Pigres

(Πίγρης), literary. A native of Halicarnassus, either the brother or the son of the celebrated Artemisia, queen of Caria. He is spoken of by Suidas (s. v. where, however, he makes the mistake of calling Artemisia the wife of Mausolus) as the author of the Margites, and the Batrachomyomachia. The latter poem is also attributed to him by Plutarch (de Herod. malign. 43. p. 873f.), and was probably his work. One of his performances was a very singular one, namely, inserting a pentameter line after each hexameter in the Iliad, thus: --

Μῆνιν ἄειδε θεὰ Πηληϊάδεω Ἀχιλῆος· Μοῦσα γὰρ σὺ πάσης πείρατʼ ἔχεις σοφίης.

Bode (Gesch. der Hellen. Dichtkunst, i. p. 279) believes that the Margites, though not composed by Pigres, suffered some alterations at his hands,. and in that altered shape passed down to posterity. Some suppose that the iambic lines, which alternated with the hexameters in the Margites, were inserted by Pigres. He was the first poet, apparently, who introduced the iambic trimeter. (Fabric. Bibl. Graec. i. p. 519, &c.)

[C.P.M]