ABSTRACT
Scholarship on ‘Homeric Society’ is in flux. New approaches to and reinterpretations of well-known evidence have made parts of Finley’s long dominant The World of Odysseus obsolete. Finley’s main point, however, now finds increasing support: ‘Homeric Society’ is neither a product of poetic fantasy nor an unrealistic amalgam of cultural traits from the Bronze to the Archaic Ages-although both are true to some extent-but a largely consistent depiction of a real society. This society probably should be dated near the poet’s own, about a century later than Finley thought.1 In this society the polis-certainly in an early stage of its evolution-was a much more pervasive feature than is usually believed.2 The long prevailing view that an elite of basileis dominated every aspect of life and that the ‘commoners’ counted for little has been challenged.3 Focusing primarily on military developments, I shall argue that the role of these commoners in both army and assembly, although for obvious reasons played down by the poet, was essential to society and the polis. This has important consequences for our understanding of the evolution of the early Greek polis.4
