He came from heaven in purple mantle clad.
Frederick Tennyson.
Quoted by Pollux, about 180 A.D., who says that Sappho, in her ode to Eros, out of which this verse probably came, was the first to use the word χλαμύς, a short mantle fastened by a brooch on the right shoulder, so as to hang in a curve across the body.
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Βροδοπάχεες ἄγναι Χάριτες, δεῦτε Δίος κόραι.
Come, rosy-armed pure Graces, daughters of Zeus.
Theocritus' Idyl 28, On a Distaff, according to the argument prefixed to it, was written in the dialect and metre of this fragment. And Philostrătus, about 220 A.D., says 'Sappho loves the rose, and always crowns it with some praise, likening to it the beauty of her maidens; she likens it also to the arms of the Graces, when she describes their elbows bare.' Cf. fr. [146].
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