Philoxĕnus
（
Φιλόξενος).
1.
A famous Greek dithyrambic poet, of Cythera, born in B.C. 435. He came as a prisoner of war
into the possession of the Athenian musician Melanippides, by whom he was educated and set
free. He lived long at Syracuse, at the court of the tyrant Dionysius I., who threw him into
the stone-quarries for outspoken criticism on his bad poems. On his escape from Sicily he
revenged himself on the tyrant, who was short-sighted or perhaps blind of one eye, by witty
raillery in the most famous of his twenty-four dithyrambs, the
Cyclops, which
describes the love of the one-eyed Polyphemus for the beautiful nymph Galatea. He died B.C.
380, at Ephesus, after visiting various places in Greece, Italy, and Asia Minor for the
public performance of his compositions. These were celebrated among the ancients for
originality of expression and rich variety of melody. We have only some considerable
fragments of a lyric poem entitled
The Banquet (
Δεῖπνον), in which the burlesque subject affords a comic
contrast to the dignified Doric rhythm. Edition by Bippart
(Leipzig, 1843), and
in Bergk,
Poet. Lyrici Graeci.
2.
A Macedonian officer of Alexander the Great who received from Perdiccas the government of
Cilicia in B.C. 321.
3.
An Alexandrian grammarian who taught in Rome and wrote on Homer and the Greek dialects,
besides compiling a glossary which has been preserved and edited by H. Stephanus
(Paris, 1573). See
Lexicon.
