Nonnus

For other people named Nonnus, see Nonnus (disambiguation)
A mosaic of Dionysus from Antioch.

Nonnus of Panopolis (/ˈnɒnəs/; Greek: Νόννος ὁ Πανοπολίτης) was a Greek epic poet. He was a native of Panopolis (Akhmim) in the Egyptian Thebaid, and probably lived at the end of the 4th or in the 5th century. He is known as the composer of the Dionysiaca, an epic tale of the god Dionysus, and the Metabole, a paraphrase of the Gospel of John.

Life

There is almost no evidence for the life of Nonnus. It is known that he was a native of Panopolis (Akhmim) in Upper Egypt, by his naming in manuscripts and the reference in epigram 9.198 of the Palatine Anthology.[1] Scholars have generally dated him from the end of the 4th to the central years of the 5th century AD. He must have lived after the composition of Claudian's Greek Gigantomachy (after 394–397 AD) with which he appears to be familiar, but before Agathias Scholasticus' reference to him as a "recent author" (in Hist. 4.23), i.e. before 530–580.[2]

He is known for his 48-book poem the Dionysiaca, the longest surviving poem in Greek from antiquity (it is only 7,000 lines shorter than the Iliad and Odyssey combined) and for the “Paraphrase of the Gospel of John”, which is thought by certain verbal echoes to have been composed before the Dionysiaca.[3]

The Dionysiaca

Main article: Dionysiaca

Nonnus' principal work is the Dionysiaca, an epic in 48 books, the longest surviving poem from antiquity at 20,426 lines, composed in Homeric dialect and dactylic hexameters, the main subject of which is the life of Dionysus, his expedition to India, and his triumphant return to the west. The poem is thought to have been written in the early 5th century.

The Metabole kata Ioannou

Also surviving is his paraphrase of the Gospel of John. A team of Italian scholars is currently producing a full commentary of the poem, book by book, of which several parts have already been published. They have shown that Nonnus was as learned in Christian theology (in particular he seems to have consulted the Commentary on the Gospel of John Cyril of Alexandria had recently penned) as in pagan myth.

See also

Notes

  1. ↑ On the references to Egypt in the poem, see D. Gigli Piccardi (1998), “Nonno e l’Egitto”, Prometheus 24, 61-82 and 161-81. Enrico Livrea has proposed the identification of the poet with the Syrian bishop of Edessa of the same name: see E. Livrea (1987), “Il poeta e il vescovo: la questione nonniana e la storia”, Prometheus 13, 97-123
  2. ↑ Fornaro, S. s.v. Nonnus in Brill's New Pauly vol. 9 (ed. Canick & Schneider) (Leiden, 2006) col.812–815
  3. ↑ Vian, Francis. '"Mârtus" chez Nonnos de Panopolis. Étude de sémantique et de chronologie.' REG 110, 1997, 143-60. Reprinted in: L'Épopée posthomérique. Recueil d'études. Ed. Domenico Accorinti. Alessandria: Edizioni dell'Orso, 2005 (Hellenica 17), 565-84

Bibliography

Complete and updated bibliography: https://sites.google.com/site/hellenisticbibliography/empire/nonnus

Modern editions and translations of the Dionysiaca:

Modern editions and translations of the Paraphrase:

A team of (mainly) Italian scholars are now re-editing the text, book by book, with ample introductions and notes. Published so far:

On Nonnus and his context:

On the metre:

On the Paraphrase:

External links