Epic
Encyclopedia article; The Columbia Encyclopedia, Sixth Edition, 2009
Collections:
Religious Studies, Education, Psychology, History, Literature, Philosophy, Entire Library
...heroic figure. The earliest epics, known as primary, or original, epics, were shaped from the legends...foundation of the Babylonian epic of Gilgamesh, of the Iliad and the Odyssey of the Greek Homer, and of the Anglo-Saxon Beowulf. Literary, or secondary, epics, written in conscious imitation...