Nine Lyric Poets

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The Nine Lyric or Melic Poets were a canonical group of ancient Greek poets esteemed by the scholars of Hellenistic Alexandria as worthy of critical study. In the Palatine Anthology it is said that they established lyric song. [1]

They were:

In most Greek sources the word melikos (from melos, "song") is used to refer to these poets, but the variant lyrikos (from lyra, "lyre") became the regular form in both Latin (as lyricus) and in modern languages. The ancient scholars defined the genre on the basis of the musical accompaniment, not the content. Thus, some types of poetry which would be included under the label "lyric poetry" in modern criticism, are excluded—namely, the elegy and iambus which were performed with flutes.

The Nine Lyric Poets are traditionally divided among those who primarily composed choral verses, and those who composed monodic verses. This division is contested by some modern scholars. [2]

Antipater of Thessalonica proposes an alternative canon of nine female poets. [3]

See also

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Aeolic verse is a classification of Ancient Greek lyric poetry referring to the distinct verse forms characteristic of the two great poets of Archaic Lesbos, Sappho and Alcaeus, who composed in their native Aeolic dialect. These verse forms were taken up and developed by later Greek and Roman poets and some modern European poets.

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Choral poetry is a type of lyric poetry that was created by the ancient Greeks and performed by choruses. Originally, it was accompanied by a lyre, a string instrument like a small U-shaped harp commonly used during Greek classical antiquity and later periods. Other accompanying instruments in later years included other string instruments such as the kithara, barbiton, and phorminx, as well as wind instruments such as the aulos, a double-reeded instrument similar to an oboe.

References

  1. J. M. Edmonds – Lyra Graeca (p.3) Wildside Press LLC, 2007 ISBN   1434491307 [Retrieved 2015-05-06].
  2. Cf. esp. M. Davies's "Monody, Choral Lyric, and the Tyranny of the Hand-Book" in Classical Quarterly, NS 38 (1988), pp. 52–64.
  3. Robbio, Matías Fernandez (2014-01-01). "Musas y escritoras: el primer canon de la literatura femenina de la Grecia antigua (AP IX 26)". Praesentia, V. 15.