- Achilles Tatius
Achilles Tatius (in Greek Ἀχιλλεύς Τάτιος) of
Alexandria was aRoman era Greek writer whose fame is attached to his only surviving work, the erotic romance "The Adventures of Leucippe and Clitophon".Life and minor works
Very little is known of the author; and the little information provided by the sources, represented by Photius and the "
Suda " (which refers to him as Achilles Statius), is often misleading. Modern scholars believe, on the ground of papyrus finds, that the author must have lived in or before the late 2nd century. It is generally assumed that he lived and wrote earlier than the Greek novelistLongus . The manuscript tradition assigns him toAlexandria , perhaps correctly but perhaps simply on the basis of the detailed description of the city found in the novel. The claim in the "Suda " that he converted to Christianity and became a bishop is often argued to be fictional. The "Suda" also ascribes to the author a work on the sphere (in Greek περὶ σφαίρας), a fragment of which professing to be an introduction to the "Phaenomena" ofAratus may still be extant (in Greek Eἰσαγωγὴ εἰς τὰ Ἀράτoυ φαινόμενα). This, however, may be the work of another Achilles Tatius, who lived in the 3rd century.Citation
last = | first = | author-link = | contribution = Achilles Tatius (2) | editor-last = Hornblower | editor-first = Simon | title =Oxford Classical Dictionary | volume = | pages = | publisher =Oxford University Press | place = Oxford | year = 1996 | contribution-url = ] This work is referred to by Firmicus Maternus, who about 336 speaks of the "prudentissimus Achilles" in his "Matheseos libri" ("Math." iv. 10). The fragment was first published in 1567, then in the "Uranologion" of theJesuit scholarDionysius Petavius , with a Latin translation in 1630. The same source also mentions a work of Achilles Tatius onetymology , and another entitled "Miscellaneous Histories".ee also
Achilles Tatius' surviving work:
*Leucippe and Clitophon Other ancient Greek novelists:
*Chariton - "The Loves of Chaereas and Callirhoe"
*Xenophon of Ephesus - "TheEphesian Tale "
*Heliodorus of Emesa - "TheAethiopica "
*Longus - "Daphnis and Chloe "Notes
References
"please note - references may no longer all be relevant with separate entries for Leucippe and Clitophon"
* [http://www.stoa.org/sol-bin/search.pl?db=REAL&search_method=QUERY&login=guest&enlogin=guest&user_list=LIST&page_num=1&searchstr=statios&field=any&num_per_page=100 "Achilleus Statios"] in the "Suda"
* [http://35.1911encyclopedia.org/A/AC/ACHILLES_TATIUS.htm "Achilles Tatius"] in the Encyclopædia Britannica (1911)
* Del Corno, Dario; "Letteratura greca" (1988)
* Photius, " [http://www.tertullian.org/fathers/photius_03bibliotheca.htm Bibliotheca] ", J.H. Freese (translator) (1920)
* Smith, William; "Dictionary of Greek and Roman Biography and Mythology ", [http://www.ancientlibrary.com/smith-bio/0020.html "Achilles Tatius"] ,Boston , (1867)
* [http://mercure.fltr.ucl.ac.be/Hodoi/concordances/intro.htm#ACHILLES%20TATIUS Leukippe and Kleitophon, complete Greek text]
* [http://books.google.com/books?id=szH1UVBtSzcC&printsec=frontcover&dq=achilles+tatius, Leucippe and Clitophon, full English translation]
* [http://www.chss.montclair.edu/classics/petron/Leucippe.html Leukippe and Kleitophon, synopsis]
*SmithDGRBM
*1911
*James N. O'Sullivan, A Lexicon to Achilles Tatius, Berlin-New York (De Gruyter) 1980
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