Greek Lyric
Olympus
Testimonia Vitae Atque Artis
1 Sud. O 221 (iii 522 Adler)
Ὄλυμπος. Φρύξ, νεώτερος, αὐλητὴς γεγονὼς ἐπὶ Μίδου τοῦ Γορδίου.
cf. O 219 Ὄλυμπος· Μαίονος, Μυσός, αὐλητὴς καὶ ποιητὴς μελῶν καὶ ἐλεγείων, ἡγεμών τε γενόμενος τῆς κρουματικῆς μουσικῆς τῆς διὰ τῶν αὐλῶν· μαθητὴς καὶ ἐρώμενος Μαρσύου, τὸ γένος ὄντος Σατύρου, ἀκουστοῦ δὲ καὶ παιδὸς Ὑάγνιδος. γέγονε δὲ πρὸ τῶν Τρωϊκῶν ὁ Ὄλυμπος, ἐξ οὗ τὸ ὄρος τὸ ἐν Μυσίᾳ ὀνομάζεται. Ο 220 Ὄλυμπος· ὁ τοὺς νόμους τῆς κιθαρῳδίας ἐνθεὶς καὶ διδάξας.
2 [Plut.] Mus. 5. 1132ef (p. 113 Lasserre, vi 3. 5 Ziegler)
Ἀλέξανδρος δ᾿ ἐν τῇ Συναγωγῇ τῶν περὶ Φρυγίας (fr. 77 Jacoby) κρούματα Ὄλυμπον ἔφη πρῶτον εἰς τοὺς Ἕλληνας κομίσαι, ἔτι δὲ καὶ τοὺς Ἰδαίους
Olympus
Olympus
Life And Works
1 Suda, Olympus1
A Phrygian, the younger Olympus of the two, a piper; lived2 in the time of Midas3 son of Gordius.
2 ‛Plutarch’, On Music
Alexander1 in his Collected Materials on Phrygia said that Olympus was the first to introduce instrumental music to Greece2 along with the Idaean
- 1Suda (O 219) lists also ‘Olympus, a Maeonian from Mysia, a piper and a composer of songs and elegiacs, the earliest performer of instrumental music for the pipes; pupil and favourite of Marsyas, who was a Satyr by birth and was the pupil and son of Hyagnis. Olympus lived before the Trojan Wars. The mountain in Mysia is named after him’; also (O 220) ‘Olympus, who devised and taught the tunes of cithara-song’. The earlier Olympus, pupil of the Satyr Marsyas and wrestler with Pan (Plin. N.H. 36. 5. 35), is presumably fictitious; the view that there were two musicians of the name appears first in Pratinas (713(i) P.M.G.) and Glaucus of Rhegium.
- 2Less probably, ‘born’.
- 3King of Phrygia (738–696 b.c.): cf. Terp. test. 5.
- 1Alexander ‘Polyhistor’ (1st c. b.c.).
- 2Cf. Telestes P.M.G. 806, Eur. I.A. 576 ff., Pl. Laws 3. 677d, Str. 10. 3. 14.