In searching for a historical context for the writing down of the Homeric text, the most obvious strategy is to look for a stage in ancient Greek history when the technology of writing could produce a text, in manuscript form, that conferred a level of authority distinct from but equivalent to the authority conferred by an actual performance. As we have seen in the previous chapter, the opportunity for a text to become the equivalent of a performance already exists in the case of early poetic inscriptions from the eighth century bce onward. But manuscripts as distinct from inscriptions are another matter. It is only at a later period, after 550 bce or so, that we begin to see actual examples of the use of writing in the form of manuscripts. As we shall now see, some of these examples involve the use of a manuscript for purposes of a transcript, that is, in order to record any given composition and to control the circumstances of any given performance. 1

One such example comes from the era of Peisistratos and his sons, tyrants at Athens in the second half of the sixth century bce: from various reports, we see that this dynasty of the Peisistratidai maintained political power at least in part by way of controlling poetry. 2 One report in particular is worthy of mention here: according to Herodotus, the Peisistratidai possessed manuscripts of oracular poetry, which they stored on the acropolis of Athens (5.90. 2). 3 I draw attention to a word used by Herodotus in this context, kéktemai