One of the epigrams attributed to him on the authority of
Maximus Planudes is a
eulogy on the celebrated
Hypatia, daughter of
Theon of Alexandria, whose death took place in 415. Another was, according to a
scholium in the Palatine Manuscript (the most important source for our knowledge of Greek epigram), written in the reign of the joint emperors
Valentinian and
Valens (364–375). A third epigram on the destruction of
Beirut (
Anth. Gr. 9.27) suggests an alternative chronology dating Palladas' activity to the age of
Constantine the Great. It is based on his edition of a
papyrus codex that arrived from a private collection to the
Beinecke Library at
Yale University in 1996. Some of his arguments in favor of this new chronology have, however, been called into question.An anonymous epigram (
Anth. Gr. 9.380) speaks of Palladas as having a high poetical reputation. However,
Isaac Casaubon dismisses him in two contemptuous words as
versificator insulsissimus ("a most coarse poet").
John William Mackail concurs with Casaubon, writing that "this is true of a great part of his work, and would perhaps be true of it all but for the savage indignation which kindles his verse, not into the flame of poetry, but to a dull red heat." There is little direct allusion in his epigrams to the struggle against the onslaught of Christianity. One epigram speaks obscurely of the destruction of the "idols" of Alexandria popular in the
archiepiscopate of
Theophilus in 389; another in even more enigmatic language (
Anth. Gr. 10.90) seems to be a bitter attack on the doctrine of the
Resurrection; and a scornful couplet against the swarms of Egyptian monks might have been written by a Reformer of the 16th century. For the most part his sympathy with the Greco-Roman pagan tradition is only betrayed in his despondency over all things. But it is in his criticism of life that the power of Palladas lies; with a remorselessness like that of
Jonathan Swift he tears the coverings from human frailty and holds it up in its meanness and misery. The lines on the
Descent of Man (
Anth. Gr. 10.45), fall as heavily on the
Neo-Platonic martyr as on the Christian persecutor, and remain even now among the most mordant and crushing sarcasms ever passed upon mankind.
A Question of Gender This translation omits the epigram's explicit reference to the role of grammar and thus grammatical gender in thought. Compare: "A grammarian’s daughter made love and then bore/A masculine and feminine and neuter child." The epigram's reference to the generative role of grammar underscores how the epigram is "likely quite dark: [the daughter] gave birth to twins (a boy and a girl) and at least one of them died thus giving the three declensions."
Tabliope Tabliope () is a made-up name of a "
Muse" that is a comic invention of
Palladas, appearing in his
epigram found in book 11 (
Humorous and convivial -
Scoptic - Σκωπτικά) of
Anthologia Palatina. The name
Tabliope is made up from the word τάβλα
tabla >
tavla (Modern Greek τάβλι
tavli "
backgammon"), derived from
Latin "tabula", and the segment -ιόπη as in the name of the
Muse Calliope ("Τάβλ"α + Καλλ"ιόπη" = "Ταβλιόπη"). The epigram, intended to make fun of an avid
backgammon player, reads: Πάντων μουσοπόλων ἠ Καλλιόπη θεός ἐστιν • Ἠ σή Καλλιόπη Ταβλιόπη λέγεται. "Calliope is the goddess of all adherents of the
Muses [i. e. arts]; but
your Calliope is called Tabliope." Some modern sources refer to Tabliope as the
goddess of the gamble (
games of
risk and random
chance). == Date ==