Sappho

Sappho

The most famous person who ever lived on the island of Lesvos is Sappho, Greece’s lyric poet. Very little is known about Sappho’s life and what is known is disputed. Scholars agree that she wrote 9 books of poetry, none of which has survived. It is also believed that she lived during a golden time of intellectual richness along the coast of Asia Minor. She was born at Eressos in 612 B.C. and she was known in her time as the Lesbian poet. Some scholars believe she was married and had a child but others say there is no evidence of this. Some believe her love poetry was written to women and that she was the centre of a “cult to Aphrodite,” and ran a type of school where women and girls were trained in the arts of music, dance and poetry to honour the muses. There is not much evidence to support various speculations which have developed over the centuries. All we have, really, are fragments of her poetry which survived on papyruses, figures on vase paintings, and writings of those who came after her. It is said that she was a genius who created a unique meter, called “the Sapphic meter“. She was named “the Tenth Muse” by Plato and the Latin poet Horace paid her the supreme compliment by imitating her meter and the unique structure of her odes. A huge statue of her is in the town’s square and her image appeared on coins of Mitilini

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