HERODOTUS LYRICORUM STUDIOSUS
HERODOTUS LYRICORUM STUDIOSUS

Summary/Abstract: In introducing his account of the Spartan tradition about the origins of their dual kingship Herodotus notes (VI 52,1) that what they say does not agree with any poet (Lakedaim"nioi g\r Ômolog}onteV oŮden[ poihtĽ l}gousi). This generalizing claim is disconcerting, but we find something similar in his account of the Egyptian gods where, in connection with the Egyptian identification of Demeter with Isis and Artemis with Bubastis (II 156,6), he argues that Aeschylus must have been influenced by this Egyptian equation when he made Artemis Demeter’s daughter, which no earlier poet had done.2 Herodotus’ confidence is striking. Obviously he could not have systematically consulted a corpus of archaic poetry, but we should see something more than bluff in these exhaustive generalizations. Their background is an environment where poetry is of widespread interest, still principally heard rather than read, and a relatively few (few by modern standards) well known names constitute a kind of informal canon, and are much discussed. Though the authority of poets does not go unchallenged, they are still regarded as sources of wisdom, their works central to the education of the young; close reading of poetry is presented as a staple of the sophistic curriculum (cf. Plato, Protag. 338e–347a), and literary topics figure regularly in conversation.

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