Creophylus (
Ancient Greek:
Kreophylos) is the name of a legendary early Greek
epic poet, native to
Samos or
Chios. He was said to have been a contemporary of
Homer and author of the lost epic
Capture of Oechalia. According to some sources, Homer gave the poem to Creophylus in return for hospitality; one source says that
Panyassis of Halicarnassus, in turn, stole it from Creophylus. Panyassis, however, is a much later poet who worked in writing: the story is presumably a way of saying that Panyassis, in his literary epic on the life of
Heracles, plagiarised the work of Creophylus.