PANYASIS, of Halicarnassus, a poet of the early half of the 5th century b.c. He was a near relation of the historian Herodotus. According to some his father Polyarchus was brother of Herodotus’s father Lyxes; according to others, Rhoeo or Dryo, the mother of Herodotus, was a sister of Panyasis. He led a revival of the old Ionian epic poetry, and his younger contemporary Antimachus continued the movement. Only insignificant fragments of his works are preserved. He wrote a Heracleas, in which the whole of the Heracles-myths were embraced in 14 books (9000 lines), and another poem in elegiacs, 7000 lines long, called ’Ιωνικά, in which he related the story of the Ionic settlements in Asia Minor and the exploits of Codrus and Neleus. Though not much thought of in his own time, he is praised by later critics. He was slain by Lygdamis, tyrant of Halicarnassus.