Since Milman Parry’s [1933-1935] fieldwork, Serbo-Croatian heroic songs have often been used to interpret the compositional practice of ancient Greek epic songs. In the present context, the usefulness of this comparison is questioned, also with respect to how far one can take this comparison, especially where the melodic patterns of the two traditions are concerned. Is the method of comparing Indo-European poetry with the results of Bartók’s studies on Parry’s collection useful for tracing common roots of Greek and Serbo-Croatian traditions? [http://www.vml.de/e/inhalt.php?ISBN=978-3-89646-645-7]