ΘΕΟΚΡΙΤΟΥ ΕΙΣ ΤΗΝ ΕΑΥΤΟΥ͂ ΒΙΒΛΟΝ. Αλλος ὁ Χῖος· ἐγὼ δὲ Θεόκριτος, ὃς τάδ' ἔγραψα, Υἱὸς Πραξαγόρας, περικλειτῆς τε Φιλίννης ON THE LIFE AND WRITINGS OF THEOCRITUS.* We have little transmitted to us concerning the life of Theocritus; and this little is involved in contradiction, and obscured by conjecture. Even his age and country have been the subjects of controversy with grammarians and commentators. The relations of Suidas t and Gyraldus, among others, are strangely confused and indeterminate. * Abridged from Polwhele's Dissertation. + We are told by Suidas, that Theocritus was a Chian, and a rhetorician; but that there was another Theocritus, the son of Praxagoras and Philinna, though some say of Simichidas, a Syracusian. Others say " he was born at Cos, but lived at Syracuse. Another Greek account, usually prefixed to our poet's works, asserts that "Theocritus the Bucolic poet was born at Syracuse," and that his "father's name was Simichidas." Gyraldus says, 66 some have thought him of Cos, some of Chios.” But from his own works we might extract enough to convince us, that he was a Syracusian; that Praxagoras and Philinna were his parents; and that he flourished under Hiero and Ptolemy Philadelphus, both in Sicily and in Egypt. Of the former, his twenty-second Epigram is a sufficient testimony*; and of the latter, his two famous panegyrical Idyls. From the Commentator on Polybius we learn that Hiero, the King of Syracuse, began his reign about 275 years before the Christian æra.t *This Epigram is inserted in this edition, on the back of the titlepage. The chief object of the poet in writing it, though perhaps it may not appear at first sight, was, no doubt, to take all possible precaution to be distinguished from the rhetorician of the same name. The last verse of the Epigram is an honest declaration, that the poet had not been a plagiary, like many of his predecessors and contemporaries. In the poem called Ibis, attributed to Ovid, we find this distich: "Utque Syracosio præstricta fauce poëtæ, Sic animæ laqueo sit via clausa tuæ." Some commentators on this passage suppose Empedocles, who was a poet and philosopher of Sicily, to have been the person pointed at others think that Ovid, by mistake, might have confounded Theocritus the rhetorician of Chios, who was also a poet, with Theocritus of Syracuse; for the former, as Plutarch (Sympos. book ii.) and Macrobius (Saturn. vii. 3.) testify, was really executed by Antigonus, for being unseasonably and imprudently witty at that monarch's expense. Though the exploits of Hiero the First are recorded greatly to his advantage by Polybius, in the second book of his History; though he had many virtues, had frequently signalised his courage and conduct, and distinguished himself by several As our poet seems to have been dissatisfied with the cold attentions of the Syracusian monarch, who was more distinguished in the character of a warrior than a patron of learning, we may attribute to this circumstance his departure from Sicily into Egypt: the court of Alexandria was the nurse of the Muses. It is rather remarkable that we know scarcely any thing of Theocritus, but what may be gathered from himself. Independently of this internal evidence, we might determine the place of his birth, from the allusions of his imitator Virgil*, achievements in war, yet he seems, at least in the early part of his reign, not to have expressed any great affection for learning, or learned men. This is supposed to have given occasion to the sixteenth Idyl, inscribed with the name of Hiero; where the poet asserts the dignity of his profession, complains that it met neither with favour nor protection, and in a very artful manner touches upon the virtues of this prince, and insinuates what an illustrious figure he would have made in poetry, had he been as noble a patron as he was a subject for the Muses. In his voyage to Egypt he touched at Cos, an island in the Archipelago, not far from Rhodes, where he was honourably entertained by Phrasidamus and Antigenes, who invited him into the country to celebrate the festival of Ceres. See Idyl vii. *Virgil. Ecl. iv. 1.: "Sicelides Musæ, paulo majora canamus." Ecl. vi. 1.: "Prima Syracosio dignata est ludere versu Nostra, neque erubuit sylvas habitare Thalia." Ecl. x. 1.: "Extremum hunc, Arethusa, mihi concede laborem." He is called "a Sicilian poet" by the Emperor Julian; "Sicula telluris alumnus," by Terentianus Maurus, de Metris, vs. 407.; and is said to be "Sicula tellure creatus," by Manilius, ii. 40. and the casual intimations of Julian, Terentianus Maurus, and Manilius. But here our views are circumscribed; and we vainly look around us for a detail of his life.* As a pastoral writer, he found every advantage in the delicious climate and luxuriant landscapes of Sicily. No country could have presented him with a more beautiful assemblage of rural images. The picturesque scenery of the hills and the valleys, diversified beyond description; an almost infinite variety of trees and shrubs; the grottoes, precipices, and fountains, of the most romantic appearance; and the sweetness and serenity of the skies; all these concurred with the tranquillity of retirement in awakening the Muse, and inspiring the Pastoral numbers. The pieces of Theocritus are the result of his own accurate observation. He described what he saw and felt. His characters, as well as his scenes, are the immediate transcript of nature. We may * Theocritus is said to have been the scholar of Philetas and Asclepiades, or Sicelidas. Philetas was an elegiac poet, of the island of Cos, had the honour to be preceptor to Ptolemy Philadelphus, and is celebrated by Ovid and Propertius. The latter was an imitator of his writings, as we learn from himself, iii. 1. 1.: "Callimachi manes et Coi sacra Philetæ, In vestrum, quæso, me sinite ire nemus." Sicelidas was a Samian, and a writer of Epigrams. Theocritus mentions both of these with honour, Idyl vii. 40. |