In Hexametrical Genres from Homer to Theocritus, Christopher Faraone discusses a number of short hexametrical genres such as oracles, incantations and laments that do not easily fit the generic models provided by the extant poetry of Hesiod and Homer. In the process, he gives us new insight into their ritual performance, their early history, and how poets from Homer to Theocritus embedded or imitated these genres to enrich their own hexametrical poems--by playing with and sometimes overturning the generic expectations of their audiences or readers.Christopher Faraone combines literary and ritual studies to produce a rich and detailed picture of hexametrical genres performed publicly for gods, such as hymns or laments for Adonis, or other that were performed more privately, such as epithalamia, oracles, or incantations. This volume deals primarily with the recovery of lost or under-appreciated hexametrical genres, which are often left out of modern taxonomies of archaic hexametrical poetry, either because they survive only in fragments or because the earliest evidence for them dates to the classical period.

Chapter One: IntroductionChapter Two: Some Preliminary SoundingsChapter Three: The Chryses Episode as an Epichoric HymnChapter Four: Circe's Instructions as a Sibylline OracleChapter Five: Helen's Pharmakon as a Disguised IncantationChapter Six: Like Golden Aphrodite: Female Lament in the IliadChapter Seven: ConclusionsAppendices:Appendix A: Curse-Prayers in HexametersAppendix B: Necromantic Prayers in HexametersAppendix C: Empedocles Go?sAppendix D: Early Anthologies of Hexametrical IncantationsAppendix E: Instructional Oracles as a Frame for the Hesiodic CalendarsBibliography