Lycurgus, the legislator of Sparta, is said to have been the first who collected the fragments of Homer's poetry, during his travels in Asia Minor, and on his return by the island of Chios. Three hundred and seven years after wards, Pisistratus, who erected at Athens the first public library that is mentioned in Grecian history, gave directions to a body of the learned for preparing an edition of the poet more correct than that of Lycurgus, and Solon and Hippar chus are said to have assisted in the undertaking.* At the destruction of Athens, in the invasion of Xerxes, the Iliad and Odyssey were taken from thence, and conveyed to Per sia ; and the despot himself seems to have respected this monument of taste and genius, since a part of the collec tion was found at Susa during the conquests of Alexander. It is perhaps to this epoch that we may assign the edition of the Odyssey which was rectified by Aratus, and which bears the name of the Aratxan edition. Alexander's enthu siasm for the memory of Homer is one of the noblest traits of his character. He charged Anaxarchus and Callisthenes to revise the copies of Lycurgus and Pisistratus ; and Aris totle put the last hand to this precious edition, called the editiop of the casket. After the battle of Arbela, when the conqueror had found, in the tent of Darius, a casket of gold, enriched with stones of inestimable value, he there deposit ed the two poems of Homer, and laid the treasure along with his sword every night under his pillow. Alter the death of Alexander, Zenodot us of Ephesus was charged, by the first of the Ptolemies, with the task of revising the edi tion of the casket. The last edition belonging to this peri od of high antiquity is that which Aristarchus, the greatest critic of his age, published under the auspices of Ptolemy Philometer, about nineteen centuries and a half ago, and which has served as a model for all collections of the works of Homer both in the middle ages and modern times.
The first edition of Homer since the invention of print ing, was that of Demetrius Chalcondyles of Athens, and of Demetrius of Crete. It is entirely in Greek, is very mag nificent, and now exceedingly scarce. It appeared at Flo rence in December 1488, in one folio, and had been collated with the commentaries of Eustathius. It was not till half a century after, that the works of Homer appeared again in Greek, with the entire commentaries of Eustathius.* This edition, the only complete -one of the commentary of Eustathius, had long been regarded as a chrfd'oeuvre of sound criticism and correctness, till the learned discovered innumerable faults in it, by comparing it with MSS.; and the improvement of taste at last threw contempt on the barren prolixity of the commentary. Six years after the Roman edition of Eustathius, there appeared at Leyden the first esteemed edition of the prince of poets that had a Latin version. It contained also the scholia of Didymus, a com mentator assigned to the age of Augustus. We notice
here only those editions which may be said to form an epoch in the illustration of Homer. Joshua Barnes brought out at Cambridge the Greek and Latin texts of Didymus, with his own commentaries. The edition of Samuel Clarke appeared at London in 17S4; that of Erncsti at Leipsic in 1764. Villoison, who was sent to Venice by the French government to collect ancient relics of literature, found in the library of St. Mark, an unique copy of the Iliad of the 10th century, with the remarks of sixty of the most famous critics of antiquity, such as Aristarchus and Zeno dotus. It appeared, that this manuscript had been made from a copy in the libt ary of the Ptolemies that was burnt by the barbarian Omar. Villoison remained two years at Venice to copy it with his own hand, and printed it in a folio volume, entirely Greek. As the original posses sor of this literary treasure had joined to it many vari ous and lost editions of the poet, this publication of Vil loison may be called the Homcri variorum of antiquity. Wolff and Heyne are the two latest editors of Homer. Their merits have been so frequently treated of in the re views and literary journals of our own time, that we forbear to descant upon them.
The memory of the great poet has received not only the homage of commentators and editors of his works, but of travellers, who have carried the reader's imagination to the scene of his action. Among these may be noticed Tourne fort, the French naturalist, who understood the classical as well as his favourite vegetable world. Richard Pococke also carried his researches into Greece, though with less satisfaction to the public curiosity than into other quarters. Lady Mary Montague visited the Troad, though somewhat hastily, and saw, or imagined that she saw, the tomb of Achilles. Doctor Chandler visited Asia and Greece in 1764-66, and made some conjectures that have not re ceived much credit. In conjecturing the exact situation of Troy, and of the scene of Homer's travels, modern travellers have not been more successful than the an cients. Wood, who, on many points, makes ingenious and probable conjectures, is far from having settled the controversy of the Troad ; and Chevalier and Gell, who succeeded him in the same attempt, have been less learned and much more gratuitous in their suppositions. To the real admirer of Homer, the controversy will probably appear of less importance than it has been made. For the difficulty of finding, at the end of 3000 years, the site of a town, of which an ancient poet says, that, in his own time, the very ruins had disappeared, (etiam perierc ruin,e,) there is surely an apparent and sufficient reason in the changes and ravages which 30 centuries can produce. By such a difficulty, no sober mind would consider itself hound to adopt the wild idea, that no such war as the Trojan ever existed ; although that supposition would ren der the Iliad a much more astonishing production than it really is.