ARISTOTLE'S BIOLOGY AND HIS LOST HOMERIC PUZZLES

Abstract

Diogenes Laertius' list of Aristotle's works includes a Homeric Puzzles (Ἀπορημάτων Ὁμηρικῶν) in six books (5.26, no. 119), as does the list in the biography of Aristotle attributed to Hesychius (no. 106). This latter also includes a Homeric Problems (Προβλημάτων Ὁμηρικῶν) in ten books (no. 147), which appears to be the same as an item in the biography (extant in Arabic) attributed to Ptolemy al-Gharib (no. 104). The later and more derivative Vita Marciana attributes to Aristotle a Homeric Questions (Ὁμηρικὰ ζητήματα). The only other reference to the title of such a work by Aristotle is from the anonymous Antiatticista, a second-century a.d. lexicon (s.v. βασίλισσα): ‘They say Alcaeus the comic poet and Aristotle in Homeric Puzzles said this.’ Finally, Poetics 25 – which begins περὶ δὲ προβλημάτων καὶ λύσεων – is a summary, with examples, of just such a work, and a description of how to undertake such an inquiry.