ABSTRACT
The poet Christophoros Mitylenaios was a man with many curiosities. Born and raised in Constantinople, he spent most of his life in this city. He was a prolific writer and very successful at that. He also wrote epigrams of varying length and metrical styles concerning persons and events of his times. The Grottaferrata manuscript is obviously an anthology of poems. Most of Christophoros’ poems were written in response to concrete situations with a view to publication. With age, Christophoros' school memories and animosities faded away and were replaced by new career related animosities. Church activities are constantly present in Christophoros’ poems; but it is their social rather than spiritual functions that seem to dominate. The poet was not a particularly devout person. The people surrounding Christophoros who are mentioned in his poems mostly belong to his own social rank and status: mainly middle level civil servants, but also educators, scholars, ecclesiastics and monks.
