Mahabharata, laid the cornerstone for much of Hindu religion. ...
Though an abundance of historical reminiscence and legend lay in the storehouse of Jewish literature, none of it was built into epic poems until relatively recently. ...
Bylina (Russian: были́на) is a traditional epic, heroic narrative poetry of early East Slavs of Russia and Ukraine. ...
A Duma (Дума in Ukrainian) is an epic poem of 16th and 17th century Cossack Ukraine. ...
World-folk epics are those epics which are not just literary masterpieces but also an integral part of the weltanschauung of a people. ...
The concept of a National epic, a mythological or partly mythological large work of poetry of defining importance to a certain nation, is a product of the 19th century phenomenon of Romantic nationalism. ...
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