Didymus Chalcenterus
Encyclopedia
Didymus Chalcenterus ca. 63 BCE to 10 CE, was a Hellenistic Greek
scholar and grammarian who flourished in the time of Cicero
and Augustus
.
records that he wrote 3500 books; Seneca
gives the figure of 4000.) As a result he acquired the additional nickname "book-forgetter".
He lived and taught in Alexandria
and Rome
, where he became the friend of Varro
. He is chiefly important as having introduced Alexandrian learning to the Romans.
, and wrote a treatise on Aristarchus' edition of Homer
entitled On Aristarchus' recension , fragments of which are preserved in the Venetus A
manuscript of the Iliad
.
He also wrote commentaries on many other Greek poet
s and prose authors. He is known to have written on Greek lyric poets, notably Bacchylides
and Pindar
, and on drama; the better part of the Pindar and Sophocles
scholia originated with Didymus. The Aristophanes
scholia also cite him often, and he is known to have written treatises on Euripides
, Ion
, Phrynichus
, Cratinus
, Menander
, and many of the Greek orators including Demosthenes
, Isaeus
, Hypereides
, Deinarchus
, and others.
Besides these commentaries there are mentions of the following works, none of which survives:
In addition there survive extracts on agriculture and botany, mention of a commentary on Hippocrates
, and a completely surviving treatise On all types of marble and wood . In view of the drastic difference in subject matter it is possible that these represent the work of a different Didymos.
Further insight into Didymus' methods of writing was provided by the discovery of a papyrus fragment of his commentary on the Philippic
s of Demosthenes
. This confirms that he was not an original researcher, but a scrupulous compiler who made many quotations from earlier writers, and who was prepared to comment about chronology and history, as well as rhetoric and style.
Greeks
The Greeks, also known as the Hellenes , are a nation and ethnic group native to Greece, Cyprus and neighboring regions. They also form a significant diaspora, with Greek communities established around the world....
scholar and grammarian who flourished in the time of Cicero
Cicero
Marcus Tullius Cicero , was a Roman philosopher, statesman, lawyer, political theorist, and Roman constitutionalist. He came from a wealthy municipal family of the equestrian order, and is widely considered one of Rome's greatest orators and prose stylists.He introduced the Romans to the chief...
and Augustus
Augustus
Augustus ;23 September 63 BC – 19 August AD 14) is considered the first emperor of the Roman Empire, which he ruled alone from 27 BC until his death in 14 AD.The dates of his rule are contemporary dates; Augustus lived under two calendars, the Roman Republican until 45 BC, and the Julian...
.
Life
The surname "bronze-guts" came from his indefatigable industry: he was said to have written so many books that he was unable to recollect what he had written in earlier ones, and so often contradicted himself. (AthenaeusAthenaeus
Athenaeus , of Naucratis in Egypt, Greek rhetorician and grammarian, flourished about the end of the 2nd and beginning of the 3rd century AD...
records that he wrote 3500 books; Seneca
Seneca the Younger
Lucius Annaeus Seneca was a Roman Stoic philosopher, statesman, dramatist, and in one work humorist, of the Silver Age of Latin literature. He was tutor and later advisor to emperor Nero...
gives the figure of 4000.) As a result he acquired the additional nickname "book-forgetter".
He lived and taught in Alexandria
Alexandria
Alexandria is the second-largest city of Egypt, with a population of 4.1 million, extending about along the coast of the Mediterranean Sea in the north central part of the country; it is also the largest city lying directly on the Mediterranean coast. It is Egypt's largest seaport, serving...
and Rome
Rome
Rome is the capital of Italy and the country's largest and most populated city and comune, with over 2.7 million residents in . The city is located in the central-western portion of the Italian Peninsula, on the Tiber River within the Lazio region of Italy.Rome's history spans two and a half...
, where he became the friend of Varro
Marcus Terentius Varro
Marcus Terentius Varro was an ancient Roman scholar and writer. He is sometimes called Varro Reatinus to distinguish him from his younger contemporary Varro Atacinus.-Biography:...
. He is chiefly important as having introduced Alexandrian learning to the Romans.
Works
He was a follower of the school of AristarchusAristarchus of Samothrace
Aristarchus of Samothrace was a grammarian noted as the most influential of all scholars of Homeric poetry. He was the librarian of the library of Alexandria and seems to have succeeded his teacher Aristophanes of Byzantium in that role.He established the most historically important critical...
, and wrote a treatise on Aristarchus' edition of Homer
Homer
In the Western classical tradition Homer , is the author of the Iliad and the Odyssey, and is revered as the greatest ancient Greek epic poet. These epics lie at the beginning of the Western canon of literature, and have had an enormous influence on the history of literature.When he lived is...
entitled On Aristarchus' recension , fragments of which are preserved in the Venetus A
Venetus A
Venetus A is the more common [or original] name for the tenth century manuscript catalogued in the Biblioteca Marciana in Venice as Codex Marcianus Graecus 454, now 822....
manuscript of the Iliad
Iliad
The Iliad is an epic poem in dactylic hexameters, traditionally attributed to Homer. Set during the Trojan War, the ten-year siege of the city of Troy by a coalition of Greek states, it tells of the battles and events during the weeks of a quarrel between King Agamemnon and the warrior Achilles...
.
He also wrote commentaries on many other Greek poet
Poet
A poet is a person who writes poetry. A poet's work can be literal, meaning that his work is derived from a specific event, or metaphorical, meaning that his work can take on many meanings and forms. Poets have existed since antiquity, in nearly all languages, and have produced works that vary...
s and prose authors. He is known to have written on Greek lyric poets, notably Bacchylides
Bacchylides
Bacchylides was an Ancient Greek lyric poet. Later Greeks included him in the canonical list of nine lyric poets which included his uncle Simonides. The elegance and polished style of his lyrics have been a commonplace of Bacchylidean scholarship since at least Longinus...
and Pindar
Pindar
Pindar , was an Ancient Greek lyric poet. Of the canonical nine lyric poets of ancient Greece, his work is the best preserved. Quintilian described him as "by far the greatest of the nine lyric poets, in virtue of his inspired magnificence, the beauty of his thoughts and figures, the rich...
, and on drama; the better part of the Pindar and Sophocles
Sophocles
Sophocles is one of three ancient Greek tragedians whose plays have survived. His first plays were written later than those of Aeschylus, and earlier than or contemporary with those of Euripides...
scholia originated with Didymus. The Aristophanes
Aristophanes
Aristophanes , son of Philippus, of the deme Cydathenaus, was a comic playwright of ancient Athens. Eleven of his forty plays survive virtually complete...
scholia also cite him often, and he is known to have written treatises on Euripides
Euripides
Euripides was one of the three great tragedians of classical Athens, the other two being Aeschylus and Sophocles. Some ancient scholars attributed ninety-five plays to him but according to the Suda it was ninety-two at most...
, Ion
Ion of Chios
Ion of Chios was a Greek writer, dramatist, lyric poet and philosopher. He was a contemporary of Aeschylus, Euripides and Sophocles. Of his many plays and poems only a few titles and fragments have survived...
, Phrynichus
Phrynichus
Phrynichus may refer to:*Phrynichus, a genus in the Amblypygi, an order of arachnids-People:*There are two dramatic poets named Phrynicus whose plays only survive in fragments:...
, Cratinus
Cratinus
Cratinus , Athenian comic poet of the Old Comedy.-Life:Cratinus was victorious six times at the City Dionysia, first probably in the mid- to late 450s BCE , and three times at the Lenaia, first probably in the early 430s...
, Menander
Menander
Menander , Greek dramatist, the best-known representative of Athenian New Comedy, was the son of well-to-do parents; his father Diopeithes is identified by some with the Athenian general and governor of the Thracian Chersonese known from the speech of Demosthenes De Chersoneso...
, and many of the Greek orators including Demosthenes
Demosthenes
Demosthenes was a prominent Greek statesman and orator of ancient Athens. His orations constitute a significant expression of contemporary Athenian intellectual prowess and provide an insight into the politics and culture of ancient Greece during the 4th century BC. Demosthenes learned rhetoric by...
, Isaeus
Isaeus
Isaeus , fl. early 4th century BC. One of the ten Attic Orators according to the Alexandrian canon. He was a student of Isocrates in Athens, and later taught Demosthenes while working as a metic speechwriter for others. Only eleven of his speeches survive, with fragments of a twelfth. They are...
, Hypereides
Hypereides
Hypereides or Hyperides was a logographer in Ancient Greece...
, Deinarchus
Dinarchus
Dinarchus or Dinarch was a logographer in Ancient Greece. He was the last of the ten Attic orators included in the "Alexandrian Canon" compiled by Aristophanes of Byzantium and Aristarchus of Samothrace in the third century BC.A son of Sostratus , Dinarchus settled at Athens early in life, and...
, and others.
Besides these commentaries there are mentions of the following works, none of which survives:
- On phraseology in tragedy , which comprised at least 28 books
- Comic phraseology , of which HesychiusHesychius of AlexandriaHesychius of Alexandria , a grammarian who flourished probably in the 5th century CE, compiled the richest lexicon of unusual and obscure Greek words that has survived...
made much use - a third linguistic work on words of ambiguous or uncertain meaning, comprising at least seven books
- a fourth linguistic work on false or corrupt expressions
- a collection of Greek proverbs comprising thirteen books, from which most of the proverbs in ZenobiusZenobiusZenobius was a Greek sophist, who taught rhetoric at Rome during the reign of Emperor Hadrian .-Biography:He was the author of a collection of proverbs in three books, still extant in an abridged form, compiled, according to the Suda, from Didymus of Alexandria and "The Tarrhaean"...
' collection are taken - On the laws of Solon , a work mentioned by PlutarchPlutarchPlutarch then named, on his becoming a Roman citizen, Lucius Mestrius Plutarchus , c. 46 – 120 AD, was a Greek historian, biographer, essayist, and Middle Platonist known primarily for his Parallel Lives and Moralia...
- A response to Cicero's De re publica, comprising six books, which later induced SuetoniusSuetoniusGaius Suetonius Tranquillus, commonly known as Suetonius , was a Roman historian belonging to the equestrian order in the early Imperial era....
to write a counter-response
In addition there survive extracts on agriculture and botany, mention of a commentary on Hippocrates
Hippocrates
Hippocrates of Cos or Hippokrates of Kos was an ancient Greek physician of the Age of Pericles , and is considered one of the most outstanding figures in the history of medicine...
, and a completely surviving treatise On all types of marble and wood . In view of the drastic difference in subject matter it is possible that these represent the work of a different Didymos.
Further insight into Didymus' methods of writing was provided by the discovery of a papyrus fragment of his commentary on the Philippic
Philippic
A philippic is a fiery, damning speech, or tirade, delivered to condemn a particular political actor. The term originates with Demosthenes, who delivered several attacks on Philip II of Macedon in the 4th century BC....
s of Demosthenes
Demosthenes
Demosthenes was a prominent Greek statesman and orator of ancient Athens. His orations constitute a significant expression of contemporary Athenian intellectual prowess and provide an insight into the politics and culture of ancient Greece during the 4th century BC. Demosthenes learned rhetoric by...
. This confirms that he was not an original researcher, but a scrupulous compiler who made many quotations from earlier writers, and who was prepared to comment about chronology and history, as well as rhetoric and style.
Editions
- Scholia on the Iliad:
Erbse, H.Hartmut ErbseHartmut Erbse was a German classical philologist.-Life:The son of a dentist from Thüringen, Erbse studied classical philology in Hamburg, where he was well known for his lively hat-wear and received his doctorate in 1940...
1969-88, Scholia Graeca in Homeri Iliadem, 7 vols. (Berlin) - Didymus' work reconstructed from the Iliad scholia:
Schmidt, M. 1964 [1854], Didymi Chalcenteri grammatici Alexandrini fragmenta quae supersunt omnia, reprint (Amsterdam) - The commentary on Demosthenes:,
Didymos: On Demosthenes, edited with a translation by Philip Harding, 2006 (OUP)
Further reading
- Russell, H.A. 1948, "Old Brass-Guts", The Classical Journal 43.7: 431-432