Epigoni (epic)

"Epigoni" (Greek: Επίγονοι, "Epigonoi" "The Progeny") was an early Greek epic, a sequel to the "Thebaid" and therefore grouped in the Theban cycle. Some ancient authors seem to have considered it a part of the "Thebaid" and not a separate poem. [For example, Pausanias 9.9.5; Scholia on Apollonius of Rhodes 1.308.]

According to one source the epic extended to 7,000 lines of verse. ["Contest of Homer and Hesiod" 15.] It told the story of the last battle for Thebes by the Epigoni ("the progeny, the next generation"), the children of the heroes who had previously fought for the city. Only the first line is now known:

:Now, Muses, let us begin to sing of younger men ... [Fragment 1 West; Scholia on Aristophanes, "Peace" 1270; "Contest of Homer and Hesiod" 15.]

Additional references, without verbal quotations, suggest that the myth of the death of Procris [Fragment 3* West; "Suda" and other lexica s.v. "Teumesia".] and the story of Teiresias's daughter Manto [Fragment 4 West; Scholia on Apollonius of Rhodes 1.308.] formed part of the "Epigoni".

The epic was sometimes ascribed to Homer, but Herodotus doubted this attribution. [Herodotus, "Histories" 4.32.] According to the Scholia on Aristophanes there was an alternative attribution to "Antimachus". [Scholia on Aristophanes, "Peace" 1270.] This presumably means Antimachus of Teos, and for this reason another verse line attributed without title to Antimachus of Teos is conjecturally thought to belong to the "Epigoni". [Fragment 2 West; Clement of Alexandria, "Stromata" 6.12.7.] An alternative explanation for the naming of Antimachus here would be that the later epic poet Antimachus of Colophon had been accused of stealing the traditional "Epigoni" by incorporating its plot in his literary epic "Thebais".

The story of the Epigoni was afterwards told again in the form of a tragedy by Sophocles, "Epigoni".

Notes

Bibliography

*"Greek epic fragments" ed. and tr. Martin L. West. Cambridge, Mass.: Harvard University Press, 2003.