Lasus of Hermione: The Poet Who Revolutionized Greek Music

At some point during the 6th century BC, a lyric poet named Lasus of Hermione was born in the region of Argolis in Greece. He was to leave a truly significant mark on the world of ancient Greek poetry and music.

Even though his works have been lost in time, Lasus is remembered as an innovator and a revolutionary artistic figure. He is believed to be one of the main personalities who transformed the dithyramb, a hymn that was sung by the Greeks and danced in honor of Dionysus, the god of wine and fertility, among others.

His groundbreaking innovations in elements such as rhythm, melody, and performance style laid the groundwork and became the foundation for the later development of Athenian tragedy and choral poetry, which shaped Classical Greece forever.

Who was Lasus of Hermione?

Lasus was born in the city of Hermione in Argolis, hence his name. Argolis is a region situated on the northeastern coast of the Peloponnese and carries the same name to this day.

Lasus lived during a time that was shaped and defined by great cultural as well as artistic change and rigor in ancient Greece. This is evidenced by his association with the city of Athens during the reign of the Peisistratids. The Peisistratids were effectively a dynasty of tyrants who ruled Athens with an iron fist in the 6th century BC.

According to information from the ancient historian Herodotus, Lasus played a significant role in exposing the numerous forgeries of oracles by a collector named Onomacritus. He was renowned across Greece for his collections. He was also an interpreter of prophecies that tried to predict the future. This anecdote suggests Lasus was not simply a poet and musician who entertained his audiences but also a man of true and meaningful learning who had a wider palette of interests and talents.

Lasus is also known by ancient sources to have written an actual treatise on music, which, unfortunately, has not survived. Hence, we are unable to appreciate the depth of his innovative talent. The loss of this work is quite a significant blow to our overall understanding of the broader topic of ancient Greek music theory and practice. If it had survived, it would have provided us with invaluable information and crucial insights into the ideas and techniques used by one of the most influential—and yet relatively unknown—figures in the history of Greek music.

Dithyrambic poetry

The dithyramb played a fundamental role in ancient Greek life. It was a choral hymn with its roots found in the 7th century BC. They were used by the Greeks as a means of honoring their beloved god Dionysus during performances of ecstatic revelation. The dithyramb was typically performed during festivals such as the Dionysia and the Lenaia. Not everyone was performing them, however. They were normally played by a chorus of up to 50 men or boys. Their primary task was to sing and dance in a circular formation around an altar.

The dithyramb was particularly loved and known for its truly wild and ecstatic nature, which stood in stark contrast to the much more sober and restrained paean. The paean was another widely used hymn that was sung in honor of Apollo instead of Dionysus. The stories that were told in dithyrambs often focused their interest on the many myths and exploits of the god Dionysus himself. In this way, the Greeks celebrated the power of their god in an attempt to inspire divine madness and to force the renewal of life itself, as they believed.

According to Aristotle, the dithyramb was the actual root from which the Athenian tragedy blossomed when it emerged in the late 6th century BC. It was nothing more than a new form of dramatic performance that evolved and became what we know today. The emphasis of the dithyramb on storytelling, as well as character and emotion laid the real foundations for the development of tragic drama in the centuries that followed. These would effectively go on to become one of the most integral and influential parts of art in the ancient world.

Lasus’ innovations that shaped Greek music

One of the main contributions of Lasus was the fact that he managed to formalize the dithyramb in Athens. This transformed its nature into a much more sophisticated and expressive art form than it initially was. He is also said to have introduced a number of new rhythms and melodies into the dithyramb. This happened probably because he drew inspiration from the aulos. The aulos is a double-reed instrument that was particularly popular in ancient Greece and helped Lasus come up with some innovative ideas.

Another exceptionally significant innovation of Lasus, and probably his most famous one, was the use of a much wider range of sounds in his compositions. Throughout his career, he is said to have expanded the musical scale of the time and experimented with new harmonies as well as tonalities. This significantly pushed the boundaries of what was possible in Greek music at the time, shaping its future in a fundamental way.

Another particularly notable feature of the work of Lasus was his characteristic use of asigmatic odes. These were compositions that avoided the sound of the letter sigma, which is the sound /s/. This peculiar technical feature demonstrates the level at which Lasus had achieved mastery of the Greek language, as well as his ability to manipulate sound and meaning in his poetry, thus creating masterpieces.

These unique innovations in the dithyramb of Lasus reflect a much broader shift in ancient Greek culture. This shift moved the entire foundation of Greece’s artistic soul towards a more intellectual and self-conscious approach to the arts as a whole.

As a poet, musician, and indeed thinker, Lasus brought to the Greek world the existence of a new type of artist. This was one who is unhappy with simply following traditions. Rather, such an artist attempts to purposefully push craft boundaries to explore new forms of expression.

The influence of Lasus on ancient Greek music

The impact that Lasus and his work had on ancient Greek poetry and music cannot be overstated. He is considered by scholars as the founder of the Athenian school of dithyrambic poetry. This would later go on to produce some of the most well-known and celebrated poets of the ancient world, including figures such as Pindar, Simonides, and Bacchylides, among others.

Pindar, in particular, was deeply influenced by the various teachings of Lasus over the years and even went on to become one of the most popular and influential of the nine canonical lyric poets of ancient Greece. The famous odes of Pindar, which celebrate the various victories of athletes and aristocrats in ancient Greece, are a great way of understanding the legacy and importance of Lasus’ innovations in rhythm, melody, and poetic form.

Although the works of Lasus have not survived—or haven’t been discovered yet—to this day, the ideas and techniques that he used had a deep and profound impact on the development of ancient Greek musical aesthetics.

His genuine emphasis on issues such as expressivity, innovation, and intellectual rigor set the stage for the development and flourishment of Greek music in the Classical period that followed and thereafter.

In many ways, we could argue that the legacy of Lasus extends much further than the world of ancient Greece. His groundbreaking innovations, particularly in the dithyramb, along with his role in the development of Athenian tragedy have had a truly lasting impact on the history of Western literature and drama.

Today, scholars and artists continue to study the relatively scant details we have concerning Lasus and draw inspiration from the works of the great poets and musicians of ancient Greece. Lasus of Hermione will forever remain a prominent figure in this early rich musical tradition of Greece.