Tyrtæus.—Another proficient in this variety of elegy was Tyrtæus, supposed to have been born in the Attic town of Aphidnæ. He led the Spartans in the Second Messenian War (685-668 B.C.), they having, by the direction of an oracle, sent to Athens for a general, to secure the success which had before been denied them. The story is that the jealous Athenians despatched to their neighbors a deformed schoolmaster, the cripple Tyrtæus, in the belief that his services would be of little value; but they mistook. The greatest military genius could not have accomplished more; for Tyrtæus, by his wise counsels and inspiriting war-songs, made his soldiers invincible. Messenia fell, and her citizens became slaves to the Spartans. Nor, afterward, was the poetry of Tyrtæus less efficacious in quelling civil dissensions and establishing domestic peace. In every respect, “the Muse of Sparta,” as he was called, proved to be to his adopted country the blessing promised by the oracle.
Tyrtæus is said to have invented the trumpet, and introduced it as a companion to the flute, then the chief instrument in use. Some have interpreted the lameness of the bard as signifying his limping measure, the second line of the elegiac couplet being, as we have seen, a foot shorter than the first.
Of the many productions of Tyrtæus, consisting of marching-songs, as well as warlike and political elegies, only a few fragments survive. His poems, characterized by terseness and impassioned power, were long popular among the Spartans, who, on a campaign, were wont to recite them after each evening meal to kindle afresh their martial fire.
BATTLE-HYMN OF TYRTÆUS.
“Our country’s voice invites the brave
The glorious toils of war to try;
Cursed be the coward, or the slave,
Who shuns the fight, who fears to die.
Obedient to the high command,
Full fraught with patriotic fire,