homer oral or written tradidio

It is possible, on the other hand, that some lesser use of the new technique of writing was the determining factor in the ability to compose such long and complex poems out of pre-existing and much shorter oral songs. Many critics do not accept this however. The huge gap in quality as well as quantity being the main factor. In essence, the poems belong to an oral culture, whether or not their monumental form owes …

…poetic songs that contained all these elements that have been discussed. Some societies that are, or were illiterate at one point or another, had no books or writings, and thus used oral tradition to tell the stories. Somewhere along the way, a person might have written the poem down to pass on to other generations. Any way you look at it, the Homeric poems have undertaken both types of tradition throughout the course of time.