Table Of ContentHomeric Stitchings
Greek Studies: Interdisciplinary Approaches
General Editor: Gregory Nagy, Harvard University
Assistant Editor: Timothy Power, Harvard University
On the front cover: A calendar frieze representing the Athenian months, reused
in the Byzantine Church of the Little Metropolis in Athens. The cross is
superimposed, obliterating Taurus of the Zodiac. The choice of this frieze for
books in Greek Studies: Interdisciplinary Approaches reflects this series’
emphasis on the blending of the diverse heritages—Near Eastern, Classical, and
Christian—in the Greek tradition. Drawing by Laurie Kain Hart, based on a
photograph. Recent titles in the series are:
The Wrath of Athena: Gods and Men in the Odyssey, Jenny Strauss Clay,
University of Virginia
Talking Trojan: Speech and Community in the Iliad, Hilary Mackie, Rice
University
Poet and Audience in the Argonautica of Apollonius, Robert V. Albis,
The Hotchkiss School
Theatrical Space and Historical Place in Sophocles’ Oedipus at Colonus,
Lowell Edmunds, Rutgers University
Choruses of Young Women in Ancient Greece: Their Morphology,
Religious Role, and Social Function, Claude Calame, University of
Lausanne, Switzerland; translated by Derek Collins and Jane Orion
Eurykleia and Her Successors: Female Figures of Authority in Greek Poetics,
Helen Pournara Karydas, Boston Latin School and Harvard University
Speech in Speech: Studies in Incorporated Oratio Recta in Attic Drama and
Oratory, Victor Bers, Yale University
Aegean Strategies: Studies of Culture and Environment on the European
Fringe, P. Nick Kardulias, College of Wooster, and Mark T. Shutes,
Youngstown State University
Aglaia: The Poetry of Aleman, Sappho, Pindar, Bacchylides, and Corinna,
Charles Segal, Harvard University
Immortal Armor: The Concept of Alke in Archaic Greek Poetry, Derek Collins,
University of Texas at Austin
Homeric Stitchings: The Homeric Centos of the Empress Eudocia, M. D. Usher,
Willamette University
Homeric Stitchings
The Homeric Centos of the
Empress Eudocia
M. D. Usher
ROWMAN & LITTLEFIELD PUBLISHERS, INC.
Lanham " Boulder +» New York " Oxford
ROWMAN & LITTLEFIELD PUBLISHERS, INC.
Published in the United States of America
by Rowman & Littlefield Publishers, Inc.
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Copyright © 1998 by Rowman & Littlefield Publishers, Inc.
All rights reserved. No part of this publication may be reproduced,
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British Library Cataloguing in Publication Information Available
Library of Congress Cataloging-in-Publication Data
Usher, Mark David, 1966 --
Homeric stitchings : the Homeric Centos of the Empress Eudocia /
M.D. Usher.
p. cm. — (Greek studies : interdisciplinary approaches)
Includes bibliographical references and index.
ISBN 0-8476-8999-9 (alk. paper). — ISBN 0-8476-9050-4 (pbk. :
alk. paper
1. Eudocia, consort of Theodosius II, Emperor of the East, d. 460 —
Criticism and interpretation, 2. Christian poetry, Greek — History
and criticism. 3. Homer — Appreciation — Turkey — Istanbul.
4. Byzantine Empire — Intellectual life. 3. Oral tradition — Turkey —
Istanbul. 6. Centos— History and criticism. 7. Oral—formulaic
analysis. 8. Transmission of texts. 9. Literary form. I. Title.
II. Series: Greek studies.
PA3972. E862Z88 1998
881.01 — del 98-6369
CIP
Printed in the United States of America
Til
eS The paper used in this publication meets the minimum requirements of American National
Standard for Information Sciences—Permanence of Paper for Printed Library Materials, ANSI
239.48-1984.
As a good house-wife out of divers fleeces weaves one peece of cloth
...1 have laboriously collected this Cento out of divers Writers.
—Robert Burton, The Anatomy of Melancholy
Contents
Foreword
Acknowledgments
Note on Citation Style
Introduction
Part One: Cento Contexts
1: Understanding the Homeric Centos
2: Eudocia Augusta: Reader-Rhapsode
Part Two: Cento Poetics
3: Accommodations
4: Enjambement
Part Three: Cento Semiotics and Aesthetics
5: Themes and Intertextuality
6: Composition by Theme 101
7: Themes from the Odyssey 113
8: Themes from the Iliad 131
References 147
Index 169
About the Author 175
Greek Studies: Interdisciplinary Approaches
Foreword
by Gregory Nagy, General Editor
Building on the foundations of scholarship within the disciplines of
philology, philosophy, history, and archaeology, this series spans the
continuum of Greek traditions extending from the second millennium
B.C.E. to the present, not just the Archaic and Classical periods. The
aim is to enhance perspectives by applying various disciplines to
problems that have in the past been treated as the exclusive concern
of a single given discipline. Besides the crossing over of the older
disciplines, as in the case of historical and literary studies, the series
encourages the application of such newer ones as linguistics,
sociology, anthropology, and comparative literature. It also encour-
ages encounters with current trends in methodology, especially in the
realm of literary theory.
Homeric Stitchings: The Homeric Centos of the Empress Eudocia,
by M. D. Usher, is a definitive study of the Homeric Centos, an
epic-style biblical poem composed in the early fifth century C.E. by
the Empress Eudocia, wife of Theodosius II. The building blocks of
the Centos are verses taken directly from the /liad and Odyssey. Such
versification, known by the technical designation of cento or
“stitching,” has not until now received the attention it deserves.
Previous scholarship has tended to underestimate the Homeric Centos
and the form of the cento in general. Usher’s book forces a radical
reassessment.
Concentrating on the historical context of audience reception,
Usher demonstrates the artistry and communicative power of the
Homeric Centos. This poem, as Usher shows convincingly, was
intended for performance before audiences who were intimately
familiar with both Homer and the Bible. To say “familiar” may well
be an understatement: the Homeric Centos presuppose a veritable
x Foreword
internalization of both Homer and the Bible for both the composer
and the audience. In the case of Homer, the composer has internalized
not only the themes of the Jliad and Odyssey but also—and this is
essential—the formulaic system of Homeric poetry.
Eudocia’s consummate understanding of both the mechanics and
the esthetics of Homeric diction cannot be understood purely in terms
of composition. Applying the techniques of formulaic analysis
pioneered by Milman Parry and Albert Lord, Usher argues that the art
of the Homeric Centos grew out of mnemonic traditions that
perpetuated the actual performance of the Homeric poems. The
reading of the Homeric Centos, in the culture of later antiquity, was
merely the means toward the end of hearing them—the same way
that audiences would hear the /liad and Odyssey at public per-
formances. The Homeric Centos, like Homer, were meant to be
heard. In the historical context of later antiquity, as Homeric
Stitchings proves, it 1s essential to keep in mind the performative
aspects of reading in general. The Homeric Centos of the Empress
Eudocia bring to the fore the cultural synergism of reading and
performing the Classics.
