TERPANDER

Form: Gr. Terpandros.

A Greek poet and musician, a native of Antissa in Lesbos. He is the true founder of Greek classical music, and also of lyric poetry, both Aeolian and Dorian. He was the first to clothe in artistic form the kind of choral song, called nomos, used at the festivals of Apollo; he also introduced other important innovations into music. He is sometimes erroneously described as having added three strings to the original lyre of four strings [Strabo, p. 618]; but it is more probable that the lyre of seven strings was already in existence in his own time [Aristotle, Probl., xix 32]. The principal scene of his labours was Sparta, whither he had been summoned by order of the Delphic oracle to quell a disturbance amongst the people. It was at Sparta that he reduced to order the music of the Dorians. It was here too that he won the prize at the musical competition at the Carneia. Between 672 and 648 B.C. he carried off the prize four times in succession at the Pythian games in Delphi. Only a few verses of his own poems are extant.