Editing Simonides of Ceos (section)

===Early years: Ceos and Athens===
[[File:Ioulida3.jpg|right|thumb|Ioulis, present-day capital of Kea (Ceos in Ancient Greek), including remnants of the ancient acropolis. Like most Cycladic settlements, it was built inland on a readily defensible hill as protection against pirates]]
Simonides was the son of Leoprepes, and the grandson or descendant of Hylichus.<ref>[[Herodotus]], [[Histories (Herodotus)|Histories]]   [https://www.perseus.tufts.edu/hopper/text?doc=Perseus%3Atext%3A1999.01.0126%3Abook%3D7%3Achapter%3D228 7.228]; Callimachus fr. 222 Pfeiffer; [[Suda]] {{lang|grc-x-medieval|σ}} [https://www.cs.uky.edu/~raphael/sol/sol-entries/sigma/439 439–441].</ref> He was born in [[Ioulis]] on [[Kea (island)|Ceos]] (Ἰουλίς, Κέως), the outermost island of the  [[Cyclades]]. The innermost island, [[Delos]], was the reputed birthplace of [[Apollo]], where the people of Ceos regularly sent choirs to perform hymns in the god's honour. [[Carthaea]], another Cean town, included a choregeion or school where choirs were trained, and possibly Simonides worked there as a teacher in his early years.<ref> Athenaeus 10.456c-57b.</ref>

In addition to its musical culture, Ceos had a rich tradition of athletic competition, especially in running and boxing (the names of Ceans victorious at Panhellenic competitions were recorded at Ioulis on slabs of stone) making it fertile territory for a genre of [[choral poetry|choral lyric]] that Simonides pioneered—the [[Epinikion|victory ode]]. Indeed, the grandfather of Simonides' nephew, Bacchylides, was one of the island's notable athletes.<ref>Jebb, ''Bacchylides: the poems and fragments'', Cambridge University Press (1905), page 5 [https://archive.org/stream/bacchylidespoem00jebbgoog#page/n9/mode/1up digitalized by Google]</ref>

Ceos lies only some fifteen miles south-east of [[Attica]], whither Simonides was drawn, about the age of thirty, by the lure of opportunities opening up at the court of the tyrant [[Hipparchus (son of Pisistratus)|Hipparchus]], a patron of the arts. His rivalry there with another chorus-trainer and poet, [[Lasus of Hermione]], became something of a joke to Athenians of a later generation—it is mentioned briefly by the comic playwright [[Aristophanes]]<ref>[[Aristophanes]], ''[[The Wasps]]'' 1411 [[wikt:ff.|ff.]], cited by D. Campbell, ''Greek Lyric III'', Loeb Classical Library (1991), page 299</ref> who earmarked Simonides as a miserly type of professional poet (see [[Simonides#The miser|The Miser]] below)