Stesichorus (; , Stēsichoros; c. 630 – 555 BC) was a Greek lyric poet native of today's Calabria (Southern Italy). He is best known for telling epic stories in lyric metres, and for some ancient traditions about his life, such as his opposition to the tyrant Phalaris, and the blindness he is said to have incurred and cured by composing verses first insulting and then flattering to Helen of Troy.
He was ranked among the nine lyric poets esteemed by the scholars of Hellenistic Alexandria, and yet his work attracted relatively little interest among ancient commentators, so that remarkably few fragments of his poetry now survive. As David Campbell notes: "Time has dealt more harshly with Stesichorus than with any other major lyric poet." Recent discoveries, recorded on Egyptian papyrus (notably and controversially, the Lille Stesichorus), have led to some improvements in our understanding of his work, confirming his role as a link between Homer's epic narrative and the lyric narrative of poets like Pindar.
Stesichorus also exercised an important influence on the representation of myth in 6th century art, and on the development of Athenian dramatic poetry.
Biography
Stesichorus was born in Metauros (modern Gioia Tauro) in Calabria, Southern Italy c. 630 BC and died in Katane (modern Catania) in Sicily in 555 BC. Some say that he came from Himera in Sicily, but that was due to him moving from Metauros to Himera later in life. When exiled from Pallantium in Arcadia he came to Katane (Catania) and when he died there was buried in front of the gate which is called Stesichorean after him. In date he was later than the lyric poet Alcman, since he was born in the 37th Olympiad (632/28 BC). He died in the 56th Olympiad (556/2 BC). He had a brother Mamertinus who was an expert in geometry and a second brother Helianax, a law-giver. He was a lyric poet. His poems are in the Doric dialect and in 26 books. They say that he was blinded for writing abuse of Helen and recovered his sight after writing an encomium of Helen, the Palinode, as the result of a dream. He was called Stesichorus because he was the first to establish (stesai) a chorus of singers to the cithara; his name was originally Tisias.
Chronology
The specific dates given by the Suda for Stesichorus have been dismissed by one modern scholar as "specious precision" its dates for the floruit of Alcman (the 27th Olympiad), the life of Stesichorus (37th–56th Olympiads) and the birth of Simonides (the 56th Olympiad) virtually lay these three poets end-to-end, a coincidence that seems to underscore a convenient division between old and new styles of poetry. Nevertheless, the Suda'''s dates "fit reasonably well" with other indications of Stesichorus's life-span for example, they are consistent with a claim elsewhere in Suda that the poet Sappho was his contemporary, along with Alcaeus and Pittacus, and also with the claim, attested by other sources, that Phalaris was his contemporary. Aristotle quoted a speech the poet is supposed to have made to the people of Himera warning them against the tyrannical ambitions of Phalaris. The Byzantine grammarian Tzetzes also listed him as a contemporary of the tyrant and yet made him a contemporary of the philosopher Pythagoras as well. According to Lucian, the poet lived to 85 years of age. Hieronymus declared that his poems became sweeter and more swan-like as he approached death, and Cicero knew of a bronzed statue representing him as a bent old man holding a book. Eusebius dated his floruit in Olympiad 42.2 (611/10 BC) and his death in Olympiad 55.1 (560/59 BC).
Family
The Sudas claim that Hesiod was the father of Stesichorus can be dismissed as "fantasy" yet it is also mentioned by Tzetzes and the Hesiodic scholiast Proclus (one of them however named the mother of Stesichorus via Hesiod as Ctimene and the other as Clymene). According to another tradition known to Cicero, Stesichorus was the grandson of Hesiod yet even this verges on anachronism since Hesiod was composing verses around 700 BC. Stesichorus might be regarded as Hesiod's literary "heir" (his treatment of Helen in the Palinode, for example, may have owed much to Hesiod's Catalogue of Women) and maybe this was the source of confusion about a family relationship. According to Stephanus of Byzantium and the philosopher Plato the poet's father was named Euphemus, but an inscription on a herm from Tivoli listed him as Euclides. The poet's mathematically inclined brother was named Mamertinus by the Suda but a scholiast in a commentary on Euclid named him Mamercus.