Mimnermus was one of several ancient Greek poets who composed verses about solar eclipses, and there was a total solar eclipse of his home town, Smyrna, on April 6, 648 BC.[1] His poetry survives only as a few fragments yet they afford us a glimpse of his "brilliantly vivid" style.[2]
Mimnermus (Greek: ΜίμνερμοςMímnermos) was a Greek elegiac poet from either Colophon or Smyrna in Ionia, who flourished about 632–629 BC (i.e. in the 37th Olympiad, according to Suda). He was strongly influenced by Homer, yet he wrote short poems suitable for performance at drinking parties and was remembered by ancient authorities chiefly as a love poet. Mimnermus in turn exerted a strong influence on Hellenistic poets such as Callimachus and thus also on Roman poets such as Propertius, who even preferred him to Homer for his eloquence on love themes (see Comments by other poets below).
His work was collected by Alexandrian scholars in just two "books" (relatively few compared for example with the twenty-six books for Stesichorus) and today only small fragments survive. The fragments confirm the ancient estimate of him as a "consummate poet"[3] but also indicate that he was a "sturdier character" than the indulgent love poet he was assumed to be by various ancient commentators.[4] Almost no reliable biographical details have been recorded. One ancient account linked him romantically with a flute girl who subsequently gave her name, Nanno, to one of his two books.
^Plutarch de.facie.lun., cited and annotated by Douglas E. Gerber, Greek Elegiac Poetry, Loeb (1999), pages 99–101
^J.P.Barron and P.E.Easterling, "Early Greek Elegy", P.Easterling and B.Knox (ed.s), The Cambridge History of Classical Literature:Greek Literature, Cambridge University Press (1985), page 136
^Douglas E. Gerber, Greek Elegiac Poetry, Loeb/Harvard University Press (1999), page 6 ISBN 9780674995826
7th century—Mimnermus evidently hoped thereby to strengthen his countrymen's resolve against further Lydian encroachments. The name "Mimnermus" might have...
Mimnermus in Church is a poem written by William Johnson Cory. William Johnson was an Eton College master and author of the lyrics to the "Eton Boating...
Mimnermus of Colophon (630BC) details a flat Earth model, with the sun (Helios) bathing at the edges of Oceanus that surround the Earth (Mimnermus, frg...
Second Semichorus exit with the body of Eteocles. The 7th-century BC poet Mimnermus accounts that Ismene was murdered by Tydeus, one of the Seven. In this...
appalled that she changed her mind and let Tydeus die. The 7th century poet Mimnermus attributes the murder of Ismene, the sister of Antigone, to Tydeus. No...
forgetfulness of pain and the cessation of obligations. For Alcman and Mimnermus, they were even more primordial, springing from the early deities Ouranos...
for conveying any strong emotion. At the end of the 7th century BCE, Mimnermus of Colophon struck on the innovation of using the verse for erotic poetry...
Hesiod (the Theogony and the Works and Days), and surviving fragments from Mimnermus. In the 5th century BC, Greek thinkers began to add new features to this...
Carians out of the city of Lebedus. His tomb was shown near Colophon. Mimnermus related that Andraemon was a native of Pylos and founder of Colophon....
edition (1970). ISBN 069022608X. Tyrtaeus in Tyrtaeus, Solon, Theognis, Mimnermus. Greek Elegiac Poetry: From the Seventh to the Fifth Centuries BC, edited...
once composed an elegy with moral advice for a more gifted elegiac poet, Mimnermus. Most of the extant verses show him writing in the role of a political...
Ethiops, with whom he passes the dark hours. According to Athenaeus, Mimnermus said that in the night Helios travels eastwards with the use of a bed...
some resemblance to letters, including an elegiac poem from Solon to Mimnermus and some lyrical poems from Pindar to Hieron of Syracuse. Lucilius had...
needed] Imitations of his work have been observed in Alcaeus, Epimenides, Mimnermus, Semonides, Tyrtaeus and Archilochus, from which it has been inferred...
most notably of Ancient Greek lyric poetry (Sappho, Alcaeus, Hipponax, Mimnermus etc.). Kakisis has also translated into modern greek famous works by Lewis...
Theogony and Works and Days Archilochus Alcman Semonides of Amorgos Solon Mimnermus Stesichorus Paleo-Hebrew alphabet Ketef Hinnom amulets, the oldest found...
like lines attributed by ancient sources to other poets (Solon, Euenus, Mimnermus and Tyrtaeus). and other couplets are repeated with few or no changes...
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