Pindar
517 BCE – 437 BCE · aged 80
5th-century BC Greek lyric poet
- Born
- 517 BCE · Cynocephalus
- Died
- 437 BCE · Argos
Life timeline
Their life from birth to death. On the timeline, world events of the time are shown faintly.
- 517 BCEBornBorn in Cynocephalus
- 437 BCEDiedDied in Argos
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Meanwhile in the world
Major world events during their lifetime (517 BCE – 437 BCE).
- 509 BCE – 27 BCERoman Republic
- 480 BCEBattle of Thermopylae
Biography
Pindar (Ancient Greek: Πίνδαρος Pindaros [píndaros]; Latin: Pindarus; c. 518 BC – c. 438 BC) was an Ancient Greek lyric poet from Thebes. Of the canonical nine lyric poets of ancient Greece, his work is the best preserved. Quintilian wrote, "Of the nine lyric poets, Pindar is by far the greatest, in virtue of his inspired magnificence, the beauty of his thoughts and figures, the rich exuberance of his language and matter, and his rolling flood of eloquence, characteristics which, as Horace rightly held, make him inimitable." His poems can also, however, seem difficult and even peculiar. The Athenian comic playwright Eupolis once remarked that they "are already reduced to silence by the disinclination of the multitude for elegant learning".
Pindar was the first Greek poet to reflect on the nature of poetry and on the poet's role. His poetry illustrates the beliefs and values of Archaic Greece at the dawn of the Classical period.
Text from the Wikipedia article Pindar, CC BY-SA 4.0
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