His most important works are the following: •
On the Capture of Thessalonica, an eye-witness account of the
siege of 1185 and subsequent sufferings of the people of Thessalonica. In early sections of this memoir Eustathios describes also political events at
Constantinople from the death of emperor
Manuel I through the short reign of
Alexios II to the usurpation of
Andronikos I, with sharp comments on the activities of all involved. The Greek text was edited by Kyriakidis, with an Italian translation by V. Rotolo; there is an English translation (with a commentary and associated essays) by J. Melville-Jones (Byzantina Australiensia Volume 8), a French translation by Paolo Odorico, and a German translation by H. Hunger. • A number of orations, some of which have been edited by P. Wirth (
Eustathii Thessalonicensis Opera Minora). In 2013 a translation of six of the earliest of these speeches was published with a commentary by Andrew F. Stone (Byzantina Australiensia Volume 19). • Commentaries on Homer's
Iliad and
Odyssey (). These address questions of grammar, etymology, mythology, history and geography. They are not so much original commentaries as extracts from earlier commentators – there are many correspondences with
Homeric
scholia. Drawing on numerous extensive works of
Alexandrian grammarians and critics and later commentators, they are a very important contribution to
Homeric scholarship, not least because some of the works from which Eustathios made extracts are lost. :Although it is likely that Eustathios quotes some authors second-hand, he seems personally acquainted with the works of the greatest ancient critics –
Aristarchos of Samothrace,
Zenodotos,
Aristophanes of Byzantium, and others. This is a great tribute to the state of the libraries of Constantinople and of classical scholarship there in the 12th century. He was also an avid reader of the
Deipnosophistae of
Athenaeus. Some of the etymological and grammatical comments by Eustathios's Alexandrian predecessors are full of errors; and Eustathios's own comments are diffuse and frequently interrupted by digressions. :The first printed edition, by Majoranus, was published in
Rome in 1542–1550 (4 vols., fol.), an inaccurate reprint being later published in
Basel in 1559–1560.
A. Politi's edition (Florence, 1730, 3 vols., folio), contains only the commentary on the first five books of the
Iliad with a Latin translation. A tolerably correct reprint of the Roman edition was published at Leipzig, the first part containing the
Odyssey commentary (2 vols., 4to.), 1825–1826, and the second, containing the
Iliad commentary (3 vols., 4to.), edited by
J. G. Stallbaum for the
Patrologia Graeca, 1827–1829. These were superseded by the edition of M. van der Valk, 1971 onwards. Extracts from the commentaries are quoted in many editions of the Homeric poems. • A commentary on
Dionysius Periegetes (dedicated to
John Doukas, son of
Andronikos Kamateros). This is as diffuse as the commentary on Homer, but includes numerous valuable extracts from earlier writers. (It was first printed in
R. Stephens' edition of Dionysius (Paris, 1547, 4to.), and later in that of
H. Stephens (Paris, 1577, 4to., and 1697, 8vo.), in Hudson's
Geograph. Minor, vol. iv., and lastly, in
Gottfried Bernhardy's edition of Dionysius (Leipzig, 1828, 8vo.). • A commentary on
Pindar. No manuscript of this has come to light; but the introduction survives. (The introduction was first published by
Gottlieb Tafel in his
Eustathii Thessalonicensis Opuscula (Frankfurt, 1832, 4to.), from which it was reprinted separately by Schneidewin,
Eustathii prooemium commentariorum Pindaricorum (Göttingen, 1837, 8vo.). • Other published works. Some were first published by Tafel in the 1832
Opuscula just mentioned, some appeared later, as by P. Wirth for the
Corpus Fontium Historiae Byzantinae series. • Unpublished works: these include theological writings and commemorative speeches. Several of the latter are important historical sources. ==Editions and translations==