Difference between revisions of "Odes of Anacreon"

|link=https://catalog.swem.wm.edu/Record/3473586

|author=Anacreon

|publoc=Philadelphia

|lang=English

|desc=8vo (20 cm.)

}}[[File:AnacreonOdesOfAnacreon1804Illustration.jpg|left|thumb|200px|<center>Portrait of Anacreon.</center>]][http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Anacreon Anacreon] (582 BCE–485 BCE) was a Greek lyric poet born in Teos, an Ionian city on the coast of Asia Minor.<ref>[http://www.oxfordreference.com/view/10.1093/acref/9780199548545.001.0001/acref-9780199548545-e-0188  " Ana'creon”] in ''The Oxford Companion to Classical Literature'', ed. by M.C. Howatson (Oxford: Oxford University Press, 2011).</ref> He likely moved to Thrace in 545 BCE with others from his city when it was attacked by Persians. He then moved to Samos, to Athens, and possibly again to Thessaly, seeking a safe place to write his poems as his patrons (including Polycrates, tyrant of Samos, and Hipparchus, brother of Athenian tyrant Hippias) kept being murdered.<ref>Ibid.</ref> It is unknown where Anacreon died,<ref>Ibid</ref> though he lived to the unusually advanced age of 85.<ref>Marty Roth, "Anacreon’ and Drink Poetry; or, the Art of Feeling Very Very Good,” ''Texas Studies in Literature and Language'' 42, no. 3 (Fall 2000): 314.</ref><br/>

Few of Anacreon’s works survive, but those that do focus on wine, love (homosexual and heterosexual), and the overall pleasures of the legendary Roman symposium.<ref>[http://www.oxfordreference.com/view/10.1093/acref/9780192801463.001.0001/acref-9780192801463-e-120 "Anacreon"] in ''Oxford Dictionary of the Classical World'', ed. by John Roberts (Oxford: Oxford University Press, 2007).]</ref> Anacreon used various techniques in his writings, including self-deprecation and irony.<ref>Ibid.</ref> The collection of miscellaneous Greek poems from the Hellenistic Age and beyond known as the ''Anacreontea''<ref>Ibid.</ref> was “mistakenly labeled” with Anacreon’s name. Despite later appreciation for Anacreon’s ''true'' poems, his works were not appreciated during his lifetime.<ref>Roth, "Anacreon’ and Drink Poetry; or, the Art of Feeling Very Very Good,” 317.</ref><br />  

[[File:AnacreonOdesOfAnacreon1804Inscription.jpg|left|thumb|250px|<center>Stamp and inscription, front flyleaf.</center>]]Listed in the [[Jefferson Inventory]] of [[Wythe's Library]] as "Moore’s Anacreon. p. 8vo." This was one of the books kept by [[Thomas Jefferson]]. Jefferson later sold a copy of "Moore's Anacreon" to the Library of Congress in 1815, but it no longer exists to verify Wythe's prior ownership.<ref>E. Millicent Sowerby, ''Catalogue of the Library of Thomas Jefferson'' 2nd ed. (Charlottesville: University Press of Virginia, 1983), 4:478 (no.4406).</ref> The [https://digitalarchive.wm.edu/handle/10288/13433 Brown Bibliography]<ref> Bennie Brown, "The Library of George Wythe of Williamsburg and Richmond," (unpublished manuscript, May, 2012) Microsoft Word file. Earlier edition available at: https://digitalarchive.wm.edu/handle/10288/13433</ref> and [http://www.librarything.com/profile/GeorgeWythe George Wythe's Library]<ref>''LibraryThing'', s. v. [http://www.librarything.com/profile/GeorgeWythe "Member: George Wythe"], accessed October 8, 2013.</ref> on LibraryThing include the 1804 Philadelphia edition based on E. Millicent Sowerby's inclusion of that edition in ''Catalogue of the Library of Thomas Jefferson''. The Wolf Law Library purchased a copy of the same edition.

Bound in contemporary full calf with gilt rules, decorative elements, and lettering to spine and boards. Stamped "Sam Hopkins" and inscribed "Hopkins, 1820" on the front flyleaf.