Lycurgus, Against Leocrates, ed. J. O. Burtt, 102

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[102] I want also to recommend Homer to you. In your fathers’ eyes he was a poet of such worth that they passed a law that every four years at the Panathenaea he alone of all the poets should have his works recited¹; and thus they showed the Greeks their admiration for the noblest deeds. They were right to do so. Laws are too brief to give instruction: they merely state the things that must be done; but poets, depicting life itself, select the noblest actions and so through argument and demonstration convert men’s hearts.

Against Leocrates. Lycurgus. ed. J. O. Burtt. London. 1954.

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Current edition Perseus

Against Leocrates (Greek) (Lycurgus. Minor Attic Orators, Vol. 2. Burtt, J. O., translator. London: William Heinemann, Ltd.; Cambridge, MA: Harvard University Press, 1954 (printing).)

Editions (1)

Κατὰ Λεωκράτους Perseus (Lycurgus. Minor Attic Orators, Vol. 2. Burtt, J. O., editor. London: William Heinemann, Ltd.; Cambridge, MA: Harvard University Press, 1954 (printing).) — 102 focus

[102] βούλομαι δʼ ὑμῖν καὶ τὸν Ὅμηρον παρασχέσθαι ἐπαινῶν.¹ οὕτω γὰρ ὑπέλαβον ὑμῶν οἱ πατέρες σπουδαῖον εἶναι ποιητὴν ὥστε νόμον ἔθεντο καθʼ ἑκάστην πεντετηρίδα² τῶν Παναθηναίων μόνου τῶν ἄλλων ποιητῶν ῥαψῳδεῖσθαι τὰ ἔπη, ἐπίδειξιν ποιούμενοι πρὸς τοὺς Ἕλληνας ὅτι τὰ κάλλιστα τῶν ἔργων προῃροῦντο. εἰκότως· οἱ μὲν γὰρ νόμοι διὰ τὴν συντομίαν οὐ διδάσκουσιν ἀλλʼ ἐπιτάττουσιν ἃ δεῖ ποιεῖν, οἱ δὲ ποιηταὶ μιμούμενοι τὸν ἀνθρώπινον βίον, τὰ κάλλιστα τῶν ἔργων ἐκλεξάμενοι, μετὰ λόγου καὶ ἀποδείξεως τοὺς ἀνθρώπους συμπείθουσιν.

Notes on the current edition

Against Leocrates

1. The law that Homer should be recited at the festival of the Great Panathenaea, held in the third year of each Olympiad, may fairly safely be assigned to the time of the Pisistratids (c. 560 to 510 B.C.). It is not mentioned in connection with Pisistratus himself, though he is credited by a number of ancient authorities with the establishment of a definite text of Homer (cf. Cicero, de Orat. 3.34), but according to Plat. Hipparch. 228b , his son Hipparchus did provide for recitations at the festival.

Lycurgus Against Leocrates 102

ed. J. O. Burtt

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