Page "Homer" Paragraph 6

" Homer " is a Greek name, attested in Aeolic-speaking areas, and although nothing definite is known about him, traditions arose purporting to give details of his birthplace and background.

The satirist Lucian, in his True History, describes him as a Babylonian called Tigranes, who assumed the name Homer when taken " hostage " ( homeros ) by the Greeks.

When the Emperor Hadrian asked the Oracle at Delphi about Homer, the Pythia proclaimed that he was Ithacan, the son of Epikaste and Telemachus, from the Odyssey.

These stories were incorporated into the various Lives of Homer compiled from the Alexandrian period onwards.

Homer is most frequently said to be born in the Ionian region of Asia Minor, at Smyrna, or on the island of Chios, dying on the Cycladic island of Ios.

A connection with Smyrna seems to be alluded to in a legend that his original name was Melesigenes (" born of Meles ", a river which flowed by that city ), with his mother the nymph Kretheis.

Internal evidence from the poems gives evidence of familiarity with the topography and place-names of this area of Asia Minor, for example, Homer refers to meadow birds at the mouth of the Caystros, a storm in the Icarian sea, and mentions that women in Maeonia and Caria stain ivory with scarlet.