Ibycus
（
Ἴβυκος). A Greek lyric and erotic poet of Rhegium in
Lower Italy, who flourished about B.C. 530. Like Anacreon, he led a roving life, and spent
much of his time at the court of Polycrates of Samos. According to his epitaph, he died in his
native town; but according to the legend made familiar by Schiller's poem, he was slain on a
journey to Corinth, and his murderers were discovered by means of a flock of cranes, which, as
he died, he had invoked as his avengers. The story goes that, after his murder, when the
Corinthians were gathered in the theatre, the cranes appeared; whereupon one of the assassins
who was present cried out, “See the avengers of Ibycus!” thus giving a
clue to their detection. Hence arose the expression used of the cranes,
Ἰβύκου γέρανοι. His poems, which were collected into seven books, survive in
scanty fragments only. They dealt partly with mythological themes in the metres of Stesichorus
and partly with love-songs in the spirit of Aeolic lyric poetry, full of glowing passion and
sensibility. It was mainly to the latter that he owed his fame. The fragments are given in
Schneidewin's Delectus Poesis Graecorum Elegiacae (1833), and
Bergk's
Poetae Lyrici Graeci (vol. ii.). See
Holsten, De
Stesichori et Ibyci Dialecto et Copia Verborum (1884).
