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TZETZES, JOHN

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Originally appearing in Volume V27, Page 553 of the 1911 Encyclopedia Britannica.
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TZETZES, See also:JOHN , See also:Byzantine poet and grammarian, flourished at See also:Constantinople during the 12th See also:century A.D. Tzetzes has been described as a perfect specimen of the Byzantine See also:pedant. Excessively vain, he resented any See also:attempt at rivalry, and violently attacked his See also:fellow grammarians. Owing to want of books, he was obliged to See also:trust to his memory; hence he is to be used with caution. But he was a learned See also:man, and deserves gratitude for his efforts to keep up the study of See also:ancient See also:Greek literature. Of his numerous See also:works the most important is the See also:Book of Histories, usually called Chiliades (" thousands ") from the arbitrary See also:division by its first editor (N. Gerbel, 1546) into books each containing r000 lines (it actually consists of 12,674 lines in " See also:political " See also:verse). It is a collection of See also:literary, See also:historical, theological and antiquarian miscellanies, whose See also:chief value consists in the fact that it to some extent makes up for the loss of works which were accessible to Tzetzes. The whole See also:production suffers from an unnecessary display of learning, the See also:total number of authors quoted being more than 400 (H. Spelthahn, Studien zu den Chiliaden See also:des Johannes Tzetzes, See also:diss., See also:Munich, 1904). The author subsequently brought out a revised edition with marginal notes in See also:prose and verse (ed. T.

Kiessling, 1826; on the See also:

sources see C. Harder, De J. T. historiarum fontibus gitaestiones selectae, diss., See also:Kiel, 1886). The Chiliades is based upon a collection of Letters (ed. T. Pressel, 1851), which has been called an See also:index to the larger See also:work, itself described as a versified commentary on the letters. These letters (107 in number) are addressed partly to fictitious personages, and partly to the See also:great men and See also:women of the writer's See also:time. They contain a considerable amount of See also:biographical details. The Iliaca, an abridgment of and supplement to the Iliad, is divided into three parts—Antehomerica, Homerica, Posthomerica—containing the narrative from the See also:birth of See also:Paris to the return of the Greeks after the fall of See also:Troy, in 1676 hexameters (ed. C. See also:Lehrs and F. See also:Dubner, 1868, in the See also:Didot See also:series, with See also:Hesiod, &c.) The Homeric Allegories, dedicated to the empress See also:Irene, in " political " verse, are two didactic poems in which See also:Homer and the Homeric See also:theology are explained on euphemistic principles (ed.

P. Matranga, in his Anecdota graeca, i. 185o). Tzetzes also wrote commentaries on a number of Greek authors, the most important of which is that on the See also:

Cassandra or Alexandra of See also:Lycophron (ed. C. G. See also:Muller, 1811), in the production of which his See also:brother See also:Isaac is generally associated with him. Mention may also be made of a dramatic See also:sketch in See also:iambic verse, in which the caprices of See also:fortune and the wretched See also:lot of the learned are described; and of an iambic poem on the See also:death of the See also:emperor See also:Manuel, noticeable for introducing at the beginning of each See also:line the last word of the line preceding it' (both in Matranga, An. gr. ii.). ' For the other works of Tzetzes see. J. A. See also:Fabricius, Bibliotheca graeca (ed.

Harles), xi. 228, and C. See also:

Krumbacher, Geschichte der byz. Litt. (2nd ed., 1897); monograph by G. See also:Hart, " De Tzetzarum nomine, vitis, scripts," in See also:Jahn's Jahrbiicher See also:fur classische Philologie. Supplementband xii. (See also:Leipzig, 1881). ' This versification is called aXiiiaKWTOS (KaiµaE, See also:ladder), a See also:term more commonly applied to a verse in which each word contains one See also:letter more than the one which precedes it. U-UBEDA 553 U The twenty-first letter of the See also:English See also:alphabet. It is a modification made in See also:manuscript See also:writing of the Latin inscriptional V, and is itself found on the See also:inscriptions of See also:Rome as See also:early as the latter See also:part of the 2nd century A.D. The symbols U, V, Y are all of the same origin, but what the origin is has been much disputed.

In the Phoenician alphabet T is the last See also:

symbol, but there can be little doubt that when the Greeks introduced symbols for vowels, which had not been indicated in the alphabet they had borrowed, they took the See also:sixth symbol of the Phoenician alphabet (see F) in its See also:ordinary See also:form Y and placed it at the end of the alphabet with the value of a vowel. This vowel was apparently u (English oo in See also:moon), though Ionic and See also:Attic Greek at a very early See also:period changed it to the See also:sound of the See also:French u. In other dialects the earlier value See also:long persisted, and in See also:modern Tzakonian, the representative of the ancient Laconian, it still survives. In some places, e.g. See also:Boeotia, the sound seems to have changed, in connexion with dental consonants, in the same way as the English sound, in certain cases i (y) being inserted in front of it. This seems to be the only feasible explanation of such spellings as rro0ca (ruxrl), Troatoi evos (aowaevos), which appear after the Boeotians adopted the Ionic alphabet. A similar See also:change must have existed in very early Attic and Ionic to See also:account for the change of t before u into s in See also:air, " See also:thou " for r6; some authorities think it was universal in the earliest Greek. Greek nowhere shows the symbol in the bowl shape that it has in the Semitic alphabet. From the 7th century B.C. both Y and V are found, sometimes both in the same See also:area. Another form somewhat later has the upper strokes curved outwards T, while the See also:angle is much less deep than in the other forms. It is noticeable that the symbol for u in the syllabary which was used to write Greek in See also:Cyprus has this form amongst others. The name of the sixth symbol in the Phoenician alphabet was TVaw (Vau), but though U has taken its form, in Greek its name was v (i.e.

English oo, as in moon, except in Attic and Ionic, where it was like the French u in lune), not upsilon, as is frequently stated. In Sweet's terminology u (oo), as pronounced in English " put " or " too, " is a high back wide See also:

round, while the sound in the French See also:sou or the Scotch See also:pronunciation of " book " is a high back narrow round. The high front corresponding sound is found in the French Lune. With this the See also:German " modified u ". (u) is often equated, but it is not really identical, being a See also:mid front narrow round vowel. The See also:pitch of the vowel u is among the lowest of the vowel sounds; the rounding and protrusion of the lips make the breath passage longer than it is for other vowels, and so its production may be compared to that of a sound made upon a See also:flute when all the See also:finger-holes are covered. In modern English u preceded by (y) arises from three different sounds in See also:middle English: (a) the long French u (ii) brought in with borrowed words from French (See also:duke), (b) eu (Early English cow) as in " new, " (f) a more open sound eu (Early English caw) as in " See also:dew" (Sweet, New English See also:Grammar, § 8o6). The y-sound was dropped after r, ch and dzh, as in " true, " " choose, " " juice " (ibid., § 857). In the literary See also:dialect also it generally disappears after 1, as in " lurid," " See also:lute." In some provincial and See also:American pronunciations it is dropped everywhere except initially, so that " Tuesday " is pronounced Toosday, " new " noo. (P.

End of Article: TZETZES, JOHN

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