ABSTRACT
Outstanding by its size and complexity and addressing the god who is thought to represent the paragon of the Greek ideal, the hymn to Apollo has elicited more scholarly debate than any other of the Homeric hymns. Prominent became Kynaithos and his like, who are said to have interpolated many verses in the poetry of Homer. Kynaithos was Chian by origin, and he wrote, among the works attributed to Homer, the hymn to Apollo and fathered it on Homer. At Athens, Hipparchus obtained the ‘genuine’ text of Homer and organized Homer recitals at the Panathenaia; the ‘first’ of Kynaithos was to start the same Homeric revival in the very homeland of Stesichorus. The search for the ‘real’ author of the ‘spurious’ hymn to Apollo would inevitably lead to disreputable Homerids. Few, however, have believed the assertion, even in antiquity; or else the quarrel about Homer’s homeland would never have started.
