Bust of Homer, the Blind Greek Poet (flourished 9th or 8th century BCE). He is famous for the epic poems The Iliad and The Odyssey, dealing with episodes from the war between Greece and Troy. The two epics influenced the development of Greek and Latin literature and provided the basis of education and culture throughout the Classical age. Though attributed to Homer, little is known of him other than the fact that his name attached by the Greeks in antiquity. Marble bust from a Hellenistic original of 200BCE.