The Bibliotheca (in English: Library), in three books, provides a grand summary of traditional Greek mythology and heroic legends. The only work of its kind to survive from classical antiquity, the Bibliotheca is a unique guide to Greek mythology, from the origins of the universe to the Trojan War. The Bibliotheca has been used as a source book by classicists from the time of its compilation in the 1st century–2nd century AD to the present, influencing writers from antiquity to Robert Graves. It provides a comprehensive history of Greek myth, telling the story of each of the great dynasties of heroic mythology, and the episodes associated with the main heroes and heroines, from Jason and Perseus to Heracles and Helen of Troy. As a primary source for Greek myth, as a reference work, and as an indication of how the later ancient Greeks themselves viewed their mythical traditions, the Bibliotheca is indispensable to anyone who has an interest in classical mythology. A certain "Apollodorus" is indicated as author on some surviving manuscripts (Diller 1983). This Apollodorus has been mistakenly identified with Apollodorus of Athens (born c. 180 BC), a student of Aristarchus of Samothrace, mainly as it is known—from references in the minor scholia on Homer—that Apollodorus of Athens did leave a similar comprehensive repertory on mythology, in the form of a verse chronicle. The text that we possess cites a Roman author, Castor the Annalist, who was a contemporary of Cicero in the 1st century BC. The mistaken attribution was made by scholars from Patriarch Photius I of Constantinople onwards. Since for chronological reasons that Apollodorus cannot have written the book, the Scriptor Bibliothecae ("writer of the Library") is conventionally called the "Pseudo-Apollodorus" by those wishing to be scrupulously correct. Traditional references simply instance "the Library and Epitome". Unfortunately, the Bibliotheca, originally in four books, has not come down to us complete. Part of the third book and the entire fourth book have been lost. On the other hand, we have an epitome that was made of the complete edition, and so also of the lost part, leaving us a good summary of its contents.
External links
- Online Text: Apollodorus The Library translated by J. G. Frazer segmented text with copious footnotes
- Online Text: Apollodorus The Library translated by J. G. Frazer condensed text (4 pgs)
- Biography of Apollodorus
Further reading
- Diller Aubrey, 1983. Studies in Greek Manuscript Tradition, (Amsterdam) pp. 199-216. Abstract. Originally as "The Text History of the Bibliotheca of Pseudo-Apollodorus", in Transactions of the American Philological Association 66 (1935), pp. 296-313.
