Epic poetry
lengthy narrative poem, ordinarily detailing heroic deeds
In poetry, an epic is a lengthy narrative poem typically about the extraordinary deeds of extraordinary characters who, in dealings with gods or other superhuman forces, gave shape to the mortal universe for their descendants. With regard to oral tradition, epic poems consist of formal speech and are usually learnt word for word, contrasted with narratives that consist of everyday speech, categorised into factual or fiction, the former of which is less susceptible to variation.
Influential epics that have shaped Western literature and culture include Homer's Iliad and Odyssey; Virgil's Aeneid; and the anonymous Beowulf. The genre has inspired the adjective epic as well as derivative works in other mediums (such as epic films) that evoke or emulate the characteristics of epics.
Etymology
The English word epic comes from Latin epicus, which itself comes from the Ancient Greek adjective epikos (ἐπικός), from epos (ἔπος),
'word, story, poem'.
In Ancient Greek, 'epic' could refer to all poetry in dactylic hexameter (epea), which included not only Homer but also the wisdom poetry of Hesiod, the utterances of the Delphic oracle, and the strange theological verses attributed to Orpheus. Later tradition, however, has restricted the term 'epic' to heroic epic, as described in this article.
Overview
Originating before the invention of writing, primary epics, such as those of Homer, were composed by bards who used complex rhetorical and metrical schemes by which they could memorize the epic as received in tradition and add to the epic in their performances. Later writers like Virgil, Apollonius of Rhodes, Dante, Camões, and Milton adopted and adapted Homer's style and subject matter, but used devices available only to those who write.
The oldest epic recognized is the Epic of Gilgamesh (c. 2500–1300 BCE), which was recorded in ancient Sumer during the Neo-Sumerian Empire.
This brief starts where responsible research should: with the source description of “Epic poetry” as lengthy narrative poem, ordinarily detailing heroic deeds. Everything that follows is an evidence route, not borrowed authority.
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The subject matters to the arts & letters register because the source frames it as lengthy narrative poem, ordinarily detailing heroic deeds. Its deeper value depends on whether names, dates, institutions and citations support that framing.
Object files, edition statements, performance records and contemporary criticism preserve different stages of the work’s history. The source revision retrieved here is dated Sep 7, 2026. The linked authority identifier is Q37484. The Library of Congress control number is sh85044306. None of the 1 selected statements returned an explicit reference. The first chronological checks are 1300.
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This entry incorporates text from “Epic poetry” on English Wikipedia. Contributors are listed in the page history. Text is available under the Creative Commons Attribution-ShareAlike 4.0 License. Selected authority identifiers and statements are retrieved from Wikidata under CC0; their references and qualifiers remain part of the verification path.