----------

[1] The first inscriptions of all were probably in hexameter: cf. Hdt.
v. 59.

[2] Horace, A. P., ll. 75-8, leaves the origin of elegiac verse in
obscurity. When he says it was first used for laments, he probably
follows the Alexandrian derivation of the word {elegos} from {e
legein}. The /voti sententia compos/ to which he says it became
extended is interpreted by the commentators as meaning amatory
poetry. If this was Horace's meaning he chose a most singular way
of expressing it.

[3] Mr. F. D. Allen's treatise /On Greek Versification in
Inscriptions/ (Boston, 1888) gives an account of the slight
changes in structure (caesura, etc.) between earlier and later
periods.

[4] Cf. infra, III. 2, VII., 4, X. 45, XII. 18, I. 30, IX. 23.

[5] From the Leominster MS. circ. A.D. 1307 (Percy Society, 1842).


III

The material out of which this selection has been made is principally
that immense mass of epigrams known as the Greek Anthology. An account
of this celebrated collection and the way in which it was formed will
be given presently; here it will be sufficient to say that, in
addition to about four hundred Christian epigrams of the Byzantine