Myrsilus
a Greek historical writer, a native of Lesbos. When he lived is not known.
Works
Dionysius of Halicarnassus (1.23) has borrowed from him almost verbatim a part of his account of the Pelasgians. He refers to him again in 1.28. Myrsilus was the author of the notion that the Tyrrhenians, in consequence of their wandering about after they left their original settlements, got the name of Πελαργοί, or storks. Athenaeus (xiii p. 610a.) quotes from a work by Myrsilus, entitled Ἱστορικὰ παράδοξα. He is also quoted by Strabo (i. p.60, xiii. p. 610), and by Pliny (Plin. Nat. 3.7, 4.12). By Arnobius (3.37, 4.24), he is called Myrtilus.
Further Information
Voss. de Hist. Graec. p. 473, ed. Westermann.
From William Smith (ed.), Dictionary of Greek and Roman Biography and Mythology. Text provided under a CC BY-SA license by Perseus Digital Library, http://www.perseus.tufts.edu, with funding from the National Endowment for the Humanities and Tufts University. Data accessed from https://github.com/PerseusDL/canonical-pdlrefwk/ on 17 October 2026.