English Dictionary

Now beſides Sappho, we read of many others of that Sex famous for Learning, as Demophila the Pamphylian’s Wife whom Apollonius here mentions; Proba the Roman Conſul’s Wife, who (A. D. 424.) wrote in Heroick Verſe the Contents of the Old and New Teſtament, ſo far as the deſcending of the Holy Ghoſt; Corinna, who was Ovid’s Beloved; Elpia, the Wife of Boetius; Polla, Wife to Lucan the Poet, who often help’d her Husband in the compoſure of his Pharſalia; Lesbia, Miſtreſs to Catullus; Cornificia, the Roman Poeteſs; Thesbia, the Compoſitreſs of Epigrams; and the other famous Poeteſs Corinna, who five times vanquiſh’d Pindar in the Poetical Art, wherein he had challenged her to contend in the City of Thebes; neither muſt we here omit the late ingenious Mrs. Phillips, our Engliſh Sappho.