(Κρεώφυλος).

1. One of the earliest epic poets of Greece, whom tradition placed in direct connexion with Homer, as he is called his friend or even his son-in-law. (Plat. de Rep. x. p. 600b; Callim. Epigram. 6; Strab. xiv. p.638, &c.; Sext. Empir. ad v. Math. 1.2; Eustath. ad Hom. Il. 2.730; Suidas, s. v.) Creophylus is said to have received Homer into his house, and to have been a native of Chios, though other accounts describe him as a native of Samos or los. The epic poem Οἰχαλία or Οἰχαλίας ἅλωσις, which is ascribed to him, he is said, in some traditions, to have received from Homer as a present or as a dowry with his wife. (Proclus, apud Hephaest. p. 466, ed. Gaisford; Schol. ad Plat. p. 421, ed. Bekker; Suidas, s. v.) Tradition thus seems to point to Creophylus as one of the most ancient Homeridae, and as the first link connecting Homer himself with the subsequent history of the Homeric poems; for he preserved and taught the Homeric poems, and handed them down to his descendants, from whom Lycurgus, the Spartan lawgiver, is said to have received them. (Plut. Lyc. 4; Heracleid. Pont. Polit. Fragm. 2; Iamblich. Vit. Pythag. 2.9; Strab. xiv. p.639.) His poem *Oi)xali/a contained the contest which Heracles, for the sake of Iole, undertook with Eurytus, and the final capture of Oechalia. This poem, from which Panyasis is said to have copied (Clem. Al. Strom. iv. p. 266), is often referred to, both with and without its author's name, but we possess only a few statements derived from it. (Phot. Lex. p. 177, ed. Person; Tzetz. Chil. 13.659 ; Cramer, Anecd. ii. p. 327; Schol. ad Soph. Trach. 266; Bekker, Anecd. p. 728.) Pausanias (4.2.3) mentions a poem Ἡρακλεία by Creophylus, but this seems to be only a different name for the Οἰχαλία. (Comp. Schol. ad Eurip. Med. 276.) The Heracleia which the Scholiast on Apollonius Rhodius (1.1357) ascribes to Cinaethon, is likewise supposed by some to be a mistake, and to allude to the Οἰχαλία of Creophylus. (Welcker, Der Episch. Cyclus, p. 219, &c.; Wüllner, De Cycl. Epic. p. 52, &c.; K. W. Müller, De Cycl. Graec. Epic. p. 62, &c.)