Collections of Poems 61basis of manuscripts and without further explanations, modern scholars fail to
recreate the literary moment when the text came into existence. Manuscripts
are important for the textual evidence they provide, but it does not suffice to
publish a Byzantine poem merely as a written text, without trying to imagine
the original circumstances of its composition.
The manuscript material can roughly be divided into two categories: collec-
tions of poems by a single author and anthologies containing poems by various
authors. The two categories are interrelated, of course, but it is often difficult
to unravel the ties that link them together. If a poem is found both in a single-
author collection and an anthology, we do not always know for certain that the
single-author collection is the ultimate source from which the anthology de-
rives the poem. The poem may have circulated in manuscript before it was
incorporated in the “edition” of the collected poems of its author, and may
therefore have been transmitted independently. Likewise, if a considerable
number of poems by the same author is only found in anthologies, there is no
need to assume a priori that they derive from a single-author collection of
poems that has disappeared. It certainly is a possibility^17 , but it is by no means
a certainty. This is illustrated, for instance, by the text tradition of Prodromos’
poems. Despite the popularity of his literary works, which is reflected in the
great number of manuscripts that have come down to us, it would appear that
“es (...) eine komplette Gesamtausgabe der Werke des Prodromos nie gegeben
hat”^18. There are many manuscripts that contain a considerable amount of
Prodromea, but the choice of poems and the order in which they are arranged
differ from manuscript to manuscript (except for direct apographs, of course)^19.
The same holds true for Psellos. His poetry has been copied in dozens of
manuscripts, but none of these manuscripts appear to go back to an edition of
Psellos’ collected poems^20. The truth of the matter is that Prodromos and
Psellos probably never bothered to publish an edition, both authorial and
authoritative, of their poems. They composed their poems for specific occa-
sions and specific audiences. They responded to the literary demands of their
time. They did not write for posterity. Not that they would not have liked to
see their works read by future generations, but the idea of posthumous fame
was not their prime concern at the moment of writing. Once a poem had been
presented to the public for which it was intended, it had served its purpose. If
the public liked the poem very much, it stood a chance of being copied; but if
the public did not think much of it, it was not copied. It is reasonable to assume
(^17) See the reconstruction of Kallikles’ collection of poems in ROMANO 1980: 44–45.
(^18) HÖRANDNER 1974: 166.
(^19) See HÖRANDNER 1974: 149–165.
(^20) See WESTERINK 1992: VII–XXXII.