HOMER

£7,950 · Offered by Sokol Books

A charming Latin-Greek pocket edition of Homer s complete works, printed in Geneva. The Odyssey was sometime in the library of the French humanist and poet Jacques Poille (1565-1623), and bears his motto and a few ms marginalia. Poille s autograph is also present in other C16 Greek editions (e.g., at NYPL). This is the second impression with Bud é s Latin text. Later in the library of the great French bibliographer Jacques-Charles Brunet (1780-1867), and n.172 charmante exemplaire in his London sale catalogue (1868). Homer has remained an obscure figure in the history of Western poetry. Whilst his Iliad and Odyssey are dated to the C9-8BC, it is uncertain whether there ever was a blind bard of such genius or whether his persona came to be used to identify the output of a long- standing oral epic tradition, or indeed both. One of the most influential poems of Western civilisation, the Iliad narrates the last years of the Greeks siege of Troy, focusing on the causes and consequences of Achilles s wrath - the opening word of the poem - after King Agamemnon seizes his concubine. The Odyssey famously recounts the adventurous journey of Ulysses, King of Ithaca, to his native island after the end of the Trojan War, facing sirens, cyclops and many other perils. Batrachomyomachia narrates a battle between Mice and Frogs, assisted by Zeus and other deities. The 33 Hymns - attributed to, but not composed by, Homer are each devoted to a different god or goddess, and written in a Greek la

• Binding: Hardcover

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