Antimachus
Antimachus ofColophon(Greek:Ἀντίμαχος ὁ Κολοφώνιος), or ofClaros,was aGreekpoetandgrammarian,who flourished about 400 BC.[1]
Life
[edit]Scarcely anything is known of his life. TheSudaclaims that he was a pupil of the poetsPanyassisandStesimbrotus.[2]
Work
[edit]His poetical efforts were not generally appreciated, although he received encouragement from his younger contemporaryPlato(Plutarch,Lysander,18).[1]The emperorHadrian,however, would later consider him superior toHomer.[3]
His chief works were: an epicThebaid,an account of the expedition of theSeven against Thebesand the war of theEpigoni;and an elegiac poemLyde,so called from the poet's mistress, for whose death he endeavoured to find consolation telling stories frommythologyof heroic disasters (Plutarch,Consul, ad Apoll.9;Athenaeusxiii. 597).[1]
Antimachus was the founder of "learned"epic poetry,and the forerunner of theAlexandrian school,whose critics allotted him the next place toHomer.He also prepared a critical recension of the Homeric poems.[1]
He is to be distinguished fromAntimachus of Teos,a much earlier poet to whom the lostCyclic epicEpigoniwas apparently ascribed (though the attribution may result from confusion).
Bibliography
[edit]- Fragments, ed. Stoll (1845);Bergk
- Poetae Lyrici Graeci(1882);Kinkel
- Fragmenta epicorum Graecorum(1877). 20th century ed: V.J. Matthews
- Antimachus of Colophon, text and commentary(Leiden: Brill, 1996)ISBN90-04-10468-2
References
[edit]Attribution:
- This article incorporates text from a publication now in thepublic domain:Chisholm, Hugh,ed. (1911). "Antimachus".Encyclopædia Britannica.Vol. 2 (11th ed.). Cambridge University Press. p. 127.
External links
[edit]- Antimachi colophonii reliquias,Henr. Guil. Stoll (ed.), Dillenburgi apud ed. Pagenstecher, 1845.
- Poetae Lyrici Graeci.Recensuit Theodorus Bergk. Editionis quartae. Vol. 2. Lipsiae in aedibus B. G. Teubneri, 1882,pagg. 289-94.
- Epicorum graecorum fragmenta,Godofredus Kinkel (ed.),vol. 1,Lipsiae in aedibus B. G. Teubneri,pagg. 273-75.
- Scholarly Bibliography for Antimachus,at A Hellenistic Bibliography, by Martine Cuypers
