Year: 1992
Type: article
Abstract: ATE ANTIQUE POEM OF DIOSCORUS in iambic trimeters usesIsocrates and Menander as models of rhetorical skill.Interest in the Nachleben of both Isocrates and Menander has unduly neglected this poem, which offers the only ancien t association of these writers. 1 Even its initial editor scorned the poem,2 and his successors have dealt with the text in a far from satisfactory manner.I shall present the Greek text, some textual notes, and a translation, before discussing the poem in greater detail and addressing a more general issue, its literary-critical Sitz im Leben.P.Rein.II 82 is part of a papyrus from the archive of the well- known sixth-century notary public Dioscorus of Aphrodito, in Middle Egypt, who has recently been the subject of a fullfledged monograph 3 and whose poetry and personality continue to interest scholars.4The papyrus contains two columns with poems on an official called Romanus, one in iambic trimeters (P.Rein.II 82) and one in hexameters (P.Lit.Lond.98).5 Dioscorus wrote them in his own hand, as is clear from the prose header: ~WO'~9POU a1tO 8T\~~l8o<; EY[Kro)~W.d<; 'tOY KUpWV ['P]wj.luv6v.This is the only time that Dioscorus refers 1 In Aelius Theon's catalogue of classical authors (Progymnasmata p.68 Spengel) Menander and Isocrates appear in succession. 2 P. COLLART, ed., "Les papyrus Theodore Reinach," BIFAO 39 (1940: hereafter 'Collart') 19-22, with an unusually sharp introductory statement.J L. S. B. MACCOULL, Dioscorus of Aphrodito: His Work and His World (Berkeley 1988: hereafter 'MacCoull'), whose discussion of Dioscorus' poetry (57-146) is the core of the book.For some criticisms, see the review by E.
Author: Peter van Minnen
Language: English
Topic: Classical Antiquity Studies
Subfield: Anthropology
Field: Social Sciences
Domain: Social Sciences
Open Access status: diamond
OpenAlex ID: W1530068847