LEONIDAS OF TARENTUM

flourished 3rd century BC Greek poet more important for his influence on the later Greek epigram than for his own poems. Leonidas was among the earlier Hellenistic epigrammatists, and about 100 of his epigrams survive, all but two collected in the Greek Anthology. They contain little personal information; he speaks of himself as an impoverished wanderer who expected to die far from home. Leonidas is a facile versifier but seldom more. Not many of his sepulchral or dedicatory epigrams can have been intended for inscriptions; the deaths often seem contrived, the dedications highly ornate. For generations after his death, epigrammatists lacking inspiration aped his manner and composed variations on his poems.