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Poetry of Sappho

Ancient Greek vase painting showing Sappho playing a lyre

Sappho was an ancient Greek lyric poet from the island of Lesbos. She wrote around 10,000 lines of poetry, only a small fraction of which survives. Only one poem is known to be complete; in some cases as little as a single word survives. Modern editions of Sappho's poetry are the product of centuries of scholarship, first compiling quotations from surviving ancient works, and from the late 19th century rediscovering her works preserved on fragments of ancient papyri and parchment. Along with the poems which can be attributed with confidence to Sappho, a small number of surviving fragments in her Aeolic dialect may be by either her or her contemporary Alcaeus. Modern editions of Sappho also collect ancient "testimonia" which discuss Sappho's life and works.

Textual history

Ancient editions

The Cologne papyrus, on which Sappho's Tithonus poem is partially preserved

Sappho probably wrote around 10,000 lines of poetry; today, only 650 survive.[1] They were originally composed for performance, and it is unclear precisely when they were first written down. Some scholars argue that books of Sappho's poetry were produced in or shortly after her own lifetime; others believe that if they were written down in that time, it was only as an aid to reperformance rather than as a literary work in their own right.[2]

In the third or second century BC, Sappho's poems were edited into a critical edition by scholars in Alexandria.[3] This may have been based on an Athenian text of her poems, or one from her native island of Lesbos.[4] It is uncertain which of the Alexandrian scholars was responsible for the edition of Sappho; both Aristophanes of Byzantium and Aristarchus of Samothrace are reported to have produced editions of Alcaeus, and one or both of these may have been responsible for the Alexandrian edition of Sappho.[5]

The Alexandrian edition of Sappho's poetry was divided into eight or nine books: the exact number is uncertain. Ancient testimonia mention an eighth book of the Alexandrian edition of Sappho;[6] an epigram by Tullius Laurea [it] mentions nine books of Sappho, though it is not certain that he is referring to the Alexandrian edition.[6] These books were probably divided up by metre, as ancient sources tell us that each of the first three books contained poems in a single specific metre.[a][8] Information about the contents of the later books is less certain: the fourth book appears to have contained many poems in acephalous hipponacteans with double choriambic expansion,[b] and possibly in other metres;[c][9] the fifth book was metrically heterogeneous, with ancient sources mentioning the use of Phaelecian hendecasyllables and lesser asclepiads;[10] of the sixth, nothing is known; a single couplet from the seventh book is preserved in Hephaestion[d] but it is unclear whether this was an entire stanza or part of a three- or four-line stanza.[11] Fragment 103 preserves 10 incipits of poems by Sappho, possibly from book 8, of which the first is in a different metre from the remaining nine; those nine may or may not all be in the same meter.[12] A ninth book may have been made up of epithalamia in various meters, though many scholars are skeptical of the evidence for this, and consider that the book of epithalamia mentioned in ancient sources might have been the eighth book of the Alexandrian edition.[13]

In addition to the Alexandrian edition, at least some of Sappho's poetry was in circulation in the ancient world in other collections. The Cologne papyrus on which the Tithonus poem is preserved was part of a Hellenistic anthology of poetry,[14] and predates the Alexandrian edition.[15] Two fragments list opening lines of poems: Fr. 103 contains openings to ten of Sappho's poems, and Fr. 213C Campbell quotes openings to poems by Sappho, Alcaeus, and Anacreon; both might be related to anthological collections.[16][17]

Loss and recovery

Friedrich Blass, whose publication of a parchment fragment of Sappho's poetry in 1880 marked the beginning of a new era in the rediscovery of her work

Today, most of Sappho's poetry is lost. The two major sources of surviving fragments of Sappho are quotations in other ancient works, from a whole poem to as little as a single word; and fragments of papyrus, many of which were discovered at Oxyrhynchus in Egypt.[18] A few fragments survive on other materials, including parchment and potsherds.[19] The oldest surviving fragment of Sappho currently known is the Cologne papyrus which contains the Tithonus poem;[20] it dates to the third century BC.[21]

Though the Alexandrian edition of Sappho's poetry made the transition from papyrus rolls to the codex, while less popular authors were not reproduced in this new format,[22] and a significant amount of her poetry survived until the seventh century,[23] her work appears to have disappeared around the ninth century,[24] and did not make the transition to minuscule handwriting.[25] Sappho's poetry continued to be accessible only in quotations from other ancient authors, which, until printed editions of Greek texts began to appear in the Renaissance, would only have been accessible in manuscript form in monastic libraries.[26] In 1508, a collection of Greek rhetorical works edited by Demetrios Doukas and published by Aldus Manutius made a poem by Sappho (the Ode to Aphrodite) available in print for the first time;[26] in 1554, Henri Estienne was the first to collect her poetry when he printed the Ode to Aphrodite and the Midnight poem after a collection of fragments of Anacreon.[27] The first modern edition devoted solely to Sappho's work was published in 1733 by Johann Christian Wolf [de], including fourteen fragments not previously included in collections of her poetry.[28] The work of collecting quotations from Sappho from ancient sources culminated in Theodor Bergk's edition of the Greek lyric poets, whose second edition contained 120 fragments of Sappho and 50 testimonia.[29]

The last quarter of the nineteenth century began a new period in the rediscovery of Sappho's poetry, with the discovery of a parchment fragment at Crocodilopolis (modern Faiyum) published by Friedrich Blass in 1880.[30] From then until the publication of the "newest Sappho" in 2014, 24 papyri preserving texts of Sappho, and eight preserving related materials such as commentaries on her work, have been published.[31] The most recent major editions of Sappho, by Edgar Lobel and Denys Page in 1955, and Eva-Maria Voigt in 1971, in conjunction with Lobel and Page's Supplementa Lyra Graeca, collect all of the material published by 1974; despite the publication of further papyrus fragments in 1997, 2004, 2005 and 2014, Voigt's remains the standard modern edition.[32]

Poems

The fragments of Sappho's poems are arranged in the editions of Lobel and Page, and Voigt, by the book from the Alexandrian edition of her works in which they are believed to have been found. Fragments 1–42 are from Book 1, 43–52 from Book 2, 53–57 from Book 3, 58–91 from Book 4; 92–101 from Book 5, 102 from Book 7, 103 from Book 8, and 104–117B from the Epithalamia. Fragments 118–168 are those which Lobel and Page did not assign to any particular book, and are arranged alphabetically.[33] Fragment numbers with capital letters (such as 16A) were assigned by later editors to fit into Lobel and Page's numeration; lowercase letters indicate different parts of the same fragment.

Glosses

These fragments are isolated words quoted by other ancient authors, arranged alphabetically.

Testimonia

The testimonia are ancient accounts of Sappho, her life, and her poetry, which are conventionally included in critical editions of her work.[56] The selection included in these editions varies considerably.[57] Along with the seventy included in Voigt's edition, those given in Campbell's Loeb edition are listed here.

Uncertain authorship

Sappho and Alcaeus, illustrated on an Attic red-figure kalathos by the Brygos Painter. The two poets were contemporaries, and both wrote in the same Aeolic dialect; there are several fragments where it is uncertain which of the two is the author.

Fragments where the authorship is uncertain. In most cases, this is because the dialect is identifiable as Aeolic, but the poem may be by either Sappho or Alcaeus of Mytilene.[59]

Spurious epigrams

According to the Suda, Sappho wrote epigrams and elegies. Three epigrams in the Greek Anthology are attributed to Sappho, though none of them are authentic.[68] These are nonetheless included in Campbell's and Neri's editions.

Notes

  1. ^ For book 1, Sapphic stanzas; for book 2, glyconics with double dactylic expansion in distichs; for book 3, glyconics with double choriambic expansion in distichs.[7]
  2. ^ x x - u u - - u u - - u u - u - -
  3. ^ No ancient source describes the contents of book 4 of the Alexandrian edition of Sappho's works. Lobel & Page assigned the fragments of poems found on P. Oxy. 1787 to book 4 on the grounds that all are compatible with the same metre and that the first three books of Sappho were metrically homogeneous while the fifth was not; if there was another metrically homogeneous book, it was therefore likely the fourth.[8]
  4. ^ Fr. 102; the meter of the two lines quoted by Hephaestion is an iambic dimeter, followed by a glyconic and a bacchius (u - u - u - - u u - u - u - -).
  5. ^ Fragment numbers are largely those of Voigt 1971, the standard critical edition of Sappho's poetry, whose numeration in most cases matches that of Lobel & Page 1955. Fragments discovered between 1955 and 1963 were included as addenda to Lobel & Page 1963, a reprint of the 1955 volume; those have different numberings in Voigt and in Lobel-Page. Fragments published after Voigt's edition was completed up to 1974 are included in Lobel & Page 1974 (SLG); the numbers are those as given in Campbell 1982 to fit in with Voigt's and Lobel & Page's numerations.[34] A small number of fragments attributed to Sappho by Voigt are not included in Lobel-Page; they are instead found in Page 1962 (PMG). Two major discoveries from 2004 and 2014 postdate all of these editions; in this list they are referred to by the names given in Rayor & Lardinois 2014, and follow the Greek texts given in Obbink 2011, Obbink 2014 and Burris, Fish & Obbink 2014.
  6. ^ a b Except where otherwise noted, metres are those given in Voigt 1971. Where a metre is only partially reconstructed, it is expressed using "-" to indicate a long syllable, "u" to indicate a short syllable, and "x" to indicate a syllable which can be either long or short, with "]" and "[" respectively indicating that the metre before and after that point is lost. "||" and "|||" indicate the end of a line and a stanza, respectively.
  7. ^ Voigt numbers the lines 1a, followed by 1–16;[35] line 1a is not in the Lesbian dialect and may not have been part of the original poem.[36]
  8. ^ Follows fragment 9 in the Alexandrian edition. Called fr.9a by e.g. West 2014 and fr.10 by Neri 2021. Overlaps with fr.10 LP (omitted from Voigt).
  9. ^ Voigt divides the fragment into 15a and 15b, but the two fragments join from line 9
  10. ^ Voigt gives 32 lines; P. GC shows that the final 12 lines of Voigt are a separate poem (16A)
  11. ^ Included in both Lobel & Page 1955 and Voigt 1971 as part of fragment 16. The discovery of P. GC shows that fragment 16A comes from a different poem to fragment 16.
  12. ^ Voigt numbers the lines up to 34, including l.3a, which is entirely lost[38]
  13. ^ a b 44A Voigt = Alcaeus 304 LP.
  14. ^ Though often presented as a single fragment, the lines come from two separate sources, and Rayor & Lardinois 2014 follow Parker 2006 in taking the fragments as separate.[39]
  15. ^ Voigt's edition groups the 26 lines of Pre-58 (Oxyrhynchus), Sappho 58, and Post-58 (Oxyrhynchus) as a single fragment.[41] A second papyrus which overlapped 12 lines of Sappho 58V, first published in 2004, preserves different text both before and after what is here called Fragment 58. Pre-58 Cologne is apparently also by Sappho. The text which comes after Fragment 58 in the Cologne papyrus is not in an Aeolic metre, and in a different hand; it is therefore not by Sappho.[21] Some, such as Obbink 2011, divide these poems into four separate Sapphic fragments; others, such as Rayor & Lardinois 2014, consider Post-58 (Oxyrhynchus) to be an alternative ending to fragment 58.
  16. ^ Voigt divides 90a into Col. II, ll.1–27, and Col. III, ll.11–30
  17. ^ Voigt numbers from l.5
  18. ^ ll.1–12 and 19–23 are illegible
  19. ^ 101A V = Alcaeus 347b LP. The fragment cited in Demetrius is not attributed to any author, but comes after three fragments of Sappho. Campbell says that Lobel and Page's identification of the fragment as by Alcaeus is more probable.[43]
  20. ^ a b c d e f g h i Demetrius was the author of a stylistic handbook for writers and orators, once identified with Demetrius of Phalerum; this theory is now rejected. The date of his treatise is disputed: one view attributes it to the late-Hellenistic period; another to the Second Sophistic.[44]
  21. ^ Fr. 103 lists the first line of ten poems by Sappho. The first appears to be in an Aeolic metre with dactylic expansion; the remaining nine are all metrically compatible – though they may not all have been the same metre – and can be reconstructed as either acephalous hipponacteans with double choriambic expansion, or as catalectic choriambic tetrameter
  22. ^ 103B V = inc. auc. 26 LP
  23. ^ a b 103C V = 214 LP
  24. ^ a b 105b Voigt = 105c LP; 105b LP = 218 Voigt
  25. ^ a b c d e The Homeric Parsings, or Epimerismoi, are a Byzantine textbook which explains single words from Homer.
  26. ^ a b 117B V = inc. auc. 24 LP
  27. ^ Lobel & Page 1955 assigns ll.1–2 of this fragment to 130 LP, and ll.3–4 to 131 LP. Campbell 1982 and Rayor & Lardinois 2014 follow Lobel and Page on this, but Voigt groups them as a single fragment.
  28. ^ a b 140 Voigt = 104a LP; 140b LP = 214 Voigt
  29. ^ a b Fragments 142 and 143 can be analysed either as dactylic hexameters, or according to Aeolic principles.[51]
  30. ^ 168A Voigt = 178 LP
  31. ^ Not included in Lobel & Page 1955. Fr.976 PMG.
  32. ^ Not included in Lobel & Page 1955. Fr.964 PMG.
  33. ^ First published in 1960 by Robert Browning, and so not in Lobel & Page 1955. Included in the addenda to Lobel & Page 1963 as 117A.
  34. ^ Campbell includes only Pseudo-Paelaphetus under the lemma Sappho 211a; he quotes Suda Σ108 as T. 3 and Strabo 10.2.9 as T. 23
  35. ^ 211b V = 211c LP; 211c V = 211b LP
  36. ^ List of incipits of poems by Sappho, Alcaeus, and Anacreon. First published in 1973 and therefore not included in Voigt. Campbell 213C = SLG S286 = Neri 306A
  37. ^ Not included in Voigt. Campbell 214A = SLG S259–261
  38. ^ Not included in Voigt. Campbell 214B = SLG S261A
  39. ^ Not included in Voigt. Campbell 214C = SLG S476 = Neri 87A
  40. ^ Cited by Plutarch in On Music, under whose name Campbell lists the fragment.
  41. ^ Greek historian, c.300 BC.[58]
  42. ^ a b c d e f g 254 V = 202 LP
  43. ^ A scholiast on Horace
  44. ^ While 263 V refers to the whole of Heroides 15, Campbell quotes four parts of it separately.
  45. ^ Eustathius says that this poem was variously attributed to Sappho, Alcaeus, and Praxilla of Sicyon. Not included in Lobel & Page 1955, Page lists it among the fragments of Praxilla as fr. 749 PMG, and among the carmina conviviala as fr. 897 PMG.
  46. ^ The fragments of poetry preserved in P. Oxy. 2299 are attributed to Alcaeus in Lobel & Page 1955 but listed among the fragments of uncertain authorship by Voigt 1971. A possible reference to Atthis (inc. auc. 31 Voigt = Alcaeus 256 Lobel-Page l.5; cf. frr. 8, 49, 96, 131, and fr. 214C Campbell) and a mention of Abanthis (inc. auc. 35 Voigt = Alcaeus 261b col. I Lobel-Page; cf. fr. 22) suggests that these fragments are authored by Sappho.[62]
  47. ^ Not included in Lobel-Page; fr. 919 PMG
  48. ^ a b c Alcaeus 303A Voigt = Sappho 99 LP. Lobel identified the fragment as probably by Sappho when it was first published in 1951; Lobel & Page 1955 also attributed it to Sappho. Campbell 1982, Rayor & Lardinois 2014, and Neri 2021 all follow Lobel and Page in listing it as Sappho 99. Gauthier Liberman excludes it from his edition of Alcaeus as being more likely by Sappho.

References

  1. ^ Rayor & Lardinois 2014, p. 7.
  2. ^ Lardinois 2008, pp. 79–80.
  3. ^ de Kreij 2015, p. 28.
  4. ^ Prauscello 2021, pp. 220–221.
  5. ^ Yatromanolakis 1999, p. 180.
  6. ^ a b Yatromanolakis 1999, p. 181.
  7. ^ Battezzato 2021, pp. 124–125.
  8. ^ a b Lidov 2011.
  9. ^ Battezzato 2018, pp. 9–11.
  10. ^ Prauscello 2021, pp. 223–224.
  11. ^ Battezzato 2018, p. 11.
  12. ^ Battezzato 2018, pp. 12–13.
  13. ^ Prauscello 2021, p. 225.
  14. ^ Clayman 2011.
  15. ^ Lardinois 2011.
  16. ^ Battezzato 2018, p. 12.
  17. ^ Acosta-Hughes 2010, p. 102.
  18. ^ Rayor & Lardinois 2014, pp. 7–8.
  19. ^ Rayor & Lardinois 2014, p. 8.
  20. ^ West 2005, p. 1.
  21. ^ a b Obbink 2011.
  22. ^ Finglass 2021a, p. 239.
  23. ^ Finglass 2021a, pp. 232–233.
  24. ^ Reynolds 2001, p. 81.
  25. ^ Pontani 2021, p. 322.
  26. ^ a b Finglass 2021b, p. 247.
  27. ^ Finglass 2021b, p. 251.
  28. ^ Finglass 2021b, p. 253.
  29. ^ Finglass 2021b, p. 254.
  30. ^ Finglass 2021a, p. 232.
  31. ^ Finglass 2021a, pp. 237–243.
  32. ^ Finglass 2021b, pp. 257–259.
  33. ^ Campbell 1982, p. 53.
  34. ^ Finglass 2021b, p. 258.
  35. ^ Voigt 1971, p. 33.
  36. ^ McEvilley 1972, p. 324.
  37. ^ Neri 2021, p. 125.
  38. ^ Voigt 1971, p. 66.
  39. ^ Rayor & Lardinois 2014, p. 114.
  40. ^ Skinner 2011.
  41. ^ Voigt 1971, pp. 77–78.
  42. ^ Neri 2021, p. 183.
  43. ^ Campbell 1982, p. 383.
  44. ^ Reed 2005, pp. 124–125.
  45. ^ Battezzato 2018, p. 13.
  46. ^ a b Neri 2021, p. 240.
  47. ^ a b Neri 2021, p. 244.
  48. ^ Neri 2021, p. 245.
  49. ^ Neri 2021, p. 251.
  50. ^ Neri 2021, p. 265.
  51. ^ Battezzato 2021, p. 125.
  52. ^ Neri 2021, p. 269.
  53. ^ Neri 2021, p. 278.
  54. ^ a b Neri 2021, p. 279.
  55. ^ a b Neri 2021, p. 280.
  56. ^ Thorsen & Berge 2019, p. 289.
  57. ^ Thorsen & Berge 2019, p. 290.
  58. ^ Campbell 1982, p. 35.
  59. ^ Campbell 1982, p. 439.
  60. ^ a b Neri 2021, p. 391.
  61. ^ Neri 2021, p. 394.
  62. ^ Rayor & Lardinois 2014, p. 153.
  63. ^ Neri 2021, p. 396.
  64. ^ a b Neri 2021, p. 399.
  65. ^ a b Neri 2021, p. 400.
  66. ^ Neri 2021, p. 401.
  67. ^ Neri 2021, p. 231.
  68. ^ Page 1981, p. 181.

Works cited