202 HISTORY OF GREECE. himself have composed the latter; and such would be my belief if I regarded plurality of composers as an inadmissible idea. On this supposition, we must conclude that the poet, while anxious for the addition of new, and for the most part, highly interesting matter, has not thought fit to recast the parts and events in such manner as to impart to the whole a pervading thread of consensus and organization, such as we see in the Odyssey. That the Odyssey is of later date than the Iliad, and by a different author, seems to be now the opinion of most critics, especially of Payne Knight 1 and Nitzsch ; though O. Miiller leans to a contrary conclusion, at the same time adding that he thinks the arguments either way not very decisive. There are consid- erable differences of statement in the two poems in regard to some of the gods : Iris is messenger of the gods in the Iliad, and Hermes in the Odyssey : JEolus, the dispenser of the winds iu the Odyssey, is not noticed in the twenty-third book of the Iliad, but, on the contrary, Iris invites the winds, as independent gods, to come and kindle the funeral pile of Patroclus ; and, unless we ore to expunge the song of Demodokus in the eighth book of tho Odyssey, as spurious, Aphrodite there appears as the wife of Hephaestus, a relationship not known to the Iliad. There are also some other points of difference enumerated by Mr. Knight and others, which tend to justify the presumption that the author of the Odyssey is not identical either with the author of the Achilleis or his enlargers, which G. Hermann considers to be a point unquestionable. 2 Indeed, the difficulty of supposing a long coherent poem to have been conceived, composed, and retained, without any aid of writing, appears to many critics even now, insurmountable, though the evidences on the other side, are, in my view, sufficient to outweigh any negative presumption thus suggested. But it is improbable that the same person should have powers of memorial combination sufficient for composing two such poems, nor is there any proof to force upon us such a suppo- sition. Presuming a difference of authorship between the two poems, 1 Mr. Knight places the Iliad about two centuries, and the Odyssey one century, anterior to Hesiod: a century between the two poems (Prolegg. c Ixi.)
- Hermann, Prsefat ad Odyss. p. vii.
