Hellenistic Poetry

"Abstract: Of all the lost Foundation Poems attributed to Apollonius Rhodius, active at the court of Ptolemy II, the Ktisis of Alexandria must have been the most important for his contemporaries, and surely is the most intriguing for modern scholars of the Hellenistic world. Unfortunately, only a brief mention of this epyllion survives, in a scholion to Nicander’s Theriaka, relating to the birth of poisonous snakes from the severed head of Medusa, carried by Perseus over Libya. Deadly and benign serpents belong to a multi-cultural symbolic imagery intertwined with the Greek, Macedonian, Egyptian and Jewish origins of the city. This paper explores the possible connections of the only episode preserved from Apollonius’ Ktisis with the most ancient known traditions on the foundation of Alexandria —possibly even created at the time of Alexander or of the first Lagid dynasts, Ptolemy I and II."

Il lavoro discute un verso di Properzio in cui nelle edizioni recenti un emendamento di Heinsius (montibus) si è progressivamente affermato a danno della lezione unica della tradizione manoscritta (fontibus). Oltre a mettere in dubbio le presunte ragioni linguistiche (addotte da Shackleton Bailey) che renderebbero necessaria la correzione, si propone un argomento nuovo a favore della lezione fontibus, e cioè il richiamo al mito di Eco e Narciso nelle Metamorfosi di Ovidio. All’eziologia ellenistica del fenomeno dell’eco, ricondotta (anche da Properzio) alla figura di Ila rapito dalle ninfe di una fonte, Ovidio oppone infatti una diversa e più ‘coerente’ eziologia, verosimilmente di sua invenzione, legata alla figura della ninfa Eco, che si smaterializza e resta puro suono percepito, in questo caso sì, tra i ‘monti’. Attraverso Ovidio si può quindi risalire, per contrasto, alla lezione (e alla connessa eziologia) che egli trovava in Properzio e rifiutava.

An "Alexandrian" encomiastic epigram in honor of Augustus (Supplementum Hellenisticum 982), "Aevum Antiquum" 11 (1998), 255-344

Contents:
1) Papyrological evidence. Hypothesis on the period and on the circumstances of the composition of the epigram. [The first known Greek epigram on papyrus with pentameters in eisthesis].
2) Epigram as Encomium and encomiastic ekphrasis. Possible epigraphical destination of SH 982.
3) Encomium as a hymn to the laudandus' divinity.
4) The Text.
5) August as a Zeus Eleutherios/Liberator: the Roman-Egyptian interpretation of the "Basileis soteres" Hellenistic tradition.
6) The Personification present in the epigram: a picture of the "Golden Age".
7) August as Nilotic ruler, bringer of Prosperity.
8) Iconography of the Augustean Apollo: the princeps and the elaboration of his own divine image.
9) Apollo "Actius" and Apollo "Leucadius".
10) Mutual influences of the Greek and Latin encomiastic poetry in the Augustan age: two different ways of expressing the same ideology.
11)  Appendix: the documentary texts of the tomos (P.Lond II 256 a, d, e) with translation and commentary.
12) Bibliography.

Harder This paper offers bi-directional readings of the intertextual allusions between Apol-lonius' Argonautica and Callimachus' Argonautic stories in the Aetia. It argues that the allusions represent direct confrontations between Callimachus' οὐχ ἓν ἄεισμα διηνεκές (aet. fr. 1, 3 Harder) and Apollonius' ὅσσα τ᾿ ἔρεξαν (Ap. Rh. I 21) narrative strategies within the same 'Callimachean' aesthetic framework. On the basis of the conclusion of my 2014 article, Anchored in Time: the date in Apollonius' Ar-gonautica, which uses the poem's astronomical references to argue for 238 BC as the terminus post quem for the epic, these readings assume that the Aetia is the prior work and that the Argonautica is the alluding text. Stephen Hinds' example of the metapoetic dialogue between Ovid and Vergil in Allusion and Intertext provides the theoretical model for the kind of bi-directional readings offered here. This paper explores the programmatic and metapoetic functions that the Argonautic myth has within Aetia, reorienting Callimachus' allusions toward the archaic epic tradition and contextualizing the 'Argonautica' in the Aetia within longstanding metaphorical discourses of 'the ship of poetry' and 'the ship of state'. This analysis concentrates on the beginning of the Anaphe-aetion (frr. 7c-8 Harder) and the Cyzicus-aetion (frr. 108-109a Harder).

Success in war over rival kings or barbarian invaders was one of the marks of legitimation for the Hellenistic rulers. Depictions of, or allusions to, war are quite rare in the surviving Hellenistic court poetry; however, we can have a glance of military life (and death) through the lens of verse epitaphs for men who served in the army –in every rank, from royal philoi to humble privates–, and from the occasional dedicatory epigrams they commissioned for temple offerings. Poetic portrayal of members of an army involves display (or concealment) of many layers of their individual and public “identity”: social status, ethnicity, cultural background, religious belief, etc. Building a corpus of such epigrams produced in the 4th-1st cent. BC, from every area of the Hellenistic world (mainland Greece, Macedonia, the Ptolemaic, Attalid and Seleucid kingdoms, the independent poleis of Asia Minor) I shall try to assess similarities and differences in self-presentation of men who –often gone unremarked by ancient historians or court poets– helped building the power of their basileis or keeping the freedom of their own polis.

Very extended version of the paper presented at the conference "Alexander's Legacy", including a commentary of all the texts which could not be included in the shorter book version (here: https://www.academia.edu/22547149/Alexander_presence_and_absence_in_Hellenistic_Poetry_in_F._Landucci_C._Bearzot_eds_Alexander_s_legacy_Atti_del_Convegno_Milano-Universit%C3%A0_Cattolica_del_Sacro_Cuore_settembre_2015_._L_Erma_di_Bretschneider_Roma_2016_pp._1-24).
I. Poetry as a vehicle for Alexander’s kleos: I.1. Alexander’s tomb and the Homeric requisites for the survival of everlasting glory; I.2 Alexander in Ptolemaic poetry; I.3. Alexander in Seleucid and Attalid poetry; I.4. Alexander in 1st BC-6th AD epigrams; I.5. Alexander as legendary hero in prose and in oral tales. II. Repertoire of poetic passages: II.1. Contemporary Epigrams: II.1.1. Anon. A.P. VI 344; II.1.2. Dedication by Craterus; II.1.3. Epinician epigram for Antigonus; II.2. Epic poems on Alexander: II.2. Epic poems on Alexander II.2.1; Papyri; II.2.2. Agis of Argos; II.2.3. Aeschrion of Mitylene; II.2.4. Anaximenes of Lampsacus; II.2.5. Arrianus; II.2.6. Choerilus of Iasus; II.2.7. Cleon of Sicily; II.2.8. Phaestus; II.2.9. Nestor of Laranda. II.3. Alexander and Alexandrian poetry: II.3.1. Callimachus; II.3.2. Theocritus; II.3.3. Apollonius Rhodius; II.3.4. Asclepiades; II.3.5. Posidippus; II.4. Other Hellenistic epigrams: II.4.1. Mnasalcas; II.4.2. Antipater of Sidon; II.4.4. The Garland of Philip and other Roman epigrams. II.5. Byzantine epigrams.

This paper can be downloaded for free - Articolo liberamente scaricabile

This paper compares a number of epigrams from the Garland of Philip and their likely models in the Garland of Meleager. By such a comparison, this work aims to stress the common features in the Philippan variations, which in turn would represent stylistic trends of the second Garland, namely: 1) the avoidance of suspense, by revealing the theme of a poem from its beginning; 2) the use of standard expressions, possibly felt as sub-generic hallmarks; 3) the reduction in the number of enjambments and the overall tendency towards a rigorous distribution of the themes in every line or couplet; 4) the relevant role played by the words, which the model and the imitation share; 5) the lexical refinement, a frequent feature but less prominent than commonly believed. By trying to shed light on these stylistic trends of Philippan variations, this paper wants to offer an argument against the view of Philippan poetry as merely imitative.

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πάντα γυναῖκες ἴσαντι, καὶ ὡς Ζεὺς ἀγάγεθ᾽ Ἥραν (Théocr.15.64) en hommage à ma mère, Éva Il est bien connu que le monde des femmes occupe une place centrale dans la production poétique hellénistique. Suivant l'exemple d'Euripide qui malgré sa réputation de misogynie a mis en scène des caractères féminins doués d'une profondeur psychologique qui les différenciait radicalement des hommes 1 , les poètes hellénistiques ont introduit des femmes qui jouaient un rôle décisif auprès des hommes. Il est vrai que la redéfinition des sexes résulte des nouvelles conditions historiques et sociales que le nouvel ordre macédonien imposa, surtout en ce qui concerne le rôle des femmes de la cour ; connaître les conditions du point de vue historique est à mon avis important afin de mieux comprendre la femme poétique. Même si les sources qui parlent des femmes hors Attique sont bien postérieures, nous connaissons assez bien les noms et l'action des femmes royales qui ont joué un rôle décisif dans la formation des cours hellénistiques. Mais nous reviendrons sur ce point-ci plus tard. Le but central de notre présentation est de montrer que cette réalité historique pourrait être importante pour mieux comprendre certains choix de Théocrite. Dans sa poésie, émerge une image bien cohérente du rôle que les femmes jouent dans le monde des hommes. La femme théocritéenne ne se présente pas souvent en personne mais c'est par son absence qu'elle domine la pensée masculine comme objet du désir, comme source d'inspiration musicale et surtout comme la raison qui bouleverse les actions et le rythme quotidien de la vie de l'homme, qui ainsi donne l'impression qu'il est la proie de son amour inachevé ou terminé au moment du désespoir et du chagrin (e.g. Idylles 3, 10, 14). Quand à leurs sentiments, Théocrite les présente insensibles au bouleversement qu'elles produisent : c'est le cas de la femme insouciante – ornement de la coupe

Chapter 10 studies Hellenistic and Roman military epitaphs, and addresses a number of interconnected issues: the unpopularity of epitaphs for individual soldiers in the Greek Anthology; the near absence of inscribed epitaphs in literary sources, despite the fact that they are often of good literary quality; and the question of their authorship.
Apparently, there was no ‘Hellenistic Simonides’, author of warriors’ inscriptional epitaphs worthy to be gathered in a book. In the seventh book of the Greek Anthology there are many fictitious epitaphs for Homeric heroes or famous historical figures, but funerary epigrams celebrating the death in battle of individual, contemporary military men are only a dozen. This lack may be a choice of later compilers of florilegia, or may be due to the fact that epigrammatists who composed  military epitaphs did not publish them as a collection. There is no evidence that any epigrammatist known from the Greek Anthology also acted as a professional writer of military epitaphs; we can just propose some hypothetical candidates for this role, such as Damagetus  and Posidippus. Epitaphs for common soldiers were usually commissioned to professional poets, most of whom now remain anonymous (only occasionally we find signatures in epigraphic poems); the technitai  found their inspiration in Homer and in the elegiac, lyric and tragic ‘classics’; anthologies like that of Meleager could also offer some models, although the main literary-epigraphic reference was still the Simonidean corpus. The lack of a specific, recognizable personal style makes it difficult to trace the same hand in contemporary epitaphs. It has been suggested that professional versifiers used ‘sample books’ for composing epitaphs, but the very existence and the nature of these anthologies is still to be proved. In some cases, the deceased, especially when he presents himself as a veteran belonging to the local élite, may have had his say on the contents and form of his future epitaph, or even might have been responsible for composing it.

At the time the Argonautika was composed, the ubiquitous image of the good Hellenistic king was Heracles. Thus, it seems odd that Apollonius would portray his Jason, the leader of the Argonauts, as not only explicitly weaker than Heracles, but as an antithetical hero. And contrast between Heracles and Jason has already contributed to much of the controversy in scholarship about Jason as a hero or as a model of leadership.

This paper reexamines this question from a different angle, by focusing on Jason’s aristaeia in book 3. Unlike other epic heroes, Jason seems to be deliberately equated with a farmer. This paper argues that Apollonius did not intend to adopt the current thinking about the ideal king in his Argonautika, but rather that he was reaching back to models found in fourth-century political philosophy. In particular, I argue that Xenophon’s idealization of the farmer-king in the Oeconomicus informs Apollonius’ choice of how to represent Jason.

Given that it is likely that Apollonius was writing the epic for Ptolemy III Euergetes, this reading of the epic suggests the poem is part of a larger ideological departure from contemporary ideas about kingship and specifically from Philadelphus’ propagandistic exploitation of the image of Heracles.

M.A. Harder, R.F. Regtuit & G.C. Wakker (eds), Past and Present in Hellenistic Poetry. ISBN 978-90-429-3321-7

This is a meticulous survey of the reception of some lyric subgenres
in Hellenistic poetry and it is meant to be the first of a series of contributions
on the subject. Leaving aside lyric in a religious context, the paper is divided
into two main sections, namely lyric poetry composed for rulers and lyric poetry
written for everyday people. In the new social context lyric poetry was intended
for presentation in the royal symposia. The Alexandrians wrote all types of occasional
lyric poetry (enkomia, epinikia, epithalamia, threnoi and epikedeia), a fact
that is reflected both in the work of distinguished poets, such as Callimachus,
Posidippus and Theocritus as well as in the epigrammatic tradition and in poetic
fragments found on papyri. Special attention is given to stichic lyric poetry and
to the new genre of the mime, whereas the oral tradition of the carmina popularia
and the making of lyric anthologies for symposiastic use complete the picture.

Harry Tzalas' Farewell to Alexandria and the Alexandrian Mime in Antiquity: The Metaphorical Language of Cultural Identity.
The aim of my paper is to investigate the metaphorical language of cultural identity used in both Farewell to Alexandria and the ancient Alexandrian mime, with special references to the visual language used to verbalize the way of thinking and the imagination, as well as the symbolic interpretations of the Alexandrian cultural experience in each case.

Although there is no explicit evidence of queen patronage in the first generations of Ptolemies, the frequent dedication of encomiastic poems to queens (especially Arsinoe II, Berenice II) by Alexandrian learned poets suggests an involvement of royal women in shaping of their public image as patrons and lovers of the arts, in full agreement with the cultural program of their husbands. The queens are presented as Muses or Graces, goddesses who traditionally protect poetry. Not only learned poetry was likely to be endorsed by some queen, but also more “popular” (although refined) forms of entertainment, like lyric song performed in public cults (Theoc. Id. 15). Inscriptions also suggests that the fourth Ptolemaic couple, Arsinoe III and Ptolemy IV, funded literary competitions (Museia).

In this article, I compare the astronomical poem by Aratus called Phaenomena (third century bc) with the citations of a work of the same name by Eudoxus that are found in Hipparchus’ only extant work, In Arati et Eudoxi phaenomena (second century bc). I argue that, contrary to what most scholars maintain, Aratus’ poem is not a mere versification of Eudoxus’ work but a version enriched in style, language, and content. Indeed, Aratus’ Phaenomena is a paradigmatic reflection of the astronomical knowledge of the period in which it was written and a comprehensive, non-technical presentation of the celestial phenomena known in his time. It was, as I show, a very popular work, so popular that Hipparchus was moved to correct it in the hope of establishing himself as the authority in astronomy and prose as its proper medium. Published Online (2021-04-30)Copyright © 2021 by Stamatina Mastorakou Article PDF Link: https://jps.library.utoronto.ca/index.php/aestimatio/article/view/37591/28593 Cor...

This paper focuses on the analysis of the Lycophronean references in two passages from the section of the Dionysiaca narrating Dionysus’ youth, i.e. IX 200-205 and XI 171-174. Nonnus draws from Lycophron a word (in the first case) and an expression (in the second)  dealing  with  Telephus’  myth,  as  he  wants  to  highlight  Dionysus’  salvific role through some prophetic allusions. Thus, the Panopolitan becomes a sort of prophet himself.  It  is  then  possible  to  observe  that  he  is  interested  not  in  the  epic  element of the Alexandra, but, rather, in its oracular element, which is embedded in the poem as part of its variety (ποικιλία).

In the Argonautica of Apollonius of Rhodes, women have a special importance, presenting themselves in complementarity with the male gender. In this study we analyse the political behaviour of two female characters, Hypsipyle, on the outward journey, and Arete, on the homeward journey. Lemnos is a kingdom governed by a woman and populated only by the female gender, after all the men have been slaughter by the women. The Argonauts ling ever longer on the island, without knowing what really happened to the previous men, and solve the women’s offspring problem by copulating with them. On the homeward journey they stop in Drepane (Corfu), ruled by Arete and Alcinous.
Our aim is to determine whether the two queens, Hypsipyle and Arete, actually have a political voice. We try to show that, in fact, both take measures to avoid external conflicts and guarantee a peaceful coexistence of nations. The expression “words dense meaning”, πύκινον ἔπος (4.1111, 1200), qualifies the discourse between the king and the queen of Drepane and has a specific political sense. It reflects the strategy adopted, both by Alcinous and Arete, to face the situation of external threat caused by the arrival, in the Drepane kingdom, of a rescue expedition for Medea.
Since in Alexandria the Ptolemaic queens had great social, religious and possibly political relevance, Arete and Hypsipyle can be considered a prefiguration of Arsinoe II; and the couple Arete and Alcinous, who would be uncle and niece or even brothers, can also be seen as a projection of the couple Arsinoe II and Ptolemy II, married and brothers.

I contributi pubblicati in questo volume sono liberamente disponibili su https://www.openstarts.units.it/handle/10077/30680 Gli articoli pubblicati sono sottoposti a valutazione di referee interni ed esterni. Registrazione del Tribunale di Trieste n. 1218 (21.04.2010) Direttore responsabile: Margherita Reguitti © Copyright 2020-EUT EDIZIONI UNIVERSITÀ DI TRIESTE Proprietà letteraria riservata I diritti di traduzione, memorizzazione elettronica, di riproduzione e di adattamento totale o parziale di questa pubblicazione, con qualsiasi mezzo (compresi i microfilm, le fotocopie o altro) sono riservati per tutti i paesi.

Als „Erfinder“ der Hirtendichtung ging der hellenistische Dichter Theokrit in die Literaturgeschichte ein und prägte damit für Jahrhunderte das Gattungsspektrum der europäischen Literatur. Die Autorinnen und Autoren dieses Bandes widmen sich der Wirkungsgeschichte des Dichters in der Literatur der römischen Kaiserzeit (Calpurnius Siculus, Longos und andere Prosaiker) und der lateinischen und altgriechischen Literatur der Frühen Neuzeit. Sie diskutieren die antike Rezeption
und bisher unbekanntere Rezeptionszeugnisse aus der frühneuzeitlichen Tradition. So können der Wirkungsgeschichte dieses „Klassikers“ neue Aspekte hinzugefügt werden. Dabei sticht nicht nur die häufige Verbindung und der Vergleich mit
seinem römischen Pendant Vergil, sondern auch seine spätere Einbindung in christliche Kontexte heraus. Auf diese Weise blieben seine Gedichte lebendig und wurden wiederholt aktualisiert – sei es rein literarisch oder sogar, wie in einem Fall, in Form von Aufführungen theokriteisch geprägter Stücke. Symbolhaft für diese immer neuen Transformationen und Verschmelzungen steht die Junktur Hyblaea avena („hybläische/sizilische Flöte“), mit der der Römer Calpurnius dem griechischen Gattungsvater in vergilischem Vokabular seine Reverenz erweist.

Revised and extended version of the paper "The Kind Look of the Muses, The Evil Eye of Ares. Encomiastic strategies in Callimachus and in Hellenistic inscriptional epitaphs." delivered at the International conference "Casting Off Shadows: Hellenistic Poetry Beyond Callimachean Aesthetics", Faculty of Classics, Cambridge University, UK, 1-3/09/16.
The paper has also been presented in part, and with significant variants,  at the Università degli Studi di Bologna (03/02/17) and at the Università La Sapienza, Roma (05/12/16).

Many Hellenistic epitaphs for youths fallen in battle point out that the deceased belonged to the civic élite of the hoi apo tou gymnasiou. The importance attached to the poetic and musical paideia in these epigrams is such that the excellence of the deceased in this field is mentioned even before the military valor (traditionally the focus of war epitaphs). The article examines in detail some case studies, analyzing how in these epitaphs the relationship between military kleos and intellectual prestige unfolds, and comparing them with some key-expressions of the poems of Callimachus.

Revised and expanded version of the paper presented at the conference "The Poetics of War. Remembering Conflict from Ancient Greece to the Great War". UCL, 2015:
http://www.ucl.ac.uk/classics/outreach/general-public/ww1

In spite of the abundance of literary, epigraphic, artistic and papyrological documents, the dynamics of most of the military events which took place in the Hellenistic period are still obscure. Numerous, however, are the epigraphic poems commemorating individual soldiers who fought in the said battles, often dying in action. Rich in literary topoi and imagery derived from the previous epic, epigrammatic and elegiac tradition, Hellenistic epitaphs, not unlike court poetry of the same period, offer a representation of contemporary wars through the lenses of the literary conventions and in the light of the poetic reinvention of the previous historical and mythical wars. Some of the traditional literary images here discussed also crop up/resurface, unexpectedly, in modern war poetry, especially British poetry of the First World War.

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Among many mythological reworkings in the Metamorphoses, Ovid provides pathetic origin stories for three female monsters whom Homer represented as inhuman and dangerous. The Gorgon Medusa, Ovid claims, was once a beautiful-haired girl raped by Neptune; the ...

The concluding line of the epilogue of Callimachus' Aitia (fr. 112.9 Pf.)1 is rightly understood as an introduction to the Iambi that follow it directly in P.Oxy. 7.1011 and the Diegeseis.2 The poet's deliberate linking of these two collections invites us to read the Iambi as a specific ...