Greek anthology

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Beginning of the Anthologia Palatina (f. 5 r.) In Codex Palatinus graecus 23 from the Heidelberg University Library

The Greek Anthology or Anthologia Graeca is a collection of poems, mostly epigrams , covering the entire period of Greek literature from ancient times to the Byzantine Empire .

Today's editions are composed of the poetry inventory of two Greek manuscripts , the older and more extensive of which appeared in the Palatinate Library ( Bibliotheca Palatina ) in Heidelberg at the beginning of the 17th century and therefore bears the name Anthologia Palatina . There is also a shorter collection, which has been known for a long time and was first printed in 1494, the Anthologia Planudea, named after its compiler Maximus Planudes (around 1300) .

The Anthologia Palatina , compiled sometime in the 10th century, contains over 3200 poems and is divided into 15 books. Since the more recent Anthologia Planudea only contains 388 epigrams that are not also part of the Anthologia Palatina , these 388 poems are usually added as the 16th book in modern editions. This work, compiled from both collections, is the Anthologia Graeca .

The epigram in ancient Greece

Epigrams - of one or more verses existing epigrams on various topics - were (literally hence the name in ancient Greece as inscriptions on-writer ) popular on tombs and all sorts of objects. They could be drawn up in different meters , the most common are distiches , each consisting of a hexameter and a subsequent pentameter . As easy to memorize, short and yet perfectly formed little poems, they belonged to the entertainment repertoire of the educated circles. They were presented on all conceivable occasions, especially at festive banquets ( symposia ) for general amusement and uplifting. Serious wisdom of life, historical reminiscences and rather slippery sayings refined by their poetic form could casually line up.

Collection growth over a thousand years

The oldest reconstructable collection of epigrams is that of Meleager of Gadara , which he published under the title Stephanos (“wreath” or “garland”) around 100 BC. BC, in the late Hellenism . It contains poems by himself and 46 other poets, including Archilochus , Alkaios , Anacreon and Simonides . Meleager's wreath was popular enough to prompt later additions. A hundred years after him, Philip of Thessalonike took up his own poems and the 13 other authors who had written in the meantime. In connection with his wreath , the word anthology is used for the first time in the manuscript of the Anthologia Palatina . Around the middle of the 6th century Agathias added further poems in his Kyklos ("circle") and divided the material thematically into 7 books. Meleager's, Philipps and Agathias' forewords are preserved in the 4th book of the Anthologia Palatina .

In addition, other epigram collections had been created in the meantime, such as that of the grammarist Diogeneianos with satirical and festive epigrams and the Mousa paidika (“boyish muse”) of Straton von Sardis , a collection of homoerotic verses in the 2nd century AD .

The final edition of the Anthologia Palatina essentially dates from the 10th century and is mostly assigned to Konstantinos Kephalas ; he incorporated the collections of Diogeneianos and Straton as well as the epigrams from the text editions of Callimachos , Theocritus , Diogenes Laertios and others; also Christian epigrams, handed down literary ( Gregor von Nazianz ) and gathered from churches; Christodoros ' description of the statues in a Byzantine grammar school, as well as inscriptions from a temple in Kyzikos .

Kephalas divided his material into 15 books, which comprised a total of 3700 epigrams. The original of his collection, which he presumably no longer edited, has not been preserved; However, it forms the basis of a further expanded version of which a copy has been preserved, which four scribes made one after the other and which was created towards the end of the 10th century ( Codex Palatinus graecus 23 ). This collection, the Anthologia Palatina , also comprised 15 books.

Abridged version of the plan and rediscovery of the original

At the end of the 13th century Maximus Planudes produced his own edition of the Greek anthology , adding on the one hand poems and on the other hand leaving out or “cleaning up” (ie circumscribing!) Those that seemed unchaste to him. A number of epigrams on art that are missing from Kephalas (or from the surviving copy of his collection) are only preserved through Planudes. It offers a total of 2400 epigrams in 7 books.

One copy of his compilation was preserved in the autograph, i.e. as a handwritten copy of the Planudes: Codex Marcianus 481 written in 1301 (based on the library of San Marco in Venice ), on the basis of which the first edition was printed in 1494. For a long time this collection, the Anthologia Planudea , was the main source of knowledge of Greek epigrammatics in Western Europe.

Front mirror of the Codex Palatinus graecus 23, in which the Anthologia Palatina was found

In 1606 Claudius Salmasius rediscovered the above-mentioned copy of the collection of Konstantinos Kephalas, the Codex Palatinus graecus 23, in the library in Heidelberg . This manuscript came to Rome in 1623, and in 1797 in the Paris National Library . In 1816 one part was returned to Heidelberg, the other remained in Paris (signature: Suppl. Gr. 384). The first printed editions were based on copies made in Rome.

The first full print edition did not appear until 1772–1776, when Richard François Philippe Brunck included the epigrams in his Analecta . The first text-critical edition is that of Friedrich Jacobs (13 volumes, 1794–1814, in the arrangement of the poems chosen by Brunck). A second edition followed in 1813-1817, based on Jacobs' arrangement of the Codex Palatinus , which has been customary ever since.

The material that Planudes offers in addition to the Codex Palatinus is , as mentioned, printed as the 16th book in today's editions of the Greek Anthology .

expenditure

  • Hermann Beckby (Ed.): Anthologia Graeca ( Tusculum Collection ). 2nd edition Heimeran Verlag, Munich 1965 ff. (4 volumes in Greek and German, volumes 3–4 in 1st edition 1958).
  1. Book 1-6 .
  2. Book 7–8 .
  3. Book 9-11 .
  4. Book 12-16 .
  1. Book I – VI .
  2. Book VII-X .
  3. Book XI – XVI .
  • Andrew Sydenham Farrar Gow , Denys Page (Ed., Transl.): The Greek Anthology: Hellenistic Epigrams. Cambridge University Press, Cambridge 1965, 2 vols.
  • Andrew Sydenham Farrar Gow, Denys Page (Ed., Transl.): The Greek Anthology: The Garland of Philip and Some Contemporary Poems. Cambridge University Press, Cambridge 1968, 2 vols.
  • Dirk Uwe Hansen (Ed.):
  1. Anthologia Graeca I: Books 1 to 5 (= library of Greek literature . Volume 72). Hiersemann, Stuttgart 2011, ISBN 978-3-7772-1117-6 .
  2. Anthologia Graeca II: Books 6 to 8 (= library of Greek literature. Volume 76). Anton Hiersemann, Stuttgart 2014, ISBN 978-3-7772-1408-5 .
  3. Anthologia Graeca III: Books 9 and 10 (= Library of Greek Literature. Volume 79). Anton Hiersemann, Stuttgart 2016, ISBN 978-3-7772-1611-9 .
  4. Anthologia Graeca IV: Books 11 to 14 (= Library of Greek Literature. Volume 89). Anton Hiersemann, Stuttgart 2019, ISBN 978-3-7772-1920-2 .
  1. L067. Book 1: Christian Epigrams. Book 2: Christodorus of Thebes in Egypt . Book 3: The Cyzicene Epigrams. Book 4: The Proems of the Different Anthologies. Book 5: The Amatory Epigrams. Book 6: The Dedicatory Epigrams
  2. L068. Book 7: Sepulchral Epigrams. Book 8: The Epigrams of St. Gregory the Theologian
  3. L084. Book 9: The Declamatory Epigrams
  4. L085. Book 10: The Hortatory and Admonitory Epigrams. Book 11: The Convivial and Satirical Epigrams. Book 12: Strato's Musa Puerilis
  5. L086. Book 13: Epigrams in Various Metres. Book 14: Arithmetical Problems, Riddles, Oracles. Book 15: Miscellanea. Book 16: Epigrams of the Planudean Anthology Not in the Palatine Manuscript

literature

Web links

Wikisource: Greek Anthology  - Sources and Full Texts