A Companion to Ancient Epigram

1. What Is an Epigram?: Defining a Genre
2. A Gallery of Characters: Real Persons and Fictitious Types in Epigram
3. Epigram, Society, and Political Power
4. Hidden Figures: The Women Who Wrote Epigrams
5. The Masculine and the Feminine in Epigram
6. Obscenity in Epigram
7. The Meters of Epigram: Elegy and Its Rivals
8. Epigram in Epic and Greek Tragedy: Generic Interactions
9. Epigram and Satire
10. Immanent Genre Theory in Greek and Roman Epigram
11. Epigram and Rhetoric
12. Greek Anthologies from the Hellenistic Age to the Byzantine Era: A Survey
13. The Origins of Greek Epigram: The Unity of Inscription and Object
14. Simonides of Ceos and Epigram in Classical Greece
15. The Development of Epigram into a Literary Genre
16. Anyte’s Feminine Voice: Tradition and Innovation
17. Leonidas of Tarentum
18. Callimachus on the Death of a Friend: A Short Study of Callimachean Epigram
19. Asclepiades of Samos
20. Posidippus and Ancient Epigram Books
21. Taking Position: Later Hellenistic Epigrammatists
22. Meleager of Gadara
23. Moving to Rome: Antipater of Sidon, Archias of Antiocheia, Philodemus, and Others
24. The Beginnings of Roman Epigram and Its Relationship with Hellenistic Poetry
25. Catullus as Epigrammatist
26. Latin Epigram in the Early Empire
27. Greek Epigram in Rome in the First Century ce
28. Epigrams in the Graffiti of Pompeii
29. Martial’s Early Works: The Liber Spectaculorum, Xenia, and Apophoreta
30. Micro to Macro: Martial’s Twelve Books of Epigrams
31. Carminis Incompti Lusus: The Carmina Priapea
32. Pseudo‐Senecan Epigrams
33. The Late Latin Literary Epigram (Third to Fifth Centuries ce)
34. Greek Epigram in Late Antiquity
35. Damasus and the Christian Epigram in the West
36. Gregory of Nazianzus and the Christian Epigram in the East
37. Inter Romulidas et Tyrias Manus: Luxorius and Epigram in Vandal Africa
38. Epigram in the Later Western Literary Tradition
39. The Epigram in Byzantium and Beyond

From Nestor’s inscribed cup to tombstones, bathroom walls, and Twitter tweets, the ability to express oneself concisely and elegantly, continues to be an important part of literary history unlike any other. This book examines the entire history of the epigram, from its beginnings as a purely epigraphic phenomenon in the Greek world, where it moved from being just a note attached to physical objects to an actual literary form of expression, to its zenith in late 1st century Rome, and further through a period of stagnation up to its last blooming, just before the beginning of the Dark Ages. A Companion to Ancient Epigram offers the first ever full-scale treatment of the genre from a broad international perspective. The book is divided into six parts, the first of which covers certain typical characteristics of the genre, examines aspects that are central to our understanding of epigram, and discusses its relation to other literary genres. The subsequent four parts present a diachronic history of epigram, from archaic Greece, Hellenistic Greece, and Latin and Greek epigrams at Rome, all the way up to late antiquity, with a concluding section looking at the heritage of ancient epigram from the Middle Ages up to modern times. Provides a comprehensive overview of the history of the epigram The first single-volume book to examine the entire history of the genre Scholarly interest in Greek and Roman epigram has steadily increased over the past fifty years Looks at not only the origins of the epigram but at the later literary tradition A Companion to Ancient Epigram will be of great interest to scholars and students of literature, world literature, and ancient and general history. It will also be an excellent addition to the shelf of any public and university library.