uly
historical period, in the eighth century B. C., all this is changed.
The Greeks as a people are called Hellenes; the Dorians rule in
Peloponnesos, while their lands are tilled by Argive Helots; and the
Achaians appear only as an insignificant people occupying the southern
shore of the Corinthian Gulf. How this change took place we cannot tell.
The explanation of it can never be obtained from history, though some
light may perhaps be thrown upon it by linguistic archaeology. But at
all events it was a great change, and could not have taken place in a
moment. It is fair to suppose that the Helleno-Dorian conquest must have
begun at least a century before the first Olympiad; for otherwise the
geographical limits of the various Greek races would not have been so
completely established as we find them to have been at that date. The
Greeks, indeed, supposed it to have begun at least three centuries
earlier, but it is impossible to collect evidence which will either
refute or establish that opinion. For our purposes it is enough to know
that the conquest could not have taken place later than 900 B. C.; and
if this be the case, the MINIMUM DATE for the composition of the Homeric
poems must be the tenth century before Christ; which is, in fact, the
date assigned by Aristotle. Thus far, and no farther, I believe it
possible to go with safety. Whether the poems were composed in the
tenth, eleventh, or twelfth century cannot be determined. We
are justified only in placing them far enough back to allow the
Helleno-Dorian conquest to intervene between their composition and the
beginning of recorded history. The tenth century B. C. is the latest
date which will account for all the phenomena involved in the case, and
with this result we must be satisfied. Even on this showing, the Iliad
and Odyssey appear as the oldest existing specimens of Aryan literature,
save perhaps the hymns of the Rig-Veda and the sacred books of the
Avesta.

The apparent difficulty of preserving such long poems for three or four
centuries without the aid of writing may seem at first sight to justify
the hypothesis of Wolf, that they are mere collections of ancient
ballads, like those which make up the Mahabharata, preserved in the
memories of a dozen or twenty bards, and first arranged under the orders
of Peisistratos. But on a careful examination this hypothesis is seen to
raise more difficulties than it solves. What was there in the position
of Peisistra