Ameipsias of Athens was an Ancient Greek

Ancient Greece

Ancient Greece is a civilization belonging to a period of Greek history that lasted from the Archaic period of the 8th to 6th centuries BC to the end of antiquity. Immediately following this period was the beginning of the Early Middle Ages and the Byzantine era. Included in Ancient Greece is the...

 comic poet, a contemporary of Aristophanes

Aristophanes

Aristophanes , son of Philippus, of the deme Cydathenaus, was a comic playwright of ancient Athens. Eleven of his forty plays survive virtually complete...

, whom he twice bested in the dramatic contests. His Konnos gained a second prize at the City Dionysia in 423 BC

423 BC

Year 423 BC was a year of the pre-Julian Roman calendar. At the time, it was known as the Year of the Consulship of Atratinus and Ambustus...

, when Aristophanes won the third prize with The Clouds

The Clouds

The Clouds is a comedy written by the celebrated playwright Aristophanes lampooning intellectual fashions in classical Athens. It was originally produced at the City Dionysia in 423 BC and it was not well received, coming last of the three plays competing at the festival that year. It was revised...

.

Konnos appears to have had the same subject and aim as Clouds. It is at least certain that Socrates appeared in the play, and that the Chorus consisted of . Aristophanes alludes to Ameipsias in the The Frogs

The Frogs

The Frogs is a comedy written by the Ancient Greek playwright Aristophanes. It was performed at the Lenaia, one of the Festivals of Dionysus, in 405 BC, and received first place.-Plot:...

, and we are told in the anonymous life of Aristophanes, that when Aristophanes first exhibited his plays, under the names of other poets, Ameipsias applied to him the Greek proverb , which means "a person who labors for others," in allusion to Heracles

Heracles

Heracles ,born Alcaeus or Alcides , was a divine hero in Greek mythology, the son of Zeus and Alcmene, foster son of Amphitryon and great-grandson of Perseus...

, who was born on the fourth of the month.

Works

Ameipsias wrote many comedies, out of which there remain only a few fragments of the follow­ing: (although this attribution is considered doubtful by many scholars) (423 BC) (Adulterers) (Sappho) (The Sling)

We also know he wrote other plays, even the names of which are now lost. Most of his plays were of the old comedy, but some, in all probability, were of the middle.