Person

Homer

Also called: Homeros

Ancient Greek epic poet to whom the Iliad and the Odyssey are attributed, usually placed in Ionia around the 8th century BC; nothing certain is known of his life, and whether one poet composed both epics is debated

The ancient Greeks regarded the Iliad and the Odyssey as the work of Homer, and simply calling someone “the Poet” meant him. Yet there is no reliable record of his life. Tradition made him a blind wandering poet, and several cities, including Smyrna and Chios, claimed to be his birthplace. Since modern research has shown that the epics grew out of generations of oral poets, scholars disagree over whether Homer was a single person and whether the same poet composed both epics.

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1 related event

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750 BC – 700 BCThe Homeric Epics Take Shapeauthor
Around the 8th century BC, in Ionia on the west coast of Asia Minor, the Iliad, on the Trojan War, and the Odyssey, on Odysseus’ homecoming, took their present form. Songs long passed on by word of mouth were written down in the newly adopted Greek alphabet and became the beginning of Western literature.

Themes this person appears in

The Trojan War and the Odyssey1200 BC – 1876
From the apple of discord to the Trojan Horse and the homecoming of Odysseus — the Greek myth in story order, alongside the real site of Troy, the making of the epics, the Laocoön group and Schliemann’s excavations