the prince of the Greek poets, flourished, according to Dr Blair, about 900 B.C., according to Dr Prieley 850, according to the Arundelian marbles 300, after the taking of Troy; and agreeable to them all, above 400 years before Plato and Aristotle. Seven cities disputed the glory of having given him birth, viz. Smyrna, Rhodes, Colophon, Salamis, Chios, Argos, and Athens; which has been expressed by the following ditich:

Smyrna, Rhodos, Colophon, Salamis, Chios, Argos, Athenae; Orbis de patria certat, Homere, tua.

We have nothing that is very certain in relation to the particulars of his life. The most regular account is that which goes under the name of Herodotus, and is usually printed with his history; and though it is generally supposed to be a spurious piece, yet as it is ancient, was made use of by Strabo, and exhibits that idea which the later Greeks, and the Romans in the age of Augustus, entertained of Homer, we must content ourselves with giving an abstract of it.

A man of Magnesia, whose name was Menaliphus, went to settle at Cuma, where he married the daughter of a citizen called Homyrus, and had by her a daughter called Critheis. The father and mother dying, the young woman was left under the tuition of Cleonax her father's friend, and suffering herself to be deluded was got with child. The guardian, though his care had not prevented the misfortune, was however willing to conceal it; and therefore sent Critheis to Smyrna, which was then building, 18 years after the founding of Cuma, and about 168 after the taking of Troy. Critheis being near her time, went one day to a festival, which the town of Smyrna was celebrating on the banks of the river Meles; where her pains coming upon her, she was delivered of Homer, whom she called Melogynes, because he was born on the banks of that river. Having nothing to maintain her, she was forced to spin; and a man of Smyrna called Phemius, who taught literature and music, having often seen Critheis, who lodged near him, and being pleased with her housewifery, took her into his house to spin the wool he received from his scholars for their schooling. Here she behaved herself so modestly and discreetly, that Phemius married her; and adopted her son, in whom he discovered a wonderful genius, and the best natural disposition in the world. After the death of Phemius and Critheis, Homer succeeded to his father-in-law's fortune and school; and was admired, not only by the inhabitants of Smyrna, but by strangers, who resorted from all parts to that place of trade. A shipmaster called Mentes, who was a man of learning and a lover of poetry, was so taken with Homer, that he persuaded him to leave his school, and to travel with him. Homer, who had then begun his poem of the Iliad, and thought it of great consequence to see the places he should have occasion to treat of, embraced the opportunity. He embarked with Mentes, and during their several voyages never failed carefully to note down all that he thought worth observing. He travelled into Egypt; from whence he brought into Greece the names of their gods, the chief ceremonies of their worship, and a more improved knowledge in the arts than what prevailed in his own country. He visited Africa and Spain; in his return from whence he touched at Ithaca, where he was much troubled with a rheum falling upon his eyes. Mentes being in haste to take a turn to Leucadia his native country, left Homer well recommended to Mentor, one of the chief men of the island of Ithaca, who took all possible care of him. There Homer was informed of many things relating to Ulysses, which he afterwards made use of in composing his Odyssey. Mentes returning to Ithaca, found Homer cured. They embarked together; and after much time spent in visiting the coasts of Peloponnesus and the islands, they arrived at Colophon, where Homer was again troubled with the defluxion upon his eyes, which proved so violent, that he is said to have lost his sight. This misfortune made him resolve to return to Smyrna, where he finished his Iliad. Some time after, the ill posture of his affairs obliged him to go to Cumae, where he hoped to have found some relief. Here his poems were highly applauded: but when he proposed to immortalize their town, if they would allow him a salary, he was answered, that "there would be no end of maintaining all the 'Ouropoi' or 'blind men';" and hence got the name of Homer. Afterwards wandered through several places, and stopped at Chios, where he married, and composed his Odyssey. Some time after, having added many verses to his poems in praise of the cities of Greece, especially of Athens and Argos, he went to Samos, where he spent the winter, singing at the houses of the great men, with a train of boys after him. From Samos he went to Io, one of the Sporades, with a design to continue his voyage to Athens; but landing by the way at Chios, he fell sick, died, and was buried on the sea-shore.

The only incontestable works which Homer has left behind him are the Iliad and Odyssey. The Batrachomyomachia, or battle of the frogs and mice, has been disputed. The hymns have been disputed also, and attributed by the scholiasts to Cynæthus the rhapsodist: but neither Thucydides, Lucian, nor Pausanias, have scrupled to cite them as genuine. Many other pieces are ascribed to him: epigrams, the Ear-tiges, the Cecropes, the destruction of Oechalia, of which only the names are remaining.

Nothing was ever comparable to the clearness and majesty of Homer's style; to the sublimity of his thoughts; to the strength and sweetness of his verses. All his images are striking; his descriptions just and exact; the passions so well expressed, and nature so just and finely painted, that he gives to everything motion, life, and action. But he more particularly excels in invention, and in the different characters of his heroes, which are so varied, that they affect us in an inexplicable manner. In a word, the more he is read by a person of good taste, the more he is admired. Nor are his works to be esteemed merely as entertaining poems, or as the monuments of a sublime and varied genius. He was in general so accurate with respect to costume, that he seldom mentioned persons or things that we may not conclude to have been known during the times of which he writes; and it was Mr Pope's opinion, that his account of people, princes, and countries, was purely historical, founded on the real transactions of those times, and by far the most valuable piece of history and geography left us concerning the state of Greece in that early period. His geographical divisions of that country were thought so exact, that we are told of many controversies concerning the boundaries of Grecian cities which have been decided upon the authority of his poems.

Alcibiades gave a rhetorician a box on the ear for not having Homer's writings in his school. Alexander was ravished with them, and commonly placed them under his pillow with his sword: he inclosed the Iliad in the precious casket that belonged to Darius; "in order (said he to his courtiers) that the most perfect production of the human mind might be inclosed in the most valuable casket in the world." And one day seeing the tomb of Achilles in Sigea, "Fortunate hero! (cried he,) thou hast had a Homer to sing thy victories!" Lycurgus, Solon, and the kings and princes of Greece, set such a value on Homer's works, that they took the utmost pains in procuring correct editions of them, the most esteemed of which is that of Aristarchus. Didymus was the first who wrote notes on Homer; and Eutychius, archbishop of Theffalonia, in the 12th century, is the most celebrated of his commentators. Mr Pope has given an elegant translation of the Iliad, adorned with the harmony of poetic numbers; and Mad. Dacier has translated both the Iliad and Odyssey in prose.

Those who desire to know the several editions of Homer, and the writers who have employed themselves on the works of that great poet, may consult Fabricius, in the first volume of his Bibliotheca Graeca.

A very singular discovery, however, which was made a few years ago in Russia, deserves to be here mentioned, together with the circumstances that attended it. Christian Frederic Matthæi, who had been educated by the learned Ernetti, and did credit to the instructions of that celebrated master by the great erudition that he displayed, being invited to settle at Moscow, and to assist in a plan of literature for which his abilities and acquisitions eminently qualified him; on his arrival at that city was informed, equally to his astonishment and satisfaction, that a very copious treasure of Greek manuscripts was deposited in the library of the Holy synod, which no person in that country had either the abilities to make use of, or the curiosity to examine. Struck with the relation of a circumstance so unexpected, and at the same time so peculiarly agreeable to his classical taste, he immediately seized the opportunity that was fortunately offered him, to explore this repository of hidden treasure. After having examined several curious books, he discovered a manuscript copy of the works of Homer, written about the conclusion of the 14th century, but evidently a transcript from a very ancient and most valuable copy, which, besides the Iliad and the Odyssey, contains also 16 of the hymns, which have been long published under the name of Homer. Nor was this all. Twelve lines of a loft hymn to Bacchus, and the hymn to Ceres, which was also lost, were preserved in this curious and long unnoticed manuscript. The hymn to Ceres appears to be entire, excepting a few lines towards the close: and it is surely remarkable, that a Greek poem, attributed to Homer, which had been lost for ages, should be at length discovered in Muscovy, the rudest and most uncivilized country in Europe. M. Matthæi, exulting in an acquisition so unexpected, and at the same time so valuable, communicated it, with singular disinterestedness, to his learned friend M. Ruhnkenius, with whose talents and extraordinary erudition he was well acquainted, that this gentleman might present it to the world without those delays which would probably have retarded the publication of it at Moscow. He was rather induced to employ M. Ruhnkenius in the publication of this curious and beautiful remnant of antiquity, because he knew that this gentleman had been particularly engaged in the study of the hymns of Homer, in order to give the public a complete edition of them. The hymn to Ceres, and the fragment of the hymn to Bacchus, were printed in 1780 at Leyden, under the care of M. Ruhnkenius; who has added some very valuable notes and observations on the hymn to Ceres, which tend to illustrate its beauties, and to throw a light on some of its obscurities. The learned editor observes, that nothing was more distant from his expectations than the discovery of this hymn to Ceres. He knew indeed that a poem bearing that title, and ascribed to Homer, existed in the second century; but as it had long been considered as irretrievably lost, he had formed no hopes of ever seeing it rescued from the obscurity to which it had been consigned. He acknowledges, that he has many doubts with respect to the high and illustrious origin ascribed to this hymn; but as no positive external evidence can be produced to determine the point, he chooses to rest his argument on what appears to him the more certain ground of internal proof; and observes, that though the poem be exquisitely beautiful, yet that it is evidently deficient in some of Homer's more striking and predominant characteristics. It wants his energy and spirit; that vigour, that inspiration, which animate and give an irresistible power, as well as an enchanting beauty, to the poems of that sublime and inimitable bard. This opinion, as we have already seen, hath been given by other critics of all the hymns of Homer. But though M. Ruhnkenius is not inclined to attribute the hymn of Ceres to Homer, he yet acknowledges, that the structure of its language is founded on the model of that great poet, and he hesitates not to give it the honour of very high antiquity. He is of opinion, that it was written immediately after Homer, or at least in the age of Hesiod; and he congratulates the age on the discovery of so curious a poem, rescued by mere accident from the darkest retreats of oblivion, and perhaps but at a slight distance from inevitable perdition. He deems it to be an acquisition, not only calculated to gratify the curiosity of the connoisseurs in classic antiquity, or to entertain those lovers of Greek poetry whose studies are made subservient to a refined and elegant species of amusement, but he also esteems it to be of particular use to the critic, as it tends to illustrate some obscure passages both in the Greek and Latin poets.

OMER, or CHOMER, a Jewish measure, containing the tenth part of the epha. See CORUS and MEASURE.