[91] The woman has surpassed the man, if not in poetical achievement, at least in her effect on the imagination of after ages. A whole host of poetesses sprang up in different parts of Greece after her-Corinna and Myrtis in Boeotia, Telesilla in Argos, Praxilla in Sikyon; while Erinna, writing in the fourth century, still calls herself a 'comrade' of Sappho.
ALCAEUS spent his life in wars, first against Athens for the possession of Sigeum, where, like Archilochus, he left his shield for the enemy to dedicate to Athena; then against the democratic tyrant Melanchros and his successor Myrsilos. At last the Lesbians stopped the civil strife by appointing Pittacus, the 'Wise Man,' dictator, and Alcaeus left the island for fifteen years. He served as a soldier of fortune in Egypt and elsewhere: his brother Antimenidas took service with Nebuchadnezzar, and killed a Jewish or Egyptian giant in single combat. Eventually the poet was pardoned and invited home. His works filled ten books in Alexandria; they were all 'occasional poetry,' hymns, political party-songs (στασιωτικά), drinking-songs, and love-songs. His strength seems to have lain in the political and personal reminiscences, the "hardships of travel, banishment, and war," that Horace speaks of. Sappho and Alcaeus are often represented together on vases, and the idea of a romance between them was inevitable. Tradition gives a little address of his in a Sapphic metre, "Thou violet-crowned, pure, softly-smiling Sappho," and an answer from Sappho in Alcaics-a delicate mutual compliment. Every line of Alcaeus has charm. The stanza called after him is a magnificent metrical invention. His language is spontaneous and musical; it seems to come straight from a heart as [92]
