Relatively little is known of the life of Crinagoras of Mytilene: a Greek epigrammatist and diplomat who lived between the first centuries BC and AD, he was despatched to Rome as part of the embassies to Julius Caesar and Octavian, was held in high regard by his contemporaries, and divided his life between his home of Mytilene and the centre of the Roman Empire, where he was acquainted with the family of the emperor Augustus. Much of the detail we have to flesh out this brief account comes from his poems, which, in keeping with the genre, draw extensively on his personal experience and on the events of the day to provide a key source for the circumstances of his life. They are also eloquent and dynamic in their own right, and as a corpus they cover a wide thematic range: many were inspired by contemporary political or military events or by personal experiences, observations, or contemplation, though they also include several sepulchral epigrams concerning the deaths of persons the poet knew, and many which were composed as notes to be sent with gifts to friends or acquaintances. This new edition collects together all fifty-one of the surviving epigrams which have come down to us as part of the Greek Anthology. Presented here in a new critical text alongside engaging English translations, they are analysed in detail in an incisive introduction and exegetic word-by-word commentary, both as individual poems and as part of the corpus as a whole. With discussion throughout covering not only textual and stylistic matters, but also literary and historical context and Crinagoras' place within his social and cultural milieu, this edition provides a guide to the life and work of this understudied poet which is both authoritative and accessible.

The “Second Sophistic” traditionally refers to a period at the height of the Roman Empire’s power that witnessed a flourishing of Greek rhetoric and oratory, and since the 19th century it has often been viewed as a defense of Hellenic civilization against the domination of Rome. This book proposes a very different model. Covering popular fiction, poetry and Greco-Jewish material, it argues for a rich, dynamic, and diverse culture, which cannot be reduced to a simple model of continuity. Shining new light on a series of playful, imaginative texts that are left out of the traditional accounts of Greek literature, Whitmarsh models a more adventurous, exploratory approach to later Greek culture. Beyond the Second Sophistic offers not only a new way of looking at Greek literature from 300 BCE onwards, but also a challenge to the Eurocentric, aristocratic constructions placed on the Greek heritage. Accessible and lively, it will appeal to students and scholars of Greek literature and culture, Hellenistic Judaism, world literature, and cultural theory.

Greek epigram is a remarkable poetic form. The briefest of all ancient Greek genres, it is also the most resilient: for almost a thousand years it attracted some of the finest Greek poetic talents as well as exerting a profound interest on Latin literature, and it continues to inspire and influence modern translations and imitations. After a long period of neglect, research on epigram has surged during recent decades, and this volume draws on the fruits of that renewed scholarly engagement. It is concerned not with the work of individual authors or anthologies, but with the evolution of particular subgenres over time, and provides a selection of in-depth treatments of key aspects of Greek literary epigram of the Hellenistic, Roman, and early Byzantine periods. Individual chapters offer insights into a variety of topics, from explorations of the dynamic interactions between poets and their predecessors and contemporaries, and of the relationship between epigram and its socio-political, cultural, and literary background from the third century BCE up until the sixth century CE, to its interaction with its origins, inscribed epigram more generally, other literary genres, the visual arts, and Latin poetry, as well as the process of editing and compilation which generated the collections which survived into the modern world. Through the medium of individual studies the volume as a whole seeks to offer a sense of this vibrant and dynamic poetic form and its world which will be of value to scholars and students of Greek epigram and classical literature more broadly.

This edition collects all the epigrams attributed to Epicurean philosopher and poet Philodemos of Gadara (ca. 110-40 BC). In editing these epigrams, Sider has reexamined several manuscripts of the Greek Anthology. Thirty-eight epigrams (three only doubtfully Philodemean, and two spurious) are printed in the original Greek and in English translation, with full critical apparatus and commentary. Sider also includes the text of a recently edited papyrus containing fragments of many known and newly discovered epigrams by Philodemos. In addition to the usual issues involved in editing a Classical poet--i.e. the poet's life, his use of meter, the epigrammatic tradition, and the place of the epigrams in the Greek Anthology--Sider's introduction considers the relationship between Philodemos' philosophy and poetry. He explains how the epigrams fit into the literary views expressed in Philodemos' On Poems and how they clashed with the Epicurean stance against the writing of poetry.

This lively translation accurately captures the wit and uncensored bawdiness of the epigrams of Martial, who satirized Roman society, both high and low, in the first century CE. The selections cover nearly a third of Martial's 1,500 or so epigrams, augmented by a historical introduction and informative notes.

A beautiful Pocket Poet selection of short poems, odes, and epigrams from ancient Greece, translated into English by a wide array of distinguished translators and poets Poems from Greek Antiquity presents a gloriously compact treasury of the enduring and influential poems of the ancient Greeks. Greek literature abounds in masterpieces, the most famous of which are lengthy epics, but it is also rich in poems of much smaller compass than The Iliad or The Odyssey. The short poems, odes, and epigrams included in this volume span a vast period of more than a thousand years. Included here are selections from the early lyric and elegiac poets, the Alexandrian poets, Alcaeus, Sappho, Pindar, and many more. Here, too, are poems drawn from the celebrated Greek Anthology, and from the Anacreontea, the collection of odes on the pleasures of drink, love, and beauty that have been popular for centuries both in the original Greek and in English. Excerpts from somewhat longer poems include Percy Bysshe Shelley’s “Homeric Hymn to Mercury” and the hugely entertaining Homeric pastiche “The Battle of the Frogs and Mice.” The English translations in this volume are works of art in their own right and come from a wide range of remarkable poets and translators, ranging from George Chapman in the seventeenth century to Robert Fagles in the twentieth.

Re-assesses the phenomenon of Greek 'local history-writing' and its role in creating political and cultural identity in a changing world.