- Anacreon
Anacreon (Greek polytonic|Ἀνακρέων) (570 BC-488 BC) was a Greek lyric
poet , notable for his drinking songs and hymns. Later Greeks included him in the canonical list ofnine lyric poets .Life
Anacreon was born at
Teos , anIonia n city on the coast ofAsia Minor . Little more is known of his life with certainty. The name and identity of his father is a matter of dispute, with different authorities naming four possibilities: Scythianus, Eumelus, Parthenius, or Aristocritus.It is likely that Anacreon fled into exile with the mass of his fellow-townsmen who sailed to
Thrace when their homeland was attacked. There they founded a colony at Abdera, rather than remaining behind to surrender their city toHarpagus , one ofCyrus the Great 's generals. Cyrus was, at the time (545 BC), besieging the Greek cities ofAsia Minor . Anacreon seems to have taken part in the fighting, in which, by his own admission, he did not distinguish himself.From Thrace he removed to the court of
Polycrates of Samos . He is said to have acted astutor to Polycrates; that he enjoyed thetyrant 's confidence we learn on the authority ofHerodotus (iii.121), who represents the poet as sitting in the royal chamber when audience was given to the Persian herald. In return for his favour and protection, Anacreon wrote many complimentaryode s upon his patron. Like his fellow-lyric poet,Horace , who was one of his great admirers, and in many respects a kindred spirit, Anacreon seems to have been made for the society of courts.On the death of Polycrates, Hipparchus, who was then in power at
Athens and inherited the literary tastes of his father Peisistratus, sent a special embassy to fetch the popular poet to Athens in a galley of fifty oars. Here he became acquainted with the poet Simonides, and other members of the brilliant circle which had gathered round Hipparchus. When this circle was broken up by the assassination of Hipparchus, Anacreon seems to have returned to his native town of Teos, where, according to a metrical epitaph ascribed to his friend Simonides, he died and was buried.According to others, before returning to Teos, he accompanied Simonides to the court of
Echecrates , a Thessalian dynast of the house of theAleuadae .Lucian mentions Anacreon amongst his instances of the longevity of eminent men, as having completed eighty-five years. If an anecdote given byPliny the Elder ("Nat. Hist." vii.7) is to be trusted, he was choked at last by a grape-stone, but the story has an air of mythical adaptation to the poet's habits, which makes it somewhatapocryphal .Anacreon was for a long time popular at Athens, where his statue was to be seen on the Acropolis, together with that of his friend
Xanthippus , the father ofPericles . On several coins of Teos he is represented holding a lyre in his hand, sometimes sitting, sometimes standing. A marble statue found in 1835 in theSabine district, and now in theGalleria Borghese , is said to represent Anacreon.Poetry
Poetic form and style
Anacreon wrote all of his poetry in the ancient Ionic
dialect . Like all earlylyric poetry , it was composed to be sung or recited to the accompaniment of music, usually thelyre . Anacreon's verses were primarily in the form ofmonody , which means that they were to be performed by a single voice rather than by a chorus.In keeping with Greek poetic tradition, his poetry relied on meter for its construction. Metrical poetry is a particularly rhythmic form, deriving its structure from patterns of phonetic features within and between the lines of verse. The phonetic patterning in Anacreon's poetry, like all the Greek poetry of the day, is found in the structured alternation of "long" and "short" vowel sounds. The Ionic dialect also had a tonal aspect to it that lends a natural melodic quality to the recitation.
The Greek language is particularly well suited to this metrical style of poetry but the sound of the verses does not easily transfer to English. As a consequence, translators have historically tended to substitute rhyme, stress rhythms, stanzaic patterning and other devices for the style of the originals, with the primary, sometimes only, connection to the Greek verses being the subject matter. More recent translators have tended to attempt a more spare translation which, though losing the sound of the originals, may be more true to their flavor. A sample of a translation in the English rhyming tradition is included below.
Themes and subjects of Anacreon's poetry
Anacreon's poetry touched on universal themes of love, infatuation, disappointment, revelry, parties, festivals, and the observations of everyday people and life. It is the subject matter of Anacreon's poetry that helped to keep it familiar and enjoyable to generations of readers and listeners. His widespread popularity inspired countless imitators, which also kept his name alive.
Anacreon had a reputation as a composer of hymns, as well as of those
bacchanalian and amatory lyrics which are commonly associated with his name. Two short hymns toArtemis andDionysus , consisting of eight and eleven lines respectively, stand first amongst his few undisputed remains, as printed by recent editors. But pagan hymns, especially when addressed to such deities asAphrodite , Eros andDionysus , are not so very unlike what we call "Anacreontic" poetry as to make the contrast of style as great as the word might seem to imply. The tone of Anacreon's lyric effusions has probably led to an unjust estimate, by both ancients and moderns, of the poet's personal character. The "triple worship" of theMuses , Wine and Love, ascribed to him as his religion in an old Greek epigram ("Anthol." iii.25, 51), may have been as purely professional in the two last cases as in the first, and his private character on such points was probably neither much better nor worse than that of his contemporaries.Athenaeus remarks acutely that he seems at least to have been sober when he wrote; and he himself strongly repudiates, as Horace does, the brutal characteristics of intoxication as fit only forbarbarian s andScythian s (Fr. 64).Of the five books of lyrical pieces by Anacreon which the "
Suda " andAthenaeus mention as extant in their time, we have now but the merest fragments, collected from the citations of later writers.A collection of poems by numerous, anonymous imitators was long believed to be the works of Anacreon himself. Known as the "Anacreontea", it was preserved in a 10th century
manuscript which also included the "Palatine Anthology ". The poems were published in 1554 with a Latin translation byHenry Estienne , known as Stephanus, but little is known about the origins of the manuscript. Salmasius reports seeing the "Anacreontea" at the library inHeidelberg in 1607. In 1623, it was given toPope Gregory XV after the sacking of Heidelberg. It was later taken from theVatican City byNapoleon in 1797, who had it rebound as two separate volumes. One of those volumes was returned to Heidleberg but the other remained in theBibliotheque Nationale inParis .In the 17th century, Thomas Stanley translated the "Anacreontea" into English verse. A few poems were also translated by Robert Herrick and
Abraham Cowley . The poems themselves appear to have been composed over a long period of time, from the time of Alexander the Great until the time that paganism gave way in the Roman Empire. They reflect the light hearted elegance of much of Anacreon's genuine works although they were not written in the sameIonic Greek dialect that Anacreon used. They also display literary references and styles more common to the time of their actual composition.A translated poem
Typical of most efforts at translation, this 19th century one by
Walter Headlam (1866-1908) takes the subject matter of Anacreon's verses and works them into a rhyming style typical of the English poetry written in Headlam's day. The subject of the poem still remains: Anacreon complaining that a young woman, whom he compares to a Thracian filly, doesn't recognize his amatory skills.Ah tell me why you turn and fly,
My little Thracian filly shy?
Why turn askance
That cruel glance,
And think that such a dunce am I?O I am blest with ample wit
To fix the bridle and the bit,
And make thee bend
Each turning-end
In harness all the course of it.But now 'tis yet the meadow free
And frisking it with merry glee;
The master yet
Has not been met
To mount the car and manage thee.Cultural references
* Anacreon is the subject of two separate
opera s, both called "Anacréon ", by French composerJean-Philippe Rameau .
* "To Anacreon in Heaven " is the opening line (and often mistaken for the title of) of "The Anacreontic Song ", the official song of the London amateur musical club theAnacreontic Society . The USnational anthem , "The Star Spangled Banner ", is set to the tune of "The Anacreontic Song".External links
* [http://ingeb.org/songs/toanacre.html Lyrics and brief history of Anacreon in Heaven]
* [http://www.miketodd.net/encyc/anacreontext.htm A brief history of the American National Athem]
* [http://www.geocities.com/~bblair/moore_anacreon_idx.htm A collection of early translations of Anacreon into English]
* [http://www.dmol.dk/billede_info.asp?genst_id=15940 Full length sculpture of Anacreon (in Danish)]Poets named after Anacreon
* "Anacreon of Painters", Francesco Albani
* "Anacreon of Persia", Hafez
* "Anacreon of the Guillotine", Barere
* "Anacreon of Sweden", Bellmann
* "Russian Anacreon", BogdanovichReferences
*1911
*"Greek Lyric II: Anacreon, Anacreontea, Choral Lyric from Olympis to Alcman" (Loeb Classical Library) translated by David A. Campbell (June 1989) Harvard University Press ISBN 0-674-99158-3 (Original Greek with facing page English translations, an excellent starting point for students with a serious interest in ancient lyric poetry.)
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