Bacchylides (pronounced /bəˈkɪlɪˌdiːz/; Ancient Greek: Βακχυλίδης Bakkhulides; born about 518 BC, died about 451 BC) was a Greek lyric poet. Later Greeks added him to a special list of Nine Lyric Poets, which also included his uncle Simonides. Scholars, including Longinus, have praised the elegance and polished style of his poems. Some scholars have said his style may appear simple or charming on the surface. Bacchylides is often compared to his contemporary, Pindar, with some calling him "a kind of Boccherini to Pindar's Haydn." However, differences in their styles make direct comparisons difficult. Translator Robert Fagles wrote that blaming Bacchylides for not being like Pindar is unfair, just as it would be wrong to criticize Marvell for not matching Milton's grandeur. Bacchylides lived during a time when dramatic styles of poetry, seen in the works of Aeschylus and Sophocles, became popular. He is considered one of the last major poets to focus on purely lyric poetry, an older tradition. His poems are known for their clear language and simple ideas, making them a good starting point for learning about Greek lyric poetry, especially Pindar's work.

Life

Bacchylides, an ancient Greek poet, is known through surviving pieces of his work. His modern editor, Richard Claverhouse Jebb, believed that Bacchylides had a calm personality, was kind and patient, and was content with simple things. He also had a quiet sadness, a feeling common among people from the Ionian region, but he was wise and thoughtful.

Bacchylides' songs were not widely known during his lifetime. Other poets, like his uncle Simonides and his rival Pindar, were popular in Athens. Their works were sung at parties, copied by philosophers, and even made fun of by playwrights. However, no evidence of Bacchylides' work exists until the Hellenistic period, when a scholar named Callimachus wrote about it. Like Simonides and Pindar, Bacchylides wrote songs for wealthy and educated people. His patrons lived in many places around the Mediterranean, such as Delos, Thessaly, and Sicily. His poems suggest he became famous later in life.

Details about Bacchylides' life are unclear and sometimes conflicting. Some sources say he was born in Ioulis on the island of Keos, and his mother was Simonides' sister. Other sources give different names for his father and grandfather. Scholars disagree about his birth date, with some placing it around 507 BC and others around 524 BC. Most modern scholars believe he was born around 518 BC, the same time as Pindar. Some ancient writers claim he was exiled from Keos and lived in Peloponnesus, where he developed his skills. This is supported by evidence, such as a poem by Pindar that mentions Keos. Some sources suggest he was alive during the Peloponnesian War, but his death date is uncertain, with estimates ranging from 428 BC to 451 BC.

Keos, Bacchylides' birthplace, had a rich tradition of music and poetry, especially because of its connection to Delos, a religious center for the Ionian people. The island also had a temple to Apollo and a training ground for choirs, where Bacchylides' uncle, Simonides, taught. People from Keos took pride in their athletic achievements, which were recorded on stone slabs. Bacchylides wrote about these victories in his poems. The island's proximity to Athens meant it was influenced by Athenian culture.

Bacchylides' career likely benefited from his uncle Simonides' connections. Simonides had powerful patrons, including Hipparchus, a leader in Athens. Later, Simonides introduced Bacchylides to important families in Thessaly and to Hieron, a ruler in Sicily. Bacchylides' early success came from commissions in Athens and Macedonia. He competed with Pindar for work from wealthy families in Aegina. In 476 BC, Bacchylides wrote a poem celebrating Hieron's first Olympic victory, while Pindar used the same event to advise the ruler on moderation. Bacchylides may have written the poem to show his talent and gain more commissions. He later wrote about Hieron's other victories, including a chariot race at the Pythian Games and another at the Olympic Games. Some scholars believe Hieron preferred Bacchylides' simpler style over Pindar's more moralizing tone.

As a poet, Bacchylides likely traveled to perform his works, as his poems often involved choirs and musicians. Ancient sources mention his visits to Hieron's court in Sicily, which is reflected in his poems. His fifth poem, written in 476 BC, suggests he had already been a guest at Hieron's court, possibly with his uncle. His third poem, written in 468 BC, may have been composed in Syracuse.

Work

The poems were gathered into special collections around the late 3rd century BC by a scholar named Aristophanes of Byzantium from Alexandria. He likely fixed the rhythm of the poems after finding them written in prose form. The poems were organized into nine "books," each showing different types of poetry. Bacchylides wrote in more types of poetry than any other lyric poet except Pindar, who wrote in ten types. The types of poetry include:

• hymnoi – "hymns"
• paianes – "paeans"
• dithyramboi – "dithyrambs"
• prosodia – "processionals"
• partheneia – "songs for maidens"
• hyporchemata – "songs for light dances"
• enkomia – "songs of praise"
• epinikia – "victory odes"
• erotica – "songs of love"

A grammarian named Didymus (about 30 BC) wrote notes about Bacchylides's work. Fragments of his poems were found on papyrus, showing they were widely read from the first three centuries AD. Their popularity lasted into the 4th century. An ancient writer named Ammianus Marcellinus noted that Emperor Julian enjoyed reading Bacchylides. The largest collection of quotes from his work was made by Stobaeus in the early 5th century. By 1896, only 69 fragments of Bacchylides’s poetry remained, totaling 107 lines. These were collected by scholars like Brunck, Bergk, Bland, Hartung, and Neue. The oldest sources about Bacchylides are notes on the works of Homer, Hesiod, Pindar, Aristophanes, Apollonius Rhodius, and Callimachus. Other fragments and references appear in the writings of ancient authors, such as:

• Dionysius of Halicarnassus – frag. 11
• Strabo – notice 57
• Plutarch – frag. 29
• Apollonius Dyscolus – frag. 31
• Zenobius – frags. 5, 24
• Hephaestion – frags. 12, 13, 15
• Athenaeus – frags. 13, 16, 17, 18, 22
• Clement of Alexandria – frags. 19, 20, 21, 32
• Stobaeus – frags. 1, 2, 3, 7, 8, 9, 10, 20, 28
• Priscian – frag. 27
• Johannes Siceliota – frag. 26
• Etymologicum Magnum – frags. 25, 30
• Palatine Anthology – frags. 33, 34.

A papyrus with Greek writing was discovered in Egypt at the end of the 19th century. A local person claimed to have found it in a tomb that had been broken into, near a mummy’s feet. The Egyptologist Wallis Budge of the British Museum bought it for a very high price. However, the British Consul and Egyptian officials did not allow him to take it back to England. Budge used a clever plan involving oranges, switched trains, and a secret meeting with a ship to smuggle the papyrus out of Egypt. He later gave it to Frederic Kenyon at the British Museum. Kenyon pieced together 1382 lines, with 1070 lines being nearly complete or easily restored. The next year, he published an edition of twenty poems, six of which were almost complete. Friedrich Blass later added more pieces from the fragments. Richard Claverhouse Jebb later created an authoritative edition of Bacchylides’s poetry.

Frederic Kenyon noted that the papyrus was originally a roll about 17 feet long and 10 inches high, written during the Ptolemaic period with some Roman-style features. It arrived in England as about 200 broken pieces, the largest about 20 inches long with four and a half columns of writing, and the smallest just scraps with one or two letters. The beginning and end of the roll were missing, and the damage was not caused by its recent discovery. Kenyon grouped the fragments into three sections: one 9 feet long with 22 columns, one 2 feet long with 6 columns, and one 3.5 feet long with 10 columns. The total length was about 15 feet and 39 columns, and the papyrus remains in the British Library. Friedrich Blass later combined some remaining fragments and found that two poems (Odes vi. and vii.) were parts of a single ode for Lachon of Keos. Because of this, some scholars, like Jebb, numbered the poems differently from Kenyon, starting from poem 8.

Bacchylides became one of the best-represented poets among the canonic nine, with about half as many surviving verses as Pindar. His discoveries also increased Greek vocabulary by about 100 words. Interestingly, his newly found poems sparked renewed interest in Pindar’s work, even though Bacchylides was often compared unfavorably to Pindar.

Much of Bacchylides’s poetry was written for powerful aristocrats who were important in Greek politics and culture during the 6th and early 5th centuries. However, these aristocrats lost influence as Greek society became more democratic. Bacchylides’s poetry celebrated these aristocrats, but he also wrote simpler, lighter verses, sometimes with folk-like themes and humor.

Lyric poetry was a strong art form when Bacchylides began his career, and its genres were already well developed. By the time of the Peloponnesian War (around the end of his life), lyric poetry was declining, as seen in the less skilled dithyrambs of Philoxenos of Cythera. Meanwhile, tragedy, developed by dramatists like Aeschylus and Sophocles, became the leading poetic genre. Tragedy borrowed elements from lyric poetry, including the dithyramb. Bacchylides also borrowed from tragedy, such as in Ode 16, which assumes knowledge of Sophocles’s play Women of Trachis, and Ode 18, which echoes three plays by Aeschylus and Sophocles. His vocabulary shows influence from Aeschylus, with some words used by both poets and no one else. Bacchylides’s use of vivid storytelling and direct speech influenced later poets like Horace. These narrative techniques were modeled on Stesichorus, whose lyr