Philemon (poet)

Born in Soly in Cilicia or Syracuse in Sicily , 330 years BC. er moved to Athens when, as you know, he began to put comedies.

In Athens, began to act as a comic poet , competing with Menander ; His first comedy was Ὑποβολιμαῖος .

Over time, he achieved great popularity, as he repeatedly won victories over his young contemporary and rival Menander , whose delicate wit was clearly inferior to Philemon's comedies. If Philemon often defeated Menander, the reason for this was not intrigue and intrigue, but the fact that Menander understood the significance of the new comedy much stricter and kept this new trend with more consistency than Philemon, and thus only made others recognize this new kind of poetry. Menander refrained from any personal satire and significantly narrowed the framework in the development of the action itself, thus giving more space to the development of characters. As a result, in the description Philemon stood below Menander, but surpassed him in the interest of the action, which he knew how to add to his comedies through intrigue in action. Therefore, the Athenians, still accustomed to the wealth of comic positions, to the clownish witticism and humor in the ancient and middle comedy, awarded prizes for the most part to Philemon. However, he was sometimes victorious and left Athens for several years either as a result of one of his defeats, or as a result of Ptolemy’s invitation to come to Alexandria .

With the exception of a short stay in Egypt during the reign of Ptolemy II Philadelphus , Philemon spent his life in Athens.

He lived to a ripe old age and died in the midst of his creative activity, approximately in 262 BC, according to history, at the time of his celebration on the stage.

Along with Menander and Dyfil was the most famous poet of the ancient Greek comedy.

Of his ninety-seven works, fifty-seven are known to us by name, and, moreover, excerpts are preserved. The two dramas are especially known because they are preserved in the imitation of Plavt , namely Ἔμπορος (Mercator Plavats) and Θησαυρός (Truminmus Plavats).

His comedies about morals, in which frantic humor, unexpected plot twists and moralism were mixed, were extremely popular, and a century passed before the more sophisticated Menander overtook him in popularity.

His son, Philemon too, was also a comic poet and left 54 ​​dramas, which, however, were soon probably connected with the works of his father.

• Philemon // Brockhaus and Efron Small Encyclopedic Dictionary : 4 tons. - SPb. , 1907-1909.
• Philemon // The Real Dictionary of Classical Antiquities / ed.-comp. F. Lubker ; Edited by members of the Society of Classical Philology and Pedagogy F. Gelbke , L. Georgievsky , F. Zelinsky , V. Kansky , M. Kutorgi and P. Nikitin . - SPb. 1885.
• Philemon (Eng.)