ABSTRACT
The double relation of epic, to history on the one hand and to everyday reality on the other, emphasizes clearly two of its most important original functions. It was a chronicle, a ‘book of the tribe’, a vital record of custom and tradition, and at the same time a story-book for general entertainment. The sophisticated relationship of the poet to his material, his awareness of historical perspective, reminds us that even our earliest epics date from a period when epic narrative had already been in use for some hundreds of years. In the Old English Beowulf there is an awareness of historical perspective on the part of the poet, which in this case takes the form of a nostalgia for the glories of the past. For Homer the background of his Iliad is the fall of a great civilization. The chapter covers some key concepts discussed in this book.
