William D. Furley and Jan Maarten Bremer provide the reader with as full a picture as possible of ancient Greek religious hymns which were sung either at religious services or in literary contexts imitating such services. The emphasis is laid on the edition of the Greek texts, both those which excavations of such sites as Delphi, Epidauros and Athens have produced from the 4th century BC on, and those which have been transmitted through the manuscript tradition or on papyri. The authors aim to provide full editorial assistance to the interpretation of the originals which are presented with textual variant readings, metrical analyses, general comment on the context - both historical and literary - of the texts, and then detailed line-by-line commentary. The material is divided into two volumes. The first offers, after a general introduction, all hymns in verse translation, each followed by a general discussion situating the text in the context of Greek worship. This volume as a whole is perfectly accessible to the Greekless reader; Greek citations are translated throughout. The second gives the Greek texts, apparatus criticus, metrical analysis and line-by-line commentary on language and content. Both volumes contain a bibliography and an index. Taken together, they present a 'reconstruction'of the composite genre of Greek lyric hymns, which many have lamented is hopelessly lost. The twofold approach of combining epigraphic and literary texts permits a fuller appreciation of the range of surviving texts than has hitherto been possible.

Born 1953; 1979 PhD; since 2003 Associate Professor of Classics, University of Heidelberg; Senior Research Fellow of the Institute of Classical Studies (School of Advanced Studies), London.