Antipater of Thessalonica

For others of this name, see Antipater (disambiguation).

Antipater of Thessalonica was the author of over a hundred epigrams in the Greek Anthology. He is the most copious and perhaps the most interesting of the Augustan epigrammatists. He lived under the patronage of Lucius Calpurnius Piso (consul in BC 15 and then proconsul of Macedonia for several years), who appointed him governor of Thessalonica.

There are many allusions in his work to contemporary history:

• one celebrates the foundation of Nicopolis by Octavianus, after the battle of Actium
• one anticipates his victory over the Parthians in the expedition of 20 BC
• one is addressed to Gaius Caesar, who died in AD 4. None can be ascribed securely to a date later than 4.

Antipater is also known for being the first to mention use of the waterwheel in a poem . He tells of an advanced overshot wheel watermill around 20 BC/10 AD, praising the reduction of human labour in grinding corn:

Hold back your hand from the mill, you grinding girls; even if the cockcrow heralds the dawn, sleep on. For Demeter has imposed the labours of your hands on the nymphs, who leaping down upon the topmost part of the wheel, rotate its axle; with encircling cogs, it turns the hollow weight of the Nisyrian millstones. If we learn to feast toil-free on the fruits of the earth, we taste again the golden age.

Source

• Ancient History
• Select Epigrams from The Greek Anthology, Edited with a Revised Text, Translation, and Notes, by J. W. Mackail (London: Longmans, Green, and Co., 1890)

See also

• Apollodorus (runner) ,Antipater's epigram
• Greek Anthology
• Vitruvius
• Watermill