Book contents
- Frontmatter
- PREFACE
- Contents
- DEDICATION
- CHAPTER I THE EARLY NARRATIVE POETRY OF THE TEUTONIC PEOPLES
- CHAPTER II THE HEROIC AGE OF THE TEUTONIC PEOPLES
- CHAPTER III SCENE AND NATIONALITY IN THE HEROIC STORIES
- CHAPTER IV THE ORIGIN AND HISTORY OF THE HEROIC POEMS
- CHAPTER V THE POETRY AND MINSTRELSY OF EARLY TIMES
- CHAPTER VI SUPERNATURAL ELEMENTS IN THE HEROIC STORIES
- CHAPTER VII MYTHICAL ELEMENTS IN THE HEROIC POEMS
- CHAPTER VIII THE USE OF FICTION IN THE HEROIC POEMS
- CHAPTER IX THE HEROIC AGE OF GREECE
- CHAPTER X THE HOMERIC POEMS
- CHAPTER XI EARLY GREEK POETRY AND MINSTRELSY
- CHAPTER XII SUPERNATURAL ELEMENTS IN THE HOMERIC POEMS
- CHAPTER XIII MYTH IN THE HOMERIC POEMS
- CHAPTER XIV FICTION IN THE HOMERIC POEMS
- CHAPTER XV THE COMMON CHARACTERISTICS OF TEUTONIC AND GREEK HEROIC POETRY
- CHAPTER XVI SOCIETY IN THE HEROIC AGE
- CHAPTER XVII GOVERNMENT IN THE HEROIC AGE
- CHAPTER XVIII RELIGION IN THE HEROIC AGE
- CHAPTER XIX THE CAUSES AND ANTECEDENT CONDITIONS OF THE HEROIC AGE
- ADDENDA ET CORRIGENDA
- INDEX
- Plate section
CHAPTER XII - SUPERNATURAL ELEMENTS IN THE HOMERIC POEMS
Published online by Cambridge University Press: 07 September 2011
- Frontmatter
- PREFACE
- Contents
- DEDICATION
- CHAPTER I THE EARLY NARRATIVE POETRY OF THE TEUTONIC PEOPLES
- CHAPTER II THE HEROIC AGE OF THE TEUTONIC PEOPLES
- CHAPTER III SCENE AND NATIONALITY IN THE HEROIC STORIES
- CHAPTER IV THE ORIGIN AND HISTORY OF THE HEROIC POEMS
- CHAPTER V THE POETRY AND MINSTRELSY OF EARLY TIMES
- CHAPTER VI SUPERNATURAL ELEMENTS IN THE HEROIC STORIES
- CHAPTER VII MYTHICAL ELEMENTS IN THE HEROIC POEMS
- CHAPTER VIII THE USE OF FICTION IN THE HEROIC POEMS
- CHAPTER IX THE HEROIC AGE OF GREECE
- CHAPTER X THE HOMERIC POEMS
- CHAPTER XI EARLY GREEK POETRY AND MINSTRELSY
- CHAPTER XII SUPERNATURAL ELEMENTS IN THE HOMERIC POEMS
- CHAPTER XIII MYTH IN THE HOMERIC POEMS
- CHAPTER XIV FICTION IN THE HOMERIC POEMS
- CHAPTER XV THE COMMON CHARACTERISTICS OF TEUTONIC AND GREEK HEROIC POETRY
- CHAPTER XVI SOCIETY IN THE HEROIC AGE
- CHAPTER XVII GOVERNMENT IN THE HEROIC AGE
- CHAPTER XVIII RELIGION IN THE HEROIC AGE
- CHAPTER XIX THE CAUSES AND ANTECEDENT CONDITIONS OF THE HEROIC AGE
- ADDENDA ET CORRIGENDA
- INDEX
- Plate section
Summary
In Chapter VI we saw that the heroic poetry of the Teutonic peoples was very largely affected by folk-tales; that supernatural beings were frequently introduced, while ordinary human beings or animals were credited with supernatural properties–in short that the distinction between natural and supernatural was not clearly drawn. We saw further that these features were by no means confined to the later stages of heroic poetry–that on the contrary some of them were prominent even in the Anglo-Saxon poems, while the others appeared to be of equal antiquity.
The same phenomena appear in Greek heroic poetry. Mythical beings and features obviously derived from folk-tales figure quite as frequently as in the Teutonic poems. Their presence is often regarded as a proof that the stories into which they enter and the persons with whom they are brought into contact are themselves products of myth or fiction. This is a question with which we shall have to deal in the following chapters. For the present it will be sufficient to quote what may be regarded as a typical expression of the attitude of more cautious scholars towards the problem of the story of Troy: “It is fantastic to treat the siege of Troy as merely a solar myth–to explain the abduction of Helen by Paris as the extinction of the sunlight in the West, and Troy as the region of the dawn beset and possessed by the sunrise. It is equally fantastic, and more illogical, to follow the rationalising methodto deduct the supernatural element, and claim the whole residuum as historical fact. Homer says that Achilles slew Hector with the aid of Athene. We are not entitled to omit Athene, and still to affirm that Achilles slew Hector.”
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- The Heroic Age , pp. 249 - 262Publisher: Cambridge University PressPrint publication year: 2010First published in: 1912