27. 1829.
[4445,1]
Niebuhr, ib. sezione
intitolata The Patrician Houses
and the Curies, p. 268. Q137659935Each house (ciascuno dei γένη gentes
nei quali era anticamente
distribuito il popolo ateniese) Q137659935bore a peculiar name
resembling a patronymic in form; as the Codrids, the Eumolpids, the
Butads: which produces an appearance, but a fallacious one, of a family
affinity (perchè quelle gentes, come
ap. i Romani, erano una mera divisione politica; ciascuna gens o casa era composta
di più famiglie senz'alcun riguardo ad affinità scambievole). Q137659935These names may have been transferred from the most
distinguished among the associated families to the rest: it is more
probable that they were adopted from the name of a hero, who was their
eponymus. Such a house was that of the
Homerids in Chios; whose
descent from the poet was only an inference drawn from their name,
whereas others pronounced that they were no way related {to} him (not. 747. Harpocration v. ῾Ομηρίδαι. It may be warrantably assumed that a hero
named Homer was revered by the
Ionians at the time when Chios
received its laws. See the Rhenish Museum (Museo Renano) I. 257.) In
Greek history what appears to be a family, may probably often have been
a house of this kind; and this system of subdivision is not to be
confined to the Ionian tribes alone.
(27. 1829.)
