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Bible Encyclopedias
Diphilus
1911 Encyclopedia Britannica
or 'DIPHILUS, of Sinope, poet of the new Attic comedy and contemporary of Menander (342-291 B.C.). Most of his plays were written and acted at Athens, but he led a wandering life, and died at Smyrna. He was on intimate terms with the famous courtesan Gnathaena (Athenaeus xiii. pp. 579, 583). He is said to have written zoo comedies, the titles of fifty of which are preserved. He sometimes acted himself. To judge from the imitations of Plautus. (Casina from the KMpoiwEvot, Asinaria from the OvaySs, Rudens from some other play), he was very skilful in the construction of his plots. Terence also tells us that he introduced into the Adelphi (ii. 1) a scene from the Zvvawr09v7'7QKOVTES, which had been omitted by Plautus in his adaptation (Commorientes) of the same play. The style of Diphilus was simple and natural, and his language on the whole good Attic; he paid great attention to versification, and was supposed to have invented a peculiar kind of metre. The ancients were undecided whether to class him among the writers of the New or Middle comedy. In his fondness for mythological subjects (Hercules, Theseus) and his introduction on the stage (by a bold anachronism) of the poets Archilochus and Hipponax as rivals of Sappho, he approximates to the spirit of the latter.
Fragments in H. Koch, Comicorum Atticorum fragmenta, ii.; see J. Denis, La Comedie grecque (1886), ii. p. 414; R. W. Bond in Classical Review (Feb. 1910, with trans. of Emporos fragm.).
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Chisholm, Hugh, General Editor. Entry for 'Diphilus'. 1911 Encyclopedia Britanica. https://www.studylight.org/encyclopedias/eng/bri/d/diphilus.html. 1910.
