Note 26 — Chapter IV · HEROES

Aristarchos’ remark that in Homer not only kings but πάντες κοινῶς are designated as ἥρωες, was directed against the mistaken limitation of the word by Ister; see Lehrs, Aristarch.3, p. 101. Before Aristarch., however, the mistaken idea that οἱ ἡγεμόνες τῶν ἀρχαίων μόνοι ἦσαν ἥρωες, οἱ δὲ λαοὶ ἄνθρωποι seems to have been general: it is expressed in the [Arist.] Probl. 19, 48, p. 922b, 18; Rhianos, too, held it, see Schol. Τ 41 (Mayhoff, de Rhiani stud. Hom., p. 46).—It is incorrect to say that in the supposed “later” parts of the Odyssey ἥρως is no longer used of all free men, but only of the aristocracy (Fanta, Staat in Il. u. Od., 17 f.). In δ 268, θ 242, ξ 97, the word is used as an honourable title of free men of superior rank, but there is no suggestion of a restriction of the word to such use. In addition to which, the word ἥρως unmistakably appears in its wider sense also in other parts of the poem equally and rightly supposed to be late (α 272, θ 483, ω 68, etc.).