EUPHORION, a Greek poet and grammarian, was the son of Polymnetus, and was born at Chalcis in Euboea in the 126th Olympiad, 274 b.c. He studied philosophy under Lacydes and Prytanis, and poetry under Archebulus the Therean. After amassing great wealth, he retired (221 b.c. ) to the court of Syria, and there assisted Antiochus the Great in forming the royal library at Antioch, which it was intended should rival that of Alexandria; and in this employment he died probably about 200 b.c. His poetry was principally epic, but he was also an epigrammatist, and has besides been supposed, though without sufficient reason, to have written dramas. Only a few fragments of his works have been preserved; but from the opinions expressed by ancient writers, it appears that he was constantly in search of archaic and obsolete expressions, and that the erudite character of his allusions rendered him so obscure as to be understood with difficulty. His works appear to have been popular as late as the times of the emperor Tiberius.

The fragments have been edited by Meineke under the title De Eup>horionis Chalcidensis Vita et Scriptis, &c., Dantzic, 1823. This work with amendments has been published by Meineke in his Analecta Alexandrina, Berlin, 1843. Seo also Clinton’s Pasti Hellenics, vol. ii. p. 511; Fabricius, Bib. Grcec., vol. i. p. 594; Heyne, De Euphorione, Excurs. iii. ad Virg. Bucol. and Excurs. v. adAen. ii.