- Musaeus
-
- For people surnamed Musaeus, see Musäus. Musaeus is also a spider genus (Thomisidae).
Musaeus or Musaios (Ancient Greek: Μουσαῖος) was the name of three Greek poets.
Contents
Musaeus of Athens
Musaeus was a legendary polymath, philosopher, historian, prophet, seer, priest, poet, and musician, said to have been the founder of priestly poetry in Attica. In 450 B.C., the playwright Euripides in his play Rhesus describes him thus, "Musaeus, too, thy holy citizen, of all men most advanced in lore."[1] In 380 B.C., Plato says in his Ion that poets are inspired by Orpheus and Musaeus but the greater are inspired by Homer.[2] In the Protagoras, Plato says that Musaeus was a hierophant and a prophet.[3] In the Apology, Socrates says, "What would not a man give if he might converse with Orpheus and Musaeus and Hesiod and Homer? Nay, if this be true, let me die again and again."[4] According to Diodorus Siculus, Musaeus was the son of Orpheus, according to Tatian he was the disciple of Orpheus, but according to Diogenes Laertius he was the son of Eumolpus and Alexander Polyhistor, Clement of Alexandria, and Eusebius say he was the teacher of Orpheus. Aristotle quotes him in Book VIII of his Politics: "Song to mortals of all things the sweetest." According to Pausanias, he was buried on the Mouseion Hill, south-west of the Acropolis.[5] where there was a statue dedicated to a Syrian. For this and other reasons, Artapanus of Alexandria, Alexander Polyhistor, Numenius of Apamea, and Eusebius identify Musaeus with Moses the Jewish lawbringer.[6] He composed dedicatory and purificatory hymns and prose treatises, and oracular responses. Herodotus reports that, during the reign of Peisistratus at Athens, the scholar Onomacritus collected and arranged the oracles of Musaeus but inserted forgeries of his own devising, later detected by Lasus of Hermione.[7] The mystic and oracular verses and customs of Attica, especially of Eleusis, are connected with his name. A Titanomachia and Theogonia are also attributed to him by Gottfried Kinkel (Epicorum graecorum fragmenta, 1878).
Musaeus of Ephesus
Musaeus was an Ephesian attached to the court of the kings of Pergamon, who wrote a Perseis, and poems on Eumenes and Attalus I (Suda s.v.).
Musaeus Grammaticus
Musaeus (also called Grammaticus in all of the manuscripts) is of uncertain date, but probably belongs to the beginning of the 6th century, as his style and metre are evidently modelled on those of Nonnus. He must have lived before Agathias (530-582) and has been identified with the friend of Procopius whose poem (340 hexameter lines) on the story of Hero and Leander is by far the most beautiful of the age (editions by Franz Passow, 1810; G. H. Schafer, 1825; C. Dilthey, 1874; Hans Färber, Hero und Leander: Musaios und die weiteren antiken Zeugnisse, Greek and Latin texts with German translation, Munich: Heimeran, 1961). The little love-poem Alpheus and Arethusa (Anthol. pal. ix. 362) is also ascribed to Musaeus.
References
- ^ Euripides, Rhesus
- ^ Plato, Ion
- ^ Plato, Protagoras
- ^ Plato, Apology
- ^ Pausanias 25.8
- ^ Eusebius, Praeparatio Evangelica IX
- ^ Herodotus 7.6.3-5; see also 8.96 and 9.43
External links
- Musaeus Grammaticus, Hero and Leander, Greek text with parallel French translation
- English translations of Musaeus Grammaticus' Hero and Leander: The Divine Poem of Musaeus: First of All Books Translated According to the Original (George Chapman, 1616); Hero & Leander (E.E. Sikes, 1920)
Categories:- Classical oracles
- Ancient Greek writers
- Late Antique writers
- Oral poets
- Ancient Athenians
- Ancient Ephesians
- Characters in Book VI of the Aeneid
Wikimedia Foundation. 2010.
