Lille Stesichorus

The Lille Stesichorus is a papyrus containing a major fragment of poetry usually attributed to the archaic lyric poet Stesichorus, discovered at Lille University and published in 1976. Some consider it the most important of all the Stesichorus fragments, confirming Stesichorus's role as a historic link between genres as different as Homeric epic and Pindaric lyric. The subject matter and style are viewed as typical of his work, although not all scholars have accepted it as his. The fragment is a narrative treatment of a popular myth involving the family of Oedipus and the tragic history of Thebes. This sheds light on other treatments of the same myth, such as Sophocles' Oedipus Tyrannos and Aeschylus' Seven Against Thebes. The fragment is also significant in the history of colometry, since it includes lyric verses divided into metrical cola, a practice usually associated with the later career of Aristophanes of Byzantium.