Description

Dionysios Solomos (1798–1857) was a Greek poet from Zakynthos. He is best known for writing the Hymn to Liberty, of which the first two stanzas, set to music by Nikolaos Mantzaros, became the Greek national anthem in 1865. He was the central figure of the Heptanese School of poetry, and is considered the national poet of Greece—not only because he wrote the national anthem, but also because he contributed to the preservation of earlier poetic tradition and highlighted its usefulness to modern literature. Other notable poems include Τhe Cretan, The Free Besieged and others. A characteristic of his work is that no poem except the Hymn to Liberty was completed, and almost nothing was published during his lifetime.

He was depicted on the reverse of the Greek 20 drachmas coin of 1990–2001.