[Born in Phrygia, about B.C. 620. Died about B.C. 560.]
The reputed author of the fables to which his name has been for
centuries attached. According to the general account, he was originally
a slave, and gained much notice for his wit, and especially for his
talent of communicating useful maxims in the form of apologues. His
talent procured him favour at the court of Crœsus. He is said to have
been thrown from the top of a rock and killed, by the priests of Delphi.
His fables, at first preserved by tradition, were at a later period
converted into Greek and Latin verse by Babrias and Phædrus. We have
them in Greek prose, told naturally and in the utmost simplicity. In
stature Æsop is described as small and hump-backed, with a prominent
stomach and pointed head, yet the intellectual expression of his
countenance is not that usually given to dwarfs.
[From the very remarkable half-figure in marble in the Villa Albani,
at Rome; the whole of which is of great antiquity. It has been
maintained that Æsop was not deformed, inasmuch as the circumstance is
not mentioned by writers, before the time of the Greek monk, Planudes
Maximus. There are, however, traditions affirming his deformity, and
Plutarch, in his Feast of the Sages, makes him sit upon a low stool at
the feet of Solon. The countenance has a thoughtful and elevated
expression. Lysippus sculptured the portrait of Æsop to be placed
amongst the sages of Greece at Athens. Phædrus refers to this work,
and the celebrity of the man is fixed by the fact that the court
sculptor of Alexander employed himself upon his statue.]