The Iliad (Penguin Classics Deluxe Edition)

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704 pages

English language

Published Nov. 1, 1998 by Penguin Classics.

ISBN:
978-0-14-027536-0
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An account, in the form of an epic poem written in dactylic hexameter, long thought to be pure Greek mythology, of a Bronze-Age conflict between the Greeks of Sparta, and those of Troy, in Phrygia, (in modern times, northwestern Anatolia, Turkey). Attributed to a sightless poet simply known as Homer, of which little is known, this epic poem was most probably created over several centuries, perhaps during the so-called Geometric Age (c. 900-700 BCE), by many authors in an oral tradition, before the adoption of writing, when it was not uncommon to be able to recite (or sing), verbatim, book-length poetic works, which were passed down by recitation over generations.

Eventually, when the Greeks adopted and modified the Phonecian alphabet for their own language, the Iliad (literally, 'The Saga [or Song] of Ilium') took on a codified, written form around 735±25 BCE. Since then it has been rendered in countless …

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