This volume explores six lyric poems by Mesomedes, a Cretan court musician to Hadrian and Antoninus Pius, addressing Greek traditional and »new« gods. Featuring a new edition of the Greek texts with annotated translations into English and Italian, it also includes essays revealing the cultural and religious dynamics of the Roman Empire in the second century AD.
Between 100 and 160 AD, Mesomedes, a Cretan court musician to Hadrian and Antoninus Pius, wrote several short lyric poems. This volume presents six of these texts, namely addresses, hymns and prayers to gods, Greek traditional divinities and »new« gods. Apart from a new edition of the Greek text, it also contains a fresh, annotated translation into English and Italian. Furthermore, the contributors provide essays offering diverse perspectives on these texts and their author, aiming to reveal characteristic aspects of a certain cultural and religious climate that developed in the Roman Empire from the second century AD onward.
Table of contents:
A. INTRODUCTIONSara Lanna: Introduction
1. The Author and the Historical Context
2. Proems, Hymns, Prayers: The Generic Forms of Mesomedes’ Poetry
3. Reception: Mesomedes’ Influence on the Poetry of Later Antiquity
4. Manuscript Tradition
5. Suggested Variations from Other Editions
B. TEXT, TRANSLATIONS AND NOTESText
(Sara Lanna) and Translation
(Richard Gordon/Sara Lanna)1a.
To the Muse1b.
To Calliope and Apollo
2.
Hymn to Helios3.
Hymn to Nemesis4.
To Physis5.
To Isis6.
To the Adriatic SeaSara Lanna and Richard L. Gordon: Notes on the Translations
C. ESSAYSThe Hymn: A Genre and its Development as a Mode of
Expressing Religious Content
(Sara Lanna)Religious Developments in the Roman Empire, c.70–170 CE
(Richard Gordon)Mesomedes and the Philosophical Zeitgeist
(Oliver Schelske)The Recovery of Ancient Greek Music and the Contribution
of Papyrology
(Egert Pöhlmann)A Mesomedes-Corpus of Late Antiquity with Musical
Notation
(Egert Pöhlmann)Mesomedes and the Music of the Imperial Period
(Egert Pöhlmann)The Hymn of Mesomedes for Antinous (Inscription of Kourion,
Mitford No. 104)
(Egert Pöhlmann)Mesomedes’ Other Hymns? Controversial Proposals.
Hymn to Attis (Heitsch no. 44,3)
(Sara Lanna) 
