Anactoria

This article is about the lover of Sappho. For the country, see Miletus.

Anactoria (or Anaktoria) is the name of a woman mentioned by poet Sappho as a lover of hers in Sappho's Fragment 16 (Lobel-Page edition) [1], often referred to by the title "To an Army Wife, in Sardis". Sappho 31 is traditionally called the "Ode to Anactoria", though no name appears in it (A. C. Swinburne, quoted in Lipking 1988).[2] [3]

Algernon Charles Swinburne wrote a long poem in Poems and Ballads titled Anactoria, in which Sappho addresses Anactoria in a long monologue written in pentameter with rhyming couplets. The poem created a sensation amongst contemporary readers by openly approaching hitherto taboo topics such as Lesbianism and dystheism. Swinburne's Sappho is heavily inspired by Milton's Satan and John Donne's poem, also on Sappho. [4] [5]

References

• Lipking, Lawrence I. (1988). Abandoned Women and Poetic Tradition. University of Chicago Press. pp. 92–96. ISBN 0-226-48452-1. Retrieved 2007-08-17.