Callimachus

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This article is about the poet. For the polemarch at the Battle of Marathon, see Callimachus (polemarch). For the sculptor, see Callimachus (sculptor).

Callimachus (ca. 305 BC- ca. 240 BC) was a Greek librarian, poet and grammarian, a native of Cyrene and a descendant of the illustrious house of the Battiadae, whence he was sometimes called Battiades (e.g., in Catullus's 65th poem).

He opened a school in the suburbs of Alexandria, and some of the most distinguished grammarians and poets were his pupils, among them Apollonius of Rhodes. He was subsequently appointed by Ptolemy Philadelphus as chief librarian of the Alexandrian library, which office he held till his death (about 240). His Pinakes (tablets), in 120 books, a critical and chronologically arranged catalogue of the library, laid the foundation of a history of Greek literature.

According to the Suda, he wrote about 800 works, in verse and prose; of these only six hymns, sixty-four epigrams and some fragments are extant; a considerable fragment of the Hecale, an idyllic epic, has also been discovered in the Rainer papyri.

His Coma Berenices is known only from a fragmentary papyrus text and the celebrated Latin imitation of Catullus (the latter's 66th poem). His Aitia ("Causes") was a collection of elegiac poems in four books, dealing with the foundation of cities, religious ceremonies and other customs. According to Quintilian (Inst it. x.1.58) he was the chief of the elegiac poets; his elegies were highly esteemed by the Romans (see Neoterics), and imitated by Ovid, Catullus and especially Propertius. The extant hymns are extremely learned, and written in a laboured and artificial style. The epigrams, some of the best specimens of their kind, have been incorporated in the Greek Anthology.

Art and learning are his chief characteristics, unrelieved by any real poetic genius; in the words of Ovid (Amores, i. 15)--Quamvis ingenio non valet, arte valet.

Bibliography

Callimachus' works are edited in the magisterial edition of R. Pfeiffer, Vol. I Fragmenta, Oxford 1949 (repr. 1965); Vol. II Hymni et epigrammata, Oxford 1953.

A more recent edition of the poems in English is Frank Nisetich's Poems of Callimachus (Oxford: OUP, 2001) (ISBN 0198147600)

Cameron, Alan. 'Callimachus and his Critics'.

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