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Nossis of Locri

Earthly Muse

Nossis of Locri, in Southern Italy, lived around 300 B.C. Twelve of her epigrams survive.

She indicates, in her epigrams, that she followed Sappho and wrote love poetry. Meleager substantiates this claim when he refers to her as a "sweet-scented iris of Nossis that he wove into his 'garland.'"

Her epigrams show aspects of a womanly world. One poem is a dedication of a cloak at the temple of Hera to the north of her homeland of Locri, in which Nossis mentions her mother and grandmother. Another poem is a dedication from an hetaera to Aphrodite. Three other epigrams describe portraits of women. Another poem is about Artemis assisting in childbirth.

Two other poems deal with men. One is an epitaph for a writer of phylax, a type of burlesque drama. The other honors dead Locrian fighters.

Poetry of Nossis

SOURCE:
  Snyder, Jane McIntosh. The Women and the Lyre . Carbondale: Southern Illinois University Press, 1991.

RELATED FEATURES:
 Anyte and Epigrams
 Korinna
 Moero
 Women in Archaic Greece

ONLINE:
 Nossis (early 3rd century BCE)
 Nossis Epigrams 1, 11.

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