Note 352 — Chapter X · THE HOMERIC POEMS.

From the fact that Pindar and other non-Ionic authors use what is apparently an Ionic form—indeed, strictly speaking, a western Ionic form—in the poet's name (Ὅμηρος), while they give the names of the heroes themselves in non-Ionic form, we are justified in concluding that they had acquired the former from a different (presumably literary) source. Certainly the earliest references to the poet come from Ionic authors. Again, Thucydides (III 104) is clearly recording a generally accepted opinion when he quotes the Hymn to the Delian Apollo under Homer's name; and I can see no reason for doubting the identity of Semonides' Χῖος ἀνήρ (cf. p. 209) with the author of this poem (v. 172: τυφλὸς ἀνὴρ, οἰκεῖ δὲ Χίῳ ἔνι παιπαλοέσσῃ). The Hymn dates probably from the period when Chios was in process of becoming Ionicised. At such a time the repertoire of a Chian minstrel would have an exceptionally favourable opportunity of gaining currency (naturally under his own name) in Ionic circles—in the Cyclades probably as well as in Ionia itself.