TRYPHIODORUS, an ancient Greek poet, who lived some time between the reigns of Severus and Ananiasius. His writings were very numerous; yet none of them have come down to us, except an epic poem, on which Mr Addison has made some entertaining remarks in the Spectator, No 63. Treating of the several species of false wit among the ancients, he mentions the lipogrammatists, or letter-droppers of antiquity, and adds, "One Teyphiodorus was a great master in this kind of writing. He composed an Odyssy, or epic poem, on the adventures of Ulysses, consisting of 24 books, having entirely banished the letter A from his first book, which was called Alpha; as lucus à non lucendo, because there was not an alpha in it. His second book was inscribed Beta for the same reason. In short, the poet excluded the whole 24 letters in their turns; and showed them, one after another, that he could do his business without them. It must have been very pleasant to have seen this poet avoiding the reprobate letter as much as another would a false quantity; and making his escape from it thro' the several Greek dialects, when he was pressed with it in any particular syllable: for the most apt and elegant word in the whole language was rejected, like a diamond with a flaw in it, if it appeared blemished with a wrong letter."
The first edition of this extraordinary work was published by Aldus, at Venice, with Quintus Calaber's Palilipomena, and Coluthus's poem on the rape of Helen. It has been since reprinted at several places, particularly at Francfort in 1580 by Frischlinus; who not only corrected many corrupt passages, but added two Latin versions, one in verse, and the other in prose. That in verse was reprinted in 1742, with the Greek, at Oxford, in 8vo, with an English translation in verse, and Notes, by Mr Merrick.