Aristarchus of Samothrace

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Aristarchus (Greek: Αρίσταρχος) 220? - 143 BC?), from the Greek island of Samothrace, was a grammarian and is noted as the most influential of all scholars of Homeric poetry. He was the librarian of the Library of Alexandria, and seems to have succeeded his teacher Aristophanes of Byzantium in that role. He established the most historically important critical edition of the Homeric poems. It is likely that he or, more probably, another predecessor at Alexandria, Zenodotus, was responsible for the division of the Iliad and Odyssey into twenty-four books each. The historical connection of his name to literary criticism has created the term aristarch for someone who is a judgmental critic.

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