OMER. According to legend, Homer was born either at Chios or at Smyrna. Herodotus dates him four hundred years before his own time, i.e., c. 850-700 B.C. (Histories 11.53), and modern scholars have accepted this date. He is the author of the Iliad, a poem on the Trojan War, and the Odyssey, a poem of Odysseus's wanderings before he returned to Ithaca. The fidelity with which Homer endowed Odysseus's wife Penelope became legendary. Jerome mentions her in his Epistola adversus Jovinianum (Letter Against Jovinian) I.45 (PL 23: 275). The medieval versions of the Troy story are De excidio Troiae historia, by Dares Phrygius, of uncertain date but generally believed to have been written about the fourth century of our era; Ephemeridos belli Troiani, by Dictys Cretensis, also dating from the fourth century; Le Roman de Troie (c. 1184), by Benoît de Sainte-Maure, and the Historia destructionis Troiae, by Guido de Columnis (before 1287).

Dorigen asks herself, "What does Omer say of good Penelope?" FranklT 1443-1444. Omer stands on a pillar of iron, Mars's metal, as one of the poets of the Trojan War, HF III.1466-1474, with other writers on the same subject--Dares, Guido, Dictys. The narrator detects a little envy among the poets; one says that Omer told lies about the war and favored the Greeks, HF II.1475-1479. Dares implies that Homer lied and swears he tells the truth, De excidio, l. Benoît echoes the accusation against Homer, Roman de Troie, 45-70, 110-116. "Omer with the honey mouth" appears in Bo V, Metr 2.1-6, and he is one of the writers of the "Troian gestes," Tr I.146, V.1792. [Dares Frygius: Dite: Guido: Lollius: Penalopee: Ulixes]

Omer, the OF variant, appears four times medially, FranklT 1443; HF III.1477; Tr I.146, V.1792; and once in final rhyming position, HF III.1466.