Pherecrates (

Greek Greek may refer to: Greece Anything of, from, or related to Greece, a country in Southern Europe: *Greeks, an ethnic group. *Greek language, a branch of the Indo-European language family. **Proto-Greek language, the assumed last common ancestor ...

: Φερεκράτης) was a

poet A poet is a person who studies and creates poetry. Poets may describe themselves as such or be described as such by others. A poet may simply be the creator ( thinker, songwriter, writer, or author) who creates (composes) poems ( oral or wri ...

of Athenian

Old Comedy Old Comedy (''archaia'') is the first period of the ancient Greek comedy, according to the canonical division by the Alexandrian grammarians.Mastromarco (1994) p.12 The most important Old Comic playwright is Aristophanes – whose works, with the ...

, and a rough contemporary of

Cratinus Cratinus ( grc-gre, Κρατῖνος; 519 BC – 422 BC) was an Athenian comic poet of the Old Comedy. Life Cratinus was victorious 27 known times, eight times at the City Dionysia, first probably in the mid-to-late 450s BCE (IG II2 2325. 50), ...

, Crates and

Aristophanes Aristophanes (; grc, Ἀριστοφάνης, ; c. 446 – c. 386 BC), son of Philippus, of the deme Kydathenaion ( la, Cydathenaeum), was a comic playwright or comedy-writer of ancient Athens and a poet of Old Attic Comedy. Eleven of his for ...

. He was victorious at least once at the

City Dionysia The Dionysia (, , ; Greek: Διονύσια) was a large festival in ancient Athens in honor of the god Dionysus, the central events of which were the theatrical performances of dramatic tragedies and, from 487 BC, comedies. It was the s ...

, first probably in the mid-440s (IG II2 2325. 56; the fourth entry after Teleclides and three poets whose names have been lost, and just before

Hermippus Hermippus ( grc-gre, Ἕρμιππος; fl. 5th century BC) was the one-eyed Athenian writer of the Old Comedy, who flourished during the Peloponnesian War. Life He was the son of Lysis, and the brother of the comic poet Myrtilus. He was younger t ...

), and twice at the

Lenaia The Lenaia ( grc, Λήναια) was an annual Athenian festival with a dramatic competition. It was one of the lesser festivals of Athens and Ionia in ancient Greece. The Lenaia took place in Athens in Gamelion, roughly corresponding to January. T ...

, first probably in the mid- to late 430s (IG II2 2325. 122; just after Cratinus and just before Hermippus). He was especially famous for his inventive imagination, and the elegance and purity of his diction are attested by the epithet Ἀττικώτατος (most Attic) applied to him by

Athenaeus Athenaeus of Naucratis (; grc, Ἀθήναιος ὁ Nαυκρατίτης or Nαυκράτιος, ''Athēnaios Naukratitēs'' or ''Naukratios''; la, Athenaeus Naucratita) was a Greek rhetorician and grammarian, flourishing about the end of th ...

and the

sophist A sophist ( el, σοφιστής, sophistes) was a teacher in ancient Greece in the fifth and fourth centuries BC. Sophists specialized in one or more subject areas, such as philosophy, rhetoric, music, athletics, and mathematics. They taught ' ...

Phrynichus. He was the inventor of a new

meter The metre (British spelling) or meter (American spelling; see spelling differences) (from the French unit , from the Greek noun , "measure"), symbol m, is the primary unit of length in the International System of Units (SI), though its pref ...

, called after him, the

Pherecratean Aeolic verse is a classification of Ancient Greek lyric poetry referring to the distinct verse forms characteristic of the two great poets of Archaic Lesbos, Sappho and Alcaeus, who composed in their native Aeolic dialect. These verse forms wer ...

, which frequently occurs in the choruses of

Greek tragedies Greek tragedy is a form of theatre from Ancient Greece and Greek inhabited Anatolia. It reached its most significant form in Athens in the 5th century BC, the works of which are sometimes called Attic tragedy. Greek tragedy is widely believed t ...

and in Horace. According to an anonymous essay on tragedy, Pherecrates wrote 18 plays, suggesting that one or more of the 19 surviving titles must be eliminated somehow (i.e. by assigning the play to another author who wrote a comedy by the same name, and assuming an ancient scholarly error, or by identifying e.g. The Human Heracles and The Fake Heracles as a single play with multiple titles).

Surviving Titles and Fragments

288 fragments (including six dubia) of his comedies survive, along with the following 19 titles: *''Agathoi'' ("The Good Men") *''Agrioi'' ("The Wild Men," or "The Savages") *''Anthropherakles'' ("The Human Heracles"; possibly the same play as ''Pseuderakles'') *''Automoloi'' ("The Deserters") *''Graes'' ("The Old Women," or "The Hags") *''Doulodidaskalos'' ("The Slave Teacher") *''Epilesmon'' ("The Forgetful Man") or ''Thalatta'' ("The Sea") *''Ipnos'' ("The Kitchen") or ''Pannychis'' (The All-Night Festival") *''Korianno'' ("Corianno") *''Krapataloi'' ("The Good-For-Nothings") *''Leroi'' ("Jewelry") *''Metalles'' ("The Miners") *''Metoikoi'' ("The Resident Aliens") *''Myrmekanthropoi'' ("The Ant-Men") *''Persai'' ("The Persians") *''Petale'' ("Petale") *''Tyrannis'' ("Tyranny") *''Cheiron'' ("

Chiron In Greek mythology, Chiron ( ; also Cheiron or Kheiron; ) was held to be the superlative centaur amongst his brethren since he was called the "wisest and justest of all the centaurs". Biography Chiron was notable throughout Greek mythology ...

") *''Pseuderakles'' ("The Fake Heracles"; possibly the same play as ''Anthropherakles'') The standard edition of the fragments and testimonia is in

Rudolf Kassel Rudolf Kassel (11 May 1926 – 26 February 2020) was a German classical philologist. He was a professor at the Free University of Berlin from 1963 to 1975 and subsequently the University of Cologne from 1975 until his retirement in 1991. Career Ka ...

and

Colin François Lloyd Austin Colin François Lloyd Austin, FBA (26 July 1941 – 13 August 2010) was a British scholar of ancient Greek. Biography Colin Austin was born in Melbourne, Australia, in 1941, the second son of Lloyd James Austin (1915–1994) and of Jeanne-Fra ...

's ''Poetae Comici Graeci'' Vol. VII. The eight-volume ''Poetae Comici Graeci'' produced from 1983 to 2001 replaces the outdated collections ''Fragmenta Comicorum Graecorum'' by

August Meineke Johann Albrecht Friedrich August Meineke (also ''Augustus Meineke''; ; 8 December 179012 December 1870), German classical scholar, was born at Soest in the Duchy of Westphalia. He was father-in-law to philologist Theodor Bergk.

(1839-1857), ''Comicorum Atticorum Fragmenta'' by

Theodor Kock Theodor is a masculine given name. It is a German form of Theodore. It is also a variant of Teodor. List of people with the given name Theodor * Theodor Adorno, (1903–1969), German philosopher * Theodor Aman, Romanian painter * Theodor Blueg ...

(1880-1888) and ''Comicorum Graecorum Fragmenta'' by

Georg Kaibel Georg Kaibel (30 October 1849 – 12 October 1901) was a German classical philologist born in Lübeck. He was a leading authority of Greek epigraphy and epigrammatics He studied classical philology at the Universities of Göttingen and Bonn. ...

(1899).

References

* * {{Authority control Ancient Greek dramatists and playwrights Old Comic poets 5th-century BC Athenians Year of birth unknown Year of death unknown