Note 223 — Chapter XXI · GRECIAN EPIC.—HOMERIC POEMS.

That there existed a cyclic copy or edition of the Odyssey (ἡ κυκλικὴ) is proved by two passages in the Scholia (xvi. 195; xvii. 25), with Boeckh’s remark in Buttmann’s edition: this was the Odyssey copied or edited along with the other poems of the cycle.

Our word to edit—or edition—suggests ideas not exactly suited to the proceedings of the Alexandrine library, in which we cannot expect to find anything like what is now called publication. That magnificent establishment, possessing a large collection of epical manuscripts, and ample means of every kind at command, would naturally desire to have these compositions put in order and corrected by skilful hands, and then carefully copied for the use of the library. Such copy constitutes the cyclic edition: they might perhaps cause or permit duplicates to be made, but the ἔκδοσις or edition was complete without them.