A Cyclopaedia of Female Biography/Corinna, the Lyric Muse
CORINNA,
A poetess, to whom the Greeks gave the appellation of the Lyric Muse, was a native of Tanagra, Boeotia. She flourished in the fifth century B. C, and was a contemporary of Pindar, from whom she five times won the prize in poetical contests. Her fellow-citizens erected a tomb to her in the most frequented part of the city. Only a few fragments of her works arc extant. She did justice to the superiority of Pindar's genius, but advised him not to suffer his poetical ornaments to intrude so often, as they smothered the principal subject; comparing it to pouring a vase of flowers all at once upon the ground, when their beauty and excellence could only be observed in proportion to their rarity and situation. Her glory seems to have been established by the public memorial of her picture, exhibited in her native city, and adorned with a symbol of her victory. Pausanius, who saw it, supposes her to have been one of the most beautiful women of her age; and observes that her personal charms probably rendered her judges partial.