Poseidippus of Pella

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For other persons of the same name, see Poseidippus.

Poseidippus of Pella or Posidippus (Greek: Ποσείδιππος ὁ Πελλαῖος, c. 310 BC-240 BC) was a Macedonian Greek epigrammatic poet who adhered to Orphism. Born in the Macedonian capital of Pella, he lived for some time in Samos before moving permanently to the court of Ptolemy I Soter and later Ptolemy II Philadelphus in Alexandria, Egypt. An inscription from Thermon in Aetolia records that he was granted the liberties of that city in 264/3 BC. He was friends with the poets Asclepiades of Samos and Hedylus. Twenty-three of his poems were included in the Greek Anthology, and several more were quoted in either part or whole by Athenaeus of Naucratis in his Deipnosophistae.

Until 2001, it was assumed that Posidippus wrote only about drinking and love. In that year the Milan Papyrus P.Mil.Vogl. VIII 309 was recovered from the wrappings of an Egyptian mummy dating to about 180 BC. It contained 112 poems, two of which were previously known to have been written by Posidippus, which address subjects that include events of the court of the Ptolemaic dynasty, gemstones, and bird divination. Because of Posidippus' authorship of these two poems, scholars have concluded that the other poems of the Milan Papyrus were also written by him.