The Development of Epigram into a Literary Genre

This chapter will provide an introduction to Hellenistic epigram. In the first part a survey of Hellenistic epigram down to the beginning of the Roman era will describe the major features concerning themes, subgenres, context, language, metre. The second part will focus on the development of epigram into a full-blown literary genre during the Hellenistic age. In this respect, the chapter intends to investigate the antecedents and the main steps of such development, paying a special attention to the oldest collections of epigrams preserved, to the epigrammatic art of variation and its possible origins, and to the contexts in which types of epigrams evolved. Scholars usually assume that Hellenistic epigrams can be classified in three main schools (Alexandrian, Peloponnesian and Phoenician school): such assumption must be revised in the light of the P.Mil.Vogl. VIII 309 recently published.