The Hesiodic Catalogue of Women: Constructions and Reconstructions

✍ Scribed by Richard Hunter

• Publisher: Cambridge University Press
• Year: 2005
• Tongue: English
• Leaves: 361
• Category: Library

✦ Synopsis

The Catalogue of Women, ascribed to Hesiod, one of the greatest figures of early hexameter poetry, maps the Greek world, its evolution and its heroic myths through the mortal women who bore children to the gods. In this collection a team of international scholars offers an attempt to explore the poem's meaning, significance and reception. Individual chapters examine the organization and structure of the poem, its social and political context, its relation to other early epic and Hesiodic poetry, its place in the development of a pan-Hellenic consciousness, and attitudes to women. The wider influence of the Catalogue is considered in chapters on Pindar and the lyric tradition, on Hellenistic poetry, and on the poem's reception at Rome. This collection provides a significant approach to the study of the Catalogue.

✦ Table of Contents

Cover......Page 1
Half-title......Page 3
Title......Page 5
Copyright......Page 6
Contents......Page 7
Notes on contributors......Page 9
Acknowledgements......Page 11
Abbreviations......Page 12
Introduction......Page 13
chapter 1 Ordering women in Hesiod’s Catalogue......Page 17
is there a poem to read?......Page 18
the primacy of pandora......Page 20
orderly women......Page 22
disorderly women......Page 30
the ultimacy of helen......Page 33
chapter 2 The beginning and end of the Catalogue of Women and its relation to Hesiod......Page 37
chapter 3 Gods among men? The social and political dynamics of the Hesiodic Catalogue of Women......Page 47
beginnings......Page 49
The erotic language of the Catalogue: sympotic connections......Page 52
Formal elements and performance context: articulating élite ideology......Page 61
Social stratification and marriage......Page 72
The Catalogue and Athenian politics......Page 77
conclusion......Page 95
introduction......Page 97
heracles in the catalogue of women......Page 98
heracles in early greek epic......Page 106
the catalogue of women: an epic between times and genres......Page 108
introduction: panhellenic poetics......Page 111
blighted progeny. the story of sisyphus and the ehoie of mestra......Page 113
the mestra-ehoie. a reading......Page 115
erysichthon and athens......Page 123
the catalogue and athens......Page 126
introduction......Page 130
the wooing of helen......Page 132
the catalogue of suitors and the motif of the wedding contest......Page 136
helen’s suitors......Page 139
castor and polydeuces......Page 145
the role of agamemnon......Page 147
the sons of amphiaraus......Page 152
boastful ajax misinterpreted......Page 155
chapter 7 Pulp epic: the Catalogue and the Shield......Page 165
chapter 8 The Megalai Ehoiai: a survey of the fragments......Page 188
the megalai ehoiai and hellenistic scholarship......Page 189
diverging traditions attributed to the catalogue and the megalai ehoiai......Page 191
Heracles and his descendants......Page 200
Heracles and Telamon......Page 204
The Argonautica fragments......Page 207
Laconian and/or Boeotian concerns?......Page 211
The Argolis......Page 213
Elis......Page 216
conclusions, and further problems......Page 217
Cyrene......Page 218
Coronis and Arsinoe......Page 220
Two lists in Philodemus and the ME......Page 222
appendix: the placing of the atalanta-ehoie in the catalogue......Page 225
catalogue and praise......Page 229
in the beginning: the locrian lineage of deucalion......Page 232
pindar, bacchylides, and the hesiodic tradition......Page 238
looking for the catalogue......Page 251
narrative structures......Page 263
catalogues and catalogue......Page 271
chapter 11 From genealogy to Catalogue: the Hellenistic adaptation of the Hesiodic catalogue form......Page 278
the narratives......Page 279
formulae and structure......Page 284
contexts and cultures......Page 288
subjectivity – a putative context?......Page 291
cosmic histories......Page 299
catalogues and catalogue......Page 304
exemplary mythography......Page 311
excessive mythography: arachne’s labor......Page 315
selective mythography: nestor’s gratia......Page 321
repetitive mythography: hercules’ labores......Page 326
hercules’ rome......Page 329
Bibliography......Page 332
Index of passages discussed......Page 354
General index......Page 356