Éphéméride of the Trojan War

The Éphéméride of the Trojan War is a Greek work probably written at the 2nd century of our era, supposedly written by some Dictys of Crete (in Greek old Δίκτυς / Díktys ). It is more known under its translation Latin E, Ephemeris belli Troiani .

Subject

The Éphéméride is one of the rare complete accounts of the Trojan War which reached us. It begins with the removal of Helene by the Trojan prince Pâris, and ends in the death of Ulysses, killed by his son Télégonos.

delivers I: removal of Helene at the beginning of the fleet with Aulis;
delivers II: unloading in Mysie with the embassy of Ulysses, Ajax wire of Télamon and Diomède to make return Achilles;
delivers III: defection of combined Troy with the repurchase of the body of Hector by Priam;
delivers IV: funeral of Hector to the embassy of Anténor among Greeks;
delivers V: return of Anténor to Troy at the beginning of Énée;
delivers VI: shipwreck of Ajax wire of Oïlée with died of Ulysses.

Dictys of Crete

The account is supposed being the work of an eyewitness named Dictys, warlike crétois, companion during the war of the king Idoménée. The adopted form is that of the éphéméride, literary form created by Alexandre Large the, consistent in a simple account and without ornament, from day to day, of the events of a war. The Latin equivalent is the comment, made famous for Jules César in his account of the Guerre of Gaules.

Dictys thus consigns the events which he saw and sees, at the request of Mérion and Molos. He writes as a phenician on nine rollers in bast, i.e. out of fiber of lime. After the war, it returns in Crete where it is buried with its rollers, locked up in a tin cassette. In 66, thirteenth year of the reign of Néron, a earthquake puts at the day the cassette, which is brought by peasants to the proconsul of the island, which in its turn transmits it to the emperor. This one places at once the rollers in its library.

Dictys must be inserted in a tradition consisting in calling into question the vision of the war delivered by Homère, while insisting on the long amount of time separating it from the facts that it is supposed to report. Thus, with the hellenistic time, the Grammairien Hégésianax had written under the pseudonym of “Céphalon de Gergis”, old having lived before Homère, a history of the war, entitled the Businesses of Troy . Philostrate, with the 2nd century, fact speech Protésilas, first victim of the war. In fact, Dictys is taken with serious by the grammairiens of the time. The Éphéméride is then used by authors like Jean d' Antioche (7th century), Isaac Porphyrogénète (11th century) and Jean Tzétzès (12th century).

History of the text

The text reached us by a complicated skew. The Greek original can be gone back between 66 and 206 to our era. We know it by papyruses found at the end of the 19th century and published for the first time in 1907. It was known a long time only by one Latin translation entitled Ephemeris belli Troiani , probably written at the 4th century. The translation of work is undoubtedly explained on the one hand because the Romans could not read the Greek any more, on the other hand because they were fond of delicacies subject, whereas Homère covers only one mean part of the history. In the passing, work loses three of its books: on the nine original ones, the last four, devoted to the returns of hero, from now on are summarized in only one book.

The text is then accompanied by a prolog, originally in Greek, and of a letter, signed by certain Lucius Septimius, claiming to be the translator. These two short documents report the circumstances of “discovered” text of Dictys and the conditions of its transmission. The two editions which we have of the principal text do not join together letter and prolog: the Codex Sangallensis (9th century-10th century) comprises the prolog but not the letter, while the Codex Æsinas (9th century) includes/understands the letter but not the prolog.

See too

Random links: