Biographies of the Epigrammatists

Erinna of Rhodes, the contemporary of Sappho according to ancient tradition, fl. 600 B.C., and died very young. There are three epigrams in the Palatine Anthology under her name, probably genuine: see Bergk, "Lyr. Gr." iii. p. 141. Besides the fragments given by Bergk, detached phrases of hers are probably preserved in "Anth. Pal." vii. 12 and 13, and in the description by Christodorus of her statue in the gymnasium at Constantinople, "Anth. Pal." ii. 108-110. She was included in the "Garland" of Meleager, who speaks, l. 12, of the "sweet maiden-fleshed crocus of Erinna."

Mimnermus of Smyrna fl. B.C. 634-600, and was the contemporary of Solon. He is spoken of as the "inventor of elegy," and was apparently the first to employ the elegiac metre in threnes and love-poems. Only a few fragments, about eighty lines in all, of his poetry survive.

Select Epigrams from The Greek Anthology