THEOCRITUS

The representative par excellence of the bucolic muse. He was born in Syracuse, but for a long time he lived on the island of Kos, where he attended the lessons of the elegist Philitas and the epigraphist Asclepiades, and was connected by friendship with the poet Aratos, to whom Theocritus dedicates the sixth of his romances. Apparently, in 270 he was invited by Ptolemy to Alexandria, and around 265 he is at the court of Hiero of Syracuse, who appreciated the poet. He appears to have died in Syracuse.

Theocritus wrote hymns, funeral dirges, elegies, iambs, epigrams and short epics. But his glory is due to bucolic poetry, which he cultivated and extended far beyond bucoli and shepherds, to farmers and more generally to farmers, fishermen, and people of the lower classes of the townspeople. Theocritus' poems were first published by the grammarian Artemidorus, around 70 BC, and an annotated edition was edited by his son Theo. Remains of Theocritus' poems are preserved in papyri.