In the last chapter we have endeavoured to estimate in general terms the position of the Homeric poems relatively to the poetry of the Heroic Age itself on the one hand and to Hesiod and genealogical poetry on the other. I have avoided entering into details in regard to the relationship between the extant poems and the lost Cyclic poems because I did not wish to load the discussion with matter which, owing to the fragmentary nature of the evidence, must largely be of a hypothetical character. At the same time I am inclined to think that the Trojan Catalogue (Il. II 816 ff.) does contain some indications which may permit the date of its composition to be determined with a fair amount of probability.
In both parts of the list we meet with a considerable number of geographical names—of cities, rivers and mountains—many of which (five in the first part and twelve in the second) do not occur elsewhere in the Iliad. The majority of the names mentioned belong to the immediate neighbourhood of the coast, and it is a fact worth noting that these almost all fall into three distinct groups—in Paphlagonia, the Troad and Caria respectively. There is a great gap covering apparently the whole of the Bithynian coast and another embracing the coast of the Aegean from Troy itself to Mycale. In explanation of this fact it has been suggested[373] that the names in the coast-districts are derived from an early poem or poems on the voyage of the Argo. This hypothesis might certainly account for the mention of the Paphlagonian names in v. 852 ff. But they are the only names in the second part of the list for which it gives any explanation; for the suggestion that the references to the Carian localities in v. 868 f. are connected in any way with the story of the Argo can hardly be taken seriously. Hence, if we are to trust the hypothesis in any form, it is more probable that v. 853 ff. are a subsequent addition to the list. But even in the first part the evidence in its favour is of the most slender description[374]. Of the thirteen place-names which occur in this section eight are found elsewhere in the Iliad; of the rest only two apparently are mentioned in the accounts of the voyage of the Argo which have come down to us. What is more important however is that these accounts do mention a considerable number of Bithynian localities[375], both on the coast of the Sea of Marmara and on that of the Black Sea, as well as several peoples who do not appear in the Catalogue. We must conclude then that this hypothesis in no way accounts for the peculiarities of the Catalogue.
The true explanation is not far to seek. It was well known to the ancients that the Bithynians were an intrusive Thracian people who had crossed over from Europe. Again, the Aegean coast, at all events from the Gulf of Adramyttion southwards[376], was covered with Aeolic and Ionic settlements. Greek tradition unanimously held that these settlements were planted subsequently to the Trojan War, and we have no reason for supposing that the author of the Catalogue thought differently. At the same time we may infer from his silence that he did not claim to know what peoples had occupied these regions previously. On the other hand he did claim such knowledge of the previous occupants not only of the Troad but also of the Carian coast.
This fact surely furnishes the means of dating the composition of the Catalogue with a fair amount of probability. It is generally agreed that the Ionic settlements were later than the Aeolic; but probably no one will contend that the Greek occupation of Miletos and Mycale began appreciably later than the end of the tenth century. It is not necessary of course to suppose that these places were still in Carian hands when the Catalogue was composed. But at the same time the memory of their former possessors is not likely to have been perpetuated in an incidental reference like this much more than a century after they became Greek settlements. The more northern part of the list contains at all events nothing incompatible with the view that it was drawn up in the first half of the eighth century. The excavations in the Troad have certainly brought to light the fact that that district was overrun by barbarians. But there is nothing to show that this took place at the time of the Bithynian invasion, whether the two movements were connected in any way or not. The evidence on the whole seems to indicate that the barbarian occupation occurred not very long before the foundation of the Ionic colonies on the Hellespont. There is nothing very remarkable in the fact that the places mentioned in the Catalogue lie chiefly on the coast; for such places would naturally be the most familiar to the Asiatic Greeks, who must have been a seafaring people to some extent from the beginning.
Now in other parts of the Iliad we find mention of several peoples which apparently occupied the districts left blank in the Catalogue. Thus in X 429, XX 329 we hear of the Caucones, who seem to have belonged to Bithynia[377]. In XXI 86 f., VI 396 f. (cf. II 691, etc.) we meet with peoples called Leleges and Cilices, the positions of which are quite definitely stated. The former are said to have dwelt in the valley of the Satnioeis, in the south of the Troad, the latter somewhat further to the east, about the Gulf of Adramyttion. Again, in Od. XI 519 ff. we hear of a certain Eurypylos the son of Telephos, chief of the Ceteioi. Telephos and his son figured in the Cypria and the Little Iliad; and Greek tradition placed their home (Teuthrania) in the region between the Gulf of Adramyttion and the Hermos. The name ??te??? has been connected with that of the Hittites (Kheta); but without going into this question we may probably follow Strabo (XIII 1. 70) in tracing a reminiscence of them in the name of a stream called Ceteios, a tributary of the Caicos. The Catalogue contains no reference to any of these peoples, presumably because their names were not familiar to the author. In later times we hear no more of the Ceteioi, while Cilices are found only in Cilicia. The Leleges indeed are mentioned frequently and on both sides of the Aegean, but only as a people of the past.
It is an easy and popular method of interpretation to discredit evidence for which no obvious explanation is forthcoming; and following this method many scholars have regarded the names under discussion as phantoms. The point against which adverse criticism has chiefly been directed is the location of the Cilices in the Gulf of Adramyttion. It is to be remembered however that we have no evidence earlier than the seventh century for the presence of a people called Cilices in the land which ultimately bore their name. In the eighth century this people apparently dwelt to the north of the Taurus. In earlier times we hear of them, so far as I am aware, only in the 'Poem of Pentaur,' a work which celebrates the battle fought at Kadesh early in the thirteenth century, between Rameses II and the Hittites. It is there stated that the "chief of Kheta had come, having gathered together all countries from the ends of the sea to the land of Kheta, which came entire[378]." In addition to a number of Syrian names which occur in the accounts of earlier wars the poem contains a group of new names of peoples, consisting of Pidasa, Dardenui, Masa, Kalakisha and Luka, with two others[379]. The last two of these names are almost universally identified with the Cilices and Lycians, and the first is usually connected with the name ??das?? or ??dasa, while many scholars accept the identification of the second and third with the Dardanoi and Mysians respectively. If the names Pidasa and ??das?? are connected we are brought to the Aegean, where we find both Pedasos on the Satnioeis and Pedasa[380] in Caria. Evidence to the same effect is furnished by the procession of ten warriors depicted on one of the monuments[381]. Of these five are of the Hittite type and two Semitic; but the other three are of Aegean physiognomy and wear different varieties of that feather head-dress which is known in Crete from much earlier times[382]. When we find that this earliest reference to the Cilices associates them with a group of peoples[383], of whom some clearly belong to the west of Asia Minor, and some quite probably to the north-west corner of the peninsula, it must be admitted that we have no valid ground for discrediting the evidence of the Iliad as to their presence around the Gulf of Adramyttion.
On the other hand it must not be overlooked that later authorities know nothing of Cilices in this region; neither do they mention Leleges in the south of the Troad or Ceteioi anywhere. If these peoples had survived the Aeolic invasion it is difficult to believe that they could have perished subsequently without leaving some trace of their existence in Greek tradition. The Pelasgoi of Larissa in the valley of the Hermos[384] appear to have been remembered in tradition, although their territories were occupied by the Aeolians—probably at quite an early date. The presumption then is that the other peoples had already been destroyed by Greek raids—as is stated in the Iliad—or else that they had been expelled or absorbed by the surrounding nations before the Greek colonies were fully established. In either case we shall have to carry back the poetic traditions relating to them practically to the beginning of the first millennium.
We have seen that it is difficult to date the composition of the Trojan Catalogue—at all events the latter part of it—after about the middle of the eighth century. I am not aware of any valid reason for denying that the Cypria as a whole may have been composed about this time or for supposing that the Catalogue ever existed independently. It is in the preceding period—presumably between the eleventh and eighth centuries—that we must place the composition of the Iliad, though its form may not have been finally settled when the Cypria came into existence. Any more definite conclusion is rendered difficult by the unsatisfactory nature of our information regarding the Cypria. But the general impression conveyed by the epitome is that an appreciable portion of the poem was derived from incidental references in the Iliad, and that as a whole it possessed to a considerable degree the characteristics of popular poetry. If this impression is correct we must conclude that heroic court-poetry was in its decadence when the Cypria was composed; and consequently we shall do well to place the flourishing period, which produced the great epics, at least a century earlier.
