Simonides of Ceos - Revision history

Irlandos at 12:13, March 24, 2006

2006-03-24T12:13:17Z

Irlandos: /* External links */

2006-03-24T12:12:12Z

External links

Irlandos at 12:11, March 24, 2006

2006-03-24T12:11:24Z

New page

'''Simonides of Ceos''' (ca. [[556 BC]]-[[469 BC]]), Greek lyric poet, was born at Ioulis on [[Kea]]. During his youth he taught poetry and music, and composed paeans for the festivals of [[Apollo]]. He was included, along with [[Sappho]] and [[Pindar]], in the canonical list of [[nine lyric poets]] by the scholars of [[Hellenistic]] [[Alexandria]]. He is the narrator and main character of Mary Renault's historical novel ''The Praise Singer''.

Finding little scope for his abilities at home, he went to live at [[Athens]], at the court of [[Hipparchus (son of Pisistratus)|Hipparchus]], the patron of [[literature]]. After the murder of Hipparchus (514 BC), Simonides withdrew to [[Thessaly]], where he enjoyed the protection and patronage of the Scopadae and Aleuadae (two celebrated Thessalian families).

Cicero (''De oratore'', ii. 86) tells the story of the end of his relations with the Scopadae. His patron, Scopas, reproached him at a banquet for devoting too much space to the [[Dioscuri]] in an ode celebrating Scopas' victory in a chariot-race. Scopas refused to pay all the fee and told Simonides to apply to the Dioscuri for the remainder. Shortly afterwards, Simonides was told that two young men wished to speak to him; after he had left the banqueting room, the roof fell in and crushed Scopas and his guests. [http://www.bartleby.com/181/253.html] There seems no doubt that some disaster overtook the Scopadae that resulted in the extinction of the family. After the [[Battle of Marathon]] Simonides returned to Athens, but soon left for Sicily at the invitation of [[Hiero I of Syracuse]], at whose court he spent the rest of his life.

His reputation as a man of learning is shown by the tradition that he introduced the distinction between the long and short vowels (ε, η, ο, ω), afterwards adopted in the Ionic alphabet which came into general use during the archonship of Eucleides (403 BCE). He was also the inventor of a system of mnemonics (Quintilian xi.2,n).

So unbounded was his popularity that he was a power even in the political world; we are told that he reconciled Hiero and Thero on the eve of a battle between their opposing armies. He was the intimate friend of [[Themistocles]] and [[Pausanias (general)|Pausanias]] the [[Sparta|Spartan]], and his poems on the [[Greco-Persian Wars|war of liberation against Persia]] no doubt gave a powerful impulse to the national patriotism.

For his poems he could command almost any price: later writers, from [[Aristophanes]] onwards, accuse him of avarice, probably not without some reason. To Hiero's queen, who asked him whether it was better to be born rich or a genius, he replied "Rich, for genius is ever found at the gates of the rich." Again, when someone asked him to write a laudatory poem for which he offered profuse thanks, but no money, Simonides replied that he kept two coffers, one for thanks, the other for money; that, when he opened them, he found the former empty and useless, and the latter full.

Of his poetry we possess two or three short elegies (Fr. 85 seems from its style and versification to belong to [[Simonides of Amorgos]], or at least not to be the work of our poet), several epigrams and about 90 fragments of lyric poetry. The epigrams written in the usual dialect of elegy, [[Ionic Greek|Ionic]] with an epic colouring, were intended partly for public and partly for private monuments.

There is strength and sublimity in the former, with a simplicity that is almost statuesque, and a complete mastery over the rhythm and forms of elegiac expression. Those on the heroes of Marathon and the [[Battle of Thermopylae]] are the most celebrated. Thomas Bullfinch wrote that Simonides "particularly excelled" in the genre of elegy: "His genius was inclined to the pathetic, and none could touch with truer effect the chords of human sympathy." [http://www.bartleby.com/181/253.html]

In the private epigrams there is more warmth of colour and feeling, but few of them rest on any better authority than that of the ''[[Greek Anthology]]''. One interesting and undoubtedly genuine epigram of this class is upon Archedice, the daughter of [[Hippias (son of Pisistratus)|Hippias the Peisistratid]], who, "albeit her father and husband and brother and children were all princes, was not lifted up in soul to pride."

The lyric fragments vary much in character and length: one is from a poem on [[Battle of Artemisium|Artemisium]], celebrating those who fell at [[Thermopylae]], with which he gained the victory over [[Aeschylus]]; another is an ode in honour of [[Scopas]] (commented on in [[Plato]], ''[[Protagoras]]'', 339 b); the rest are from odes on victors in the games, hyporchemes, dirges, hymns to the gods and other varieties.

The poem on Thermopylae is reverent and sublime, breathing an exalted patriotism and a lofty national pride; the others are full of tender pathos and deep feeling, combined with a genial worldliness. For Simonides requires no standard of lofty unswerving rectitude. "It is hard," he says (Fr. 5),

:to become a truly good man, perfect as a square in hands and feet and mind, fashioned without blame. Whosoever is bad, and not too wicked, knowing justice, the benefactor of cities, is a sound man. I for one will find no fault with him, for the race of fools is infinite. ... I praise and love all men who do no sin willingly; but with necessity even the gods do not contend.

Virtue, he tells us elsewhere in language that recalls [[Hesiod]], is set on a high and difficult hill (Fr. 58); let us seek after pleasure, for "all things come to one dread [[Charybdis]], both great virtues and wealth" (Fr. 38).

Yet Simonides is far from being a hedonist; his morality, no less than his art, is pervaded by that virtue for which [[Ceos]] was renowned--[[self-restraint]]. His most celebrated fragment is a dirge, in which [[Danae]], adrift with the infant [[Perseus]] on the sea in a dark and stormy night, takes comfort from the peaceful slumber of her babe. Simonides here illustrates his own saying that "poetry is vocal painting, as painting is silent poetry," a formula that (through [[Plutarch]]'s ''De Gloria Atheniesium'') became Horace's famous "ut pictura poesis."

Of the many English translations of this poem, one of the best is that by J.A. Symonds in ''Studies on the Greek Poets''. Fragments in T. Bergk, ''Poetae lyrici Graeci''; standard edition by F.W. Schneidewin (1835) and of the Danae alone by [[H.L. Ahrens]] (1853). Other authorities are given in the exhaustive treatise of [[E. Cesati]], ''Simonide di Ceo'' (1882); see also W. Schroter, ''De Simonidis Cei melici sermpne'' (1906).

''This entry is adapted from the 1911 Encyclopedia Britannica.''

== External links ==
{{wikiquote}}
* [http://www.bartleby.com/181/253.html Simonides] from the ''Age of Fable'' by Thomas Bullfinch (at Bartleby.com)
* [http://www.kat.gr/kat/history/Txt/Cl/Plato/AgonSimonides.htm The 'Simonides ''Agon' '' as a Pivotal Discourse in Plato's ''Protagoras'']
* [http://www.csad.ox.ac.uk/POxy/VExhibition/3965.htm Simonides, ''Elegies'': second century AD] Photos of fragments (click on pictures for larger images)
* [http://www.oup.com/us/catalog/general/subject/ClassicalStudies/LiteraryCriticism/~~/c2Y9YWxsJnNzPWF1dGhvci5hc2Mmc2Q9YXNjJnBmPTEwJnZpZXc9dXNhJnByPTEwJmJvb2tDb3ZlcnM9eWVzJmNpPTAxOTUxMzc2NzE= Book Review of ''The New Simonides: Contexts of Praise and Desire'']
*[http://www.gottwein.de/Grie/lyr/lyr_simon01.php Zweisprchige Textauswahl zu den griechischen Lyrikern mit zusätzlichen Hilfen]

{{Credit wikipeda}}

[[Category:556 BC births]]
[[Category:469 BC deaths]]
[[Category:Ancient Greek poets]]

@@ Line 1: / Line 1: @@
 '''Simonides of Ceos''' (ca. [[556 BC]]-[[469 BC]]), Greek lyric poet, was born at Ioulis on [[Kea]]. During his youth he taught poetry and music, and composed paeans for the festivals of [[Apollo]].  He was included, along with [[Sappho]] and [[Pindar]], in the canonical list of [[nine lyric poets]] by the scholars of [[Hellenistic]] [[Alexandria]]. He is the narrator and main character of Mary Renault's historical novel ''The Praise Singer''.
-Finding little scope for his abilities at home, he went to live at [[Athens]], at the court of [[Hipparchus (son of Pisistratus)|Hipparchus]], the patron of [[literature]]. After the murder of Hipparchus (514 BC), Simonides withdrew to [[Thessaly]], where he enjoyed the protection and patronage of the Scopadae and Aleuadae (two celebrated Thessalian families).
+Finding little scope for his abilities at home, he went to live at [[Athens]], at the court of [[Hipparchus (son of Pisistratus)|Hipparchus]], the patron of literature. After the murder of Hipparchus (514 BC), Simonides withdrew to [[Thessaly]], where he enjoyed the protection and patronage of the Scopadae and Aleuadae (two celebrated Thessalian families).
 Cicero (''De oratore'', ii. 86) tells the story of the end of his relations with the Scopadae. His patron, Scopas, reproached him at a banquet for devoting too much space to the [[Dioscuri]] in an ode celebrating Scopas'  victory in a chariot-race. Scopas refused to pay all the fee and told Simonides to apply to the Dioscuri for the remainder. Shortly afterwards, Simonides was told that two young men wished to speak to him; after he had left the banqueting room, the roof fell in and crushed Scopas and his guests. [http://www.bartleby.com/181/253.html] There seems no doubt that some disaster overtook the Scopadae that resulted in the extinction of the family. After the [[Battle of Marathon]] Simonides returned to Athens, but soon left for Sicily at the invitation of [[Hiero I of Syracuse]], at whose court he spent the rest of his life.
@@ Line 25: / Line 25: @@
 Virtue, he tells us elsewhere in language that recalls [[Hesiod]], is set on a high and difficult hill (Fr. 58); let us seek after pleasure, for "all things come to one dread [[Charybdis]], both great virtues and wealth" (Fr. 38).
-Yet Simonides is far from being a hedonist; his morality, no less than his art, is pervaded by that virtue for which [[Ceos]] was renowned--[[self-restraint]]. His most celebrated fragment is a dirge, in which [[Danae]], adrift with the infant [[Perseus]] on the sea in a dark and stormy night, takes comfort from the peaceful slumber of her babe. Simonides here illustrates his own saying that "poetry is vocal painting, as painting is silent poetry," a formula that (through [[Plutarch]]'s ''De Gloria Atheniesium'') became Horace's famous "ut pictura poesis."
+Yet Simonides is far from being a hedonist; his morality, no less than his art, is pervaded by that virtue for which [[Ceos]] was renowned--self-restraint. His most celebrated fragment is a dirge, in which [[Danae]], adrift with the infant [[Perseus]] on the sea in a dark and stormy night, takes comfort from the peaceful slumber of her babe. Simonides here illustrates his own saying that "poetry is vocal painting, as painting is silent poetry," a formula that (through [[Plutarch]]'s ''De Gloria Atheniesium'') became Horace's famous "ut pictura poesis."
 Of the many English translations of this poem, one of the best is that by J.A. Symonds in ''Studies on the Greek Poets''. Fragments in T. Bergk, ''Poetae lyrici Graeci''; standard edition by F.W. Schneidewin (1835) and of the Danae alone by [[H.L. Ahrens]] (1853). Other authorities are given in the exhaustive treatise of [[E. Cesati]], ''Simonide di Ceo'' (1882); see also W. Schroter, ''De Simonidis Cei melici sermpne'' (1906).

@@ Line 32: / Line 32: @@
 == External links ==
-{{wikiquote}}
 * [http://www.bartleby.com/181/253.html Simonides] from the ''Age of Fable'' by Thomas Bullfinch (at Bartleby.com)
 * [http://www.kat.gr/kat/history/Txt/Cl/Plato/AgonSimonides.htm The 'Simonides ''Agon' '' as a Pivotal Discourse in Plato's ''Protagoras'']
@@ Line 39: / Line 39: @@
 *[http://www.gottwein.de/Grie/lyr/lyr_simon01.php Zweisprchige Textauswahl zu den griechischen Lyrikern mit zus&auml;tzlichen Hilfen]
-{{Credit wikipeda}}
+{{Credit wikipedia}}
 [[Category:556 BC births]]
 [[Category:469 BC deaths]]
 [[Category:Ancient Greek poets]]