Alcaeus of Mytilene

Alcaeus of Mytilene was an ancient Greek poet from Mytilene, the main city of the island of Lesbos. Exact dates are uncertain, but most estimates place his life roughly between 620 and 580 BC. He wrote in the Aeolic dialect of Greek and belongs to the archaic period of lyric poetry. He matters for two reasons. Scholars in Hellenistic Alexandria counted him among the nine canonical lyric poets, and the Alcaic stanza takes its name from him, a form later poets such as Horace adopted.

Alcaeus was born into the aristocratic warrior class that dominated Mytilene, which was then the strongest city on Lesbos. The island's older ruling family, the Penthilids, had lost much of its power, and rival noble factions fought for control. Alcaeus and his older brothers were deeply involved in these struggles but rarely won them. They took part in overthrowing the tyrant Melanchrus, around 612 to 609 BC, though the poet was then still too young to play a major role. Later they plotted against the tyrant Myrsilus, only for Pittacus, once their ally, to betray them. Alcaeus went into exile and, when Myrsilus died, he greeted the news with a drinking song. Pittacus later took power and governed well, allowing some exiles home, yet he also drove out his opponents, Alcaeus among them. According to Herodotus, the poet threw away his shield to escape the Athenians during a fight over Sigeion, and he later wrote a poem about the episode. His years of exile probably took him to Lydia, Boeotia, Thrace and Egypt. How he died is unknown, though a battle is considered likely.

His poems were gathered into ten books by the scholars of Alexandria, with commentaries by Aristophanes of Byzantium and Aristarchus of Samothrace. Today we have only fragments, some no longer than a phrase, preserved through quotations by ancient writers and through papyri found in Egypt, including those from Oxyrhynchus. His work covered hymns to the gods, political and military songs, drinking songs and love poems, of which little survives. He wrote for his companions in a direct and often partisan voice, and his poems were sung by a single performer rather than a chorus. He shared a close bond with Sappho, his contemporary and fellow Lesbian. Later tradition held that the two were lovers, though there is no firm evidence for this.

His legacy lives on in the stanza form named after him and in Horace's admiration, since Horace took him as a model and translated some of his verses into Latin. Renaissance scholars brought his fragments back into print. The first modern edition appeared in Basel in 1556, and a fuller collection with commentary by Fulvio Orsini came out in Antwerp in 1568. He is remembered today as a major voice of Greek lyric poetry and as a poet who wrote directly about the political life of his time.