ON THE HOMERIC USE OF THE WORD ἭΡΩΣ.
The word ἥρως occurs at least 110 times in the Iliad and Odyssey, and once in the hymn to Aphrodite. If we could ascertain the sense in which the author or authors of these poems used it, we should, I am persuaded, be able to apply this knowledge to our enquiries into the state of society in the times to which the poems refer, or at any rate in the times at which the author or authors lived. Besides, I suspect it would throw some light on a very interesting question,—the state of the great national families which ultimately constituted the mixed body of the Greeks, as these families stood at a very early age, though not the earliest known to us in the Greek traditions. The age in question, too, is one which exhibits strong and interesting analogies to particular eras in the history of many other nations; and, besides this, it is an age as to which we have, through the Homeric poems, a very vivid picture of the habits and feelings of those who acted in it; so that the enquiry has a historical and moral, as well as a philological interest.
But unfortunately I must begin by owning that my researches on the subject have not satisfied me. On the one hand, I have been unable to verify some notions which have been adopted by scholars of eminence; and, on the other, I have succeeded in completely overturning four or five hypotheses of my own. That which I shall hereafter submit to the reader is a very vague one, and I have but little confidence in it. If, however, we cannot get at the truth, we may at least get rid of some errors.
I need scarcely remark that, as we are enquiring into the Homeric use of the word, we have nothing to do with the acceptation of it which prevailed in a later time, and
