Simon of Athens

Simon of Athens
Born	Simon
Nationality	Athenian
Known for	fragments on horsemanship

Simon of Athens was an Athenian writer on horses and horsemanship of the fifth century BC. He is the earliest known ancient Greek writer on the subject; Pliny described him as primus de equitatu scripsit, "the first to have written on riding". His writings are quoted by Xenophon.

It is not known when Simon lived. However, it cannot have been much before 460 BC, as he is known to have criticised a work of the Athenian painter Micon, who lived at about that time. Simon is the earliest writer of ancient Greece known to have written on horses and horsemanship, and was described by Pliny as primus de equitatu scripsit, "the first to have written on riding".

According to Xenophon, Simon dedicated a bronze statue of a horse, on a plinth decorated with reliefs of his deeds, in the Eleusinion in the Agora of Athens.

Simon's writings are quoted by Xenophon, who refers to him both in the Hipparchikós (Ἱππαρχικός) and in Perì hippikēs (Περὶ ἱππικῆς, "on horsemanship"). A fragment attributed to him is contained in the Byzantine Hippiatrica, an assemblage of Greek texts on horse care and horse medicine dating from the fifth or sixth century AD; it deals with the characteristics of a good horse, and is entitled περί ἰδέας ἱππικῆς, or roughly "on the ideal horse". Another fragment is included in the Onomasticon of Julius Pollux.

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