Quote Originally Posted by CountArach View Post
I mean what I said. It is a very rare Homeric scholar who believes that Homer ever existed. The poems were being composed by word-of-mouth for centuries on end in all parts of the Hellenic world, and many different versions abounded, with no single 'canon' version. If my memory does not fail me, what we have was put together by the Athenians who wanted a uniform version that could be sung at the Olympic games. If you want evidence for this look at the catalogue of ships and note that Athens is mentioned, despite the fact that it would have been nothing at the alleged point of the war.
Fabled scholars are very common in ancient times. Lycurgus is one of them. There happens to be very little evidence of his existence, yet there are stone busts of him, like there are of Homer.