Alcaeus on the career of Myrsilos: Greeks, Lydians and Luwians at the east Aegean-west Anatolian interface

Dale, A. M.

doi:10.1017/s0075426911000024

Cited by 11 publications

(4 citation statements)

References 16 publications

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“…1274b18-19) that Pittakos did not change the traditional constitution, we must assume that pryanis and the basileis were traditional in Mytilene, probably heading the state during the Penthilid rule. The Penthilids, like the following ‚tyrants', could have used the title prytanis, as suggested by Lenz (1993) 297 (the suggestion of Dale [2011] 22 that the title of the 7 th century Mytilenean rulers was myrsilos finds no direct support in the sources and assumes that the poems of Alkaios were gravely misunderstood by the ancients). Mytilene could have been a polis where tyranny emerged from the position of the highest ranking official (Aristot.…”

Section: Mytilenementioning

confidence: 99%

Basileus, tyrannosand polis. The Dynamics of Monarchy in Early Greece

Kõiv¹

2016

Klio

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The article scrutinizes the development of the forms of leadership in the Early Iron Age and Archaic Greece, questioning the traditional view that per sonal leadership as described in the Homeric epics (the ‚Homeric basileia') was the rule during the Early Iron Age, but was replaced in the Archaic period by col lective aristocracies, and by tyrannies as a principally new kind of monarchy. The article questions the strict distinction between the ‚constitutional' forms of government like basileia and oligarchy, and tyrannis as an illegal break of the con stitutional order. The Early Iron Age archaeology supplies no evidence for institu tionalised and permanent personal leadership, and the Homeric epic, presenting a controversial vision of an ostensibly distant past, cannot be accepted as a reli able guide to the sociopolitical order of the Early Iron Age. The terms basileus and tyrannos were used largely synonymously until ca 400, demonstrating that the Archaic Greeks did not distinguish between legitimate basileia and illegal tyrannis in their contemporary world. The evidence, including the halflegendary accounts concerning particular poleis, suggests that the more or less firmly established monarchies emerged from the eighth century onwards. On the other hand, it infers constant tensions between competing elite groups striving for power, and the consequent fluctuation of the forms of government in the Archaic. The situation could have been similar during the Early Iron Age, which suggests that Early Iron Age Greeks were familiar with both collective and personal lead ership. The emergence of tyrannies and collectively governed poleis can be seen as varying, alternative, ways of polity formation resulting from the quickening development and growing tensions from the eighth century onwards; the legiti macy of both depended on local circumstances. Tyranny appears not as a break of established aristocratic order, but as the monarchic form of elite leadership; the legitimacy of both depended on local circumstances. Tyranny appears as the monarchic form of elite leadership in the early polis, which proved, however, unaccept able in the long term as personal rule became increasingly regarded as an undesirable negation of consensual order.

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Section: Mytilenementioning

confidence: 99%

Basileus, tyrannosand polis. The Dynamics of Monarchy in Early Greece

Kõiv¹

2016

Klio

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“… 14 For discussion of Lesbian history in this period based on textual sources, see, for example, Mazzarino (1943); Page (1955); Ferrari (2010); Dale (2011); Gagné (2013) 210–26.…”

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confidence: 99%

“…On the Kleanaktids see also Ferrari (2010) 9–12 and 18–19, for whom Melankhros, Myrsilos and Sappho were Kleanaktids. On Myrsilos see Dale (2011), where I raise the possibility that mursilos might have been a title applied to both Melankhros and Pittakos.…”

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“… 49 Dale (2011) 17 with further references. Following Yakubovich (2019) 310–11, the underlying stem is likely qaλmu - rather than qaλmλu - as previously read, while the etymology proposed by Carruba (2006), from Luwian * kuwala(n)muwa -, ‘warlord’, ‘having the strength of the army’, would be another instance of Luwian vocabulary continued in Lydian.…”

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Alcaeus, Pittakos ‘son of “Hyrras”’, and the Lesbian aristocracy, or ‘How to do things with words’

Dale

2023

J. Hell. Stud.

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This paper offers a reassessment of the representation of Pittakos, tyrant of Lesbos, in Alcaeus’ verse. I begin by examining the textual evidence for Pittakos’ father, Hyrras, before progressing to re-evaluate the evidence for the aristocratic clans of Lesbos as attested in the Lesbian poets. Building on this, and with reference to the patronymic/gentilic Arkheanaktidās seemingly used of Pittakos in Alcaeus, I relate the preponderance of patronymic forms found in Alcaeus’ verse to the iambic and comedic use of ‘characterizing’ patronymics in -(ι)δᾱς. I then argue that both ῎Υρρας and Ἀρχϵανακτίδας are to be interpreted via a cross-cultural and bilingual rhetoric of kingship, with the latter being in essence a calque of a Lydian intermediary of the Luwian designation ura- handawati-, ‘great king’, with ὔρρας and its derivatives in Alcaeus a nominalization of the Luwian adjectival stem ura-, ‘great’. This argument is then related to the increasing evidence for Lesbos as a central locus for Graeco-Anatolian cultural exchange. The end result is a comprehensive reassessment of historical reconstructions emanating from the texts of Sappho and Alcaeus, as well as a reassessment of Alcaeus’ poetic objectives in his attacks on Pittakos, ‘son of Hyrras’.

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2021

The Herodotus Encyclopedia

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Alcaeus on the career of Myrsilos: Greeks, Lydians and Luwians at the east Aegean-west Anatolian interface

Cited by 11 publications

References 16 publications

Basileus, tyrannosand polis. The Dynamics of Monarchy in Early Greece

Basileus, tyrannosand polis. The Dynamics of Monarchy in Early Greece

Alcaeus, Pittakos ‘son of “Hyrras”’, and the Lesbian aristocracy, or ‘How to do things with words’

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