Forgotten Scholarship: Gustav Adolf Schöll, Herodotus, and Greek Oracular Poetry
abstract
Schöll’s thesis that there was a network of epic narratives with legendary and oracular contents written by chresmologues and prophets can no longer be supported. We should admit, instead, that the oracular stories about the local past that Schöll most acutely detected were in most cases handed down by work of mouth. Oral tradition – or, rather, ‘semi-oral’ – must be given pre-eminence over chresmological epic. Still, Schöll had insights of the greatest importance concerning the oracular tradition in Herodotus. Today, we can realise it far better than the philologists of his times and the great scholars of Herodotus who came after him have been able to do.
Keywords: Local traditions • Herodotus • Delphic verse oracles • Oracular poetry