Hesiod

This new, fully-annotated translation by a leading expert on Hesiodic poems combines accuracy with readability and includes an introduction and explanatory notes on these two works by one of the oldest known Greek poets. The Theogony contains a systematic genealogy and account of the struggles of the gods, and the Works and Days offers a compendium of moral and practical advice for a life of honest husbandry.

And, Works and Days

Theogony

Hesiodus

Richard S. Caldwell

Hesiod's straightforward account of family conflict among the gods is the best and earliest evidence of what the ancient Greeks believed about the beginning of the world. Includes Hesiod's "Works and Days", lines 1-201, and material from the Library of Apollodorus.

Hesiod's Theogony

"Robert Lamberton's Introduction is an excellent, concise exposition of current scholarly debate: his notes are informative and helpful. . . . Those who want a translation that captures something of the spirit of an ancient Greek poetic voice and its cultural milieu and transmits it in an appealing, lively, and accessible style will now turn to Lombardo." --M. A. Katz, Wesleyan University, in CHOICE

Works and Days and Theogony

Epic poems by one who has been called the first Greek philosopher and theologian.

Theogony. The Shield of Herakles

The Works and Days

"This volume, which completes the new Loeb Classical Library edition of Hesiod, contains The Shield and extant fragments of other poems, including the Catalogue of Women, that were attributed to Hesiod in antiquity. None of these is now thought to be by Hesiod himself, but all have considerable literary and historical interest. The Catalogue of Women is a systematic presentation in five books of a large number of Greek legendary heroes and episodes, organized according to the genealogy of the heroes' mortal mothers. The Shield provides a Hesiodic counterpoint to the shield of Achilles in the Iliad, with Heracles as the protagonist. The volume concludes with a comprehensive index to the complete edition." --Book jacket.

Hesiod describes himself as a Boeotian shepherd who heard the Muses call upon him to sing about the gods. His exact dates are unknown, but he has often been considered a younger contemporary of Homer. In Theogony Hesiod charts the history of the divine world, narrating the origin of the universe and the rise of the gods, from first beginnings to the triumph of Zeus, and reporting on the progeny of Zeus and of goddesses in union with mortal men. In Works and Days Hesiod shifts his attention to the world of men, delivering moral precepts and practical advice regarding agriculture, navigation, and many other matters; along the way he gives us the myths of Pandora and of the Golden, Silver, and other Races of Men. Also included are The Shield and extant fragments of other poems, including the Catalogue of Women, that were attributed to Hesiod in antiquity. None of these is now thought to be by Hesiod himself, but all have considerable literary and historical interest. The Catalogue of Women is a systematic presentation in five books of a large number of Greek legendary heroes and episodes, organized according to the genealogy of the heroes’ mortal mothers. The Shield provides a Hesiodic counterpoint to the shield of Achilles in the Iliad, with Heracles as the protagonist. The volume concludes with a comprehensive index to the complete edition.

Hesiod: Theogony, Works and days, Testimonia

Hesíodo

Sōkratēs L. Skartsēs

Kaktos (Firm). Philologikē Omada

Hapanta

Works & Days

Hugh G. Evelyn-White

Hesiod was an early Greek poet and rhapsode, who presumably lived around 700 BC. His writings serve as a major source on Greek mythology, farming techniques, archaic Greek astronomy and ancient timekeeping. Of the many works attributed to Hesiod, three survive complete and many more in fragmentary state. They include Alexandrian papyri, some dating from as early as the 1st century BC, and manuscripts written from the eleventh century forward. He wrote a poem of some 800 verses, the Works and Days, which revolves around two general truths: labour is the universal lot of Man, but he who is willing to work will get by. Tradition also attributes the Theogony, a poem which uses the same epic verse-form as the Works and Days, to Hesiod. A short poem traditionally attributed to Hesiod is The Shield of Heracles. Several additional poems were sometimes ascribed to Hesiod: Aegimius, Astrice, Chironis Hypothecae, Idaei Dactyli, Wedding of Ceyx, Great Works (presumably an expanded Works and Days), Great Eoiae (presumably an expanded Catalogue of Women), Melampodia and Ornithomantia.

The Theogony of Hesiod

Homer

Alex Struik

This edition contains the collected works of Hesiod including Works and Days, The Shield of Heracles, The Theogeny as well as Homer's Hymns, Epigrams and fragments of the Epic Cycle. Hesiod was a Greek oral poet generally thought by scholars to have been active between 750 and 650 BC, around the same time as Homer. His is the first European poetry in which the poet regards himself as a topic, an individual with a distinctive role to play. Ancient authors credited him and Homer with establishing Greek religious customs. Modern scholars refer to him as a major source on Greek mythology, farming techniques, early economic thought (he is sometimes identified as the first economist), archaic Greek astronomy and ancient time-keeping. In the Western classical tradition, Homer is the author of the Iliad and the Odyssey, and is revered as the greatest of ancient Greek epic poets. These epics lie at the beginning of the Western canon of literature, and have had an enormous influence on the history of literature.

Hesiod, the Homeric Hymns and Homerica

The Shield of Heracles

Hesiod's Theogony is a large-scale synthesis of a vast variety of local Greek traditions concerning the gods, organized as a narrative that tells how they came to be and how they established permanent control over the Cosmos. It is the first Greek mythical cosmogony. The initial state of the universe is chaos, a dark indefinite void considered a divine primordial condition from which everything else appeared. Theogonies are a part of Greek mythology which embodies the desire to articulate reality as a whole; this universalizing impulse was fundamental for the first later projects of speculative theorizing.In many cultures, narratives about the origin of the Cosmos and about the gods that shaped it are a way for society to reaffirm its native cultural traditions. Specifically, theogonies tend to affirm kingship as the natural embodiment of society. What makes the Theogony of Hesiod unique is that it affirms no historical royal line. Such a gesture would have sited the Theogony in one time and place. Rather, the Theogony affirms the kingship of the god Zeus over all the other gods and over the whole Cosmos.Further, in the "Kings and Singers" passage (80-103) Hesiod appropriates to himself the authority usually reserved to sacred kingship. The poet declares that it is he, where we might have expected some king instead, upon whom the Muses have bestowed the two gifts of a scepter and an authoritative voice (Hesiod, Theogony 30-3), which are the visible signs of kingship. It is not that this gesture is meant to make Hesiod a king. Rather, the point is that the authority of kingship now belongs to the poetic voice, the voice that is declaiming the Theogony.

Teogonía; Trabajos y días; Escudo; Certamen

Marie-Christine Leclerc

Voici la première traduction française, composée sur le rythme du vers grec, de l'ensemble de l'œuvre conservée d'Hésiode, poète grec des VIIIe et VIIe siècles av. J.-C., dont les livres de sagesse surgissent à l'origine de la littérature européenne. La Théogonie définit le panthéon des dieux, ordonné autour de Zeus. Les Travaux et les jours, poème d'une société vouée au travail de la terre, enseigne les règles et les usages de la vie. Le Bouclier d'Héraclès tente de rivaliser avec le bouclier d'Achille dans l'Iliade d'Homère. Le Catalogue des femmes et les livres perdus, dont les fragments sont ici traduits et commentés en français pour la première fois, sont une source méconnue mais indispensable des grands mythes grecs. Enfin, La Dispute d'Homère et d'Hésiode offre au lecteur la tradition biographique ancienne, souvent oubliée de nos jours. Chaque poème est accompagné d'un commentaire qui en fait apparaître la composition et la signification.

Les Travaux et les jours ; Le Bouclier ; Le Catalogue des femmes, fragments ; Autres fragments ; suivis de La Dispute d'Homère et d'Hésiode

La Théogonie

Winner of the 2005 Harold Morton Landon Translation Award from the Academy of American Poets. In Works of Hesiod and the Homeric Hymns, highly acclaimed poet and translator Daryl Hine brings to life the words of Hesiod and the world of Archaic Greece. While most available versions of these early Greek writings are rendered in prose, Hine's illuminating translations represent these early classics as they originally appeared, in verse. Since prose was not invented as a literary medium until well after Hesiod's time, presenting these works as poems more closely approximates not only the mechanics but also the melody of the originals. This volume includes Hesiod's Works and Days and Theogony, two of the oldest non-Homeric poems to survive from antiquity. Works and Days is in part a farmer's almanac—filled with cautionary tales and advice for managing harvests and maintaining a good work ethic—and Theogony is the earliest comprehensive account of classical mythology—including the names and genealogies of the gods (and giants and monsters) of Olympus, the sea, and the underworld. Hine brings out Hesiod's unmistakable personality; Hesiod's tales of his escapades and his gritty and persuasive voice not only give us a sense of the author's own character but also offer up a rare glimpse of the everyday life of ordinary people in the eighth century BCE. In contrast, the Homeric Hymns are more distant in that they depict aristocratic life in a polished tone that reveals nothing of the narrators' personalities. These hymns (so named because they address the deities in short invocations at the beginning and end of each) are some of the earliest examples of epyllia, or short stories in the epic manner in Greek. This volume unites Hine's skillful translations of the Works of Hesiod and the Homeric Hymns—along with Hine's rendering of the mock-Homeric epic The Battle of the Frogs and the Mice—in a stunning pairing of these masterful classics.

Works of Hesiod and the Homeric Hymns

"The Theogony is one of the most important mythical texts to survive from antiquity, and we devote the first section to it. It tells of the creation of the present world order under the rule of almighty Zeus. The Works and Days, in the second section, describes a bitter dispute between Hesiod and his brother over the disposition of their father's property, a theme that allows Hesiod to range widely over issues of right and wrong. The Shield of Herakles, whose centerpiece is a long description of a work of art, is not by Hesiod, at least most of it, but it was always attributed to him in antiquity. It is Hesiodic in style and has always formed part of the Hesiodic corpus. It makes up the third section of this book"--Provided by publisher.

Hesiod

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