The

is a Greek epic of approximately 8,800 lines, divided into fourteen Books, whose aim is to bridge the chronological gap between the two Homeric epics by narrating the events that occur after the death and burial of Hector at the end of the

and before Odysseus' adventures as narrated in the

. The poem was probably written in the third century CE, and circulated together with the Homeric epics throughout Late Antiquity and Byzantium.

There is almost no external evidence about the author of this work. Manuscripts only give us a title (Ta meth' Homeron, literally “the things after Homer”) and a Hellenised Latin praenomen (Kointos, from the Latin Quintus). Internal evidence is also very scant. In the only apparently autobiographical passage in the epic, the

2044 words

Citation: Hadjittofi, Fotini. "The Posthomerica". The Literary Encyclopedia. First published 09 May 2010 [https://www.litencyc.com/php/sworks.php?rec=true&UID=30295, accessed 22 November 2024.]

• View recommended reading for this article