Sappho 96

A fragmentary piece of parchment, with Greek lettering
P. Berol. 9722, the parchment on which Sappho 96 is preserved.

Sappho 96[a] is a poem by the archaic Greek lyric poet Sappho. 37 lines of the fragment are preserved on a 6th-century parchment. The first twenty lines describe an imaginary scene in which an unnamed woman is struck by grief remembering an absent companion, Atthis; the remaining 17 lines, possibly originally a separate poem, reflects more generally on the foolishness of trying to compare human and divine beauty. As with other poems by Sappho such as poem 16 and 94, memory is a major theme.
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