Theognis and his Poems

Abstract

The collection of elegiac poems which bears the name of Theognis offers one of the most interesting problems in the literary history of Greece, and, in spite of many tentative solutions, it must be admitted that the origin and composition of this anthology still remain a mystery. We know that the Theognidea include poems composed by Tyrtaeus, Mimnermus, and Solon, and it is therefore by no means unlikely that they also include a great number of other elegies that can no longer be traced to their proper sources. As the object of the following article is to discuss a few points connected with the poet's life and political surroundings, we must first of all discover some test which will enable usto distinguish the genuine poems of Theognis from those of other poets represented in the collection. We can safely assume that Theognis is the author of all the elegies in Book I. which contain the name of Cyrnus, the young noble to whom the poet addressed so many of his didactic and political poems. For the name of Cyrnus is the σφρηγίς referred to by the poet in elegy 19–26, as something which will lead to the detection of the theft, if the poems are stolen. The σφρηγίςcannot, as some suppose, be the name of the poet himself: the mere insertion of the name of Theognis at the beginning or end of a collection of disconnected poems would afford no protection against plagiarism. What was wanted was a mark attached to each poem, and it is to serve this purpose that the vocative Κύρνε is so frequently introduced.