PHILES, MANUEL (c. 12751345)

This article appears in Volume V21, Page 375 of the Encyclopedia Britannica.

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PHILES, MANUEL (c. 12751345) , of Ephesus, Byzantine poet. At an early age he removed to

Constantinople

CONSTANTINOPLE
CONSTANTINOPLE, COUNCILS OF

, where he was the pupil of Georgius

Pachymeres

PACHYMERES, GEORGIUS (1242-c. 1310)

, in whose honour he composed a memorial poem. Philes appears to have travelled extensively, and his writings contain much information concerning the imperial court and distinguished Byzantines. Having offended one of the emperors by indiscreet remarks published in a chronography, he was thrown into prison and only released after an abject apology. Philes is the counterpart of

Theodorus

THEODORUS, FLAVIUS MALLIUS

Prodromus in the time of the Comneni; his character, as shown in his poems, is that of a begging poet, always pleading poverty, and ready to descend to the grossest flattery to obtain the favour-able notice of the

great

GREAT

. With one unimportant exception, his productions are in verse, the greater part in dodecasyllabic iambic trimeters, the

remainder

REMAINDER, REVERSION

in the fifteen-syllable " political " measure.
Philes was the author of poems on a

great

GREAT

variety of subjects: on the characteristics of animals, chiefly based upon Aelian and Oppian, a didactic poem of some 2000 lines, dedicated to Michael Palaeologus; on the elephant; on plants; a necrological poem, probably written on the death of one of the sons of the imperial

house

HOUSE
HOUSE (O. Eng. hiss, a word common to Teutonic languages, cf. Dut. huis, Ger. Haus; in
Gothic
- GOTHIC
it is only found in gudhiss, a temple; it may be ultimately connected with the root of " hide," conceal)

; a panegyric on John Cantacuzene, in the form of a dialogue; a conversation between a man and his soul; on ecclesiastical subjects, such as church festivals, Christian beliefs, the saints and fathers of the church; on works of art, perhaps the most valuable of all his pieces for their bearing on Byzantine iconography, since the writer had before him the works he describes, and also the most successful from a literary point of view; occasional poems, many of which are simply begging letters in verse.
Editions: the natural history poems in F. Lehrs and F. Dubner, Poetae bucolici et didactici (Didot

series

SERIES (a Latin word from serere, to join)

, 1846) ; Manuelis Philae Carmina inedita, ed. A.

Martini

(1900) ; Manuelis Philae Carmina ed. E. Miller (1855-1857). See also C. Krumbacher, Geschichte der byzantinischen Litteratur (1897).

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