Page:History of the Literature of Ancient Greece (Müller) 2ed.djvu/469

447 LITERATURE OF ANCIENT GREECE. 447 the public in general assumed the character rather of isolated and mo- mentary gratifications than that of a poetic expression of prevailing sentiments and principles. However, Lyric poetry was improved in a very remarkable manner, and struck out tones which seized with new power upon the spirit of the age. This was principally effected by the new Dithyramb, the cradle and home of which was Athens, before all the cities of Greece, even though some of the poets who adopted this form were not born there. As wc have remarked above,* Lasus of Hermione, the rival of Si- monides, and the teacher of Pindar, in those early days exhibited his dithyrambs chiefly at Athens, and even in his poems the dithyrambic rhythm had gained the greater freedom by which it was from thence forth characterized. Still the dithyrambs of Lasus were not generically different from those of Pindar, of which we still possess a beautiful fragment. This dithyramb was designed for the vernal Dionysia at Athens, and it really seems to breathe the perfumes and smile with the brightness of spring. t The rhythmical structure of the fragment is bold and rich, and a lively and almost violent motion prevails in it ; I but this motion is subjected to the constraint of fixed laws, and all the separate parts are carefully incorporated in the artfully constructed whole. We also see from this fragment that the strophes of the dithyrambic ode were already made very long ; from principles, however, which will be stated in the sequel, we must conclude that there were antistroplu s corresponding to tliese strophes. § 2. The dithyramb assumed a new character in the hands of Me- laniitides of Melos. He was maternal grandson of the older Melan- ippides, who was born ahout 01. 65. B.C. 520, and was contemporary with Pindar ;§ the younger and more celebrated Melanippides lived for a long period with Perdiccas, king of Macedon, who reigned from about 01. 81, 2. b.c. 454, to 01. 91, 2. b.c. 414 ; consequently, hefore and during the greater part of the Peloponnesian war. The comic poet Pherecrates (who, like Aristophanes, was in favour of maintaining the old simple music as an essential part of the old-fashioned morality) considers the corruption of the ancient musical modes as having com- menced with him. Closely connected with this change is the increasing importance of instrumental music ; in consequence of which the flute- players, after the time of Melanippides, no longer received their hire % The paonic Bpecies of rhythms, to which the ancients especially assign "the splendid," (to ftsyaXovpivU,) is the prevailing one iii this fragment. § That the younger Melanippides is the person with whom, according to the eelebrated verses of Pherecrates, (Plutarch de Musica, HO. Meineke /•>. Com. Gr., vol.11. p. 326,) tlu' corruption of music begins, is clear, partly from the direct statement of Suidas, partly from his chronological relation to Cinesias and Phi- loxenus. The celebrated Melanippides was also the contemporary of Thucydides, (Marcellin. V. Thucyd. § 29,) and of Socrates, (Xenoph. Mem., 1. '• {> 3.)
 * Chap. XIV. § L4. t Sce above, Chap. XIV. § 7.