The Iliad of Homer - Get a Free Blog

[pg
xxii]
tiadae, the chieftain of
Thessaly, from his valour
and the number of his
forces, may have been the
most important ally of the
Peloponnesian sovereign;
the preeminent value of
the ancient poetry on the
Trojan war may thus have
forced the national feeling
of the Athenians to
yield to their taste. The
songs which spoke of
their own great ancestor
were, no doubt, of far inferior
sublimity and popularity,
or, at first sight, a
Theseid would have been
much more likely to have
emanated from an
Athenian synod of compilers
of ancient song,
than an Achilleid or an