Hesiod Hesiod

This translation contains an introduction, commentary and interpretive essay and well as numerous notes and annotations to provide the history and background of the epic, and the mythological context in which it is placed. Hesiod's straightforward account of family conflict among the gods is the best and earliest evidence of what the ancient Greeks believed about the beginning of the world. Includes Hesiod's "Works and Days", lines 1-201, and material from the Library of Apollodorus.

Hesiod, one of the oldest known Greek poets, stands out as the first personality in European literature. The Theogony contains a systematic genealogy of the gods from the beginning of the world and an account of their violent struggles before the present order was established. The Works and Days, a compendium of moral and practical advice for a life of honest husbandry, throws a unique and fascinating light on archaic Greek society, ethics, and superstition. Hesiod's poetry is the oldest source for the myths of Prometheus, Pandora, and the Golden Age. Unlike Homer, Hesiod tells us about himself and his family (he lived in central Greece in the late eighth century BC). This new translation by a leading expert combines accuracy with readability.

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The Theogony contains a systematic genealogy of the gods from the beginning of the world and an account of their violent struggles before the present order was established. The Works and Days, a compendium of moral and practical advise for a life of honest husbandry, throws a unique and fascinating light on archaic Greek society, ethics, and superstition. Hesiod's poetry is the oldest source for the myths of Prometheus, Pandora, and the Golden Age. Unlike Homer, Hesiod tells us about himself and his family (he lived in central Greece in the late eighth century BC). This new translation by a leading expert combines accuracy with readability.

Three epic poems by Hesiod, the 'other' great epic poet of ancient Greece (along with Homer, his near-contemporary). Constituting some of the earliest known works of literature in European history, the poems of Hesiod describe the creation of the cosmos, the history of the gods, the life & concerns of a simple shepherd in rural Greece, and agricultural knowledge and techniques, and all, as scholar Robert Lamberton wrote, in a voice that is "idiosyncratic, ironic, self-conscious…appropriating proverbial wisdom…and transforming it into a discourse that is as much an account of poetry as it is an account of the world." [Robert Lamberton, Hesiod, Yale Univ. Press]