Corinna Biography | Poet

CORINNA, surnamed “the Fly,” a Greek poetess, born at Tanagra in Boeotia, flourished about 500 B.C. She is chiefly known as the instructress and rival of Pindar, over whom she gained the victory in five poetical contests. According to Pausanias (ix. 22. 3), her success was chiefly due to her beauty and her use of the local Boeotian dialect. The extant fragments of her poems, dealing chiefly with mythological subjects, such as the expedition of the Seven against Thebes, will be found in Bergk’s Poëtae Lyrici Graeci.