Dionysios Skytobrachion

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Dionysios Skytobrachion was a probably in the 3rd century BC. Greek rhetor and mythographer working in Alexandria .

In the scholias of the work Argonautika by the Greek poet Apollonios of Rhodes , two different places of origin for Dionysios Skytobrachion, Mytilene and Miletus , are given. This is likely to be based on a typing error and not - as is often assumed in research in the second half of the 19th and first half of the 20th century - that Dionysius actually came from Mytilene and invented an author of the same name, Dionysius from Miletus , around him to be able to cite as an alleged source in his works. The nickname Scythobrachion mentioned in the Byzantine lexicon Suda(ie “leather arm”) or Skyteus has so far eluded an explanation.

Dionysius wrote mythographic novels, including Trojan stories and an adaptation of the Argonaut saga. According to the Suda, the volume of the latter work was six books, according to the Apollonios Scholien, however, only two books. Furthermore, Dionysius wrote a work that dealt with Dionysus , who was born in Libya , the Atlanteans and the Amazons . Diodorus used this script in the third book of his Universal History, just as Dionysius' Argonautica served as an important source for his own account of the Argonaut saga ( Bibliothḗkē historikḗ 4, 40–55). The treatment of myths by Dionysius therefore showed euhemeristic and aitiological features. The author also related the Argonauts saga more closely to the Trojan saga. In addition to the excerpts of Diodorus and the Apollonios scholias, papyrus finds also contributed to the knowledge of his literary work.

Edition of the fragments

literature

Remarks

  1. ^ Dionysius [13]. In: The New Pauly (DNP). Volume 3, Metzler, Stuttgart 1997, ISBN 3-476-01473-8 , Sp. 631.
personal data
SURNAME Dionysios Skytobrachion
BRIEF DESCRIPTION Alexandrian rhetorician and mythographer
DATE OF BIRTH 3rd century BC Chr.
DATE OF DEATH 3rd century BC Chr.