The Text

The Fragments

Wharton numbers the fragments as Bergk numbered them in 1882 and groups them by metre. The modern number (Voigt, which keeps the numbering of Lobel and Page) follows his where the two are confirmed to name the same poem: fragment 2 here is Voigt 31. Each fragment’s page holds Wharton’s note on where it survives, the verse renderings he collected, and the Greek.

In Sapphic Metre

1 (Voigt 1): Immortal Aphrodite of the broidered throne, daughter of Zeus, weaver…
2 (Voigt 31): That man seems to me peer of gods, who sits…
3 (Voigt 34): The stars about the fair moon in their turn hide…
4 (Voigt 2): And round about the [breeze] murmurs cool through apple-boughs, and…
5 (Voigt 2): Come, goddess of Cyprus, and in golden cups serve nectar…
6 (Voigt 35): Or Cyprus and Paphos, or Panormus [holds] thee.
7, 8 (Voigt 40): But for thee will I [lead] to the altar [the…
9 (Voigt 33): This lot may I win, golden-crowned Aphrodite.
10 (Voigt 32): Who gave me their gifts and made me honoured.
11 (Voigt 160): This will I now sing deftly to please my girl-friends.
12 (Voigt 26): For they whom I benefit injure me most.
13 (Voigt 16): But that which one desires I ...
14 (Voigt 41): To you, fair maids, my mind changes not.
15: And this I feel in myself.
16 (Voigt 42): But their heart turned cold and they dropt their wings.
17 (Voigt 37): According to my weeping: it and all care let buffeting…
18 (Voigt 123): Me just now the golden-sandalled Dawn ...
19 (Voigt 39): A broidered strap of fair Lydian work covered her feet.
20 (Voigt 152): Shot with a thousand hues.
21 (Voigt 129,1): Me thou forgettest.
22 (Voigt 129, 2): Or lovest another more than me.
23: Ye are nought to me.
24: While ye will.
25 (Voigt 36): I yearn and seek ...
26: O Muse of the golden throne, raise that strain which…

In Dactylic Metre

27 (Voigt 158): When anger spreads through the breast, guard thy tongue from…

In Alcaic Metre

28 (Voigt 137): Hadst thou felt desire for things good or noble, and…

In Mixed Glyconic And Alcaic Metre

29 (Voigt 138): Stand face to face, friend ... and unveil the grace…

In Choriambic Metre

30 (Voigt 143): And golden pulse grew on the shores.
31 (Voigt 142): Leto and Niobe were friends full dear.
32 (Voigt 147): Men I think will remember us even hereafter.
33 (Voigt 49): I loved thee once, Atthis, long ago.
34 (Voigt 49): A slight and ill-favoured child didst thou seem to me.
35 (Voigt i.a. 5,2): Foolish woman, pride not thyself on a ring.
36 (Voigt 51): I know not what to do; my mind is divided.
37 (Voigt 52): I do not think to touch the sky with my…
38: And I flutter like a child after her mother.
39 (Voigt 136): Spring’s messenger, the sweet-voiced nightingale.
40 (Voigt 130): Now Love masters my limbs and shakes me, fatal creature,…
41 (Voigt 130): But to thee, Atthis, the thought of me is hateful;…
42 (Voigt 47): Now Eros shakes my soul, a wind on the mountain…
43 (Voigt 149): When all night long [sleep] holds their [eyes].
44 (Voigt 101): And purple napkins for thy lap ... (even these wilt…
45 (Voigt 118): Come now, divine shell, become vocal for me.
46 (Voigt 94): And tender woven garlands round tender neck
47 (Voigt 178): Fonder of maids than Gello.
48 (Voigt 144): Of Gorgo full weary.
49: Of a proud (or perfumed, or flowery) palace.
50: But I upon a soft cushion dispose my limbs.
51 (Voigt 141): And there the bowl of ambrosia was mixed, and Hermes…
52: The moon has set, and the Pleiades; it is midnight,…
53 (Voigt 154): The moon rose full, and the women stood as though…
54 (Voigt i.a.16): Thus at times with tender feet the Cretan women dance…
55: Then delicately in thick robe I sprang.
56 (Voigt 166): Leda they say once found an egg hidden under hyacinth-blossoms.
57 (Voigt 151): And dark-eyed Sleep, child of Night.
57A: Aphrodite’s handmaid bright as gold.
58 (Voigt 133): Andromeda has a fair requital.
59 (Voigt 133): Sappho, why [celebrate] blissful Aphrodite?
60 (Voigt 128): Come now, delicate Graces and fair-haired Muses.
61 (Voigt 153): A sweet-voiced maiden.
62 (Voigt 140?): Delicate Adonis is dying, Cytherea; what shall we do? Beat…
63: Ah for Adonis!
64 (Voigt 54): Coming from heaven wearing a purple mantle.
65 (Voigt 53): Come, rosy-armed pure Graces, daughters of Zeus.
66: But Ares says he would drag Hephaestus by force.
67 (Voigt 44): Many thousand cups thou drainest.
68 (Voigt 55): But thou shalt ever lie dead, nor shall there be…
69 (Voigt 56): No one maiden I think shall at any time see…
70 (Voigt 57): What country girl bewitches thy heart, who knows not how…
71: I taught Hero of Gyara, the swift runner.
72 (Voigt 120): I am not of a malignant nature, but have a…
73: But charming [maidens] plaited garlands.
74 (Voigt 159): Thou and my servant Love.
75 (Voigt 121): But if thou lovest us, choose another and a younger…
76 (Voigt 82): Mnasidica is more shapely than the tender Gyrinno.
77 (Voigt 91): Scornfuler than thee, Eranna, have I nowhere found.
78 (Voigt 81b): Do thou, Dica, set garlands round thy lovely hair, twining…
79 (Voigt 58): I love delicacy, and for me Love has the sun’s…
80: And down I set the cushion.
81 (Voigt 148): Wealth without thee, Worth, is no safe neighbour [but the…

In Various Metres

82 (Voigt 124): And thou thyself, Calliope.
83 (Voigt 126): Sleep thou in the bosom of thy tender girlfriend.
84 (Voigt 127): Hither now, Muses, leaving golden ...
85 (Voigt 132): I have a fair daughter with a form like a…
86 (Voigt 155): All joy to thee, daughter of Polyanax.

In The Ionic A Minore Metre

87 (Voigt 134): In a dream I spake with the daughter of Cyprus.
88 (Voigt 135): Why, lovely swallow, daughter of Pandīon, [weary] me?
89 (Voigt 100): She wrapped herself well in delicate hairy ...
90 (Voigt 102): Sweet Mother, I cannot weave my web, broken as I…

Epithalamia, Bridal Songs

91 (Voigt 111): Raise high the roof-beam, carpenters. (Hymenaeus!) Like Ares comes the…
92 (Voigt 106): Towering, as the Lesbian singer towers among men of other…
93 (Voigt 105a): As the sweet-apple blushes on the end of the bough,…
94 (Voigt 105b): As on the hills the shepherds trample the hyacinth under…
95 (Voigt 104a): Evening, thou that bringest all that bright morning scattered; thou…
96 (Voigt Alcaeus 304): I shall be ever maiden.
97 (Voigt 109): We will give, says the father ...
98 (Voigt 110b): To the doorkeeper feet seven fathoms long, and sandals of…
99: Happy bridegroom, now is thy wedding come to thy desire,…
100: And a soft [paleness] is spread over the lovely face.
101 (Voigt 50): He who is fair to look upon is [good], and…
102 (Voigt 107): Do I still long for maidenhood?
103 (Voigt 117): The bride [comes] rejoicing; let the bridegroom rejoice.
104 (Voigt 115): Whereunto may I well liken thee, dear bridegroom? To a…
105 (Voigt 116): Hail, bride! noble bridegroom, all hail!
106 (Voigt 113): For there was no other girl, O bridegroom, like her.
107, 108: Sing Hymenaeus! Ah for Adonis!
109 (Voigt 114): A. Maidenhood, maidenhood, whither art thou gone away from me?…
110: Fool, faint not thou in thy strong heart.
111 (Voigt 165): To himself he seems ...
112 (Voigt 167): Much whiter than an egg.
113 (Voigt 146): Neither honey nor bee for me.
114: Stir not the shingle.
115: Thou burnest us.
116 (Voigt 119): A napkin dripping.
117 (Voigt 164): She called him her son.

Epigrams

118: Maidens, dumb as I am, I speak thus, if any…
119: This is the dust of Timas, whom Persephone’s dark chamber…
120: Over the fisherman Pelagon his father Meniscus set weel and…

Miscellaneous

121 (Voigt 122): Reported by Athenaeus
122, 123 (Voigt 156): Far sweeter of tone than harp, more golden than gold.
124: Reported by Demetrius
125: Reported by Maximus Tyrius
126: My darling.
127: Reported by Aristides
128: Reported by Pollux
129: Reported by Philostratus
130: Reported by Libanius the rhetorician
131: Reported by Strabo
132: Reported by the Scholiast on Apollonius Rhodius
133 (Voigt 104b): Reported by Himerius
134: Reported by the Scholiast on Apollonius Rhodius
135: Reported by the Scholiast on Hesiod
136 (Voigt 150): Reported by Maximus Tyrius
137: Reported by Aristotle
138: Reported by Athenaeus
139: Reported by Athenaeus
140: Reported by Palaephătus
141: Reported by Wharton
142: Reported by Pausanias
143: Reported by Aulus Gellius
144: Reported by Servius
145: Reported by Servius
146: Reported by Philostratus
147: Reported by Himerius
148: Reported by Eustathius
149: Reported by the Lexicon Seguerianum
150: Reported by the Etymologicum Magnum
151: Reported by the Etymologicum Magnum
152: Reported by Apollonius
153: Reported by the Etymologicum Magnum
154: Reported by Athenaeus
155: Reported by Pollux
156: Reported by Phrynĭchus the grammarian
157: Reported by Hesychius
158: Reported by a Parisian MS. edited by Cramer
159: Reported by a Scholiast on Homer
160: Reported by Eustathius
161: Reported by Choeroboscus
162: Reported by Joannes Alexandrinus
163: Reported by an unknown author
164: Reported by a treatise on grammar edited by Cramer
165: Reported by Phrynichus
166: Reported by a Scholiast on Homer
167: Reported by Photius
168 (Voigt 162): Reported by the Etymologicum Magnum
169: Reported by Orion of Thebes
170: Reported by Pollux

The Fayum Fragments

Wharton’s account of these unnumbered fragments, with the letters as he read them.