Table Of ContentANACREON OF TEOS:
TESTIMONIA AND FRAGMENTS
Anacreon of Teos
Testimonia and Fragments
Edited and Translated with Introduction
and Commentary by
HANS BERNSDORFF
VOLUME I
Introduction, Text, and Translation
1
1
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Preface
Anacreon is one of the lyric poets people like most; that in itself would seem to
justify a detailed commentary. He is commonly reduced, though, not just to the
familiar stereotype, but to a small number of well-known quotation fragments.
However, there has been considerable gain from papyri, not hitherto fully
exploited; research on Greek lyric poetry has been advancing; the immense
impact of Anacreon has recently been explored and needs further exploration,
especially for Latin poetry. The time seems ripe for a full-scale modern com-
mentary in English.
I first became more closely interested in Anacreon in 2004, when R. Daniel
and M. Gronewald observed, in their editio princeps of the Cologne Sappho,
how the new poem probably influenced Anacreon. The sort of commentary
I was starting to envisage did not seem to be made superfluous by the Modern
Greek commentary of A. Rozokoki (2006); that is not at all to deny its merits,
especially on textual matters in the quoted fragments. My work on the com-
mentary started seriously in 2008. Two editions with commentary have since
appeared: G. M. Leo’s selection of Anacreon’s erotic fragments in 2015 and
A. Porro’s edition of ancient papyrus commentaries on Anacreon in 2016.
I have profited greatly from these contributions and am very grateful that both
scholars allowed me to see their work before publication.
The standard editions are D. L. Page’s for Anacreon’s lyric in Poetae Melici
Graeci and Supplementum Lyricis Graecis and M. L. West’s for his elegiacs in
Iambi et Elegi Graeci; I have adopted their numeration. The texts of papyrus
discoveries not yet included in those editions are presented at the beginning of
my own (pp. 105–64).
It is a pleasure to thank all the institutions and people who gave me support
in this project.
My own university and the Deutsche Forschungsgemeinschaft granted me
several periods of research leave in which I could push ahead with the com-
mentary. I was lucky enough to do this in the inspiring ambience of the Oxford
Classics Faculty, thanks to a Keeley Visiting Fellowship at Wadham College in
2010/11 and a Visiting Fellowship at All Souls College in 2014. Moreover a
generous grant by the Fritz Thyssen Stiftung supported me during my stay at
Wadham and gave further support while I finished the manuscript.
I am also grateful to my colleagues Klaus Alpers, Frank Bernstein, Ewen
Bowie, Timo Christian, Daniela Colomo, Rudolf Führer, Michael Haslam,
Karlheinz Hülser, Richard Hunter, Robert Parker, Filippomaria Pontani,
Philomen Probert, Alexandra Rozokoki, Martin Schmidt †, Iris Sticker and
vi Preface
Martin West † for commenting on earlier drafts or giving advice on special
problems.
The support of three scholars in particular was important during the whole
period of work on the commentary: Gregory Hutchinson followed this project
right from the beginning with never-ceasing interest and gave generous advice
on innumerable philological problems. Ursula Mandel, my Frankfurt colleague
in Classical Archaeology, gave several joint seminars with me on Anacreontic
problems and provided me with lots of archaeological parallels. Benjamin
Henry shared his immense papyrological and literary knowledge with me
whenever I asked, and immensely improved the edition of and commentary on
the papyri.
Some of my preliminary thoughts on Anacreon’s poetry have been shared
with audiences at the universities of Bamberg, Bologna, Cambridge, Innsbruck,
Komotini, Marburg, Munich, Oslo, Reading, Trier, and, on several occasions, in
Berlin, Frankfurt, and Oxford. In Oxford I had the honour of devoting the
Gaisford Lecture of 2017 to an Anacreontic topic.
Anja Behrends, Martina Benati, Franziska Bos, Sophie Buxbaum, Anja
Glaab, Mattis Heyne, Anton Li Koschak, Veronika Lütkenhaus, Laura Picht,
Janna Regenauer, Helena Schmedt, Rouven Schulhof, Katharina Storch, and
especially Claudia Geißler are owed my warm thanks for checking the manu-
script or reading the proofs.
Phillip Bone fulfilled the task of improving and smoothing my English and
finally reading the proofs with admirable reliability and patience.
Without the help of librarians this work could not have been written. In
particular I wish to thank the staff of the Bodleian and Sackler Libraries in
Oxford and the Bibliothekszentrum Geisteswissenschaften of Goethe University
Frankfurt, especially Christina Lorenz.
Finally, I would like to acknowledge the assistance of the Oxford University
Press in bringing this commentary into the light of day, and particularly to
Hilary O’Shea in the first years and Charlotte Loveridge, Karen Raith, and Joe
Matthews afterwards. The copy-editor Kathleen Fearn saved me from numer-
ous errors, and Timothy Beck’s proof-reading was highly effective.
The greatest debt of thanks is owed to my wife Carolin Ritter for her never-
ending encouragement and support during all those years of work. Our sons
Carl and Paul were born into a world in which the name Anacreon could be
heard very often; I am moved by the friendliness with which they accepted this.
Contents
List of Figures ix
VOLUME I
General Introduction 1
§ 1. Life 1
§ 2. Themes 11
§ 3. Models 16
§ 4. Performance 18
§ 5. Language and Style 22
§ 6. Metre 28
§ 7. Reception 31
§ 8. Fate of the Text 45
§ 9. Orthography of this Edition 54
§ 10. Presentation of the Fragments 54
§ 11. Excluded Fragments 55
List of Abbreviations 57
Bibliography 59
Testimonia 93
Text and Translation 103
Texts of Papyri not Included in PMG and SLG 105
Texts Included in PMG and SLG 159
Texts of Elegiac Fragments 249
VOLUME II
Commentary 253
General Index 863
Index of Greek and Latin Words Discussed 869
Index of Passages Discussed 872
List of Figures
1. Anacreon (inscribed) with comasts, cup by Oltos, ARV2, 62/86, of 520-510
BC, London Brit. Mus. E 18 (1836,0224.145). Illustration from Jahn, O, Über
Darstellungen griechischer Dichter auf Vasenbildern. Leipzig 1861, Plate 3. 200
2. Portrait statue of Anacreon, Roman marble copy after a Greek bronze
original by Phidias (c. 440 BC). Copenhagen, Ny Carlsberg Glyptotek,
Inv. 491. 212
3. P .Oxy. 3722 fr. 1 col. i.17 (infrared). Courtesy of The Egypt Exploration
Society and the University of Oxford Imaging Papyri Project.
© The Egypt Exploration Society. Protected by UK copyright
law: further reproduction without the permission of The
Egypt Exploration Society is strictly prohibited. 268
4. The sanctuary of Artemis Leucophryena near Magnesia on
the Maeander. K.-H. Engemann. 387
