poem consisting of two episodes, viz. the interview of Heracles with the bailiff of Augeas and his recital to Phyleus, son of Augeas, of the story of the Nemean lion. The composition is not unworthy of Theocritus. It is, however, anonymous in the MSS. and comes next to another anonymous poem called “Megara, the wife of Hercules.” It is probable from some metrical and linguistic peculiarities that xxv. and the " Megara" are both by the same author. xxvii. "The wooing of Daphnis" ('Oapitrrfc) is also anonymous. It contains imitations of Theocritus, but the tone and the language betray a later writer.
We have no sure facts as to the life of Theocritus beyond those supplied by Idylls xvi. and xvii. It is quite uncertain whether the bucolic poems were written in the pleasant isle of Cos among a circle of poets and students, or in Alexandria and meant for dwellers in streets. The usual view is that Theocritus went first from Syracuse to Cos, and then, after suing in vain for the favour of Hiero, took up his residence permanently in Egypt. Some have supposed on very flimsy evidence that he quarrelled with the Egyptian court and retired to Cos, and would assign various poems to the "later-Coan" period.[1]) Wilamowitz-Möllendorff, laying stress on the fact that in the best MS. the poem to Ptolemy (xvii.) comes before that to Hiero (xvi.), very ingeniously puts the Egyptian period first and supposes it to have been of very short duration (i.e. 277 to 275), and then makes the poet, after his unsuccessful appeal to Hiero, retire to Cos for the rest of his life. This view would enable us to see a reference to Ptolemy in vii. 93, and even to the young Apollonius Rhodius in 47-48 of the same poem.
The poems of Theocritus were termed Idylls (εἰύλλια) by the grammarians. The word is a diminutive from eKos, and is supposed to mean "little poems." The use of eKos'in the sense of "poem" is somewhat doubtful, and so some have referred e£5uXXta to «i5os in its usual sense of " form " or "type." Thus eKos Povko\i.k6v, eiruchv, \vpmov might be used to classify various kinds of poetry, and these poems might be called eiouXXia, since they include so many types.
Language and Metre.—Theocritus wrote in various dialects according to the subject. The Lyrics xxviii., xxix. (and xxx.) are in Aeolic, that being the traditional dialect for such poems. Two poems, xii. (AJtijs) and xxii. (to Castor and Pollux), were written in Ionic, as is stated in titles prefixed to them, though a number of Doric forms have been inserted by the scribes. The epics in general show a mixture of Homeric, Ionic and Doric forms. The Bucolics, Mimes, and the "Marriage-song of Helen" (xviii.) are in Doric, with occasional forms from other dialects.
The metre used by Theocritus in the Bucolics and Mimes, as well as in the Epics, is the dactylic hexameter. His treatment of this may be compared both with Homeric usage and that of other Alexandrian poets, e.g. Callimachus. It was the tendency of these writers to use dactyls in preference to spondees with a view to lightness and rapidity. This tendency shows itself most in the third foot, the favourite caesura being the trochaic, i.e. after the second syllable (- ◡ |). On the other hand, the Alexandrians admitted a spondee in the fifth foot, especially when the verse ends with a quadrisyllable. Theocritus in the Epics conforms to the new technique in both these respects: in the Bucolics his practice agrees with that of Homer. The feature in his versification which has attracted most attention is the so-called bucolic caesura. The rule is that, if there is a pause at the end of the fourth foot, this foot must be a dactyl. This pause is no new invention, being exceedingly common in Homer. Theocritus uses it so frequently in the Bucolics that it has become a mannerism. In the Epics his practice agrees with that of Homer.
We always think of Theocritus as an original 'poet, and as the "inventor of bucolic poetry" he deserves this reputation. At the same time he had no scruple about borrowing from predecessors or contemporaries; in fact he did so in the most open manner. Thus xxix. begins with a line of Alcaeus,[2] and xvii., as the Scholiast points out, with words used by Aratus at the beginning of the Phenomena. The love of the Cyclops for Galatea had been treated by_ Philoxenus, and fragments quoted from this show that Theocritus copied some of his phrases closely. In the mimes Theocritus appears to have made great use of Sophron. Idyll ii. is modelled upon a mime of this writer which began in a very similar way.[3] The Scholiast thought that Theocritus showed want of taste in making Thestylis a persona muta, instead of giving her a share in the dialogue as Sophron had done. The famous poem about Gorgo and Praxinoe at the feast of Adonis was modelled on one by Sophron about women looking on at the Isthmian games ('Iff0M'oJ-oiw<u), and fragments quoted from this are closely imitated by Theocritus. It is extremely interesting to find a similar poem in the recently discovered mimes of Herondas, the fourth of which is termed " Women making offerings to Aesculapius" ('AtncXijTly ivartBeitrai xal ffiwtdf oixreu) . The relation of Theocritus to Herondas is a subject of great interest. Herondas must have been a contemporary, as he refers to Ptolemy Philadelphus,[4] and was a native of Cos, so that he and Theocritus must have been acquainted. There are some curious parallels in the language and idioms of the two poets, but which of them copied the other it is impossible to determine.
Manuscripts.—The oldest authority for any part of Theocritus is a papyrus discovered by B. P. Grenfell and A. S. Hunt at Oxyrhynchus, written in the 2nd century A.D. and containing xiii. 19-34.[5] There are also fragments of another papyrus belonging to the 5th century, which contain some lines of i., v., xiii., xv., xvi. and xxvi.[6] These papyri are carelessly written and do not contain any notable variants. The most valuable of the existing MSS. belongs to the Library at Milan (Ambros. 222). It was written in the 13th century, and contains Idylls i.-xvii., xxix., and the Epigrams. Other good MSS. of the same family contain xviii. also. The other poems come from two sources. One of these is represented by several MSS. and contains xix., xx., xxi., xxii., xxiii., xxv. The other contains xxii. 69-223, xxiv., xxv., xxvi., xxvii., xxviii., xxix. This collection was first published in the Junline edition (1515) from a codex Patavinus now lost. The only existing MS. of any value in which it is found is in Paris (2726), and was written in the 14th century. These two collections are termed φ and π by Hiller and other recent writers. It will be noticed that xxv. and a portion of xxii. are found both in φ and π. In these poems there are constant divergences, and π appears to give the better recension.
There are important Scholia to Theocritus, or rather to that portion of the poems (i.-xvii. and xxix.) which is found in the best MSS. The most valuable of these are those contained by Ambros. 222 (K). They are composite in character. The Argument to xii. is ascribed to Eratosthenes, a contemporary of Justinian, while reference is frequently made to the views of Munatius, who lived in the time of Herodes Atticus, and Amarantus, a contemporary of Galen. Wilamowitz-Möllendorff ascribes the nucleus of these Scholia to Theon, who wrote similar scholia on Lycophron and Apollonius Rhodius, and is stated to have written a commentary on Theocritus.[7] This Theon is stated to have been the son of Artemidorus, the first editor of Theocritus. It is, therefore, suggested that Theon formed the shorter collection of Theocritean poems, furnished them with scholia, and wrote the second epigram quoted at the beginning of this article. The other poems, which possess no scholia and have come down to us from the other collections, would, according to this ingenious theory, be those which appeared in the larger collection of Artemidorus but were excluded by Theon.
Bibliography,—(i.) Editions, (a) Critical, H. L. Ahrens (1855); Ch. Ziegler (1879); U. von Wilamowitz-Mollendorff, in Oxford Classical Texts (1907). (b) epexegetical, E. Hiller (1881 ; German notes); R. J. Cholmeley (1901; English notes), (ii.) Translations. A. Lang (1880; prose); J. H. Hallard (1901; verse), (iii.) Subject-matter. Ph. E. Legrand, Étude sur Theocrite (1898); (iv.) Textual Questions. E. Hiller, Beiträge zur Textgeschichte der Griechischen Bukoliker (1888); U. von Wilamowitz-Möllendorff, Die Textgeschichte der Griechischen Bukoliker (1906). (v.) Metre. C. Kunst, De Theocriti versu heroico (1887). (vi.) Scholia. Ch. Ziegler, Codicis Ambrosiani 222, Scholia in Theocritum (1867). (A. C. C.)
THEODECTES (c. 380–340 B.C.), Greek rhetorician and tragic poet, of Phaselis in Lycia, pupil of Isocrates and Plato, and an intimate friend of Aristotle. He at first Wrote speeches for the law courts, but subsequently composed tragedies with success. He spent most of his life at Athens, and was buried on the sacred road to Eleusis. The inhabitants of Phaselis honoured him with a statue, which was decorated with garlands by Alexander the Great on his Way to the East. In the contests arranged by Artemisia, queen of Caria, at the funeral of Mausolus, Theodectes gained the prize with his tragedy Mausolus (extant in the 2nd century A.D.), but was defeated by Theopompus in oratory. According to the inscription on his tomb, he was
- ↑ The chief argument is that in xii. 5 the poet says —
ὅσσον παρθενικὴ προφέρει τριγάμοιο γυναικός.
As Arsinoe had been married three times, it is thought that she might have been offended by this remark. - ↑ οἶνος, ὦ φίλε παῖ, λέγεται καὶ ἀλαθέα.
- ↑ Sophron's mime began with xet ydp & ia^dXrot; Theocritus's begins with xo" itoi ral SA^veu;
- ↑ l. 30, Geiimv ¢i8e)d>¢T>v réuevos, 6;3u.¢n}e)s Xpnarés.
- ↑ Oxyrhynchus Papyri, iv. p. 139.
- ↑ C. Wessely in Berliner Philologische Wochenschrift (1906), p. 831.
- ↑ Θέων, Etym. on i. 392 Gécov 6 'A.p'r¢, uL-Edapov, ib. on iv. 5. Cf. Ahrens, ii. p. xxvii.
