Page:History of the Literature of Ancient Greece (Müller) 2ed.djvu/201

179 LITERATURE OP ANCIENT GREECE. 179 which the thought is placed before us and gradually heightened with great beauty and nature) " like the sweet apple which ripens at the top of the bough, on the topmost point of the bough, forgotten by the gatherers — no, not quite forgotten, but beyond their reach *." A frag- ment written in a similar tone, speaks of a hyacinth, which growing among the mountains is trodden underfoot by the shepherds, and its purple flower is pressed to the ground t ; thus obviously comparing the maiden who has no husband to protect her, with the flower which grows in the field, as contrasted with that which blooms in the shelter of a garden. In another hymeneal, Sappho compares the bridegroom to a young and slender sapling . But she does not dwell upon such images as these alone ; she also compares him to Ares §, and his deeds to those of Achilles || ; and here her lyre may have assumed a loftier tone than that which usually characterised it. But there was another kind of hymeneal among the songs of Sappho, which furnished occasion to a sort of petulant pleasantry. In this the maidens try to snatch away the bride as she is led to the bridegroom, and vent their mockery on his friend who stands before the door, and is thence called the Porterf. Sappho also composed hymns to the gods, in which she invoked them to come from their favourite abodes in different countries ; but there is little information extant respecting their contents. § 10. The poems of Sappho are little susceptible of division into distinct classes. Hence the ancient critics divided them into books, merely according to the metre, the first containing the odes in the Sapphic metre, and so on. The hymeneals were thus placed in different books. The rhythmical construction of her odes was essentially the same as that of Alcreus, yet with many variations, in harmony with the softer character of her poetry, and easily perceptible upon a careful compa- rison of the several metres. How great was Sappho's fame among the Greeks, and how rapidly it spread throughout Greece, may be seen in the history of Solon**, who was a contemporary of the Lesbian poetess. Hearing his nephew recite "Oitom lor o.k^otu.'Tu, iuQovro }> ftaXoh/itivr,!;. Ov fihv IxXiXaQovr' ) aXX' ohx Vfrvvavr' Ix'ixiitQczi. The fragment is in Walz, Rhetores Grseci, vol. viii. p. 883, Ilimerius, Orat. I. 4. § 1G. cites something similar from a hymenaeus of Sappho. jf 0'ia.v tu.v vdxivtfov iv ou^itri i'o'i/ji.ivis av^^t; •xoasl xctTaUTUpavst' %up.a) 2s T£ vogfugav «^e;. Demetrius de elocut. c. 106, quotes these verses without a name; but it can scarcely be doubted that they are Sappho's. In Catullus, the young women use the same image as the young men in Sappho. J Fragm. 42. Blomf. 34. Neue. § Fragm. 39. Blomf. 73. Neue. % Fragm. 43. Blomf. 38. Neue. It Is worthy of remark, that Demetrius de elocut. c. 167, expressly mentions the chorus in relation to this fragment. N2
 * OTov to yXuzupccXov tozvfarai clx/ioj i;r' oo^y,
 * Ilimerius, Orat. 1.4. 5 16.
 * In Stobseus, Serm. xxix. 28