Megalai Ehoiai

The Megalai Ehoiai (Ancient Greek: Μεγάλαι Ἠοῖαι, Ancient: [meɡálai ɛːhói.ai]), or Great Ehoiai,[1] is a fragmentary Greek epic poem that was popularly, though not universally, attributed to Hesiod during antiquity.[2] Like the more widely read Hesiodic Catalogue of Women, the Megalai Ehoiai was a genealogical poem structured around the exposition of heroic family trees among which myths concerning many of their members were narrated.[3] At least seventeen fragments of the poem are transmitted by quotations in other ancient authors and two second-century CE papyri,[4] but given the similarities between the Megalai Ehoiai and Catalogue of Women it is possible that some fragments attributed to the Catalogue actually derive from the less popular Hesiodic work.[5] Indeed, most of the scholarly attention devoted to the poem has been concerned with its relation to the Catalogue and whether or not the title "Megalai Ehoiai" in fact referred to a single, independent epic.

  1. ^ Abbreviated ME. On the meaning and significance of the title see Nature, relation to the Catalogue and authorship, below. Alternate Latin transliterations of the title are also occasionally used in modern scholarship: Megalae Ehoeae or Eoeae; occasionally the Latin translation of Megalai is also found: i.e. Magnae Eoeae.
  2. ^ Cingano (2009, p. 119).
  3. ^ Most (2006, p. lix), Cingano (2009, pp. 118–19).
  4. ^ These are "Hesiod" frr. 246–262 in the edition of record, Merkelbach & West (1967).
  5. ^ Cingano (2009, pp. 120–1). In her recent edition of the Cat. and ME, for example, Hirschberger (2004) assigns to the ME eleven fragments which Merkelbach and West took to belong to the Cat. On some of these fragments see D'Alessio (2005c) and Doubtful and disputed fragments, below.