Manuel Philes

Manuel Philes (c. 1275 or 1280, † 1345 or 1350), of Ephesus, was a Byzantine poet.

At an early age Manuel Philes moved back to Konstantin Opel, where he became the pupil of Georgios Pachymeres, in whose honor he later wrote a memoir. Philes seems to be very well-traveled, and his writings contain much information about the Byzantine imperial court and respected Byzantines. After he had insulted an emperor by indiscreet remarks in a chronology, he was thrown into prison, from which he was released only after a humiliating apology.

Philes is in the time of Komnenen the counterpart Theodoros Prodromos; his character, as is clear from his poems, is the one begging poets, constantly vorschiebend his poverty, and ready to fall back on the übertriebendste flattery to catch the benevolent attention of the great. With a minor exception all of his works are written in verse, the majority in zwölfsilbigen iambic trimeters, the rest in fünfzehnsilbigen "political" verse.

Manuel Philes wrote about a very wide variety of topics on the characteristics of animals, mainly based on the work Älians and Oppians, a didactic poem of over 2000 lines, Michael IX. Palaiologos dedicated; about the elephant; about plants; necrological a poem, probably related to a death in the imperial house; a panegyric on John VI. Cantacuzenus, in the form of a dialogue; a conversation between a man and his soul; over ecclesiastical issues, such as church festivals, Christian faith, the Saints and the Fathers of the Church; about art, perhaps the most valuable part of his work, because of their attitude to Byzantine iconography, and also because of its outstanding literary quality; Occasional poems, mostly in the form of begging sayings in verse.

Expenditure

• Manuelis Carmina Philae. Ex codicibus Escurialensibus, Florentinis, Parisinis et nunc primum Vaticanis edidit Emmanuel Miller. Paris from 1855 to 1857.